and i’ve sang it rather poorly in accompaniment to a guitar track on youtube that sits with it okay, bit slow though…

I want to try and do it justice, as i think it’s half decent.

Options learn the guitar?
Get someone else to play the guitar while i sing it?
Get someone who can play the guitar and sing better than me to sing it?

I recorded it on my phone and it’s depressing stuff lyrically and sounded akin to Johnny Cash’s version of hurt!

Anyone know a little studio in the West Mids?

p.s peace and love, I love you all, but no more letters please… 😀

A Zoom (brand) recorder in a living room with lots of furnishings will get you a reasonable quality recording. Use Audacity (the computer programme) to mix the tracks on your computer. If you have good microphone you can just plug it into the sound card.

1/ record a rough single take to a metronome or drum beat

2/ play that back into one ear, and play/record the guitar part.

3/ do the same for the voice.

4/ mix to taste. You can layer several guitar tracks to thicken up the sound and add solos. Same for the voice. Effects can also be added, a voice track through a PA with a bit of chorus and reverb.

If you need to synch stuff then tap out the metronome/drum beat before you start singing or playing so you can line up the peaks on the computer graphic when mixing.

good stuff, something to look into.

This is junior’s sound cloud:

Everything on Chanson de Noël except the drum part was recorded with a Zoom in our living room, Audacity for mixing. IIRC the drums were recorded direct from an electronic drum kit. The guitar parts were played on a Telecaster through a Fender Mustang, a Fender Jazz bass through a neutral PA amp. the Zoom can be adjusted to cope with everything from a quiet voice to an overdriven guitar.

No advice to give. But it’s the kind of thing I would love to do if I had any talent.

starts saving pennies for a zoom and youtube tutorials on audacity taking a hit. 🙂

No advice to give. But it’s the kind of thing I would love to do if I had any talent.

go for it! This song of mine has been knocking around for a year and I’m still tweaking it now.

Britain’s Got Talent?

Reaper is another excellent home mixing software – its free and has loads of free synth/drums etc plugins so you can play loads of stuff on your PC if you don’t have access to a proper drummer etc.

Learning curve can be quite steep initially, but it is worth it.

Base studios in Stourbridge have a recording booth etc along with people on hand for mixing etc
They are on Gainsborough trading estate next to the green duck brewery.

If you have any Apple products then they usually come with Garageband installed. I find it a brilliant little work programme to get ideas down and I have got some pretty impressive results from it. If you can’t play the guitar that well but know the chord sequence you want to use then the programme can do it for you with several types of picking styles. They are quite generic but will give you an idea of how it will sound. You can add drums ‘live’ so you play the virtual drum kit with your fingers to bring out your inner John Bonham and can over lay drum parts by playing over the previously recored part ie. maybe start with bass an snare then add hi hats etc. It is all pretty intuitive.

Edit: Studios are expensive places to be if you are not sure what you are going to do.

we have a zoom at work apparently,…the dream starts here, thanks for all the feedback.

There have been quite a few proper recordings that have been done using GarageBand, I heard someone on 6Music not so long ago, on LaLa’s show I think, who’d put together an entire album using it. I believe there are lots of plug-ins available for drums, etc.

I spend a little time on GarageBand now and again. It’s great fun and you do get some good results. Mine, however could not be termed songwriting – not even by the most generous critic!