Recording Studio: It was the first of times, it was the worst of times!

Playing live is one job.

Playing in the studio is entirely another. I've seen live gig warriors absolutely stink it up when the tape rolls(or someone hits space bar).

So, you had a learning experience, now you have a better idea. That engineer sounds like a knucklehead, avoid him if you can, get some experienced people in. I'm just going to bet the dude probably can't mix a salad, much less your tracks.


Dan
 
Yamaha Rider said:
Haha. I plead not guilty - it was absolutely apparent to me that the only way to record drums was for me to play along to a guide track that had my drums on it.
I tried repeatedly to explain this and no-one took me seriously.
It was me who salvaged the session with the live take too. To be fair, the band leader/guitarist acknowledged that after reviewing the recordings.
But how could it not be obvious from the outset that the drums keep the time, not the guitar?!!
Click to expand...
keep us posted on how well that works.
 
Even playing to a scratch guitar and vocal performed with impeccable time is very hard, there just isn't enough rhythmic information to work to.
There is a story of Jeff Porcaro re-recording the drums to MJ's Beat It. The original tape got corrupted (long story), so they had to re-do the drums while keeping Jackson's vocals in tact. Apparently there was some bleed on the vocal track of the original backing track that Michael sang to. So Porcaro asked the engineer to crank the MJ vocal into his headphones and he went out and created a new click track by clicking sticks together. THEN he redid the drums.
The two easiest ways to record a good basic drum track is drums, plus bass and guitar - playing live together, or drums with a click (with the addition of live bass and guitar or a backing track).
In this case you were 100% in the right and the recording engineer and band were in the wrong.
 
Yamaha Rider said:
I'm in my first band with some highly experienced gigging musicians - last week we went to a local recording studio to capture a couple of our original songs.
I had suggested the band record Scratch Tracks on my phone of us playing the songs before we went so I could have them in my headphones to play to while recording the drum track...
They laughed at me. "It'll just be a live take of us playing together, stop worrying"
We get set up in the studio and - it is NOT a 'live take of the band'.
The recording guy gets the guitarist/singer to record a Scratch Track, alone, no click, for me to play over.
I protest: "but I'M the time keeper!"
"Have a go", they all say.
I am then instructed to lay down a drum track to this, out of time, recording.
Multiple, miserable, takes later, of banging my head against a wall trying, and failing, to smooth out the time - I ask, exasperated, to record some live takes of me drumming with the band before we go.
It felt like breaking out of chains!
Those live takes were the only usable material we recorded all night.
I'm a newcomer to music - these guys have been playing all their lives...
What the actual ....?
Click to expand...

Is that a photo from the actual studio?

To me that looks the corner is someone’s living room. It doesn’t fill me with confidence.
 
Trying to put a pulse to something not recorded with one can be a disaster. Little pushes and pulls in tempo do NOT become apparent until you try to play something else to them. I don't exactly know why it's not more conspicuous without drums or percussion, but it's not. Listen to that tiny spot in The Sound of Silence where it sounds like Paul Simon's guitar falls back just a *hair* as the band plays; that's likely because he DID slow down there, but it wasn't obvious until the producer decided to overdub an entire band playing behind them.

Even using a click is no guarantee. I have a friend I record with. He's a great musician and has good natural time, but he absolutely blows when it comes to playing with a click. He'll say, "Just overdub your drums, I tracked this to a click". No, he didn't. What he did was record, but fall back, catch up to the click, fall back, and catch up again. This makes my job--trying to find the little peaks and valleys--even harder than playing to organic time that moves more naturally. I don't even have the click in the cans when I record, because I'd go insane--he's all over the place and it's like trying to herd cats. When I can, I'll play back a take of his in the control room with the click up and suggest re-doing it if it's immensely bad. Every musician has a musical blind spot--the click is his.

Recording is by far my favorite thing to do. However, it can be tremendously rewarding while also being immensely frustrating.


Dan
 
Yamaha Rider said:
I'm in my first band with some highly experienced gigging musicians - last week we went to a local recording studio to capture a couple of our original songs.
I had suggested the band record Scratch Tracks on my phone of us playing the songs before we went so I could have them in my headphones to play to while recording the drum track...
They laughed at me. "It'll just be a live take of us playing together, stop worrying"
We get set up in the studio and - it is NOT a 'live take of the band'.
The recording guy gets the guitarist/singer to record a Scratch Track, alone, no click, for me to play over.
I protest: "but I'M the time keeper!"
"Have a go", they all say.
I am then instructed to lay down a drum track to this, out of time, recording.
Multiple, miserable, takes later, of banging my head against a wall trying, and failing, to smooth out the time - I ask, exasperated, to record some live takes of me drumming with the band before we go.
It felt like breaking out of chains!
Those live takes were the only usable material we recorded all night.
I'm a newcomer to music - these guys have been playing all their lives...
What the actual ....?
Click to expand...

I understand your frustration. In my last band, we did something similar. Since I was inexperienced with the whole recording thing, I kept my mouth shut and did what the engineer instructed, even when it seemed off. Over time, I realized the guy was nothing but an opinionated, loud mouth, know-it-all "hack" who didn't know much more than I did. The other guys in the band were all doe-eyed, showing the guy all sorts of respect and reverence like he was some sort of musical genius. He wasn't.

The incident that convinced me happened when he was recording hand percussion. I finished it, but it didn't sound right. The "engineer" angrily insisted all was fine. Minutes later, the bassist figured out that the microphone I thought I was using was actually turned off. My entire performance was being picked up by the bass drum mic on the other side of the room! The engineer became even more angry and said it was fine. That track actually made it to the original recording, even though it sounded like hot buttered ass.

Eventually, the other guys got tired of this guy's nonsense and parted ways. We're not the only band who had issues with this guy.
 
River19 said:
They key element in what you said above is that you guys had a plan and executed it. I think that is half the battle for a lot of folks.
Click to expand...
I don't get how you can't be organised when you're recording and it really doesn't take a lot.

equipmentdork said:
That engineer sounds like a knucklehead, avoid him if you can, get some experienced people in. I'm just going to bet the dude probably can't mix a salad, much less your tracks.
Click to expand...
I'm not surprised at all with the engineer. I had a couple of friends who got stung doing a recording for a choir last year and the engineer insisted the whole band including the drums (yep he insited on vdrums too!) were DI'd and he mixed it on the fly into a stereo mix with no click. He recorded the choir on top of an unchangeable mix and it sounded as bad as you'd think. He charged a kings ransom for this abortion and nobody in the band was paid for their time. My friends quit when it got released and it's on spotify too to make it worse.
 
Yamaha Rider said:
I'm in my first band with some highly experienced gigging musicians - last week we went to a local recording studio to capture a couple of our original songs.
I had suggested the band record Scratch Tracks on my phone of us playing the songs before we went so I could have them in my headphones to play to while recording the drum track...
They laughed at me. "It'll just be a live take of us playing together, stop worrying"
We get set up in the studio and - it is NOT a 'live take of the band'.
The recording guy gets the guitarist/singer to record a Scratch Track, alone, no click, for me to play over.
I protest: "but I'M the time keeper!"
"Have a go", they all say.
I am then instructed to lay down a drum track to this, out of time, recording.
Multiple, miserable, takes later, of banging my head against a wall trying, and failing, to smooth out the time - I ask, exasperated, to record some live takes of me drumming with the band before we go.
It felt like breaking out of chains!
Those live takes were the only usable material we recorded all night.
I'm a newcomer to music - these guys have been playing all their lives...
What the actual ....?
Click to expand...
The first mistake those "playing all their life" guys (and the recording engineer) did was NOT use a metronome for the guitar tracks. How is any drummer supposed to follow a guitarist that is all over the place?
I say don't let them put it on you. as a matter of fact even show them this if they argue.

That said, you should learn (and then be able to perform) the song by yourself using a click track. (Not as easy to do when the music has several tempo changes but still not too hard if you know how many measures before a change).
If you can't play alone to a metronome then it was not only the guitarist it was also you.
 
Yamaha Rider said:
Thankyou, Ron.
I'm very much a 'less is more' type of groove drummer - so I value my timing even more. Pride myself on it, even. Hence my frustration!
Glad you mentioned the click - because it absolutely would not have worked on one of these songs anyway - it slows down in the choruses. I also hate the idea.
What I was desperate to do was play over a Scratch Track with my own drums already on the song - it would have been SO simple to achieve!
When I suggested it - the sound man looked puzzled said "no, it might muddy the drum sound"
How could it muddy the sound when it's only in my headphones???
I think he must have misunderstood my meaning.
Click to expand...
I had to play to the largest audience of my life without monitors...
The only reference I got from my drums was the sound bouncing back from a building across the street about a second after I hit a drum. I could not hear the guitars or let's say it was a complete wall of noise that was unintelligible to me, so I had to literally play all our songs alone and counting the bars. No click track or anything else. This made me learn the importance of monitors. Then years later, I went to a studio to record our bands originals for a demo. I have good timing, always have, but the engineer wanted me to record with a click which is understandable because nobody is perfect.
It took me 3 takes to get used to the click, basically I played the song almost all the way through but a little change got me out of sync and they didn't want to punch in the rest, they wanted a full perfect take... That was the only song that was that difficult, all others were busier on the drums but somehow much easier to track in one or two takes tops. It felt really weird to be the first and only one tracking at that point but that also reinforced my understanding that you should know the songs in your sleep BEFORE going to the studio so you can play your parts alone, forward and backwards.
One final thing, if you get told by the recording engineer to change something, don't get mad, just listen, very seldom would they make a change that didn't make sense. Finally learn how they tune, where they position mics, how they EQ, and anything else you can so that when you get your own gear to record at home, you have a good starting point. All of this ONLY applies if you are working with a REAL recording engineer in a real studio and not just some dude with a mixer and a DAW that probably knows less than you do.
 
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Hollywood Jim said:
You guys need a better recording guy "Recording Engineer". You had a bad experience because you had a bad recording guy.

.
Click to expand...
That is absolute true. HE should have known better. but nowadays anyone with a mixing console and a DAW call themselves "producer" or "Audio Engineer" when they haven't produced a single thing nor have they gone to school to actually learn music production.
 
tris66 said:
Your band mates failed by not communicating what they wanted/expected from the engineer.
The engineer failed by not communicating with your band to as to what you guys expected from him.
Amateur hour. Both parties huge fail.
And YOU failed. Yup. It is your life and time is ticking. What have you done to educate yourself on how the recording process works? Are you expecting to have your band mates and some random engineer educate you? You were playing original tunes and didn't expect you'd be doing some recording at some point? You are on the internet. The resources are huge and mostly free. There are drummers on this board who have drummed on records that sold millions. Did you make a thread on what to expect, practice, ask or do before you went in the studio?
Click to expand...
This ^^^ I have never wanted to be the guy who knew the least of ...Anything. In order to be "educated" I do a lot of research (which is much easier now with the internet), back in the day you had magazines and books and you had to go find them. I understand having a hard time learning something that you are NOT interested in, but learning the recording process??? (Shakes the bell and chants: "Shame, Shame, Shame").
 
doggyd69b said:
I had to play to the largest audience of my life without monitors...
The only reference I got from my drums was the sound bouncing back from a building across the street about a second after I hit a drum. I could not hear the guitars or let's say it was a complete wall of noise that was unintelligible to me, so I had to literally play all our songs alone and counting the bars. No click track or anything else. This made me learn the importance of monitors. Then years later, I went to a studio to record our bands originals for a demo. I have good timing, always have, but the engineer wanted me to record with a click which is understandable because nobody is perfect.
It took me 3 takes to get used to the click, basically I played the song almost all the way through but a little change got me out of sync and they didn't want to punch in the rest, they wanted a full perfect take... That was the only song that was that difficult, all others were busier on the drums but somehow much easier to track in on or two takes tops. It felt really weird to be the first and only one tracking at that point but that also reinforced my understanding that you should know the songs in your sleep BEFORE going to the studio so you can play your parts alone, forward and backwards.
One final thing, if you get told by the recording engineer to change something, don't get mad, just listen, very seldom would they make a change that didn't make sense. Finally learn how they tune, where they position mics, how they EQ, and anything else you can so that when you get your own gear to record at home, you have a good starting point. All of this ONLY applies if you are working with a REAL recording engineer in a real studio and not just some dude with a mixer and a DAW that probably knows less than you do.
Click to expand...
I've had far too many situations like this so I can relate. I now just focus on what I have to hear and consider the rest a luxury. For example, in my keys driven band as long as I can hear the keys and the vocals I can play our set. If I can hear other things, great. If not... I can still play. I grew so tired so arguing with sound guys about monitor mix for an hour straight that I learned to just fight for what I need and not bother with the rest.
 
doggyd69b said:
That said, you should learn (and then be able to perform) the song by yourself using a click track. (
Click to expand...
Why learn to do something virtually no one ever does? The music is there to guide you through the arrangement, therefore you can concentrate on the feel and execute any fills to the best of your ability.
I record on my own all the time. Someone sends me their track and I play to it. They've played their track to a click (and told me the bpm), or at a push I can generate a tempo map and make a new click. But you won't get a killer recording when the whole thing is based on a drummer in a room on their own, with no music to play to.
 
roncadillac said:
I've had far too many situations like this so I can relate. I now just focus on what I have to hear and consider the rest a luxury. For example, in my keys driven band as long as I can hear the keys and the vocals I can play our set. If I can hear other things, great. If not... I can still play. I grew so tired so arguing with sound guys about monitor mix for an hour straight that I learned to just fight for what I need and not bother with the rest.
Click to expand...

same...in all of my bands, I always assume that I will not be able to hear anything that I want, or the way i like it, so I try to get the songs down pat in my head. I also sometimes - in practice - turn my bass amp all the way down (since that is usually what my stage mix sounds like) to replicate that situation.

and that is why I also have a "no drums" monitor mix...I need as much help hearing the other stuff for me to play my drum parts correctly.
 
Chris Whitten said:
Why learn to do something virtually no one ever does? The music is there to guide you through the arrangement, therefore you can concentrate on the feel and execute any fills to the best of your ability.
I record on my own all the time. Someone sends me their track and I play to it. They've played their track to a click (and told me the bpm), or at a push I can generate a tempo map and make a new click. But you won't get a killer recording when the whole thing is based on a drummer in a room on their own, with no music to play to.
Click to expand...

^^^^ This

I usually receive a full track with a scratch vocal sent to me which is awesome so I know what the emotional aspect of the vocal is to cater my playing to. The more info I have about how the song builds, peaks and/or pulls back the better I can cater my part and dynamics to the song.

I get an mp3 of the song bare minimum is usually guitar and vocal with a bpm setting and a leading count off so when I drop it into my DAW it lines right up with the grid and I can validate by seeing their count off waveforms lining up properly.......then it is off to creative land and working out a part.

To play a 3-4 min song to a click with just drums and nothing else in your ears but a click? No thanks, program that or hire someone else, that ain't me.
 
JimmyM said:
If I had a dollar for every guitarist or keyboard player who can’t keep good time…oh wait…I do ;). But somehow it all comes together, unless they really
Click to expand...

doggyd69b said:
The first mistake those "playing all their life" guys (and the recording engineer) did was NOT use a metronome for the guitar tracks. How is any drummer supposed to follow a guitarist that is all over the place?
I say don't let them put it on you. as a matter of fact even show them this if they argue.

That said, you should learn (and then be able to perform) the song by yourself using a click track. (Not as easy to do when the music has several tempo changes but still not too hard if you know how many measures before a change).
If you can't play alone to a metronome then it was not only the guitarist it was also you.
Click to expand...
But - the simplest and most natural way to do the job would have been for me to play over a track of me and my band, performing the song.
And it would have brought out the best in me!
I've never played to a click, so I don't know how I'd do - although I taught myself to play by drumming along to hundreds and hundreds of records - which I guess teaches you to match time with a track?
One of the tracks we were recording has distinct time shifts between chorus and verse, so a click would have been disastrous in this instance. (The guitarist refuses to use one too!)
 
doggyd69b said:
That said, you should learn (and then be able to perform) the song by yourself using a click track. (Not as easy to do when the music has several tempo changes but still not too hard if you know how many measures before a change).
If you can't play alone to a metronome then it was not only the guitarist it was also you.
Click to expand...
Who even does that? Talk about making life harder than it needs to be! That will sound dreadful.

If the guitarist is out of time and there's no click how do you polish that turd?
 
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