Home Recording Project & Info

[rjfoster]

Hello everyone!
I just finished another home recording project. I added guitars to the backing track for Queen's Tie Your Mother Down. The BT included Bass, Drums and Vocals.

I am posting this because I am interested in finding new ways to improve the quality of the recordings, and was wondering if any of you know any "tricks" that improve the sound. Here is what I did:

I mic'ed up my amp (CyberTwin SE) with 2 SM57's. One was placed about 3 inches from the left speaker, near the edge of the speaker and was pointing in towards the center of the cone. The other was placed about 3 feet away from the right speaker, aimed roughly at the center of the cone. The mics were then connected to my 4 channel Behringer mixer. I basicly used the mixer only for boosting the levels of the microphones - bass, mid and treble were all left set at the top-center position. (ie neither boosting nor cutting) The Behringer was then connected to the line in on my computer's Sound Blaster Live card. (Approx a $40 card)

I used Samplitude Studio version 4.5 (an older version) to do the recording. The only DSP effect I used was one called "Aural Activator" which is supposed to fatten up the sound of recordings. I recorded the rhythm guitar parts 4 times and then panned the 4 takes to hard left, hard right, medium left and medium right. No delays or reverbs were used. I did however add a small amount of mid boost to the rhythm tracks. Then I did the leads using a different Cyber Twin setting for a hotter lead sound. Finally I just balanced the levels of the tracks by ear (no special method there) and then mixed it down to 128kb mp3 format. The result is linked below.


Tie Your Mother Down RJ Style

So, if any of you home recording pros out there know of any neato tricks for home recording please post them!

Thanks!

Rj

[3fingers]

We mic pretty much the same RJ. In fact I have probably the same behringer 4 channel and 2 SM57's! It's a prety stock setup. The secrets are in the mixdown. The best tricks are in the compression (like 2:1) and the reverb and the stereo placement of things. That, to me, makes the sound come alive in the mix. Your recording is great. Not much to change imo. A question though is a friend uses his line out to record. Does it make a better recording going this route? If so, I will pass that info to him. Your tune jams man! No deniying you technique has great results.

[rjfoster]

Originally Posted by 3fingers

We mic pretty much the same RJ. In fact I have probably the same behringer 4 channel and 2 SM57's! It's a prety stock setup. The secrets are in the mixdown. The best tricks are in the compression (like 2:1) and the reverb and the stereo placement of things. That, to me, makes the sound come alive in the mix. Your recording is great. Not much to change imo. A question though is a friend uses his line out to record. Does it make a better recording going this route? If so, I will pass that info to him. Your tune jams man! No deniying you technique has great results.

Thanks for the reply! The Behringer I am using here is the Eurorack UB802 - a very basic 4 channel mixer - but nice none-the-less! This unit has Control Room Out (L and R 1/4 jacks), Main Out (L and R 1/4 jacks), and Tape Out (L and R RCA jacks). I am using the Tape Out jacks mostly just because I don't have any adapters on hand that will connect the L and R 1/4" jacks to the mini stereo line-in on the sound card - seems to work well though. I am not sure what the advantages are of the other two OUTS - maybe you know? This little board even sports phantom power in case your mic's require it. (Mine don't)

You mentioned compression as being important. Did you mean that the final stereo mix should be compressed at 2:1, or that the individual tracks should be compressed prior to mix down. I am a bit confused as to how that would work. (And why that would work too to tell the truth.) I am always looking for anything new to try though.

Thats it for now! Rock on bro!

Rj

[rjfoster]

Found this on the web -

http://www.homerecordingconnection.c...w_cat&cat_id=1