Recording In an Old House

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BuffaloHunt

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So... My family is moving out of our house into our newly built house. They are keeping the old house and will be renting it out sometime in the future. I have been given permission to set up the house for recording session with my band.

I just want some tips on setting stuff up. I will have plenty of time to record (weeks to months) so no issue with rushing things.

It is an older home, with 2 floors. 3 bedrooms, 2 bathrooms, living room, kitchen, den and rec room.

I am wondering what the best ideas would be for isolation, rooms for drums/vocals/acoustics etc...

Thanks
 
Put the drums in the biggest room you have and use that to your advantage .
For isolation put the guitar in a separate room as so with the bass.
Just put down a scratch vocal and redo after.
 
Record one instrument at a time. Old house walls will transmit the sounds through and reverberate, so putting instruments in separate rooms and recording all at same time is likely to wind up with a lot of background noise and bleed-through.
Screaming guitar, drums and loud thumping bass will make windows vibrate at certain tones. Got any inside rooms?
 
thanks for the replies. i do see a problem with the old single pane window vibrating. My vision was something kinda like Led Zeppelin recording at Hedley Grange. Using the entire house to my benefit with experimentation on different recording techniques.
 
Ya I can see where your going with this. kinda cool. Not everyone can have a situation like this thrown in their lap. Have fun but don't go into the basement that's where the boogie man lives!!!!!!!!!!!!!:eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek::eek:
 
mjbphotos said:
Record one instrument at a time. Old house walls will transmit the sounds through and reverberate, so putting instruments in separate rooms and recording all at same time is likely to wind up with a lot of background noise and bleed-through.
Screaming guitar, drums and loud thumping bass will make windows vibrate at certain tones. Got any inside rooms?
Click to expand...

Whats wrong with a little blood:) I say what the first guy said:D
 
experimentation is going to be key - that's what Led Zeppelin did - in that movie "it might get loud" Page was talking about how a roadie type guy is the one who set up the drums in the stairwell, and that no one knew what would happen (but we all found out soon enough).

I moved into a 100 yr old house recently - actually most of the walls in the house are very dense - concrete-style plaster over thick wire mesh over lath boards that are 1/2 inch thick and you can't hear much through them (they reflect a lot) - but the external windows let a lot of sound (and air) in and out. The 10' ceilings are nice, too. I've got people living in this house, though :)

I recorded some guitar near the center of one of the larger rooms, and had so much reverb I couldn't really use the tracks for much, but in other places (and in other places in that room), I'm getting results I like more. None of it sounds *bad* really, it's just that I'm fighting the rooms at first until I figure them out. If all the furniture is gone, you're going to want to do a lot of sound treatment.
 
How tall are the ceilings?

If there's a great room with high vaulted ceilings, you're in luck!
 
I have a 25 foot vaulted cieling in my home...but the sound from the outside is too dominant in that room...the burbs kinda suck for old house recording...you have to live in the country...but that takes you too far from the clients.:rolleyes:
 
darrin_h2000 said:
I have a 25 foot vaulted cieling in my home...but the sound from the outside is too dominant in that room...the burbs kinda suck for old house recording...you have to live in the country...but that takes you too far from the clients.:rolleyes:
Click to expand...

That's why I feel so fortunate to live on 3 wooded acres across the river from a park. Occasionally I have to halt recording to let a train pass, but for the most part, I record when I want to. I am spoiled by 14' ceilings as well.

If I ever wanted clients, I'm still only 2 miles from the intersection of the two busiest interstate highways in my state.
 
Unfortunately the ceilings are relatively low.

I guess my next question would be what sort of equipment or materials I could look into that would be on the cheaper side and necessary for the project. Keep in mine it is only going to be a temporary studio setup and am looking for the most important pieces to get by.

I already have a MacBook, ART TubeFire 8 Firewire interface, 4 Closed-back headphones with 4 channel headphone amp, LDC Mic, Drum Mics, Mic Stands, and a variety of XLR-XLR cables.
 
Try finding padded office dividers I find them used all the time for about $5. to $10. a piece and you can move them around to brake up a room into any size room that you want or to help separate a few amps etc.
 
my Drum Mics are a set of CAD microphones with drum clips, a kick drum mic and 2 SDC microphones
 
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