We stopped to take stock of what's going right and what's going wrong in our recording process so far.
Due to COVID, well...(gestures broadly)...things are different.
Historically, we have been able to roadtest songs at live shows or rehearsals.
Between "everything" and "everything else", live testing is not happening and it is taking some adjustment to get used to recording in layers, rather than all together.
Our recording gear, some 'reasonably priced' input devices are working a treat, as is our Digital Audio Workstation, in this case Reaper (as suggested by F.O.T.B Michael L. )
Friend of the band Pete D.'s suggestion of using the new Plugin approach to amps etc is also working well.
What we're missing is monitoring and playing 'together' (apparently I get a discount on quotation marks this week).
This has meant going back and forth on stuff that normally would have been worked out during rehearsal or gigging.
I have some testing to see if I can run multiple USB audio devices (low probability of success).
Using our handy dandy excel sheet, it became apparent that all the stuff we recorded together at Coggers place is now in mixing or final mixing. All the stuff that we recorded in The Cooler/Backyard is still pending.
On the plus side, the change in recording process is consistent with our historical approach - every album is its own trip. In this case, the songs are more complex and we're worrying less about reproduce-ability on stage, which has always been a key thing for Mr Wizard.
Right now, what the heck, we're just going for it, which is leading to some mutation. Once again, consistent with our preferred approach.
And as a tech nerd, new buttons? BUTTONS!!!
Monitoring (listening to the playback for recording) has proven to be the biggest hurdle and I am doing my danged-est to avoid buying Yet More Gear 'cos part of this album concept was to do it El Cheapo. Well sort of. We're still getting things mastered so there's that.
Borrowing gear, cobbling bits and pieces together and doing it on Zero Budget was sort of the aim. As the way we make music changes, some things are easier to do than they have ever been.
As we're confirming, the tech does not replace the need to work out our parts together, before we hit the studio.
At the same time, we just recorded some stuff we wouldn't have done the same way, if we had been in studio.
I am gonna need like 5 guitarists on stage to make this sound right, live. Hmmm....
This week I'll try tech testing and re-engineering and we'll see if we can make this work with what we have, otherwise I'll be gear hunting or maybe we might even need to consider....a....studio (oooh)....nah. LOL. We'll figure this out.
Thanks to our Cellar Dwellers and Friends Of The Band for supporting us as we get it done. Support the album here: www.paypal.me/stormcellarband
