First time recording advice

[Dr. Skeeter]

In a couple of weeks my band is going to record our first EP at my friend's house. He has a lot of good equipment and is competent at engineering and shit. We're just a two piece band with me on drums and my buddy on guitar/vocals, but the kid who is recording us has a Rickenbacker 4001 from 73 which persuaded me to record bass for this too. All of this means i'm gonna multi track instead of just playing live like I thought. I'm beyond excited and have high expectations now. I'm gonna have to really buckle down and learn the bass parts and get our songs down and stop fucking around at practice smoking too much weed and playing GTA San Andreas n shit. I come to you experienced musicmen to give me advice on my first real time recording. Things to prepare for, dos/don'ts, etc. Not only from a drummer/bass perspective but just general things too.

Thanks in advance. Usually read good things here. Pass some nugets of wisdom on to the younger generation, do the world a favor.

[spookstrickland]

Super Easy, I did this in the studio to.  just play your normal songs as you would as a two piece lie then overdub the bass.  because you are not a bass player just keep it simple and if you do shows as a two piece after releasing a cd with bass people will wonder where the bass player went?  I know it happened to me all the time.

[MichaelZodiac]

I've got a question in term of multi tracking, is it harder to do than just playing together? Most of our songs have a structure but we jam on it as well so I'm a bit worried that we fuck things up. Most smaller recording outfits do multi tracking because they don't have the place to let a band play in the same room.

[Volume]

If your tempo goes up and down overdubs can be tricky otherwise it's like playing along to a record. That's something to bear in mind. If it suits your style and your drummer is comfortable playing with a klick-track that's an option. Either way, practicing with a klick before you record is good, and messing with tempos (remember to write down the tempo that works best).

[Mr. Foxen]

Shoot the guy some examples of what you want the record to sound like. And actually listen to them before deciding what to send, to listen to the production, not just the familiarity of the music. Have all your shit teched before the recording, and actually a fair bit before, so a proper job can be done. Small crackles and shit you can ignore jamming, but they fuck a take.

[fallen]

Write down the list of songs you want to record and put them in priority order. Then if things start going wrong or you run low on time you can have a quick meeting and maybe cross a couple of them off the list.

Vice versa have those two extra songs because if things go smooth it's nice to have choices when you edit it down to go onto the EP.

[RAGER]

You guys are a 2 pc. and play out like that right?  So why add bass?  Your guitar gear is already set up, maybe come up with some chunky simpler guitar riffs as a rhythm track and use some panning.  maybe change some eq for 1 guitar track to add some low end. 

/played in and recorded as a 2 pc.

[chille01]

The hardest part for me is always the intros and bridges and areas where it is just my guitar with no drums.  Easy enough for the drummer and you to come back in together when you're looking at each other in the same room, another thing entirely to do it in an overdub.  If your drummer can play to a click, than that is the answer to avoid that problem.  Unfortunately, most of the drummers I've played with can't or don't want to.  If he never has, don't try and make him learn in the two weeks before the session, it'll just psych him out.  We get around it by always doing a stick count into every song, even if it starts with just guitar, and having the drummer do stick counts to keep the tempo in the parts where he doesn't play.  Makes it easier to do guitar overdubs, and you can edit the stick counts out when you don't need them anymore.  If there is a big cymbal crash ringing out into one of those parts, it gets trickier to edit them out.

Also, tune between every take, and use the same tuner for all of the instruments.  Try playing sitting down if you always stand up.  I find I can play more precisely sitting down in the studio.  Other guitarist finds the opposite, so that'll depend on what works for you.

When you listen back to takes and decide if they are good or not... listen.  Don't yap and smoke joints through the playback, or you might miss some little mistake that will drive you crazy or even cause you to scrap the track down the road. 

[everdrone]

I agree, play as a two piece, you can send the guitar signal to a bass rig live and do it the same way in the studio too, so the listener knows what he gets when he goes to your live show   I saw two person bands rip it up that are heavy - tweak bird, etc


...if all else fails just record bass last and follow the guitar root notes, or hire a session bassist. if you are gonna get a bassist anyway, then now is the time

[Dr. Skeeter]

I'm the drummer and i've been playing bass since I was 12 so i'm doing both for this session. Between the responses here and a pm black gave me this has been really good advice so far. Thank you all. As far as playing bass on the recording i'm just gonna do root notes just for the sake of low end mostly. Most of our riffs are pretty simple and it shouldn't be too difficult. My only real concern now if playing to a click track. I don't have any real experience recording drums so we'll see how that goes.

[mortlock]

besides your own performance ..remember, there are things out of your control at play..expect the unexpected. be prepared to roll with whatever happens. be ready to accept a certain level of disappointment. you never get exactly what you want.

[RAGER]

And if you think it really blows, refer back to the Chris Holmes thread.  It's prolly not as bad as that.

[Chovie D]

number one thing is know the material, know your parts.
seems obvious but apparently its not...

protip*:bring a good book or something to keep you entertained

[AgentofOblivion]

Spend extra time getting the sounds right before you start and also on getting good performances for takes.  You shouldn't say "good enough" during these two stages.  Make sure you really like the raw sound before any mixing and that it's close to what you want.  It will save a lot of time in the long run and you'll end up with a much better product over all.

And even if you lay down a good take or two, do a few extra.  There's always little mistakes you don't hear at the time that you wish you could correct and having an alternate take to choose from is a great asset.  The last thing you want to do is spend all this time/effort/money and then have parts that you're embarrassed to show to people because you were too lazy to do an extra take or two.  You'll regret it.

But it's also important to remember that there WILL be things you won't like, but things that seem like a huge deal will not be in a couple months once you aren't so close to it and no one else will notice them anyway.  Aside from that, just make sure you have your shit together.  Not only know your parts very well and be able to play them without many mistakes, but plan for how you're going to record certain parts.  Someone above mentioned there is a section with just guitar but a cymbal crash needs to ring out.  That means you can't hit the cymbal and then start clicking the sticks if you want to not have the stick-click in the final product.  That means you'll probably have to record that section twice on the drums, once with the sticks clicking to keep the beat, and the second time with the cymbal crash and no stick clicks.  That way the guitar player can listen to the clicks to keep time and you can hear them also when you over-dub the drum track with the cymbal crash.  It's nice to have a plan for those sections that makes sense so when you get there you don't waste time.  Or it comes time to fix something but you can't because you didn't have the foresight to realize you should have been hitting sometime to keep the time.

[mutantcolors]

To reiterate the above post, don't expect studio magic. If your sound sources and performances aren't where you want them, there aint no fixing that after te fact. You can do all the editing trickery on Earth, it'll still fall short (plus that's just bad form.)

[heytrid]

record a di of your guitar alone, no effects. That way you can easily re-amp/re-effect and the track is identical to the effect track you recorded before.

[Dr. Skeeter]

I'm thinking about just recording live, because I really don't give a shit either way. What do you cats think?

Just like that except an extreme doom band.

[moose23]

I'm all for recording live if at all possible with the DK sessions being a prime example of why it's worthwhile. I do give a shit though. 

[black]

As long as you go shirtless like Jello, you'll be gold.

(actually a big fan of "live" recording.)

[moose23]

Top tip: always record vocals topless, lets you put you heart into it better..

[Dr. Skeeter]

Well it's settled then mothafuckas! I'm a huge fan a live recording as well and that exact DK video is one of the main reasons why I started playing music to begin with. I then went out and got a Fender j bass and put a huge DK sticker on the back of it. Badass record

[fallen]

In every studio and even most houses I've been in there has either been an iso booth or an extra room somewhere that you can jam the guitar amps into to isolate them from the drums.

It's fairly common for bands to record drums and bass live off the floor and then overdub as needed. Some do drums and guitar live.

In one band I was in we jammed a lot so when we recorded we went D.I. with one track of bass, stuck the guitar amp in the vocal booth and then all stood in the room and played the songs live. After that we overdubbed vocals, 2nd guitar and amp bass because we liked a bit of dirt in the bass tracks.

We practiced so much that this was a quick way for us to record because we could count on each other to nail our parts pretty much every take. This was to tape though. These days it's so easy to punch in and fix a guitar flub or whatever so all you need is one clean drum take.

[Dr. Skeeter]

Do I still have to a drum to a click track then? That's a real bitch. My time should be occupied smoking more weed.

[da_qtip]

Do I still have to a drum to a click track then? That's a real bitch. My time should be occupied smoking more weed.

You don't have to play with a click. But it will make any editing or comping way easier for the engineer. Also, this may be blasphemous to post this here.. but don't get too high. If any complications or something come up and you're completely baked, a lot of time will get wasted.

[mutantcolors]

And for fuck's sake don't reply with "but I can't play if I'm not totally baked."