Moderators Lee Knight Posted October 1, 2008 Moderators Share Posted October 1, 2008 I've been trying my hand the past few years with offering an all inclusive recording package. From preproduction to final disc. Everything in between. The past few years have gone well and have allowed me to remain involved with music after a career years ago performing. Along the way I've even received a few San Diego Music Awards nominations for Best Album and Best Pop Album. Not bad. At 4k an album, I'm not getting rich, but I have a day gig. The money goes into gear. I'm nuts, but I'm happy. Up to this point preproduction has consisted of listening to very well arranged demos, fine tuning song structure and envisioning an aural environment these songs would be living in. Etc. Up till now... My latest project will be for a very fun, but very undisciplined weekender's old style rocking' rhythm and blues group. Muddy Waters meets Commander Cody on shrooms. Fun... but... The harp player is great except he never stops. The lead player is ok, and he never stops. The rhythm player is chunky and cool. The bass player sucks. The new drummer is workable. The singer is golden. Elvis with a devil on each shoulder. FUN. And a nightmare. My challenge is to keep their fun, insane vibe, but exert some control over things as well. They really aren't good enough to pull this off "for real". The harp and lead? Maybe track them together after the rhythm section. Maybe I'll get the singer in on the rhythm section dates as well instilling his madness. My question... How the hell do you do preproduction for something like this? It would be cake if I were to track separately, but that's for pussies in this type of scenario. So... what next???? Help. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members russrags Posted October 1, 2008 Members Share Posted October 1, 2008 Hi Lee, My recommendation would be to go see these guys play LIVE as much as you can before trying to record them. This will give you a lot of insight as to the best way to arrange the music. I usually start out with things on paper, starting out simple and then building by Verse 2 and planning way ahead who has the 1st half of the solo, who has the 2nd half. Break it down the same way in each section too. If you track these guys separately, it's my experience that the 1st guy's on will try to plug every hole, leaving you a mixing nightmare. I do a lot of recording separately, but it's with seasoned musician's that understand the arrangement, then I'm able to keep all the faders open and it will just about mix itself. Your probably going to have to get as many guy's on together as you can, so they'll be able to realize for themselves, that they have to figure out who's going to play where. You might want to just track the rhythm section initially, so when it comes down to fixes after each take the other guy's aren't sitting around being bored. Cut just a scratch vocal during the basic tracking. On a separate session get the harp player, Ld GTR player to play together, so everything is tasty. You might even want a final vocal on before the harp/Ld GTR ??? Try to keep the party atmosphere to a minimum if you can, only people directly involved with the session should be there. You should really go up on your price, sounds to me like there's a real value to what your doing. Hope that helps .... hey send me some of your stuff, I'd really like to hear some of the things you do. RussNashville Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Magpel Posted October 1, 2008 Members Share Posted October 1, 2008 Lee, I have no advice, but a request: you must document these sessions here, ala mixerman. That would be a blast. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Lee Knight Posted October 1, 2008 Author Moderators Share Posted October 1, 2008 Great stuff! Yes, I just bought the little Zoom H2 for documenting these guys live. I've seen them a few times already. The plan so far... record some gigs and rehearsals. Take notes on what works and what doesn't. Try to track accordingly. I think doing the harp and lead together after the basics will be the way to go. No way are these guys going to be able to stay focused and engaged while we work out another guy's bit here and there. I love the idea of mapping out the verses as you suggest then trying to get that down as live as possible. Nice. Oh... and when I said shrooms, that was just to give you a picture of the mayhem that spews forth. These guys all own there own businesses. Beer is the drug of choice here. That, I'll attempt to limit to any degree I can. These guys are keeping Anheuser-Busch in business. Good stuff Russ. Thank you. Up my price? We'll see. San Diego isn't exactly a hot bed of music these days. As for the diary? Good lord. I'd have to think about that. That's intimidating for a number of reasons. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members UstadKhanAli Posted October 1, 2008 Members Share Posted October 1, 2008 How "heavy-handed" do you think you would be with the editing since you mentioned that they cannot pull off a lot of this stuff "for real". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Lee Knight Posted October 1, 2008 Author Moderators Share Posted October 1, 2008 How "heavy-handed" do you think you would be with the editing since you mentioned that they cannot pull off a lot of this stuff "for real". Ummm. Well, I've had a lot of success with tracking numerous playlists over the same click and comping everyone. Grabbing the best bits of every one's performances and making one very solid take. But that's to a click and there's the rub... The drummer is solid and plays well to a click but I'm not sure that best fits these characters. On the other hand, neither does sloppy playing. So, one thought. Do my regular: track 3 times for comps. Then turn the click off and get another. The tracks that fly free, we let them be. Those that don't, it's comp city. After comping, I'm pretty good at moving things so even the player doesn't know what I've done. He usually says, "Man, I was on...". Not to the grid, just to where he thought he was going but didn't make it. So, I'd love to track this sans click, but these guys really aren't up for it. On the outside chance they get there, and after trying 3 passes locking to a click they just might be... then we'll grab it that way too. That's one plan. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members UstadKhanAli Posted October 1, 2008 Members Share Posted October 1, 2008 Now this is where I really don't know what I'm talking about because I use Pro Tools as a tape recorder, more or less, although I do some editing. But aren't there things like Elastic Time in which you can tighten up passages or the whole song while still sounding "natural"? That way the band can play with no click but there's a safety net of sorts rhythmically? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Lee Knight Posted October 1, 2008 Author Moderators Share Posted October 1, 2008 Now this is where I really don't know what I'm talking about because I use Pro Tools as a tape recorder, more or less, although I do some editing. But aren't there things like Elastic Time in which you can tighten up passages or the whole song while still sounding "natural"? That way the band can play with no click but there's a safety net of sorts rhythmically? Absolutely. The issue is getting the best bits via a comp, which is really powerful, vs. having them nail a solid take top to tail and making minor slides. Even without Elastic Audio, I would Tab to Transient, slice, slide, time stretch to close the gap, crossfade. In essence and in practice then same thing, just a lot more time consuming. So yeah, getting a take without click might be EXACTLY what this gig needs. Thing is, I don't know till I'm in the heat of it which is the preferred MO for this situation. I'm leaning toward making room for both. Free time, and locked to click. Choose which flies best after the fact. But once again... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Ernest Buckley Posted October 1, 2008 Members Share Posted October 1, 2008 Hey Lee- Sounds similar to a band I was working with about 3 years ago... a lead singer who was definitely the energy of the group but also in his own world, a drummer that was very "loose" and a bass player who was "ok". The guitarist and keyboardist were very good players and somehow could groove with this loose rhythm section. We recorded the entire band live in the studio to get their vibe. The bass player, guitarist, keyboardist and lead singer hung out in the control room and we put the drummer out in the studio. The guitarists amp was setup in another room so we had good isolation. Everyone was recording their tracks but we were just trying to get a tight rhythm section which we did. Considering there was no click, the band sped up and slowed down on their own so they were what I call "organically tight". The heaviest editing we did was editing the snare sound because the drummer never hit it consistently. We later recorded the vocals over again and the keyboardist and guitarist overdubbed their solos and punched in here and there where we needed to tighten things up. The overall product sounds like a band playing live because they did for the most part. And considering they were not playing to a click, the tracks are very organic... live does have its advantages. Keep the tape rolling and let them play. You`ll eventually capture performances that are good for the most part, then you can mold the rest. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Lee Knight Posted October 1, 2008 Author Moderators Share Posted October 1, 2008 Actually Ernest, the band you describe sounds a lot more capable than these guys, sorry to say. The end product will be a hoot, I'm confident, it's the getting there part that's, well... having these guys play all together at once, as sacrilegious as it may seem to some, is probably not a good idea and frankly not what they want. Probably. Maybe. I think. I think I'm going to be engaged in slight of hand. Edit: I do get where you're coming from here though. They do want to sound as if it all is happening in a live, wild, free and easy environment. I just think it takes a bit more skill to pull that off, and it's my job to figure out how we go about creating that. Unfortunately, doing it for real probably won't have that effect. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members russrags Posted October 1, 2008 Members Share Posted October 1, 2008 Lee, You said the Drummer is pretty good ... I'd establish a tempo w/ a click, but turn it off and let it get human. There would probably be little I'd fix w/ the drums, maybe a band punch or two ... just line up the Bass w/ the Kick and you'll probably be alright. Make "them" do the work, so you don't have to. RussNashville Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Lee Knight Posted October 1, 2008 Author Moderators Share Posted October 1, 2008 Yeah? That does sound appealing. Making them do the work I mean. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil O'Keefe Posted October 1, 2008 Share Posted October 1, 2008 Lee, have you been to any of their gigs or practices? If not, IMO, you should. Get an idea of how they're doing it live. Then hit some of their rehearsals (rehearsal and working out parts is a HUGE part of the pre-production process IMO) and start working through it all, with emphasis on the arrangements. If the lead guitar and harp are constantly walking all over each other and the lead vocal, you should point that out to them. As Russ said, work out who is going to fill what holes... give the harp player the first half of the verse, the guitar the second half, or split the verses up between them - whatever works for the song. It's either that or just let 'em roll, with the understanding all around that you'll be doing a bunch of subtractive editing later to keep people from stepping on each other. Personally, I'd prefer / recommend the former as opposed to the later approach. Kick the bass player's butt and make him / her practice like mad... alone with a metronome, and together with just the drummer... and failing that, hire a better bass player for the sessions.... or edit like mad. Which would YOU rather do? IMO, you should get the songs arranged as closely to what you want on the final recording in advance, make sure everyone knows what they're about and THEN go in and wax 'em. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Lee Knight Posted October 1, 2008 Author Moderators Share Posted October 1, 2008 Lee, have you been to any of their gigs or practices? If not, IMO, you should. Get an idea of how they're doing it live. Then hit some of their rehearsals (rehearsal and working out parts is a HUGE part of the pre-production process IMO) and start working through it all, with emphasis on the arrangements. If the lead guitar and harp are constantly walking all over each other and the lead vocal, you should point that out to them. As Russ said, work out who is going to fill what holes... give the harp player the first half of the verse, the guitar the second half, or split the verses up between them - whatever works for the song. It's either that or just let 'em roll, with the understanding all around that you'll be doing a bunch of subtractive editing later to keep people from stepping on each other. Personally, I'd prefer / recommend the former as opposed to the later approach. Kick the bass player's butt and make him / her practice like mad... alone with a metronome, and together with just the drummer... and failing that, hire a better bass player for the sessions.... or edit like mad. Which would YOU rather do? IMO, you should get the songs arranged as closely to what you want on the final recording in advance, make sure everyone knows what they're about and THEN go in and wax 'em. Yes, yes, and yes. Good stuff. I might be the bass player. The guy's a serious drinker and really not much of a player. They're all a bit concerned. I'm actually considering not tracking bass during the basics but that might be a train wreck. I could enlist an engineer to run the tracking while I lay down bass. That's a possibility. We'll see how the politics go in the next couple weeks. I'll be recording their gig on Saturday and working a rehearsal the next Wednesday. Good stuff Phil, thank you. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Kendrix Posted October 2, 2008 Members Share Posted October 2, 2008 Help with reproduction - dont you think that s a bit inappropriateOh nevermind. On second thought mute buttons can be your friend in such situations- if the bleed is managed accordingly. At least in that scenario you wont risk disturbing the energy flow the band has become acustomed to. This may or may not be a factor with these guys. However, from your descriptions it seems like it might. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Ernest Buckley Posted October 2, 2008 Members Share Posted October 2, 2008 The guy's a serious drinker and really not much of a player. That has to count for something. Seriously, if you were thinking of replacing him from the start you could have said so... you would have saved me some writing. btw- we had to trigger some snare sounds for our drummer... and I had to play some keyboard bass to fill in a couple of rough spots. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Lee Knight Posted October 2, 2008 Author Moderators Share Posted October 2, 2008 That has to count for something. Seriously, if you were thinking of replacing him from the start you could have said so... you would have saved me some writing. btw- we had to trigger some snare sounds for our drummer... and I had to play some keyboard bass to fill in a couple of rough spots. Sorry. But hey... I'm thinking a lot of things. All the info is great food for thought. Thanks much for your post, seriously. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil O'Keefe Posted October 2, 2008 Share Posted October 2, 2008 I might be the bass player. The guy's a serious drinker and really not much of a player. They're all a bit concerned. I'm actually considering not tracking bass during the basics but that might be a train wreck. That can work sometimes, but whenever possible, I like to get at least drums, bass and some sort of harmonic rhythmic instrument (keyboard or rhythm guitar) captured all together... I could enlist an engineer to run the tracking while I lay down bass. That's a possibility. You can always try to do both. Go to "engineer mode" and get everything set up; levels, tones, etc. Then grab your bass, hit "record" and switch to player mode.... then just play. Afterward, switch back to producer mode and analyze the performances... IMO, it's not really all THAT hard to do... We'll see how the politics go in the next couple weeks. Aaah, band politics - always LOADS of fun! Good luck with your project! PS I'd either raise my rates or go to a "per hour" billing setup - "per project billing" always short changes someone - usually the studio. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Lee Knight Posted October 2, 2008 Author Moderators Share Posted October 2, 2008 I could enlist an engineer to run the tracking while I lay down bass. That's a possibility. You can always try to do both. Go to "engineer mode" and get everything set up; levels, tones, etc. Then grab your bass, hit "record" and switch to player mode.... then just play. Afterward, switch back to producer mode and analyze the performances... IMO, it's not really all THAT hard to do... Yeah, I've done it. Talk about a rush. I VNC'ed my laptop to my PT LE rig in the control room. Who needs coffee? Wheee! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Phil O'Keefe Posted October 2, 2008 Share Posted October 2, 2008 VNC? I just use a Frontier Design Tranzport... or track the bass from the CR - I have tie lines running into the iso booths which allow me to track guitar, bass or anything else that requires an amp while still sitting in the CR. It's really useful for reamping too. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Moderators Lee Knight Posted October 2, 2008 Author Moderators Share Posted October 2, 2008 I almost bought a Tranzport a few times... but VNC is free and it works. I think it was Magpel who turned my on to it. I use VNC for my day gig but never realized the cool application with tracking. Essentially, you end up seeing your desktop remotely on your laptop. Full remote control. If your laptop is wireless, then you're wireless. A little cranky but workable. I wouldn't want to edit, but as far as controlling transport and song locations it totally flies. I don't have a window between my tracking space and the control room and I like to be in it if I'm in it. So being on top of the drummer (figuratively speaking) is key for me. Sounds like you've got a very nice and productive setup. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Ernest Buckley Posted October 2, 2008 Members Share Posted October 2, 2008 Lee-I think the hardest part of any producers job is dealing with the collective and individual egos of the band. I just remember how difficult it was to produce my own bands CD way back in the day. You would think being part of the band would make this aspect of the job easier... it didn`t. As the lead vocalist and primary writer of the band, the other guys would often look at me as if I were a complete stranger when I would ask them kindly to consider playing something else. In a way, maybe its easier if it comes from a total stranger... I`ve had both experiences, one as part of the band, another as the outsider... both are tricky. You`ll probably earn your money in dealing with egos alone. The actual part of recording the record is free. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Hard Truth Posted October 2, 2008 Members Share Posted October 2, 2008 How I would proceed would depend on what the client wants. Do they want to sound as good as possible, or do they just want to be documented? Is it more important to serve the song or capture what the band does live? Are they out for a record deal or more weekend gigs? Is a fun process more important than the results? Is it original material or covers? etc. I think discussing these matters with the client will be more useful than any advice you get here. It sounds like you have the know-how to help them acheive their goals, once you know what they are. Secondly, making some recordings and letting them hear themselves may inspire them to address some of their issues on their own. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members UstadKhanAli Posted October 2, 2008 Members Share Posted October 2, 2008 As the lead vocalist and primary writer of the band, the other guys would often look at me as if I were a complete stranger when I would ask them kindly to consider playing something else. In a way, maybe its easier if it comes from a total stranger... I`ve had both experiences, one as part of the band, another as the outsider... both are tricky. I think that it's easier if you are not part of the band so that you have that separation and history. It's almost like trying to do a project with family members at that point. That's been my experience, anyway. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members RockViolin Posted October 2, 2008 Members Share Posted October 2, 2008 Have these guys ever heard a recording of themselves *in action*? I certainly remember how I felt the first time I heard myself. Maybe it would do more harm than good though, (reality checks aren't for pussies but a preproduction recording of whatever they can play best, and worst maybe, which can be referred to when discussing things that could/should be better, might be handy. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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