cfg
Member
Occasional hobbyist here. I have done a little recording in the past with budget gear (Reaper, Saffire 6, and a handful of half decent mics) and have struggled to get guitar tracks without buzz or hum. I've never heard a dead quiet guitar amp yet, as there is always some minor amount of hum or buzz, and my tracks likewise have some noise I don't like.
I googled the question, and some answers included surgically editing out the parts before and after the guitar parts, and the fact that amp noise will be masked once when there are other instruments playing. I get that, but here's what I can't figure out. Snipping parts is fine for digital recording, but there's a ton of music from the 60's, 70's, and 80's that was laid down on tape, where presumably editing out sections leading up to and just after certain guitar parts was not an option, and they're quiet. I can't believe every hi gain guitar player from days gone by had a dead silent amp, and yet there are thousands of songs where no hiss, hum, or buzz can be detected when the guitar is not playing and the other instruments are also relatively or completely quiet.
So, just how did the engineers of old using tape manage to avoid hiss, hum, and buzz from hi gain amps? Or, if they did capture some of it, how did they get rid of it with gear of the day? What am I missing?
I googled the question, and some answers included surgically editing out the parts before and after the guitar parts, and the fact that amp noise will be masked once when there are other instruments playing. I get that, but here's what I can't figure out. Snipping parts is fine for digital recording, but there's a ton of music from the 60's, 70's, and 80's that was laid down on tape, where presumably editing out sections leading up to and just after certain guitar parts was not an option, and they're quiet. I can't believe every hi gain guitar player from days gone by had a dead silent amp, and yet there are thousands of songs where no hiss, hum, or buzz can be detected when the guitar is not playing and the other instruments are also relatively or completely quiet.
So, just how did the engineers of old using tape manage to avoid hiss, hum, and buzz from hi gain amps? Or, if they did capture some of it, how did they get rid of it with gear of the day? What am I missing?