4-Track Recording

[Gavin]

What's the best way to record 4-track?

I have a Tascam 4-track recorder and I'm having problems lining up the tracks together.

Should I lay down the drum track first or the guitar track?

 

[M.Brane]

The way I usually worked on my 4-track cassette (TASCAM 414) was to do drums first, then bass and rythym guitar. Then I would do a submix onto a VCR and run that back to the 4-track on a fresh tape on 1 & 4 and record lead guitar and vocals on 2 & 3. It takes some practice to get your final mixes balanced doing the submix thing but the sound quality is much better than bouncing tracks.

 

[SS454]

Yeah, M. Brane has good advice. I used to do it the same way. Bouncing tracks can be tricky when doing multiple stereo instruments. I takes a lot of planning ahead of time. Still a lot of fun though.

 

[Gavin]

Thanks for the help.

My guitar multi effects pedal has a metronome. I have an idea.

Here's the set up. My 4-track is very old (Tascam MiniStudio Porta 05) and I'm only able to record 1 track at a time:

Track 1: Vocals (mic)
Track 2: Drums (overhead mic)
Track 3: Guitar 1
Track 4: Guitar 2/Metronome

I will record tracks 1,2 and 3 with Metronome on Track 4. Then I will replace Metronome with a Guitar solo on Track 4.

That should work, right?

 

[imalion]

Gavin,

I usually like to keep drums on track one or 4 because tracks 1 and 4 have more bass tone on a 4 track tape recorder.


Steven

 

[Gavin]

Interesting. Thanks for the info.

By the way what type of cassette tape do you use? I heard metal types damage the heads.

 

[imalion]

Gavin,

Thats True. Metal tapes are not good. I usually try to get the shortest ones I can find. 30 minutes is perfect.


Steven

 

[M.Brane]

My 4-track is very old (Tascam MiniStudio Porta 05) and I'm only able to record 1 track at a time:

Actually you can do 2 at a time on that machine. I know, I have one of those. It was the first 4-track I bought back around '91. They didn't make that model very long because it had problems with the mix bus. If you run the faders over half way it freaks out and makes rumbling noises. I took it to a tech who did some mods that helped but he told me he couldn't eliminate the problem because it's the way the circuit is designed. That's part of the reason I bought the 414. That and the 414 does 4 at a time at high speed, has 4 mic pres, two sends and two stereo returns.

I had the best results with TDK SA tapes. I also used Maxells but they seemed to get more drop outs and azimuth problems.

 

[Gavin]

I'll try TDK SA 30min tapes. Thanks.

I did manage to record 2 tracks at the same time but when I mixed down I couldn't control the volumes. Both tracks had the same 2 instruments recorded on both of them.

 

[M.Brane]

Because that is a 2 bus machine you have to pan the inputs to L&R respectively when tracking 2 at a time or you'll get the same signals on both tracks.

 

[Gavin]

oh ok thanks i'll try that.

 

[Osbick Bird]

Thanks for the help.

My guitar multi effects pedal has a metronome. I have an idea.

Here's the set up. My 4-track is very old (Tascam MiniStudio Porta 05) and I'm only able to record 1 track at a time:

Track 1: Vocals (mic)
Track 2: Drums (overhead mic)
Track 3: Guitar 1
Track 4: Guitar 2/Metronome

I will record tracks 1,2 and 3 with Metronome on Track 4. Then I will replace Metronome with a Guitar solo on Track 4.

That should work, right?

That should do it, though if imalion's right about better bass response on 1 and 4 (I never noticed the difference on my old Yamaha, but my ears might not have been good enough to tell at that time), switching the drums to track one might work better.

Let me second the 30-min TDK SA tape recommendation. I too found these to work the best in my recorder (which I no longer have and wish I still did). Your mileage may vary.

If you can pull it off, recording your vocals and your guitar solo on a single track (either in one pass or with a punch-in) could leave you with another open track. It really depends on the song and whether or not the vocal parts and guitar solo overlap or not, but it might be worth a try.

OB

 

[DaveO]

Osbick Bird's suggestion about putting non-overlapping parts is one I used a lot when I was using my 4-track (I've since moved onto my PC). The one drawback I found is that when trying to mix down it was not always easy to adjust levels or EQ when mixing down.

For example, if the guitar solo and a vocal line needed different EQ, I'd have to try arranging enough space in between the two parts to make the necessary adjustment in real time when mixing down. It's doable, but not always easy. I sometimes had to be creative with the arrangement to get the amount of space I needed.

 

[sheppard]

some times imix a couple of tracks down to my cd recorder,then send them back to a fresh tape.
ping ponging is ok in moderation.on my machine i can ping two track while playing a third,which is useful sometimes

sheppard