I’ve been messing around with some digital audio workstations lately in preparation for doing some Onward Voyageur recordings (and mixing, although it looks like we’re moving ahead with that sooner than I thought). I have in the past played around with N-tracks, Cubase, Nuendo, and Sonar on my pc, but since buying a mac I’ve just been making my demos in garage band. I imagine I could record the whole band in it too, but I wanted to see what else was out there.

I tried out the free daw Ardour first, but in spite of following their instructions as closely as possible, the program did crash fairly regularly, and you wouldn’t believe how long it took me to figure out how to load tracks (and I consider myself pretty good at using software). I played with it up until the point where I discovered that all of our backups were short little tracks that I had to manually line up, got frustrated trying to figure out how to add markers, and then when it crashed again I thought it was time to look at something else.

I downloaded a 30 day trial of a program called Reaper, and I have to admit the interface sure is pretty (I like a pretty interface!) and I got the hang of it a little quicker than Ardour. Lining up the backing vocals was easier because I could easily add markers! So I have to learn as much as I can before the trial expires!

And hey, if you’re reading this and have a favorite program that you like to record with, can you tell me what it is? And is there an easier way to import a protools recording when some of the tracks aren’t as long as the whole song?

Last weekend Onward Voyageur was in the studio, and I tried blogging and recording at the same time:

Today is our last day in the studio, where we are trying hard to record 8 songs in 3 days. We are going to finish up all the backups (we have 4 people singing on all the songs, so after getting good beds this is probably the biggest part) plus overdub some keyboards, banjo and trumpet.

One of our biggest wishes would be to have free time to experiment (or affordable time? or our own studio?) but there are always budget, time and babysitting constraints. So, I’ve been mucking around a bit because I want to learn to record us, and the great thing about digital is I can actually take these studio tracks and play around with them on my own computer. After this stint we’re going to try and record one song on our own in the jam space.

11:45 We’ve just finished all the vocals for Myth of Broken Wrist, and Leslie is singing backups for Fall in the Spring. This is the first time in the studio for Leslie, and we’re all getting turns holding Baby Iris, the amazing studio baby.

11:54 Finished Fall in the Spring – pretty quick,eh? We’d actually only had Leslie’s parts to finish up from yesterday. Next up, Landmine. We’ve appointed Joyita supreme dictator of backups, she has final say on all parts, if they’re up to scratch or not. This is what you get for being such a great backup vocalist. Christine always nails her too although she would probably argue that with me.

12:47 Finished Landmine and we’re almost done Eye to the Ground. Joyita always goes last as her voice is “the blender”. This is the song I’d really like to make a video for so we have to get this one right!

12:51 Joyita the one take wonder.

12:54 Christine’s up for Dead & Buried. Sometimes when we really examine our harmonies closely we realize someone is singing the same part as someone else, so its always up to Joyita to come up with the new harmony on the spot.

1:22 Good thing I only have to sing one line (although quite a number of times) cause I got Leisurely Collapse in one take!

1:28 Joyita is jumping up and down.

2:19 What’s up with Starbucks? Their coffee sucks.

2:25 A lot of bands say they will fix it in the mix, with us it’s, we just won’t have it in the mix at all.

3:15 Eve on the clave, Carrie on banjo and JP on trumpet!

Ok, I got a little tired of trying to do two things at the same time so that last line pretty much sums up the rest of the day. Last night we had a listening party and I am SO SO happy with the rough mixes! Can’t wait to mix it.