am I missing something here?

[Milkman]

Hi All,

I see a lot of people here talking about laying down 24 tracks for a tune...I usually lay down 5-7 - 2 for drums, 2 vocals, marimba, keyboard and synth...

Are all of these tracks just instruments recorded, or are they effect tracks etc...or am I totally missing something here?

Thanks.

Milkman

[Emeric]

Depends what your doing Milkman, and the style of music.

I notice you say you use two tracks for drums. Is this a drum machine or real drums? Either way, two tracks for real or drum machines can work.

I record acoustic drums and usually use 6 or 7 mic's. So that would explain 7 of them. Add a few acoustic tracks, few electric tracks, bass, lead vocals, backups, lead guitar, percussion. Doesn't take long.

But again, depends on the style and what your doing. I try to limit myself to 16, but usually average in around 20, not all playing at the same time.

[Stealthtech]

As emeric said.........
Track for bass drum, 1 for snare, 1 for toms, 1 for hats, 1 for crashes, 1 for cowbell, 1 for tambo, and so on and so on
vocals, backup vocals, layered vocals, and so on
you get the idea......

[Milkman]

Thanks for clearing that up guys...I only have 4 mics which go into my mackie and into my audiophile...so I can only ever record 2 at a time...but I am going to hook some outs of the mackie in to the sb live to give me a little more flexibility mixing wise...

btw, i record mostly light rock, ballads and jazz

[Stealthtech]

I should clarify a little on the drum issue. Im not using mics. that would be tough. I use midi controlled drum modules and soft synths which allow me to record each and every drum hit seperately, this makes the drum tracks very controlable.

[TexRoadkill]

One thing to consider is that the fewer tracks playing at the same time the cleaner your mix will sound.

This was more of a concern with analog but still applies. Every bit of room noise, mic noise, effects hiss, running faucets, crying babies, whatever little noise is in each track keeps adding up. If you can discipline yourself to only use the fewest tracks that you really need it will make your mixing job easier and cleaner.

I think overuse of stereo tracks when they are not really needed increases the track count needlessly, especially with keyboards. If you dont need a wide piano sound then just record it in mono and save the room in the mix.