Tight guitar tracks- recorded riff by riff?

[jamesboyd]

Hey all,

Been practicing getting my rhythm recording chops up and realised how crap I really am :hotjump:

I know guitarists like dino cazares would even just record the riff perfectly once and the copy and paste, but what about other tight players-loomis, adam.d, meshuggah etc

is it common practice to just record songs one riff at a time?

I personally try and just play the whole song through, but that usually involves a few compromises in doing so.

thoughts? is it crap to cheat? etc

 

[DIOBOLIC5150]

Hey all,

Been practicing getting my rhythm recording chops up and realised how crap I really am :hotjump:

I know guitarists like dino cazares would even just record the riff perfectly once and the copy and paste, but what about other tight players-loomis, adam.d, meshuggah etc

is it common practice to just record songs one riff at a time?

I personally try and just play the whole song through, but that usually involves a few compromises in doing so.

thoughts? is it crap to cheat? etc

I think "cut and paste" is lame. I always do my guitar tracks in one take, and I never punch in. If I can't play it straight through after several tries, I shouldn't have wrote it to be so complicated...
It's great practice to do it over and over and it makes you a better player in the long-run.

 

[Cooperman]

I don't cut and paste but I will punch in and out to fix something. I'll record a whole take of the track and then go back and fix whatever needs fixing. I can't be bothered re-recording a whole take if there's only one or two bad notes.

 

[Andy Sneap]

I tend to get it a section at a time. Mainly so the tuning stays exactly the same for the four tracks. If I can cut and paste, I'll do that also, the guitarist could sit there and do it again, but whats the point??? If you've got it perfect, why do it again.

 

[Nostalgiaplatz]

This is quite an interesting question! I've tried both ways - recording the whole guitar lines straight and the copy/paste approach, but... for the second case, it sounds weird in the passages from one riff to another (or the repetition of the same) there're a few "sound glitches" if I can describe them that way. Is there any sort of fix? Cuz, I do prefer having sequence of riffs, as it saves some time when trying to make the song better played. I know I should record the song entirely at *one take*, but it's too time consuming ^_^

Thanks for any sugestions/tips

 

[2dark]

I always try to get each track done as one take, and then just punch in/out on the
parts that didn't went well.
Since I have to play those stuff live, I should get it done. Doesn't work all the time,
but that's what I go for.
On bad days I do also riff by riff, and usually on the next day I hate it and I do it again in one take.

morningstar:
from what I understand is that you hear 'clicks' between each take?
That would mean you should take a look at the crossfades between those takes.

 

[Hopkins-WitchfinderGeneral]

This is quite an interesting question! I've tried both ways - recording the whole guitar lines straight and the copy/paste approach, but... for the second case, it sounds weird in the passages from one riff to another (or the repetition of the same) there're a few "sound glitches" if I can describe them that way. Is there any sort of fix? Cuz, I do prefer having sequence of riffs, as it saves some time when trying to make the song better played. I know I should record the song entirely at *one take*, but it's too time consuming ^_^

Thanks for any sugestions/tips

You want to edit the beginning and end of every individual "take" very carefully to smooth the transistion over. I always spend about 30mins to an hour doing this after recording a guitar to make it all fit so there are no sudden volume swells/clicks etc when one part changes over to the next.

I go with Andy on this one, you just can't get it perfect doing it all in one go so you have to break it down into smaller sections.

Sometimes it helps to not break it down into individual riffs but rather sections, say 3 riffs at a time.

So first off you'd play INTRO>VERSE>CHORUS then cut out and do the next part, whatever that happens to be and then edit the transistions together so it sounds like one contiguous audio file instead of the audio equivilent of ministroni soup.

 

[Hopkins-WitchfinderGeneral]

morningstar:
from what I understand is that you hear 'clicks' between each take?
That would mean you should take a look at the crossfades between those takes.

Exactly, all sound "swells" somewhat in volume... meaning you can get away wioth clever and precise crossfading to make it sound like one track when it gets mixed down.

 

[2dark]

happens when you cut takes not at the zero-crossing the wave
(I hope that's the correct english word for that).
Depending on the software you use, you can get avoid this
by setting this somewhere as a default in the preferences.

 

[Nostalgiaplatz]

Oh. Thanks! I think I've seen 'crossfade' somewhere in the menus of cubase, but I'm not sure about what it is or stands for, through I've a little idea. Could you point me the section of cubase's help or any other source to check this out?

Thank you very much!

 

[dayve]

Aye a short crossfade should sort this out well enough.

This is another "it depends" situation I think. If you have a guitarist who's playing is a bit dodgy, then cut and paiste is probably best, if they are a bit better then they can do it section by section, or if they are a bit better again they can do the whole song at once. All are valid ways of doing it, it just depends what is the quickest and easiest. There's no point in re-recording the whole song if there's only one dodgy moment, if that take took half an hour to get in the first place, but if the guitarist is good enough then it's probably better to do the whole song again, because what you have just played, and what is coming up effects how you play, and it sounds a whole lot more natural. Although I do like the mechanical sound bands like Fear Factory achieve with cut and paiste, but it only suits certain styles IMO. Anyone know how much cut and paiste goes on in Meshuggah???

Since moving onto protools from cubase about 8 months ago I've not used clicks at all, cos I hate them. I tend not to copy and paiste if I can possibly avoid it, as it tends to sound a bit naff, and time stretching every riff bar by bar, or even 1/4 by 1/4 if the other musicians groove a bit differently is horribly boring!

 

[ThomasT]

I like playing my bass in one pass. Sometimes I only correct some litte parts.

I did all variant with other musicians depending on the time and their skills.
So once a song is played on the first take, sometimes I record not riff for riff but notes for notes! I remember a simple riff of the last session of my own band E-D-C-A each note are two takts with 16ths. The guitar player had problems to play the C-A (first fret low H string to 5ths fret on E string). He always swallowed the last 16th of Cs or the first of As. So we stopped after E-D-C and start again on A. Or he had difficulties to start with the 16th on an other song after a slower part. So I played the part before, he starts playing the 16th during this part and I punched in when the real 16th parts starts. Perfect. And much faster than to try it again and again.

And most of the problem are often on very simple part which are playable with 3 promille of alcohol in blood whereas complicated parts are done on the first take...

 

[Frank'nfurter]

Hehehehe.... yeah, unbelivable but true.
I had to do this note by note procedure at a guitar solo in the past.

 

[egan.]

The guitar player had problems to play the C-A (first fret low H string to 5ths fret on E string).

Haven't been in music class in a while, but which one is the low H string? haha

 

[SickBoy]

Haven't been in music class in a while, but which one is the low H string? haha

Nothing to laugh about, it's just a different name for what's usually called a B string or note in Anglic literature. I suppose the notation with H comes from Germany and it's in use in my country too...

 

[ThomasT]

Nothing to laugh about, it's just a different name for what's usually called a B string or note in Anglic literature. I suppose the notation with H comes from Germany and it's in use in my country too...

Right. My Mistake. Because I call our Tuning "Head-Tuning": H, E, A, D, (F#, h)

FYI: there is also a B in german. It's the tone B flat...confusing, isn't it?

H == B
B == Bb

Btw. would be interressting to know why this is different.

 

[Hopkins-WitchfinderGeneral]

Stupid germans.

 

[Impy]

It's the same here in sweden, atleast that's what they taught me back when i took bass lessons

 

[jamesboyd]

well it is kinda cheating but honestly I can't stay 'in the pocket' enough for 3-5 mins without fucking up, so I'm gonna give it a whirl

if I want to do it riff by riff in pro tools what's the best way of doing it without click and pops etc?

I mean it's easy to do if you just use say two different tracks and then just do the fades at the start and end of your different sections but if you're doing 4 rhythm tracks and you've got 2 mics on the cab then you'll end up with 16 tracks this way

oh and on meshuggah's 'I' they would of cut and pasted a lot!!
in fact I heard that a lot of 'nothing' was done that way as well!


peace

-j

 

[2dark]

Oh. Thanks! I think I've seen 'crossfade' somewhere in the menus of cubase, but I'm not sure about what it is or stands for, through I've a little idea. Could you point me the section of cubase's help or any other source to check this out?

Thank you very much!

Sorry. I don't have Cubase. I use Nuendo, but maybe the menu structure
is the same:
File->Preferences->Editing->Audio and activate 'Snap to Zero Crossing'

or do a search for 'zero crossing' in the help files


I almost forgot:
I did a bar by bar kinda thing on a solo.
Because I didn't had any clue on what the hell I should play and live
it has been always different. So I started playing until it sucked and punched in, playing, punch-in, playing, ...