Hi all. Software engineer slowly closing in on 50 here, new to the forum, not so much to home recording. I play guitar and bass passably, keyboards sufficiently for my own needs and love singing but just not very good at it
Which is part of why home recording is such a thing, really...
Started out almost exactly 30 years ago with a second-hand Tascam 144, co-owned between my and the band's lead guitarist/vocalist. Did a whole bunch of funny stuff on it over a few years and had a load of fun, before it broke down and got trashed (something I bitterly regret these days) sometime in the nineties.
Fast-forward more than twenty years of practically zero recording or song-writing activity (I did play in a band all the time) to a few years back when we moved to a bigger house with a room to spare for a home studio. Started out with a Linux laptop, Scarlett 2i4 and Zoom R16. Fiddled and tinkered with it all quite a lot, tried different software and setups, even writing some glue-type software of my own to make it nicer and whatnot but no music came out. Then in 2017 tried dropping the laptop from the setup and program the drums directly on Zoom RT-234 and record on the R16 standalone, and it was like magic: all of a sudden I had three new demos and actual desire to make more. Bought Squarp Pyramid and a JV-1080 synth module for sequencing more than just drums and then another module and ... you know how it goes.
That's also when the limits of the R16 really started hitting home hard: Sure it has a truckload of effects and all, but if you want to route sound to an outboard effect ... you don't. If you want to pan around live during mixdown, no, nope. Both very basic things that even the old Tascam 144 could do! And if you wanted to sync it to the sequencer, well, not that either. And the eight inputs that seemed like a huge amount initially were suddenly all permanently occupied and not enough at all.
This is where it starts to get a little crazy
For the last year and a half I've been building an analog-style studio around a Soundcraft FX16 mixer and Fostex D2424LV multitracker, adding patchbays and effects as time and money have permitted. Building the studio has become almost as much of a hobby as making music itself - this "project" finally kicked me to learn how to solder (lots of multicore-cables to do!) which has led to other interesting paths, etc. And having a terrific time both building it and creating music in it.
FWIW, I'm not a DAW-hater, not at all. It's just that for me personally, music making and computers don't mix, for whatever reason. Maybe it's because I always end up tinkering with the setup and trying out new software toys instead of actually making music. That is, when the heap of #¤%#¤ actually works after latest update-round etc. Might also have to do with dayjob revolving around computers and wanting to keep a certain distance on freetime.
Anyway, nice to find such a place for sharing experiences with like-minded people. The wife is a patient listener but there's a limit...