Getting Started With Recording My Own Music

The perfection of imperfection

Photo by Jonathan Velasquez on Unsplash

I’ve finally gotten back around to recording again. I say finally, though it’s only been nine months since I’ve been in the studio. When COVID hit, it was around the time that Mellotron reached out asking if I wanted to record and release a single through them. I wasn’t sure how I was going to accomplish this since the studio I normally go to had temporarily shut down.

I had been wanting to record at home for awhile, so this forced me to get serious about purchasing my own equipment.

I consulted with the recording engineer I work with, as well as another friend who has far more experience with this, and they were both very generous with their time and knowledge. I asked them everything from: What interface should I get? What kind of microphones, XLR cables, mic stands? What recording software should I use? What kind of studio headphones would be sufficient? (Since I wasn’t quite ready to splurge on a pair of monitors.)

Here’s what I ended up with:

1. Apollo Twin MKII (from Universal Audio)
2. A pair of AKG 414 BULS mics
3. Beyerdynamic DT 770 PRO 80 Ohm (closed back) headphones