10 Invaluable Recording Tips For Professional Results In Your Home Studio.

I’m currently recording a debut ep from the ground up with a band.

As we discussed ideas and our plan of attack, I knew we would have to address certain key components as we progressed. Such as finding the tempo (or multiple tempos in this case) of the songs before recording. And deciding where we would record drums.

Keys To The Harmonicraft

Throughout the whole process, from first hitting record to completing the final mix, there are some crucial tips that I’ve come to learn over the years.

This is what I would tell myself 10 years ago when I was just starting out in the audio world. If you are a beginner or need a refresher on the fundamentals, you’ll find these invaluable!

1) **Get It Right At The Source**- If you are recording and mixing the same track, spend more time and effort on the recording phase. Get solid takes, stellar tones, and unique performances.

A high-quality mix is 80% the recording and 20% the mix. Properly tuned instruments, new strings, and microphone placement will have the most impactful effect on the final result. Aside from the players and compositions, of course ;).

2) **Finding/Layering Your Drums Beats**- If you are recording acoustic drums, give extra attention to the room and microphones you plan to use. Drums are the instrument that covers the widest range of sonic frequencies.

The quality of your drum recordings will directly reflect the quality of your final product. Treat the room with sound-proofing. You need to make sure you can capture them properly.

Rent a space if you have to. Even though the band I’m working with is on a small budget, I strongly suggested we rent a space to at least record the drums. Absolutely worth it, they sound great.

If you use a drum machine or an electronic drum set to play your drum parts, you can enhance the sonic quality of these rhythms by layering sounds on top of one another.

You can also use this technique to add sampled drum sounds to increase depth to your acoustic drum tracks.

3) **Decorating Your Room**- When you set up your studio, think about the types of materials you use for furniture, floor, and wall treatments. You can improve the sound of your room simply by using materials and furniture to absorb or reflect sound.

In addition to creating a comfortable creative atmosphere, if you think about how the furniture and decorations in your studio affect the sound, you can save time and money in optimizing your room for recording and mixing.

4) **Setting A Tempo Map**- Before you start to record, set a tempo map of the song within your DAW. Workout the length, tempo and time signature of every section of the song. Then when you record, play to this metronome.

This is crucial to assure everything in the track is aligned, and working together. It’s essential for modern editing techniques. Unless you’re recording a band live off the floor, but that’s a different story.

5) **Listening To Your Mix In Mono**- Although it might feel counter-intuitive to switch to mono after perfecting a balance in the stereo field, doing so will enable you to perceive your mix differently and hear whether any of your sounds or instruments are overlapping frequencies or crowding each other.

If it sounds good in mono, it generally sounds great in stereo.

6) **Doubling Your Tracks**- If a track sounds thin in a mix, make a double and include both of them in the mix. This technique can also be very useful to enhance a certain quality of a track by aggressively processing the copy you made to bring out the feature you are looking for.

Then, you can mix it with the original at a lower volume to accentuate that quality, without affecting the original track.

7) **Use Automation**- Using automation makes a mix “breathe” and is fundamentally a requirement to get a professional result. Volume, panning and automated effects can smooth out transitions and make parts more impactful. Sonic and ambient variation keeps the listener engaged throughout the whole song.

It’s rarely possible to get a perfect balance throughout the entire song without some volume automation.

8) **Always Trust Your Ears**- Whether it be adjusting an EQ curve, compression settings, finding a guitar tone, keeping a take, arranging a song or any other process in a modern recording situation, always trust your ears.

Regardless of how extreme or odd something may look within a DAW or plugin visually if it sounds good to you, run with it. No one will ever see or care about how your EQ or automation curves look. All that matters is the authentic sonic experience that will move the listener.

9) **Pressing Record In Stealth**- Get your instruments, microphones, and levels set before you start to rehearse a part. When you start to practice, hit the record button. You’ll be surprised when you catch the perfect performance or new idea when not planning to record a serious take.

I can’t tell you how many times I’ve failed to capture something epic because I was just “noodling” on guitar. HIT RECORD.

This works great for recording others as well. Ask them to run through the song as a warm-up, but hit record. MUHAHA

10) **Leaving Humanity In Your Tracks**- Don’t be so hooked on getting every note perfect that you miss the feel of a performance. Before you go auto-tuning and editing the life out of your music, give it a good listen and see whether the thing you want to fix is maybe what gives the part character.

With these bits of advice in mind, all your recording and mixing efforts should be successful!

What have you found useful in your music production experiences?

Interested in learning more? Click here to download your Mindset Map and discover your next steps in your musical journey.

My name is Alexandre Joyal. I help music creators achieve success with their music by teaching them how to produce themselves and adopt a creative mindset.