Behold....It's Clapbox (and its free)

First off, sorry for the slow post. It was Christmas and I have a 3 year old boy and a new set of identical twin girls so I had NO time to post. I did bust out the laptop today and find this. It is a free plugin for Ableton live called Clapbox. I can definitely see where all of the people who use claps in their music could use this at some time or another, especially the hip hop crowd. All you have to do is download the plugin and click on the pack. It will install, Ableton will open up and wallah. Go to the instrument rack and you will have a new instrument there. It is basically a clap sound with parameters that can be adjusted like any other sound. I got some pretty good "claps" out of it so have fun with this one. Here is the link to Clapbox so go get it and get to clappin.

Free Plug-ins from Kjaerhus Audio

I found a company that has some really good vst effects and the best part about it is they are totally FREE. The list includes a Auto-Filter, Chorus, Compressor, Delay, EQ, Flanger, Master Limiter, Phaser, and a Reverb. All are part of Their Classic series plug-ins and are free for download. I tried some of them out on Ableton and they work Great.

Don't be fooled by the fact that they are free, They sound as good as the ones built into my daw to me. You should check out Kjaerhus audio and download the free plug-ins here. There is also a lot of other vst's on thier site so checkem out.

Download ReBirth 2.0.1. for FREE ...legally

ReBirth was one of the first successful software synthesizers on the market at one time. On September 1, 2005 Propellerhead officially discontinued the Software Synth that once ruled the among the masses. ReBirth was the start to what we all know and associate with as far as software synthesizer type products today.

Propellerhead is celebrating by opening ReBirth Museum to commemorate its history. They are also making the software available for FREE. Propellarhead says all development on ReBirth RB-338 has stopped. There will be no future updates and no Mac OS X version. All personal customer support of the product will be discontinued. They receive very few questions from ReBirth owners anymore and all of the information they usually provide is now available in the FAQ section on the new ReBirth web site. ReBirth will be given away for free, anyone can download and use ReBirth 2.0.1. The download and instructions are also available on the ReBirth site.

This thing is fun to play with and pretty much just a BAD A@# piece of software. Add the fact that it is free now and you cant go wrong. Download ReBirth . You will have to register on the site first, after doing that (which costs nothing) you have access to all kinds of cool stuff like forums, downloads etc. The same user name and password also works on the Propellerhead Software User Web site.

You Try........You like

AudioCubes ?

AudioCubes anyone? Don't worry, I didn't know either. It turns out that they are Cubes that are capable of generating and processing audio and MIDI information. Meaning they can control programs like Ableton Live by switching their position in relation to each other.

They will also generate lo-fi sounds without using a computer. They ship with a demo of Ableton live and the software for the cubes plus some loops and samples.

There are some videos on their site. Check them out. I think they would be fun to play with and if you were a live DJ or performer they would spice up your performance but I cant see myself using them in my studio. I will say I have never played with them, Ive only seen them on the Internet so I wont be to quick to judge. That's why I wrote this and gave you this link to their site... so you can go judge them.

Here is a video of them in action.

Casio PT-82 /// A blast from the past!

Years ago (almost 22 years is a bit more accurate) I got my first electronic keyboard, the Casio VL-1. I was 10 years old and there was nothing any cooler to me. I put it in my book bag and took it to school and had a crowd standing around my desk the minute I got it out and hit rhythm select/start. It starting pulsing away with its blip beat sound and I was king of the classroom for the 30 seconds before the teacher told me to put it away or it would be hers.

I also still have a Casio SK-1 Sampler which I am in the process of circuit bending at the moment. I have finished all of the wiring and soldering but have yet to build a case for it that will hold all of the new buttons, knobs, and sensors I have added, but that will be a different post in the future.

OK, got a little off track there. What I was getting at is that a year or two ago a friend of mine gave me her Casio PT-82 she had from way back. I put in in a closet forever. Then I let my son play with it for a while, but I never really messed with it myself. I recently had a minor surgery and while picking my son up from Grandma's I saw the PT-82 in a pile of toys, I had honestly forgot I even had it. I asked her if I could take it back home and she said sure so I brought it home and dropped 5 double A's in it. It's crazy how we forget just how far we have advanced in technology but trying to play this thing will remind you real quick.

Believe it or not I have been playing with this thing for 3 days now (well, me and the kids). Its amazing how much we get used to the synths and drum machines today that do all of the work for us. With my Korg EA1 and ER1 I can hit play and when one of the pattern starts it sounds so good I really don't have to do anything except add more patterns to it to get something that will still impress people who don't know how they work. I'm not saying that it takes no talent to make electronic music, I'm just saying its getting so easy it makes us lazy. I sat around pushing 1 key at a time trying to get a cool bass line or lead melody and came up with some good stuff that I plan to sample and use in the future. Since it really doesn't do ANYTHING on its own it will be nice to say that the finished product is all my idea and not sampled or a preset sound or pattern.

I don't think I will be getting rid of the PT-82 anyway soon, Its kinda nice to go back in time and play with the synths and boards that got us where we are today.

Dexter DAW Controller

I stumbled across this last night and I must say this thing is pretty cool. It's by a company called Jazzmutant. It's a multi touch DAW controller. The best way I can describe this thing is that it is like a giant iPod touch screen that controls your DAW.
This is not the first touch screen controller on the market but what is so special about this is that it has Multi touch capabilities meaning that all 10 fingers can be touching the screen simultaneously and moving the sliders up and down just like a real mixer in real-time. This will be great for tasks like leveling multiple tracks. It also has very cool interfaces for adjusting the equalization, panning, and other effects making controlling your DAW a lot more fun and natural feeling.

JazzMutant has gotten together with some of the leading DAW producers so they could better integrate visual representation and two-way communication between your Daw and Dexter. The amount of information shown on the screen of the Dexter at all times is almost enough that you could turn your PC screen off and still control your Daw.
You can see a video of it here, I'm sure you will be impressed. It's kind of like when you look at your Daw and see all of the cool sliders and knobs and wish you could just control them by touching the screen, will now you can.
As far as pricing goes I can’t seem to find any online but I would guess since it is a upgrade of sorts or a next generation of the Lemur from the same company it will probably be around the same price which is a steep $2500…..Yes, you read it right…..$2500.
Anyway check it out here and go to YouTube and type in Dexter DAW and watch the videos and see what you think.

Free drum sample packs

I found this link in a forum last night while chugging around the web. This guy made samples of his 12 piece pearl master custom drum kit with zildjian cymbals and packaged them up for the world to download and test for free.
He offers the pack in RAW Samples, Ableton packs for the new drum rack in Live 7, and RMIV presets. I downloaded the raw samples and put them into Ableton 6's Impulse and got out my m-audio trigger finger and had some fun. I was banging away for a good 20 minutes adding effects and tweaking the sounds out. The sounds are 24 bit raw and processed Multi Dynamic samples and have a very real sound to them, especially for a free download.
He also offers another pack called Glitch kit one where his samples are created by importing (.txt, .midi, .pdf, ext.) He uses anything he can find as raw 24bit audio Data then he Edits & Tweaks out the samples. I have yet to download this one so I don't know what it sounds like.

You can get the samples here and they are free to download. There is a donate option there but it is not required so check it out if you like using drum samples in your music production process.

findsounds Dot Com

I read a post in a forum talking about this website where you could find just about any sound effect/sound you wanted. It was described as the Google of samples. I went to the site to check it out and found it was pretty useful. The site is pretty straight forward, you type in a sound you are looking for and it returns a LOT of results. I searched for gunshot and it returned over 200 results.
I will say that if you're doing commercial work I would be a little Leary of findsound's returns as they do just link you to samples found all over the web (which is why they give so many results) and I'm sure that some of the sounds are copyrighted. If you're working on a personal project, it couldn't hurt, but for professional work I would definitely look at the URL of the site the sound came from and find out if it's ok to use them to avoid any trouble.
The cool thing I liked about the site was that you can filter your searches by file types, number of channels, resolution, and sample rate. It will search for AIFF, AU, MP3, and WAVE formats. You can choose between mono or stereo samples and 8 bit or 16 bit samples.

With all of that said if you are needing a sound effect or sample for your music or whatever reason http://www.findsounds.com/ is a quick and easy to use place to find them.

$50 Dollar daw, check out REAPER

I was looking around online last night and ran across some people talking about a program called Reaper. They were discussing this really cheap digital audio workstation that packed a lot of cool stuff for the money. I also thought it was cool that they were saying the inventor of Winamp created it, which I think rocks.
I went and downloaded it and played with it for about an hour and I must say, NOT BAD. The software is uncrippled, unexpiring shareware for windows. Reaper is available for download without technological limitations for evaluation purposes. Once you have evaluated REAPER, you can purchase a license. Its is 50 dollars for a personal license or 225 dollars for a commercial use license. If you use it past the trial it will still work with full functionality but will make you wait 6 seconds or so every time you open it and remind you to buy it. (cmon now, its 50 bucks)
Some of its features are: 64 bit audio engine, Direct multi-track recording to many formats including WAV/BWF/W64, AIFF, WavPack, FLAC, OGG, and MIDI, Support for VST, VSTi, DX, DXi effects, and it supports running from USB keys or other removable media so its portable too. Like I said, that's a lot for 50 bucks.
It looks pretty easy to use. I only played with it for a little while but I had no trouble finding my way around it. If you are comfortable with recording software you should be alright, if not its a cheap way to get started and who knows, it might be all you will need.
Here are some screenshots.
Here's where ya download it.
Give it a shot.
Tell us what you think.

Ableton Live 7 is almost here !

Ableton Live 7 is in beta testing for select Ableton 6 users right now. As soon as I heard this I went to the Ableton site to see what was going on.

I was happy to see a lot of changes that should make the program better. Some of the changes include new and improved devices with side-chaining capability, 64-bit mix summing, better midi timing, hardware integration, and video export.

They also granted some of the wishes of the public in this release. Some of these additions include time signature changes and multiple automation lanes.

The 2 things I read that really excite me are the addition of the new "Drum Rack" which streamlines beat production via an easy drag-and-drop interface and most of all the support of native sliced audio and REX files! Now it will be easy to chop up samples using programs like Recycle and save them as REX files which will be importable to Ableton. This was one of the only things I wished Ableton would do and now it seems my wished are coming true.

So keep checking the Ableton Live website to see when the official release is and give it a try when it's available, I know I am going to.

Nine Inch Nails offers Master tracks on new album

Trent Reznor is offering pre-formatted GarageBand and Ableton Live files for each track contained on the band's recently released album "Y33RZ3R0R3MIX3D", which he's distributing on dvd.
The dvd includes every track from the album in the correct format for GarageBand and Ableton Live. The dvd will also have a demo of Ableton Live on it.
Years ago Trent started releasing master tracks on NIN.com to see what kind of user-generated remixes would materialize from his fans. This spawned a host of remixes with websites and online communities getting involved. The band liked the results and are now releasing a remix album that includes some of this fan-created material as well as the actual multitrack master files for every song from their latest album, Year Zero.
The bands next move is (or was) setting up a site through which fans can share their remixes of their music. That is up in the air at the moment because his former record label feels that if they host a remix site they will be opening themselves up to the accusation that they are sponsoring the same technical violation of copyright they are suing other sites for.
Universal is still allowing them to release the masters which I think is pretty cool since most everyone these days seem to spend more time suing than producing. It nice to see a company chill a little.
Anyway, I'm sure whether its NIN's website or "Joe Anyone's" website we will still start seeing some really cool remixes of the songs off the new album start to surface online in the near future. I think its a great idea. We will get to hear remixes from all different kinds of musicians all with different ideas which will result in a wide variety of remixes all sounding different since it wont be one person doing them all. Who knows, we might get a whole new sound that creates a whole new genre of music.
In the meantime if you like NIN and like remixing music go get the new album and start making your own remixes, I'm sure the masses will find a way to get the remixes out there whether its on an official NIN remix site or not. I think it's a great idea myself and hope they go ahead with it.

Sneak Peak at Denon's DNHS5500

This is for all of you Denon tabletop cd turntable lovers out there. In the next few weeks Denon will announce it newest cd turntable, the DN-HS5500. It is a tabletop (hard drive) MP3 player/midi controller with the layout and controls of the Denon S3500.

You can view it here:http://www.decks.co.uk/productviewer?productpath=/decks/products/digital_dj/denon/dnhs5500&selectedview=0

Here is the only video I can find anywhere on it: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=udG8phxRtho

It seems they are keeping everything hush hush for now until its debut in December. Ive read that you can start cueing mp3's from the internal drive or external usb devices without interruption which should be pretty cool. Adding a midi controller so you can control you software should make this a pretty popular piece of hardware among live DJ's.

Free Mac digital audio workstation

First off I want to be upfront about the fact that I have not tried this software out for myself. This is not because I didn't want to but because it's only for Mac and Linux (go ahead mackies,rub it in my face). I ran across this on night while doing research for the blog. I read about it and saw that it was getting a lot of buzz online so I went to get it and that's when I found it was Mac only.
The software is called Ardour. It is digital audio workstation like Protools or Cubase. It is all open source so it is free.
The software's feature are: multichannel recording, non-destructive editing with unlimited undo/redo, full automation support, a powerful mixer, unlimited tracks/busses/plugins, timecode synchronization, and hardware control from surfaces like the Mackie Control Universal. This is a direct quote from their website. "If you've been looking for a tool similar to ProTools, Nuendo, Pyramix, or Sequoia, you might have found it"
So there ya go. If anybody tries it out or has used it before please leave a comment so our readers can get your opinion on it.
Here is a link to the download page for it. http://ardour.org/download. Let us know what you think

"

Old MiniDisc recorder = Affordable Portable Sampler

If you are like a lot of us we all want that latest and greatest in technology. Somewhere around the year 1998 Sony had the next big thing so I ran out and bought a MiniDisc recorder. I bought a home unit AND a portable because this thing was going to be the wave of the future. I think I used it every bit of ten times before it got set on a shelf and started collecting dust with my cassette players.
I was going to put mine on eBay a while back so I did what anyone usually does when trying to find info on a product,I Googled it. Wouldn't you know on the first page I ran across an article talking about the return of the minidisc. I had to read it because I knew they were not making a comeback with mp3 players so cheap.
I read on and it was an article talking about how people who make their own music should buy a minidisc recorder to capture samples instead of an expensive portable sampler. As I read on I forgot all about my plans for eBay and was happy I had never sold them before.
MiniDiscs don’t get scratched like Cd's, and the discs never go bad so they can be written to again and again. Because it’s digital there’s no quality loss with time or playback. There are 60, 74, and 80 minute discs available for a couple bucks a piece. Sony makes a electret condenser stereo microphone for around 50 dollars or there are cheaper ones as low as 20 dollars. They are usually require a battery since condenser mics need power and you will most likely not be near a mixer with phantom power.
The players offer 1/8" stereo inputs and outputs and some have S/PDIF or TOSlink optical inputs. Most recorder models also support the "plug in power" feature which is simply a built-in 1/8" mic preamp for use with passive mics. I will probably get a self powered mic for mine because I've read this really eats the battery life up.
So, if you are one of the unlucky souls who thought you wasted your hard earned money on a dead technology then today's your lucky day. Don't go out and buy that 300 dollar portable sampler, go downstairs and blow the dust off of your Sony MD and start collecting your samples. I know I'm headed out to get me a little condenser mic today and start getting mine.

HUGE glossary of audio terms and acronyms

I stumbled across this in a forum on http://www.audioforums.com/. It is a HUGE glossary of audio terms and acronyms, and I mean HUGE. This has just about every audio related word in the world plus some more in it. There are lots of words you already know and use and a whole lot more you probably have never heard of.

I spent a long time here and bookmarked it for future use. It's very educational ....plus you can walk around for the next couple of days talking over your friend's heads like you da man :)

check it out here http://www.sweetwater.com/insync/word.php

Flickr's Audio Recording Studio Group

I found a group on Flickr where people just post pictures from their home studios.
All kinds of recording studio's photos are welcome. I spent quite a while looking through them and even joined Flickr myself and added some.
There are pictures of gear, instruments, musicians, sessions, studios... Just about every kind of picture you can think of that has to do with making music.
Anyway, It was a great find. Check it out http://www.flickr.com/groups/audio/pool/
Maybe you will want to join yourself and add to the collection. Not only will you help it grow but it is also a good place to network with other musicians.

Digidesign's New Mbox 2 Micro

Have you ever been waiting at an airport or sitting on the couch and wish you could work with Pro Tools? Well now you can, and without a big m-box sitting on your lap and covering yourself with wires.
Digidesign recently introduced the new Mbox 2 Micro. This little bad boy packs an audio interface into an anodized aluminum USB key.You get one audio output: an 1/8″ stereo output jack, upgrading your laptop’s headphone out jack to 24-bit, 48KHz monitoring. This means the Micro is all you need to carry to run Pro Tools. It's basically a dongle with a headphone jack
You get Pro Tools LE, 45 plug-ins (Bomb Factory + DigiRack), and Xpand playback and synthesis, for 279 dollars.
The only downside I see in this is that if you already have Pro Tools LE Is like you are paying 279 dollars for an extra dongle. Maybe they could offer the micro for a lower price to people who already have LE but I doubt it with all of the piracy issues at hand.
So all in all I would say this would be a great little item for those who don’t yet own Pro Tools LE already.
check it out here" http://www.digidesign.com/

Black Violin

This is something I stumbled across on Youtube. I love it when that happens don't you.
These guys have taken an instrument that we all associate with Godfather movies and elevators and totally re-invented it.
Take two guys with violins (Wil-B “Simply Sick” and Kev Marcus) add a DJ (DJTK, known by most as “Lethal Weapon”) and you get ... Black Violin. Their sound is somthing new, it's a blend of clasical violin and hip hop that is a welcome change in the music wolrd. The video that I saw on youtube was great so it was off to google to find their website which is http://blackviolin.net/.
Check it out, its nice when somthing new and fresh comes around in the music world.

Inside Home Recording's Podcasts

If you are really getting into home recording this is a must. This site has the best podcast Ive found on home recording. The first time I heard one I listened to 5 more that night.
It's basically a podcast that covers the latest in home studio recording and is hosted by keyboardist-producer Paul Garay and web guy–drummer/guitarist–editor Derek K. Miller.
They Go over a lot of stuff at a great pace that is just right for the beginner or the Pro. I listen every chance I get.
Anyone interested in recording music, podcasts, or other audio should subscribe, even if you’re an expert already. There is a wealth of knowledge in these podcasts and they are fun to listen to. check them out here http://www.insidehomerecording.com/ or if you have itunes just set it and forget it.

RecordingReview.com's Soundcard Wizard

I recently ran across a cool website with an even cooler program in it that is used to figure out what type of sound card you will need for the PC or mac in your studio. This site has a wealth of information on it for every type of musician. It breaks down into categories for all types of artists with blogs,forums, and reviews of just about everything.
The one thing that I found really helpful on this site was the Home Recording Sound card Wizard. This little program will save you hours of time when trying to figure out what type of sound card you need for your machine. It also has a Beginners mode that will walk you through some questions about what you are needing in a sound card and then will give you a list of all cards that fit your description. This is a great tool that will take a lot of the guess work out of your quest for the perfect sound card. check it out, here's the link http://www.recordingreview.com/soundcard/soundcard_wizard.php

Starting your own Home Studio

Being a musician in today's world is great. With all the hardware and software available out there the possibilities are endless. 10 to 15 years ago you would have to go pay for studio time in a professional studio to get your music on tape or CD. Now with computers as powerful as they are and all of the the great software we have anyone can get their music heard.

I imagine if you're reading this then you probably already have a computer, so a big part of your studio is already paid for. It's pretty safe to say that any computer three or four years old or newer should be okay to run today's recording software. I would suggest having at least a gig of RAM though.

One thing you will have to buy is an audio interface. There are many types of these, some that snap into your PCI slots on your motherboard just like a normal sound card, some are boxes that use a USB cable to connect your computer, and others use a FireWire cable. The good thing about the external ones that use USB or FireWire is that they will connect to any computer that has one of these ports, desktop or laptop.

Before you buy your audio interface you need to think about how you are going to be recording music. Is it just going to be you, will you be recording more than one instrument at the same time, do you need a midi interface? All of these factors need to be considered before you go and purchase your hardware.
A good website to go to is http://www.musiciansfriend.com/ to learn more about audio interfaces. There are ton of them on there with factory specs for each one. This is also a great site to learn about pretty much all of the hardware and software you might need for your studio. They are always doing reviews of the new stuff that is coming out.

Once you have your computer and sound card out of the way it's time to think about what software you're going to use. There are many out there and it can sometimes be confusing especially when you have salesmen pulling you in every direction. A good thing to remember is that almost every one of these companies offer a trial version you can download over the internet that will let you try out the software for free for a short time period. I would suggest doing this before you go and drop your hard-earned cash on one only to find out you like another one better a month or so down the road.
If you want to get your feet wet without spending any money at all try out Audacity. This is a free audio recording program that really does a great job considering it’s price (free).
You can find it here: http://audacity.sourceforge.net/
Some other (not free) programs that are popular are: Protools,Cubase,Ableton live, and cakewalk.
I’m sure there are many more out there but these are the ones I can think of right off the top of my head.



Some software only works with certain audio interfaces. For example, if you wanting to use ProTools then you must have a ProTools compatible interface. So this is something you want to check out before you buy.
Okay now that you have your computer, your audio interface, and your software of choice there’s one more thing we need to get before you start recording. We need something to listen to the music with. I’m sure it won’t take you long to find out that the speakers that came with your pc aren’t quite cutting it.
This is where studio monitors come in. They range anywhere from 100 bucks to well into the thousands of dollars. I have a very cheap pair of m audio monitors that only cost around 149 dollars a pair but I think they work quite well, at least for now. Do a quick Google search on Studio Monitors and you will soon see that there are a ton of them to choose from so it’s all in what you are wanting to spend.
The reason it is good to have studio monitors is because they have a flat frequency response. This means which you hear is closer to what the real mix sounds like. When you use regular stereo speakers it is hard to set up your mid range, bass, and treble. Most regular stereo speakers are built to enhance sound whether it is by giving it more bass, more treble, or whatever. So if you're using these speakers when you are making your music it might sound totally different when you get into another stereo,car,or mp3 player.

Studio monitors are made to put out a flat frequency response. This means no bass boost, no enhancements at all, just a flat, true sound of your mix. Get your music sounding good on these and you should be good to go wherever your music is played.
So all in all if you already own a computer that is not much more than three or four years old. You have an audio interface and some studio monitors. Just figure out what software you want to use and you should be ready to start recording.
I would venture out to say that anymore for under $1000 you can have yourself a pretty nice setup that would do just fine for any musician that wants to get started in home recording. These are good times for musicians, you don’t have to go to a professional studio and pay for studio time. You don't need to "know the right people", with all the Myspaces and Youtubes out there you can go from being the guy with the guitar the party to the next big thing with a little luck.
So get down to your local music store, pick up the things you need, and start recording some music. It's a lot of fun and I'm sure once you get started you won't be able to stop.

Condenser vs. Dynamic microphones

Let's take a look at both of the microphones and compare their advantages and disadvantages. The most common microphone found in studios is the condenser mic, it has a much greater frequency response. The output of the microphone is louder and has a much cleaner sound to me. One thing I have noticed with condenser mics is that they pick up every little detail. This took some getting used to as the mic would pick up strange sounds your mouth would make, your feet on floor, or any other noise you might make while in the booth.

The main thing I noticed about condenser mics is their price in comparison to dynamic microphones. They are generally a lot more expensive. I have seen them anywhere from $200-$5000 in a local music stores around here. Since I'm not made of money I started with a $200 microphone. Even though it was bottom-of-the-line I couldn't believe the difference in the sound it produced. It was like a whole different person in the booth. His voice had more bass, and more treble. It basically produces a full sound like the person was right there.

One thing about condenser mic you need to know is that they require external power called Phantom power. Most any mixer you buy today will provide this.

There are two kinds of condenser microphones large diaphragm and small diaphragm. The large diaphragm microphones are usually used for recording vocals. You will get a much warmer sound with a large diaphragm microphone.

Small diaphragm microphones are better when you want to record something a wide frequency such as a live taping or a guitar.

One other thing you need to know about condenser microphones is that they are very fragile. Usually one good drop to the floor and you're reaching and your wallet for money to buy a new mic.

Dynamic microphones are used more in live performances or onstage because they can take a beating. These things are like tanks, drop them all you want and they'll still work like new most of the time. They do really well on stage and can withstand very loud yelling and lots of screaming guitars.

The good thing about dynamic microphones is that you can get a good one for around $100. One of the more popular ones is the Shure sm57. I'm sure you will find one of these in just about every professional studio.

So in a nutshell, if you're going to be on stage get yourself a dynamic microphone that can take a beating but when it comes to your booth, grab a large diaphragm condenser mic to get the full rich sound you're looking for.

It's gettin HOT in here...

I've noticed a lot of people asking about the heat issue.

I'm not really sure what to do about this myself, for now I've just been doing 20 minute sessions.

I've looked on the web and found stuff about venting sound booths but everything is either very expensive or out of my league. There are some prefab booths online that cost anywhere from 2000 - $4000 dollars, they all have venting but none of them say how they do it.

I thought about using computer fans in the top since they are so quiet but that kinda kills the soundproof qualities of my booth. I also thought about pumping AC into it but then again the same problem arises.

If there is anybody out there who has done this before or knows of a link that can help let me know. I would appreciate any feedback , good or bad. A little constructive criticism never hurt anybody right?

Messing around in studio

Just trying to get the hang of the whole midi, sync stuff. This is not really the kind of music I play but its still fun so I figured I would post it.

When I get comfortable with the recording process I will attempt to record some acoustic guitar and piano or keyboard.

Lots of new videos added to blog!

I have been up for the last 2 days looking for good videos to embed in the new players on the blog. There are now 4 players with over 90 videos to watch. All videos have to do with home recording and there are a LOT of training videos on there.
There are training videos for Ableton live, Cubase, and Propellerheads Reason plus a lot random videos showing off peoples recording and beat making techniques so get comfortable and have fun.

New video players on blog

There are two new video players on the blog now. One is called the HST video player which has a bunch of random home recording videos mostly from youtube or Google video and the other is the Cubase tutorial video player which also pulls videos from the internet about using Cubase.
The cool thing about these players is that I am the one who has to go spend the countless hours on youtube, Google video, etc. to find them, then I put them all in one place for you to enjoy.
I will update them as I come across more cool and interesting videos and I plan to add more players on different subjects in the future.
They are pretty straight forward to operate. Hit play, if you don't like the particular video that is playing hit the arrow at the bottom of the player and it will go to the next one. You can also click on the menu button and it will give you a list of all videos on that are on that player and you can pick the one you want to watch from there.

Scroll to the bottom of the page to see the video players.

Flooring in studio ?

I am getting ready to rip the old, gold, and very dated carpet out of the room I'm building my studio in. I'm not really sure what I am going to put down yet.
Ive been looking at pictures of studios all over the web and there is a little of everything going on in the way of flooring. Some have carpet, some have hardwood, some even have some sort of rubber stuff going on in them.
Any suggestions to what I should use and why. I was just gonna use carpet. ???

Mac or PC ?

OK I'm probably gonna get massacred by some people for being a PC guy.........waiting...waiting....cool, no gunfire.
I never used Macs before I got into PC's, as a matter of fact I didn't even own a computer until the last year of the super-awesome windows ME. (what an OS to start with huh)
My first experience on a computer was with the worst operating system ever made. The good thing was I had nothing to compare it to so it was all so new to me it was still great, hindsight is 20/20.

It was less than a year later when xp came out and I have probably touched a computer everyday of my life since then. I first got into computers because of art, not music. I had a friend who was a web designer and I saw him using Photoshop and that was it, I bought a PC soon after and in the 7 years that followed I have been at it full throttle and changed careers all because I saw someone move a person's head to another body. I now work on computers for a living and they are an everyday part of my life.

I remember the first time used a Mac. I was in a Photoshop 7 class I took at a local community college. I seriously had to have someone open Photoshop for me because I could not find the "START" button. Since then my job has made me have to use them on occasion so I'm not so bad with them anymore.

I got into music recording just last year and since I have been fixing PC's for 3 years I already knew a lot about them so I was not about to switch to Mac and relearn everything. When something breaks on my PC I know how to fix it. I can upgrade it with ease and as far as the price goes we all know it's a LOT cheaper than a G5.

Im not a closed minded, die hard PC nut so I started doing research online to see if there was some super underground secret I didn't know about Macs that made graphic design and home recording a breeze. I was thinking if I found one I could tell my wife how I had to have one because I cant do whatever with my PC. I looked forever. Websites,blogs,forums. I found many stories telling the pros and cons of both but most were just opinions and I could not find one strong enough to let me part with 3 thousand dollars.

So, I did what anyone would do. I went to a friend who worked at the local Mac dealer and asked his opinion. He did his job and told me how great they were and how they were made for the kind of stuff I do. He told me that everything is right where you think it should be and they are way easier to work than a PC. That might be true if you were not a windows user and had not already trained yourself that the "x" was in the upper right hand corner.

I must admit, when I saw the G series desktops the look alone makes you want one. They are a beautiful machine to look at. I was also impressed with the whole "swishy" feel of the 'OS.
I still wasn't sure so I told him I didn't know what I was going to do so my friend said "why don't you borrow my Mac book for a week, I'm gonna be outta town anyway". I took him up on the offer. I took the laptop home and put my PC away for a while.

I will say at first it was cool simply because it was new to me but soon the newness wore off and then the frustration set in of not knowing how to do everything. I loaded Ableton live on it and started playing with garage band a little too. After all was said and done I was like YUP....you can record music on these too. I honestly did not see any reason to go drop 3 g's on a new box, buy a new sound card,new software, AND deal with relearning a new OS. I'm sure the Macs work great for recording and graphics. I'm sure they don't get many viruses if any (if I were a virus writer I would target 90% of the population too) All in all they are awesome machines but my whole issue was "what can they do that I cant do with my PC" and I didn't find anything out there significant enough to make me switch.

So for now I'm gonna stick with my PC (and some good spyware protection of course). Maybe someday Ill buy one just to have one but I see no real reason to cross over at the moment.

I would love to read your comments about this, remember I am new to home recording and I don't know a lot about Macs so
I could be missing the big picture. Maybe there will be some comments that could change my opinion.

Studio tour (video)

I am getting ready to take everything out of here so I can rip the old carpet out and completely refinish the walls. I figured I would shoot a before and after video since I'm kinda documenting the whole process here.

Sorry about the Blair Witch style video, never said I was a Video guru.

I threw a beat on my drum machine and made the bass lines with my EA1 for the background music, hopefully it's not to repetitive for ya.

Roland XP-50

I bought this board about 10 years ago at a pawn shop. At the time I had never heard the word midi and did not even own a computer, (and now I work for Geek squad???...who knew huh). Anyway, I'm just saying I had no clue on how to do anything with it except play it like a piano.

I put it in a closet for 8 years and almost sold it 2 or 3 times, I'm so glad I never did.

After I started working on PC's for a living I got to hang around a lot of people who messed with midi, once I saw how it worked I drug my XP-50 out of the closet and blew the dust off of it and now I'm building a whole studio. Once again, I'm glad I held onto it. This thing is great. I love the sounds it has in it. It also had a dance expansion pack in it when I bought it so I have some good "Rave,techno-type sounds in it as well.

The keys have a nice feel to them and the jog wheel makes it easy to scroll through your patches. I have not messed with the sequencer much on it since I use the PC to do that part of it.

Here are the specs on the board

64-voice polyphony; 16-part multitimbral capability; 512 preset patches; 8 MB of internal waveform memory
32-bit custom RISC chip
Redesigned 16-track sequencer; 100 patterns
Accepts any four SR-JV80 Series expansion boards
40 insert effects in addition to digital reverb and chorus
Direct-from-disk playback; Realtime Phrase Sequencing
GM/GS Compatible

They are great boards.

You can usually find them on eBay starting around 450 and up based to their condition.

Vintage Synth Explorer

I really am taking an interest in vintage analog and digital synthesizers. I look on eBay all of the time for them and I am always looking at pawn shops and music stores for whatever I can find.

http://www.vintagesynth.com/ (Vintage Synth Explorer) is a awesome site to learn about all kinds of synths. They have over 500 instruments and counting on their site. There are reviews and info on all sorts synths old and new. Its a great place to read what each one does and will point you in the right direction when it comes time to start looking to purchase.

The site even has "gear for sale" and "wanted gear" sections to buy and sell your instruments.

I stumbled across this site on a Google search a while ago and I just figured I would spread the word, Its a great site and a lot of fun to read about the old synths. Oh yeah, you can also download patches for some stuff there too, check it out.

E-MU 0404 sound card

This is the card I am using at the moment and I have no problem with it at all. It has two 1/4" analog inputs and outputs, optical 24-bit/96kHz S/PDIF In/Out, Coaxial 24-bit/96kHz S/PDIF In/Out, and MIDI In/Out. Everything I need at the moment.

Its performs great for me and I have no latency problems at all with it.

My only problem is that I'm thinking of moving to Pro tools and I will need an M-Audio card for that. If it were not for that one reason I'm not sure I would even upgrade right now (if it ain't broke....)

I am looking into firewire mixers. I could kill two birds with one stone because I'm using a little 4 channel mixer right now and I do need some more channels. I'm not sure what I'm going to get yet but for 100 dollars if you are just getting into home recording this little card will do the job.

check out the Emu 0404 here http://www.emu.com/products/product.asp?product=10447 In my opinion its a lot of card for a hundred bucks.

Cubase or Protools

Short post tonight.
I've been using Ableton for about 7 mths and I like it but I'm finding that nobody else uses it and many don't even know what it is. I am really starting to like the sounds that come from hardware synths instead of vst's anyway so I am going to make the switch to either Pro tools or Cubase. I'm pretty sure I want to go with Pro tools but it will cost me a lot more because I do not have a m audio sound card. I have not used either one of them so I just wanted to get some pro and cons of the two.
It seems that Pro tools is more the industry standard from what I have read online. I just don't want to drop and extra 3 to 4 hundred if its not necessary.
Let me know what you think. Thanks.

Got my EA1 today!

My Korg EA1 I bought off of EBay arrived today...I've been waiting for this for a while. Anyway, This little guy can produce some awesome sounds and I cant wait to get into it. I opened it up and made sure it worked and took the pic so I haven't got to play with it more than about 10 min.

I have been looking for one of these for a while now. They seem to go for around 175 to 200 dollars (used) in the music stores around here but I lucked out and bid the highest on EBay for only 61 dollars! It was so cheap I thought it wasn't going to work when it got here. The only thing wrong with it was the master volume knob and power cord were missing. I bought a universal ac adapter at Best buy for 8 dollars and wallah. I don't really care about the volume knob, you can still turn it if you have to but I will probably set it and forget it anyway and use the mixer to control it's volume.

SO..... keep your eyes out on EBay when adding hardware or software to your studio, if you are patient enough you will strike gold.

Sound booth frame

This is what the frame of my booth looked like before I hung the Sheetrock. It's 4 x 4 x 7.5 ft.

I thought 4x4 was small until I finished it then I found that 4 ft is a lot bigger than it seems. There is enough room for 2 people to be in there comfortably or one person with a guitar. It seems huge with a single person in there which is how it is used 99% of the time anyway.

I used regular Sheetrock but I used Sheetrock adhesive AND screws to hold it up and help seal it off. I also used insulation between the walls just like it was an outside wall to help keep sound out. The glue helped kill vibration and sound leak but will be a pain if I ever have to replace a piece of Sheetrock. I recommend not gluing the rock to the studs where there are cables running behind it. Everywhere cables run in my booth have a removable,separate piece of Sheetrock that is only screwed in so I can remove it and replace bad cables or add them with ease. After the rock was up I did no mud or tape on the inside since it would be covered with acoustic tile anyway but I did fill the cracks with clear silicon just to seal it off even more. For the window I used 2 pieces of Plexiglas with a 1 in. spacer (piece of wood with foam seals) between them. It seemed to work well and only cost me around 24 dollars for both pieces which is cheaper and easier than glass.

After that I ordered my tile online. It ended up being about 180 bucks but I have quite a few tiles left over (like 25 or so). They came with some spray glue which has not been so good to me. I keep having to re glue them up every so often. I did a post on that last week and someone commented and told me to try krylon. I am going to research it and give it a try because I am getting tired of re gluing the tiles every month or so.

So.... for around 350 dollars in supplies and a little work you can build a sound booth that sounds great if you don't mind sweating a little. I based that figure on the supplies it would take just to build the 4x4x7 booth not the wall you saw in the video on my previous post.

Trigger finger by M Audio

I came across one of these one day while hanging out at my local music store. I was not planning on buying one nor did I even know what one was but I did have some money burning a hole in my pocket and like always I was going home with SOMETHING that day.

The owner of the store told me how cool this thing would be if I was getting into midi and how each button could be programed to do whatever you want it to. I must say it took a little while to figure out how to set it up but also remember I am new to everything midi so I'm sure someone who is more experienced could breeze right through it. OK, with all that out of the way, I love this controller. The pads are touch sensitive and seem very durable. I bang the crap out of them when using it to control drum programs and it feels very solid. I program all of the sliders to do different things (faders,volume controls,rolls,etc.) This is very easy to do in ableton live,you just put your mouse on the slider or knob in the program you want to program and then move the one on the Trigger Finger you want to assign it to. I picked this up used but still in perfect condition for 125 dollars...money well spent in my opinion.

I'm sure you are realizing that the only reviews I am doing right now are of stuff that I own so naturally they will probably get high ratings. I give this one a 5 out of 5 just like the midair 37. Both controllers are something I now would not want to be without.

Check out the M Audio Trigger finger here

http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/TriggerFinger-main.html

M-AUDIO Mid Air 37

I installed Reason on my laptop and bought one of these little bad boys. I use it ALL OF THE TIME. I can sit on the couch with my laptop on the table beside me and since it's a wireless controller with no cords in my way I just throw some headphones on and I have a blast without having to alienate my wife by going downstairs to hide in my studio. I got it on sale at Guitar Center for 137 dollars and it was worth every penny. Its also great for taking on the road in hotels etc.
Check it out http://www.m-audio.com/products/en_us/MidAir37-main.html
I give it 5 out of 5

Monitor in booth

This turned out great. I bought a dual monitor card for the PC that is running the daw and now it doesn't take 2 people to record vocals anymore. It also helps when one person is in the booth and the producer is behind the controls because you can see the peak levels and whatever else is going on. We also use it to see lyrics.

Best addition to my studio I've done and it cost me about 250 bucks.

Whats your favorite DAW?

Just wondering what everyone is using out there. I have been using Ableton live 5 and 6 for the whole 7 mths I've been into home recording. (I know, not exactly vet yet)
I think I am going to switch to pro tools though since it seems to be the industry standard.
I know there are tons out there so let us know what you like and why you like it.

acoustic tiles won't stick!

I used the spray adhesive that came with the tiles I ordered and it seemed OK at first but after a week or two I always have to re glue them? I put the glue on the tiles and the wall, let it get tacky and it stuck good at first but always starts coming off later. If anyone has used this glue befor or knows of a better glue please let me know because its getting old re glueing them all of the time.

Building a sound booth (video)

I took a bunch of my videos from the month we spent building the both and spliced them together to show the process from start to current condition. I plan to build a whole home studio but for now I'll just show the booth. I would guess with lumber,Sheetrock,Plexiglas,and acoustic foam I spent about 700 dollars on this project so far. This is not counting cables and wiring which would have cost me a ton if I didn't work at BBY.