stripped down & back 2 basics or How I Divorced my Computer.

Get that song on tape! Errr... disk?
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preservation
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stripped down & back 2 basics or How I Divorced my Computer.

Post by preservation » Mon Aug 17, 2015 6:19 pm

i never come to the recording branch of OSG, but i could use some advice.
i've moved twice in the past year and now my tiny studio is back up and running.
the problem is inspiration. ideas come to me all the time, as long as i'm not in front of a brightly lit screen.
being in front of a Mac desktop makes me more apt to think "oh, i should Google how to mix down those channels"
or "hrm, i've never looked into X technique"... or "i wonder if George has responded to my e-mail...".

after getting really into synthesis i started worrying if i needed to upgrade my DAW, my computer, my etc etc etc
building up "my studio" has taken precedent over writing fun tunes, and i've just about had it. i have nothing to show
for it but a bunch of half-assed demos.


now all i wanna do is write some song foundations on guitar, maybe to a sampled beat, then just overdub a little
more guitar or string/organ synth. flesh it out a little, throw it on Soundcloud, and wait to collaborate.
i'm wondering if it's best to just try and find some effing Tascam 4-track or some Zoom SD recorder device to put
on a coffee table and forget about for an hour at a time. at least i could annotate it with "capo 4th fret, augmented X shape @ 7th & 9th..."

i'm a collaborator at heart, but w/ a busy job and a family it gets tough to have friends over on any sort of regular basis
to write. i absolutely want to discipline myself to make, say, 5 rudimentary-but-solid demos and lock myself away until it happens.

has anyone been here ? can you have a mid-life crisis @ 32 ? i feel like i'm being a little bitch.

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Re: stripped down & back 2 basics or How I Divorced my Compu

Post by preservation » Mon Aug 17, 2015 6:20 pm

i'll add that this really started to come to mind when i revisited a lot of tunes i've been in love with for a long time:

suicide, johnny thunders, richard hell, the stooges, jamc, flat duo jets, misfits, the cramps
all that great/raw in your face stuff

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Re: stripped down & back 2 basics or How I Divorced my Compu

Post by jorri » Tue Aug 18, 2015 5:25 am

Have always tried to remove the computer element.
Just a basic clean recorder where you push record, music goes in is ideal and I don't think can be improved. If i need drum machine i record it in etc. no channel or quantise fiddling.
And limit myself to it, that means focusing on the arrangement, the music, the tracks that go IN...rather than what preamp is used or plugin (which is what engineers do, but I think that's why we specialise: musicians simply should not be thinking about all that tech stuff when creating because its a very different mode of creating that's needed when being a producer or engineer! If you don't have someone recording you, remove that from the equation because the musician part is definitely more important...at least for a while, after some time you can always go back and 'mix' it, or better get someone else to.

I use a zoom h2n for quick things.
and a yamaha aw1600 for multitrack. (some new zoom, boss or tascam multitracks seem great and simplified, but with more useful things like a sampler)

really the yamaha works just as good as an interface (some of the new ones can actually be used as them too), so if any complex editing or mixing is done i can still do it no problem, just plugging into USB and all the tracks are up as if I'd recorded them straight to PC. except I can easily take it anywhere and dont have to fiddle with latency or look at screens.
Same with the zoom handheld, the mic's pretty good, I think you can get multitrack versions now.

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Re: stripped down & back 2 basics or How I Divorced my Compu

Post by preservation » Tue Aug 18, 2015 11:33 am

thanks for replying.
i definitely feel like all the armchair engineering stuff clouds my creative process.
i have to daydream a bit to get a vibe in my head, and sitting in front of Reason or Reaper
just kills everything.

pressing Record and having the simply ability to overdub is the only thing i think i need now.
i'll look into that Zoom. i guess i'd just sit it a few feet away from my guitar amp or right
up next to my acoustic.

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Re: stripped down & back 2 basics or How I Divorced my Compu

Post by Soggasaurus » Wed Aug 19, 2015 6:28 am

I've only recently gotten into recording and I do everything via computer, but I do wonder if taking this approach would help me actually complete stuff instead of endlessly fiddling. One of the most distracting things for me with DAW's is the visual aspect. After I record something I'll go through and watch all the wave forms and see how they line up with the rhythm delineations in the track and get bothered when I don't hit a mark right on time. This leads to investing about 5 times as much effort into fixing things that generally barely need fixing and a whole lot of vibe killing. Add that to the endless patch and effect options, panning choices, and input/interface/level tweaking and it adds up to way more time spent on process than actual music.

The one big plus for me with computer recording is that just by having a Mac and a few guitars and keyboards I have what I need to make decent sounding recordings without a ton of extra gear. I've got a Focusrite Solo and a Yeti USB mic that, coupled with the computer, allow me to get pretty close to what I have in mind for anything I want to do. I'd love to have access to non-computer gear that'd allow me to make good sounding stuff but that'd involve a total revamp of what I've got going on now or paying to use a real recording studio. I'm sure it'll come one day but computer recording makes more sense for me right now.

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Re: stripped down & back 2 basics or How I Divorced my Compu

Post by InLimbo » Wed Aug 19, 2015 6:52 am

I've actually got a friend who is the most skilled musician I know, who needs to divorce his computer. He's got perfect pitch, the best bassist I know on a synth, and just has the natural knack of translating what's in his head to actual sound. One time I was at his house with his uncle (who was also my mentor, and a great musician as well) and they got into a pretty stern debate about what chord the windchime outside was playing. They went back and forth about which piece was what note. Turns out my buddy was dead on, after 15 minutes of arguing when he went and played it on the piano - F#min7. I'll never forget it.

Anyway, he's got so focused on the processes of making music, rather than outcome, that his recent work for the past year or so has gotten extremely sterile. There's no mood anymore, no soul, no element that operates on the subconsious level that you're unable to pinpoint why you like it. For him now, it's all about making an instrument being used in an unconventional way. It's all about the effects, and the routing of the effects, and post processing, and the gear, and the quantity of patch cables on the MS-20, the mix, the mastering, etc.

But it's just polishing a turd because the music itself is not at all interesting. And it's a goddamn shame.

I've got an entirely different philosophy when it comes to music. I used to make songs using the PC, with tons of different VSTs for drums, synths, piano, strings, etc. But I've completely cut that whole aspect out. Now I just play with my guitar and effects, using the looper to overdub, and just basically improvising with myself as if I were the only one on stage and people were watching me. I don't record it anymore because like you, and my friend here, it had an adverse effect on my creative process. Playing guitar for me now is just fun, it's a hobby, and the music I create is just a moment of expression that happened to be apparent at that time. The next time I play, it'll be something different, maybe worse or even better, but regardless, it served it's purpose at that time and is of no use to me anymore. When I jam with other people, it's the exact same idea - no recording, just go with the flow, go with the feel, and when you're tired, pack your shit up and go home.

Anyway, this translates to me playing music for me, and nothing else. I can't imagine a world where this would be good advice for someone trying to make something else from music, to experience it with other people, etc. But it might point you in a different direction, I don't know.

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Re: stripped down & back 2 basics or How I Divorced my Compu

Post by Larry Mal » Wed Aug 19, 2015 7:30 am

I don't know how I can write music that's not on a computer, since I try and do the drums, bass, keyboards and guitars and in theory the singing soon. I just would not be able to do that on a Tascam Portastudio like I used to try to back in the day.

But, too much can be too much, and I sometimes spend my time learning software and fucking around rather than actually writing. I'm actually on a new computer, and I'm going to limit myself to a set of tools and not add to them rather than buying new software and virtual instruments all the time. Use a set of Waves effects that I own and only a few other things. Use Komplete and Maschine and some other software that I already own rather than looking for inspiration in new software. I probably have everything I really need even now.

Not dissimilar to me and guitars, actually, rather than playing and writing on a single instrument that I know well, I've found myself doing guitar shit for the sake of doing other guitar shit more than using it as an actual instrument. Part of that is time, I don't have much of it, so soon I'm going to discipline myself, limit my tools, and try and find a way to make composing the focus and not the tools.

I'll still need a computer, though. Just playing live onto tape leaves me with only hours of undeveloped guitar parts and chord progressions. If I had a band, that might be different. And maybe it's time for me to have a band, but with a one and a half year old, another kid on the way soon, and a full time job, I think self-discipline is what's really needed here.
Back in those days, everyone knew that if you were talking about Destiny's Child, you were talking about Beyonce, LaTavia, LeToya, and Larry.

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Re: stripped down & back 2 basics or How I Divorced my Compu

Post by salty » Wed Aug 19, 2015 8:37 am

Wow, this subject is really hitting home with me! I can remember having a Tascam Porta 7, not giving a crap about tone (I ran my guitar through a Rat and Delay straight into the unit) and creating non-stop! I moved to using a computer with Vegas Pro and a few DX Plugins and my creative did take a hit. As my software got more robust I was able to do things I found to be interesting, but the amount of material started decreasing for sure... So I feel like there must be a balancing point there somewhere. The point of having all the colors you need to paint on the canvas with, without detracting from the work being completed. Maybe a stripped down machine with no internet access. Do not sue it for mixing or anything, just recording and maybe adding in synths and drums. Bust out several songs that way and then spend time on another machine set up for mixing and what not? At that point you could even do some reamping or throw in an overdub here and there?

The other thing that killed me creativity and song creation was getting in a band with a friend that is a gear snob. I found myself influenced by him and I wanted him to approve of my tones and gear. I got into spending way too much time looking at gear and playing around with trying to get a tone that matched sounds that other people have been using for years...what is creative about that! Used to be so fun for me in the past was taking a sound I liked, despite how it would sound to a tone guy, and using it to make something interesting that fit the piece I was working on or to be the start of a new piece.

I then got into building pedals and that has stolen more time from creating music. I know I am not a very good guitarist and the things my friends point to as my strength is my playing not sounding like everyone else. I need to take hold of that idea, stop the tone quest and start recording again. I am trying to move from Ableton to Reaper, because that is what my tone snob friend used...maybe I need to forget that idea and stick with what I know.

Preservation, I would be totally interested in how you end up tackling your dilemma. Also, if you ever have something you want someone to collaborate on with you, I love that sort of thing! I love the ability we have of sharing and creating music with people that live no where near us! What an amazing time we live in! :w00t:

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Re: stripped down & back 2 basics or How I Divorced my Compu

Post by Liquids » Fri Aug 28, 2015 8:18 am

I think it's benefitial to differentiate between "demo" and ..."recording" or, what you might prefer to call whatever it is a polished end-product is.

When you are working on musical ideas--using a format that focuses on the core elements--sound source (instrument, etc), capturing (mic) and medium (tape, DAW, etc) and no more is key.

Discipline is hard here--one can take a demo track meant to just document or inspire ideas and then fiddle with plug-ins and such to explore. That's certainly one approach toward getting somewhere with a basic sound/song idea but...

I think having a means to 'demo' that is highly simplified is key. Without the bones of a song/melody being strong, all the production in the world can't make it something anyone will want to listen to more than twice or for "that cool part at #:##..."

So I'd encourage people stuck in the rut, or finding the DAW to be a creativity-drain find a means to dumb it down, if need be, and find a way to simply capture sound and ideas, and offers little to no incentive to try and make that cool.

Once you've compiled parts, melodies, etc to the point that you think you have something and have pushed the demo to the limits in a sense...well, then it might be worth moving on to all that is available via DAW or the like. By then you'd have a defined track and the creative process in the non-computer realm will have had to develop...then you can potentially expand it. If one gets caught up, you still have the original idea in raw form...

However one does it, a basic means to demo and brainstorm creatively--demo--can be really helpful in a myriad of ways.

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