Notes on Pre Production 1 - Making a Recording Right From the Get Go !

Here at the Coolest Recording Studio in London Town - we got All kinds of approaches to audio capture & production. One hard & fast rule is to discuss with band & production team - what it is they are after before we even hit the button!

 Making a Record

That old carpenters maxim "measure Twice Cut Once" - also applies in the recording / production world - & How!
There will be sessions where you either can't talk to the producer - or no one really knows where the song is headed sonically speaking - & it's all a bit experimental.
So - Always close mic your instruments - this is just good recording practice - will keep bleed to a minimum, & will provide the producer with a basic, solid background to work with.

To Compress or No? 

Compressing on the way in (at recording stage) is generally frowned upon - for novices or people starting off in the recording world - as it's easy to screw it up.
It's very common practice by seasoned pro's - there's generally light compression on snare, kick & toms - & heavier compression on overheads & ambient mics - But! You gotta really understand your recording environment - & Really understand what your compressors are doing - if in doubt - leave it out!
Get it right - & your recording will be just about production ready after editing.
You'd be amazed at how many recordings were actually "made" by the recording engineer.
Just as common these days is the addition of Overdrive or Distortion - it's an element that can dramatically energise any recording - & works on all instruments & vocals.

You can plug a mic strait into a preamp - & then into a distortion pedal:

Fuzz Zfex

But! - The better way - is to set up a basic recording chain - for instance - put a mic on a snare drum - run it into a mic preamp ( + maybe eq & maybe compression).
Then set up a bus send from the snare channel of your daw (the track you are currently recording) & set the send to approx -7.
Open up a new channel - call it snare distort - & set the Input as the bus you just sent your snare to. On this channel - either open up a distortion plugin (Like THIS free one) - or use your i/o widget to plug into an analog distortion unit - like this one:

Get your musician to play - have a little tweak - record some takes with a lot of overdrive - & record some with hardly any - then see how they sit in the mix. & prepare to be amazed.
Here at Shstudios we have all kinds of odd recording paraphernalia - & most of that would be of the warm analog variety - like this dual mono soft distortion clipper we had built.

Looks creepy - but sounds so ridiculously good it'll make you cry - on drums / vocals / keys & guitars.
Now go forth - & Create something Marvellous!

You can see the studio website HERE .