Introduction
Not every songwriter is meant to be a performer, a producer, or an engineer. Many of you would probably go the route of having your songs demoed in a reputable studio, and avoid the frustration of the do-it-yourselfer. Me, I’m just a masochist I guess 🙂
I started out in 1985 with a 4-track recorder, one of the first ones out there designed by Tascam. I had no idea what I was doing, so my husband took the place of engineer, while I just did the playing and singing. Not a good thing for a marriage 🙂 Eventually, I got frustrated with how “slow” he was, and I realized I was just going to have to learn to do it myself! I armed myself with knowledge AND I saved my marriage at the same time.
However, it took a lot of trail and error, mostly error, in order to understand the whole process of getting a song to sound good on tape. Even saying the word “tape” shows you how long I’ve been at it! In the beginning, I had no understanding of the very basics, so my education came from trusting my ear as to what sounded “right”, and though I do know a lot more now, I still tend to fall on that same rule in the present. I trust what sounds right to me. If you ask the question, you will get PLENTY of opinions as to how to set up your studio, which equipment to buy, blah de blah de blah. You’ll get SO MUCH that you will have no idea where to start and who to trust. This series of tips is really designed for an absolute beginner, so the rest of you audio hounds take your know-it-all somewhere else :-)!! Continue reading “Recording Tips”
The question today is: Has production become more important than songwriting in today’s music? It’s not a new question, but it’s important to revisit from time to time. I actually saw a discussion of this on Reddit and it got me to thinking about it again.