Indeed, this is a day to day type of demo. Some are worse, some are better.
The drummer in this band is 18, and had a crappy
Tama Rockstar set. He tuned them the way he liked them and that is what I had to work with. On their limited budget, not time to play around with much ambiant micing techniques, or to experiment with different drum tunings. Indeed, the drums and bass were the main reason why they didn't continue with a full length recording here. Once they heard what it sounded like on tape, tried it again, found that they couldn't get a take that was squeaky tight, it was decided to scale back to a 4 song demo. They realized that they were not ready to release a full length as a band. They realized they need to work with a producer to maximize the potential of their sound. They realized that $2000 or $3000 dollars is not going to produce a hit record!
No editing on this stuff. No budget for that type of thing. They actually played to a click track if you can believe that.
Most of the guitars and vocal work was first or second take stuff with a couple punch in's. The drums and bass took up a full 16 hours of the 35 they spent on this!
One thing people don't realize, unless you work FOR other people in audio work is that you are totally at the mercy of their talent level, and what they think they want to hear. I can "suggest", but usually find that the lower the talent level, the less of the "suggestions" they utilize. If things are not going well, and you are not paid to produce the recording, it is not very good business to say "Hey guys, you are pretty much stinking the place up with your chops right now, how about you come back in a week after you practice this stuff and we can get on with it".....nooooooooooooooooo, you sort of suck it up, and try to "help" them into a better performance. But, there is a line to even that! One of the things that the owner of the studio I work at is VERY leary of is the "potential offend". This aspect of audio work "offends" me really, but again, it is not good business to even say a single thing that may offend the client. When they ask "What did YOU think Ed"? I have to say "That was pretty good. What did YOU think of it", and hope that they don't push for more comment from me! What I may have to say to them could really be a disaster in a PR aspect for the business (oh yes, I have created these disasters in the past!
)
If I had the tapes still, I would be glad to hear what some of YOU guys would have done in about two hours mixing this song. Now that would be interesting. I don't get the benefit of "taking my time", or "I don't feel up to tackling this today, think I will mix it tomorrow", or the freedom to tackle the stuff that I don't like. When the client says "Can't you put some reverb on that vocal track, and turn it up"? I can't say "Are you crazy"? It is also a whole lot of fun to have 4 guys sitting 6' behind you, chatting away while I try to find some balance in the mix. Try that sometime! It is loads of fun to hear the squeaky voiced guy go on about his girlfriend while you try to mix!
Or to deal with a badly intonated bass track and try to make it "stand out a little more", or to tame that one vocal line that was 8dB hotter than anything else, but is in the quietest part of the song and totally inappropriate to the overall dynamics. Top off having to "get the phone" because their girlfriend is calling, fetching coffee, explaining why you cannot turn down the hihat without turning down the snare because the dude played the hihat way too loud in comparison to the snare, so there is nasty bleed, explaining to the bass player that those notes that don't ring out true and sound like a fart were actually the WAY HE PLAYED IT, you can see that in 2 hours, a few things are going to be left undone in the mix, and god for bit, we cannot spend any MORE money.
Yeah, it is swell doing this stuff for a living. And the money is killer!!!
Ed
Now THAT completely blew me away! I think I've gotta sit down... wait, I am already, um, er... whew... 