OK.
You are an in a band.
You create music.
You want to record your songs.
Over the next few pages I will write about recording bands, and more
importantly me recording your band.
This document is a bit long, so maybe go offline, or print it. If
printing it, reduce text size and save the trees. I left the text size big here
for ease of reading from a screen.
Get back to me at ballsofironstudios@yahoo.co.uk
if you are interested or wish to discuss ideas with me. I am otherwise engaged
at the moment. I will available to in July 2003, and will have a phone number
then. In the meantime, I hope to organise projects from here via email. See
also the next issue of Unfit for Consumption for more on this.
Here’s a quick roadmap to my ideas and ramblings over
the next few pages: You can click on each one to skip ahead to each topic...
OK.
Balls of iron studios is a mobile 16-track recording
system.
In a nutshell, my studio and my approach to recording will give you the
following benefits:
1. Experience: I’ve been playing music for nearly
20 years and recording for 10. I’ve recorded over 100 projects from people from
all over Ireland, Europe and the USA. I have a masters in Music Technology,
have lectured in studio recording, and attended The TapeOp Magazine Recording
Conference in Sacramento last summer and am now blood brothers/have the same
number of syllables in my name as monsieurs Albini, Endino, Zientara et al…
2. Versatility: Balls of Iron is a mobile studio.
My studio and I come to you. Other more established studios (which
from here on are referred to as ‘cement’ studios, because they are stuck to the
ground with cement), cannot do what I can do. They are stuck in the
one place, and must use the same acoustic spaces each and every time a
recording is made there.
I can record anywhere. The amount of acoustic spaces I can record
in is limitless.
3. Optimum recording:. Recordings in concrete studios
can suffer due to the band’s unfamaliarity with the new surroundings, ‘time is
money’ pressures, and getting it all finished in the one session.
Knowing this, I aim to achieve the best situation in which the recording
can take place. Where possible, I go see your band live, study previous
recordings you’ve made, and prepare for the songs you are going to record.
We record where you feel you perform at your best, where you are most
relaxed, in familiar surroundings, where you get the best vibe, where you wrote
the music in the first place, where your mojo flows. That is where we record. Not
in a sterile, cement, unfamiliar studio, with sometimes scary engineer monsters.
4. I cost less: I charge less than most cement
studios because, I have less overheads, e.g. no rent, no electricity etc. I
charge €5 per hour per band member. The minumum price is €15 per hour. You save
on paying for the 3 or 4 people in your band going to a concrete studio (food /
travel / accomodation). Instead you only pay for one. Me (i.e. I travel by bus
and I crash/eat at your place, not a B+B).
OK.
My motivation for writing this?
Every band should record. WHY?
Recording is important for other reasons. Back in the early 1800’s, a
smart boy English dude called ‘something Bunting’ (I think) went all around
Ireland collecting Irish tunes, jigs and reels that folk were playing all over
the place. Although many tunes have survived by families passing them on to the
next generations, Bunting is the man we have to thank for many of the tunes in
today’s repetoire being preserved by his writing them all down, way back then.
Similarly, I’m up for recording the tunes of today, primarily for the
benefit of the bands themselves, and the people who may like their music, but
also for future generations who are curious to find out what the real
Irish music was like, and not the mainstream dross which was peddled at the
time of their existence.
2. Why should you record with me?
You should want to record with me if you like the cut of my jib, if you
like the sound of recordings I have already made, if you think we can make good
things happen in the studio.
So here’s some ‘getting to know me’ stuff. If you want to read all about
me, there’s plenty of stuff on my website, located for now at https://mocstudios.tripod.com/mebands.htm
But here’s an abbreviated version:
J Robbins: Husker Du’s Zen Arcade, despite its technical shortcomings (i.e. it
is not the best recorded album ever, technically speaking), is an example of a
great recording; a great band captured playing their great tunes."
Albini: "I would agree with that 100%"
That’s me. That’s where I am at.
OK, suppose that by now you’ve decided to record with me. A wise choice
in my unbiased opinion…
What happens next?
Let’s say you are a band with drums, bass, 2 guitars and 2 vocals.
OK, we arrange a date. This is the date. People arrange to take time off
work to be available. I work for a minimum of 8 hours per day. Of course not
everyone needs to be around all the time. We follow a schedule.
Before that date, we correspond lots and stay in constant contact. You
send me Cds/tapes of previous recordings you may have and a tape (rehearsal
recording) of the songs you want to record. Hopefully, if I haven’t seen ye
already, I can go see you play live before we record.
The date arrives. I arrive at your place of residence/rehearsal –
wherever you chose to make the best recording, where you are most comfortable
& relaxed and are likely to perform at your best, and record the fastest. Now
we can make a record.
I set up my gear, 1 desk, 8 mics, monitors, headphones. I can record 8
tracks at a time.
You bring every bit of gear which you may need during the project. Such
as (you’re preferred) mics, mic stands, headphones, spare strings, guitars,
drumsticks, pedals, amps, power supplies, batteries and plectrums. That way we
waste no time.
The rest goes something like this:
That is how it usually happens.
Alternatively we can do it all live. 4 drum mics, 1 bass, 2 guitar, 1
vocal. It’ll be rougher, but faster... Only problem is, if someone fucks up,
the whole song has to be done again. If 4 different people fuck up 4 different
times, that’s 4 playings of the song, all not usable. Can get frustrating if
you’re not on top of your game.
Doing the multi track way (as described above), means fuck ups are more
easily redone doing one part at a time.
The format on which you get the finished mixes is CD. DAT copies can
also be arranged. ADAT master tapes of the 16 tracks can also be arranged, but
at a cost of €50.
Mastering (aka ‘making it sound LOUD MAN!’): I am not a mastering
engineer. However, I will do mastering if required. It means getting the
finished mixes ‘back to the lab’ (i.e. to the PC) in Limerick. Depending on my
schedule with other recording projects, arranging a date for the mastering
session happens when I have time free.
Extra services - I know plenty about websites, CD Sleeve design, and the
printing of artwork and the CDs themselves. I have some contact with places
which can do a deal with my ‘clients’. Extra copies of the master CD can be
supplied at a cost of €5. My brain is available for picking on any subject
under the sun.
If you’re like me, then you will have skipped forward to this bit. "Cut
the bullshit, how much do you cost?"
I wish to stress that I believe the nature of my setup, the ‘mountain
comes to Mohommad’ factor means recording with me saves you money on expenses
you wouldn’t have thought of (see table below).
My rate sounds most reasonable when I put it like this - I charge €5
per hour per member of band.
A 3 piece pays €15 per hour. A 4 piece €20 per hour. Anything bigger, we
can haggle. Anything smaller, duos or solo €15 per hour too (sorry).
On top of this, my expenses i.e. travel, food and board, must be
covered. The most desireable arrangement is
Travel – I take the bus or if you can pick me up, even better.
Food – I buy food at the supermarket for the week and cook it myself. Shouldn’t
come to more than €30. Or if you can feed me, even better.
Board – I crash at your place. I bring sleeping bag and ground mat. But
if you have a spare bed or couch, even better!
Basically I do what I can do to make it less expensive for you.
Reason why I charge ‘so much’? Paying back
out-of-control loans.
Reason why I charge per member of band? I was in
bands. I want to spread a bit of equality around. So a fee like €20 is unfair
to a 3-piece band paying €6.66 each, compared to a 5-piece paying €4 each. I’m
expecting €5 per hour per member of band is a fair price.
Also, sourcing work, organising projects takes time. All of the
preparation work (i.e. me writing this), initial contact/correspondance takes
time. None of which gets counted when we count up the hours at the end.
Side note
- In 1996 I recorded with Veneer in Dennis Allen’s studio in Limerick, it cost
15 pounds per hour. 7 years later, after lots of inflation, I am charging
roughly the same rate. Worth a mention.
Where does all that money go? Paying back
loans. I don’t own this gear yet. I have made the leap, and bought the gear. I
believe great things can happen as a result of this expensive leap. Recording
gear costs a lot. Want to buy a ‘decent’ mic? You are talking €1,000. Maintenance
of gear. Insurance etc.
OK here’s some food for thought. Besides the actual cost per hour in a
studio, there are other costs associated with making a record, which you may
not have considered.
I did a search recently on most of the studios available in Ireland at
the moment. The variation of rates went from €200 to €320 per 8 hour day, right
on up to Windmill Lane’s €gazillion per minute. I’ve not used any of them, but
I’m sure they do a great job.
But just to force this ‘I’m better value’ point home, check out the
following table.
Say you are a 4 piece and you spend 5 days (i.e. 5*8 = 40 hours) making
a record. Check out the expenses.
Cost of recording with me, Balls of Iron, compared to them, Concrete
Studio X, charging €320 per 8 hour day.
Expense |
BALLS OF IRON |
Cost |
|
CONCRETE STUDIO X |
Cost |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Transport to studio |
My train/bus fare |
€20 |
|
4 * your train/bus fares |
€80 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Bed for 5 nights |
Me staying in your place |
€0 |
|
The 4 of you staying in a €15 hostal for 5 nights |
€300 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Food |
Me eating home cooked meals |
€30 |
|
You eating junk in cafés or ordering in |
€200 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Beer |
With me it’s FREE! Or at least, at the end I buy a big slab to
celebrate |
€0 |
|
Pricey |
€100 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Actual cost of 40 hours of recording time |
Me = €20 per hour |
€800 |
|
€320 per 8 hour day |
€1,600 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Mastering |
Me = €20 per hour, 5 hours |
€100 |
|
€50 per hour, 5 hours |
€250 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Miscellaneous |
CDs, Dat etc |
€50 |
|
CDs, Dat, other |
€100 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
Total |
|
€1000 |
|
|
€2,480 |
|
|
|
|
|
|
I’m sure there’s lots more expenses that would come up, but from what’s
there, you get the picture.
I’ve set myself up in a way that makes sense to me. Tieing oneself down
to one premises didn’t make sense to me.
I’m not really trying to be an alternative to concrete studios. It has
just ended up this way.
A sad reality with concrete studios is their being stuck to the
ground. Another is that they are located in places which, frankly, aren’t
ideal for the recording of music e.g. industrial estates, inner city
expensiveland.
When you go to a cement studio, you are paying for the rent of their
premises, their electricity, tea bags. I have no such overheads. Hence I can
charge less.
With Balls of Iron, you chose where we record. As discussed previously,
the atmosphere of a concrete studio can phase a band, or make them
uncomfortable. The pressure of ‘time is money’ can force you into making hasty
decisions during the recordings which you may regret later. Most studios
schedule bands to record that the engineers have no prior knowledge of.
I aim to address all these factors. I want the band to be firing on all
cylinders. I want to know the music of the band before we record. I’ve probably
seen all of you live, and if not hope I can do so beforehand. Also, prat of the
preparation of recording the songs is you making a (as crappy as you like) demo
recording of them. It should put us on a good footing before we begin.
6. How good is the finished product?
The other obvious question is "But wont you get a better finished
product in a concrete studio?"
Answer = No.
I believe, or better yet, I know you can get just as good results in the
home recording environment as you can in a concrete studio.
In every house, you have acoustic spaces which are as good if not better
than most studios…
Examples of great recordings made in home / small studios…
Other advantages of doing it with me
Otherwise, if you’ve ever seen that episode of Star Trek, The Next
Generation, where this gal comes on board and she knows how to be sexually
appealling to each of the crew members, she was a sex empath. Well that’s sort
of how I am with tunes. Not to sound pretentious or whatever, but I think I can
understand pretty quickly the direction a song is trying to go. I’ve been in a
reggae band, a shoegaze melody pain band, a bucket of acid electronica blues
band and a louder than god loudynamic rifftastic band and now I do my thing
solo. Lots of experience. I believe my experience is an obvious help in me
doing a great job on your recording.
My main rule about recording in terms of ‘knowing when not to stop’ is:
"If you know, listening back to it 100 times, that a certain bit is
going to annoy the shit out of you every time you hear it, then we do it again."
I start with the approach of ‘you know what you want’. If in need of
advice, I’ll advise. If you need a cheerleader, I’ll probably disappoint. If I
can call you Betty, you can call me Al.
7. Idea: Collective recording for less
In trying to give the bands I record as good a deal as possible, in the
best spirit of all things underground and collectivoish, I’ve come up with an
idea that caters for a cash strapped collective of bands.
But at the same time, this is my crust. I’m serious about making great
recordings with great bands, but want to get paid fairly too. I know bands are
broke at the best of times, so here’s my idea for both backs getting scratched.
IDEA: Collective recording:
Whenever I record a band, I arrive at the chosen venue to make the
recording (with my ace, not-like-any-other-studio, MOBILE 16 track RECORDING STUDIO),
I have to get there, set up mic stands, mics, get levels, work on sounds.... generally
doing time-consuming thinking for the benefit of the recording. It usually adds
up to about 4 hours.
Take a number of bands, e.g. 4, then all that time comes to 4 * 4 = 16
hours.
Now consider those 4 bands deciding to record at the same time e.g. over
a 10 day period. Then automatically, that removes 3 of those 4 4-hour slots. Bang!
12 hours recording time saved for the 4 bands (aka Eur240!) and 12 hours of doing
the less interesting stuff saved for me.
Consider also the obvious benefits of everyone’s gear being around:
· A
broken guitar? Borrow yer man’s over there...
· More
heads around = improve possibilities of capturing vibe of the band as they are
live, or get feedback or ideas from the other bands
· Band
A’s singer can’t reach the high backing vocal part for song A, so vocalist from
band B, who can reach the note, does a guest vocal…
· Maybe
at the end of the session all the bands can get together and we can record a
version of ‘We are the World’ or something...
· Bands
coming together under the one roof can talk about contacts, organise a tour
together, maybe a compilation CD, a music collective (if none exists), gigs,
songwriting etc. A veritable mini underground rock conference!
The advantages are infinite. The savings are substantial – set up time,
my time is fully productive, (e.g.: when one band is on a break or runs in to
problems, another can be recording), my expenses are divided among many. I keep
track of how much time each band has recorded, and fairly sort out the bill at
the end.
Similarly, we can get into an organised schedule, whereby we do drums on
day 1, bases day 2, guitars on day 3, etc. Guitarists can swap pedals or
sounds,
e.g. guitarist Y, "hey, that’s the sound I was looking for for song
X, can I quickly stick down my bit"
Guitarist Z "Go for it man."
We’re all such good mates and the recordings are sounding so good, we’re
so happy we can hardly count… etc. (obscure pink floyd quote, ‘have a cigar’
off ‘wish you were here’ anyone anyone?)
Obviously this idea won’t work with bands who bitch with each other and
don’t get along. But if everyone can agree on the importance of recording one’s
songs, then hopefully they can agree to get into the spirit of ‘do it for the
record’ and put all the shit aside and be involved in something great.
Feel free to email any of my clients and ask them of the quality of my
services. I know for a fact that Niall Quinn and Giveamanakick@hotmail.com
will both have nice things to say to me, cos I slipped them brown envelopes.
OK, wrapping it up now. To recap on what I said already, Balls of Iron
rule because
Bottom line is: I think this is a good idea. That’s why I’ve shared it
with you.
Thanks for reading. Sorry if it has dragged on.
RSVP if you’re interested in recording, or to discuss any ideas you may
have.
Peace,
Mark O’Connor,
AMC, Tooth, B. Mech. Eng., MA Mus Tech.,
BALLS OF IRON STUDIOS
(or SÍLE if you prefer, Studio Íarann liathróid na hÉireann)
p.s. I’d
like to thank my sister for helping me with this. She has lots of corporate
bones in her body so she read over an earlier version of this and gave me
advice on how to make better. Turn it into an offer you can’t refuse. Stuff like
"Mark – follow the
rule of any good presentation. Tell them what you’re going to tell them, tell
them and then tell them again."
Maybe
that’s why it dragged on so much...