Ever spend all day recording something...

[Dr. Vegetable]

Re: Ever spend all day recording something...

For every gem that makes it through the process, there are 1,000 tracks festering on the cutting room floor.

But yeah, don't delete it - storage is cheap. Archive those old tracks and someday you may find inspiration in them, or discover a way to make them work. Besides, how are your heirs going to milk your legacy if you don't leave several posthumous albums worth of garbage behind for them to re-master?

 

[jake_xms3_punk]

Re: Ever spend all day recording something...

For every gem that makes it through the process, there are 1,000 tracks festering on the cutting room floor.

But yeah, don't delete it - storage is cheap. Archive those old tracks and someday you may find inspiration in them, or discover a way to make them work. Besides, how are your heirs going to milk your legacy if you don't leave several posthumous albums worth of garbage behind for them to re-master?

+1


I've found some gems sifting through my old harddrives from when I first got into recording in my early teens onwards. Most of it just puts a nostalgic smile on my face. Im so glad i kept them.

i love listening to my progress as a musician from over the years. these old recordings are my diary, and all the memories come flooding back.
ill listen to what I'm recording right now in another 15 odd years and smile.

Some of the old recordings, I've even stolen a chorus or phrase or riff or whatever from.

It's like old embarrassing photos, you may hate them and not want to show people, and would hate it deep down if those photos got destroyed. It's good to look back.

 

[GoldenVulture]

Re: Ever spend all day recording something...

I keep them all. I've even got 3 1/2" reel to reel tapes that were recorded on battery mono recorders in the mid 60's of me and mates clunking around on acoustic guitars when we were about 14.

 

[Myaccount876]

Re: Ever spend all day recording something...

never delete anything! You might listen back in a few weeks with fresh ears and have a different opinion. Even if it still doesn't sound good, I'm sure it can be salvaged.

So true. I've kept stuff I hated at first, only to say a week later "WTH was I on/thinking?". I've also had the opposite happen "Man that totally kicks ass!" -1 week later- "WTH was I on/thinking?".

 

[Dr. Vegetable]

Re: Ever spend all day recording something...

Wow... that little reel-to-reel recorder brings back memories from my early childhood. We had that exact same unit. By the time I was old enough to play guitar, we had moved up to a giant RCA reel-to-reel deck. Man, do I wish I still had that thing!

 

[GoldenVulture]

Re: Ever spend all day recording something...

Wow... that little reel-to-reel recorder brings back memories from my early childhood. We had that exact same unit. By the time I was old enough to play guitar, we had moved up to a giant RCA reel-to-reel deck. Man, do I wish I still had that thing!

You mean the RCA ? Two track ? Four ?

A couple of mates fathers had Grundig reel to reels in the 60's. We used to record jams with them.
Something like this.

 

[That90'sGuy]

Re: Ever spend all day recording something...

So many truisms in this thread I can't tell you how many times I've done all the above. I've spent several days even obsessing over the exact tempo of a track (jeez, should it be 85 or 86 bpm? maybe if I double it and make it 170 playing on the downbeat will be easier... only to find out it's sheer craziness with a metronome). Mentally, you have to be in a certain state to record things well. Some days I was just not feeling it. I'd try to force it and inevitably, I'd end up scrapping all of those parts. I think recording in the morning is a good thing... for some reason playing to a metronome becomes a lot more second nature when you're not spending so much time focusing on it.

There's a reason why usually the best recordings are done by professional artists in professional studios with professional engineers. There's way too much stuff to screw up and you really have to have a lot of dedication to do it right. I'll admit I'm way too lazy to get to that level and I try to make things easier on myself by buying a few really nice pieces of hardware and severely limiting the amount of tracks in my stuff to make them fit with little to no modification. I feel for you metal/hardcore kiddies.... there's A LOT going on (I'd be HFPing and LFPing the sh1t out of instruments to even given them a chance at cutting in the mix).

 

[Dr. Vegetable]

Re: Ever spend all day recording something...

You mean the RCA ? Two track ? Four ?

A couple of mates fathers had Grundig reel to reels in the 60's. We used to record jams with them.
Something like this.

Actually, either.

The RCA we had was a big old suitcase model. Kind of like this one...

...but I remember ours had a cool fluorescent vacuum tube level meter indicator that glowed green. Some of these old reel-to-reel decks had great preamps in them.

EDIT: Sadly, we only had 2-track. If we'd had a 4-track, I could've grown up to become the next George Martin!

 

[everdrone]

Re: Ever spend all day recording something...

sometimes I just jam for an hour or two and record tidbits here and there

then listen to em a day or so later and sort through it and find what I like and delete the rest; I just am not gonna listen to that shizzle ever again since I have spotify

 

[Funkfingers]

Re: Ever spend all day recording something...

All day? On something that wasn't coming together in the first few takes? No, sir.

Add my vote to the Don't Delete pile.

Something about the project must have been good enough for you to want to play guitar over it. With a computer software recorder, it is perfectly possible to make numerous passes, none of which will be exactly what you had in mind. Bang 'em down anyway. Save everything. Rest your ears. On another day, return to the project with your editing hat on. Choose the juiciest licks. Cut and paste into something cool.