A question for alldat, DBF and other home-recording types...

Let's pretend I had a handful of songs in my head or scratched on miscellaneous paper scraps in my sock drawer. They're arranged and ready to be recorded. Where would you recommend I start with that process? What type of equipment do you think is absolutely necessary? What if I only have one guitar? I've seen apps for my phone but they make demos from the 80's sound remastered by Cliffy.

It just depends on what you feel comfortable working with. I used a "band in a box" type unit that is portable but kind of big. Those will give you plenty of usable tools for in home recording. But, if you need drum tracks from loops or from a drummer friend online, it is going to be hard to complete this project.

A computer with recording software might be your best bet. You will need a program to start working with like Audacity (free) or get a Mac that has GarageBand built into it. Both of these are great programs. You will also need to buy an interface (like an M-Audio unit at Musician's Friend for example). This will allow you to hook the guitar into the computer and play straight to the tracks you are recording.

You will need to buy a bass at some point, or get your bass playing friends online (like me and DBF) to help you with those tracks. Both of us work really cheap. I have done tracks for Incarnate, as part of Walk On Water on the Deliverance tribute album, and a few songs for Liberty N Justice. The only compensation I have ever asked was for credit to be given for my work. That's it.

With the computer based recording, you will either need to learn to program drum tracks with loops (something I know nothing about) or find a drummer friend with recording capabilities. You don't need that at first. You can start building your songs with a click track set and record to that. This will keep your music in time and make it easy for a drummer to record later. However, if you feel that you need the drums to record, I would get some good loops and play to those. You can always record live drums later.

As far as cost, I couldn't even begin to speculate. I put my studio together over a couple of years and spent nearly $3000 for the Korg D-3200 recorder, Yamaha electric drums, my POD Line 6 unit for guitar, my V-Amp for bass, and two condenser mics for vocals. I don't want to scare you off from making your studio (computerized or equipment based like mine), but you are going to have to spend some money. The beautiful thing is that you don't have to keep spending that money for studio costs when you want do another project. A good studio will cost you that much or more to record a single album. It will cost even more if you have to hire musicians and a musician. Being a musician ain't cheap!!!

As Alldat mentioned, GarageBand (comes free with a Mac) is what I use for basic recording. Some of the things I can do are:
- program the drums, either by looping the pre-fab ones, or dragging and dropping each drum/cymbal hit onto the score
- program keyboards, again, by dragging notes onto the score, and choosing the keyboard sound
- program the bass in the same way; of course, a real bass is more, well, real
- arrange the track; with the Arrangement option, it's easy to duplicate sections of a song and indicate the verse, chorus, solo, etc.
- record and add effects to "real" tracks (guitar, vocals, etc… anything recorded with a mike or sound input), like a guitar tone or echo/reverb
- record along to a click/metronome, and make timing edits to move badly-timed notes to the closest beat
- make a rough mix and master

That's a good amount of operability with free software, of course. However, as to the guitar and vocals:
- Because I don't have a guitar amp, I record guitar through an advanced guitar pedal, the Digitech GNX4. It belongs to my brother but he got a device specifically built for recording guitar (Apogee One). http://www.digitech.com/en/products/gnx4
- Before I started using the GNX4, I simply recorded my guitar directly into the computer, using a 1/4"-1/8" adapter on the end of my patch cable. The sound isn't excellent but it's better than nothing. Like Alldat said, get an interface for guitar (such as the Apogee One, like my brother uses).
- If you have an amp, you might want to get an instrument microphone (my brother uses the Shure SM57) to record the amp.
- As for vocals, I don't know what to use, frankly. For now, I have a couple of ancient condenser mics that were made for tape recorders, and they sound terrible. But again, I had them lying around, and I made use of them.

Yeah, so there's my advice and limited knowledge. I wish I would record more, but I'm not a tight guitar player, which demotivates me, so I procrastinate and never get back to my projects… Ugh.

(p.s. I am available to record bass, if you want. Like Alldat, I won't ask for more than credits.)

Hey, DBF, instead of those old tape recorder mics, you might want to try a low cost mic from here:

http://www.musiciansfriend.com/pro-audio/mxl-990-condenser-microphone-with-shockmount/273156

I have two of these in my studio and paid a bit more for them. They aren't top studio quality, but it will give you a very warm mic for a low cost. These are great for capturing vocals.

Those look pretty good. I know two people (besides you) who have MXL-990s; in fact, the vocals on the Placate The Masses album in my sig were recorded with one (I think). However, it would help if I could sing in the first place.

I have decided to buy me a Boss BR800 recorder. I think it along with a couple of good mics and my guitars and bass would be all I need to make awesome Cd's. The BR800 has a programmable drum computer built in it. You can also hook it up to a commuter and add more features.

Great info guys. Lots to look at and think about. Now to just get the money...

You don't have to buy it all at once. What would you need FIRST to get started recording? That' where you start. If you wanted to capture all your guitar tracks first, then either the computer/software/interface would be what you need. If you want something like the Korg unit I have, then I'd start there. You can add things like better vocal mics or bass processors, or drums/mics when you get to that stage.

Have you started buying gear yet?

No, but I've looked at some options. I looked at the Korg unit you mentioned and a few others like it, though at this point we're having some financial struggles so that may be a few months off. I've also looked at some "instrument simulators" like drum machines and so forth.

It looks expensive but I think you made a good point that once it's bought I'm set for quite a time

Oh, one other thing. Buy good gear, even if it costs more. It's worth paying more to get better quality and features.

DBF is partly right. Buy good gear, but it doesn't have to be the most expensive. I have a couple of cheapo guitars that I actually like the sound/feel of more than my name brand guitar.

Buy good gear, but don't break the bank. If you can't afford a $500 vocal mike, then don't worry about it. Just buy the best you can afford and keep playing with that until you get it to sound the best it can.