Here are three next steps for you to take:
1. Get our free video training & checklist, "Standout Mixes - The DIY Musician's Guide To Exciting Mixes That Stand Out And Connect":
theselfrecordingband.com/standoutmixes
-
2. Apply for The Self-Recording Syndicate, our personalized coaching program!
It all starts with a free clarity call where we talk about your music, give you feedback and a step-by-step roadmap that you can then implement on your own, or together with us.
Best case: We end up working together and completely transform the sound of your music forever.
Worst case: You get an hour of free coaching, feedback and recommendations for what to do next.
Sounds fair? Cool. Apply now and book your free clarity call:
theselfrecordingband.com/call
-
3. Join the free Facebook Group ("The Self-Recording Band Community"):
theselfrecordingband.com/community
--
Episode show notes:
Have you ever been looking forward to having to go through 637 takes, trying to find the good parts after the recording session is done? Me neither.
How to avoid that? Learn to comp on the fly and commit as you go!
On this episode we're discussing comping on the fly vs "comp diving" after tracking, the pros and cons of each, and the skills you need to be able to pull this off without risking anything or ruining the flow of the session.
Here's why this matters:
And here's how to do it:
Let's dive in!
--
For links to everything we've mentioned in this episode, as well as full show notes go to: https://theselfrecordingband.com/205
--
If you have any questions, feedback, topic ideas or want to suggest a guest, email us at: podcast@theselfrecordingband.com
Here are three next steps for you to take:
1. Get our free video training & checklist, "Standout Mixes - The DIY Musician's Guide To Exciting Mixes That Stand Out And Connect":
theselfrecordingband.com/standoutmixes
-
2. Apply for The Self-Recording Syndicate, our personalized coaching program!
It all starts with a free clarity call where we talk about your music, give you feedback and a step-by-step roadmap that you can then implement on your own, or together with us.
Best case: We end up working together and completely transform the sound of your music forever.
Worst case: You get an hour of free coaching, feedback and recommendations for what to do next.
Sounds fair? Cool. Apply now and book your free clarity call:
theselfrecordingband.com/call
-
3. Join the free Facebook Group ("The Self-Recording Band Community"):
theselfrecordingband.com/community
--
Episode show notes:
Have you ever been looking forward to having to go through 637 takes, trying to find the good parts after the recording session is done? Me neither.
How to avoid that? Learn to comp on the fly and commit as you go!
On this episode we're discussing comping on the fly vs "comp diving" after tracking, the pros and cons of each, and the skills you need to be able to pull this off without risking anything or ruining the flow of the session.
Here's why this matters:
And here's how to do it:
Let's dive in!
--
For links to everything we've mentioned in this episode, as well as full show notes go to: https://theselfrecordingband.com/205
--
If you have any questions, feedback, topic ideas or want to suggest a guest, email us at: podcast@theselfrecordingband.com
you're more likely to cut corners if you do it after the fact, in my opinion, versus paying attention to each take that's being recorded, making notes and doing it on the fly and we're going to get into how to actually do that but I think the end result in most cases if you know your way around the doll, of course, the end result will be better if you do at least some of it on the fly and not have to do all of it after the fact, because you just probably won't. Next is the Self Recording Band Podcast, the show where we help you make exciting records on your own wherever you are DIY style. Let's go. Hello and welcome to the Self Recording Band Podcast. I'm your host, benedikt Hein. If you're new to the show, welcome. This is where we help you make better recordings from your jam space or wherever you are basically. So you've come to the right place if you want to make better DIY recordings. If you are already a listener, welcome back. We really appreciate you.
Speaker 1:Today we're going to talk about something that was actually requested inside our coaching community, the Self Recording Syndicate, and we thought it's like a good podcast episode or Malcolm actually thought that and I agree. So we talk about comping on the fly, and this is a topic that we're going to explain what comping actually means, but it's like it's a really helpful thing that you should know about. It saves you time in the process of making a record. Later in the process, after tracking, it gives you a better idea of the final product. As you are tracking, it helps you move fast and it helps avoid getting too close that's what I'm trying to say and losing perspective, and it prevents recording unnecessary takes and wearing out the singers or performers, and it will ultimately lead to a better end result because you're not likely to cut corners in the process. So we're talking about that. It's basically picking and choosing the best takes while you're recording, doing some small edits as you go, instead of doing it all after the fact, and we're going to explain to you how to do that, go a little deeper on, like why that's worth it, and share some of the tools and techniques and skills you need in order to pull it off. So, as always, this episode is on YouTube and on your favorite podcast platforms like Spotify, apple Podcast, wherever you enjoy podcasts, and I'm doing this with my friend and co-host, malcolm Owen Flutt.
Speaker 1:Hello, malcolm, how are you? Hey, benny, I'm great man. How are you doing? I'm great. Great weekend, fantastic Snowboarding again with the kids. Oh, that's awesome. Yeah, really awesome. The first time they made it down the entire hill where we were snowboarding without falling. They didn't really do turns and stuff, they just stood up and went and that was like terrifying. But they made it all the way down and it was awesome.
Speaker 2:So, yeah, pretty cool, that's so fun. We actually had snow here as well, so let's ride. You had, yeah, let's go. Did you see? Yeah, go ahead.
Speaker 1:Yeah, I just wanted to say that I wanted to ask if there is actual snow, because Richie, who we both know, is also a member of our community and a long time listener. He lives close to you, or relatively close to you, on the same island at least, and he sent me pictures a while ago of snowy hills and stuff and it's hard for me to imagine that after being there. But yeah, right, yeah.
Speaker 2:You were here for the gorgeous summer, yeah.
Speaker 1:So actually I have snow right now, but it does get snowy All right, all right.
Speaker 2:Yeah, not much, honestly, not hindering us in any way, but there is some snow. It looks nice for sure. Awesome. Did you see the new Kemper?
Speaker 1:There's a new Kemper there's a, so the answer is no I should say Not a new Kemper.
Speaker 2:New Kemper is a loaded thing because it's not Kemper 2, but it's like a Kemper stomp. It's called the Kemper. Let me think what it's called. It's called the Kemper player. Oh yeah. Yeah, I know what you mean. Yeah, it's like a little tiny Kemper. It can't profile or anything, it just can hold the sounds. Yeah, but it looks rad. I don't want to sell my big Kemper because I don't think I'll ever be profiling at AMP again, honestly, so it just may as well have something for gigging and jamming. Yeah, I can't decide yet.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it looks pretty cool. I'm still like that transition was a little rough there. I thought it was something about snow and because you were so fast, then you transitioned to the Kemper so it took me a while to realize what you're asking.
Speaker 1:What has this Kemper to do with snow? But yeah, the Kemper is great and the new thing that they released yeah, I had a look at it and it sounds like a fun solution, for sure, if you already have the profiles, and I honestly think most people never really got into profiling themselves anyway. So I think Totally, yeah, that's totally fine.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think for 99% of people, just something that has good sounds you can load good sounds onto is going to be better, but it's so rather something like that's available now yeah. Guitar amps have gotten so good.
Speaker 1:Absolutely, absolutely, and it is. You still need an amp, though. Right, it's like a passive thing. It doesn't have a power amp or something.
Speaker 2:Does it no power amp yeah.
Speaker 1:Still so great, yeah, awesome. So what did you do that we can check this Kemper out, or what was your? I mean, I looked at it on the line and stuff like that, but no, I was just I actually went to.
Speaker 2:I hung out at the recording studio, though I did go down to SilverSide Sound down the road, which is a beautiful studio just next to me, and, yeah, we hung out there. There was a session going on. I was playing with a camera, though I wasn't recording. Yeah, it was another side of it this time. Yeah, but it was fun being back in the studio for a full band session, checking all that out.
Speaker 1:It was good All right, great, that sounds like fun. Yeah, I saw, actually I saw a live recording, a live video of a pretty cool punk emo band. What was their name? Poor Sport, poor Sports, is that a thing?
Speaker 2:Oh, yeah, yeah, yeah, poor.
Speaker 1:Sports, poor Sports yeah.
Speaker 2:Good band.
Speaker 1:I saw a live video that they did, I think, at SilverSide Sound, if I'm correct. I think it is.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I totally know what you're talking about. I saw that too. Yeah, that was pretty good. They're a great band. They're a great band.
Speaker 1:They're all around, great thing. I think Derek Madden, our friend, shared this Cool. I saw it and did was pretty cool, so shout out to that band in that studio.
Speaker 2:Going to put the link to that in the show notes. Yeah, poor Sports. They're a very tight band. They're good, yeah For sure.
Speaker 1:It's very much my thing. I instantly added it to my Spotify, to various Spotify playlists, because I really enjoyed them. Oh, awesome, I'll let them know. Yeah, yeah, do that, do that? Great, all right. So we're going to start recording stuff, or back to like the whole topic of recording and specifically comping this time. So we should probably start by telling people what comping actually is, because we don't expect you to know that and we're here to explain it. So what does?
Speaker 2:it do, yeah, yeah. So comping. Comping is the act of selecting the best bits of different performances, different takes, and making them into a super take. You're compiling the different performances into a performance that somebody can listen to then. So vocals are the most common example of when you would be doing some comping is you know, the person might sing the song from the back three times or something, or or the pen. You can go as granular as you want to start just doing section by section, and you probably will, but the ultimately you end up with all of these different performances and you have to go through and select, comp so what we call that, the performance together, and just choose the best sections and cut it all together so that nobody can tell it was cut together. But you end up with the best result you can from those performances. That is comping in a nutshell.
Speaker 1:It is Absolutely so, and there's two ways to do that. You can do that as you record, like during the session. You can record and at the same time pretty much pick the sections you want to keep and create your sort of master take that's going to be the final take. Or you can just record, take after take after take and then afterwards go through it and then piece together your final performance. Right, and if you, if in case, you're wondering like why would I even do that? Like isn't it the thing to just record a song, start to finish? Because I know that a lot of people think that's the way you do it and I understand why they think that it is totally common and normal to do it that way, to like, piece together the performance.
Speaker 1:This is not something bad or like a you know, it's not cheating or anything like that. Even the best performers in the world do that. If you can pull it off to just record one take, then awesome and for you. But you don't have to do it. It's totally fine to just focus on a verse or even just a part of it, even sometimes, you know, doing individual, like a few, a couple of few words or whatever it like so that's totally totally normal. Yeah, totally normal.
Speaker 1:I'm just saying because I know that a lot of people would be like yeah, why wouldn't I just sing the song start to finish or play the song start to finish?
Speaker 2:I'm glad you brought that up, because a lot of people do think, well, you just have to nail that kind of thing. And I mean, if you want to hold yourself to that, sure, but it doesn't help the result. In my opinion it actually even just as a musician knowing that, hey, if I screw up, I don't need to stop, I can just keep playing and we'll grab that little one bit that I messed up from a different take. That just is going to. Let me not get hung up on the details, that don't matter. So you can let off pressure from the band a lot.
Speaker 2:And another thing that I think some people maybe don't know is that you can totally comp live, like live band performances as well, like if you are tracking and there's bleed and stuff. You can still pull off comping. In those situations you can still comp, even if you aren't using a metronome. It's harder and not as successful, but you can still comp things together. In that format too, comping can be done pretty much in every format and well, digital audio workstations your DAW that you're using to record has made this a lot easier, and we're going to get into the how later. This has been happening since the days of tape as well. They were literally cutting and splicing tape together to make this happen. So it's like timeless tactic used by audio engineers and it's actually kind of a skill that makes somebody an audio engineer, because it is kind of something that separates somebody that's not from somebody that is is the ability to comp.
Speaker 1:Absolutely 100%. And yeah, let's go into like those two approaches and the pros and cons to each. I honestly don't think there's a lot of. Personally, you don't think there's a lot of pros to doing it after the fact, other than maybe it makes the actual session a little less stressful if you don't know what you're doing. So I can see that If you're not really you know, if it's not really intuitive for you to navigate the DAW and do all of that, you might not be able to focus on the performances and would rather do that and then do the comping after the fact. I can see that. But once you get to a certain level of skill using your DAW, I think there's more pros than cons to doing it on the fly actually, or to doing it least.
Speaker 1:you don't have to completely finish it, but to get it pretty far, at least on the fly.
Speaker 2:I think there's a lot of pros to that. I'm in the same camp and, just to make it simple for our listeners, there's the comping the fly, and then there's the comping after the fact, which I think Benny and I both refer to as comp diving. I can be wrong about that, but that's what I call it, comp diving, because you end up clicking like the button that reveals all of the different takes that you've done and it's just this huge accordion of takes nearly oh man, I got to listen to 36 of these to find the best one. Yeah, and it's overwhelming after a heavy day of overdubs. Yeah, and yeah, it can be a bit much.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but starting with the comp diving, which would be the doing it after the fact, the only pros that I can really think of are that you keep the momentum of the session going. You're like, okay, just play it again, Play it again. Okay, I think we're good, let's just move on, let's play the next part, whatever, whatever, whatever. You're playing as much as possible without any interruptions, ideally, yeah, that's kind of the pro. And can I think of one more? You don't have to do the comp under the pressure of the artists there. Like, there's a little bit of a, you might feel better about it if you're the one doing the comp. When you're doing it later alone, you know, yeah, you might kind of like kind of get into a vibe there and maybe be more confident making decisions without like other people over your shoulder. Maybe there's a pro there.
Speaker 2:But I think to both of those and those are honestly the only things I could try and argue for comp diving. Once you get good enough at comping on the fly, you kind of get both of those benefits back anyways, in my opinion, because once you get good at comping on the fly, it pretty much happens in real time. It doesn't slow you down and you are making the decisions kind of without telling the artist, because they're just singing the next part. They don't even know that you've already comped the parts before, and then when they walk out of the vocal booth, for example, you're just going to click play and be like check it out. You did it. Yeah, you know that's an ideal situation but like the yeah, well, there's. You could argue there's some pros for the comp diving and it's kind of like as soon as you get good at comping on the fly, they become evened out.
Speaker 1:Yes, 100% agreed.
Speaker 1:And one thing you said there in the beginning where you said like, okay, now I got these 36 tracks that I have to listen through.
Speaker 1:The reality is, if you're being honest, you probably won't do that. Most people won't listen to the entire thing. You will listen to a couple and then be like, well, let's just go with this one, because you know I can always fix it or whatever. I don't have the bandwidth to listen to all of these anyway, and so you might not even listen to the best take you know. And so you're more likely to cut corners if you do it after the fact, in my opinion, versus paying attention to each take that's being recorded, making notes and doing it on the fly and I'm going to we're going to get into how to actually do that, but I think the end result in most cases if you know your way around the doll, of course the end result will be better if you do at least some of it on the fly and not have to do all of it after the fact, because you just probably won't Absolutely.
Speaker 2:Yeah, absolutely yeah. Now, maybe pros for for comping on the fly is that when you are done, you know you're done, because you can actually listen to the comp and the singer can confidently be like okay, I'm, I don't have to worry about this anymore, I can crack a beer, I can start drinking milk again. Yeah, they weren't allowing themselves to do and and like or if, because vocals are the easy example. But let's say we're do comping drums on the fly. Now the drummer can strike their kit. So while you're just finishing the like you know, finishing up the comp or just doing a final polish on that, they can be striking their drums so that you're ready to move on to recording bass or whatever. You know like it's going to free up that time and you're going to have the confidence to be saying, no, we're done, let's move on to the next thing. You don't have to then be like, oh, we're not done, we have to set up that chain again, and never it never works. Yes, so that's a huge pro for comping on the fly.
Speaker 1:We're 100%. So also I think that the less time you have to spend with your raw recordings or with the with the yeah, the source tracks that you're recording, the better, because it keeps it. You know you're going to be very close to it anyways, and the more, the more you hear it, the more time you spend with it, the less objective you're going to be when it comes time to mix and or do any other things later. So I think it's not a good idea to even have to have that session after the fact, where you have to listen to it you know 50 times. It's way better to do it in the session and then, after when that's done, you can just move on to the next thing, like you just said, malcolm.
Speaker 1:So it's, it's. I think it keeps you fresh, helps avoid getting too close to it too early and then, yeah, and also it prevents like unnecessary takes. So sometimes you know if you're just recording and you're just guessing, then you might want to, you might make your singer do like three extra takes just to be safe, because you're not really sure if you got everything and if you can actually comp something together. So you say like let's do five more or whatever, and then we'll probably have enough, whereas if you pay attention, do it on the fly, check if it works, and then, if it works, just commit. You can be like you can confidently say, okay, that's it, we're done, and you might save, you know, a couple of takes. Actually wouldn't not wear the singer out, and so yeah absolutely yeah.
Speaker 2:For singers especially, I think, competent on the fly couldn't be more crucial because, while it seems more efficient just to keep rolling, take after take after take, you end up doing redundant takes that you didn't need to do Because you're like well, I, we did five of the intro, so we might as well do five of the verse. You know it's like well, they got it on the first one, why? Why, you can do it again, just just move on. And and that momentum of being like hey, you just nailed that, let's go to the course, like that gets you better takes, winning, letting the musician know that they're winning and crushing it is going to accelerate things even more Totally.
Speaker 1:Speaking of momentum, another pro is like it gives you a better idea of the final product. I think it's always so much fun during a session to to be like well, things are coming together, like I already hear the final thing, it's exciting, right, I don't hear to a bunch of like raw takes and every time I play I have to explain to everyone in the room well, this is not the final thing, we have to do this and that Like it's way cooler to be able to hit play and every time you do that, you hear something that is exciting and awesome, and every single take you add is like getting you closer to the final thing. That's a way better way of working in my opinion, and so I always like to have that. That's also the reason why I kind of mix on the fly, even though I might undo these decisions, but I always make the rough mix sound good as we go. Just just it's.
Speaker 1:It's so much more fun to have it close to the final thing, or, you know, and the more advanced you get, the more you commit. Like it's not these days if I drag something, I probably don't even mix that much in the DAW as I go, but I'll just commit the source tones, I'll just record through whatever I think is necessary and capture great sounding stuff because I have the confidence to do so. But I just think in general, if you can after recording, if the person comes back to the control room and you hit play and it sounds close to finished, it's an awesome feeling and everyone's going to be more excited about the record 100%.
Speaker 2:Yeah, I think it was Chris Lord algae, who's probably the most famous mixer ever. Told his brother, tom Lord algae, when he gave him a job yeah, kind of a big break, I think, with like green day or something crazy that he like he was like no big deal. It's really easy. But every time you click play it should sound like the finished record, something along the signs, paraphrasing for sure, but. But it's kind of like, totally true, it's just like why would it not sound right when you play it back? So there's no reason to have a vocal line in there that you don't know is good, like it's just going to distract the singers, just going to start hating it and be stressed out that it all sounds like that. So you kind of actually have to be really careful, in my opinion, to only play stuff that sounds good.
Speaker 1:Yeah, that's another thing too. Well, I didn't even think of that. But you're totally right. Sometimes if there is a certain thing that you keep playing back that annoys the performer, even if you fix it later, they might still hear that, just because they heard it so often and got used to it, or the fear is there that it still might be there somewhere. So, yeah, don't make them get used to the mistakes. They play them back stuff that they enjoy.
Speaker 2:Yeah, that's going to come up again in the house.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Thoughts on that for sure. Cool, that's definitely a really good point.
Speaker 1:Great yeah, let's get to that actually, so what is required to pull?
Speaker 2:that off.
Speaker 1:I think the first thing is, as we said a couple of times now, know your basic editing tools and shortcuts to use all those tools in your DAW. So this is really just a few things. So all the DAWs differ a little bit there how you actually do it. But the few things you always need is you got to have something like scissors, a way to cut the event, the audio track, whatever. You have to know how to do that quickly.
Speaker 1:You have to know how to move events or just call them events now they're called differently in different DAWs like the clips or whatever you want to call them stuff with the waveform in it. You have to know how to move that back and forth or snap it to the grid, move it without snapping these types of things. And then you have to know how to piece it back together apply fades. That's basically it, like cut, move, put together, add a fade that it doesn't do any clicks and stuff. And those are the things you need to know how to do and you need to know how to do it very quickly, ideally without even having to look at your keyboard, just doing it.
Speaker 2:Yeah, agreed. Yeah, it does take a certain amount of skill with your DAW. You should have a pretty good grasp on it, like you said, know the basic editing tools, but then also know your hotkeys, because if it takes you three minutes to slide a vocal take up to your comp track, that's slowing you down too much, and then you should probably do it after the fact because you're just not able to comp on the fly. Yeah, totally, but yeah, okay, no, keep going, that big buck can wait.
Speaker 1:Okay, well, yeah, the other thing is the actual comping feature. So what I mean by that is, depending on which DAW you're using. If you're using any of the major ones, the full versions like Pro Tools, cubase, logic, reaper all of these have a comping feature. Reaper, I think, just added it not too long ago because people got all excited and it was one of those things where I'm like, yeah, cubase has been doing that for a decade, but anyway, it's like instead of having to record on multiple tracks and then moving it all to like that one master comp track that you just said, malcolm, there is a comping feature built into these DAWs where you record on the same track over and over again and it creates these invisible layers underneath what you're seeing and you can either collapse that or open that up. And then you have in Pro Tools, I think it's called a playlist, if I'm not wrong and then in Cubase they call it sub tracks or something I don't even know what they call it, but like there's a button, you click it and then it expands the track and then you see all those takes underneath each other and like all lined up.
Speaker 1:So you can even do a loop recording and it will just add take after take after take, and then you can just mark certain sections of each take and it will automatically appear.
Speaker 1:Those mark tracks will automatically appear at the top on the actual like sort of master track, whatever you want to call that and you can create your comp easily by just you know, just like grabbing a marker, marking the sections that you like, and they will appear at the top.
Speaker 1:And you can even set it so that it automatically adds fades in the background and you can quickly comp your track together like that, with the comping feature. So with that you don't have to have multiple tracks, you can do it all on one track, select the sections you like and then, once you have your comp and you listen through it and you like it the way it is, you can commit and get rid of all the junk basically. So that's the comping feature, and it pretty much works the same way in all these stars. If you don't have that feature because you're on a light version or a different dog that doesn't have that, there's still a way to pull it off, though, and I think you have actually a workflow, malcolm, where it's kind of in between right. You have that manual comp track, if I remember correctly, despite having the playlist. So you might want to explain how you do it, because I always just use the comping feature in Cubase.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, totally, and there's no wrong answer here. It's just kind of figure out the workflow that works for you, and every once in a while I'll do I do change it based on the client I'm working with or the instrument I'm working with. So what I like to do? Well, first you described the comp feature and then, yeah, the alternative. I just want to kind of give a brief overview of what that really actually looks like.
Speaker 2:So people grasp both, and manually doing like a comp on the fly is just having like an empty track. And then you're going through the different takes you did, still using that playlist view that Benny just described, but then finding, like the section you want, command C for copy, go up, click on that same spot, you know, not moving the alignment of your cursor and the timing of the session on that blank track and then pasting it there. And then you're just going to copy and paste and build it that way. That's kind of like the manual approach, whereas Benny's approach. You just highlight it and it appears up on there. It's just kind of done for you. It, depending on the daughter, might be like a hotkey or a buddy and you have to press, but it just kind of like shoots it all up there and you can just while you're in that playlist view you can audition each take if you need to refresh.
Speaker 2:But but yeah, those are kind of like the two comp on the fly methods and I like to have that empty track like a separate audio file or a separate audio track, I should say, floating above the track that I'm recording on. I call it like a tracking track and then like a comp track and the reason I like that is because I can. I can kind of. I mean there's multiple reasons. Sometimes I'll have different monitoring, like effects on the comp track.
Speaker 2:So because the singer only wants to hear stuff like certain, like it doesn't want any effects or something on like their track, what they're monitoring, but when we listen back we want to hear it cut in there.
Speaker 2:It also makes pre and post role really easy, because that comp track that I'm copying the good stuff onto has all the good stuff.
Speaker 2:So they hear and they're singing along with the stuff that they just nailed and then it punches in onto this other track and you can also do that on the like with Benny's method to. This just kind of works really easily in in Pro Tools. But another thing I like about this method is that I can repeat that comp track and I can copy up like second best takes, yeah, and third best takes, you know, and then I have this little like quick audition. So the singer is like oh, I don't like the one you chose there. I'm like no, no problem, I just mute that clip and go to the track above it and unmute it and it's like there was my second choice ready to play and it all is kind of seamless like that. And then if they like it, I'll just drag it down onto the next one. So you can see how there's like so many different ways you could do this. But like I use this method most when I know that I want to have options available, I guess.
Speaker 1:Yeah, you're totally right.
Speaker 1:And now that you say that I actually do variations of that as well, depending on the situation.
Speaker 1:So what I, for example, what I like to do, is, even if I don't record onto a separate track, what I sometimes do is I record on my one sort of comp track but I will duplicate it and not record on the duplicate but arm the monitoring like on the turn on the monitoring on the duplicate, and so they will listen to that duplicate thing, but it's recorded to different track, which allows me to do the overlap thing that you just said, where you hear the previous section, without me having to create the punch endpoints and stuff like that.
Speaker 1:You know it's very easy to just, and also I don't have to mute and unmute that thing all the time. It's just one monitor track that's on all the time and the other one is just not on, and that way I don't have to switch back and forth. So that alone is worth it often. And so, yeah, I do variations of that as well, and you'll figure out your own work for a float, I think, once you get you wrap your head around this, absolutely yeah, and different instruments will have different preferences for you as well.
Speaker 2:Yeah, like drums. I don't do this because you don't want to have like another like 18 tracks. Yeah, empty like that. I got to copy onto all this comp, you know, using Benny's described method of using the comp features. That's the quickest way for that. But for guitars I like the comping track thing and vocals I tend to as well.
Speaker 1:Good thing though you brought up the drums, because one thing we absolutely need to mention is, whenever you're doing comping with multi-track recordings could be multiple mics on a guitar amp or full drum kit Make sure, before you start recording or comping or anything that you group those tracks together and you lock the. There's a different feature, probably in different DOS, but you have to lock the phase relationships between those tracks and make sure that when you apply, when you do a comp, that it applies it exactly the same way to all of those tracks. So in Cubase, for example, if you don't hit that button and you start to make a comp and you accidentally don't highlight one of the tracks, then you might comp you know, 15 out of the 16, but one you're going to miss, and then you're going to create a mess and it all will just never work again. So you have to make sure that the phase relationship stays the same and that whatever you do to one track will also automatically be applied to all the others. That is an absolute must.
Speaker 2:Well, there's that related instrument. Yeah, definitely, 100% necessary. Yes, yes, good, good point. And yeah, you'll have to look into your own DAW for how that works. Yeah, it's just handled differently between them. Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2:Now, one thing that's really important is that you keep track of your takes outside of the DAWs. Well, at least I think this is really important. So what I mean by that is that you're taking notes. Essentially, that's really what it boils down to. If you've got an amazing vault of a memory and you can do it that way, that works, I guess. But I like a pen and paper to go through it with and that is just me taking notes of which parts of the performance I like.
Speaker 2:So if they're doing like a front to like a start to finish performance of the vocals, let's just pretend I'll be like verse one, zero three. That's like take three, you know, and then circle. That I've got like a whole little matrix and nobody else would ever be able to understand. But it makes sense to me for how I can like, because you don't have time to be like. Oh, when they said that word it was quite good. You just have to like, have like, because it's in real time. So I'm like three circle, three, circle, star, and like I have that, and then I can look at this and just be like okay, take three was good here.
Speaker 2:The next line was take four, and then I can piece it all together that way and that's going to let you both like because we're comping on the fly. That's the idea. Definitely do this. If you're not comping on the fly, definitely definitely do this, because you don't want to listen to all 18 takes. You just want to listen to number three and four, the ones that had got circled, you know, or like, whatever your system is. But if you're comping on the fly, this is still valuable. Because what if you play it back and then the singer is like oh, I really don't like, like, like the line there, and you're like okay, well, that's okay, I also circled number four. So I'm going to pull them to take four now instead of three, which was in there, and then you you know that that one's going to be pretty good as well and then you don't have to like, be like okay, let's start at the beginning. Here's your first take. Oh, that was bad.
Speaker 1:Still pretty bad and you know, like it, I could like that for years before I figured that out, man. That was exactly how I communicated with singers in the first five years of my career. Whatever which is so terrible.
Speaker 2:Yeah, so yeah, it speeds up both of your the time for everyone just knowing which takes were good and having those backup options available. Right, so that's, that's a no brainer. Still have some kind of way of keeping track of what is good and what is not good, so that you can make your life easier if you have to do more comping after the fact or if somebody requests to change from what you went with. Yeah, totally.
Speaker 1:Also, like we said, avoid playing the bad stuff back to them too many times, which means I would also make and I don't know if you do that too, but I would also make notes of the takes that are absolutely not going to cut it. So there's a mistake, they're saying the wrong word or something was just clearly off. I will be like oh, that's definitely not it, and I will get rid of it as fast as I can, just because I don't want to play back that stuff over and over again or accidentally listen to it.
Speaker 2:If I clearly know it's trash right. And so yeah, yeah, I, I, I didn't do that. I wish I did. That's a really good note. I should have just like X'd it on my, my notes, kind of thing. But what I would do I try to do, and I don't think I was strict enough about that is just undo the recording, just be like, no, that one didn't happen, and then I can't listen to it again. But the trouble with that is that sometimes there is good within the bad.
Speaker 2:So it's all good until they screwed up the word. You know you don't want to lose that that might have, that might save you, so your method is a really good idea.
Speaker 1:Yeah, yeah, so, exactly. So I want to keep it, but I want to mark it as like not good and if we really can find something awesome in the other takes, I can still go back to that bat take and find a good thing, or whatever you like. Or they might tell me hey, I really liked how I sang this one part here and even if I marked it as the bat take, I can still go in and grab that one clip that they really enjoyed or something you know. So, but, yeah, make notes. It's absolutely critical and especially if you, if you're not at the point where you feel like you can do it on the fly, if you do it afterwards, definitely make notes so you don't have to go through everything, but you have like a selection that you can start with. And then, yeah, just for obvious reasons, Great, yeah, good, I will.
Speaker 1:I also think there is a sort of a hybrid approach. If you're not fast or in, or you know fast enough, skilled enough to do it while the person's in the room, you can maybe just focus on the performance fully, make notes as they go, record a bunch of takes, and then they will gonna need they're gonna need breaks anyway in between, and so there will be time probably in between, takes in between, whatever that you can use to then quickly look at your notes, do a bit of comping until they come back, and then you at least did it in the session, not necessarily as you're going, but sometime in the session. You don't have to do it afterwards and you're still making progress. So of course you need breaks as well, but probably the singer, whoever's playing, they will need breaks more frequently and then you can use these.
Speaker 1:You know, when they go to the bathroom maybe you can quickly choose a couple of lines and then you have made progress and so you don't have to do it at the same time. If that helps, that's kind of a hybrid thing. I would do both. I would do a lot of things as we go just because I can do it, but then also, if they need a break or whatever, I will still improve it even more, just to make progress and to move on.
Speaker 2:Yeah, totally Like guitars and bass attract 100% as I go, all right, comp 100% as I go. Like by the time we move on to the next part, the last one's already edited, pretty much like close to like. It's kind of like it's easy, it's really easy to do those in bite sized chunks. So it's like okay, that's done, move on. Vocals is harder though, because, like it is way more dynamic. Sometimes the comps might not go well together because of those dynamic changes and tonal changes of the singer. So that can be tricky.
Speaker 2:The words can be attached to each other. So it's not as simple as just saying hey, you said that word nice on this one, but the next word is good or was bad. Let's just combine those two, because if they're attached, like if the words blend into each other, you might not be able to take those and shove them together without it sounding like an edit. So it's not totally as easy to comp on the fly to its entirety, but you can still get the rough chunks put in. So, okay, this was overall the best. First stance of the first verse and then the second stance of the first verse and get that rough comp done on the fly. And then, after you finished vocals, you're like all right, go have a drink of water and relax on the couch outside. Okay, now I'm going to dive in and be like, okay, that word I got to. Go to the other you know, highlighted best takes and see if we got that word better on that comp and do a tighter comp from there.
Speaker 1:For sure. Yeah, 100%. And also having notes helps there, because what you also don't want to do is with them. You don't want to with them in the room, you don't want to spend too much time trial and error, without trial and error things and like listen to a bunch of takes and you want to be fast and efficient and you want to make them feel good and if they have to sit through you, you know going through all these things and taking an hour to do some minor edits, that's not the way to do it. So you have to be fast, you have to have notes and you can do it while they take a break, but it should also don't take forever and make them insecure about the performance.
Speaker 2:So absolutely, yeah, yeah, really good, no cool. Is there anything you don't comp on the fly?
Speaker 1:Not really, I think honestly Not really. I mean there is. With drums it takes a little longer, just because of the amount of tracks and then also all the stuff that I listen to. So with drums I listen to various things. I can only focus on so much. So with drums I might listen to how consistent the kick is, how consistent the snare is, the overall timing and feel, of course, if there's any sort of flams in between, certain things that I can't really fix afterwards, like all kinds of things, and I have to watch all these levels. There's just so much to monitor and to do while doing drums that I usually just listen and look at the screen while they play. But I will still make notes and then I will. I can pretty quickly, once the take is done, open up all those lanes, pick a section, move it up or whatever, and I still kind of do it. But it's a little slower than just having one thing to focus on for me.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, drums are the only one that's really different for me too, drums. In general, I mean, I'm more in rock than metal, so it's less exact than metal is. Often there's a lot of changes being made. We're experimenting with parts, so we're looking at drums as a whole, start to finish performance usually for me, rather than something we punch in, which I punch in every other instrument pretty heavily.
Speaker 2:With drums it's kind of like if I got a good studio drummer, we're going to play the whole song through. We're going to tweak the parts a little bit if we need to, and then we're going to play the whole song through like three or four times and then that's all I'm going to need. And well, I'll definitely make notes as that's playing. Be like, okay, you nailed the verse here, nailed the chorus here, and then it's like you know, four edits later that's the comp. You know just like chunk, chunk, chunk, and we're probably done. Yes, but I'm doing that after the fact, after we've played it like four times pretty much. So I guess drums are the only one that I comp dive on, but because I'm working with such a good session drummer, it's like not a lot of tracks, yeah, totally.
Speaker 1:And also the thing is with most other things maybe with the exception of vocals, but guitars, as you said, and a few other things once the comping is done, the editing is almost also done, assuming that you have good drum tracks to play to that have been edited before you add the other instruments, which is highly recommended. And so for those things like yeah, when the recording is done, the comping is done, then the editing is pretty much also done. With drums, it's like there's going to be a comp and it's going to be great, but there's going to be some more detailed editing after the fact. Just because I want to really make sure that the groove is tight, I might have to quantize things, I might have to fix a fill here and there. There's just so many transients, so many hits, so many things to fix that, and it's the foundation for everything else that there's always this extra step required anyways. So that's why the drum comp doesn't have to be perfect right away. I just need to know that it's good enough so that I can edit it without artifacts.
Speaker 1:That's the one thing I look for with drums. It's like with a good drummer you don't have that problem really. But the reality is with many, many drummers you have to make sure that they are close enough that if you have to move a hit or if you have to fix a fill or whatever, that it's close enough that you can do it without an artifact. And you just know with experience that there are certain things you can't really fix. For example, if a kick and a snare are happening at the same time but there's a slight flam that you don't want very hard to fix. That oftentimes. But if the thing is together but both are pretty late, that's fixable. So there's certain things that I just listen for with drums and I just know what can and can't be done, but I don't necessarily do it all as I go.
Speaker 2:Isn't it funny that the four on the floor is like the hardest beats to fix. It's the simplest thing and it's so overdone, but for drummers to nail that it's so rare I had so many people tell me over the course of my career.
Speaker 1:I don't know what people would tell me. I don't know why everyone's raving about AC-DC, drums or whatever. It's the simplest thing in the world, everyone can play that. And I'm like go sit down and try to play back in black like that. No way you can pull that off.
Speaker 2:And then zoom in on how unaligned your kick and snare are.
Speaker 1:Yeah, it's like it's so hard to pull that off in a really great way. Yeah, totally, I feel like the longer, the more time you have in between hits, the harder it is to get right. Like, if it's just very busy, you just can't tell some of the detail, but if there's enough room, it gets harder and harder to really nail that. Absolutely, 100% agree.
Speaker 2:But yeah, it comes with experience. A lot of this comes with experience. Actually, you gain this intuition on what you can and can't fix and how to handle the momentum of the artist in front of you as well. So adjusting your comping to suit who you're working with is another thing that will become intuitive as you develop the skills to do it as well.
Speaker 1:Totally. And one more skill I have on my list here that I think is really critical this is to learn. You need to learn how to listen for the right thing. So I'd say, when I'm comping and when I make decisions of what's going to stay and what's going to be cut out, I listen for feel and emotion, especially with vocals, more than I listen for technical perfection. So there are some exceptions. So let's say, guitar tuning, it's got to be right. Right, because it's so hard or almost impossible to fix. So with guitars I very much listen for perfection in terms of tuning, maybe not in terms of timing, but definitely in terms of tuning.
Speaker 1:With vocals it's different. With vocals I listen to, does that feel right, does it have the right vibe? And like, yeah, it's hard to describe in words, it's just you know when it's right and you know when it's not. And it's not the intonation, it's not the timing, because that stuff can be easily fixed if it's not too far off, right. But sometimes I have a take that's perfect theoretically, where like the timing spot on, the intonation spot on, but it just doesn't speak to me. And then there might be another take where something about it is just exactly right and it gives me goosebumps, but it might not be perfect. So you have to learn to listen for those things and then pick the take that feels better and if it's like slightly off, you can always fix that. So that's a thing you need to learn, I think, how to listen for those things, especially with vocals, absolutely.
Speaker 2:Yeah, yeah, that's great, great. Note this video or, sorry, this podcast.
Speaker 1:It is a video.
Speaker 2:Yeah, it is a video, you can watch it. But what I'm saying is that, well, we can describe what comping is and good approaches to it to then implement it, like there's an extra step for this podcast and, as you, actually learning how to do it in your own DAW, because it is different in each DAW. So there's a, you know requires a deeper look, yeah, and if you're not understanding us at all, it's worth looking up because this might change how much you hate recording. That's a good way to put it.
Speaker 2:Because if, like it's so, front like oh man, I just had no idea you could even playlist tapes for the longest time. When I started with Pro Tools and know just like every time I wanted to try again, I had to like make a new track, and then I just ended up with like a hundred tracks of one guitar filling up my whole screen and I didn't know where anything was a terrible. So so worth learning this skill. Yeah, it's, it'll really clean things up for you.
Speaker 1:Man, absolutely Like. I have a couple of sessions that are 15, almost, yeah, 15 years, almost 20 years old at this point, that I still have on hard drives in Logic and in Cubase of songs that I really enjoy, some of my old bands, some of my friends' bands that I always had on my someday maybe list to remix or whatever, just because I love these songs. But the reason why I didn't do it aside from, like not having really the time to do it, but another big reason actually is that I just don't want to open up these sessions, because I know how I recorded them back then and they are such a mess. It takes all over the place no playlists, no comping Totally, and just if somebody would go through that, prep it for me and I could just mix, that would be awesome. But like having to do that first step, that is what keeps me from actually doing it. So so that is why, please, I don't want you to be in the same situation a couple of years from now. Like, don't sabotage yourself, be your future self's best friend and like track everything properly, do comping on the fly, because then, even if you decide to open up a session months or years later it's still going to make sense to you and the essence is going to be there, the takes are going to be there and, yeah, I wish I knew that 15 years ago. So, yeah, 100% great note, yeah, cool, I think that's it. On that note, malcolm, you said like I'm hearing it and then seeing it applied or applying it yourself, for two different things. This is one of the reasons why I highly recommend you apply for the self recording syndicate.
Speaker 1:By the way, our coaching program because we can show you how to do that. We actually do that inside the coaching program. So one of our students actually suggested this as an action plan. We call them action plans in the coaching. So he suggested comping on the fly as a topic for an action plan and now we created this episode.
Speaker 1:But there will be an action plan as well, with videos showing you how to do those things that we just talked about. And then, of course, we do sessions with our students where we walk them through it and show them, show it to them in there at all and all those things. So if you want to learn more about this and how to actually do it without having to figure it out on your own, go to the self recording bandcom and just apply for our coaching program. We've passed registrations for now if you're listening to this, in January or early February, but very soon the doors will be open again, once we changed a few things to the program and then you can get in again and actually learn how to do all this.
Speaker 2:Yeah, and one more thing I want to point out is that Benny, like a crazy person, is committed to being able to teach in any DAW.
Speaker 1:Yes, that's true.
Speaker 2:I don't under. I still can't wrap my head around.
Speaker 1:But Not just me, to be fair Me and a couple of people helping me, but we do it, yeah.
Speaker 2:Yeah, but, but he's going to meet you where you are. So if you're not using like Benny's, like like you, base whiz, but if you're not using that, he's still going to be able to help you, which is amazing, absolutely. Yeah, you're probably like the only place that does that. Only education option. I think. I honestly think so.
Speaker 1:There's many things I think that only we do, like the whole, the whole one on one attention that we give, and like the yeah, definitely thing with the DAWs I don't know if any other program that does this so very proud of that and then, yeah, just apply for it. It's awesome, great. Final note here before we wrap this up I'm going to be at NAMM in a couple of days actually. So 10 days from now, like almost two, like about two weeks from now, namm is happening and 10 days from now I'm going to fly to From recording.
Speaker 1:Yeah, Sorry from recording. Yeah, About a week from. Yeah, A week from after. Like when does this episode?
Speaker 2:come out.
Speaker 1:This is posted, this episode comes out like Wednesday. So, yeah, a week from now, if you listen to this, right on Wednesday, I'm already going to be in the US, actually, or I'm going to, just I will probably have just arrived or whatever and then I'm going to be in LA for about a week, go to the NAMM show, and I have a couple of days before and after NAMM. So if you are at the NAMM show or if you are in the LA area, please let me know. I'd love to connect, I'd love to meet, I'd love to have lunch or whatever. So I haven't been there before.
Speaker 1:I have met our listeners in Canada, like in Vancouver Island. I have met our listeners in a couple of places in Germany and Europe, but I haven't met them Any of you in California or LA. So I'd love to do that, I'd love to meet up, I'd love to connect and let me know if you are there, and I can't wait to do this. This is going to be great and, obviously, if you're at NAMM or if you are part of a company or someone who is there for work reasons, let me know as well. I'm going to just love to talk to as many people as possible there and make some connections, so feel free to reach out. I'm going to be there all the time. It's going to be very exhausting, but also exciting, and I'm looking forward to that.
Speaker 2:Yeah, man, that's going to be so fun. Have a blast. And I did see that there's a couple friends of the podcast I know. John McLucas is going to be there, christian Colet is going to be there. That'll be a good crew. For sure, warren, definitely will be there as well. I think, yeah, warren will be there. Yeah, wish I could make it for sure.
Speaker 1:Yeah. Yeah, that's the bummer that you can't make it, malcolm, but I'll do my best to represent the Suffering Band. Yes, next year. Awesome, man, cool. Thank you for listening, as always, let us know. If you have any questions, comment below. If you're watching on YouTube, leave us a review. All the things you could do to help us reach more people would be very appreciated, very much appreciated, and talk to you next week. Bye-bye, adios, bye, bye.