New recording project - to Helix it or not

ewal

After many barren years, I might be restarting a band project which petered our before the pandemic.

The core of the band is me on guitar and my drummer mate who is also a sound engineer, albeit mainly live music engineering.

The idea is we would record drums and a guide guitar part together, which I would then layer up with home recorded parts, perhaps inviting others in to collaborate once ideas have developed.

Now work and family pressures is likely to mean that recording time together is going to be extremely limited - therefore we need to keep options to a bare minimum and build a really effective tracking workflow.

I use an HX Stomp XL when recording at home and have spent time short-listing some amps and learning how to re-amp using Helix Native. However, when working in rehearsal room with drummer, how would I integrate that in to his recording set-up? I reckon we should focus on getting decent drums recorded, and leave the Helix trickery out of the equation until I start layering things up at home. I need to go in with simplest guitar set-up as possible so distractions are avoided - either an amp and very few pedals or HX Stomp XL by itself...

Just thinking out loud really!

Musical_Mystery_Tour

If the song's structure is set in stone in terms of verse, chorus, bridge etc, then you could just record the drums to a click track which would give you solid timing for later integration into a DAW, or if you need guitar to help the drummer feel the flow of it, do the same and use an isolation booth or headphones for the guitar so it isn't bleeding into the drum recording but you can still hear enough to feed off each other and go with the flow. 

Another way to go about it would be to create the song with just a guide drum part until it is at a fairly finished stage and then have the drummer play to that on headphones and record the drums at that point, then stick that on a track in the DAW.

A lot will depend on what the song is and how you want it to feel in terms of the drumming's timing, i.e whether you want it loose, or nailed on the beat to make midi or sequenced stuff easier to incorporate. I'm inclined to think the fancy guitar effects can wait, particularly if the song is possibly going to evolve in terms of later collaborative additions. bviously if you're going to have others adding stuff, some solid timing on the part of the drum BPM will be a help and a well thought out drum part will make the song too of course.

I always reference the playing of John Bonham when considering that kind of thing: If you listen to his playing on something like Kashmir, if he was even a millisecond later on the beat it would have sounded terrible, but he takes it right up to the ragged edge of coming in late on the beat and it's what maks the song as good as it is. The timing of the drums is everything on that track.

Another one I like to refer to for that kind of consideration is Alan White on the Yes track, Run Through the Light. On the face of it there doesn't seem to be anything particularly complicated about it although it undeniably works well with the top notch bass paying from Chris Squire. But after a while, you realise the drumming literally has not one cymbal hit on it all the way through the entire song, which is what gives it the lovely open space it needs for the vocals, the Fairlight and of course all that fab guitar playing from Steve Howe, which doesn't even sound like a Les Paul, even though it is. At the time it got slagged off by all the Yes fans bemoaning the loss of Jon anderson on vocals and even booed the and when they went on tour, however, these days everyone recognises what a great album Drama is and it's in no small part due to the drumming and how that slots into the production.

Drums tend to be an afterthought for a lot of other musicians, but getting them right makes a big difference, so yeah, get the drums right first before going mad on the guitar stuff.

stickyfiddle

DI your guitar straight into the desk/DAW and send that to Helix Native for monitoring (and you might as well record that output as well). 

Then you at least have a guitar sound “on tape”, which you can later use or discard as you see fit

Musicwolf

The most important first stage is to lay down a really solid drum part.  Performance is far more important than sound quality, so focus what little time you have on getting a good take rather than messing around with mic positioning.

It comes down to whether your drummer can / wants to record to a click track or whether you need to lay down a guide guitar at the same time.  If the latter, then don't worry about the sound or the odd mistake (as long as it doesn't put the drummer off).  Just use the HX Stomp and headphones to avoid any spill into the drum mics.

If you are using a click then you could pre-record the guitar parts before hand - but still bring your guitar rig on the day because I've encountered plenty of drummers who say that they can play to a click, but can't.  If you are still developing the songs, and feel that you may need to make edits, then you will need to play to a click.

Bod

Will you be using the Stomp as an interface when recording your guitar?  If so, then that allows you to record the clean guitar as well as the effected output.  You can do the same if using a different interface by adding a send block to the beginning of the chain and recording that as well as the normal outputs.

digitalscream

The obvious solution, if you want to reamp using a Helix of some sort (ie using the tones in the Helix itself), is to buy Helix Native. Then there's no mucking around with interface latency when reamping - just record the dry track, and muck around with the tone as much as you want after the fact. You can do that easily with the Stomp.

ewal

Thanks for all thoughts and suggestions. I've already got Helix Native and will definitely be making use of it when adding tracks back at home. I think the priority when working with drummer is getting decent drum tracks recorded, my guitar will be little more than a conductor. There's no way the drummer would play with the same energy if he's playing to a click track.

First things first though - let's see if I can remember the songs!

ewal

Still pondering this....

The music we're playing is loud and rocky. Can you really simulate the sound of a guitar being played beside a cranked amp using with a Helix and headphones? It's the interaction between the guitar and amp I'm wondering about - the sustain and feedback?

ewal

Decision made.

I'm going to go with two setups - a live amp/pedals setup, and a HX Stomp/Native setup. I'll use HX to track guide guitar at home, then live setup in studio, then HX back at home for bass and any overdubs.

Best of both worlds and the only way for me to avoid confusion and options paralysis. Also means I get to play through my amp for first time in years.