Hiphop: analog recording

Penfold wrote:why u on dre's arse anyway? he dont really want you to know how he makes his beats. Like Slum Village says man "DO YOU, Cuz ***** I'm ah DO ME"
When I make beats its all over the place, DIG-> ANO->DIG<-ANO->DIG who cares as long as you get your desired result.

Penfold u'r a joka !!! ...yeah f**k Dre !

I bounce to bloody 4 track Yamaha cassette !

Not really but I am seriously considering it to get some analogue warmth !

Logic Audio > Cassette Tape > Sound Forge > CD > Streets !! LOL

I just got my Professional Editing Hi-Fi VCR from ebay today....check it out!

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?Vi ... %3AIT&rd=1

Tell you what I'M gonna do.....

1st off, all my sounds are analog modules (i.e. Mo' Phatt, Proteus 2000, etc) and they go through my Yamaha mixers into my monitors. They only time they become digital is when I mix down to Wavelab. My vocals are, of course, digital.

I'm gonna hook up this VCR (which was $1400 BACK IN LIKE '94...I got it for $100 ) to my main mix outs on the mixer and slap it HARD to some High Grade videotape in SP mode. THEN, I'm gonna dump THAT into my Wavelab.....I'll keep ya'll posted.

And Tanamo, I lucked out.....peep the ebay listing for the specs....it even has the L and R stereo gauges to monitor volume levels up to +8dB!!

ummm....yeah!

*double post*

According to what the good doctor tells us, he's been recording and tracking digitally (protools) for around 2 years now. But when he did record analogue I'm sure he just had his MPCs and samplers synced up, fired up the mic and recorded the session onto tape.

Yo Knoxx, seems like the only analog pieces I see are that Yamaha mixer and the Vestax... The modules emulate or model analog sounds but I could be wrong.

Anders wrote:I just don't get how Dr. Dre does this: analog----->digital----->product
If he actually records everything to tape first, and then samples the recordings into his mpc/sampler, it must take a very long time for him to arrange and complete a track.

If you're talking about creating samples from miked sources, recording the source to (stereo) tape first and then sampling it could be benificial to the sound (tape 'warmth' and compression), and would be more practical than sampling directly (easier to sample a tape than having a drummer play while you press record on the MPC). If you're talking about sampling from records it would make less sense, as records are analog anyway. Dre probably samples records too, but I also know he's big on just having a few libraries of samples loaded up in his MPCs.

What I think he's saying when he says he records everything to analog, is that he tracks his samplers/synths/vocals to analog tape and then mixes this tape down to stereo on his SSL. He probably uses one or two 2" 24 track reel to reel recorders for this, and this working method was the way it was done before DAWs existed.

Of course most of his sources (his MPCs, digital synths) would be digital, but the process of recording said sources to analog tape, and mixing this down on an SSL will give the mix a sound that you wouldn't get if you went from the MPC/synths straight into Protools. And his analog sources (drums, vocals, guitars, analog synths) wouldn't see the digital domain until the mastering stage (unless he'd choose to sample them).

fez wrote:Yo Knoxx, seems like the only analog pieces I see are that Yamaha mixer and the Vestax... The modules emulate or model analog sounds but I could be wrong.

You're right. The MoPhatt and Proteus are as digital as can be. They do have analog outs though (D/A converters), so maybe that's what Knoxxx is talking about???

yeah knox, they aren't analog, you are probably just confusing analog signals with analog modules.

How it ends up does not make irrelevant how it got there. Tape compression sounds incredible, emulators of it only get so close. Also, when you go digital you are only working with part of a signal, not the whole, so sounds change. there is life and sound beyond 20hz-20khz.

I'm starting to hate cd's a lot. A great recording will sound ok in an ipod, a crappy recording on an ipod will give you a headache, analog recordings still sound different to me on the ipod, but I am using mp4's.

I am so sick of hearing about how there is a difference between analog and digital. Jesus. IF you know what your doing, you can get a great sound from either. Digital is a converted analog signal. That means that its the same sound, just a less pure format. For example, the standard sample rate for Compact Discs is 44.1 kHz. Which means 44,100 samples (or ‘snapshots’) are taken each second to convert the sound into a digital format. Now that equates to the original sound being sampled every 2.26 100,000ths of a second. Now if your ears can discern 0.0000226 of a second of sound, then you are indeed someting special. I know analog sounds differnet than audio. Worse. More noise and static and interference. That's why they invented digital. For a cheaper, better sound alternative. No one would have switched to digital from analog in the first place if digital wasn't at least as good, if not better than analog. Usually the "fuller" sound that people like from analog is actually just slight interference noise that occurs due to the inherent flaws in physically dragging the medium across the reader (wether needle or tape head). And like some cats have already figured out, it's all digital when it hits a CD anyway, so what's the point of spending a lot more time and money doing all your recording and mixing and mastering analog, just to release a digital product?

M.ic P.ro C.rusher wrote:Now if your ears can discern 0.0000226 of a second of sound, then you are indeed someting special.

Who are you kidding? We don't listen to each sample (as in 1/44,100th) of a second) seperately, do we? We hear the overall picture.

M.ic P.ro C.rusher wrote:I know analog sounds differnet than audio. Worse. More noise and static and interference. That's why they invented digital. For a cheaper, better sound alternative. No one would have switched to digital from analog in the first place if digital wasn't at least as good, if not better than analog.

I'm just saying it sounds different. You're the one that starts talking about "better" or "worse".

M.ic P.ro C.rusher wrote:Usually the "fuller" sound that people like from analog is actually just slight interference noise that occurs due to the inherent flaws in physically dragging the medium across the reader (wether needle or tape head).

So f•cking what? If it's "a sound people like", then it's a good sound, isn't it? Who cares that it's not 'technically perfect or where those imperfections come from? Are you saying people shouldn't like that sound because it's due to imperfections?

And by the way, it's not just "slight interference noise that occurs due to the inherent flaws in physically dragging the medium across the reader". If we're talking about analog tape, it's mostly harmonic distortion and dynamic compression due to saturation of the tape.

M.ic P.ro C.rusher wrote: And like some cats have already figured out, it's all digital when it hits a CD anyway, so what's the point of spending a lot more time and money doing all your recording and mixing and mastering analog, just to release a digital product?

Are you even friggin' serious????? The POINT is that analog processing (recording to tape, mixing on analog boards, etc) CHANGES the sound of the end product. It does this regardless of what medium it'll be released on; CD, limited as the format is, gives a pretty accurate reproduction, so a signal that has been nicely processed through analog tape/board/eq/compression will still show those qualities on CD.
If you think it all boils down to what format the music's released on, it's you who's gotten carried away in this analog/digital bullsh*t talk.

lo-fi wrote:it's you who's gotten carried away in this analog/digital bullsh*t talk.

Obviously (who had to break down every point of my post?)

********WE INTERRUPT THIS POST FOR A SPECIAL REPORT********

does it really matter, as long as you both get what sound you are looking for, who cares who gets what, again as always said.... DO YOU.... and Lo-Fi, why u breaking down on M.P.C. like that, its only the internet, you are going to think what you want, and he is going to do the same... ALL IS A MATTER OF OPINION... not that either one of you have to go with one another of course.......

It really makes little sense to expect anything of actual substance from this forum. Especially in arguments like these. Peoplewho have never even used 4 track cassette diss analog as a whole because they just want to feel good about what they are recording too.

Basically it's a waste, but I'll leave you with this, all analog isn't the same and all digital isn't equal. the fact that a m audio sound card and a pro tools hd sysdtem are both digital doesn't make them of equal quality, and as far as sound goes analog still is preffered by many, but no one wants to pay for it cuz digital is cheaper and easier, not better quality.

Digital formats also introduce distortion ( in fact, anything with a sampling rate introduces distortion by default) and have many errors, a cd is not an exact duplicate unless you take great pains and lots of gear to verify. Digital can handle having lots of errors becauser it's built to work that way.

I love how someone has a basic understanding of digital recording, explains sampling rates in their argument like it somehow shows that they know everything there is to know about analog and digital to settle it once and for all.

[quote="jaem"]the minute you sample...you are digital......



PROVE ME WRONG!!!!!!

[/quot

ur an idiot

i recently got hold of a nice reel to reel machine (check the avatar) and at the moment i pretty much sample everything through tape, either by recording it from vinyl to tape first and then playing it back to the mpc, or if i'm in a hurry i do it by simply letting the signal go straight through the machine while the tape is rolling.

it really does have a very noticeable effect to the sound, the tape saturation this machine gives sounds really nice when used correctly and i can distort my drums just as i want them without none of that digital clipping. there's some hiss of course but when i don't want it in the sound i just cut of some of the high frequencies (i always eq on the way in!!)

once the beat is done tho i do take it to a studio to record it into a DAW, purely because of the ease of use and getting the master to a cd right away. we also have a 2" machine that we can run the beat through before going into the DAW but it's mainly used for live recordings. i have plenty of time to get into that stuff later, i'm just starting out with all this studio shyt.

bottom line: who gives a f*ck!




































no sorry, i meant to say i love analog!