Recording, What's Best -Live or Layered

 I had a discussion the other night with a friend of mine about what is the best way to record, one instrument at a time, or live performance?

For me, it all turns on the artistry of the performer.    If you are an artist that has a unique way of playing and singing, you don’t want to lose that.   Frequently in my early years I would change things to accommodate the other musicians, even to changing the key to make it easier for them, not thinking about how easy it would be for me to sing in that key.

Here’s the first thing.  If you are a great guitar player and arranger, you want to have that up front.  You want to acknowledge that and serve it.   And one way to do that is to record your voice and guitar first, so that all the other musicians have to serve your vision.

If you are not such a great player, than this also may be the best way to serve you as you won’t be stopping and starting a whole band if you take the trouble to lay down a single track that is right on the money, regardless of the amount of takes it took to get that way.

As an aside, I also want to bring your attention to how easy it is to fix things in the computer.   You can fix anything out of time, out of tune, out of whack, it doesn’t matter, if you take enough time you can fix it.

The downside of that is that instead of becoming better on your instrument by doing take after take til you get it right, you become great at editing a mediocre performance into a serviceable one.   Don’t fall prey to the computer fix.   Get it right to begin with, you will become a better musician because of it.   Now back to our regular programming…

Secondly, give the basic track a good serviceable vocal, and save that vocal, but try singing again when the whole track is assembled and you may find that you respond differently to the whole song when you have a band behind you.

Which brings us to another way of recording.   Ensemble Recording.  There is no denying that something magical can happen when you get a group of musicians together.    Just like a scintillating conversation, the interchange between the players makes for some amazing music.

I like to put together a basic ensemble of me on guitar, with a bass player and percussionist and try to make the arrangement and the track sizzle with just the basic trio.

I have also recorded with bass, drums, keyboards and guitars live and it’s wonderful if you have the time and the money to keep playing til everyone hits their stride all at once and you get the magical take.

This is what Brian Wilson (www.brianwilson.com), The Beatles (www.thebeatles.com), Phil Spector (www.philspector.com) and many others did in the sixties and into the seventies.  And the way it HAD to be done prior to multitrack recording.

The down side here is that you don’t have the separation between the instruments so if someone makes a mistake, even if you take it out of their track, it’s probably leaked into the other tracks.  It takes a lot longer and a lot more money to record a bunch of folks at once, even if you rehearse them for weeks (you’ve got to pay them for rehearsing, don’t you?).   But the results will be different and perhaps better than if you layer it.

As a matter of fact, there were a group of musicians in Los Angeles in the sixties that played on everyone’s session.  They were a magnificently gifted group of players and you can find out about them at www.thewreckingcrew.tv.    I highly recommend you checking out the film or dvd.    They played ensemble style and seeing that film is a lesson in how to play together, but I digress…

In the end, I tend to do a combination of both, the decision based upon what serves the song and the performance.

Steely Dan made some of my favorite records of all time, and they did mostly layering.   They just stayed at it and made the musicians play over and over til there was a complete understanding of what the previous musicians had laid down.

Some people say that there is no spontaneity in their recordings, but I disagree.   The recordings sound great, the arrangements are musical, intelligent, logical and surprising.   And it’s a recording.  If you want spontaneity every time, go out and support live music.

In the end, as I almost always advise, serve the song.   Do what it takes to make it work as a recording, because people will play a great recording over and over again.   It’s worth the effort to get it just like you want it.

Comments

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