How to track...

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Garak

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So far I have seen four ways to go about tracking...

1) Everyone plays to a click track. Usually starting with gtr then bass or drums and everything else. The is usually done when the gtr player is the head of the band it seems.

2) Drums first then bass, gtr, and so on... Usually when working with all around good musicans.

3) Drums first sometimes tracked the same time as bass because of odd timing. This is used mostly for punk music and stuff that wasn't written on paper first it was just made up via jamming.

4) Everything off the floor at the same time. When time is short and gear is pleantyfull.

(Of course these are for your typical rock style bands, drums, gtr, bass and vocals.)

Are there any other ways to do it?
 
There is one more also..I am doing a album this way..
I am using a drum machine for "time".I had the drummer program the machine so he had something he could live with to track later to...I am tracking most of the instr. at home and later the drums and bass at a Adat studio, so it is kinda ass backwards.But its how I have to work this project!To use a click track would not work because of the "pushes" on alot of the songs..So a kik drum, snare and hat were important to record to for the groove.


Don
 
A pretty popular way to do things, and I have done it, is to go to a nice studio with a good room and equipment, and track the drums, spending all of the studio time doing that... then bring the tracks home and take your time working on the remaining tracks. You'll have much more time to get it right and then practice mixing it, and you can accomplish the overdubs in quality with only one good pre and converter, rather than needing 8 or so for drums and room mics, and you ge tthe benefit of having the drums in a good room, which makes considerable difference.

Editing in...
Part of the idea of having a really good pre (API, Neve, etc) for me is so that I CAN do this, go to a studio, get good drums, and be able to take my time and do overdubs. 2 Days of good drum tracking should cost you about $600. If you wanted to do quality drum tracking on your own of good caliber, you would need $2500 worth of pres (at least) and another $2000 worth of converters, and a well designed room. Yeah, good luck. You can then accomplish a really good recording by having just one or 2 good pre's and DI at home, a good mic or 3, and a great converter, all with good resale value and not costing you TOO much. Make sense? If you're a lone ranger though, then its not as easy... I split studio costs with 4 other people, and that makes it WAY more feasible. Anyway....
 
Tube that is definetly the way to go!I've taken a 10,000 to about 2,000 that way!It really helps on the preproduction costs..Also when you transfere your tracks between media you can take advantage of large frame Neve,API and SSL and high end converters {Apogee etc.} for further enhancement! It makes a big difference in the sound!It is just takes a long ass time...LOL

Don
 
I'm planning on building a commerical studio someday and what I plan on doing is having one main studio for recording stuff off the floor and recording drums. Then I will have a few small vocal booths and control rooms just for tracking vocals and instruments. Also I will have a few diffrent control rooms just for doing mix downs. Around here land and realestate is cheep and the high paying end of the market is small.

Most of the stuff I will providing studio space will be small bar bands recording demos, small folk groups and students. With this end of the market having one big studio with lots of great gear dosn't make sense. A small protools setup and cheep PC based workstations work in this market.

I'll have a few students from the local collage's recording arts program working for me to keep things afordable for my customers.
 
Garak, That sounds like a good plan.Give yourself room to grow!..Option 1 seems like the most common way..sometimes the bass, guit and vox are kept and sometimes they are scrached..Every session is a little different...Good luck

Don
 
The bass being recorded together with the drummer is usualy for the "groove". You need to inspire the drummer to get a better "in the pocket" groove. A click track is hardly inspiering.
Also the drum and bass are 2 instruments that work together on the groove and the bass player should lock on to the drummer.

I usualy record the drums and record the bass direct. If the bass is a good track with a few problems I'll punch in. If the track doesnt hold well then I'll retrack the bass after the drummer is done.

The best way to record a drumer or even other band members is tohave a solid "Guide mix".
This is were you prepare a guide of a harmony instrument like guitar-keys, and along side of that a click, a bass line, and the vocals. These are all to be trashed later and to be used only to give the musicians a idea whats flying. Ever try playing drums to a click alone if you dont know the song perfectly ?........
All the subtle changes the bass player needs might be in the vocals !!
I try (depending on time and budget) to multitrack the the guide so when the drummer says "hey the click is way to loud lower it in the headphones..." I dont lower with it the bass line or something else. In short...give him a good headphone mix acourding to each musicians needs.
 
I agree with Shailat... just wanted to add a couple of points:

- It's important that your guide mix reflects the feel you want from the final song (ie, don't do an unplugged guide mix, when you want an agressive rock sound - the drummer's "feel" won't be the same...)

- Also... make damn sure the timing on the guide is immaculate, otherwise it's real tough for most drummers to track to... if the guide is off of the click, it's real difficult to ignore bad timing of the guide....)

Bruce
 
I agree with Bruce, and would like to add one other thing:

WRITE EVERYTHING DOWN! Make sure that you have complete notes on how the tracking was done. Before you go to the studio make sure that you have a notebook of track sheets and take the time to fill in the blanks.
 
With the band I'm currently working with we are doing everything to a click track. The band feels better playing to a click track an feel its the only way they can get things tight without 1000 takes.

For most of the tracks so far we have started with a scrap gutiar track that guides the band through out the song. Some times one of the bandmemers will sing along to the song from the control room other times one of the band memebers will stay in the live room with the person playing and count on their fingers so they can keep track of where they are in the song.

So far we have tracked the lead gtr, rthym gtr and bass for almost all their songs. We can't do drums until we get just about everything else done because we have to rent the mics and I should have my Studio Projects C1 this week so we are going to do a few acc. gtr. tracks over next weekend and start the vocal tracks.

I got two more bands who want todo some recording before and durning xmas. So to save money on renting gear I'm going to see If I can get all 3 bands to record drums the same week at the same place. Also that way they can mix and match each others kits to get the best sound. Both of the other bands want to record drums and bass at the same time which should make things go quickly.
 
Its just the way the band works, their drummer dosn't live in town and can't get in to town to jam with them very often. Drums are not quite at important with their music as say with hard rock. The drummer stopped by for a bit a few days ago and had no problems playing along to what they have already recored and the click track.
 
Garak,
This is not a knock.......

No one and I mean NO ONE ! will convince me that a song will groove better when doing drums last.
No matter what style, the drums in 95% of the cases will provide the base and foundation of a song. You cant build a tower starting from the 10th floor.
Musicians who dont lock onto the drums-bass section are making a mistake in my humble book.
Although he might claim he can play to the click (and perhaps he actully can.... ) I give you my word it will not groove as well nor will the players play with a total "in the pocket" sound. In tempo? perhaps but music is far from being a "on time" issue

I would suggest you offer them a different way of looking at it, as you are the engineer and the "know how" of sound.
In any case I wish you the best of luck.
 
Shailat is 200% right... I'm pretty sure you're going to hear some weirdness come mixdown time, if you haven't already.....

Bruce
 
This reminds me of a recording session a year ago. The drummer and bassist were not able to lay down a groovy track, while these two were experienced and groovy musicians. They used to rock on stage. After a couple of takes we tried to record them seperatly. No succes.

During take 24 or so the basist told me he could concentrate while seeing the drummer .......????????????
So don't look at him we said.....nope, he couldn't concentrate.

At last we put a huge screen between the two.....the first take after this was perfect.

I still don't understand this guy.
 
With limited inputs, am I the only one that does it this way?

1) Set up the whole band through the cheap-o mixer, with everybody running direct (doesn't sound great, but that way we're all playing together). Run the mix through 4 sets of headphones for everybody.

2) Record only the drums (pre-mixed through the good mixer) while the whole band plays together.

3) Lay in guitars, bass, vocs, keys, etc.. after you've got a good drum take.

Everybody except the drummer has to play it twice, but that way the drummer doesn't have to fight the cold timing of a click track.

I've tried it with a click track, and the whole-band-together groove gets lost. I've never met a drummer that didn't feel (at least a little) constricted with a click track.
 
Seanmorese79..

How do you get a clean drum track then? With everyone playing, dosen't it bleed into the drum mics? Using directout, sound still comes through the speaker cabs.. I'm in sort of a jam here with my band trying to do a recording with my pc and a mixer... ANy more input?
 
I am not nearly as experienced as some of these guys but you guys keep referring to the "groove". In some music there is no groove. There isnt meant to be and oif there was it would be just wrong. e.g. a song which is basically an acoustic guitar and vocalist with just a hint of drus here and there to fill but no groove, accoustic country music. In these situations it may not be a probelm to record the drums last. It may even be better because th drums can hear the vocals and guitar and get the feel of the song and knwo just what kind of soft cymbal hit etc will be appropriate etc.
 
we're pretty much doing what seanmorse said....

to eliminate bleed through, we put the click through headphones, along with direct signals from POD's on guitar and bass and vocals from the console, which were done in a separate room...


kinda sucky for me (engineering and playing bass) to not be able to see eachother, but I felt like we locked in pretty good.....I'll know for sure in a few days when I lay the bass down!!!! :o)
 
So the guys on bass and guitar are playing with heaphones on listening to? All in seperate rooms(drum, bass, guitar)? And everyone is playing at the same time?
 
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