• Getting Started With Home Recording
  • Getting Started With MIDI Production
  • My Electric Guitar Secret Weapon
  • 10 Things Every Band Should Know Before Recording
  • Do I Need A High End Mic Preamp?
  • Home Recording Soundcard Wizard
  • Electric Guitar Microphone Shootout

Getting Started With Home Recording

Are you new to recording and not exactly sure what gear you need? RecordingReview.com specializes in helping beginners jump into the world of recording. There are about 2,000 traps that can easily waste thousands of hours of your time. Recording Review focuses on giving you the info you need to make the right decisions for you. This is what the Getting Started With Home Recording Guide is all about.

Getting Started With MIDI Production

MIDI production is not just for techno and dance music anymore. The use of MIDI has become an integral part of the recording process in rock, metal, and even country. In fact the only genre's of music that don't utilize MIDI that often are Folk and Bluegrass!

With that said, MIDI can be confusing at first. MIDI brings up a big, new list of definitions to learn and MIDI just seems to play by a different set of rules than convention computer recording. Luckily, I've created the Getting Started With MIDI Sequencing Guide to help you burst through the learning curve and reap the benefits of synths, samples, and MIDI production.

Steinberg Cubase 4 Studio
Steinberg Cubase 4 Studio
PreSonus FIREPOD Studio Package
PreSonus FIREPOD Studio Package
Waves SSL 4000 Collection Native
Waves SSL 4000 Collection Native
Toontrack DFH Superior Custom and Vintage
Toontrack DFH Superior Custom and Vintage
Propellerhead REASON 4.0 Music Production Software
Propellerhead REASON 4.0 Music Production Software
Neumann TLM-103 Microphone
Neumann TLM-103 Microphone
My Electric Guitar Secret Weapon

For a rock guitar player, there is something about a killer distorted guitar sound that becomes a passion, or maybe even an addition. Of guitar, many beginners in the home recording world have trouble with recording electric guitars. In this member only guide, I'll talk about my secret weapon for recording huge electric guitars.

10 Things Every Band Should Know Before Recording

Before any band walks into a recording studio, they had better prepare themselves. There is a lot to learn about the recording process, but taking a few minutes to read this guy could save you thousands of bucks!!

10 Things Every Band Should Know Before Recording is my attempt to get you up to speed on the process of recording extremely quickly! If we can immediately rule out beginner mistakes and make sure you have a clear idea on how the process REALLY works, the odds of your next recording being successful are improved immensely.

Do I Need A High End Mic Preamp?

Don't let peer pressure convince you that you need to dump thousands of dollars into a high end microphone preamp. Let your ears decide! Maybe after listening to this preamp shootout, you can decide if the subtle change in character offered by a preamps is going to be worth the cash.

Take a listen to my Preamp Shootout. With preamps such as API, Great River, Vintech (Neve 1272 clone), Presonus M80, and Mackie 1604 you can listen to the difference between super expensive and super cheap preamps and decide for yourself if you want to drop the cash on a preamp yet or not.

Home Recording Soundcard Wizard

The hardest part to choosing the initial gear to get started recording at home is the audio interface / soundcard (same thing). It used to take hours and hours and hours of research to figure out the features you needed. Then it took hours and hours and hours to figure out which brand of audio interface was most reliable. Of course, then, someone would say that X brand is way better than Y brand (which is usually a total lie!). It was a mess!

Now, choosing an audio interface is much simpler. Just go through the Home Recording Soundcard Wizard. It'll ask you 10 questions and spit out the audio interfaces that meet your needs in order of price. You immediately know which audio interfaces work for you. Then it's just an issue of choosing the most reliable audio interface that meets your budget. It's easy!

Electric Guitar Microphone Shootout

Do you really need a super high end microphone to get great sounding electric guitars? Here is a shootout I put together with the Royer R121 ribbon microphone, Shure SM 57, Audio Technica AT4033, Sennheiser MD 421, and Soundelux U99.

CD Mastering

One of the most misunderstood subjects in the world of home recording is the topic of mastering. Few people understand what mastering is or what it does. In fact, a lot of beginners mix up audio mastering and audio mixing, which are two completley different parts of the equation.

Austin Recording Studio

For anyone interested in doing any recording in the Austin, Texas region, I'd highly recommend that you check out my friend, Mark Warren, and his Austin recording studio, 5AM Studios. Mark has some KILLER gear and great sounding rooms. I wish I had my teleporter, I'd use his recording studio all the time.

Latest Recording Blogs
  • AD Converter Shootout: Mytek AD96 vs Presonus Firestudio

    Thinking of upgrading to high end analog to digital converters? Check out this little shootout between Mytek AD96 and Presonus Firestudio AD converte
    Posted in Audio Engineering Principles

  • Using Hardware Synths In Softsynth World

    I've ran into more and more guys who want to use their hardware synths in their computer based home recording studios lately. This article will discu
    Posted in MIDI Sequencing

  • DSP Latency Checker Utility

    Is your computer with built in audio interface capable of handling home recording. This free tool will test to see if your computer setup has what it
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  • Aradaz Maximizer 5 VST Brickwall Limiter

    Today I decided to try out the Aradaz Maximizer, a VST Brickwall limiter, to see how it compared to the Waves L2. It appears that we have an exciting
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  • New Forum For AAMS Automatic Audio Mastering System

    The AAMS Automatic Audio Mastering System is loved by some, hated by others. My arm was twisted into creating a special forum for this controversial
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  • User Friendly Recording Software

    If you are looking for the easiest recording software, this article is for you.
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  • Sample Layering Snare Drums: My First Time With KT DrumTrigger

    KtDrumerTrigger and Battery drum sample layering bailed me out of a problem where EQ wasn't the answer. I'm very hesitant to go down the path of soun
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  • Toontrack Superior Drummer 2.0 Pre-Order Available

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  • Voiceover Microphone Shootout

    Here's a voiceover shootout with most of the microphones I own. I'm certainly no voiceover expert, but it's nice to be able to hear so many microphon
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  • Aradaz Amp 2 White vs Guitar Rig 2

    So how do the free VST guitar plugins stack up with a premium big boy? In this blog I review the Aradaz Amp2 White and compare it to Plexi and Recti
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Latest Recording Forum Posts
  • bleeding tracks...

    ah...you are on to something. How do I 'route' the send to the right place? kristina
    Posted in Introduce Yourself

  • mixing issues and blistered tissues...

    Things got immensely better at 45 secs. when you panned the synth instruments. Electric, did you listen past that point? I agree with the "carv
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  • Alesis Multimix 8 USB with cubase LE on mac os X

    Oh yea, just thought....are you opening up cubase before connecting the firewire cable?
    Posted in Cubase

  • Answering Machine Jingle

    I made this up to put on our home answering machine. It's in mono. Now, the problem is getting it to sound half-way passable on the machine.
    Posted in Bash This Recording

  • DFHS with Pro Tools

    As far as recording drum tracks, do I want to create an instrument track or a midi track? I'm going to be using the key-rig to trigger the samples and
    Posted in Pro Tools

  • When Did Hit Songs Become Garbage?

    ---Quote (Originally by drago)--- In fact, I would argue popstars of today like Kelly Clarkson, Justin Timberlake, Beyonce, and Kanye West are far mo
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  • Some metal stuff

    Just recorded this song (instruments only right now). Gear was: Snare Top - Audix i5>Focusrite Trak Master Snare Bottom - Sterling ST77>DMP3 Kick
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  • introduce myself

    ---Quote--- I can't seem you get any sound into the recording program and I see no modulation on the screen. ---End Quote--- Try this: Soundcard T
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  • Logic Express 8 or Logic pro audio

    I have LOGIC STUDIO PRO 8 and used Express too (both 7 and 8) - not a whole lotta differences. Pro comes with some extra HIGH-END stuff and a whole l
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  • hey!

    Welcome to the forum. Be sure to keep an eye out for my upcoming home recording book. Brandon
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Recording Reviews

Talking about recording is great. However, one thing the internet world is not so good at when it comes to helping people get better at audio engineering is the overemphasis of words. Without a doubt, the best way to get better at your recordings is have them reviewed by experts, peers, and everyone in between.

So, simply Join Recording Review today and post a new song / mix you are working. We'll give you real world advice to drastically improve your music recordings. I love the Recording Review section because it focuses on EXACTLY what the problems are on your mix. It's common for a beginner to say “I'm not happy with the way my mixes are turning out” and a typical, generic response is “Buy better preamps or better mics!”.

Well, that's a stupid way of solving a problem. There is no use guessing with thousands of dollars in equipment when the problem may be the way you are approaching your mix. Maybe you just need to move your studio monitors? Maybe you are recording substandard musicians? Recording Reviews is the fastest way to improve your recordings!