New to recording

[guitarplayrhank]

Hello all I'm new here, I've been a musician for abut 6 years. I now want to start recording. I'm new to recording but I understand some things, types of mics, EQ, compression, gain etc. I'm planning on buying a blue baby bottle for acoustic guitar and vocals, and a Shure SM58 for electric guitar. I am unsure of what preamp to get and how to connect to my mac. I was considering a Focusrite Scarlett 2i4, is this a good preamp for acuostic and electric guitar and vocals, do I need a USB interface, mixing board, or other equipment? or can I just connect the preamp through the USB port directly?
Any help is greatly appreciated!

 

[ecc83]

Oooo! That's a tidy wedge for noob to drop on a mic?

I have no knowledge of the BBlue and I am sure it is a good mic but I personally would not give it house room, too much "style over purpose" for my liking.

In any even, unless you have a nice sounding, pretty big room I think most folks think a small, pencil style capacitor mic (better two) are better for acoustic guitar and are also well suited to vocals. You can get two very good SDCs for the price of that blue horror and a stereo bar to boot!

The Shure is fine for micing an amp but the SDCs will work for that as well.

Be a good idea Hank to read the stickies. Pre-amp you do not need, because there already will be two in whatever Audio Interface you get. That Focusrite is fine but some folks have reported poor latency and input overload problems with DI'ed electric guitar. Other AIs to consider...
Steinberg UR22, Native Instruments KA6.

Dave.

 

[mjbphotos]

Yeah, do some more reading. The audio interface you buy should have mic preamps. The SM58 is primarily a vocal mic, but can be used to mic an amp. The SM57 is the instrument version (doesn't have the big ball screen).

 

[DSPDiva]

+1 on the 57. I would recommend that one over the 58. The Scarlet should be fine, but there are a bunch of options out there for the same price more or less.