Cheers.
After coming up with an initial idea, I will program the drums right away and start playing along with that loop again and again until I come up with something. In the case of this song, I had about 75% of the arrangement before I even sat down to do any drum programming. Many times I will find myself not even near a guitar, and will have to write out the riff on a scr@p of paper using notation, to be transcribed to guitar at a later time.
When the drums are complete, I make a 2 channel mix of them and burn it to CD. I import that mixdown into my DAW and then start working on the overdubs. I really don't use punch-ins, so each track is a complete take. Unless a part is giving me serious trouble, I will stop the track midway and start from the beginning again. I think this keeps the playing sounding fresh and unmechanical.
Feel free to ask any questions you please!
