Learning to Record – Pt. 1 (aka Sh*t Gets Even More Complicated)

I do not consider myself to be a stranger to musicianship. This holds true for both playing instruments and writing original music; the two have gone hand in hand since I picked up a guitar in the fourth grade and began writing songs for the first time. From here, I found myself messing around on the drums, piano, bass, and even enjoyed a short stint on the trombone. Since then, I have dabbled a fair amount in recording live audio, but that has remained rudimentary. For the most part, recording has entailed putting a microphone or two in a room, playing a song through, and leaving the audio as it is. This all changed in the Spring, when I delved into the world of audio production for the first time. Intrigued by the alluring realm of professional recording, I did a bit of research. Of course, all of the videos I watched and articles I read made production seem easy. Confident that I could quickly learn to produce world class audio, I dropped a wad of cash on an entry level equipment package (including essentials like an audio interface, MIDI controller, DAW, microphone, and stereo headphones), and dove head first into producing my first music.

Fast-forward six months, and boy, do I realize how overzealous I was. Initially, my mentality was along the lines of, hey, I can write songs, and I’m good with computers, so this should be second nature!  Now, I feel overwhelmed by the amount of detail that is required in learning the mere basics of production. I can spend an hour working on the vocal track for a song, and find that I’ve made zero progress. It is tedious. As if to add insult to injury, such focus as this on detail is causing me to find things within my songs that I can no longer tolerate. It really becomes annoying when you hear your own voice singing a verse 50 times.

Ideally, all of this will translate into me being more critical of my music, and thereby creating a better product, but I am skeptical…stay tuned for part 2, which will hopefully take a more positive outlook on this learning experience.