New Home Recorded Song. New to This

  • Thread starter Thread starter phriq
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phriq

phriq

Freon Productions
Hey Everyone,

I have been in bands since high school and have been recording our music for a few years now. I have now been doing only solo work and have been recording my music at home. I have no recording schooling and only have the knowledge I have gotten from trial and error. Anyway, I only have 1 mic (SURE SM86) which I use to do vocals and mic my amp and guitar. the mic goes to a mixer which goes to my line in on my PC. I record bass by directly going line in to the mixer. Drums are done using Acoutica Beatcraft. I use Cool Edit Pro for my mixing. I know its nowhere near perfect, but I want to get as much input and suggestions as I can. Also, if you can recommend ANY equiptment that I should get, please let me know. I am new to this and want to work hard to getting the best sound I can possibly get for my solo music.

Please listen to "A Prayer, A Promise, A Passing" at

www.myspace.com/christopherflitton

Thanks in advance for all the help!
 
Hey very good for a start. First off I think your kick and snare are too loud. Then after that your vocals are a bit loud. You have to get everything to sit right and cooperate with each other in the mix. On the end with the climax, the drums get to a more acceptable volume but could still go down. For one mic youre doing a good job on your other stuff. If I could say, take the time and really try hard to get good vocal takes. The songs would sound a lot more pleasing if you took the time to get the pitch right. There are programs for pitch correction but that should only be a last resort. Good start!
 
Erokrazor's post echo's my own feelings about this song. Pretty decent job considering your limited resources. Great songwriting and arranging...

:D:):D:)
 
Thanks very much for the input so far. Would you guys have any other suggestions aside from the leveling and pitch correction in the vocals? Any vocal recording techniques I could try or effects to work with? Also, if you were in my situation, what are some esential equiptment pieces you would recommend me getting to get better sound?
 
Maybe you can improve the recording of the guitar using a Shure SM57, a "workhorse" in every major (and home ) studio. The 57 is perfect to close mic amps and record snares. It can afford high sound pressure levels (SPL) without been damaged. A must in any studio.

To record vocals you can use a pop filter (also called P Pop) to avoid undesired noises caused by breathing, reduce plosives and sibilance problems (when you sing Ps and Ss), and protect the mic from saliva. You can upgrade to a SM58. If you ahve the money to get one, try to get a condenser microphone (you can use it to record acoustic guitar too) Go to a local store and make all the questions before adquiring one. Beware, these are very fragile mircophones so you ahve to be very careful with the transportation and manipulation. By the way, sing slighty off mic to avoid plosives.

For better results with the bass use a Direct Box, often called DI for direct injection. BOSS has a very effective one for 100 bucks. I use a Behringer Ultra G and itworks for me. Conect your bass/guitar to the DI and the output goes to your mixer or your PC. Some direct boxes have amp simulators, pretty useful if you want to quick record without making noise in the middle of the night.

My final advice is to buy some recording books. They're a great source of information and will guide you thru this marvelou world of home recording. I'd recommend, in that order, the following books:
Guerrilla Home Recording by Karl Coryat
The Recording Engineer's Handbook by Bobby Owsinski
The recording guitarist by Jon Chappell
Sound recording advice by John Volanski

Phew, hope this info will help you. You got nice tunes, it's up to you to record them like a pro.
 
phriq said:
Hey Everyone,

I have been in bands since high school and have been recording our music for a few years now. I have now been doing only solo work and have been recording my music at home. I have no recording schooling and only have the knowledge I have gotten from trial and error. Anyway, I only have 1 mic (SURE SM86) which I use to do vocals and mic my amp and guitar. the mic goes to a mixer which goes to my line in on my PC. I record bass by directly going line in to the mixer. Drums are done using Acoutica Beatcraft. I use Cool Edit Pro for my mixing. I know its nowhere near perfect, but I want to get as much input and suggestions as I can. Also, if you can recommend ANY equiptment that I should get, please let me know. I am new to this and want to work hard to getting the best sound I can possibly get for my solo music.

Please listen to "A Prayer, A Promise, A Passing" at

www.myspace.com/christopherflitton

Thanks in advance for all the help!
Click to expand...

Wow, this was better than I was expecting. The weak link in your signal chain is the line in on your soundcard; that's first to address. I used to use an M-Audio Audiophile 192, and it was clean as a whistle for $179. They make less expensive ones, but you need something that will give you cleaner input and much lower latency.

It appears that you do have a natural ear for this though, and I encourage you to invest a little in it, because you are a good songwriter, and you have a good vocal sense. The arrangement is pleasant, airy in spots, dense in others, full of interest the whole way.

A 57 will prove to be a workhorse for you. Check the pawn shops.

LOVED the break and re-entrance at 3:56. You have some passion there, bro, good on you!!

Adobe Audition is the follow-on to Cool Edit, Adobe bought Syntrillium many years ago. It's wonderful, leaps and bound ahead of Cool Edit, but with a similarly easy interface. You might want to invest. Make sure your PC has enough RAM. By this I mean >2GB.

VERY general tip for recording, don't worry about not enough gain on acquisition; you can ALWAYS make up gain, but you can't take out clipping.

Friended you on MySpace. Good work!! KEEP IT UP!!!!
 
Thank you all for the great advice! i am going to look into getting a sm-57. I also am looking into getting an interface. I have heard of the m-audio one. Thanks again for all the advice, I am looking into it all. Any other suggestions welcome. thanks.
 
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