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I'm curious about anyone's experience with self-imposed limits with respect to their recording equipment.

For me, the equipment I work on definitely influences the way I work and what tools I'll use. When I use a 4-track cassette recorder I tend to stay on the 4-track, not expecting to transfer that to 2" tape and add many more tracks. When the prog-rock band I work for brings over their Cubase file I open their 85 track song on my computer and mix it there, not intending to use an analog console because I don't have that many computer outputs or faders.

My ideal recording situation would be to get the best sounds straight to 2" 16 track tape so that the mixing is simply slight level adjustments. I'd like to do few drastic fader moves. So, I'm wondering if it's wise to move towards recording equipment that encourages that way of thinking. For example, I see Boutique Audio still makes a small mixer with level and EQ adjustments, but the level adjustment is done with a rotary pot instead of a fader. I like the idea that the rotary pot makes it more difficult to change levels. I think the process and the product matter equally.

http://www.boutiqueaudio.com/inwardconn ... de-car.htm

To be clear: this is for a small commercial studio. I'm not a recording artist I'm an engineer. I don't intend to the studio to be appropriate for all clients or types of records. Some favorite recordings:
Tom Waits - Mule Variations
Dirty Three - Ocean Songs
Marc Ribot - The Prosthetic Cubans

I suppose what I'm really asking is this: am I shooting myself in the foot by buying smaller equipment with less functions in an attempt to force my ideal recording & mixing situation?

Often I mix projects recorded by artists in their homes on their computers or whatever they had. I find when I do these projects I work much harder during mixing for a great sound than if I'd tracked it myself. There's no surprise there but I keep it in mind because I do want be able to mix their home-recordings with whatever the new setup is. I don't want to turn away my friends because in my new setup I don't have the capacity or proper tools to mix their recordings.

thanks for reading this,
Bill

I've recorded quite a few bands, on their equipment or mine.

I've always got better sounds out of my equipment than out of theirs, which is how it is supposed to be. If you want to record small bands with a 16-track and that's it, maybe even with a minimal amount of outboard equipment and probably just some standard microphoness, then I recommend doing what you do.

When I use my equipment, it is simple shit. 16-tracks maximum pretty much. I record bands that don't do many overdubs, so I've NEVER had a problem with it.

I have a friend who is in a doom metal/post-rock band. I like them, wanted to record them, but they wanted every individual drum mic'd and tracked singularly (12 mics), at least 6 guitar tracks, 2 bass tracks, a keyboard track, a sampled audio track, and MANY vocal tracks. I am not equipped to trudge my way through a mess of so many tracks. Plus, I don't think they're very big into analog equipment. They want quick, cut and paste ProTools shit.

I think you're not shooting yourself in the foot if you're limiting yourself to your comfort zone and you know exactly the clientele you want to have in your studio.

P.S. If I'm not mistaken, I think I read somewhere that Tom Waits is one of the easiest people ever to record. It may've been him. This engineer was talking about just sitting in a large room with probably 8 mics recording the music all at once, including vocals, and there were something like 10-12 instruments. People would get closer to the mics when they wanted to be heard better.

I may be wrong, but I'm almost positive it was Waits.

Steve V. wrote:P.S. If I'm not mistaken, I think I read somewhere that Tom Waits is one of the easiest people ever to record. It may've been him. This engineer was talking about just sitting in a large room with probably 8 mics recording the music all at once, including vocals, and there were something like 10-12 instruments. People would get closer to the mics when they wanted to be heard better.

I may be wrong, but I'm almost positive it was Waits.

Yes it was, it was in TapeOp, or I remember reading something similar in there, about Tom Waits...maybe about a year ago now?

phildodd wrote:

Steve V. wrote:P.S. If I'm not mistaken, I think I read somewhere that Tom Waits is one of the easiest people ever to record. It may've been him. This engineer was talking about just sitting in a large room with probably 8 mics recording the music all at once, including vocals, and there were something like 10-12 instruments. People would get closer to the mics when they wanted to be heard better.

I may be wrong, but I'm almost positive it was Waits.

Yes it was, it was in TapeOp, or I remember reading something similar in there, about Tom Waits...maybe about a year ago now?

Word.

Don't make things difficult for yourself. As you know, there are no rights and wrongs in audio recording. Choose the equipment that you feel most comfortable working with. You aren't forcing yourself to mix or record a certain way if this is the way you really want to do it.