Pre-Production Advice

[Ryan Collings]

Hey Trockers!

I'm working on my debut album for my solo project Stanmore Phoenix and I'mm currently in the pre-prod stage...

To set the scene, I'm 25 and have been in various bands on various instruments (bass guitar and vocals) since I was 15 and yet I am yet to release a full length album. So something inside me this year snapped and I decided TO HELL WITH EP's, I'M DOING A FREAKIN ALBUM... THIS YEAR!!! After coming to that decision, I also decided to cut as few corners as possible and make the best damn album I can doing whatever it takes to acheive this...Today has brought some news which has brought this idea home with the tragic death of a band member from a local Indie band occuring yesterday. He was quoted as saying of his recently completed album that he wanted to make the best album possible because "You never know if you'll get to make another one"

So here I am seeking some more advice as I am known to do from time to time.

The importance of pre-production struck me last year when I flew to L.A. in America to play bass on a record being produced by an "esteemed Hollywood producer" Evidently, inspite of producing records for no-doubt, Motley-Crue, Ace Freley etc etc. no-one told this guy much about what a "producer" should be doing and as such I felt he pretty much sucked at it. His Pre-production was non-existant and I couldnt' help but feel that this band (in which i contributed bass and backing vocals as a last minute recruitment and with which i no longer play) Could have greatly benefited from more of this. So after noticing this, I decided that if at all possible, as much pre-prod as necessary/possible would be conducted for my next record. And here I am with the better half of a year to work on this thing (within my own self-inflicted release dead-line of December 09)

A quick note on why I am creating this album... World Domination? Fame? Money? Fun? Sense of acheivement? - Well, all of the above and none of the above, I'm doing it because a) I can, b) I want to and c) I need to.

RE: Pre-Production so far -

I'm finding it invaluable to hear my songs back in rough format and its funny to hear how some of the tracks I thought were less strong are actually more strong :P Also hearing performance parts that need to be worked on ie. false setto sustained notes might sound a bit piss weak etc... This also corresponds to my live shows where I can get a better measure of how (shit) I sound live on my own.

Heres the way we have been doing it so far -

We have tracked the track beds for multiple songs. ie. acoustic guitar and my lead vocals... Sometimes live and sometimes overdubbed vocals. These are the guts of the track as a singer/songwriter project its all acoustic guitar based.

Thanks to a musical associate I met through work, we have access to a more than adequate for PreProd studio and so its great in many ways to have a second set of ears and brains.

The idea with the guitar/vocal tracks other than for me to pick apart all my shortcomings is to pass them on to the others involved and toss around various arrangements (structural/lyrical changes) to build ontop of the track beds. Most were done to a click so the drummer should find it easy and the ones that aren't done to a click, i guess will give me some insight into the drummers ability... Or lack thereof xD

Bare in mind that because a solo project, although I will be utilizing some session muso's and friends/musical associates etc. to play various parts on the album; as a multi instrumentalist I will be playing most if not all of the preProd stuff myself barring drums. Mainly as a matter of convenience/expense in this developmental phase. The upshot of this is obviously we can't really jam the songs out and see how they come out naturally and build on that... And part of me is saying this is important... I'm going for a pretty organic sounding record... So anyways, a bit of thinking out loud there, but i guess i could always come back with an ensemble and jam stuff out b4 doing the actual album.

So I have a couple of questions -

A) Am I going about this the right way? (Pre-Prod)

B)What other things should I be looking out for during this phase?

C) Any other advice? Random thoughts/comments/abuse?

That is the end of my extremely lengthy rant and as such i will include the appropriate html
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A VERY BIG - advTHANKSance

- Ryan

[Simon B]

the only things I would say are,

make it sound good then stop, I read that somewhere.... I like it........

have fun

and pretty much have your songs written before you go to commit them,

and then once the album is finished...... never listen to it again. because you will just find problems, or things you didnt like or ifony you done this....

[jkhuri44]

there is a few things to say about caring so much about a record....what i will say, from personal experience, doing practically exactly the same thing as i have already done....

the longer you take doing stuff, the longer u fall victim to feeling sick of ur own shit....so as much love, dedication and spirit you wish to pour into a project, do it keeping in mind the following:

1. the longer you take, the better the decisions u will make, providing you dont suck :P And the better your product will sound. However, you risk hating it, or getting sick of it, coz u spent so long at it.

2. the shorter you take, it might suck more. BUT you may be happier about it for the short term, before ppl listen to it and tear it apart. The upside is, it finished faster...hehe

Now...if you're wondering wtf i mean by the above, what it means basically, is...make sure u evaluate why ur recording and producing an album carefully....

if youre doing it for world domination purposes, i highly suggest option 1.

if you're doing it for fun....then, be as careful as you can, without being toooo anal....and enjoy the experience of producing, and learn a few things along the way, hopefully to improve on next time...

i hope what i've said helps....at all.

[Ryan Collings]

Thanks guys. Yes Jamil, it did help, very insightful. I was actually after
More technical advice in the first place but this is all very important stuff to consider :)

[rick]

it all seems so simple to me
1 . you write 20 tunes and find someone you trust to tell you 17 of them are not so hot
2. then you write 100 tunes and by that ratio you have enough good songs on tap to make an engaging first album.
3. print a click track of some feeble or dramatic kind and start recording on anything , wire / paper/rust , protools it doesnt matter
4. throw out the stuff that sounds shit , keep the stuff that makes you smile .
5. if nothing makes you smile go back to step one - repeat
6. the reason they call them records is they are a record of where who and what you were about at a particular time.
7. if it doesn't feel right and like a whole lot of fun your doing it wrong
8.pay people you respect for their time/input
9. get on with it
10 turn up to work on time and awake to the job that you love or your boss will wonder were your priorities lie :)

[Ryan Collings]

Haha, you know where my priorities lie Rick!

Music is a hobby and a passion.

Turtlerock is a JOB and a passion :D

[Chinagraf]

- Pay attention to tempo. The more you work on a track , the slower it feels. This can make you speed things up more and more with each version till you destroy the groove.
- Record all your prepro stuff well. You may never get the same feel when you go to do a final re record of a song, and you may need to use a take from prepro recordings.
- Dedicate a drive for this project only if you can, and keep it seperate from you usual stuff. Be totally anal about file management. You can end up with a lot of versions and takes etc, so find a clear understandable system for naming etc and stick to it the whole way through.
- Use templates. Set one up with your usual reverb and delays, group masters etc. Very quick way to get up and running when you have to try another idea.
- Get other players involved. I'm a multi instrumentalist control freak, but the real magic happens when you let others add their spin to your thing.
- Try to not listen to stuff as much as you can. You are going to hear the tracks sooo many times by the end it is easy to get stale. After a great session the temptation is there to stay up listening to the track over and over. When you finish recording turn it off and leave.
- Outside the people involved I don't think playing the tracks to others as you go is very helpful. It can derail your original intentions and have you second guessing things.
- Try to have things set up - both on the daw, the mics and the instruments. Wearing both hats can mess things up. The more organising and setup stuff you can get out of the way, the more room your creative side of your brain has to play.
A great idea can disappear in the time it takes you to set up a mic stand and get a level.

[Ryan Collings]

Thanks Andy,

All those tips sound Super Helpful! I will keep them in mind.

[David W]

it all seems so simple to me
1 . you write 20 tunes and find someone you trust to tell you 17 of them are not so hot
2. then you write 100 tunes and by that ratio you have enough good songs on tap to make an engaging first album.
3. print a click track of some feeble or dramatic kind and start recording on anything , wire / paper/rust , protools it doesnt matter
4. throw out the stuff that sounds shit , keep the stuff that makes you smile .
5. if nothing makes you smile go back to step one - repeat
6. the reason they call them records is they are a record of where who and what you were about at a particular time.
7. if it doesn't feel right and like a whole lot of fun your doing it wrong
8.pay people you respect for their time/input
9. get on with it
10 turn up to work on time and awake to the job that you love or your boss will wonder were your priorities lie :)

Some of the best advice I've read on the net in a long time.
I think I'm going to have to start buying AT again to read some more of your articles.

[Martin]

- Pay attention to tempo. The more you work on a track , the slower it feels. This can make you speed things up more and more with each version till you destroy the groove.
- Get other players involved. I'm a multi instrumentalist control freak, but the real magic happens when you let others add their spin to your thing.

Two of the best bits of advice you can get for free i reckon, take it from someone who does it every single day and even when he'd rather not still does it and makes it sound mad.


Personally i'd be out there gigging those songs for 6 months straight two or more nights a week at whatever singer songwriter type nights will have you. This is an excellent way to gauge which songs work on people and which ones don't. It also makes you play them properly and sing them properly, if you can swing it, take a two track recorder to the gig and then listen back to how you sound it can be VERY revealing, it also means you voice will be in top form when you do go to record it.

When i did an EP type thing years ago (same deal, all the instruments except drums) the one thing i am STILL proud of is how my voice was strong. I'd been doing 3-4 gigs a week so we punched out seven songs in one session and they all sounded good. I struggle to listen to how loose my guitar playing was, and the crunchy protools MIX IT LOUD vibe i had going. But i learnt a lot, and have a little time machine/time capsule to go back and listen to see how i've progressed in performing and production.

oh and if you only remember one word from this post, its one of Andy's... GROOVE... don't wreck it.

[heathen]

-
- Try to have things set up - both on the daw, the mics and the instruments. Wearing both hats can mess things up. The more organising and setup stuff you can get out of the way, the more room your creative side of your brain has to play.
A great idea can disappear in the time it takes you to set up a mic stand and get a level.

Very good point!

I think jamming on songs is pretty important in getting playing fluidity and vibe happening. Also trying to stay excited and animated even if you have heard the track too many times.

Nothing shits me more than when tracking muso's who just shoegaze while trying to get the perfect take, you really have to remember to get into it sometimes, capturing the whole performance not just the sound and if you can't on that particular day move onto something else and revisit the other later.

Getting intro's and outro's perfect is important also, sometimes you can work on the meat of a song for so long and forget those little start and finish points until you go to listen back and realise the intro sux.

[ChrisW]

it all seems so simple to me
1 . you write 20 tunes and find someone you trust to tell you 17 of them are not so hot
2. then you write 100 tunes and by that ratio you have enough good songs on tap to make an engaging first album.
3. print a click track of some feeble or dramatic kind and start recording on anything , wire / paper/rust , protools it doesnt matter
4. throw out the stuff that sounds shit , keep the stuff that makes you smile .
5. if nothing makes you smile go back to step one - repeat
6. the reason they call them records is they are a record of where who and what you were about at a particular time.
7. if it doesn't feel right and like a whole lot of fun your doing it wrong
8.pay people you respect for their time/input
9. get on with it
10 turn up to work on time and awake to the job that you love or your boss will wonder were your priorities lie :)

Yeah, I agree. All of the above is great advice.
I've worked in all kinds of scenarios.... pre-production, no pre-production. there is no magic way to make an album I guess. Even within the album itself, pre-production might be the way to go with one song, writing and recording as you go along will work best for another song.
All I can add to Rick's advice is 1) don't work on the material forever, and 2) find someone to use as a sounding board, critic and be prepared to accept their opinion.

[Ryan Collings]

Thanks Guys.

All your advice is very helpful.

I am playing atleast one gig a week at the moment and the strength of my performances is coming along in leaps and bounds. It's funny that I can feel how I'm getting better and then when I talk to the audience, the feedback is much more positive too.

I have some rough track beds back now (guitar and vocals live with a couple of vocals harmony overdubs) and I'm so tempted to listen lots, but I've restricted myself so I don't wear the songs out in my mind. Only one thing jumped out at me after listening to the 9 tracks and that was to extend an outro which had a really nice ambient feel which ended all too soon...

Thanks again Trockers.