What's wrong with this?

[chessrock]

Why is it that whenever I'm recording in the studio, everyone wants to sound "live" . . .

Yet when I record people live, they want me to help them sound "studio" ? ? ?

[Seanmorse79]

...murphy's law

...people always want what they can't have

...grass is always greener in someone else's studio

take your pick

Most of it's probably just difference in terminology. They've probably recorded themselves live with a boombox and wanted it to sound better. Or, they've recorded themselves in a starter studio (1 track at a time), and gotten sterile results.

[chessrock]

Good points you make.

Actually most of my clients are people who have tried cutting some demos at some of the mid-sized studios and found their experiences less than satisfying. On a few rare occasions, I've done some pre-production work for some more serious musicians.

For the most part, though, the guys I deal with are wackos. Can we be honest with ourselves here? How many of us can truthfully claim that we are musicians and have all of our marbles in tact?

I'm venting, which is healthy I suppose.

Why on earth do we want to sound "live," yet we also want our vocals to be pitch-corrected . . . our mistakes edited out, and our procuction to sound polished? I think we're all just striving for an ideal happy medium that only exists in our heads. Kind of like "warm, yet accurate" . . . or "loud, yet dynamic."

I think I'm on a role here. I'm going to have to put my marketing hat on and re-do the web site. How's this:

Record with Chessrock for that "live, yet studio" sound. Your demos will be good, yet they will suck. Hmmm. I don't know about that one.

[Barometer]

We just started our studio tracks for a demo CD we're making. The last thing I want out of it is to sound "live". Live sound seems easy to me, play live and record it live, if that's what you're after.

And yes, all the musician's I know are wackos

[Stealthtech]

I've learned that musicians are hardly ever satisfied with their recordings. Ive worked with some guys that were so damn picky I had to kick em out !!! I couldn't take it

[darrin_h2000]

Record them live then, use that for a scratch track. Its the groove they are looking for, not the abiant noise.

[VOXVENDOR]

Reminds me of a recording I once did.... The band didn't have a drummer, so I offered to play the drums on the track with a drum machine...

I started to program the machine and they stopped me, and asked if I could play them live with my fingers.... To a click....

"A Programmed Drum Machine Doesn't Groove", I think was the argument....

I agreed...

Sure I say.. No problem... I'M actually a pretty decent finger drummer....


I start doing it, and lay the track almost flawlessly......To a click....

Then the lead singer asks me if my protools has a quantize function to make it solid, cause *his* cubase can do that... (Almost like he was hoping I didn't have the function so he could talk down my tools)

I say "Yeah.... Of course it has quantize...But then you will lose your groove..."

He says, "Yeah, but not really, Quantize just makes it more solid sounding"


I just did it and argued no more.....

I mean this guy was sure that Programming a Drum machine ahead of time, would make a sterile grooveless tune...YET, 100% quantization at the end wouldn't do that same thing....

I mean, Both methods, you end up locking up to a sequencer.... No question about it.... Just 2 different ways of doing it.

Duh.

[VOXVENDOR]

Originally posted by Stealthtech
I've learned that musicians are hardly ever satisfied with their recordings. Ive worked with some guys that were so damn picky I had to kick em out !!! I couldn't take it

You know.. You have a point.... Unless you make a great amount of money or really love dealing with the human side of it, and can be very nerve wracking and unfulfilling of a hobby....

Thats why I stopped...... I just got fed up with people saying they want to sound like Backstreet Boys, but then after a week of awesome recording and programming on my part (My opinion there), they decide, that it sounds too "boy-band-ish"

And then they give up and I never hear from them again....

I just gave up.. Fuck em.

My mistake was I was a songwriter and had publishing interests in the projects, so I was doing it for free.

[chessrock]

Dude, don't say fuck musicians in general.

Just say fuck boybands.

As wacko as most of the guys I deal with are, at least they don't suck.

[VOXVENDOR]

Fuck em all!!!!

I have not worked with any boy bands......I was just using the BSB as an example, to illustrate the types of conflict I frequently encountered... I assure you I have run into this problem with all genres..