how do you keep your mixes in proper time?

[minofifa]

sorry if this has been answered already but i did do a search!!

My question is in regard to timing. I am just wondering the best procedure to follow to ensure that the whole song comes togeter nicely, in terms of all the tracks lining up properly.

For exmaple, here at school i can lay down the guitar tracks but when i go home for the summer i have to record our drummer. Should i give him headphones with the guitar tracks and let him sync the drums to it? I remember that when i recorded int he studio, we did the drums first...

Also, say i wanted to use midi, drum machines and synths and whatnot. What is the best way to sync this stuff up with audio tracks like guitars or vocals? Should the midi / soft synth stuff get done first?

Another example: if you read in the computer recording forum. there is a thread about everybody mixing a song. One member added drums to the mix. How did he do this?

Thanks for the help guys

 

[cstockdale]

Use a click track (just like a metronome), record the clicktrack, and then you have a reference to add everything else to and it doesn't matter what order you record in: everyone will play to the same tempo.

 

[minofifa]

cool.

is there any way to sync midi up to recorded audio? for example if i were to create a sampled violin to lay down in the mix, what is the best way to create it, with respect to what's been recorded aleady. Or, would it work better to do the midi stuff first: like create a drum clcik track with midi and do all of the "digital" sampling and midi stuff to that. Then use all of that as a reference for recording the audio stuff like vocals and whatnot?

Thanks again.

 

[fldrummer]

How are you recording? Analoge??

If you're recording digital on the computer in programs such as Cubase Cakewalk...They have a Built in metronome and midi. So if the audio part is played to the nome when putting the midi in on your computer it will be all toghter. PLAY TO A NOME!

 

[MichaelM]

If you recorded the 'real' audio first you would have to play exactly to a metronome so that you don't go out of time at all and so you can create the midi sounds at the same tempo as the audio. This is much easier to do digitally than analogue. If I was doing it analogue I would definatelly record the midi sounds first.

 

[alien]

What we do is tab it out using PowerTab (it's free). Usually, just the primary guitar and the bass.
It takes time, but I do not have a MIDI pickup on any of my guitars.

The upswing is that, on playback, PowerTab gives a metronome click. This is extremely helpful if your song changes time signatures or tempo. When you dump it to a MIDI file though, the metronome click is not present.

here's how I work around that. My soundcard is a 4/4 soundcard. Inputs are from the subgroups and the outputs run to the last four channels of my mixer. It's also a full duples card as most are these days.
Channel 20 on the board is Output #1 from the card. I'll assign Channel 20 to Subgroup 1 which feeds Input #1 on the card.
I'll open both my recording program and PowerTab. I will set up track 1 to record from Input #1, hit record, swicth over to PowerTab, and hit play on it's playback.

Track 1 is now my click track with not only a metronome click, but also a MIDI representation of the primary guitar and bass for the drummer to hear as he will be able to add accents for such.

Once everything is recorded, I delete the click track for mastering.

 

[tjohnston]

my question is what to do when the choras is slightly faster. The click track stays the same but the part has to be faster.

 

[MichaelM]

Most DAW programs will let you insert tempo changes into the song at different points so you can speed up or slow down the midi/metronome playback.

 

[bucchild]

All of this sounds good, but there's one major issue to consider: the drummer. After you do all this, the drummer has to be able to play to it. It's definitely best to record the guitars on top of the drums. It is much easier for a guitarist to make up for a drummer's inconsistencies than vice versa. Plus, drummers are a little better at keeping themself in time (or at least should be).

If you can find a good method to get a click track that follows your time changes, everything should be fine. But in the case that you're trying to put all these different parts in before drums, and making up the time as you go, you're asking for trouble when you get it in the drummer's hands.

I also don't know how well your drummer knows the songs. If he knows them well, there could be a serious problem. I tried to record a song by putting down a click track and then recording my guitar. i followed the click track perfectly, but the click track I put down was different from the tempo my drummer had been used to playing the song at. Every time there was a time change, he'd come into that part either too fast or too slow, and then make up for it once he realized he was off from the click track....it sounds very sloppy. It's better to have the drummer set the time changes than make him adjust to them if this is the case....

you may all disagree with me, but I'm just sharing my experience on the matter.

 

[MichaelM]

No, I definatelly agree with you (I am a drummer). In one song I recorded for my band recently there is a tempo change so I set up the tempo, and then kept adjusting the change until it was the same as how I would normally play it.

 

[bucchild]

If you, as a drummer set the tempo during recording, that's fine....but guitarists are impossible to follow as far as time goes....at least for drummers....Drummers set tempo, not follow it. But I'd advise any guitarist doing a recording to leave all tempo issues up to the drummer. Time changes are different in the drummer's mind than the guitarist's. A guitarist can easily follow a drummer's tempo change, but the drummer is going to have a hard time following the guitarist's. It's just easier along the way.

However, if the drummer is not very familiar with the song, this isn't really an issue. if he's knew to the song, he'll learn the tempo changes as you recorded them. my drummer recorded the drums for the guy I'm doing a demo for, just as a favor. He needed drums, and my drummer volunteered. he jammed the songs a couple times with the guy I'm recording, learned them with the time changes he already had in the song, and it only took a few takes on each song. But my lead guitarist and i tried to record one of our own songs, and then have him lay down the drums after that, and as soon as the time change came, he was lost....we ended up scrapping the guitars we recorded....

Again....this is definitely not gospel, just my experience....