recording drums when tracking whole band live

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Hi, I'm bumping this thread because I was about to post almost exactly the same question. I'm looking to record some demos in our regular rehearsal space - a nice sounding function room above a public house. We're a pretty raw sounding heavy blues band so a live in the studio recording seemed like the best way to capture our vibe, and i was looking for some tips.

For an idea of the kind of sound I'm after:
Hound Dog Taylor
The Black Keys

And of course our current round of cobbled together demos: .44 Pistol on Soundclick
 
Just go for it and experiment along the way with mic placement just remember... a little bleed is OK. ;)






:cool:
 
There is a lot of good advice in here. I just want to reinforce some of the finer points. Firstly, absolutely go DI with the bass. Have everyone wear headphones so you can all hear. Second, don't record your vocals live. Have the singer use a low volume voice and use it for cues for the band.

And this last part is optional, this is what I do. I also direct the guitars and/or keyboards. Why you ask? The bleed from an electric guitar will really pick up in the drum overheads, and this may be fine for you but I don't like it because sometimes I want to go back and change particular guitar section. If there is a lot of bleed, that's impossible. Also, many times the guitar is too loud and you find yourself fighting the bleed when trying control volume levels. So I just DI the guitars, and then go back and record them afterwards. This way you get the whole band performing in unison, and then you get the separation that will allow for more control over the mixing stage later.
 
I'm with nate on this one. And with regards to later mixing, if you get the instruments down, get everything sounding good in the room, get everyone playing well and feeling well, your mix will be there. Very often I'll track everything live and when it comes time to mix I set levels and I'm done.

Just to reinforce the point I'm trying to make, if you're doing it live you have to make it about the performance and the moment in the room, be tight and loose at the same. Make sure all of your instruments sound perfect. Make sure the drums are tuned well. If you know someone that can tune drums better than your drummer let him or her do it. If you're using shitty cymbals buy steal or borrow better ones, well this should go for any crappy gear you have...

Those iso boxes can be a good idea, but if it starts to sound like...well the guitars are in little boxes I would take em out and just face them away from the drums. If there are other rooms or hallways available adjacent to the live room try putting some mics in em to add a little flavor.

Everyone here is right though, if you get better isolation you will have more options when mixing, I just get scared/anxious sometimes and I wanna hear the final product (or as close to it as I can get) when I'm tracking.

Have fun and experiment!!
-Barrett
 
That's what I do with the bass amp CM.
And go-betweens for the guitar amps





:cool:
 
Lots of good info here so far but there are some things I disagree with.
Everyone talking about a little bleed is ok I absolutely agree with and I disagree with DIing everything. The reason is because you have to think of the room you're recording in as another instrument. How much of that room you want in the mix is up to you and depends on the song/style of music. Removing all room tone with baffles and such is literally removing life from the tone. You will hear it.

I record in a room that if a professional engineer came into would probably vomit then pass out because it is so acoustically bad. But it does have a bit of character. I mic everything, even the bass and I get really good separation of my instruments and not a whole lot of bleed between the mics. The main concession I have to make is most of my mics are pretty close to whatever they're miking which gives a bit more punch than is desired sometimes.

The key to any live tracking is level coming from the source. You don't need to play as loud as possible to get a good sound. If you can nail that then the room or proximity of mics to each other are not huge issues. Tone is what you are going for and volume and gain are tools to reach that tone.
 
If your band plays well and sounds well in the room and your mics are set up to capture that, well it'll sound good :)

As for excessive cymbals in the OH's, put up a room mic in a spot that captures the whole kit and not just the cymbals. I just use OH's in a small room to give it a bit more of a stereo image, but the bulk of the sound will come from the room mic. Or just put up a room mic instead of stereo overheads, you'd be suprised how good mono drums sound! If it picks up the guitars even better :) Put up some gobos in front of the guitars and DI the bass, that'll give you enough the control you need and you can fix and flubs providing they're just little ones.

It's kinda funny I used to mutitrack everything then add reverbs and delay etc to make it sound like it was a live performance in a good room, took forever. So I spent my time making a good room, record it all at once and don't use much efx anymore.... go figure. The "glue" you hear in live recordings is often the bleed from other instrumets into other instrument mics .Also it's way more fun than recording individual tracks over and over again.
 
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