This is as good a time than ever to ask you this Warren, I guess I'm just curious and trying to get place how I feel about my suspicions. But is this video directly related to yours at sunset?... and are the sponsored by focusrite? I feel that you(and Glen) provide some of the better content on mixing here on UA-cam. But being somone who follow's you closely, and having been involved in the industry for a while, There's been a few times where it felt like some things that were being pitched as unbiased & genuine, could possibly be something a little less sincere and a little more business. I'm really not trying to blow up your spot, I apologize if it appears that way. I feel like my pessimistic side is getting the best of me lately. Appreciate your content.
And now I'm off to check out *your* channel. Man, who needs recording school when you have quality UA-cam tutorials and things like "Nail the Mix"? I'm in hog-heaven, nigga.
Agree, I do have those cr3's but I'm watching this through jbl computer speaker on my laptop. To be honest that guitar doesn't sound good at all. I think Glenn, should do another video those Mackie cr3's, on the focusrite, Behringer mixer and country man di through every amp in the studio starting with the Peavey Windsor. The drums are only instrument that sounds good, so does the bass. Level on the guitars are too low. During the sub mix Glenn shows you can see level for guitar is low. Ain't throwing stones just explaining what I see & hear.
Terrific timing! I've had my eyes on the Mackie CR3s for some time, now, because the price point was decent. Was just short of biting the bullet and getting them, and then this comes out. A lot of well-timed and well-compiled information, just like always! Thanks, Glenn!
yeah had the same experience - i did an a/b comparison when the fucking woofer on the back was covered, great sound then (for the price) - if they didnt put these damn woofers on the back it would be a decent set of monitors.
Been doing music production for 5 years now, and I can say this video is extremely helpful. Started out with just a computer, interface and a $60 Mic. There were many moments I felt like I would never get any better, or that I was going nowhere with it. There was always a part of me that was intimidated of being dedicated to recording, producing, composing etc. Deep down however, I knew this was truly my passion and no matter how many road blocks I hit, I could never stop doing what I love. Fast forward to today I have a decent home studio and have already produced my second record. So even now, watching videos like this keep me determined and remind me of why I started.
I am a home hobbyist when it comes to recording, I really just record my own ideas for songs and you tube. I also have a small budget when it come to buying gear. I had bought the Mackie CR3's because of the price point. I was hesitant but they are much better than the Klipsch surround sound system I was using for years. I did feel they sounded strange when I first hooked them up, but I have nothing to compare them too. So far they seem to be doing great for me the hobbiest. I also want to thank you for listing that inexpensive DAW called Reaper. I have been using an old Sonar 7 pro from 2007 and it had been acting up and just dropping out in the most inconvenient places. Been searching for something I can actually afford, and its awesome that they let you try it before you buy it too. Thanks Glen
GLENN! Your content is always top notch but this was a MUCH NEEDED video! So glad you took the time out to do this as it will answer a ton of questions for n00bies. Keep rocking man you are amazing
This is fucking 1st class oldschool heavy metal, dont care about sound and gear at all !! I'm watching this part all over again, even without your talk and it's convincing enough, hail \m/ !!!
in my opinion the worst thing you can do is get a lot of plugins when you start recording (when you dont know how to use crompressors the right way and eqs) because you will be tweaking all the time a sufering from option paralisis ... that is what is happening to me ... just start with reaper plug in and as you move forward you will discover than maybe you need a diferent comp here and there or a diferent eq and then you add them ... it is the best way to learn i my opinion
Yeah dont spend any additional money on plugins if you are on a tight budget, get hardware instead. You can start with plugins that come with the daw and there is alot of completely free plugins that are great and even virtual instruments.
I wouldn't spend any money on something if I didn't know what it is or how to use it... kinda common sense. But most people interested in investing $1500 in a studio probably know how to use a compressor and wants an EQ and noise gates and other useful tools.
Well, plugins are fun, of course, but I agree, practically all DAWs today come with a great set of plugins to start with. Especially I wouldn’t recommend the slate bundle, it seems cheap at first but of course the subscription gets expensive over the years. There are so many good plugins from indie developers today, inexpensive or free (the likes of Klanghelm, TDL, Valhalla, kazrog, hornet etc) or extreme sales from waves or plugin alliance, there should be no need to fall into the subscription hole (after five years you payed nearly $1000 for the bundle. There’s a lot in there granted.)
Glenn, This video is fantastic. Not only does it prove that a good song and a good recording is in the performance of the musicians and how well a song is written and arranged, it shows with out a doubt you don't need thousands and thousands of dollars a year to be "competitive" with your ep/lp - It's all going to come down to how well you wrote a song, and how well you perform it. I'm excited that I have a lot of this gear already, and it was kind of a relief to realize I don't really need much more except maybe a couple of microphones and a small mixer for that nifty guitar trick. Dude, your channel is a life saver - Cheers and here's to many more years of your UA-cam career continuing to go well for you, so we can get no nonsense down to earth fact based videos. Rock on \m/
Hey Glenn im glad I stumbled upon your channel about 2 years ago. Its been a pleasure laughing and learning about recording metal with you and t j thanks for the demo. I've been slowly building up my gear when I find extra money and the bills are paid. Im a drummer and already have a kill drum set. So I'm thinking of getting the focusrite 18i20 and inviting some bands for recording .
Hint: check the used market - even a 1st-gen 18i20 is more than good enough, for (less than?) half the price of a brand-new 2nd-gen. You can put the difference towards (better) monitors, and/or something like a MOTU 8pre - even one with busted Firewire works just fine as an 8 mic input "extension" via ADAT ;)
Thank you so much for this video. I’m a country singer songwriter from Eastern Kentucky and last year I was ready for my third album. I contacted three local studios who all were in the $3000 to $3500 price range for ten songs. Plus the price of musicians. I just couldn’t do that. So I pulled $600 from my savings and went shopping on Facebook market place. I got a 14 track interface, a 4 channel headphone amp, a new set of those Makie monitors, bought Reaper and began. I already had a couple of budget mics. My biggest challenge was drums without a doubt. I ended up downloading a fee drum program and never looked back. So I completed my 1 home studio album over the summer of 2018, all acoustic. Then began recording more of a full band album. I’ve currently recorded over 25 songs all original . I’ve released a handful to iTunes/Spotify etc. I’ve taken on demo services for other locals. I’ve even began recording a full length album for a local Gospel group. So my advice is do it. This modern equipment is so good it’s so much easier to get a quality sound now more than ever. I remember in the 90s my band trying to record analog and the sound always sucked. Thanks for the video it’s these type of information videos that help us newbies learn. I’m no pro, but I’m not going broke recording myself either thanks to used equipment and the willingness to learn. 😎
The guitars could have been louder in the mix, but honestly, this is the best sounding mix, in my opinion, you've done. The guitar tone it self sounds awesome. The drum mics sound great too.
Glenn, I think this might be one of the best videos you've ever put out. This is absolutely fantastic for someone (like myself) going into music production. Cheers from Australia, where the shipping is expensive and the sun burns.
Its a very specific sound, though - '80s metal, almost like it was mastered for vinyl; It sounds to me like the frequencies are very focused on the mids. It could also be that im just noticing the reverb on the mix
Alex Walters I thought the same thing. Glad I wasn't the only one. Also, it's very cool that they bought stuff from one of the my local shops. Pixel Pro is a great place to buy from. I've always been impressed with thier knowledge of what they sell.
Watching the mix currently at 6:30, listening through a set of blue sky monitors. Sounds great, seems like guitars are a tad low in the mix. Could be my monitors though. Listen to the mix through your professional monitors and see if there's any changes you would make? Thanks for the tutorials, cheers!
That was my perception as well using my cellphone (I know! I shouldn't hear these videos through my cellphone, I usually use my monitors, but it's sunday and I'm still in bed)
Yeah I agree, the guitars needed to be a bit louder and the bass need more thump. Unless they were purposely going for that "traditional heavy metal" revival sound you hear in bands like Sumerlands/ Eternal Champion.
The Driver no, this isn't something Glenn would do without telling us, this is just a highlight of the flaws of the studio monitors. Too much bass and mids with a lack of highs (which would explain why the guitars and bass are backed up compared to the vocals)
DevilDead13820 - eh, I don't want to jump the gun on that claim. You're going to have to ask Glen or point this to Glen directly to know for sure. The reason why I said they might've gone for a Traditional Heavy Metal mix was because his friend, the guy singing and doing guitar and bass (don't know his name), has a forte for that kind of sub-genre sound. But the point of this video is you can get a pretty pro-like mix for $1,500 anyway. We shall see.
Great video Glenn!! Love the content and your never ending banter on bass players and musicians in general (as bassist I see myself in my mid teens in alot of those rants🤣) luckily, I have grown to listen to the likes of Cliff Burton, Jason Newstead, Steve Harris, Alex Webster and the list goes on, they have been inspirations in helping me become a better musician. Now almost in my mid 30s after beeing out of the game for almost a decade, I have picked up guitar and reunited myself with my g&l L2500 for the last 2 years. I'm the process of building a small home studio and getting back on the horse again. I find myself extremely lucky to have all the tools necassary around me with social media to become even better. Without people like you and many others we would still be stuck in the late 90s where info was scarse and you had to try shit for yourself, not many people were very knoledgeble on technical stuff... keep telling it like it is and keep up the awesome work that you do!! A raging FUCK YEAAHHH!! from Montreal Qc
because it is what we use at my band's studio. i hook another output from the interface to the mixer just for click so we can or dont't have to hear them
SpectreSoundStudios another tip. I use $40 aussie Dollaridoos Koss ear buds for tracking vocals. I got the idea from Kevin Richards, from Rock the Stage NYC where he used an ear plug to bridge the ear - skull bone the same way you put your finger in your ear to hear what you're singing. Like a solo button The ear buds work like that so I get to hear skull resonance, as well as they let me hear what I am singing as it doesn't block out the room noise. As they are also jammed right in my ear, the bleed, into the vocal mic is much lower The result is I sing much better as I hear myself closer to the way I practice, and it cuts the pitch issues in half !! Now I'm not a singer, but I do smash out comedy jingles and parodies on a regular basis for the No Agenda podcast. I'm talking no more than 4 hours of my interactive time to write, find a backing track or record one, record, mix & master and send it off That is spread over 2 days, so I don't have much time to practice the song and get to know it. I'm limited to my time alone in the car. These are also tracks that are 30 - 90 seconds long, used once in the show and that's it, so they are not going on any high rotation. The sound isn't as big as head phones, but it _feels_ more tactile, more direct with the ear buds, and most pitching issues disappear. One final thing, sometimes I will use pitch correction and auto tune to create a guide track to sing against as a reference, especially when there are notes I'm missing consistently that are usually notes that are a little dissonant against the chord I'm singing against. Where possible I will always use a raw track, and I'll only ever use pitch correction when I'm simply out of time and I'll give myself an upper cut after if I have
I currently am running a pair of yorkville yx10's and a 2x15" sixth order band pass sub as my studio monitors as I already had them for running band practices/performances. I setup a reference mic and equalized them to a flat response. I also have a lot of room treatment like bass traps and budget (diy) diffusers and sound absorption. I would eventually like proper studio monitors but a Focusrite 18i8 is my next large purchase so I can record a full band at once. I am using Reaper after having watched your videos while searching and trying out different DAWs. Thank you Glen and your crew at SMG for your videos. Entertaining and educational.
Do keep in mind that the 18i8 only has *four* mic preamps; "only" the 18i20 has eight. That is, assuming you don't already have some 8ch mic preamp with an ADAT output...
If you want to do it all wrong my studio is currently sitting at $350. And the quality shows. Lmao. But the key is to learn to use what you can afford. Great video. Some awesome ideas
This is awesome, I'm glad you took the time to show people like me, who might not have the means to go all out on studio gear. That you can still get something half decent at a low cost. Obviously it will never be as good as paying a shit load of money at a high end studio. But at least I can dream right?
Hugh Bannister dime had the most aggressive tone, people always say it's really scooped but the way he set his gear tricks the ear into thinking that, he ran a bunch of eq with the mids cranked before the amp then cutting it a little on the amp to give the illusion that it was more scooped than it was
That's a great way to get started! The beauty of the gear list in this video is you can build on it very easily when you start to save up more cash. You can sell a piece and upgrade it as time goes on. That whole setup cost a little less than my Neumann monitors alone. But that's OK because who has $1750 when first starting out to spend on one part of your set up for demo and DIY recording. Super video Glenn.
Great video. This is the kind of thing I've been waiting for. I'm eager to put these to use. Thanks so much for looking out for the budget studio guys who are still learning.
Awesome vid man! I just made the switch to Reaper. Still wrapping my head around it, but my workflow is improving. I cut my digital mixing teeth on Adobe Audition aka Cool Edit Pro years ago, and the transition was awkward to say the least, but Reapers design is pretty intuitive once you get used to it, and the live monitoring rocks. Stay gold ponyboy! Cheers!
Yeah, Adobe bought them. Things looked promising, and then? Nada. Half ass VST support, and practically nonexistent VSTi, and then it dropped off the face of the planet. I dug the workflow layout for it's time. I pull it out from time to time if I'm tracking straight audio for something quick and easy. It's actually legit free to download with the rest of Adobe CS2 on their website. That's still a pretty good bundle of tools Photoshop, Audition, ect. considering 7 years ago it was over a grand. I like cheap. lol! I LOVE free! lol!
On the 57's. Was that two for $99. 10 smackers for lunch? You rock ! Back in the mid 80's I began my demo recording service. I bought more used gear. There was actually quite a bit of old stuff available if you hung around and did some speaker lumping for those you were learning from. Stuff like boxes of the57's predecessor the Unidyne and Uniball that had to be scraped to remove spit. Computer and digital recording did exist but only Real Studios could afford it. I first real Tape recorder/console was a used AKAI four track with six inputs consisting of two Mic preamps, four line ins all assignable to four subgroups. The specs were actual studio quality, great for a four track cassette with bed running the tape at 2x spreed, plus track four had the ability to add a high frequency FM syncing code to run MIDI stuff. Everything else I had was from my live rig that I used to make a (starving)living &free draft beer twice a week. Good work if you can get it. GOOD TIMES !!!!
ZombieHorror666 I don’t think the instrumental is that bad, if a little generic, and the chorus is catchy, the phrasing of the lyrics aren’t the best though, the timing of them doesnt really link with the song that well
Awesome video, I am in the process of upgrading my studio at the moment and around 1500 - 2000 dollars is my budget. This video came out just in time. Thank you and keep up the good work!
Fair enough, but I'm guessing if you're going to try to shed a little bit of expense from this, as long as the Reaper plug-ins will do the job, it could be a way to make the cost even more accessible :) But hey, as someone whose "studio" at the moment is just a two-channel interface, a couple dynamic mics, and free plugins with Reaper as his DAW, this video might be the thing that convinces me to pick up a cheap drum mic kit like the Samson set and a Scarlet 8i2. I mean I don't even have access to a drum kit to record, but just having the option if it comes up would be excellent. I'm also considering that condenser mic, because I really want to record acoustic guitar and vocals better, and was looking for a mic recommendation that won't bust the bank. To direct this comment more at Glenn (but feel free to answer if you have experience!): Since the Mackie monitors didn't work out, are there any other similarly priced monitors you'd recommend? I've been headphone-mixing for a long time and I want to step up my game with a decent set of studio monitors.
Holy shit! One of the best videos I’ve ever seen you produce. Thanks sooo much for making this video! You have no clue how helpful ALL this information I just took in is for me. You Glenn are awesome! Is it possible you could make a video that runs down the specs on what your computer will require in order to record and mix the way you do? That would be pretty cool! Thanks again!
Based on this video, how much money does it cost to make a professional studio? As someone who plans to put a down payment on a house in the near future, my dream is to have my own recording studio in my backyard. Music is something I take seriously so there's no cutting corners, which is why I'd like an honest guess as to what I should expect the total price to be when I have a fully fleshed studio. I want to open a savings account for it when I start my new job. Thanks for the bang for your buck videos like these, you give future audio engineers like myself hope for the future.
D1L4TE Not counting construction(like, are you planning on building something from scratch?), I'd say $10000 would get pretty much everything you need, cutting no corners. But my opinion on gear is there's less difference than price justifies, if you've got a treated space and decent monitors. For the record, I've spent about $3000 on my gear, and there isn't much I'm looking to change.
Kidzelda0 I appreciate the reply. I was planning to start from scratch, reason being so I could build it for its intended purpose instead of just using a room prebuilt in my house. I want proper acoustic treatment/sound proof walls, the right flooring, electrical wiring, all that stuff. I know it sounds a bit much as I know a lot of people just find a room in their homes, but I'm willing to do what it takes to get the best results.
D1L4TE Then you'll spend more on construction than anything. You're talking about a building with at least two rooms, on a proper foundation, that's prolly $20000 before you even get to the soundproofing and other audio-specific construction work.
Kidzelda0 I knew it was going to be expensive. I was honestly expecting around $40,000 for the whole project, but in case I had forgotten something to add into the equation I wanted an experts opinion on what my ending price would be. Thanks for your honesty, and if you have any more tips you are willing to share I'd really appreciate it. As you can probably tell I'm fairly new to construction and purchasing houses haha.
Great video Glenn, I'm currently building my first home studio and found some of the items you used of interest. I'm intending to get a 18/20 for my drums, but just to get me going and to later use for just the vocals I've bought the 2i2 bundle, which came with a pair of head phones and condenser mic (all for £179). I've ordered a pair of M-Audio BX8 monitors and reaper on my computer. I spent the rest of my cash on sound proofing and acoustic dampening. I hope to get used to the reaper program while I save up for a bigger interface, so I can start recording my drum kit. Thanks for all your videos, I find them informative and funny. Thanks again from the UK.
Hi, Glenn! Thanks for making this video. Currently my studio consists of a PreSonus AudioBox iOne (I really wish I had bought the iTwo), a Samson C01, Reaper and its stock plugins, a set of Sony MDR-ZX100 headphones, a set of Shure SH440 headphones, Superior Drummer, and iZotope Ozone 5. In addition to upgrading my monitoring situation, I'm definitely looking to save up to buy an 8+ channel interface and possibly a midi mix console so I don't have to use a mouse to move all the faders/knobs in Reaper. I'm pretty sold on the Focusrite you demo'd in this, as it easily fits into my budget. Is there a budget-friendly midi controller you could recommend? I understand that sometimes "budget" and "good" are mutually exclusive, but it's worth a shot.
I've got Arturia minilab and it's awesome and cheap. It has a lot of knobs and buttons, and you can repurpose one of the ribbon faders to be a controller as well. And it's a big plus that Arturia software allows you to set the behavior of each knob and button (like, absolute or 3 types of relative control), and you can match it with what Reaper listens to. Plus you can assign amy midi code for the controls. So I'd recommend anything from Arturia for that reason.
Check the used market for interfaces. You should be able to find a 1st-gen 18i20 (or a similar unit from Presonus, Steinberg, MOTU etc) for half the price (or a smidge over) of the retail 2nd-gen one in this video.
That actually sounds pretty good! I am a high school student in a band with a tight budget, most of which has been going to instrument maintenance, so this might be what we need to record drums. Only critique is that the delay on the vocals is a little too high.
Not referring to this particular videos but thanks to you dude I got my first good sounding metal mix. I'm so happy and excited to continue learning more and expanding. Thanks man. Cheers from India !
Also, this video didn't take into consideration the PC being used. The PC I bought 12 years ago doesn't have anywhere near the processing power required for recording a full band. About 4 years ago I built a PC using 16 gigs of RAM and an AMD 3.1Ghz 8-core with the saving point being the gpu that cost me about $600. And I built it specifically for recording, not gaming. At a bare minimum you're still looking at about $400-700 for a PC to record with, if you build it yourself and put the money in the right places in the PC internally.
People have computers, but people don't have computers capable of the processing power required for recording 10+ tracks. The $300 laptop most people have simply isn't enough. I know because I tried recording with one. As soon as you set the latency to anything under 512 samples the DAW would crash with anything more than 2 tracks in it. It takes a pretty powerful computer to process ALL those plugins and monitor several tracks at super low sample rates. However, assuming someone does have a good gaming PC, yeah they should be fine lol. Good video otherwise! Thanks!
And an ipad still costs several hundred dollars, not including the itrack dock, or the DAW used on the ipad. All the meanwhile not having the benefits of using a computer. Besides, the itrack dock doesn't have enough inputs on it to record a full drumset like Glenn does in this video.
Should musicians self-produce? I'm debating. My lead guitarist (Who is extremely talented) thinks we should just record, mix and master everything ourselves and only spend money on marketing and promotion. However, I would rather hire professional mix engineers and maybe even professional studio time. I really want our band to skyrocket if possible (Maybe even reach celebrity status) I'm fine with doing either one as long as we can be successful and not just stay local with only close friends and family knowing that we even exist.
That's a hell of a debate indeed. Just keep in mind that every self-anything activity takes a lot of time and energy you could otherwise use to make music and practice to become greater musicians (which is definitely a must if you wand to become popular). You might find yourself not playing music at all and just do all that production or promotion stuff, and I assume you're not as goos at it as professional managers and engineers.
Whatever sounds best. If you mean that your lead guitarist is an extremely talented studio engineer and mixer, and if you know what you want the album to sound like and how to get there, then go for it. However if you both know for a fact that you could get better results from hiring professionals, then go that route and simply learn how to do it yourselves before next time. Self-producing is _incredibly_ liberating but the bottom line is to do what's best for the music at the time.
Bones98, you can, but even Chris Lord Alge won't make it sound like a top-40 record if the production is cheap. Although a lot of mixing engineers who charge $50-100 per song are used to work with low quality source material, so you will get something half decent with that approach. My band gone this route too.
The behringer x32 boards are fantastic mixers/ interfaces themselves. More for the money. Talkback mic and monitor mixing covered. Just another way to go on budget. I use that hooked up to a surface pro 3. Live, in studio, I frickin love it. I second the Samson mics but you'll want to upgrade pretty quickly. The nice thing is, once you have the money to upgrade, you don't have to get rid of the Samsons. The kick mic is nice on floor toms and the spare Tom mics are good when you get that guy with a 28 piece kit. A lot of that wisdom comes from live work more than studio so take it for what it is. I'm real happy with this setup for both.
Imo you should have considered the pc pricepoint too. Not everybody run arounds with pc able to record/mix/master a full band and the non free vst too. Altho i appreciate the sentiment behind the video (and i agree you don't need a stupid amount of money to start your own recordin studio), let's just say it could have been thought a little more throughly.
Handling a couple vst put together and 2/3 tracks nope. But handling mulltiple vsts on multiple tracks, oh believe you me. To do so you need ATLEAST a 600 bucks rig (and that's leaving the gfx card out). Again, the point that you still don't need a stupid amount of money to get you started it's 120% correct and absolutely valid. I just personally think you should have considered into the budget the price for a decent enough pc. Not everybody is a nerd like us with config/selfmade builds, most people don't even know how to update their drivers lol.
There are ways to keep your CPU usage down by the way. Like using dedicated buses for reverbs and delays instead of putting them on every track, increasing ASIO buffer, bouncing down (freezing) tracks you're not currently working on etc. That way you can run quite busy sessions on an old PC. I should probably make a video about that.
You don't (or wouldn't) necessarily need to buy a brand new computer from a shop, that's capable of handling audio. I've recorded 24ch drum-sessions on my Dell Precision M4800 laptop with no hitches whatsoever. I got this refurbished four years ago (that's 2014), and granted, it was a pretty penny at the time (~$12-1300 or so), keep in mind it's a *laptop* . Obviously a similar-power desktop would've been easily half the price at the time. I'll let you "do the math" on how cheaply you could get those kinds of levels of computing power nowadays (used, obviously).
"Don't overthink it" is possibly the best advice above all. Some beginners spend thousands on gear thinking it will make their end result better, not realizing it's 99% know-how, 1% gear. Same with podcasting. I have a show that airs on actual broadcast radio in a size 6 market (Houston) on iHeart. 99% of the time, all I use is a $90 Samson Meteor USB mic into recording software. Listeners, whether it's radio or music, care what you're saying, not what you're saying it into. Unless it's Nady.
you're amazing Glenn... Great motivation for us.... i keep learning new stuffs from you every single day... Hats off to you Glenn... u da best.. youre inspiring and awesome.. \m/
You need to do more videos like this, really valuable information here! Many people(including me) read all kinds of forums and think you have to have this or that to get great sounding mix.. Even thou it all comes down to great performance and honing your skill as mixing engineer
This is the best fuckin' youtube channel for young budding musician's and engineers a like. Hat's off to you Glenn, I came for stupid musician's text and stayed for the knowledge.
Couldn’t agree more about slate plugins, they are the nuts! I still prefer studio one though, but that’s just preference and years using the same product, I really find your videos informative and straight to the point so thank you, keep it up!! Regards Dan
I have the same Mackies. I initially didn't buy them for mixing, rather just for music listening in my home office. They don't have the sparkle you would want, nor do they have the low-end you need, so you really would be doing a bunch of guess work. I sometimes use them to dial-in tone for tracking, but even then, I have to put on some good headphones to get an idea of what I'm missing in the Mackies. Definitely save up for something better, especially if you are mixing for paying customers.
Great work with the mix! I really think it fits the late 80s thrash/heavy metal vibe. Kinda reminds me of Metal Church. Would be cool to hear the whole song as well. Great video, you fucking rock!
Cool budget VID. Being a Victim of past choices and current circumstances there is not much money for flights of fancy. In a Past life I was transcribing LP’s to the digital realm and a internal “M Audio Audiophile 192” second hand was what I ended up using. It is quiet enough and clean enough for what I was doing. I’m Still using it with a disgusting mike pre I built as well as a mike pre in a peace of “performance digital combo practice thing” Oh and been using Linux as my OS and music production software. So the next peace of gear I was looking at getting was a mike/line level Pre, so I could use different style of microphones instead of the simple dynamic mikes I have been using so far. The choice is coming down to “ focusrite scarlett 2i2 2nd gen” as part of a kit with a Cardioid Condenser Microphone Or the “behringer style mixer” directly in to my line in. The plan is to record Guitar and Vocals separately and or some field recording with the laptop (group performance/sound effects) The biggest problem is in NZ dollars about $500 for the kit NZ dollars about the same or slightly less than Canadian dollars and the “behringer style mixer” with USB out put is about the $200. Are you planing to compare this type of equipment?
Damn that was hard to read :C For band recordings I would definitely recommend a USB mixer since you can plug more than 2 mics into it. For guitar and vocals overdubbing - just a focusrite solo and any mic of your choice.
As a drummer, my only quarrel with this mix example is the strings need like a 3-6db bump they almost way to quiet. I wish the drummer torqued those bottom three snare lugs up a tad tighter for a little more space and tone. But, once you added post production it does sound less like a cardboard/sand paper sound and more spacial. (I like to do most of my work on the kit for less work in the Daw, to save money on studio time. Which, would be my main justification for a slightly brighter snare tuning. ) Overall, however; this is a clutch mix for $1500 home studio. I’ve worked with an engineer/bass player who used an X32 with our live rig, usb into pro-tools to track. his mixes didn’t even sound this great. A testament to your prowess 🤘🏻!
*Rob Scallon enters Glenn’s recording studio carrying his shovel* “alright I’m ready to track bass”
Super informative!
Thanks for dropping by, Adam!
Watch that video again :)
He's wearing the rule#2 shirt.
ua-cam.com/video/EbpEjkwyOts/v-deo.html
Hi Adam!
the Best bass player 😂
Amazing! Great work my friend! This will get more people making music!! Truly inspiring!
This is as good a time than ever to ask you this Warren, I guess I'm just curious and trying to get place how I feel about my suspicions. But is this video directly related to yours at sunset?... and are the sponsored by focusrite? I feel that you(and Glen) provide some of the better content on mixing here on UA-cam. But being somone who follow's you closely, and having been involved in the industry for a while, There's been a few times where it felt like some things that were being pitched as unbiased & genuine, could possibly be something a little less sincere and a little more business. I'm really not trying to blow up your spot, I apologize if it appears that way.
I feel like my pessimistic side is getting the best of me lately.
Appreciate your content.
And now I'm off to check out *your* channel. Man, who needs recording school when you have quality UA-cam tutorials and things like "Nail the Mix"? I'm in hog-heaven, nigga.
Agree, I do have those cr3's but I'm watching this through jbl computer speaker on my laptop.
To be honest that guitar doesn't sound good at all.
I think Glenn, should do another video those Mackie cr3's, on the focusrite, Behringer mixer and country man di through every amp in the studio starting with the Peavey Windsor.
The drums are only instrument that sounds good, so does the bass. Level on the guitars are too low.
During the sub mix Glenn shows you can see level for guitar is low.
Ain't throwing stones just explaining what I see & hear.
You do amazing work as well
Warren very cool to throw support 🔊
I love how Glenn tried not to laugh when mentioning the Mackie monitors.
Wow. This has a truly late 80s/early 90s sound to it. I like that it doesn't sound over produced. I really like this a lot.
This is some great information!
YOU are some great information
Terrific timing! I've had my eyes on the Mackie CR3s for some time, now, because the price point was decent. Was just short of biting the bullet and getting them, and then this comes out. A lot of well-timed and well-compiled information, just like always!
Thanks, Glenn!
Zak James The Presonus 3.5 are the same price and just as good. I have both monitors
i own the mackies and they are REALLY bass heavy. take that into account.
The mackies are pretty good, but quite boomy. I put socks in the woofer holes on the back and that really helped lol.
yeah had the same experience - i did an a/b comparison when the fucking woofer on the back was covered, great sound then (for the price) - if they didnt put these damn woofers on the back it would be a decent set of monitors.
Been doing music production for 5 years now, and I can say this video is extremely helpful. Started out with just a computer, interface and a $60 Mic. There were many moments I felt like I would never get any better, or that I was going nowhere with it. There was always a part of me that was intimidated of being dedicated to recording, producing, composing etc. Deep down however, I knew this was truly my passion and no matter how many road blocks I hit, I could never stop doing what I love. Fast forward to today I have a decent home studio and have already produced my second record. So even now, watching videos like this keep me determined and remind me of why I started.
I am a home hobbyist when it comes to recording, I really just record my own ideas for songs and you tube. I also have a small budget when it come to buying gear. I had bought the Mackie CR3's because of the price point. I was hesitant but they are much better than the Klipsch surround sound system I was using for years. I did feel they sounded strange when I first hooked them up, but I have nothing to compare them too. So far they seem to be doing great for me the hobbiest. I also want to thank you for listing that inexpensive DAW called Reaper. I have been using an old Sonar 7 pro from 2007 and it had been acting up and just dropping out in the most inconvenient places. Been searching for something I can actually afford, and its awesome that they let you try it before you buy it too. Thanks Glen
Videos like this are why this channel is the shit. You deserve millions of subscribers IMO.
i love how this ever so conveniently came up on my recommended section, JUST in time for my $1500 tax return.
Glad I could help!
I know this was a big achievement for you Glenn! Congrats on completing this one. You're the man!
GLENN! Your content is always top notch but this was a MUCH NEEDED video! So glad you took the time out to do this as it will answer a ton of questions for n00bies. Keep rocking man you are amazing
This is fucking 1st class oldschool heavy metal, dont care about sound and gear at all !! I'm watching this part all over again, even without your talk and it's convincing enough, hail \m/
!!!
in my opinion the worst thing you can do is get a lot of plugins when you start recording (when you dont know how to use crompressors the right way and eqs) because you will be tweaking all the time a sufering from option paralisis ... that is what is happening to me ... just start with reaper plug in and as you move forward you will discover than maybe you need a diferent comp here and there or a diferent eq and then you add them ... it is the best way to learn i my opinion
Good point.
You Hit the Nail.
Yeah dont spend any additional money on plugins if you are on a tight budget, get hardware instead. You can start with plugins that come with the daw and there is alot of completely free plugins that are great and even virtual instruments.
I wouldn't spend any money on something if I didn't know what it is or how to use it... kinda common sense. But most people interested in investing $1500 in a studio probably know how to use a compressor and wants an EQ and noise gates and other useful tools.
Well, plugins are fun, of course, but I agree, practically all DAWs today come with a great set of plugins to start with.
Especially I wouldn’t recommend the slate bundle, it seems cheap at first but of course the subscription gets expensive over the years.
There are so many good plugins from indie developers today, inexpensive or free (the likes of Klanghelm, TDL, Valhalla, kazrog, hornet etc) or extreme sales from waves or plugin alliance, there should be no need to fall into the subscription hole (after five years you payed nearly $1000 for the bundle. There’s a lot in there granted.)
Glenn,
This video is fantastic. Not only does it prove that a good song and a good recording is in the performance of the musicians and how well a song is written and arranged, it shows with out a doubt you don't need thousands and thousands of dollars a year to be "competitive" with your ep/lp - It's all going to come down to how well you wrote a song, and how well you perform it.
I'm excited that I have a lot of this gear already, and it was kind of a relief to realize I don't really need much more except maybe a couple of microphones and a small mixer for that nifty guitar trick. Dude, your channel is a life saver - Cheers and here's to many more years of your UA-cam career continuing to go well for you, so we can get no nonsense down to earth fact based videos.
Rock on \m/
+L O awesome! Please make sure you subscribe!
Oh brother, I've been subscribed for 2 + years now, with the notification bell on, and your newsletter. \m/
Hey Glenn im glad I stumbled upon your channel about 2 years ago. Its been a pleasure laughing and learning about recording metal with you and t j thanks for the demo. I've been slowly building up my gear when I find extra money and the bills are paid. Im a drummer and already have a kill drum set. So I'm thinking of getting the focusrite 18i20 and inviting some bands for recording .
Go for it! That way you can also be a session drummer with his own recording facility which is a huge thing.
Hint: check the used market - even a 1st-gen 18i20 is more than good enough, for (less than?) half the price of a brand-new 2nd-gen. You can put the difference towards (better) monitors, and/or something like a MOTU 8pre - even one with busted Firewire works just fine as an 8 mic input "extension" via ADAT ;)
Hell yeah, you are right I guess I could preform as a session drummer if needed.
Thank you so much for this video. I’m a country singer songwriter from Eastern Kentucky and last year I was ready for my third album. I contacted three local studios who all were in the $3000 to $3500 price range for ten songs. Plus the price of musicians. I just couldn’t do that. So I pulled $600 from my savings and went shopping on Facebook market place. I got a 14 track interface, a 4 channel headphone amp, a new set of those Makie monitors, bought Reaper and began. I already had a couple of budget mics. My biggest challenge was drums without a doubt. I ended up downloading a fee drum program and never looked back. So I completed my 1 home studio album over the summer of 2018, all acoustic. Then began recording more of a full band album. I’ve currently recorded over 25 songs all original . I’ve released a handful to iTunes/Spotify etc. I’ve taken on demo services for other locals. I’ve even began recording a full length album for a local Gospel group. So my advice is do it. This modern equipment is so good it’s so much easier to get a quality sound now more than ever. I remember in the 90s my band trying to record analog and the sound always sucked. Thanks for the video it’s these type of information videos that help us newbies learn. I’m no pro, but I’m not going broke recording myself either thanks to used equipment and the willingness to learn. 😎
“Sound like” but with recording technology instead of an artist’s tone. Great video!!!
The guitars could have been louder in the mix, but honestly, this is the best sounding mix, in my opinion, you've done. The guitar tone it self sounds awesome. The drum mics sound great too.
Have you ever done a walk around tour of your studio? Thanks Glenn, keep up the great work!!!
He did a couple years ago
Glenn, I think this might be one of the best videos you've ever put out.
This is absolutely fantastic for someone (like myself) going into music production.
Cheers from Australia, where the shipping is expensive and the sun burns.
This sounds like an '80s mix.
+Alex Walters funny how 80s records were vastly superior to what's coming out riday
Its a very specific sound, though - '80s metal, almost like it was mastered for vinyl; It sounds to me like the frequencies are very focused on the mids. It could also be that im just noticing the reverb on the mix
The 80s was the golden age of Metal, though not only for the mixes sound.
Alex Walters I thought the same thing. Glad I wasn't the only one. Also, it's very cool that they bought stuff from one of the my local shops. Pixel Pro is a great place to buy from. I've always been impressed with thier knowledge of what they sell.
Is that supposed to be a good or a bad thing? To me is a great thing :)
LOVE the snare sound on this. Kick too. The whole mix is nice and fat sounding. Honestly my favorite sound you've gotten.
Watching the mix currently at 6:30, listening through a set of blue sky monitors.
Sounds great, seems like guitars are a tad low in the mix. Could be my monitors though.
Listen to the mix through your professional monitors and see if there's any changes you would make?
Thanks for the tutorials, cheers!
nope, vocals are too much up front, there's not enough guitar and it really lacks some bottom end for the bass. This is how I hear it.
That was my perception as well using my cellphone (I know! I shouldn't hear these videos through my cellphone, I usually use my monitors, but it's sunday and I'm still in bed)
Yeah I agree, the guitars needed to be a bit louder and the bass need more thump. Unless they were purposely going for that "traditional heavy metal" revival sound you hear in bands like Sumerlands/ Eternal Champion.
The Driver no, this isn't something Glenn would do without telling us, this is just a highlight of the flaws of the studio monitors. Too much bass and mids with a lack of highs (which would explain why the guitars and bass are backed up compared to the vocals)
DevilDead13820 - eh, I don't want to jump the gun on that claim. You're going to have to ask Glen or point this to Glen directly to know for sure. The reason why I said they might've gone for a Traditional Heavy Metal mix was because his friend, the guy singing and doing guitar and bass (don't know his name), has a forte for that kind of sub-genre sound. But the point of this video is you can get a pretty pro-like mix for $1,500 anyway. We shall see.
Yes! I've been waiting for this
EDIT: Glad I watched it, good to know some things can be done for so cheap
not bad at all! Shows that it's mostly skills and experienced that will give you good results rather than expensive gears
Great video Glenn!! Love the content and your never ending banter on bass players and musicians in general (as bassist I see myself in my mid teens in alot of those rants🤣) luckily, I have grown to listen to the likes of Cliff Burton, Jason Newstead, Steve Harris, Alex Webster and the list goes on, they have been inspirations in helping me become a better musician. Now almost in my mid 30s after beeing out of the game for almost a decade, I have picked up guitar and reunited myself with my g&l L2500 for the last 2 years. I'm the process of building a small home studio and getting back on the horse again. I find myself extremely lucky to have all the tools necassary around me with social media to become even better. Without people like you and many others we would still be stuck in the late 90s where info was scarse and you had to try shit for yourself, not many people were very knoledgeble on technical stuff... keep telling it like it is and keep up the awesome work that you do!! A raging FUCK YEAAHHH!! from Montreal Qc
why dont use the mixer for talkback setup. output from interface goes to the mixer and hook a cheap mic here, and send them to the drummer.
+fuzzfizz that might work! Good idea!
because it is what we use at my band's studio. i hook another output from the interface to the mixer just for click so we can or dont't have to hear them
SpectreSoundStudios another tip. I use $40 aussie Dollaridoos Koss ear buds for tracking vocals. I got the idea from Kevin Richards, from Rock the Stage NYC where he used an ear plug to bridge the ear - skull bone the same way you put your finger in your ear to hear what you're singing. Like a solo button
The ear buds work like that so I get to hear skull resonance, as well as they let me hear what I am singing as it doesn't block out the room noise.
As they are also jammed right in my ear, the bleed, into the vocal mic is much lower
The result is I sing much better as I hear myself closer to the way I practice, and it cuts the pitch issues in half !!
Now I'm not a singer, but I do smash out comedy jingles and parodies on a regular basis for the No Agenda podcast. I'm talking no more than 4 hours of my interactive time to write, find a backing track or record one, record, mix & master and send it off That is spread over 2 days, so I don't have much time to practice the song and get to know it. I'm limited to my time alone in the car.
These are also tracks that are 30 - 90 seconds long, used once in the show and that's it, so they are not going on any high rotation.
The sound isn't as big as head phones, but it _feels_ more tactile, more direct with the ear buds, and most pitching issues disappear.
One final thing, sometimes I will use pitch correction and auto tune to create a guide track to sing against as a reference, especially when there are notes I'm missing consistently that are usually notes that are a little dissonant against the chord I'm singing against. Where possible I will always use a raw track, and I'll only ever use pitch correction when I'm simply out of time and I'll give myself an upper cut after if I have
That's some sweet advice!
Anvilshock thanks....assuming you were addressing me :-)
I currently am running a pair of yorkville yx10's and a 2x15" sixth order band pass sub as my studio monitors as I already had them for running band practices/performances. I setup a reference mic and equalized them to a flat response. I also have a lot of room treatment like bass traps and budget (diy) diffusers and sound absorption. I would eventually like proper studio monitors but a Focusrite 18i8 is my next large purchase so I can record a full band at once.
I am using Reaper after having watched your videos while searching and trying out different DAWs.
Thank you Glen and your crew at SMG for your videos. Entertaining and educational.
Do keep in mind that the 18i8 only has *four* mic preamps; "only" the 18i20 has eight. That is, assuming you don't already have some 8ch mic preamp with an ADAT output...
Drummers are not weird we are enigmatic
He should make a t-shirt with that phrase on it
Daniel Leonov but then you are expecting drummers to know what that big word means.
TJ_The_Drummer good point.
Good stuff man! I’ve been using KRK Rokits G5 monitors for years now.
Love for you to do some metal mixing challenges .
YOOOO I have that same mixer!! awesome videos man, thanks for this!
If you want to do it all wrong my studio is currently sitting at $350. And the quality shows. Lmao. But the key is to learn to use what you can afford. Great video. Some awesome ideas
Truth. Best wishes.
This is awesome, I'm glad you took the time to show people like me, who might not have the means to go all out on studio gear. That you can still get something half decent at a low cost. Obviously it will never be as good as paying a shit load of money at a high end studio. But at least I can dream right?
The Focusrite is a good, solid foundation, though1
Glenn if you had the privilege to record Pantera, would you have stepped your foot down on Dimebag for his tone or let him have it his way?
Would have let him have his way!
SpectreSoundStudios good man
Dimebag was too great of a talent to second-guess on things like tone.
Hugh Bannister dime had the most aggressive tone, people always say it's really scooped but the way he set his gear tricks the ear into thinking that, he ran a bunch of eq with the mids cranked before the amp then cutting it a little on the amp to give the illusion that it was more scooped than it was
Damn good question! Damn good. Lol
Loved it! From one producer to another, keep it up! :D
TJ straight up looks like Brian Fantana from Anchorman 😂
Erik Buchan thank you :)
TJ_The_Drummer No problem man. I'm digging it 😉
I thought he was going for the John Bonham look.
So 70's. It's awesome.
That's a great way to get started! The beauty of the gear list in this video is you can build on it very easily when you start to save up more cash. You can sell a piece and upgrade it as time goes on. That whole setup cost a little less than my Neumann monitors alone. But that's OK because who has $1750 when first starting out to spend on one part of your set up for demo and DIY recording. Super video Glenn.
Is TJ cosplaying Ringo Starr to join a Beatles cover band or something?
Did Ringo ever have that '80s Tom Selleck 'stoche? :P
I was about to say the exact same thing!
He looks more like George Harrison
Great video. This is the kind of thing I've been waiting for. I'm eager to put these to use. Thanks so much for looking out for the budget studio guys who are still learning.
Nice, livedrums on a budget is usually hard, good video :)
Loving the sound of the drums.
I imagine TJ drives a 1969 GTO Judge, rolls his own cigarettes, and describes John Bonham as his spirit animal.
TJ is great.
Man Your Awesome !!!!!! Many Blessings !!!! You Won A Fan For Life Here !!!!! Thanks For The Lessons And All The Gear Advice and Reviews.
Awesome vid man! I just made the switch to Reaper. Still wrapping my head around it, but my workflow is improving. I cut my digital mixing teeth on Adobe Audition aka Cool Edit Pro years ago, and the transition was awkward to say the least, but Reapers design is pretty intuitive once you get used to it, and the live monitoring rocks. Stay gold ponyboy! Cheers!
+Jason Heaton cool edit pro! There's a name I haven't heard in years!
Yeah, Adobe bought them. Things looked promising, and then? Nada. Half ass VST support, and practically nonexistent VSTi, and then it dropped off the face of the planet. I dug the workflow layout for it's time. I pull it out from time to time if I'm tracking straight audio for something quick and easy. It's actually legit free to download with the rest of Adobe CS2 on their website. That's still a pretty good bundle of tools Photoshop, Audition, ect. considering 7 years ago it was over a grand. I like cheap. lol! I LOVE free! lol!
Gods below I miss Cool Edit. Still use Audition for podcasts. SCREW ADOBE.
Yeah, it's a shame. It was such a promising DAW.
+Jason Heaton outsiders reference?
On the 57's. Was that two for $99. 10 smackers for lunch? You rock ! Back in the mid 80's I began my demo recording service. I bought more used gear. There was actually quite a bit of old stuff available if you hung around and did some speaker lumping for those you were learning from. Stuff like boxes of the57's predecessor the Unidyne and Uniball that had to be scraped to remove spit.
Computer and digital recording did exist but only Real Studios could afford it. I first real Tape recorder/console was a used AKAI four track with six inputs consisting of two Mic preamps, four line ins all assignable to four subgroups. The specs were actual studio quality, great for a four track cassette with bed running the tape at 2x spreed, plus track four had the ability to add a high frequency FM syncing code to run MIDI stuff. Everything else I had was from my live rig that I used to make a (starving)living &free draft beer twice a week. Good work if you can get it.
GOOD TIMES !!!!
Great work, but why does the song sound like it has no energy? It just seems....lifeless.
He used cheap monitors that he's unfamiliar with. With some more use i'm sure it'd sound better. Like the guitars being louder etc
Steven Hall plus it could have used being like 5 or 10 bpm faster
Its bad songwriting. You need a good song to start with.
ZombieHorror666 I don’t think the instrumental is that bad, if a little generic, and the chorus is catchy, the phrasing of the lyrics aren’t the best though, the timing of them doesnt really link with the song that well
Drums and vocals are way too loud!
Awesome video, I am in the process of upgrading my studio at the moment and around 1500 - 2000 dollars is my budget. This video came out just in time. Thank you and keep up the good work!
Bet you could probably save even more money by using some of Reaper's built-in plug-ins. Is that something you'd recommend?
Well, they do the job perfectly, but Slate plugins he used can bring it to other level.
Fair enough, but I'm guessing if you're going to try to shed a little bit of expense from this, as long as the Reaper plug-ins will do the job, it could be a way to make the cost even more accessible :)
But hey, as someone whose "studio" at the moment is just a two-channel interface, a couple dynamic mics, and free plugins with Reaper as his DAW, this video might be the thing that convinces me to pick up a cheap drum mic kit like the Samson set and a Scarlet 8i2. I mean I don't even have access to a drum kit to record, but just having the option if it comes up would be excellent.
I'm also considering that condenser mic, because I really want to record acoustic guitar and vocals better, and was looking for a mic recommendation that won't bust the bank.
To direct this comment more at Glenn (but feel free to answer if you have experience!): Since the Mackie monitors didn't work out, are there any other similarly priced monitors you'd recommend? I've been headphone-mixing for a long time and I want to step up my game with a decent set of studio monitors.
There's also a ton of free plugins, some of them are great! I'd like to know about better cheap monitors as well.
Oh yeah, and I definitely appreciate Glenn mentioning some great free plug-ins in this video. I'm absolutely planning to check those ones out!
Reaper plugins are ok. They do the job. I just don't like the compressor. But I'm sure you can find one for free!
Holy shit! One of the best videos I’ve ever seen you produce. Thanks sooo much for making this video! You have no clue how helpful ALL this information I just took in is for me. You Glenn are awesome! Is it possible you could make a video that runs down the specs on what your computer will require in order to record and mix the way you do? That would be pretty cool! Thanks again!
Based on this video, how much money does it cost to make a professional studio? As someone who plans to put a down payment on a house in the near future, my dream is to have my own recording studio in my backyard. Music is something I take seriously so there's no cutting corners, which is why I'd like an honest guess as to what I should expect the total price to be when I have a fully fleshed studio. I want to open a savings account for it when I start my new job. Thanks for the bang for your buck videos like these, you give future audio engineers like myself hope for the future.
D1L4TE Not counting construction(like, are you planning on building something from scratch?), I'd say $10000 would get pretty much everything you need, cutting no corners. But my opinion on gear is there's less difference than price justifies, if you've got a treated space and decent monitors. For the record, I've spent about $3000 on my gear, and there isn't much I'm looking to change.
Kidzelda0 I appreciate the reply. I was planning to start from scratch, reason being so I could build it for its intended purpose instead of just using a room prebuilt in my house. I want proper acoustic treatment/sound proof walls, the right flooring, electrical wiring, all that stuff. I know it sounds a bit much as I know a lot of people just find a room in their homes, but I'm willing to do what it takes to get the best results.
D1L4TE Then you'll spend more on construction than anything. You're talking about a building with at least two rooms, on a proper foundation, that's prolly $20000 before you even get to the soundproofing and other audio-specific construction work.
Kidzelda0 I knew it was going to be expensive. I was honestly expecting around $40,000 for the whole project, but in case I had forgotten something to add into the equation I wanted an experts opinion on what my ending price would be. Thanks for your honesty, and if you have any more tips you are willing to share I'd really appreciate it. As you can probably tell I'm fairly new to construction and purchasing houses haha.
D1L4TE I would pretty well agree with your assessment.
Yet another gem from the talented Mr Fricker
Tj looking like Ringo star.
Great video Glenn, I'm currently building my first home studio and found some of the items you used of interest. I'm intending to get a 18/20 for my drums, but just to get me going and to later use for just the vocals I've bought the 2i2 bundle, which came with a pair of head phones and condenser mic (all for £179). I've ordered a pair of M-Audio BX8 monitors and reaper on my computer. I spent the rest of my cash on sound proofing and acoustic dampening. I hope to get used to the reaper program while I save up for a bigger interface, so I can start recording my drum kit. Thanks for all your videos, I find them informative and funny. Thanks again from the UK.
Hi, Glenn! Thanks for making this video. Currently my studio consists of a PreSonus AudioBox iOne (I really wish I had bought the iTwo), a Samson C01, Reaper and its stock plugins, a set of Sony MDR-ZX100 headphones, a set of Shure SH440 headphones, Superior Drummer, and iZotope Ozone 5. In addition to upgrading my monitoring situation, I'm definitely looking to save up to buy an 8+ channel interface and possibly a midi mix console so I don't have to use a mouse to move all the faders/knobs in Reaper. I'm pretty sold on the Focusrite you demo'd in this, as it easily fits into my budget. Is there a budget-friendly midi controller you could recommend? I understand that sometimes "budget" and "good" are mutually exclusive, but it's worth a shot.
I've got Arturia minilab and it's awesome and cheap. It has a lot of knobs and buttons, and you can repurpose one of the ribbon faders to be a controller as well. And it's a big plus that Arturia software allows you to set the behavior of each knob and button (like, absolute or 3 types of relative control), and you can match it with what Reaper listens to. Plus you can assign amy midi code for the controls. So I'd recommend anything from Arturia for that reason.
Check the used market for interfaces. You should be able to find a 1st-gen 18i20 (or a similar unit from Presonus, Steinberg, MOTU etc) for half the price (or a smidge over) of the retail 2nd-gen one in this video.
Thanks for doing all this man! And the people who come to play and record with you are awesome too.
Thomann?
Mh, do they have good mic stands?
That actually sounds pretty good! I am a high school student in a band with a tight budget, most of which has been going to instrument maintenance, so this might be what we need to record drums. Only critique is that the delay on the vocals is a little too high.
I've seen you wear many anime shirts, so what is your favorite anime? My personal favorite is One Punch Man.
+Hayden of Everything Death Note
Glenn! Check out Gundam Wing 00, if you haven't already!
SpectreSoundStudios Good man. Here, have an apple.
@@SpectreSoundStudios what an outstanding soundtrack there. What do you think about it?
Great shout to Pixel Pro Audio! Good bunch of dudes and about 15 minutes from my house. Thanks for supporting a Wisconsin company.
I've noticed that, to my taste, in recent videos you've been mixing the guitars a lot quieter than previously. Was this a conscious decision?
+Burn Halfmetal this was the monitors
Not referring to this particular videos but thanks to you dude I got my first good sounding metal mix. I'm so happy and excited to continue learning more and expanding. Thanks man. Cheers from India !
Also, this video didn't take into consideration the PC being used.
The PC I bought 12 years ago doesn't have anywhere near the processing power required for recording a full band. About 4 years ago I built a PC using 16 gigs of RAM and an AMD 3.1Ghz 8-core with the saving point being the gpu that cost me about $600. And I built it specifically for recording, not gaming.
At a bare minimum you're still looking at about $400-700 for a PC to record with, if you build it yourself and put the money in the right places in the PC internally.
+Glenn Conner lets assume people have a computer
People have computers, but people don't have computers capable of the processing power required for recording 10+ tracks.
The $300 laptop most people have simply isn't enough. I know because I tried recording with one. As soon as you set the latency to anything under 512 samples the DAW would crash with anything more than 2 tracks in it.
It takes a pretty powerful computer to process ALL those plugins and monitor several tracks at super low sample rates.
However, assuming someone does have a good gaming PC, yeah they should be fine lol. Good video otherwise! Thanks!
Glenn Conner you can record 10+ tracks with an ipad if you get an itrack dock
And an ipad still costs several hundred dollars, not including the itrack dock, or the DAW used on the ipad. All the meanwhile not having the benefits of using a computer.
Besides, the itrack dock doesn't have enough inputs on it to record a full drumset like Glenn does in this video.
Let's just assume the video isn't for console peasants. #pcgamingmasterrace
This is a clear example of experience > gear. Thanks Glenn.
why does tj look like a dad from the 60's
Hey Glen! Totally unrelated to this, but I just wanted to say thanks for putting Moon on the Water up. I love that recording.
Should musicians self-produce?
I'm debating. My lead guitarist (Who is extremely talented) thinks we should just record, mix and master everything ourselves and only spend money on marketing and promotion. However, I would rather hire professional mix engineers and maybe even professional studio time.
I really want our band to skyrocket if possible (Maybe even reach celebrity status)
I'm fine with doing either one as long as we can be successful and not just stay local with only close friends and family knowing that we even exist.
That's a hell of a debate indeed. Just keep in mind that every self-anything activity takes a lot of time and energy you could otherwise use to make music and practice to become greater musicians (which is definitely a must if you wand to become popular). You might find yourself not playing music at all and just do all that production or promotion stuff, and I assume you're not as goos at it as professional managers and engineers.
Whatever sounds best. If you mean that your lead guitarist is an extremely talented studio engineer and mixer, and if you know what you want the album to sound like and how to get there, then go for it. However if you both know for a fact that you could get better results from hiring professionals, then go that route and simply learn how to do it yourselves before next time. Self-producing is _incredibly_ liberating but the bottom line is to do what's best for the music at the time.
"extremely _experienced_ studio engineer and mixer" *
You can always record at home and send the tracks to get mixed and mastered by a pro. Some places charge $100 per song
Bones98, you can, but even Chris Lord Alge won't make it sound like a top-40 record if the production is cheap. Although a lot of mixing engineers who charge $50-100 per song are used to work with low quality source material, so you will get something half decent with that approach. My band gone this route too.
The behringer x32 boards are fantastic mixers/ interfaces themselves. More for the money. Talkback mic and monitor mixing covered. Just another way to go on budget. I use that hooked up to a surface pro 3. Live, in studio, I frickin love it. I second the Samson mics but you'll want to upgrade pretty quickly. The nice thing is, once you have the money to upgrade, you don't have to get rid of the Samsons. The kick mic is nice on floor toms and the spare Tom mics are good when you get that guy with a 28 piece kit. A lot of that wisdom comes from live work more than studio so take it for what it is. I'm real happy with this setup for both.
Imo you should have considered the pc pricepoint too. Not everybody run arounds with pc able to record/mix/master a full band and the non free vst too. Altho i appreciate the sentiment behind the video (and i agree you don't need a stupid amount of money to start your own recordin studio), let's just say it could have been thought a little more throughly.
+Davide Pannone really? 10 years ago you would have had a point. These days most pcs have no problem handing audio
Handling a couple vst put together and 2/3 tracks nope. But handling mulltiple vsts on multiple tracks, oh believe you me. To do so you need ATLEAST a 600 bucks rig (and that's leaving the gfx card out).
Again, the point that you still don't need a stupid amount of money to get you started it's 120% correct and absolutely valid. I just personally think you should have considered into the budget the price for a decent enough pc. Not everybody is a nerd like us with config/selfmade builds, most people don't even know how to update their drivers lol.
There are ways to keep your CPU usage down by the way. Like using dedicated buses for reverbs and delays instead of putting them on every track, increasing ASIO buffer, bouncing down (freezing) tracks you're not currently working on etc. That way you can run quite busy sessions on an old PC. I should probably make a video about that.
You don't (or wouldn't) necessarily need to buy a brand new computer from a shop, that's capable of handling audio. I've recorded 24ch drum-sessions on my Dell Precision M4800 laptop with no hitches whatsoever. I got this refurbished four years ago (that's 2014), and granted, it was a pretty penny at the time (~$12-1300 or so), keep in mind it's a *laptop* . Obviously a similar-power desktop would've been easily half the price at the time.
I'll let you "do the math" on how cheaply you could get those kinds of levels of computing power nowadays (used, obviously).
Great work, and I'm so fucking happy you still use your fantastic hair in the intro.
There wasn't enough left over for Autotune!!!
+Chris Wilson lol. It's almost like I did that on purpose!
Well, it comes for free with Reaper :P
you are an aamazing host, great character and attitude man!
The drummer is a 1970s porn star?
+Ozzy Pete nah. 80s drug lord
"Don't overthink it" is possibly the best advice above all. Some beginners spend thousands on gear thinking it will make their end result better, not realizing it's 99% know-how, 1% gear.
Same with podcasting. I have a show that airs on actual broadcast radio in a size 6 market (Houston) on iHeart. 99% of the time, all I use is a $90 Samson Meteor USB mic into recording software.
Listeners, whether it's radio or music, care what you're saying, not what you're saying it into.
Unless it's Nady.
Your the man. I already have a set up far beyond this but damn I wish I would have had this video when I started. Good stuff Glen. For real.
you're amazing Glenn... Great motivation for us.... i keep learning new stuffs from you every single day... Hats off to you Glenn... u da best.. youre inspiring and awesome.. \m/
You need to do more videos like this, really valuable information here! Many people(including me) read all kinds of forums and think you have to have this or that to get great sounding mix.. Even thou it all comes down to great performance and honing your skill as mixing engineer
I'd actually love to hear this full song. Sounds very 80's hair metal-esque. I dig it!
Every time I Watch Your Videos I Gain A Lot Of Knowledge, Thank You Glen👍
Oh so that's what the makies were for. I've noticed them on your desk a few months ago and I was expecting a review but this is even better
Behringer stuff is great. I recently bought an interface and I'm very happy with it.
This is the best fuckin' youtube channel for young budding musician's and engineers a like. Hat's off to you Glenn, I came for stupid musician's text and stayed for the knowledge.
This is such a great video! Thanks Glen!!
Couldn’t agree more about slate plugins, they are the nuts! I still prefer studio one though, but that’s just preference and years using the same product, I really find your videos informative and straight to the point so thank you, keep it up!! Regards Dan
Great Video man! I know a ton must have gone into this video but it really showed and was well worth it!
I have the same Mackies. I initially didn't buy them for mixing, rather just for music listening in my home office. They don't have the sparkle you would want, nor do they have the low-end you need, so you really would be doing a bunch of guess work. I sometimes use them to dial-in tone for tracking, but even then, I have to put on some good headphones to get an idea of what I'm missing in the Mackies. Definitely save up for something better, especially if you are mixing for paying customers.
Great work with the mix! I really think it fits the late 80s thrash/heavy metal vibe. Kinda reminds me of Metal Church. Would be cool to hear the whole song as well.
Great video, you fucking rock!
Oh yeah, Metal Church is a great example of that era's metal
Fantastic. I've always enjoyed your channel, and this type of video is really where it's at. Thank you!
+Paulie Jay you're very welcome & please subscribe if you haven't already!
Great video Glenn! Love videos like this
Cool budget VID. Being a Victim of past choices and current circumstances there is not much money for flights of fancy. In a Past life I was transcribing LP’s to the digital realm and a internal “M Audio Audiophile 192” second hand was what I ended up using. It is quiet enough and clean enough for what I was doing. I’m Still using it with a disgusting mike pre I built as well as a mike pre in a peace of “performance digital combo practice thing” Oh and been using Linux as my OS and music production software. So the next peace of gear I was looking at getting was a mike/line level Pre, so I could use different style of microphones instead of the simple dynamic mikes I have been using so far. The choice is coming down to “ focusrite scarlett 2i2 2nd gen” as part of a kit with a Cardioid Condenser Microphone Or the “behringer style mixer” directly in to my line in. The plan is to record Guitar and Vocals separately and or some field recording with the laptop (group performance/sound effects) The biggest problem is in NZ dollars about $500 for the kit NZ dollars about the same or slightly less than Canadian dollars and the “behringer style mixer” with USB out put is about the $200. Are you planing to compare this type of equipment?
Damn that was hard to read :C
For band recordings I would definitely recommend a USB mixer since you can plug more than 2 mics into it. For guitar and vocals overdubbing - just a focusrite solo and any mic of your choice.
I use to have those Mackie monitors. They were pretty cool I upgraded to some bigger jbl and use the Mackies for jamming in my basement now lol
As a drummer, my only quarrel with this mix example is the strings need like a 3-6db bump they almost way to quiet.
I wish the drummer torqued those bottom three snare lugs up a tad tighter for a little more space and tone. But, once you added post production it does sound less like a cardboard/sand paper sound and more spacial. (I like to do most of my work on the kit for less work in the Daw, to save money on studio time. Which, would be my main justification for a slightly brighter snare tuning. )
Overall, however; this is a clutch mix for $1500 home studio. I’ve worked with an engineer/bass player who used an X32 with our live rig, usb into pro-tools to track. his mixes didn’t even sound this great. A testament to your prowess 🤘🏻!
Awesome video! Definitely will be using this for reference on making my mini studio at home!
Thanks for putting this together! I'm going to try this.
I loved this! I don’t even plan on doing it! But it kinda makes me want to!
Thanks for taking time time for doing this
That Behringer mixer is a useful problem solver. I'm using one to bridge the 1/4" TRS stereo outs from an audio interface to RCA output to a stereo.
Love your videos, Glenn. This gives me hope for doing my own record!