My switch to Mac!

About 18 months ago I started to make a technical migration at home from Windows to Mac. It wasn’t that I was disappointed with my “Windows experience” nor was it that I simply wanted a nicer looking computer. The key thing that drove me to make the change was software. It wasn’t even the quality of the software that made me switch. It actually came down to the extortionate prices I was going to have to pay to upgrade my somewhat out of date recording studio software. Over the years I have spent a very large sum of money on licences and upgrades with Steinberg, both on Cubase and a large number of their plug-ins. After spending around five years not upgrading the software (mainly because I wasn’t using it) the price to upgrade Cubase and my various plug-ins was astronomical! (not to mention the number of plugins no longer have an upgrade paths or even a version that supported a current operating system). Before this I had never really considered purchasing a Macintosh computer.

Some investigation later I made my choice. I was going to buy an iMac and a copy of Logic pro. The reality was that the cost of the iMac plus Logic pro (effectively starting again from scratch) was less than buying similarly specified PC and upgrading the software I already owned. 18 months on I have to say that the switch to Mac and logic has been a success. While I know that many of the features found in logic can be found in other DAW packages I am very happy with what I have available to me in logic. Being absolutely honest it still crashes from time to time just like my PC did and there are some drawbacks to having FireWire and my external audio hard drive but overall I have been extremely pleased.

My setup now includes my iMac with an additional screen and external 2 TB hard drive for audio and an apogee duet interface. I have been very, very impressed with the results that are unable to achieve. My main problem there is finding somewhere quiet enough to record. I don’t think the finances or my wife’s patience will run the soundproofing the studio and I am currently in!

The only thing I really lack now it’s time so until somebody invents the endless day I reckon my setup is pretty much complete. I will probably try not to fall too far behind on upgrades   again  though ;)

    

Songwriting and music production

There's a lot more to recording a great song than simply clever or skilled production. While it is absolutely possible to take a fantastic song and make it sound terrible it is almost impossible to take a terrible song and make it sound great.

Songwriting and arranging a two very important skills for home producer. Music production relies heavily on the quality of the material that is being produced. There are many fantastic resources on the web and in print that can help you in writing that perfect song and arranging it in a interesting way.  One of my more recent purchases have been a number of books by Rikky Rooksby.  many of his books seem to focus on helping guitarists writes better songs  I can highly recommend The Songwriting Sourcebook: How to Turn Chords Into Great Songs  as it has helped me over the last 12 months.

 In addition to reading books or browsing the web there are many other resources that you could turn to. another of my favourites  is Songsalive. Songsalive  is a not-for-profit organisation originally started in Australia but now becoming more global with chapters across the US. They run workshops and provide online services dedicated to help struggling songwriter's. Check out their website to see if there is a chapter near you or maybe you could even consider starting your own.

The origins of a home recordist

I've been recording music at home for years. I started with Cubase version 3 on a PC that had substantially less processing power than my mobile phone does  now.  Initially  home recording from me was a way of producing demos for bands I was in for less money  than I was spending at professional recording studios. The reality is that I have probably now spent more money buying computers, mixers, microphones, monitors, software and software upgrades over the years than I would have likely spent on studio time. In fact I suspect using a reasonably priced well run professional project studio would have saved me money in the long run and likely produced demos of a higher quality. Even so I have absolutely no regrets. Yes maybe I could have paid my mortgage off a bit quicker but I have had a fantastic time produced tracks and I am very proud of and whenever I have an idea for a new song I can just pop into the spare room and start recording.

Over the years my home setup has gone through a number of incarnations. Starting out as a lowly 66 MHz PC, running  Cubase and through many upgrades to a large hybrid digital/analogue setup. Now I am once again back to a single computer, this time an iMac running everything natively.  I now do nearly all of my work in Logic Pro, which I switched to from Cubase just over a year ago but that is another story  for another post.

The massive explosion of computing power we've seen over the last 10 to 20 years has completely revolutionised the recording industry.  Not long ago the cost of setting up a half decent recording facility was astronomical, excluding all but the very wealthy and the professional studios run by record companies et al. These days for an investment of under $2000 you can put together an exceptionally capable system. Unfortunately what money cannot buy other skills and  ears  required to produce a great recording ( at least so far that is one thing that the power of computers has not made obsolete).