Chris Reitz dot Com

OK, so I’ve been putting this off for WAY too long. I promised a tutorial on how to make old acoustic foam pretty, so here’s Part 1. (You’ll have to wait for the glue to dry for Part 2.) I should add that, although good acoustic foam is rated at least Class B for fire safety, chances are, my trick here is NOT Class B, so don’t try this in a commercial studio. This will also change the sound absorption qualities of the foam a bit (that disclaimer is just for the audiophiles). However, the stuff still works, just not as well as it could in an ideal world.

So we're going from this.....

....to this.

The materials you’ll need are some ok-quality 8′-long 1x2s (they don’t have to be perfect, but builder-grade furring strips don’t quite cut it — you also need them to be exactly 2″ wide which furring strips are not), the foam (duh), some 1/8″-thick particle board, and some nice-looking, thin fabric. Add to that some tools and glue, but I don’t want to list all of that, down to how many nails you need. That’s not the point.

1'x1' foam tile

OK, first, cut the foam into manageable sizes. I made my tiles 1′x1′, 2′x2′, and 1′x2′. That way, there’s a nice variety. Makes things prettier in the end.

Now, you’ll want to cut the 1×2 into whatever lengths you’ll need…four 2-footers, two 2-footers and two 1-footers, or four 1-footers. The closer you get to perfect measurements, the better, but remember it’s all going to get covered up by the cloth, so don’t spend hours trying to get these cuts perfect.

Marking off the lap joint

Now, we’ll cut lap joints on either side. Quick math lesson, but if you want a lap joint using a 2″x3/4″ board, you’ll need to cut a notch in each board that’s 3/4″x1″. Here’s the setup, and the finished product(s). As you can see, I’m making more than one tile, not one weird octagonal one.

The cut lap joints. Next step: glue!

As you can also see, I like using Titebond II glue.  It dries fast, is pretty strong, and doesn’t do weird stuff to the wood.

Note that all of the boards look the same, and that they have the lap joints on the same side. It is SO easy to put the lap joints on the wrong side, and then you have to buy new wood. Not fun.

OK, now, using plenty of clamps, glue it up, and then measure the diagonals of your tile, to make sure it’s square. Both diagonals should be the same length. If not, bend/twist/torque the tile until they are.  Then let dry.

Clamping hte frame

And I’ll see you again when the glue’s dry.

Actually, one thing to note. I mentioned it before, but you don’t need to make the frame look like it’s made by a master cabinetmaker. It’s going to be covered by fabric. Make sure things aren’t too far out of whack, but if they’re off by up to 1/16″, it’s not the end of the world. The fabric will hide it.

OK, gotta run some errands and wait for the glue to dry. Peace out!

And one more. How to record on a tight budget. I had another one about mastering, but it didn’t really have anything good in there. I might eventually write something up about it.

Your band wants to record a hit, but how? You’ve tried your parents’ tape deck and it didn’t work. How do the pros do it? Bad news. The pros do it with a lot of money. But there is a way to do it without having a multi-million dollar budget.

These days, most recording is done digitally, or on a computer. So, if you have a desktop computer, or a laptop with a bit of space on the hard drive, you are in luck. Otherwise, you can build a computer for a very reasonable price. My band built one for $385. It had a 40GB hard drive, 1.56GHz AMD Athlon XP processor, and 512MB of RAM. We found a monitor that was being thrown out, and used that. You don’t need a fancy computer to record audio. The only thing I’d change if I were building a new computer is I’d get a much bigger hard drive. But if you’re willing to store most of what you do as CD backups, a 40GB drive is just fine. [It's hard to find a 40GB drive anymore...just shows you when I wrote this!! HA!]

if you have a laptop, you’ll probably want to look into getting a PCMCIA sound card like the DigiMark Pocket VX 220. Most laptop sound cards aren’t good enough to record with, so you need either a USB card (ok) or a PCMCIA card (better). [Firewire is even better, but Firewire cards can get very expensive.]

Next, you will need a small mixer. It only needs enough inputs for one person’s instrument and one microphone. My band uses a Behringer Eurorack UB1002FX. It has two mono inputs (one mic and one guitar), and four stereo imputs for things like keyboards. We got it for about $75.

Get a good microphone. Usually, the more expensive you can afford, the more expensive you should buy. My band uses a Shure Beta58 that we got for about $150, but if you can afford a $600 multi-pattern large-diaphragm condenser, get one. It will help your sound. [I also recently bought an Audio-Technica AT2020 for about $80. I HIGHLY recommend it if you're looking for a cheap, nice-sounding condenser.]

Buy a set of good speakers. Decent studio monitors cost about a thousand dollars but I have gotten away with using a Phillips minisystem ($150) and some $20 Sony headphones [which later broke and now I'm using $40 Sennheiser EH150s].

Recording software can be the most expensive item on your list, if you let it be. Or you can let it be the cheapest. My band uses a package called Audacity which is free. We got it from Stanford’s PlanetCCRMA website, which offers a comprehensive group of Linux audio packages for recording. We also got a bunch of free effects plugins from PlanetCCRMA. Audacity also runs on Windows for those who prefer. Otherwise, you are looking at $500 to thousands of dollars for multi track recording software [Adobe Audition is a great broadcast editing suite, and runs about $350].

Set up your studio where you can (where you won’t get too much noise or complaints of noise) and record one track at a time. My band usually does drums first, then main [rhythm] instrument, then other instruments, then vocals. Make sure your ‘vocal booth’ is reasonably quiet. We use my (small) room with some winter blankets over the doors to the outside and to the bathroom [this will be changing soon---we're building a real studio!!]. Try to get rid of any reverb in it, and also try to get rid of any resonant frequencies (notes that sound louder than others when sung for more than a couple seconds). You can usually do this with blankets and pillows, but if you can afford it, you might be interested in special acoustical foam and bass traps. [I got some for free when a broadcast school got gutted for a new tenant to move in.]

When you’re in the studio, take time to listen to tracks and see if you really want to keep them. You are not a pro, so it will take you some time to produce professional sounding audio. It took my band several years of studio experience to be able to throw a track together in a couple hours. Our first recording took a day for a 5-minute song. At the end, we didn’t like it and we re-recorded it. Several times. I’d estimate that it took close to 40 hours of studio time to record our first 5-minute song.

ok…that about covers it for my re-posts. I’ve got a couple other things that I might eventually post up, and yes, I know, I still need to finish my relay rack. I’m procrastinating, which those of you who know me know I can be very good at.

Aaaaaaannnnnnnd, Part 3. Releasing a CD. I’ve done 5 CDs for different people so far. Works pretty well.

All right, you finally have enough songs to make a CD! Now what?

First, you’ll need a name for the CD. If it’s your first, you might self-title it. That saves the work of coming up with a good name for the CD. Otherwise, a song name, recurring idea, song lyric, etc., might work.

Set a release date. If you have all your songs recorded, two months from now might be good. Three months would be even better. No rush that way. Don’t even think about releasing the CD until you have at least 3/4 of your songs recorded.

Next get permission for any songs you will have on the CD which aren’t yours. This can sometimes take some time and a bit of money. Usually, you’ll pay 9 cents per song per copy. You’ll have to decide how many CDs you will make. Make it reasonable. If you are Auntie Dot and the Comfortable Chair, it won’t be smart for you to make a run of 10 000 CDs. If you are the Black Eyed Peas, a run of a hundred won’t be too smart.

Either do your artwork yourself or get someone else to do it. Make sure that all the artwork has some sort of common theme. Our CD uses a photo of some neat clouds.

look at where to sell your CD. I highly recommend CDBaby. You’ll probably need a UPC code for your CD as well. CDBaby sells you one for about $60.

Get your CD manufactured. We used DiskFaktory, but there are many other manufacturers out there. If you followed these instructions, you will already know how many CDs you will be making, so I’ll skip explaining it here. However, here is one clarification. If you are getting a hundred CDs made, duplicate them. This means you will get CD-Rs from the factory which will run on 99% of CD players. If you are making a lot of CDs (1000 or more), replicate them. That way, you’ll get real audio CDs which will work in all CD players. Don’t replicate small runs. It’s too expensive. You’ll end up paying more than $5 per CD, when a duplicated CD would cost you about $3. A replicated CD from a large run will cost you about $1.

Part 2 of my re-posts: starting and running a rock band.

So you have a great idea for some music and so you want to start a band. But how? What makes the difference between Metallica or the Who and Auntie Bea and the Doilies (or any other no-name band)? Here are some guidelines for putting together a band that will work out. And, since most of us can’t afford a million-dollar studio, here’s how the band can work out for cheap.

First, choose the members of your band carefully. My band consists of me and my brother. We both have similar goals for our band and we both know how to set realistic goals. The last thing a band needs is one guy who thinks that his song (which consists of one note repeated over and over again) and his dress style (uncomfortably reminiscent of the Beatles) will make the band a legend. You want to find people who have a similar vision for the band and similar (realistic) goals. Make sure you don’t get a bunch of yes-men who will do whatever you tell them, unless you are already very experienced with bands. You will benefit from other members’ constructive criticism. Also try to get members who will be able to make practices. My band consists of me and my brother (who lives with me), so we don’t have to worry about the problem at all!

Choose equipment carefully. Each member should buy his or her own instrument and parts, or better, already have an instrument. There are a few items that everyone will need to chip in on, such as recording equipment and performance equipment. It’s a bad idea for one guy to own all the equipment because he will basically own the band. “Don’t like what I’m saying? Fine, well I quit. And I’m taking the mics, PA system, mixer, computer, and your instruments.” Also, don’t feel like you have to buy top-of-the-line right off. It will make a difference if you record vocals with a $100 or $1000 mic, but your audience probably won’t be able to tell the difference. Wait until you can afford the $1000 mic and then buy it.

so what equipment do you need? If you are only recording your music (and not performing it), get a computer (either use a band member’s or build one for cheap – see the Linux HowTo (not up yet) [which I never ended up writing. I highly recommend Ubuntu because of its great support on the Ubuntu forums] for instructions], a mic (My band uses a Shure Beta58, which we got for about $150), a small mixer with a few effects (I highly recommend the Behringer Eurorack UB1002FX, which we got for about $75), and your instruments. Also make sure to get some decent speakers for your computer. I use a Philips minisystem which cost about $150.

If you are performing, you need a mic for each vocalist and acoustic instrument (AudioTechnica XM1s are dirt-cheap, we got ours for $20 each), a mixer which has enough space for all the mics and all the instruments you will plug into it, speakers, monitors (speakers that let you hear what you’re playing), amplifiers for the speaks and mons, and cable. You might also need a CD player. My band’s performance system cost me about $2000. We bought it for $1500 and then added some extras.

This is the first in a series of short articles I’d written while I was still back in school. When I graduated, I lost my web space, so I’m just re-posting them here. So here goes: How to perform music on a tight budget.

Who cares about recording? Your band wants to perform! You have seen the setups that big bands use, but there is no way you could ever afford them. Is there any way to perform without spending thousands of dollars?

The technically correct answer is no. My band managed to pull off a performance setup for about $2000. Which technically is thousands. But hey! it’s not $20 000.

The first thing to ask is how many instruments do you have and how many vocalists do you have? In my band, we have three instruments (plus an acoustic instrument) and two vocalists. So we need three mics (one for each vocalist plus one for the acoustic instrument), two guitar (mono) inputs and one keyboard (stereo) input. We also use a CD player for extra tracks that we can’t perform (like extra harmonies). That brings the total up to 3 mics, 2 stereo, and 2 mono. Mics usually run off XLR cable, and guitars and keyboards run off 1/4″ phone (or TRS) cable. CD players sometimes run TRS and sometimes run RCA. So, we needed 3 XLRs, 4 TRS and 1 stereo RCA. Go to your local audio dealer with these numbers and they will show you a mixer which might work for you.

Ask yourself (realistically) how large your typical audience would be. For us, we didn’t see catering to a crowd any bigger than 500 people. And that was an overestimate. We ended up needing two 15″ speakers. Tell your dealer this number too. They’ll show you a speaker/amp setup which will work.

Just a side note, there are two ways to amp your speakers. One is to buy an amplifier and run the output of your mixer into that. The other is to buy a power mixer, one with an amp built in. We used a power mixer. It works, but if you see your band ever needing to expand a bit, I’d suggest getting the amp separately. Either that or get active speakers (speakers with a built-in amp). These options cost more, but they are more expandable. If you’re planning for the day when you play the Astrodome, don’t get a power mixer.

What if you are in the situation my band is in? 2 vocalists and 6-part harmony? How the heck do you perform your music? What my band did is to burn a “Performance CD” which has all the tracks that you won’t perform. That way, you can’t be accused of lip-syncing, but you won’t have to figure out how to sing more than one note at once.

Get a good sound guy. This can be the toughest thing to do on this page. You have two options. 1) get a guy who is familiar with your music and knows what kind of sound you’re interested in, or 2) YOU do sound and write down all your settings and teach someone how to set up the mixer for your settings and how to fight feedback if it occurs. My band did #2. It works reasonably well, although, I suppose #1 is a bit better.