Ye Olde’ Studio
For my recording studio, I wanted to make any type of music I felt like making. No boundaries on the genre. If I wanted to make pure techno, I wanted the capability to do that. If I wanted to make rock music with 6 instruments recorded live, I wanted to do that. I made my decisions wisely in buying various elements for my studio, but I know now that I still went a little overboard.
Here is a photo of my walk-in closet which I had organized to use as my recording booth. Already purchased and shown are the MXL condenser microphone, and a pair of headphones on the wall. I already owned the synthesizer on the desk (Akai AX-60 which is with a friend of mine in Portland, OR right now), as well as the guitars.
Not seen in these photos are the metal shelves which I hung my shirts on. These, along with the convoluted bed padding I tacked along the walls, provided the dampening necessary for mic recording. I had my electric guitar, bass, acoustic, and condenser microphone all setup in the closet. The cords for the microphone and other instruments were very long and ran along the edge of the room pushed under the baseboard, and then out of the corner of the closet door.
Outside of the closet I had my computer desk setup, which also housed my patch bay.
Here you can see the parts as I assembled the desk, which is a Studio RTA Mix Station which I bought from a Guitar Center for around $120.
For software I choose to go with Cubase. I had heard that it had MIDI capabilities which exceeded that of the industry standard Pro Tools, and since I was a PC guy I wasn’t going with Logic Pro.
I really like this software since it’s available for the Mac or the PC. The only downside is that simpler Cubase sessions can’t be played in Cubase LE, and I expect that the same goes with Cubase Essentials now.
After all was said and done I had a very nice setup. I’m not really sure where to start. I wanted to present something of value in a structured way, but I think I’ll just write whatever comes to mind and structure it better later. Here is a photo of my good friend, Neme of Prolific, working on a track in my home recording studio. He’s the owner of the studio now in Orlando, Florida. I’m living in Berkeley, California now. He can keep the equipment and Cubase, but I want my IK Multimedia software back. He’s gonna send me the software soon where I’ll be using it on a Mac platform.
