Tag: acoustic guitar

Dancing Barefoot (Patti Smith cover)

dancing barefoot studio session

Raw Studio Footage “Dancing Barefoot” (cover)
(no shredding here, only good old fashioned acoustic guitars 🙂 )

Yesterday someone I got to know trough Facebook, Herman, and I came together in my home studio to record the basic tracks for a set of cover songs we both like. Including this one, by Patti Smith’s “Dancing Barefoot”. Audio you hear is taken from the smartphone we used to record the video.

We also recorded Daniel Amos Band’s “Shotgun Angel” and U2’s “40”. All in one session! Drums, one guitar and vocal. Now it’s up to me to re-record the vocals and also add bass.

This song will have female vocals, to be recorded later. Making music with someone you’ve only known online for a few years can be a little tricky — but we had a lot of fun today and worked out very well!

That’s the basic idea of the ‘Solid Rock Blues Band’ concept. While it’s a one-man-band, I love to work with others to play and record music. We might be doing a few additional recordings in the future!

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New song release – Mountain High

Mountain High Song Release Solid Rock Blues Band

Mountain High (Valley Below) is an uptempo song, countryrock and bluesrock influenced, by the Solid Rock Blues Band project. Inspired by a short holiday trip to the Harz region in Germany.

While on holiday this song was written by Rudy and it took a few months before the melody and music were composed. After that was ready, recording and mixing the song was done in one day. Recorded, mixed and released on May 2, 2021 at The Loft Studio.

Video Mountain High

Audio only (Soundcloud)

More details about this recording

Recording
Drums – Digitech Trio
Bass – Harley Benton MM84ASB
Acoustic Guitars – Samick Greg Bennett (Electro Acoustic)
Electric Guitars – Ibanez AS53-TF Hollow Body
Vocal Mic – AKG C900 Condenser
Audio Interface – Behringer UMC404HD
DAW – Harrison Mixbus6

Video
Free stock video from https://www.pexels.com/nl-nl/videos/ and footage shot in the Harz region, Germany. Edited using Flowblade

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Pandemic Blues – Acoustic Home Recording

pandemic corona virus blues

There’s no way to escape from the coronavirus and the news about it these days. It inspired me to write a song, recorded in my living-room. Fear mongers and fake news aside, this is a critical situation we’re in. A pandemic that is sweeping over the world. It has spread and still is spreading like wildfire at the moment.

For all of you that have been hit hard by the corona crisis and those worried what’s going to happen next. This pandemic will change our lives for months, perhaps years or even decades to come. Stay strong! Don’t be overwhelmed by fear and please listen to those in charge: keep your social distance and if possible stay away from others as much as you can.

Acoustic session – Live from the livingroom.
Recorded using my Motorola Moto G7 smartphone
Edited with Flowblade (Linux Mint).
Guitar: Samick Greg Bennett.

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Acoustic Home Studio Sessions – Bob Marley’s Redemption Song

Bob Marley is of course a well known reggea singer and songwriter. I like many of his songs a lot, especially ‘Redemption Song’. So, while testing some improvements on my studio (video) I was playing it and decided I wanted to record it for the ‘Acoustic’ series.

For this track I used the following:

  • Guitar – Samick Greg Bennett GD-101 SCE/N
  • DI – Behringer Ultra-DI DI600P
  • Vocal Mic – MXL770
  • DAW – Harrison Mixbus5

I duplicated the guitar on two tracks to widen it more and put some reverb on the vocal. On the master bus I put a limiter. That’s all 🙂

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Acoustic Studio Sessions – In God’s Country

In God’s Country from the album The Joshua Tree is one of the best U2 songs, from one of their best albums ever. Since I’ve been a staunch U2 fan, ever since I heard them on the radio when I was around 12 years old, I love to play their songs. I hardly ever record them. This is an exception on this ‘rule’. It’s a perfect song for an acoustic version.

I shot the video during the recording. After I shot the video I noticed it could have been a little better but it’s the recording that matters the most of course.

RECORDING ACOUSTIC SONGS

Now many ‘singer songwriters’ whome record at home, record in one take. This is of course possible. The video suggests I did the same. And yes — I recorded vocals and guitar at the same time; the guitar trough a DI (Direct Input) and guitar and vocals on separate tracks. After that, I re-recorded the vocals on an additional track (as you can see in the video). The reason for this is simple: if you record vocals and guitars at the same time, the guitar sound will ‘bleed’ into the vocal track. It makes mixing it very difficult. So if you ever record acoustic guitar and vocals for a simple demo or album: make sure you can split them.

If you record an acoustic guitar that isn’t an electro-acoustic, don’t sing along! Your vocal will ‘bleed’ into the guitar track and if that happens, you can’t do overdubs on your vocal unless you re-record the guitar as well.

ABOUT THE RECORDING

About this recording:

– DAW Software: Mixbus5
– Guitar: Samick Greg Bennett GD-101
– Vocal Mic: MXL770
– DI (Guitar): Behringer
– Audio Interface: Behringer UMC404

Video:

– recorded with Sony Cybershot DSC-HX350
– Edited with OpenShot

The audio might (ormight not) become available in the future, for now I’m only publishing the acoustic series on Youtube.

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New Studio! Videotour of the new Home Recording Studio

The ZolderStudio (LoftStudio) has moved! As you might have noticed we were moving to a new location because we’ve bought a new house. Well, that is.. to us it’s new. But it was build around 1880. So it’s got a long history already. Anyway — we’ve started moving into the new house and rebuilding the studio.

After putting in the stuff we already had we’ve added a carpet, some new cables, additional acoustic treatment like DIY Acoustic Panels (see this video about the making and installation of the panels) and finally, yesterday, put in the foam acoustic panels on the walls.

The acoustic panels, btw, were very cheap to create. We paid less than 20 euro’s for them (hint: pre-made painters canvas). The acoustic foam was ordered online from Geek.

 DIY Budget Home Recording Studio

In essence, my home recording setup is a computer with a (Linux) DAW (Ardour, Mixbus5).

Recording at home shouldn’t have to be very expensive. Hook up a mic, trough an audio interface or use an USB condenser mic, and you’re ready to go. But once you get started with recording, there’s no turning back. So I bought a lot of addtional stuff over the years. Lot’s was also given to me as a gift, like the SoundTech ST162 16-channel mixer.

This really still is a budget home studio. Even though some people who visit me think it has cost a fortune to collect all this gear and to create it. There’s a lot of “DIY” stuff in the studio and, as written above, lot’s of stuff comes from very cheap, online, shops and stores in the Netherlands like the Action (there are many of them now all over Europe).

PICTURES & VIDEO

 

YouTube video (open in new window)

So, we’re “ready to rock” again!

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MXL770 Studio Condenser – Unboxing, Review and Testrecording

The MXL770 Studio Condenser is a very budget friendly yet high quality studio condenser microphone made by Marshall. It is a perfect microphone for those recording at home – it’s suitable for recording acoustic instruments like an acoustic guitar, as well as electric instruments and vocals.

So – I turned 50 the other day and my wife gave me a few very nice presents! One of them is this MXL770 studio condenser microphone. My favorite studio condenser, a McCrypt condenser microphone, is having issues after having been in use for over 20 years. So – time to replace it. This is a great replacement. In fact, I think it’s a very good upgrade. While the McCrypt was most certainly a great mic, this one is even better.

 

 

 

In the video there’s a test recording using my acoustic Washburn guitar and some vocal. Both are ‘dry sound’, no processing done. In the end of the video there’s a mixdown of the track I recorded.

The microphone was ordered online at Thomann (Germany).

 

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