!!I'm Always Late!!

[LisaBennett]

I've noticed that when I record I'm usually a little bit late with the timing on the track.
I tap my feet along with the beat but still lo and behold.........I'm off.
Now maybe it's the mic plug because I use a converter to plug it into my laptop.......or maybe I'm just one of those people that are off beat and just don't know it.
Either way, if someone could tell me a few tricks, it would be greatly appreciated.

Thank ya verry mucha

 

[guitarplayr82]

Are you using a click track to record? If you are, tapping your feet might even throw you off of the click. And do your songs have drums? If they do, track the drums first and then the rest of the instruments. I find it easier to play in-time to a full drum track rather than just a click sometimes. And if your songs don't have drums, you might want to think about laying down a simple quantized MIDI drum beat to use as the click... or you could go even simpler and make a MIDI click track out of a tambourine and shaker, or an open and closed hi-hat sound. Sometimes it can help to have some percussion to play along with rather than the straight click, even if it is as simple as a tambourine.

 

[Track Rat]

Better late than pregnant. Could this possibly be a latentcy/ monitoring situation?

 

[Bobbsy]

I was recording a vocalist with the same problem a while back and finally solved it by giving her a click track with a count in on her headphone mix...might be worth a try.

Bob

 

[Chili]

I'm thinking latency also. You can nudge your vocal track forward as a quick fix. Or dive into the manuals for your DAW and interface and figure out how to set Latency Compensation. Also, be sure you're using the interface's ASIO driver and not the DirectX or WDM(?) stuff.

 

[savvy]

I find listening to the beat or the song again and again and again helps me realise where the "in" is to begin a line etc, give that a go maybe?

I had a friend who was using a click track and she kept drumming along - threw her off her starting point and we realised that when she stopped, the timing finally matched XD