What's wrong with this?

  • Thread starter Thread starter chessrock
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chessrock

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Why is it that whenever I'm recording in the studio, everyone wants to sound "live" . . .

Yet when I record people live, they want me to help them sound "studio" ? ? ?
 
...murphy's law

...people always want what they can't have

...grass is always greener in someone else's studio

take your pick :D

Most of it's probably just difference in terminology. They've probably recorded themselves live with a boombox and wanted it to sound better. Or, they've recorded themselves in a starter studio (1 track at a time), and gotten sterile results.
 
Good points you make.

Actually most of my clients are people who have tried cutting some demos at some of the mid-sized studios and found their experiences less than satisfying. On a few rare occasions, I've done some pre-production work for some more serious musicians.

For the most part, though, the guys I deal with are wackos. Can we be honest with ourselves here? :D :D How many of us can truthfully claim that we are musicians and have all of our marbles in tact? :D

I'm venting, which is healthy I suppose.

Why on earth do we want to sound "live," yet we also want our vocals to be pitch-corrected . . . our mistakes edited out, and our procuction to sound polished? I think we're all just striving for an ideal happy medium that only exists in our heads. Kind of like "warm, yet accurate" . . . or "loud, yet dynamic."

I think I'm on a role here. I'm going to have to put my marketing hat on and re-do the web site. :D How's this:

Record with Chessrock for that "live, yet studio" sound. :D Your demos will be good, yet they will suck. Hmmm. I don't know about that one.
 
We just started our studio tracks for a demo CD we're making. The last thing I want out of it is to sound "live". Live sound seems easy to me, play live and record it live, if that's what you're after.

And yes, all the musician's I know are wackos ;) :)
 
I've learned that musicians are hardly ever satisfied with their recordings. Ive worked with some guys that were so damn picky I had to kick em out !!! I couldn't take it:mad:
 
Record them live then, use that for a scratch track. Its the groove they are looking for, not the abiant noise.
 
Reminds me of a recording I once did.... The band didn't have a drummer, so I offered to play the drums on the track with a drum machine...

I started to program the machine and they stopped me, and asked if I could play them live with my fingers.... To a click....

"A Programmed Drum Machine Doesn't Groove", I think was the argument....

I agreed...

Sure I say.. No problem... I'M actually a pretty decent finger drummer....


I start doing it, and lay the track almost flawlessly......To a click....

Then the lead singer asks me if my protools has a quantize function to make it solid, cause *his* cubase can do that... (Almost like he was hoping I didn't have the function so he could talk down my tools) :D

I say "Yeah.... Of course it has quantize...But then you will lose your groove..."

He says, "Yeah, but not really, Quantize just makes it more solid sounding"


I just did it and argued no more.....

I mean this guy was sure that Programming a Drum machine ahead of time, would make a sterile grooveless tune...YET, 100% quantization at the end wouldn't do that same thing....

I mean, Both methods, you end up locking up to a sequencer.... No question about it.... Just 2 different ways of doing it.

Duh.
 
Stealthtech said:
I've learned that musicians are hardly ever satisfied with their recordings. Ive worked with some guys that were so damn picky I had to kick em out !!! I couldn't take it:mad:
Click to expand...

You know.. You have a point.... Unless you make a great amount of money or really love dealing with the human side of it, and can be very nerve wracking and unfulfilling of a hobby....

Thats why I stopped...... I just got fed up with people saying they want to sound like Backstreet Boys, but then after a week of awesome recording and programming on my part (My opinion there), they decide, that it sounds too "boy-band-ish"

And then they give up and I never hear from them again....

I just gave up.. Fuck em.

My mistake was I was a songwriter and had publishing interests in the projects, so I was doing it for free.
 
Dude, don't say fuck musicians in general.

Just say fuck boybands. :D

As wacko as most of the guys I deal with are, at least they don't suck. :D
 
Fuck em all!!!!;)

I have not worked with any boy bands......I was just using the BSB as an example, to illustrate the types of conflict I frequently encountered... I assure you I have run into this problem with all genres..


:)
 
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