The first recording I did, serious recording, as opposed to the stuff in my mom's living room, was done on an old (even in 1992) half-inch Teac 80-8. The Teac belong to Sam Rosenthal and he also had a board that, and I am not making this up, once shot out a flame. I am told it was a Tapco board but I really don't recall. We had to rent the now discontinued Ovation Thunderbolt because I only had my classical acoustic with me. The classical was a Sigma (made by Martin) and it had a warped neck and went out of tune about fret five.

Rosenthal was using an Emu and a Poly 61 keyboard. The former was new for the time. The latter prehistoric but had some neat sounds.

We recorded two records with the band name Thanatos with basically this same set up at his home studio "the lush garden" in Los Angeles in 1992 for the release This Endless Night Inside (yes, it is very goth) and then in 1994 for the recording of An Embassy to Gaius. Both these were released on Rosenthal's Projekt label.

The next record I recorded was Blisters. While some of this was done on the same half-inch Teac most was not. Sam was busy with various things and I recorded the CD with William Tucker at his home studio , "Xenophobe". Most of my takes went into an old 16 track cassette recorder. I have no idea what it was but it really didn't matter since, aside from the bass and guitar parts, Tucker played the rest of the recording was running virtual. There was no need to bounce or do anything tricky--and there was not even a computer in the apartment. This record was a melding of very old and sort of old. We used an Akai 1000 for sampling and that was time consuming to put it mildly.

In both of these cases the vocal microphones we used were Shure 58s. The same old mics every club on earth uses. I figured that a fancy mic was putting a ten dollar saddle on the five dollar horse that is my voice. If you listen to Blisters it actually sounds great which is a tribute the the engineering skill of Tucker because the gear we used was not great or even necessarily good.

Now, recording the last of five and a half records, things are a little different and a little the same. How they are the same is this--I do not have a studio. I do not want a studio and I will never want a studio. Therefore I have to work with others. With a low budget band paying for a pro studio these days is stupid. If you have done music long enough you know people with home set ups that will work just as well and cost a lot less. Be a mooch or buy the software and gear you need yourself. As part of this series I will talk about setting up a home studio on the cheap as well as the software you can use--from my non-technical focus.

In the case of the new record I am working, basically, with two people; one uses PC based Vegas and the other Mac based Logic. My opinion of each of these is that they work. Picking one over the other seems irrelevant.

But there is much to learn from the old recordings I made. First the vocal microphones. Using 58s was a mistake. They do not have the range and clarity of better microphones (not that there is anything wrong with them, they are great on stage). In recent recordings I have used both AKG and Blue condenser mics. Sometimes we have recorded using both at different places in the room. It gives you a lot wider range of sound to play with that the Shure 58s will.

I also have to say something to the "tape is better crowd" and that is--No it isn't. It is different and may even be desirable in some ways but using a reel to reel half inch is a pain in the arse. I have done it for two and a half records. You can keep it. I would prefer to spend time working on the actual music rather than dealing with one of those old beasts. These days you do not really need to warn most people away from tape as it has become impractical and expensive but there are still romantics and luddites out there.

Another thing new engineers and do-it-your-selfers should know is that overuse of reverb is not your friend. It can hide certain inadequacies for a singer but you wind up sounding like you recorded your vocals while stranded at the bottom of a well. Just do another take and get some confidence.

More on recording, home studios, amps and electric guitars soon.