Jeff i really really appreciate you taking the time to answer my post point by point, i cant thank you enough.
1- so far we only have two focusrite saffire pro 10i/o (for clean pres). We are planning on buying two good 500 series pre, and the ones i like so far by listening to demos were the ma5s (especially for the price) which is why i mentionned them, but there are plenty of good ones (if you have a recommandation please let me know) . We will also purchase some converters (possibly the aurora) and that will go to a lynx PCI express card. Other than that we have some event monitors and i will purchase a AX7 pair as well.
3- i was planning on tracking a passive pickups -> mark V -> traditionnal recto (stilleto) cabs and an active-> recto -> rectifier oversized cabs for the rythms. I also have a 5150 which i will experiment with. But s you said it is important to keep DI tracks and i will take your advice for sure.
4 and 5- makes sense, i will do that.
One last question i have is about drums. If you were to receive a project for mixing, would you care about accoustic drums. The reason i am asking is i am not sure wether it would be worth it tracking the accoustic especially since we dont have the best pres for that like some APIs that would cost us way too much if we need around 16 tracks.. I dont see a way we could compete with samples recorded at a professionnal studio with expensive gear..
Should i still do that maybe so that the person mixing might be interested in having them to perhaps merge it with samples instead of replacing completely?
The other way is we can track midi with our drummers electronic drums as well (dm5). The reason i am asking is if we were to replace all the drums do we still have a chance of having "our own sound"? this is a concept i am new to and i honstly dont even know if its legal to release an lbum with samples of drums that arent ours? im sorry if thats a really noob question i just dont know how it goes as i am still new to all of this..
Thanks again
No worries dude, maybe my kindness will influence your project in my direction for the mix!
1. The Saffire Pro pres are pretty solid as far as "general" pres, good enough to put on hats/ride/rooms/toms, kick/snare if those are going to be heavily sample augmented as well. The Avedis looks cool, but I would personally go with either a pair of API 512's or a 512 and a Great River - that way you either get a stereo set of API pres, or an API and a Neve, which would be awesome for variation. That's actually the setup I have with my SCA preamps at the moment, one API channel and one Neve channel.
2. Those gtr chains sound fine - I might recommend going with the Oversized cab over the Stilletto and just leaving the mics on the cab but changing heads, but that's a matter of taste/laziness/consistency.
As far as recording acoustic drums to be sample replaced/augment later or programming/playing through a midi kit, I REALLY prefer working with real drums when possible, and I believe the end result is usually better if the mic selection is good and the source isn't terrible. With as many pres as you have (20? maybe 22?), it makes no sense to not track acoustic drums, given that you have enough 57's or whatever for the kit and a decent pair of OH mics, as well as some mics for hat/ride and rooms.
It's not illegal to use samples on releases, though, given you've paid for them. Even with a sampler like Superior 2.0 or the SSD-Kontakt based kits, part of the price you pay is the right to use it in productions.
Oh one more thinsg since you asked about clean pres. I am planning on purchasing an RME babyface when its out for my home studio (im buidling this so i can write music at home when its really late and dont feel like driving to the rehearsal space haha) so maybe we can use it instead of the focusrite for the clean pres.
Just to make sure i understand though you mentionned them just for DI tracks right? which means we should track all the rest except for the drums with the avedis.. Or should we avoid having that much colouration for all the instruments? (mainly im thinking guitars vox and bass amp)
One last bass question:
i noticed that most people around here record bass only with DI, does that mean it is better than tracking a bass amp as well? or is it just because of practicallity that people do it?
Aslo our bassist has a 4X10 cab and a 1X15. I heard from people that we shouldnt track the 15" speaker as it is not very uisable for our style (prog metal) do you agree with that?
Sorry about all the questions..
You'd want to track guitar DI's with either the best pre's you have or the ones that are the least 'colored' - for instance, I'd take a Neve over a Mackie pre, but I'd take an API over a Neve pre, since the API has qualities that lend itself well to DI tracking (fast transient response, overall tight, clean sound). Bass, vocals, and mic'd guitar amps can benefit from some preamp coloration.
My bassist actually runs the same 4x10 + 1x15 combo, but for a very different style. From my experience micing up his stack, I'd agree that the 1x15 would be sort of useless in a prog metal scenario, at least for me. Some speaker movement can really help with bass, especially if he has a nice head, but it's not as necessary as with guitars. I'd track with mics thrown up on his amp, but definitely include the DI, just like with guitars.
