© 2007 HS Recording

By HS Media

You and your equipment- Dos and donts.
• Do arrive on time and well rested
• Do bring lots of snacks as you will need to keep your energy up.
• Do make sure new strings are played-in.
• Do discuss the session and your goals before you start.
Track laying:We want that ‘live”sound. Yeah, right!  BUT! They take longer because no-one can make a mistake and if you do makes it usually difficult to drop-in afterwards.
When tracking:
• Play with as much energy in each and every take as your body can muster.

• No song needs a triple-harmony guitar solo.
• Be consistent. All choruses (expect maybe the repeats at the end) should sound the same.

• Take frequent breaks. You will be surprised how easy it is to hear a lackluster performance.
• Play to the best of your ability (doh, obviously!) for each take. If you like the take, have a listen to it in the control room. If you think you could play it better, or a section better (and that’s why you should play to a click - consistent timing), play it. Don’t rely on the engineer’s skill to “fix it in the mix”.

Mixing is for mixing, not fixing! Play it until you cannot play it any better.
• When you are done with your parts - don’t put pressure on the next guy in, get out of the way and go and relax. But don’t stand there and pull funny faces!!!
• Don’t chat in the control room. You work there, you relax elsewhere.
• If you are singing, do everything to make yourself comfortable. Jump around. Sing naked holding your bits. Take lots of breaks.
• This is a performance. Don’t be scared.

Mixing:
This is where I have fun and try to squish all your creative juju into a pair of 10 quid speakers bought from Dixon/curry/comets.
• Discuss all song plans before mixing.

• Play cd samples of what you mean.
• Don’t chat incessantly to each other in the control room. It’s distracting and does not allow the engineer to mix.
• Do listen to the mix at different volumes.
• If you have booked proper time, burn a rough mix to cd/mp3 and listen to it in a place you know (car, headphones).
Mastering:
One thing only - Don’t’make the song so loud that it loses all depth or dynamics!!!! All audio equipment has a volume button. They can turn it up!! Listen to Soundgarden’s original release of Superunkown to hear what I mean. It’s not as “loud”as American Idiot or any modern cd, but the music has depth and so has the recording.

Back to Recording Preparation P1. .