I went to the studio on Friday to celebrate ten months of being alcohol-free.

It's amazing how much clarity, control, and confidence you get when you're not poisoning your brain every day.

But I digress; you're here for the recording tips...

Here are the two biggest lessons I learned from Friday's recording session and how they will help you make better mixes.

The Goal of the Recording

My goal for the session was to track the foundation of drums and bass. 

Although I have a sweet home studio setup, I can't record drums at home. I don't have enough input, and it would be very cramped.

Not to mention that it simply wouldn't sound very good in such a small room. 

And as you know, if you get it sounding great at the source, mixing is easy.

So I went to Saint Cecilia Studios down the street from my house. My buddy Steven has run Saint Cecilia for years, and it's always an awesome place to hang out.

Pre-Recording

Before we even went into the studio, I recorded a quick acoustic guitar and vocal demo and charted out the song for the drummer and the bass player.

Then, I set up a rehearsal so that we could go over the parts and get a feel for playing the song in the same room together.

Just like a good recording will make mixing easier, a good pre-production session and a well-rehearsed band will make the recording session go smoothly.

Recording

The drummer and bass player set up in the live room, and I took my place in the iso-booth off to the side with my acoustic guitar and vocal mic.

The setup went smoothly because everyone in the room was a professional. 

Relying on amateurs and half-assing things because you're not skilled enough will quickly erase your willingness to spend another minute in the studio. Having high-quality people help you every step of the way makes the music production process so much more fun.

The only snags we ran into were the kick and snare, but we ignored those because they aren't that important to the overall drum sound.

Just kidding.

During line-check, the snare sounded a little dark.

It was still a cool sound, but we ultimately swapped it out for a brighter snare.

And as soon as the drummer hit the new snare, we knew it was the right decision. It just transformed the whole drum sound.

If I want a dark snare, I can always remove some of the higher frequencies in the mix. But if I start with a dark snare, there are not many things I can do to add something that isn't there. An exciter, maybe, but I'd rather start with a recording that sounds as close to the finished record as possible.

The kick drum was also giving us some problems, so we swapped it out. We thought the vintage Ludwig was the logical choice for the style we were going for. It sounded good in the room, but for some reason, it just felt like a fart through the microphones.

So we swapped it out for a different kick, and the kick sound came alive in the control room.

Then we ran through the song a few times and had a keeper after three takes.

Like George Washington said, "if I had three hours in the studio, I would spend the first 150 minutes dialing in the sounds, and the last 30 minutes having fun."

Two Things to Take Away

Two things for you to take from my experience:

• Come prepared: If you spend enough time making sure everybody knows the song, is comfortable with the arrangement, and can perform their parts without trouble, your recording session will feel more fun.
• Use the right source: To get it right at the source, you need to use the right source. If your instrument doesn't sound the way you want, swap it out. Use a different snare, find another acoustic guitar, or try a new preset. Starting with great sounds means less work in the mix.

Listening to the tracks after importing them into my DAW once I was back in the home studio was a joy. It was exactly what I needed to get excited about continuing with the song.

Next up is acoustic guitar, then I'm having a friend record some atmospheric electric guitar, so let me know if you liked this email so I know that I should write more.

Until then, 

Björgvin

P.S.

If your tracks are already recorded and ready for mixing, but you don't know where to start, check out Step By Step Mixing or the Mix Mastery Bundle right here.