10 tracks in 5.5 days: now I feel low....

16S

16S

all gods fail...
Apr 14, 2007
931
0
16
Reading, UK
Me and the other guitarist/writer in my band decided at the start of this year to self record a 10 tracker. I am living in Stockholm so he flew out last week and I took 4 days off work. During these days plus the full weekend we tracked 10 songs. Guitars were only double tracked cos there wasn't time for quad. 4 drum tracks had to be written from scratch and also a load of lyrics and vox.
Before we started i was really excited about the whole thing but by the end i was feeling really low and exhausted.
We only just got everything tracked before my mate had to leave for his flight. (Actually i still have some solos to track and samples to create...)
Guess i under-estimated the process. We've done 2 or 3 tracks before over a weekend...
Now i'm left with all the mixing which i can't face at this moment :loco:

Do any of you guys also feel like this sometimes?
 
You know, I have never had that many at once. I do get that "holly fuck so much shit to do with not a lot of time" feeling though. Most of the time I don't get rushed because one of the first things out of my mouth is "I have a day job, I have to pay my bills you get my time when I have time."

Bands generally accept this.
 
I tracked 11 songs in 3 days once. This included programming drums with my drummer but didn't include vocals. It wasn't too much of a problem really cause back then I could quadtrack 7-8 songs in a day (cause I was well-rehearsed).

Basically what we did was:

a) Record guitars for Song 01 to groovy loop.
b) then export it so my drummer could start programming drums on another computer
c) While he was programming I'd quadtrack the guitars for Song 02, Song 03 etc.
d) when he was done programming on Song 01, I'd lay down the bass too (all the gear was always hooked up so I just had to switch from guitar to bass)

By the end of Sunday night we had 11 "playbacks" finished with Drums, Bass, Guitars and Synths/Loops.

Vocals took another 4 days about a month later, where we tracked 2-3 songs per day.

I don't remember the mixing period.
 
16S said:
Do any of you guys also feel like this sometimes?
Click to expand...

When the crunch is on that hard, definitely. I always make sure to explain to bands that rushing is the very worst thing they can do. I'd rather spend 2 weeks in a low/mid level studio than 1 week in a super world-class one. When you start feeling drained every day the creativity suffers, the performances suffer and the overall end product suffers. Nothing worse than turning this great job into a chore.
 
...well in this case it was my own /band project so i guess i only have myself to blame and i always let my friend (the other guitarist) talk me into these things.
vocals was a killer because i am not rehearsing regularly (rest of the band is in the UK) and i was doing 2 -3 songs each day. My voice was fucked in the end.
While i was tracking vox the guitarist was writing drums, while he was laying down some gtrs or bass i was writing lyrics etc , etc...then all change and i would be tracking my gtrs, bass etc...

Plus the day after finishing, Terrorizer magazine wanted one of the tracks for their CD so i had to do a "quick mix" on one of the tracks.

that was a nightmare because all the songs at that point were one big blur to me. I will post a clip of the quick mix so you guys can tell me if i wasted 5.5 days busting my balls for a crock of shite.:lol::erk:
 
Yep. I hate that feeling. Hopefully you'll get passed that and start to get excited about it again. I'm sure you will. Personally, I haven't recorded I band I've been in in quite a while and everyone else is normally really cool about time so I shouldn't complain. :)
 
Sounds familiar :)

When my band was still active (and we were young back then) we rushed into the studio of the place where we rehearsed and did everything by ourselves, tracking, mixing etc. We spent like 16 hours a day there for a few days and it just sucked enormous amounts of dick after a couple days. It's not worth it... everything suffers from it, like your performance, creativity, attention, hearing etc. etc.

Music can't be rushed, it's like an old lady crossing the road... just gotta wait for it.
 
bah its terrible to work on your own music from beginning to end IMO.
i'd rather get a third party into the project to bring a new vision. of course if you can afford it.

i already heard enough of my music by only producing it. you're just tired and I think you spent too much time on this.

make a good break for few days. don't forget that you have to enjoy it. thats why you play music.
 
pifos_2 said:
bah its terrible to work on your own music from beginning to end IMO.
i'd rather get a third party into the project to bring a new vision. of course if you can afford it.

i already heard enough of my music by only producing it. you're just tired and I think you spent too much time on this.

make a good break for few days. don't forget that you have to enjoy it. thats why you play music.
Click to expand...

Definately.. forgot to mention that. This is a big problem for me, no matter how awesome I think my music is while writing it, it always feels mediocre when I'm done with it.
 
I don't think you've wasted your time, but that mix still needs some work.

My ears kinda hurt from all the shrillness, the highs are too trebly. I realize you didn't have much time to fix stuff, and I guess that's why the drums are so extremely mechanical, but I would also advice to rethink about the double bass drumming over certain parts of the song, especially on the solo... it just sounds like a truck that has its engine on "WRRRRRRRR", but this is probably due to the mechanical nature of the drums.

But I would definately try to tame the shrill of the highs first before anything, I think it's gonna change the mix a whole lot.
 
Dude, thanks. I will work on the highs and get them under control. Does the mechanical nature of the drums come from the patterns themselves or more the actual sounds?? The patterns i don't want to work with any more but the sound of the kit i will work with.
 
I couldnt go straight to mixing following the tracking. I needed some time to approach the mix objectively...
 
true ;-) however it probably means you have some time to focus and apply objective creativity as you go. I am still too much of a noob for that...
 
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