Be The Recording Guy In Your Band

If you’re in a band, you need a home studio. In fact, every musician needs a home studio. But if you are in a band and you’re reading this, then you my friend need to be the “recording guy/gal”.

Every band needs one. That special someone who has some equipment, some knowledge, and drive to organize recording sessions for the band. My guess is that the rest of your bandmates (like most musicians) don’t want to be bogged down with the technical stuff, so that simply leaves you.

Via Niels Heidenreich Flickr

Record Your Rehearsals

The best thing you can do is starting this week, record your band’s rehearsals. Whether you multi track it or just get a stereo mix of the band, make sure you get your practices on “tape”. These recordings can be rough of course and will mostly be utilized for arranging, writing, and demoing.

It’s amazing what you hear when you listen back to a “live” recording of yourself. You start to see where a song needs some tweaks or where the band isn’t jiving well. Plus if you happen to play to a click live (many bands do) then your demo can easily be imported into your actual recording session to serve as a guide track.

Think Like a Producer

While the rest of your band will be thinking about playing gigs, writing new music, or something else entirely (like how to pay rent being a musician), you need to start thinking like a producer. Ask yourself these types of questions: What are our best songs? Are we ready to record them? When/where can I get the drummer alone to record some drum tracks? When would we want to release an EP/album? Should we just release digital singles on our website?

Every time you get together with the band is an opportunity to bring your mobile recording rig along and try to potentially work on some recordings. You may never have any actual “sessions” booked, but instead you piece together a killer album over the course of 6 months. The idea is to be thinking about these things enough so you can capitalize on your time together.

Push The Limits

The great thing about recording yourself (if you know how) is that you have no pressure. You can be as creative as you want. You can try crazy weird recording techniques into the wee hours of the night only to realize that they sound horrible, and no money or pride is lost. Only your time.

So go ahead and get your band to try things. Be original. Be creative. Don’t feel pressure, just make music and have fun. Remember…we are living during a great recording revolution where you have access to so much powerful recording equipment and technology that happens to also be super affordable. Grab some gear, grab your band, and be the recording guy that I know you can be!