hi. looking for suggestions/input for recording a rock band w/ drum machine. the group is 2 guitars 2 vocalaists and a drum machine. i guess mainly the question is which would be the best way to record something like this...digital or analog. have done only analog recording in the past but never recorded a drum machine b4. there are obvious benefits to using digital for a DM. just not too sure where using analog would be better...as per say if we were recording an actual live drum set.

hope that makes sense...help?

what are the "obvious benefits"?

if you are playing the drum machine through an amp, all of the digital/analog benefits are the same as with regular drums. if you are creating the drum tracks on the computer, you will benefit from whatever the computer has to offer, and it will sound like shit.
play the drums through an amp, then mic the amp with whatever ambience and panning sounds best. i suggest a lot of ambience for any unnatural source. Then record it to tape.

-noah

obvious like...adding digital effects to the drum signal..room sounds, delay etc..

-we did a pre production of this album on a computer. that is pretty much all i have to reference.

thanks.

a little bit of preamp distortion always sounds pretty good for drum machines. gives it a little more 'life'. delaying one side of the stereo output a few milliseconds can sound cool too, but if mono compatability is important to you (for vinyl or am radio), this can be bad.

when doing that kind of channel delay, i think it's prudent to keep a good amount of dry signal too. you never know what full on delayed stereo will do when the listener moves away from the ideal position between the speakers

i don't think the position of the listener should affect the sound of delayed drums any more than it would with a perfectly phased recording. anyway, the sound is already tweaked, and the effect would either be augmented or diminished. This wouldn't be the end of the world. I have had some experience with this type of thing. The majority of my band's record was recorded with one mic on the amp and the other approximately two meters away. The entire thing was out of phase (except for a few lucky frequencies). I've listened to it enough, and i don't notice any difference in sound when i move around.


-noah

sorry i wasn't clearer, a 'few' seconds of delay in my mind is around 15-20ms at the very least, so i don't think you'll experience any comb-filtering/haas effect funkiness. it's just something i used to do with drum machine based demos and it would always sound bigger and more ambient.

so this is all in a analog setting? delay etc?

what about the quality of the drum signal analog vs digital...perhaps if we recorded the rest of the group (guitars & vox) onto tape and bounced the digital drum track onto the tape?

if you're recording all at the same time, then you would either play the drum machine directly to the tape and listen to them through headphones or play them amplified through a speaker and record them as such. Recording the drums straight from the computer to the tape won't give any ambience. The drums would still sound out of place. It would make the most sense to do them all at the same time, since you won't be able to do the drums after everything else is complete. Doing the drums first would only isolate them more, and i don't think that would be beneficial.




-noah