Perhaps it's because I'm an old git in my early 60s but I often find that this modern form of recording with DAWs really places so much emphasis on defining and sticking to a set tempo as part of the workflow that it sometimes really gets in the way of making music. The track windows with their timing grids geared towards quantisation distract sometimes from just the urge to play and make music. It's nice to let a song speed and slow down naturally in accordance to its own vibe. I know many DAWs support temp changes during a song, but I don't want to have to sit down and try and plan with a calculator what bpm I need to slow or speed up to.
In the 'old' analogue days of recording on tape machine I/we never used to use click tracks etc. It was just a count in oh the recording track and off we went. It was a much more organic and natural way to record a song.
I do try hard nowadays just to set a rough tempo on the Reaper, then remove the metrone and time grid but sometimes I feel like I'm swimming against the current beause of the nature of DAWs.
Anyone else ever feel the tyranny of the tempo.. or is this just an old fart problem?
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However I'm willing to accept my mind probably doesn't work the same way competent recordists or musicians minds do
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1. Compare the guitar track and the click to make sure that they line up, and fix if not.
2. Check the tempo map to see if there are any weird glitchy tempo changes, and if so, fix them. At this point the guitar track retimes with the tempo track.
3. Make sure it's the tempo I want it to be (not to fast or slow overall) and adjust to taste.
I can then add in section markers and generate a Drummer track, after which I can play along with the Drummer track (having got the feel of it to what I want).
As far as playing and recording music goes, I see a metronome as a great training aid to learn not to let the tempo drift up or down. I completely understand those who prefer to use a DAW as a tape machine, it makes a lot of sense for those who prefer to work that way.
I've been trying to edit the tempo manually to get the right feel for a song that starts slow and then speeds up in the transition bar before the verse starts (in real life the drummer makes this happen with a single stroke roll that gets faster) and it isn't easy for me to program and have it sound convincing.
When I got back into home recording, I recorded each instrument in complete takes as I did on the old four-track, which included drums provided from keyboards or drum machines as I had done before. I think playing along to a drum machine would be much the same as playing along to live drums tight to a click.
The bar for recording drums is lower than ever but the average standard of production for hobby bands has never been higher so you combine those 2 things and you get lots more substandard performances being edited into something acceptable.
In metal at least the actual technical standard of parts has been increasing over the years too.
QOTSA are an example.
I think Clutch are too.
If the band is well rehearsed then you don't need to use one.
I often do not.
A trick that people might not know, you can use a half time or quarter time metronome, which gives you the ability to more loosely track a session tempo whilst still maintaining some reference to a grid.
So for a 120bpm track set the session tempo to 60 or 30 bpm.
Jazz musicians use it on the offbeat so you can swing.
You can do this by setting a half bar count in and playing on the off beat.
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It's not just DAW related though - it's also that so many people play all the parts themselves at home - there's no opportunity to feed off other musicians like you get in a live room.
In an old band we used to record it live and then bin most of the guitars and all the vocals. Always kept the bass and drums, and if it was clean enough as much of the rhythm guitar parts as we could too.
Then the rhythm section's little ebbs and flows were preserved for layering the rest on. Sounded so much nicer - like an organic living thing rather than soulless perfection.
One of the best things about playing with other people is that interaction - when you feel a tune as a group and everyone knows what the others are going to do.
Perfection is a crap idea.
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