Homerecording overview

[GuitarIv]

Cheers guys,

so recently a friend of mine asked me to write a promo track for his recording studio, telling me he wanted something ultra modern, djent metalcore breakdown like, you know the typical stereotype of what I consider to be the Pop of metal, to promote his work.

Although I hate the whole (there are exceptions) Metalcore and Djent genre, I know how to write such things since they most times follow the same boring pattern and hey, you don't get the chance to record in a fully equipped studio for free very often :P

Anyway, starting to work on this it brought up an issue every modern guitarist faces sooner or later: my lack of options to record demos and get away from the imagination limiting sound of guitar pro.

Right now I have Audacity as a beginners "DAW" recording with my small and cr@ppy Vox Metal Amplug Headphone amp going directly into my laptop which leaves me, you can tell, with quite some problems like latency, no options of adding drums, no decent click and a lofi sound. I attached an example of what I've done briefly, even for a demo that's intended to be a quick idea you can send someone via Mail this sounds awful...

Anyway, I started to get into this topic and from my understanding I will need:

 - An Interface. Heard good things about the Focusrite Scarlet, it's available right now as a studio bundle including headphones and Cubase Lite for a very reasonable price

 - A proper DAW. I know I could get Reaper, but don't know if that would do the job. Then again I don't have a few hundred quid to spend on a proper program.

 - Studio Monitors/Headphones. Don't know how good the ones included with the Focusrite Scarlet are, but I guess they should do the job for an amateur writing demos.

 - A program for Guitar sounds. Line 6 podfarm maybe?

What I'm basically asking of you is to guide me into the right direction where to start my home recording for demos on a budget. I love guitar pro but it sounds horrible and limits my imagination. Am I missing something on this list? Some insight on the matter would be appreciated :)

Cheers!

p.s.: the pickup used is a Painkiller in Drop D-flat

[Toe-Knee]

I moved from Cakewalk producer edition 7 to Reaper a few years back and I couldn't be happier. Not only is it significantly cheaper it's more flexible, more user friendly and allows for a much easier workflow so nothing gets in the way.

As for drums i highly recommend steven slate I think he has a budget version out for around Ģ30 now but he occasionally does offers to get the higher versions for around Ģ40 so it may be worth holding out on that one (i got ex + platinum of version 4 for Ģ49! and 3.5ex for Ģ14)

With regards to recording guitar sounds i would avoid anything line6 from the pre HD era. There are many great *free* plugins that you can get that are far better sonically such as TSE x30 and lecab for loading impulses.

You could also record from a lineout if your amp has one and add impulses using lecab.

[Kiichi]

Personally I use, as I mentioned in the off topic forum thread, a laptop with Cubase and a Steinberg UR28 Interface, with Beyerdynamic DT880 Headphones.
That for me is really a great home recording combo and very portable too.

Combine that with my mics, a modded MXL V69 tube condenser (great value in itself, even better with a tube and 1 cap change), a Sennheiser E906 dynamic mic (can be used like a SM57, but to me just sound better. Popping up everywhere, might replace the SM57 as a standard I think) and a vintage Shure 545L with jack out which is somewhat related to the SM57 but smoother more musical and a tad more vintage.
With that collection of mics I can do almost anything I need to.
Oh and I also of course got myself a mic screen, helps a lot, especially with vocals.

On top of that I have a line out on my HTH 5w Fender Tweed Champ style amp and a Weber Mini Mass with line out for my Orange TT, plus the Recabinet plugin Toe-Knee mentioned.

For Drums I snatched BFD2 at a sale cause I love tweaking, but heck, I am still trying to conquer this one xD Sound bloody great though.

For recording guitar and  bass I also can use the direct in through my interface and use Amplitube 3 which I just bought. So far it seems pretty darn cool, also compared to things like a POD. The models are pretty nice, tweaking is very intuitive and the clean sounds especially are really suprisingly good so far I feel.
I will continue to learn and tweak and maybe someday do some clips, which at my speed should be done my the time Amplitube 5 is available.

Just gotta find a setting in there which does something like an acoustic amp, then I am happy and can do all I need.


I hear good things about Reaper, but I dunno how the plugin situation is there.

As I said in the other thread you just need to find something which is not insanely shabby and (or) works for you. Sufjan Stevens showed it really well.
Love the value I get out of my V69, love the deal I got on the 545L. Both really not highend, but good quality and have a character I can work with. Most importantly they have character. As long as a mic has that it is good in my eyes then you just gotta find out for what it fits.

[JJretroTONEGOD]

After trying most DAW's out there since the 90s, I think Cubase and Pro Tools are the best and for me Cubase has the slight edge for amount of features and plug ins, Cubase LE or Pro Tools LE would be your best choices. Reaper is excellent too, definitely on par with the best if you can be bothered learning it though (I found it harder to use) and it doesn't look as good visually.

As for using software, to create guitar sounds I like NI Guitar Rig more than Amplitude, but I don't use it anymore. I think you can buy LE versions....Cubase has an plug in amp simulator that comes with it that is surprisingly good, I own the full version so I don't if that's included in the light version.

You can't beat a real amp and a mic on a cone, as said the sm57 is an industry standard, so is the sennheiser e606 or e906 which both sound better on high gain sounds.

re-amp boxes are also useful combined with a DI box, you can re-amp any clean sound and re record it whilst moving the mic around e.t.c. Far easier than constantly playing whilst moving a mic around.

The Focusrite scarlet would be a great choice for a first interface yes especially with Cubase, you can't really go wrong with this deal!

[Kiichi]

As for using software, to create guitar sounds I like NI Guitar Rig more than Amplitude, but I don't use it anymore. I think you can buy LE versions....Cubase has an plug in amp simulator that comes with it that is surprisingly good, I own the full version so I don't if that's included in the light version.

You can't beat a real amp and a mic on a cone, as said the sm57 is an industry standard, so is the sennheiser e606 or e906 which both sound better on high gain sounds.

Guitar Rig is really cool too. For me point that brought me to Amplitube was that I found the clean sounds to be better and the great Orange models. Plus if I can scratch the money together there is an SLO on too =)

Of course you canīt really beat mic, but in reality I can rarely crank my amp enough to record properly and generally it is more work. Work that pays off though but still.
When micing and amp I prefer the dual mic method btw, taking two different sounding mics, placing them properly (and at the same distance to keep from phasing issues) so they each reflect that character and then mixing them together by reversing he phase on one and then mixing then toying with the mix until you find the worst point. Then put the phase back and you got an amazing larger than life sound.

[Plenum n Heather]

 - An Interface. Heard good things about the Focusrite Scarlet, it's available right now as a studio bundle including headphones and Cubase Lite for a very reasonable price

I have a Scarlett 18i20; combined with the Mix Control software and Cubase 6 ... very powerful combination!

- A proper DAW. I know I could get Reaper, but don't know if that would do the job. Then again I don't have a few hundred quid to spend on a proper program.

Not sure what you mean by a 'proper'. Reaper's price of admission is low enough to try for yourself.

 

- Studio Monitors/Headphones. Don't know how good the ones included with the Focusrite Scarlet are, but I guess they should do the job for an amateur writing demos.

I would not advise upgrading the monitors until you've spent enough time with the new ones to know what you do and (more importantly) DON'T like about them.

 

- A program for Guitar sounds. Line 6 podfarm maybe?

I don't understand what this means. :)

[Brow]

Just thought I'd chime in with my very simple setup I use for home recording, nothing overly expensive but it works for me so far!

Interface: M-Audio Mobile Pre USB. This is a very simple 2 channel (mic or line inputs) usb interface with phantom power.

DAW: I'm currently using Reaper, Adobe Audition and Audacity on my home PC. Reaper is the main DAW for recording whereas I use Audicity for simpler tasks such as editing audio files etc. Adobe Audition is from before I got Reaper and I don't really use it anymore. I used to use Cubase whilst at college, and Soundscape when I worked in the studio but neither of those have been available to me so I've settled on Reaper.

Monitors/Headphones: For Monitors I just use my bog standard pair of Logitech speakers with a sub. They're not really cheap, but not top of the lien either. I would love some better monitors but I just don't have the room for anything bigger at the moment. If I ever get a bigger desk and more space then I'll get some monitors too. I have a pair of nice Sennheiser headphones, not sure of the model, again they're the 1s we used at the studio and I liked them so much I got myself a pair. I don't mix on them though, only use them for checking mixes back or for when it's late and I can't monitor as loud as I need/want to.

Program for guitar sounds: I have Amplitube but don't use it. I also have a POD XT with the added amp and FX packs but I only really use that for quick demos or when I want to get an idea done quickly. I'm much more of a 'mics on cabs' kind of guy  :lol: I do also sometimes take a slave out from my SLO clone and use cab impulses as Toe-Knee mentioned above. I'm still experimenting with that and haven't got into too much detail with it so far.

Mics: You didn't ask about mics but I'll just list what I like and use anyway!  :lol:

BLUE Baby Bottle: This is a nice neutral sounding condensor mic that pretty much reproduces whatever you put infront of it. It's both a blessing and a curse depending on application  :lol: It's a very 'hot' mic so is quite limited on what applications you can use it for. I have to severely pad it down just to use it on a guitar cab. I tend to use this paired with 1 of the others below.

Audix I5: This is an alternative to the industry standard Shure SM57. It can be used on pretty much any sound source and will give good results most of the time. I find it to be a bit more fuller sounding than an SM57, which I find can be a bit thin and nasally. Again, depending on application both are useful.

Shure SM58: This is actually my vocal mic for live use but sometimes I take the cap off and use it on guitar cabs for recording. It gives results very similar to an SM57 for the most part.

Here's some quick recordings I've done with combinations of the setup above:

https://soundcloud.com/browsif/fool-for-your-lovin-hds - Holy Divers
https://soundcloud.com/browsif/master-jailbreak-slo-mules - Mules

Both were recorded at home with the amp as loud as I could get it whilst still being able to (barely) hear the backing track to play over. There are a few timing and playing issues on both, but I was only messing around so left them as is. I'm currently getting a solo put onto the Fool For Your Loving track but that's not too important.

[bucketshred]

I have got an M-Audio pro tools box thing, fostex monitors and a rode NT1a microphone all needing a new home...

And a Presonus Firebox!

[MDV]

DAW:

Reaper. Theres really no reason whatsoever not to start with it. Its the same sort of product as the 'name' DAWs in its capabilities (they all differ slightly, but theres no more difference between, say, reaper and cubase than cubase and protools, and theres no 'winner' there either; its all preference and what you specifically need from it at the end of the day)

However, DAWs all have the same basic core capabilities. They implement them in slightly different ways, but your first priority is learning things like bussing, sends and receives, automation, editing, comping, and a million other things and combinations of them. All of them do these things. Learning these core capabilities and the basics of building a mix (I jest; thats a lifetime job), but where to pan things, rules of thumb on eqing, layering, how the basic mixing tools work (EQ, compression, reverb, delay, etc etc etc) can be done in any DAW and reaper is the easiest. I also think its the best, and moved to it from sonar (which I moved to from cubase).

Interface: Stability and well written drivers are the most important thing. Equivocating about frankly small differences in conversion quality and mic pres needs to take a very distant second place to dropout-less low latency performance. I recommend focusrite saffires by default (if firewire is an option; hopefully it is, as its better for audio).

Monitors really needs to be 'monitors and room treatment'. Your room is going to be a bigger problem. Rockwool slabs, wood, screws, some fabric and some patience. A spot of open celled, dense foam doesnt go amiss either. Headphones negate the room totally, and so are always a useful compliment, but they have their own issues. The main thing on headphones and monitoring is, in order, its linear enough that there are no big nulls; frequencies you cant hear because they're too quiet compared others and are being masked, and you know them very well.

Program for guitar sounds - SM57 and some patience.

[Kiichi]

Monitors really needs to be 'monitors and room treatment'. Your room is going to be a bigger problem. Rockwool slabs, wood, screws, some fabric and some patience. A spot of open celled, dense foam doesnt go amiss either. Headphones negate the room totally, and so are always a useful compliment, but they have their own issues. The main thing on headphones and monitoring is, in order, its linear enough that there are no big nulls; frequencies you cant hear because they're too quiet compared others and are being masked, and you know them very well.

Program for guitar sounds - SM57 and some patience.

Disclaimer: As of this writing I am intoxicated. Please excuse any errors in language and otherwise. Thank you.

While I agree with most you say and admit that you have a lot more experience than I do I still want to voice, again, my thoughts on those two things.

On the monitor / headphones thing I feel I can say that for beginners headphones are  better I feel, for the reasons you stated. Since you take out the room they are at a clear advantage. Being able to treat a room properly for the monitor speaker to do their work is much harder than it may sound.
If you however go into one or two really big shops with a good selection of headphones and try them out with music you know very well and in the optimal case know that it is a good mix and master you can compare headphones and find the one that works for you.
In my case I went into the store with among other things "Steven Wilson - A Grace for Drowning", "Sufjan Stevens - All Delighted People" and most importantly "Peter Gabriel - Scratch my back". I tried those with all possible headphones ranging from under 100 bucks to 1k. For me the Beyerdynamics DT880 stuck, as I heard the most detail and also faults, which still were few. I heard basslines I never knew existed and it was bliss. They just work for my ear and reveal more than any other single piece of monitoring equipment does, though a combination always wins (I always also crosslisten on my Extreme Isolation Headphones and my Teufel Concept F system at a minimum)

On the mic side, yes being able to get good sounds out of a SM57 is something everyone should  be able to do after some time as you might be confronted with it at any time and it teaches you a lot about positioning and off / on axis things and such.
I do however still not like that mic for myself, the harsh midrange and general character just does not work with me(95% of the time).
To me the Sennheiser E906 is a much nicer thing. Much more honest in sound for one, less character (in a good way), but still has a pleasant one. If I just place it in a way thtat the outer part of the shell (whatever you would call it) is in front of the speaker cone (so the mic is placed on the outer part but still on the speaker) I can get a good live sound no matter what (well 97% of the time). I just need to adjust the build in EQ between normal and enhanced for the high mids and then do a simple room adjustment on the board. Never had such a simple guitar sound live. Also I can just hang it in front of the speaker.
If it is set right which is pretty easy compared to a SM57 I feel it does a much better job at translating what comes out of the speaker to the outside.

Anyhow just my 2 cents.

[JJretroTONEGOD]

I moved from cakewalk sonar to pro tools to reaper then to cubase

[Alex]

I have a Terratec Phase X24 (a firewire interface), a Sennheise E906 (I prefer its ease of setup), Beyerdynamic DT770 and Ableteon Live Intro (8).

I like Ableton, it is so different, but fun.

All of the stuff I have is, sadly, criminally underused (except for the headphones). I think I used Ableton more to make some electronic tracks than to ever record anything. Lately I've been thinking it would be best to sell microphone and interface and instead use something like the Laney Ironheart Studio or a POD instead.

[MDV]

Kiichi, not entirely sure what youre getting at. I never said that headphones arent to be used. They have innate drawbacks. They have no stereo field, they are binaural, they $%&# with pressure in the ear due to proximity and being even partially closed on the ear (including for open backs) which affects perceptions of low end and dynamics, and then there are the problems of getting LF out of a headphone at all, because 40hz and 40mm drivers are a problematic combination. HF reproduction for reasons I dont understand is always less linear and often tails off low as well.

Beware advertised specs; unless you see a +/- or - db value on the frequency range, dont trust it. That goes all the time, but with headphones especially.

None of them are absolute problems, insofar as you can hear centre panned in the centre of your head, and the problems they have due to being on your ears are partial, not total (its not like a headphone CANT produce 40 hz, but compare it to good speakers in a treated room ;)).

All are surmountable and need to be taken in balance, with at least an attempt to understand them and their effects.

Fwiw, I use ATHM50s, HD25s and future sonics atrios. I also have some shure E4s that I despise and RS140s that I never use (though I probably should, they do have a use) I'm not shy of headphones.

SM57 - like other things, see if I care. I cant and dont want to tell you what to like. The simple fact of the matter however is that the 57 is the best chance you have of getting a guitar in a mix, and a huge number of legendary guitar sounds have been made with that connecting the air to the electronics. Id be very surprised if the 57 isnt on more records for guitar sound than every other mic put together, and with good reason.

Sometimes I use my 421, or combine the two, sometimes I use 2 57s or my AT4050. I've done distorted guitars with a rode NT1A ffs. Like what you like, use what you want, but unbiased and well founded advice to a neophyte has to be 'get a 57'.

[Kiichi]

I was not trying to disagree with you. It seems I got the tone wrong as it was late at night and I was not exactly fit anymore xD

On the count of monitors and headphones I was not under the impression you are against headphones I just wanted to make the point that for a beginner headphones are probably the easier option as you take the room out of the equation. Of course they have downsides too and you raise great points to be taken into concideration with this.

On the mics I was only voicing my personal views. While I personally dislike the specific character of the SM57 it is not a bad mic by any means and I can certainly work with it. Compared to other mics I just find it a bit harder to place myself as I wanne place it in a way which goes against the mid character it has, again that is just me though. It is the standard for a reason.
The range of sounds and applications you can get out of it is great no doubt and I would have no real issue with using it exclusivly for cabs and other things. Plus this thing would not break if I tried to kill it xD
For most things I just personally prefer the E906 or my 545L, the first especially cause I find it easier to find a placement which suits my ears, which is important to me in live situations when I donīt have the time to tweak the SM57. For the live placement for a sound I can make into something nice with the E906 I need about 10 seconds.
In a studio where you have the time to tweak I would not even put one above the other.

And as I mentioned, but it seems not have brought the point home enough, I too support getting a SM57 as a first mic as it is the standard, therefore you will use it at some point, it is a great and versatile mic and I learned more about positioning from it than from anything else.
I was also praising the E906, yes, but I did not mean to put the SM57 down as it may have appeared.

[GuitarIv]

Woah, lots of responses from you guys, you all seem to be far ahead down the recording road opposed to me who's just starting out :P
I'm a bit overwhelmed and to be honest right now I just wanna tip my toe in the water and start slowly so I can record ideas and demos. So I might just as well get the Focusrite Scarlet Bundle, the mic is a CM25 Condenser Studio Microphone and the Headphones included are HP60 "Closed Ear Professional Studio Headphones" all by Focusrite with Cubase 6 LE. I guess I could just as well snag that deal (everything in the bundle for 140 bucks) and start experimenting before I spend more money on professional you guys have suggested. Opinions?