The consistency problem

[kurdy]

I

[philbo]

My take: You are trapped in thinking about it.... it is much better to be trapped in making recorded music, and also a lot more fun. Start! It is the only way to begin!

[Lee Knight]

I agree with your take philbo. An important part of recording music is to finish. To wrap it up and call it done. For better or worse... there it is.

 

As I drove home from a little local concert put on in a cool backyard this past weekend, I listened to the CD a performing singer/songwriters had given me. What struck me most was the fact that he finished it... and many others. He's one of my competition localy as engineer/producer/studio. He records local artists just like I do. And yet... here he was with a finished CD of his stuff. Finished. Warts and all. Not perfect, but I was listening to it.

 

And he wasn't listening to mine because...

 

 

I haven't finished mine.

[Billster]

Do the best you can with what you have, and do indeed make a finished product.

 

The actual music is what matters. If later on you have the opportunity to use better equipment and skills, the music is still what matters.

 

The music on my CD (see sig line link) was recorded over the course of about 5 years (I'm not telling you which recordings are that old), and some of the writing goes back even farther. I had good recordings from the time I first wrote that music, but I went back and "improved" on the recordings, armed with the knowledge and ability that I have now. But the melodies and chords and rhythms are the same. Those I knew. Re-recording was not a real issue. I liked some of the stuff on the early recordings, but not as much as the better performances I captured more recently.

 

Do the best you can with what you have, and do indeed make a finished product.

[DVaz]

I have a similar thing, but not with gear: with me. I quite recently started to record my bands music and as such I'm on the steepest part of the learning curve. This means that things I did 2 weeks ago, and 2 weeks before that and so on sound progressively much worse.

 

I figure it goes like this: you learn some stuff. get some gear, and so long as it ends up sounding 'ok' (whatever that is to you) make a project from it. Then progress. Work to the peak of your gear and ability and complete a project. Repeat for the next project (but with the better gear and knowledge, and quite probably musical ability)

 

Then compile the lot and you have a work thats both a musical and a sonic evolution. It would be boring if 10 hours of music all sounded the same, with the same mics, the same mixers, the same pres, the same dacs and everything else.

 

I say keep the sound from when it was recorded. Dont re-record it unless its actually bad.

[jackcheez]

 

So I

[Lee Knight]

Maybe a way to look at this issue, and a means of getting past it:

 

When I record a group, I never upgrade anything during the course of that project. Perhaps looking at your personal projects and recording the same way is a good thing to do. In other words. Finish what you've started before moving on.

 

Then upgrade

 

Then move on

[DVaz]

 

Maybe a way to look at this issue, and a means of getting past it: When I record a group, I never upgrade anything during the course of that project. Perhaps looking at your personal projects and recording the same way is a good thing to do. In other words. Finish what you've started before moving on. Then upgrade Then move on

 

 

I think thats what I meant to say.....sort of!

[rasputin1963]

The thing is, I

[kurdy]

 

Maybe a way to look at this issue, and a means of getting past it: When I record a group, I never upgrade anything during the course of that project. Perhaps looking at your personal projects and recording the same way is a good thing to do. In other words. Finish what you've started before moving on. Then upgrade Then move on

 

 

Yeah--that's sort of what I'm leaning towards. As I said before, I can't really go out and purchase anything at this time, anyway. I do feel that what I'm doing now is pretty much the absolute best I can do with the gear I currently have (I've tried to improve upon how I've been doing it--didn't work). But it takes me so long to finish a project--my last one took about three years (i.e. ten to twelve songs)--I feel I could be slowing down my evolution this way. I've already started recording for my current project, and I'm only two songs in (both taking me several months).

 

The problem for me is that some elements of the sound really are not where I'd like them to be, not the songwriting, performances, musicianship, etc., which I am happy with. Hopefully when people hear it, the deficiencies won't distract from its strengths.

 

Anyway, as I said, it's so hard to be objective. I think what I'll do is not listen to what I've done so far for a week, and then come back with a fresh perspective.

[monstermaker]

Pull out the plastic. You have the rest of your life to feel guilty. :poke:

[kurdy]

 

Pull out the plastic. You have the rest of your life to feel guilty. :poke:

 

 

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