A great guitar track is the result of many disparate items coming together. And while we can’t offer suggestions on writing a great song, here are some ideas to make your recording sessions trouble-free and musical. Some may seem self-evident, others may seem meaningless, but the combination of preparation and inspiration are essential.
1. Get the Guitar in Shape
This is one of the self-evident ones, but a surprising number of musicians show up for sessions with guitars that aren’t ready for prime time. Dead strings, bad intonation, and random buzzes don’t help in the quest for a great guitar track. Make sure that your instrument has a good setup, the intonation is properly set, the action is appropriate for your style of playing, the strings are new, and there are no mysterious hums, squeaks, or buzzes coming from the instrument. If you’re adept at such things, you can do it yourself, otherwise, consider a professional setup. A well set-up guitar sounds better and feels better — and that will help you to play better.
2. Check Everything Else
Make sure that everything works correctly — from cords to effects to amp. The studio isn’t a great place to have to track down weird noises, intermittent shorts, or broken stomp boxes. Make sure your guitar cables work. If you’ll be using battery-powered effects, make sure that fresh batteries are in place. If you’re using a pedalboard with a power supply, make sure that the power supply is working correctly. Check every connector cable as well — you’re likely to be plugging and unplugging various devices during the session, and you don’t need to be hunting for that one cable that shorts out when it’s moved. Don’t forget to check the amp, too — buzzes and hums that may seem minor (or be unnoticeable) when playing live can become huge problems under the microscope that is a recording session. So make sure that speakers aren’t blown, tubes are good, and everything is in top condition for the session.
3. Record a Direct Guitar Track
It may be that you won’t need or use it — but if you discover at mixing time that you chose the wrong amp sound or the wrong effects chain, you’ll have the opportunity to run the unaffected guitar through another amp or another set of effects. The direct track won’t be a life saver, but it can be a track saver!
4. Use The Room
The sound of your amp — and therefore, the recorded sound of the amp — is greatly affected by the room, especially in smaller spaces such as many home studios. Small rooms may require close miking the amp, as early reflections and standing waves can cause anomalies in the frequency response if the mic is placed in more distant positions. Of course, small rooms, complete with anomalies, can be the basis for some interesting miking techniques; try, for example, placing a second mic near the ceiling; depending on the room treatment (or lack thereof), you may achieve interesting results.
5. Get The Amp Off The Floor
When your amplifier is in physical contact with the floor, three things can happen: first, the amp can cause the floor to resonate, resulting in vibrations that interfere with the sound coming out of the amp. Second, if the amplifier mic is a bit distant from the speaker cone, sound coming from the amp can bounce off the floor before reflecting into the mic, causing comb filtering that can effect the sound. And finally, the cabinet coupling with the floor will enhance low frequencies, which can make the guitar sound muddy. When recording multiple guitar passes, this muddiness can make mixing a real chore. So getting the amp up a bit so that it isn’t in physical contact with the floor generally improves the recorded sound. Whether you use a commercially available isolation pad (Auralex and other companies make them) or use a chair, raising and isolating the amp will clean up a lot of low end problems.
6. The Microphone as an EQ
It’s worth noting that there’s no single “correct” microphone placement; even when close-miking a speaker, changing the mic placement can change the sound of the recorded guitar track. Place the microphone so that it’s pointing at the center of the speaker and you’ll get more low frequencies and high frequencies. As you move the microphone toward the edge of the speaker, the mid frequencies will become more dominant. Changing the direction the mic points will also have an effect; with the microphone midway between the center and the edge of the speaker, pointing the mic toward the center cone can bring out low-midrange frequencies, while pointing more towards the edge of the speaker can boost the upper midrange frequencies.
7. Choose Where To EQ
Besides using microphone placement to shape the tone of the guitar track, there are usually four other options for EQing. These include the tone controls on the guitar, the tone controls on the amp, the EQ on the mic preamp (when recording), and finally, EQing during the mix. In general terms, the earlier you change the tone, the more of a difference the tone change becomes. If, for example, you roll off the high end using the guitar tone knobs, you can’t get that high end back farther down the road. If you change the EQ at the amp, the resulting change affects the way that the guitar part fits into the mix. Less critical (but still important) is adding or subtracting EQ on the microphone preamp. Try to avoid boosting frequencies on the preamp if at all possible; mild reductions (especially mids and the low end) tend to be a better approach. Finally, EQing the guitar tracks at the mix stage allows you to do the final detail work in making the guitar track fit within the mix. But if everything else is done correctly, often only minor changes (or no EQ at all) are necessary during mixdown, other than for creative effect.
8. Stomp Box Logic
Pedalboards have become a common component of most guitarists’ signal path — and you may have built the perfect set of sounds for your live shows. But when you take that system into the studio, be willing to change it. Generally speaking, if you’re not using a specific effect on a track, it’s best to remove it completely from the effects chain, as it may be causing unwanted noise and degrading the sound of the guitar. When choosing the effects desired for a track, think creatively about the order in which the pedals can be used. Since you’ll likely be modifying your usual setup (to remove unused effects), try experimenting to see if changing the usual order of the pedals changes the sound for the better. It’s also a good idea to use the shortest connector cables possible — and, as mentioned earlier, check them before you head for the studio.
9. Watch The Reverb
Unless you’re playing in a surf band, consider minimizing (or eliminating) the amp’s built in reverb; while one reverb drenched guitar can sound very cool, once you start stacking multiple guitar passes, the reverbs will get pretty messy — and it’s hard to “un-reverb” a track once it’s recorded.
10. Have It Flow!
Remember that music — and recording music — is supposed to be fun. If you get a crazy idea that seems like it would add something important to the track, take a few minutes to see if it is important — or if it’s just crazy. You won’t know until you try.