Where do you draw the line on editing?

[JasinElric]

+1 to Jeff

Don't split hairs if you're the guy in the chair. If some assclowns want to sound better on a recording than they do live, that's on them. An AE's task is to do the best they can with all the resources and techniques available to them. I would just keep the band in the loop as much as possible about what I'm up to.

Also, Metal is just about as fake as Pop music at this point in history, why is this even an issue? It's getting to a point where guitars, bass and drums are edited so tighly they sound like VSTis, making it difficult for me to even tell the difference between fake instruments and real ones. I'm certain the general music listener can't tell the difference at all.


I didn't even think #1 was an option. That's hysterical.

 

[Machinated]

Do you guys think it's fucked up that we tune between takes? I mean, if you really played the song all the way through the last chords should be slightly out of tune, right?

not to mention tuning between different shaped chords......

the answer to the question is basically a decision producers are paid to make.

 

[Josh Burgess]

My view on it from the producer's chair: Who gives a shit if it's cheating? Sometimes you have crappy singers and drummers and need to produce professional results. If you're the type who's going to be a stickler on things being super super natural then you're probably in the wrong genre to begin with (you're going to forgive BOO on these techniques? I get the comparison but I personally have done 4/6 for them and know that they've done 1, 2, 3, and 5 on records.). On any given session I probably do at least 2 if not all 6 of those things. At a certain point you just need to get your job done.

My view on it as a guitarist/musician: Mostly agreed, but that's also part of why I haven't been in a band myself in years.

I don't know about BOO, but that new solo song by Lee McKinney sounded extremely, extremely edited. The leads sounded super synthy... like the whole one note at a time style of tracking...

 

[scorpio01169]

1: Recording parts slowly and then speeding them up. Nope
2: Punching in frequently/recording a couple of bars at a time. Only if the take was great up to a certain point, but if I feel I can do the whole take better, then that's first.
3: Blending multiple takes with playlists or similar. DON'T KNOW WHAT THIS MEANS EITHER
4: Quantizing drums/guitars to tighten them up. Not for my projects. real and real time drums.
5: Auto-tuning vocals. Never, My singers will do it till it's right
6: Copying and pasting parts. Never.
Since I'm running a hybrid system and try to run it as close to analog tape as possible, editing tricks are minimal for me.

 

[crillemannen]

I really think some producers out there is pushing it though, when guitars are starting to sound like machines and everything from riffs to solo's sound like they've been recorded note for note is not good in my opinion. It should all be done modest and tasteful not over do it.

 

[JeffTD]

I don't know about BOO, but that new solo song by Lee McKinney sounded extremely, extremely edited. The leads sounded super synthy... like the whole one note at a time style of tracking...

Totally, guy sucks and is incapable of playing his own tracks - watch any live video of this band and you'll see that Cameron (drummer, writer, synths/programming) is the reason they sound the way they do.

 

[Random3]

I'll clarify, by blending multiple takes with playlists I basically mean comping... I couldn't remember the word earlier. It's so common I almost didn't write it down, but I was trying to think of any editing process that alters or cleans up the original performance.

 

[egan.]

Different styles require different standards. My only hard line in the sand is when the editing becomes the majority of the work and is more influential on the sound than the player. Obviously electronic elements are a separate thing. Basically my line is where hyperreal stops and unreal begins.

 

[indecizo]

This is 2015 OP. Just think about that for a minute.

 

[Mago]

Mago mentioned Photoshop, which is funny because I feel like modern production is like Photoshop for music. People don't want their records to sound just like a live performances (an unprocessed pictures), they want it to sound like the ideal version of the song, a song that sounds "magical" in the sense that it is, for better or worse, better than otherwise possible (the filtered, edited picture).

Oh yeah, it most certainly is!

Although it's a different way of working, even if it has a lot of similarities.
Like recording the same part a couple of times, that's like looking for the best framing/composure of the picture.

But it's hard work to make a potato look like a supermodel

If you have a good performance/model/scenery, a well composed song/picture then you're just gonna enhance what's already there by editing it.

You can slap a filter on any picture in instagram, but if its a shitty picture then in the end it's just a shitty picture with a filter and fx on it. Same with bad songs and bad performances.



Personally I don't enjoy editing. At all. I get so fucking bored while having to move the 0s and 1s around it's not even funny.
But it has a place in metal music that serves most types of band in a good way, also when they are great performers to begin with.
For the type of music I dig the most I like the editing to sound as natural as possible, even if mechanical type of editing can have its place as well.
But personally I prefer to listen to full on electronic music if I want to listen to that kind of stuff.

To the point that was mentioned, what if the music is good but the composer can't play well enough to pull it off? Song is king etc...
In the ideal case you'd hire someone with better skills to record it for you (Mozart and the likes also had to have their stuff played by lots of other players).
It's when theres awesome songs and no budget to hire session musicians when these types of tools come in handy. You can create something potentially great that wouldn't be possible otherwise. As any tool, it can be used and abused. That's just the way the world works

 

[JeffTD]

I like the photo analogy but remember that it's totally possible and often the case for pictures of something to look better than the real thing just by proper framing, exposure, etc - nothing to do with post processing or editing.

What I mean is that a well recorded take in the right context can often sound better than the real thing would live before editing even happens.

 

[Vice//Versa]

I like the photo analogy but remember that it's totally possible and often the case for pictures of something to look better than the real thing just by proper framing, exposure, etc - nothing to do with post processing or editing.

What I mean is that a well recorded take in the right context can often sound better than the real thing would live before editing even happens.

I totally agree. The ultimate goal is capturing a "performance" rather than just a take. I think this is the reason we collectively, as listeners, feel strongly bout having humans play instruments; any VI can play notes accurately, but only a talented player can make a composition sound like more than just the sum of its notes (slightly strange analogy).

 

[JeffTD]

I totally agree. The ultimate goal is capturing a "performance" rather than just a take. I think this is the reason we collectively, as listeners, feel strongly bout having humans play instruments; any VI can play notes accurately, but only a talented player can make a composition sound like more than just the sum of its notes (slightly strange analogy).

Yup, pretty much +1 to all of this. side note - where in CA are you, man?

That said as much as I want every band to be Sylosis and strive for insane performances and no edits, it's just not possible with most bands, and if you're trying to make a living out of it and produce professional results on a regular basis then you just have to fucking get the thing done some times, you know? That's really what it comes down to - I absolutely love, adore, and appreciate good, natural sounding productions but I also am not always given a good hand to play with.

Sometimes you have to cheat to get good results when you don't have something good to start from, and nobody is going to listen to a shitty production and go "oh okay I'm sure the mixer is great and just had a shitty band to deal with."

 

[Vice//Versa]

I live up in Ridgecrest, trying to decide were to transfer for over next semester. Lets just say there's not a whole lot of clients here. For some reason I though were from Ventura and not LA.

What you said about that sort of organic metal productions kinda reminded me of Nolly's attitude towards recording Project Ghost. I know mixing engineers weren't as accessible back in the day, meaning more shitty bands were naturally filtered, but I have no idea how they managed to salvage material the way we get to with slip editing, quantization, and pitch correction, and fucking magic. I also feel like it would be nice to have an audience that didn't carry all this misconceptions about autotune and the recording process TBH.

 

[LeSedna]

I don't care about the technique used but whenever the artist is actively hiding the performance was edited, or claims it is not, angers me. That Lanne Guy from this Rign Of Saturn bullshit annoys me because as much as he technically can play, he is not better than many many other guitarists in the world. They got their buzz for the sole reason their music is edited to a point where it sounds like godlike performances and people are buying it. Hell on his supposedly real guitar playing videos you can see his hand moving an unnatural way, which is probably some "+10%" speed setting on the video editing software or something. There is this video of a clean guitar song which he pretends to play on video, while this is obviously VST, you can even hear machinegun notes. Someone mentioned this is actually direct from GP6 with a few selected RSE instruments, yet the guy will deny it. That is when it annoys me. And the worst and bottom part of it, is that is their way of getting attention, as their music otherwise lacks imagination, in all honesty. Whenever you see a live of them, sure they can play, they are skilled, but nothing out of the absolute extraordinary anymore and they sound like any random duo of shredders playing atonal riffs because it is easier than composing a very very good and inspired harmony. The whole problem is not the process but that musicianship is given credit for this extra tightness.

A good example would be between the buried and me. They do edit takes, but just the right amount. They can definitely play live. Although recorded in several part, their latest studio live video is impressive.

The only one I feel bad about is recording at half speed. At least comping or recording pieces of the performance will either way be the result of an actual human playing the music. That is in the assumption of a band recording instrumental based music, that wouldn't apply to someone trying to experiment through electronic, heavy edited, experimental or ambient music where he sky is the limit.

Another thing is, the better the material is in itself, the least it needs editing to sound good. 99% of those current over edited prog-my-ass bands get attention only because the production pushes them forward. Take any of them, put them with a single amp each, record a more traditional way (normal editing, normal comping), and put this online : they will never get the same audience. The problem for me is not the actual process of producing, it is that the final result is not an image of the band itself when it is overproduced. And my problem is when people don't ackowledge that. Very very few will go on and say "yes in fact I'm doing this project just so the songs sound good and I used tricks to get there, I thought my direct recording takes don't give me that aesthetic I am after. And yes this backing track here is just so the live performance sounds cool". I would be okay with that. So I'd rather listen to someone going over the top with that in a creative way than listening to people who wanna be legends but are as good as the next shredder in line. Especially when it shows any "music"-ianship.

That's why people like Ola, Merrow, have success. They show musicianship and sound good as is. Yet they edit themselves when needed. I'm 100% fine with any editing which I would describe as the eraser of a painter. At the end you're trying to release a final product. Live is different. But if it doesn't have the inherent qualities of your own craft skills, the credit should go to the tool which did the tools for you, because it gave more of itself than you did.

I personnaly don't feel a big problem about tuning in between takes. I kind of have one with tuning myself between chord shapes but I try to limit it to chords played high in the fretboard because I feel this might more be of a problem with the guitar setting, as some guitars sound pretty much in tune even up there from what I can see generally speaking. I'm curious wether the ever tune bridge helps this in any way ?

The photo analogy is always good. It's in fact the same thing : processed applied to waves of different length across the range the human body can process. Curves are nothing else than EQing along the wavelength frequency span. Good editing software will allow you to even draw the curves for all layers of colours. Then of course things differ, but applying a filter is the same as applying processing on audio. Capturing a perfect photo is like recording a perfect take : it will need less editing or post processing. Choosing your microphone is like choosing your lense. Your camera is your AD converter. Your screen is your headphone. Photoshop is your ProTools. And just like in audio : shit in is shit out, if you burnt your picture, it's because you overloaded your sensor = you clipped your input and you can't get back the lost information. A bad camera won't give you a technically good picture. A good photographer however will make memorable pictures out of it just like Ola makes any guitar sound good on his videos. This is no different than audio in this aspect and in the same regard, I think intelligent photoshopping is possible even using all kind of techniques. But it annoys me when it is obviously going to a point when credit should be given to the editing and not the original material anymore. And in the same aspect, over the top Photoshop is cool when used creatively. Ring of Saturn would be, maybe, some already quite muscular guy photoshopping his muscles to make them look so special and he gets credit for that.

 

[sander]

Music is not sport. There is no such thing as cheating.

 

[Random3]

LeSedna I agree with basically all of that, although I still need to see BTBAM's studio video. From what I have seen though, they are tight as hell.

Music is not sport. There is no such thing as cheating.

I agree that it is not a sport, and you cannot categorically state that one piece of music is better than another. I do think however that mediocre musicians using recording tricks to sound like godlike, and then denying that they ever used any trickery would be considered cheating.

If you are presenting a finished product that, say, was recorded at half speed and then sped up in editing, if it sounds good then great, you have made a song that sounds good. If you then deny that you did this then you are deceiving the listener by claiming that your product is something that it is not.

It would almost be like if X pop singer denied using auto tune or lip-syncing, but the difference here is that we are talking about a genre that almost always requires and showcases a level of technical proficiency. If you are pretending to be better than you are in a genre full of people who are actually as talented as you are pretending to be, you are going to get called out regardless of whether your recordings sound good as a product.

 

[JeffTD]

Music is not sport. There is no such thing as cheating.

Can you qualify this statement?

cheat
CHēt/Submit
verb
gerund or present participle: cheating
1.
act dishonestly or unfairly in order to gain an advantage, especially in a game or examination.

Of COURSE there is such thing as cheating in music.

Business is not sport; is there still no cheating there? How about School? I definitely cheated there but I was never involved in sports. Monogamy isn't a sport - are you saying cheating in a relationship is impossible?

 

[Mago]

I like the photo analogy but remember that it's totally possible and often the case for pictures of something to look better than the real thing just by proper framing, exposure, etc - nothing to do with post processing or editing.

What I mean is that a well recorded take in the right context can often sound better than the real thing would live before editing even happens.

Yeah that's true, but the source still has to be interesting to lead to an interesting photo imo...same for getting the "right" take.
Totally see where you're going with leaving editing/fx out of the picture (oh how punny) though!


No hard lines anywhere here!

 

[Heabow]

I didn't read all the post. Most of 'crazy editing' projects I worked on were about "fixing" stuff as opposed to optimizing them because the musicians were really bad and some of them were so bad that it was even a pain in the ass to make them play riff by riff or part by part (simply mentionning note by note recording would cause heart attack to them I guess). And the result is not good of course especially when the music calls for a natural vibe. But editing as fuck when musicians know how to play their shit is absolutely not a problem if the music needs it. When I record myself I am ready to record so all the editing I need to do on my tracks is to crossfade parts that have been recorded separately and clean. But I think it's way easier to record when you drive the DAW and know what you're looking for - I am better (and picky) when I record alone.