25 years ago if you wanted to make an album you went to a purpose built studio and recorded it with professionals. Depending on the quality of the studio, this would often involve having to first get a deal with a label to pay for the sessions. Without serious financial backing behind you it was simply impossible to get a record recorded well and manufactured, let alone distributed.

Fast forward to the current day – digital technology and computing power has revolutionised the way we record music and transformed the music industry. The top studios used to pay hundreds of thousands of pounds just for their mixing consoles and spend the same again on top quality microphones, audio processing and speakers. These days you can pick up software that emulates the sound of these top vintage consoles and equipment for a fraction of the price, moving recording top quality albums from the studios into the bedroom and rehearsal rooms of today’s indie musician. The move has meant that most of the major studios have now gone bust and with them the loss of some of the greatest sounding recording equipment and rooms ever built. A loss that not everyone appreciates as the cold thin digital sound of many ‘budget’ releases these days testifies. 

Whilst so many of the new recording tools are incredibly accurate and faithful to the vintage equipment they emulate, it only takes a few days working in a great professional studio with an experienced engineer or producer to see that it’s not only the tools that are important. In our opinion so many of the greatest records ever recorded sound like that not just because of the awesome sounding gear but also because they were recorded by quality engineers with years worth of professional experience. The magazines, books and audio courses that claim to be able to teach you how to record a hit record in a matter of a few lessons are misleading; the technology is good enough today to allow you to record a pretty decent sounding recording but it takes years of working at it and learning the tricks to be able to make something that genuinely stands out from the rest of the crowd. 

The plus side is that as an artist you no longer have to sign your career away to a record company or compromise your sexual morals finding a sugar daddy to fund your recording sessions. It’s possible to go and spend less than a grand and pick up enough equipment to record a pretty decent sounding demo. If you spend a bit more then with a bit of practice you can actually record something that sounds pretty special. Indulging in the luxury of owning your own equipment also means that you can spend as long as you want to complete your masterpiece without a single glance at the studio clock, gone are the days of watching another hour and £100 tick away as the bassist screws up yet again!

In the following posts we’ll give you some tips on making that all important first album.

Tips for DIY recording —>