Attempting to self record our first demo

M

mhetheridge

New member
How's it going? This has been a very useful and informative forum. Anyway, the band that I'm in is getting ready to record a demo. We're doing it ourselves. We're kind of a hard edged, semi punk trio. We've recorded at a friends home studio and the process took forever to record and mix 2 songs. It took like 3 hours for him to set up and get the levels right. Anyway, this is the equipment that I have aquired so far:

1. Zoom MRS 802 digital 8 track. It has the ability to record two tracks simultaneously. I'm not real happy with it but hey it was a Christmas Present.
2. Yamaha MG16/4 mixer
3. Microphones
- AKG D112 for the kick drum
- Shure SM57 for the snare, and one for micing the guitar
- MXL-603's for overheads
- A cheap Nady condenser mic for vocals

This is my thought and here is where we need some input: We are wanting to record this "live". What we would like to do is mic the drums, guitar, and run the bass directly into the mixer. We would send this into one channel on the digital 8 track and then have the vocal track recorded (as a scratch track) directly into the 2nd channel of the digital 8 track. Does this sound like it would work? Our other thought was for me and the guitar player to record the song to a click track and then have our drummer record to that. Anyway, thanks in advance.
 
I agree with Tex, only I'd track drums and bass together. I find its the best way to get the rhythm section to mesh. Then go back and overdub guitar tracks, and lastly vocals.

Actually, if you wanted to be able to do some panning with the drums, you might want to just track drums initially, then overdub bass and guitar together, then vocals. If you do it this way, you could also use the D112 on the bass amp, because theres a good chance that it might sound better than the amp's DI (I'm assuming that you don't have a higher end DI). Just make sure you track the guitar and bass in separate rooms so they don't bleed into one another.
 
I agree with both replies. I'd record drums separately though, to a click track. Record bass and guitar at the same time, if you like and can get good isolation between them and then record vox. That leaves 3 tracks for additional guitar or vocal parts. By the way, getting setup properly is not a place to cut corners. Proper mic placement and levels are crucial for a good recording, so take your time with it.
 
Thanks for the input. We are going to isolate the drums in one room, the guitar amp in another room. I recorded a bass track and a scratch guitar track to a click track this morning. I'm going to try and do the drums in the next couple of days. Anyway thanks...
 
A word of advice...depending on how cheap that nady is, you may want to swap it out and use the SM57 to record vocals with. Is the nady a large diaphram? If it is then use it, but if not, then use the SM57.
 
The Nady is the large diaphragm mic. I got it off of Musicians Friend some time ago. I've recorded some acoustic guitar stuff with it and doesn't sound bad. Thanks for all of the input. I'll post some of the songs after we're finished.
 
I record a lot of 'live' stuff and think it can work out great for you for a demo. When you record live you have a tendency to really capture the energy of the song, which is difficult to do when overdubbing. Do the best you can with isolation, run headphones if you want to put amps in another room, and capture it live.

If this is a demo you are planning on shopping around, I would suggest not recording the vocals live. The selling point of most demos is the vocals and the groove. If you capture a great live performance and spend some extra time on the vocal parts, you should be able to give yourself the best shot at a shoppable demo.

One other thing is that unless your drummer is really good, or is used to playing to a metronome, you may have a really hard time laying them on top of pre-recorded rhythm tracks or even laying them down first with a click. Session players get paid a lot of money to do this well because it is a terribly hard thing to do.

Just my 2 pennies. (May not even be worth that)

Good luck.
 
Just as a word of experience with these things, my band has been making a demo and we are all kinda new to this, but after about 3 or 4 tries, we've finally got the method down right. It's still going to take us a while to get it all mixed down and duped but the recording took about 5 days.

Anyway, I'd agree that if you can use a click track, record a metronome or use a built in one that runs with the recording. It makes the songs sound a lot tighter and stronger sounding. Not all songs work with a click though, and from my own experience i strongly suggest not using scratch tracks that havnt been recorded to a click. You get mistakes in the scratch tracks, which gets extrapolated even more in the final mix.

Its a shame you didnt get a 4 track really, because then you could have stereo drums, bass guitar and then do vocals afterwards.

hope it works out for you! :)
 
I have this running debate (but dormant for now) with my band about a demo: live vs overdubs.

I think a fully live demo will capture a band's character and ability to perform in public better than separately tracking each instument. Even a poor recording of a well-performed live event will tell the listener more than a good studio demo. But I think it can be done with good results. My reasons for wanting to take that approach may be different than yours though.

In my argument with the bandmates, the "listener" is someone who can hire us and who may think anyone can sound good in a studio. I know other bands have gotten this line from club owners. My band took the individual tracking approach at amateur studios. The demo is so-so and has left at least one club owner unimpressed. We're a pretty tight cover band and get rehired wherever we play. The demo has to be able to get us in the door and I don't think ours does sometimes. I'm convinced a live recording would do that.

If your reasons are similar to mine I would at least attempt live recording. And then you could send me a copy to play for my bandmates. :-)
 
EddieRay said:
In my argument with the bandmates, the "listener" is someone who can hire us and who may think anyone can sound good in a studio. I know other bands have gotten this line from club owners.
Click to expand...

Interesting point. Why not just do some studio tracks and overdub the sound of an audience or a pub crowd? :D :D
 
We are not really making this to shop around per se. I have thought about the isolation issues already. Luckily, were we practice is a small shotgun style house. We can put the drummer in his normal spot (the living room), The miked guitar amp in the bedroom, and have the guitar player (who is also the singer) set up in the kitchen and then me (the bassist) in the living room running direct into the mixer. If we could get a good mix (drums, guitar and bass) that way (that would be track one) and have a vocal scratch track(track two) run directly into one of the inputs on the digital 8 track, that's how we'd like to do it. We have a headphone amp that will house 4 headphones. Otherwise, what we have talked about doing is to record the guitar and bass tracks to a click track. I have done this already to a couple of the straight forward songs. The only thing that needs to be laid down is drum track, the vocal track and a couple of guitar tracks. The only good thing about my digital 8 track (Zoom MRS 802) is that I can have a virtual track that I can use to record another part to and then choose the one I like best. This is what I was going to do for the vocal track. Anyway, thanks for all of the input.
 
I personally think that trying to submix everything on the way in is going to create more problems than its worth. Think of it this way...do you really need to record a scratch vocal track? I'm guessing that the vocal arrangements aren't horribly complex, so I wouldn't worry about recording a scratch vocal, especially considering that you can only do two tracks at a time. I think you'll get the most usable tracks if you track the drums in stereo first. Use the 3-mic drum technique, send one of the overheads to the L output and the other to the R, and put the kick mic in the middle. You could also add a snare mic and put this one in the middle as well. Once you have your drums, then do the guitar and bass to individual tracks. Its going to be a lot easier to overdub guitar and bass parts than it is to overdub drums to a click track. Given the limitations of your equipment, I would think your first concern should be keeping everything on separate tracks to be able to get the best possible mix when its all tracked. Do it however works best for you, of course, but just know that submixing everything on the way in doesn't allow you very many options after the fact.
 
Yeah, you're exactly right about the submixing thing. I spent the last hour reading about that. We are planning on recording everything separately now. And no, the vocals are not complex at all. We're your basic garage band. Here is one last stupid question so I apologize in advance. After micing the drums as you have described, do you group them in the mix and then run them into track one of my recorder, and the bass and guitar into track 2? Anyway, thanks in advance.
 
I would set up the overheads in the 3-mic technique (search for Recorderman's 3-mic technique if you're familiar with it...its also known as Modified Spaced Pair). Set your main L and R faders at Unity gain (0dB), and run the L and R outputs into the two inputs on your recorder. Pan the left overhead's channel hard left on the board (I consider the left overhead to be the one on the left side if you're looking at the kit from the front). Pan the right overhead's channel hard right. This will give you a wide stereo spread of the entire kit. Add the kick drum mic and keep it panned in the center. Add a snare mic if you want/need it and pan it center as well. Adjust the levels so that you're getting a good overall sound of the entire kit. I realize that yes, this is submixing, but submixing a drum mix is a very different ballgame than submixing all the instruments together. Once you have this set up, track the drums on both tracks on the recorder. Pan the track thats fed from the board's L output hard left, and the R output hard right. This should give you a good image of the entire drum kit on your recording. After you have that, start overdubbing.

Since you only have one guitarist, you may want to overdub second guitar tracks, even if they're just the same guitar part. Playing the same part twice, with different guitars or amp settings, can result in tracks that should compliment eachother nicely if you pan them left and right (experiment to see how much panning sounds good to you).

I hope this all makes sense.
 
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