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High school bands follow the conductor more closely than you'd think. Actually, most of the people with instruments aren't really "musicians" and don't feel the music the way a rock band would. They're just following the conductor and playing what's on the sheet. They might do better than you'd...

If you're trying to make your album sound louder, you need a limiter with a very quick attack and release, a threshold somewhere around -.3 (negative point three) and enough gain to get from where you are to where you want to be. Most people use the L2 or something similar. If you're interested...

1. Listen for problem areas. 2. Find the problem area by boosting and sweeping. 3. Cut the problem area 1db at a time until it sounds right. Making a habit of always cutting at 310hz is going to leave many of your recordings sounding really thin. Same with 500hz. A lot of power comes from those...

There are two main ideas to keep in your head at all times. 1. Online message boards of audio engineers is not your audience. Take the good and learn from the bad. 2. The ultimate rule is that whatever you're doing to make it sound the way you want it to sound - is right. It's really easy to...

In my experience, the Mackie pres aren't nearly as bad as the Mackie EQ. If you're interested in getting 16 preamps for $1000, Mackie is the way to go. If you have more money to spend, your sound is going to improve. At the very least, get one stereo preamp (a Joe Meek or Focusrite) in addition...

I strongly believe that anyone who is serious about home recording should own this card and at least a few of the money plugs. Don't ask any more questions, just buy it. The Pultec and LA2a will show up on every track and you'll find uses for just about everything else from time to time.

I've been thinking about this question for the past few hours. The answer really is that these guys have this much power just in who they are as people. Talk to Win, Regine or any of these guys for more than 2 minutes and you'll know where the power comes from. The first time I heard Funeral, I...

Usually, budget is the limiting factor. How much money do you have? Find out, then find a way to do an album for that much. You can find engineers who work for $100/day and some that work for 10x that. Expect to get what you pay for. If you're taking things fairly seriously but still want to do...

As someone who has known The Arcade Fire since their first shows (my little brother was their drummer on the EP and for a few years before the LP came out), I'm telling you that the power that comes out of that band is coming from the musicians and the way they play their songs. There isn't a...

The threshold is always going to be directly related to the level of the signal you're working with. If your signal peaks at -10, your threshold isn't going to work unless you set it to <-10db. Play with the extremes of attack and release times until you can hear what they're doing, then set...

The Beach Boys doubled almost every vocal. Sometimes it was used as an effect, sometimes just to thicken the track. I say just record it and see what you can do to make it sound right. Using varying eq and compression settings will obviously change the way these two tracks relate to each other...

For the money that you'd spend on the Waves plugins, I'd put it into recording equipment and books that will help you get those sounds to begin with. Seriously, all the talk about using the right gear during the recording to get the sound you're looking for is right. I didn't believe it when I...

If you're just looking to get your recording level up, you're looking for a limiter. Basically, it'll increase the average volume while "levelling" the peaks so you don't clip the signal. A compressor with a high ratio is a limiter. T-Racks is a really decent program for $300. For about $1000...

I have both the e609 silver and sm57 and don't use much else to record guitars. Either mic will probably do. It definitely can't hurt to own a 57. You can use it on just about every instrument with average results. It's definitely going to be a "go to mic" for guitars and snare drum every time.

Yeah, I'm not using them to mix. Just tracking and another point of reference. Maybe I'm getting more used to them or maybe my "breaking them in" is working, but they're opening up a bit, sonically.

You're probably better off putting the money into a nice mic. What are you using right now?

It's the morning now and they still sound really really boring. I guess that's just what they're supposed to sound like.

I don't think there's anyone in the history of music who is still proud of their first mastering job. I know I thank god I didn't put my name on the first disc I mastered. It would have sounded better if I put it out unmastered, for sure.

I'd definitely suggest sending it to someone who does mastering for a living. If you're in a city, find someone locally so you can sit in on the session. You're interested enough in the process, you'll get a lot out of it.

I just bought some new headphones that seem to be lacking in the bass. Is this going to go away with a few hours of heavy usage? They are the ATH-m30 model. I wanted a closed design without spending a fortune. Still, they sound quite... dull in the low end. More dull than "flat" monitoring. I'm...