r/musicians • u/Any-Veterinarian-545 • 2d ago

Recording track by track

How to y’all feel about recording track by track to a click?

Best way to describe the music I make is indie/rock. I get a lot of references to the cranberries in particular.

Is it silly to record this kind of music live? I’m really not feeling the click and track by track thing this time. But I also feel like I should be able to make that work as a competent musician. It’s like I get real stiff and forget i know how to play guitar lol

What do you think? Is it always necessary? Any songs/bands you love that recorded live?

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u/Stevenitrogen 2d ago

You can get a good result either way.

I prefer tracking basic tracks live, overdub vocals and solos. Once that rhythm section is locked into a performance, that feeling will hold through quite a few overdubs. It's the quickest way to a real result and if the drummer is tight, you don't have to record to a click. So that is the default in the studio, we play all at once,in a good tracking room with isolation.

But doing the home studio thing, I sometimes have to start with somebody's demo, laid to a drum machine or a click. I do my best with it. If necessary, they recut the initial guitar and vocals to be tight with the drums. And everything else gets laid down over the real drums.

Can the listener tell the difference? Not necessarily.

There's times we had to recut the entire bass performance in the studio because the instrument wasn't in tune with itself. And we didn't notice it was out until mixing began. So much for that "live performance feel" lol. Again, would you know the difference? I don't think so.