Bands always requesting to track live. Why!!!

[if6was9]

Seems to me that half or more of the bands I get contacted about recording think it's a great idea to record live.

Many of them think it's a great way to get more songs recorded for less money. I've had a few disastrous sessions where bands tried to cram as much as possible and end up sacrificing quality takes for more songs and run out time. Often they end up ditching these extra songs at some stage as they're not good enough.

And one I often hear is "we want to record live so it sounds raw, but still sounds really good". I find I get this a lot from inexperienced bands and bands who are either lazy not not really ready for the studio. They don't want to have their parts scrutinised on their own as aren't really sure of what they're playing or know they can't play it well enough. Pointless as it everything will have to pass quality control at some stage and instead the whole band will have to redo the take.

Seems to me many bands aren't ready to separate their "live" experience from their studio one and try to force the studio experience to be more like a live gig.

Now, I'm all up for recording a band live and have done it several times with varying levels of success but I think it requires even more time and be more difficult for a band, especially metal bands, to pull off and sound good. Timing errors, tuning problems, mistakes and just general untightness all add up. Your band better have your shit together if you want to gonna sound good.

Also means good mics, pre's and such can't pull double duty too.

 

[Jordon]

I get it a lot too. I usually let them book a day and run them through their paces. 9 times out of 10, they end up saying "fuck it," and decide to record things separately, but every once in a while.....Every once in a while, it can work out, but fucking rarely.

 

[aviel]

i think that its much more natural and musical to record live. you can get much more feel to the song and it could bring up some good bonding to the music. BUT it will require the band to be super tight, with lot of experience, and amazingly trained for this stuff. also i guess it will be much more demanding and chanllenging for the sound engineer to capture everything as good as possible.

 

[drew_drummer]

Depends on the band I'd say. The few times I've done it, it worked well, but there again, I only record one band!

 

[MotherEel]

You better not be telling stoner bands to do anything but record live.

 

[LBTM]

headphones, DI guitars, triggers, vocal mics facing away from the drums and it will be fine.
try to get them play with a click track also if possible.

they rehearse together so it's logical if they ask to record together, isn't it?

 

[schwinginbatman]

The only thing is that you'll probably end up having to fix a lot of it anyway, unless the band you're recording is really quite good. So essentially, rather than bypassing that part like most bands want to do, they just end up delaying it. For metal, I prefer to take it one instrument at a time, so that things are easily controlled, which again, with most bands you'll have to do regardless. But with blues or jazz, or like MotherEel said, stoner bands, definitely live.

 

[LBTM]

Here's a stoner band recorded live (not by me): blackdroid.bandcamp.com
It sounds pretty good for the style.

No samples, lot's of bleed, audix on kick, 57 snare and floor tom, 451s OHs, sm59 guitar, cx212 bass.

 

[colton]

that's how these guys record (more about the process is included with the actual DVD):

but they practice a shit ton together and it's part of their philosophy as a band.

 

[if6was9]

As I stated in the Op, it's bands that really aren't up to the task that are asking me all the time. I have recorded plenty of bands live to know that to pull it off with good results you need to have your shit together, even more so than when tracking one at a time. I know it can work well but I think we can all agree that most bands don't have the skill and are honed enough to do it well.

 

[LBTM]

So:

a) record them anyway risking bad reputation.
b) record only bands that can play their shit.
c) re-record the instruments yourself and tell them "i fixed it in the mix".

i've done that last one a few times and nobody noticed. people don't know what mixing really is lol.

 

[vondano]

So:

a) record them anyway risking bad reputation.
b) record only bands that can play their shit.
c) re-record the instruments yourself and tell them "i fixed it in the mix".

i've done that last one a few times and nobody noticed. people don't know what mixing really is lol.

LOL

c is awesome

 

[if6was9]

I'm not really asking for advice on what to do, I'm trying to get a conversation going no why this is such a big thing with bands. I've played in bands for the last 10 years and we've never felt like recording live was a must as SO many bands seem to.
I'm also a live sound engineer to pay the bills so I guess I see a lot more bands live than most guys here would, I'd say 1 in every 40 bands I see would be capable of making a decent live record.

 

[LBTM]

yeah, i'm continuing the conversation, not trying to end it

even me, that know the benefits of recording separately, when i was the drummer of a band i was always recording us together playing in the same room live. it's the perspective each band has on how they want to sound. for most bands i get i insist on recording separately but most of the times the vibe turns out wrong so i have to take extra time to set up the equipment in the best condition and get them the best headphone mixes i can to get the best performance out of them in a live environment. and 4/5 times it turns out great. maybe not with the first take. they need time to get used to the studio/headphones/feeling of being recorded. let them rehearse in the studio for 30 mins and then record the first take. let them get comfortable and it can work well, maybe better than what they would record separately. it doesn't need to be perfectly in tempo or have static dynamics. let them record as a band. what they would like to record, not at industry standards.

 

[JeffTD]

It's easy to see why this is a thing with bands.

1. It's how records used to be made.
2. It's way cheaper and less time-consuming than individual tracking.
3. They're in a goddamn band - the whole point of being in a band is to play music WITH other people.

If a band could track live and get as tight a performance as individual tracking then I would 100% want to do that every single time, anyways.

 

[Grå Värld]

Bands I have been in have tracked live because we wanted to record a lot songs (grindcore 20 songs) and doing it with individual tracking was more expensive. However the live recording has a live vibe eg guitar feedback, tempo shifts, dynamics BUT there are mistakes eg bum notes, fluffed drum fills and a thinner guitar tone. It really depends on the bands genre. When we tracked seperately our next album it sounded huge but sterile. Playing live to tape takes discipline and tightness that totally benefits your live show too. The other thing is that I think releasing 4 well recorded tracks is better than trying to release a live to tape album as people download stuff rather than buy a CD. Lots of rehearsal studios offer the ability to record a rehearsal so bands should do that and see if that sound is what they want or something more polished.

 

[LBTM]

Lots of rehearsal studios offer the ability to record a rehearsal

i don't know what's going where you live but here rehearsal studios is a joke. i haven't ever heard a decent sounding track recorded on a rehearsal studio. they use cheap mixing desks recording to audacity and market it as "professional hi-quality recordings".

 

[Grå Värld]

i don't know what's going where you live but here rehearsal studios is a joke. i haven't ever heard a decent sounding track recorded on a rehearsal studio. they use cheap mixing desks recording to audacity and market it as "professional hi-quality recordings".

Was not meaning to imply that rehearsal recordings are quality but a band that is considering recording live needs to hear a rehearsal recording of themselves to see if that is the sound they want. If it is then recording live with a few more mics and overdubing vocals maybe an option.

Another reason I think for bands wanting to record live is that the project get done quicker (depending on the time spent mixing). Heartless are a band that recorded live their first 7" and then tracked seperately Hell is other people. Have a listen and judge for yourself which one sounds better

http://heartless.bandcamp.com/

 

[if6was9]

See that's my main gripe with it, that bands try record live because they're trying to do tons of songs in a little amount of time. The main request I get off bands looking to record live is "we want to do an album, we want to record it live but it still has to sound great. We can only afford 2 days"

Bands used to record live, but they used to still go to the studio for a few weeks to do it right. This is something I've no problem with, as they are spending time getting good tones, and doing lots of takes to get the right one.

I've taken the work in the past but whats the point of doing something that's just full of stress and doesn't come out sounding as good as it could have.

 

[LBTM]

Guys, recording's a bitch... Let's deal with it.