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haha that guys is awesome!! I could see and watch him do that for awhile I think. Entertaining.

Sounds like we are in full understanding. As for pre-amps, I have a Joe Meek tube box for some color but mostly I prefer my RNP from FMR that I picked up around 5 years ago. Its a nice little Class A preamp that gives an awesomely clean sound (no color) which works great for me to experiment with. I also have the RNC compressor for DI bass should I need it but I usually just skip the comp and keep my levels low with a lot of headroom. I personally haven't tried any of the higher end preamps, other than turning knobs in a music store. and no worries for being long winded.. you should see the last post I made in my "Wish it Away thread" http://forums.songstuff.com/topic/40322-wish-it-away/

Thanks for your explaination Starise.. it is much appreciated. Personally I would not consider workflow and plug-ins etc as part of the sonic quality argument.. but I can also see how it WOULD impact it on application considering how one would use it. I guess because I don't use some of the features you mentioned I wouldn't experience everything. I mostly use "straight up audio recording" with a side of midi. Nothing too fancy, I run a M-Audio Audiophile 24/96 and the 192. One has two stereo RCA in's and outs (and SPDIF) and the latter 8 ins and outs. For me this made a huge impact compared to the on-board Sound Blaster /Realtek type cards as well as a few USB mics. (I won't even use USB headphones anymore as my headphone amp sounds SOO much better coming out of my 24/96). I am also a fan of the outboard presonus strips. I don't really care for the small USB boxes as I have found them to slow and really quiet. (higher latency also)

I suppose I agree with your analogy.. I just have not experienced a dull knife when it comes to a daw. Except for maybe my Tascam 4-track from 1991.. it produced pretty dull recordings LMAO. If I were being very specific, I would akin a dull knife to inferior plug-ins. So.. if you are grouping "bundled plugs" into your thought process I would probably fully agree. Just my own personal thoughts.. on my own personal experiences. Personally, I would not give a sonic advantage to ANY DAW that I have tried. I feel some are better for loops, some midi, some audio, but its just subjective to my workflow. I HAVE noticed big differences when I started using better converters.. just not any DAW specifically. That said.. I'm not too old of a dog to learn new things so if you have a daw that you feel is sonically superior I will certainly enjoy checking it out. ps- I hope I am not coming off combative with my responses.. I am just enjoying getting specific about my experiences and enjoy learning new things.

While I agree with the summary of your post Starise, I want to reiterate something I said earlier. Any of the programs can make quality music. Its easy to get caught up with "this program is better so it will make better music" much like Mac vrs PC. Its like saying you'll be a better painter if you get the nicer paint set. They are all just different "tools" to create music using similar but different approaches. Which is why its important to try a few different programs to see if their "approach" is more inline with how you instinctively like to do things. that is all.. nice post Starise

Glad you liked it man.. and thanks for telling me about that Beatles song. I can see now that when I played it on the acoustic it sounded different. Once I put dirt on it there was no mistake. Good to know and thanks again for helping me out!!

re: the new computer.. just make sure to spend the money on good converters! Don't just plug a cheap USB mic in or send a nice outboard preamp to the STOCK soundcard jack. In my opinion that is the only thing that matters really assuming you get a decent enough computer for usual tasks. I still prefer the internal soundcards over the USB boxes myself but they can both sound good) I still have a PC in my basement from like 1998 running Windows ME that can still run Reaper with zero issues. Granted.. it gets choppy when I get over 12-15 tracks but that thing is like a single core 1.2ghz

honestly I have used extensively many many of them.. and they all work well and can all produce the same quality work. It really just depends on how you prefer to do things. Any of them can make great music. I started in Fruity Loops, then Cakewalk Midi, then Cakewalk Sonor, Cubase for awhile, ProTools and Logic on my friends machines, Ableton and another one that you paint the loops that the name escapes me. I was comfortable and settled into Cubase for a few years until I tried Reaper v2. For me the workflow was the most intuitive for how I like to do things. It was hard giving up Cubase because of how pretty it was and how used to the built in plug-ins I had become. Ease of use won though and I stuck with Reaper. Since then he's (the developer) been continuing improvements and is now up to v4.76 and it runs like a beast. Its by far the lightest running software.. it feels clean and fast. I will say though, the learning curve trying to pick up Reaper as a first DAW would be pretty steep. Its up there with ProTools and Logic and the rest of that sort of DAW as compared to like Garage Band or FL Studio which are more limited and self guiding... all just my opinion though

that's it! Beatles.. I was pretty sure that pre-chorus riff (:51) sounded familiar to me but I couldn't place it so I kept playing it. Do you recall which song? I am happy you enjoyed the chorus part. That's my favorite part too.. this clip here was a result of me finishing up some beer tasting (for science!) and "rocking up" this song that I started a few months ago as a joke: I started playing music with a couple of guys and thought I would bring this song if I could work out the parts. I'll keep spit balling ideas and hopefully finish out the song solidly. Thanks for listening and responding!

mistakes were made

I am off work for a long weekend. I cracked an early beer and felt musical so I made this ditty. I left room for someone to lay down some rap vocals or speech or vocoder or darth maul or anything. Just sharing.......

I don't mind using a capo for this, if I am playing mostly first position chords. The problem with using it while trying to play leads is that you have a different 1st position chord (key) than for leads. This is confusing for me when playing on the fly. Your mileage may vary..

another trick you can use when you are copying into a stereo track to double the guitar.. in addition to nudging one a little bit, you can also use different effects/eqing. For instance, lets say I take my main guitar track and swing it say 40% to the left. Then I will eq and or compress it to get the sound I want. then, I will copy into the second track, and put it at maybe 30 or 50%. Then I may roll off the eq above 4k or 5k to make it sound more dull. Then I may roll off under 500hz to take the bass out. Now I have a thin sounding, middy guitar. THEN I will smash it with a compressor and suck all the life out of it. Then maybe add a little reverb and or delay. Now that I have done all that, I will turn that track down to zero, play the whole song, and slowly bring up the fader until it sits just under the left track at all times. Doing something like this will keep the focus on the left guitar, while still helping make it bigger and more spread. All of that said, I still prefer using two separate takes when at all possible.

I wrote out a pretty long response to a similar question here if you want to read: http://forums.songstuff.com/topic/38547-recording-your-guitar-work/ That said, I am of the camp to always mic electric or acoustic if its going to be for a keep track. If you don't have an electric guitar amp, those plug-ins mentioned can fake it pretty well, just like a nice taylor expression system on an acoustic. At the end of the day though, its never as good as miced. Just my opinion though, your mileage may vary

The problem with the snare is that its so loud, trying to keep both parts of the recording sounding good is difficult. What i mean is, you have two parts to the snare sound. You have the initial CRACK.. then you have the decay sound of the snares coming in and filling out the rest of the hit. So, usually what happens is, you can get the crack to sound good, but then it has no body or umpf to finish out the hit sound, or you get a muddy crack and a nice finish. I have found a combination of techs that together can get there.. or at least close. Performance: Less is more, when you are tracking, focus on NOT using dynamics at all, just play the same volume, semi quiet, and don't change it. Don't get louder or softer on any parts. This goes for all of the drums, not just snare. You got to remember that when we listen to recorded music, it really doesn't have a lot of dynamic range.. especiialy drums. They usually have the exact same volume throughout. That said, if you use dynamics when tracking, it will cause the compressors and gates to react differently.. and that will make the recording vary too much. Some hits will sounds good, others will sound flat. for close micing snare: aim one mic at the batter head aimed at a 45 down towards the head, and facing towards the player. Meaning the mic is pointing at the players, but down at the head. aim a second mic the same way, but UNDER at the snare head. To find the exact sound you like, its usually best to listen in to the feed from another room with headphones one, and have another person move each mic a little to look for a sweet spot. Then mix the two signals on the board with the snare head mic much lower in volume. I usually eq out some low mids around 300-500hz, and I roll the bass off around 100hz or so. Next is compression.. most snares now adays are compressed to hell and back. A lot of them use a technique called "NYCity compression" which means instead of using a compressor on the main snare track, you SEND to another track where you have the compressor. In this track you smash it. As in low/zero attack and fast release, and 10x or more compression. You want to smash down pretty good taking all the dynamics away leaving only a smashed sounding, dull snare hit. Then, you turn the volume all the way down on your compression track until you can't hear it anymore. Then start SLOWLY bringing up your volume so you can start hearing the smashing snare track coming up under the regular snare track. Most times you will still need some LIGHT compression on your main track to keep the volume in check. Keep bringing up the volume until to find the sweet spot. What this does is, it allows you to hear a clean, mostly uncompressed crack, along with a full sounding decay. Instead of what you may be getting now, which is a dull crack and too much sound from the bottom snares. Once you have that, you'll want to use a noise gate to close off the very end of the decay. This will add sharpness to the hits. It will probably be faster for you to google "how to set the gate on a snare" but the important part is to set the timing of the "closing" of the gate to the BPM of the song so the sound of the snare lasts exactly ONE eight note. (or 16th or quarter note depending on the kind of song) hope this helps, good luck

thanks man. I feel I captured a pretty good tone on that one, and more importantly to my earlier point, I use tons of controlled feedback in that song. Something that is almost impossible to do direct in. The bass in that track is direct-in though.. as for the cover, its Alice in Chains off the Dirt album. thanks for listening and enjoying!

no prob at all. Finding tone is hard, but capturing it is a whole nother beast. Another thing about recording straight in the box, is you can't really get good controlled feedback. For instance, listen to this cover I did with a few other efriends just for fun: https://app.box.com/shared/41h8h1c78h I am on everything but lead vox and drums. You can hear my tone and feedback and everything very well so its a good example. I used a 57 into a RNP (Really Nice Preamp) and thats it. I remember trying very hard to make my direct-in track work out, but I couldn't.

what I have seem with screaming/screamers is too much air and pushing. and as Mahir Can Kucuk mentioned, if you hurts its wrong so you should stop. After you've warmed up, try starting with the quietest screaming tone you can make and get louder from there. Sometimes the screaming that we hear as "loud" isnt as loudly produced as we think it is. If you feel tension in your neck increasing stop and start over. You want to keep your neck and throat as relaxed as possible when you're finding your tone. I also suspect that "too much air" is the reason you are having a hard time controlling your pitch.

Sometimes to get quick and dirty, I will look around to see what other comparable acts are doing and I just cherry pick what I see from there lists. Additionally, on acoustic you can pretty much cover anyone nicely so just build sets for the kind of audience. If all else fails, go grab a beer at the venue and bring a pencil to write down what is being played. It really just depends on what you're trying to do with your music. Are you trying to be SUPER accessible to any and everyone, or are you trying to give people a unique flavor. I think you you sit down and make a game plan, the songs will find you

I will add another one on to "its not the key but the range". Range is more of a "how high or low" and key is more of a "do I play the sharp or flat". That said, to help with your question, I would sit down at a piano (or any instrument really) and warm up your voice for a few min. Once you are nice and loose, start in the middle and go down until you hit the bottom, them go back to the middle and go until you hit the top. Once you know your range, you may get what you're looking for by asking "what are song good songs that don't go above "A4" or whatever.

I think.. it really doesn't matter. I think you will be happy with any quality telecaster. Just think of how much you would be willing to spend on one, and go shopping at a few stores. Bring your amp with you, and you can sit in a room and play every tele they have. The right one will find you. There will be one that just has that little something special that will rub you the right way. If it doesn't jump out at you, from the new OR used section, keep looking. You will know it when you play it.

Finger picking can be a little harder than with a pick. As for sound, there is no "best" sound. Think of sound as a color.. just pick the best color for the job. Meaning this, finger picking tends to have less attack therefore will seem a little less bright. Some songs, that may be perfect for, but other songs that may cause you to lose too much focus from the guitar by other instruments. Some songs, a pick will make the guitar compete against the vocals for "front stage".

I love the flexibility that recording straight into the box offers. For writing music and getting Ideas down fast, you can't beat it. That said, I still have never recorded a direct-in guitar that I have kept and liked. It always has that.. tone that I just don't like. All that sweet amp tone that I have grown to love just isn't there. There is some new software out that fakes it pretty well, but it still doesn;t beat out a miced. Electric Guitar and acoustic guitar alike. Bass guitar you can sometimes make it work if the bass piece isn't very melodic. As for micing, for most electric guitar I can usually always fine a nice tone from a 57, 1" from the grill as you've mentioned. I usually set it 1" from the grill, about half way to the side of the speaker, and I aim it towards the dust cap. I have also had fun with a Rodes 1k about 3-4 feet back on a nice dirty bluesy sound and low volume. If I can give any advice, its to start low and work your way up. The best sounds (in my opinion) come from lower volume and less distortion/gain than you would normally want to jam around at. The mic picks up the sounds differently than we do, especially since its listening in from 1". Just start off as low as you can go, and slowly move it up from there. You will get great dynamic sounds I promise.