MOTUnation.com

Well, here's what I have:

G5 dual 2.7
828 MkII
Rode NT1A+Boom Mic Stand
DI-Box
A yamaha promix01 which I never used for audio. Only as a control surface.
A 6 channel behr* mixer which I never used.

A friend of mine wants me to record their 4 person band so they have them availble for purchase when they play. The CD will be mastered somewhere(haven't decided where yet). I'm not new to mixing but a little new on tracking. They want to pay me $200. I'd do it for free for the experience. The band consists of 2 guitar players, 1 bass player, 1 drummer. Their style is rock-slighty overdriven guitars.

The bass player has a p-bass. One guitar is hollow body electric, the other is a strat. I obviously need more mikes, which I have no problem buying. My motu only has 2 mic pre's. So, there lies the problem. What else would I need?

I was thinking of 3 SM57's(snare,2 guitar cabs), bass direct, akg d-112 for kick, overheads(?), hats(?), additional preamps(?). Rode for vox.

What do you think?

My budget is <$1000. Obviously I would like to stay around $500-600. I'm ITB because I do a lot of personal projects that don't require alot of mics or outboard gear. The songs I mix for people, they track elswhere and I mix it--it has always come out great.

Thanks for any help.

I have an 828mkII. I track groups live with ten tracks. (2 mic pres, 8 lines in). I bought an 8 channel preamp to run into the 8 line ins. How many vocals or are you going to overdub them? You should be able to do this fairly easily. 2 guitars, bass, 4 or 6 channels of drums, 1 or more vocals. Do it live, bands tend to play better together as opposed to overdubbing. Overdub vocals as needed. HTH. Stephen

Thanks for the reply. The vocals will be scratch tracks, re-recorded later at my house. Did you record the bass direct or mic'd? My only real problem is mic choice. What kind of preamp are you using if you don't mind me asking?

If you're needing to track a drum kit (K, Sn, H and 2 OH's), two electric guitars, bass and vocals, your going to need every bit of 9 or 10 preamps. I'd suggest that you look into something like the Presonus Digimax LT or the Focusrite Octopre and take that via lightpipe into your 828. Unfortunately, the cost of the preamps is going to eat up most of your budget. As far as mic's go (taking a modest budget into consideration), I'd use 57's on snare, and guitar cabinets as you suggested, Audix D6 or AKG D112 on kick and maybe an Oktava MK-012 on hat. You might want to look into another NT1A and use them as OH's on your kit, and then use them as vocal mics during overdubbing. The D112 or D6 would also be great if you retrack bass and decide you want to mic the cabinet in addition to a DI feed. It's all so subjective, but this is a reasonably inexpensive setup that would give you all the discrete inputs you need. If that's way too expensive, you could always submix the drums into 1 or 2 channels. It's not ideal, but I suppose it'd work.

-jordan

Hey Reggansa, I have a line out on my bass amp that I run into one of the 8 line ins on the 828. I bought an SM PR8 mic pre. It has phantom power (switchable on each ind. channel) and a gain knob. They have some newer ones that also have an insert on each channel and one has an option for an ADAT output card. Mine was $99 two years ago. Also got an 8 channel TRS to TRS snake to connect them. It's not the highest end gear but it will give you what you need to get tracking!
Stephen

Thanks for the help. I think I'll probably get the M-Audio Octane and the shure drum mic package(3 57's, 1 52). I don't know yet for overheads. I'll use the 2 57's on snare, and either just use the overheads or get 2/3 more mics for toms. I'm paying more than I wanted, but my really only other option was the Behr ada-8000 or the Studio Projects SP828.

Hi there,

I bought one and channel 4 And 6 have a slight hum.
I wished I had settled for Focusrite or Presonus preamps now . .