Recording budgets, Session planning, Time management etc...

Plec · 27th August 2006

Imagine sitting there doing a mix, tracking vocals, editing drums or whatever.. and you get this nasty feeling in your stomach telling you that "ok, so this is not where I intend it to be yet... but we got to be done now to stay on budget".

We've all been there quite a few times... right?

I read a post at the Bruce Swedien Q&A about him doing the thriller mix. When Bruce thought he was done, Quincy whips out this cassette with his rough mix on it and ... well... Bruce had to start over. Bruce states that it's a big difference between being DONE and being SATISFIED.

My question is.. is being satisfied a luxury only available to the big names in the industry? I mean, read stories about Mutt Lange for example. DONE? Yeah right... I even read somewhere that if the label wasn't going to put out the dough he required to be SATISFIED with a project he would take it out of his own pocket.

I work mostly on albums that sell 5000-15000 (quite a contrast) and the odd one that might sell a lot more. My average budget I have to work with when I produce a 10 track album or so is somewhere around 12 000$. In my world this usually ends up with 5 days doing drums, 3 days doing guitars, 2 days doing bass, 4 days doing vocals, 4 days to do other stuff and 5 days for mixing. There are no margins whatsoever, working your azz off to make it as good as it can be, but only to end up being DONE and saying "well, it sounds really good when you consider the budget we had to work with". Being SATISFIED with a project, for me, would mean having the time to maybe re-do some basstracks, take a week and do some drum editing, some additional days to try out some new production ideas that came along during recording etc... all this "margin of error" that would in the end make me feel a lot more SATISFIED with a project would easily double or triple the inital recording costs.

When being asked to produce an album for a band, I'd love to tell the label "Well, it will be finished when it's finished, and it will cost you what it took to finish it."

Basically, all you slutz out there.. how do you go about handling this?

espasonico · 27th August 2006

A good band is easier to record. Pre-production it´s also very important. If you have this couple of things, in a couple of days or three you can get the basic tracks recorded.

What I thing is very important is to know what you will have to do, that is why I find pre-production very important. I need to know how good or bad the band plays, how good the singer is, etc otherwise you get really bad surprises when you meet a band where you have to beat-detective the drummer, edit the bass player, spend 2 hours for a guitar part, auto-tune vocals and etc... If you know that stuff before you start, you can make a better planning.

27th August 2006	#1
Plec Gear maniac Joined: Apr 2004 Location: Sweden Posts: 151 Thread Starter	Recording budgets, Session planning, Time management etc... Imagine sitting there doing a mix, tracking vocals, editing drums or whatever.. and you get this nasty feeling in your stomach telling you that "ok, so this is not where I intend it to be yet... but we got to be done now to stay on budget". We've all been there quite a few times... right? I read a post at the Bruce Swedien Q&A about him doing the thriller mix. When Bruce thought he was done, Quincy whips out this cassette with his rough mix on it and ... well... Bruce had to start over. Bruce states that it's a big difference between being DONE and being SATISFIED. My question is.. is being satisfied a luxury only available to the big names in the industry? I mean, read stories about Mutt Lange for example. DONE? Yeah right... I even read somewhere that if the label wasn't going to put out the dough he required to be SATISFIED with a project he would take it out of his own pocket. I work mostly on albums that sell 5000-15000 (quite a contrast) and the odd one that might sell a lot more. My average budget I have to work with when I produce a 10 track album or so is somewhere around 12 000$. In my world this usually ends up with 5 days doing drums, 3 days doing guitars, 2 days doing bass, 4 days doing vocals, 4 days to do other stuff and 5 days for mixing. There are no margins whatsoever, working your azz off to make it as good as it can be, but only to end up being DONE and saying "well, it sounds really good when you consider the budget we had to work with". Being SATISFIED with a project, for me, would mean having the time to maybe re-do some basstracks, take a week and do some drum editing, some additional days to try out some new production ideas that came along during recording etc... all this "margin of error" that would in the end make me feel a lot more SATISFIED with a project would easily double or triple the inital recording costs. When being asked to produce an album for a band, I'd love to tell the label "Well, it will be finished when it's finished, and it will cost you what it took to finish it." Basically, all you slutz out there.. how do you go about handling this? __________________ Keep It Heavy! Sound=Distorsion=Music

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27th August 2006	#2
espasonico Lives for gear Joined: Jan 2005 Posts: 663	A good band is easier to record. Pre-production it´s also very important. If you have this couple of things, in a couple of days or three you can get the basic tracks recorded. What I thing is very important is to know what you will have to do, that is why I find pre-production very important. I need to know how good or bad the band plays, how good the singer is, etc otherwise you get really bad surprises when you meet a band where you have to beat-detective the drummer, edit the bass player, spend 2 hours for a guitar part, auto-tune vocals and etc... If you know that stuff before you start, you can make a better planning.