Cheap and easy band demo ideas

[clayfeat]

Our band needs to put together a demo just for club owners. Any ideas on what to buy or use would be appreciated. (Band:Bass, drums, guitar and vocalist. Country, blues and rock.)

[Geyser]

Are you asking about what type of recording equipment to buy or use or what? I'm a little confused, but I'll give it a shot. If you get a quality mic, like a Shure SM57 or 58, you can get a good sound into just about any type of equipment. I used to make great sounding demos on my old Yamaha 4 track that recorded onto audio tapes. Without knowing what type of recording equipment you have access to (studio, home computer, analog/portable 4-track, etc), I'll just give some general tips...

Keep it short and sweet. A club owner/booker isn't going to listen to a full-length disc, or necessarily even full-length songs. Take 3 tunes that are indicative of your sound and put them together, with the best one first. The booker may not even get past the first half of the first song before they make their decision.

To keep your recording process quick, record all the instruments live and then overdub the vocals and possibly any leads. If you're rehearsed and ready, this shouldn't take more than one or two attempts, especially for a demo.

Good luck...

[joshigh]

A good 8mm, or digital camcorder does the trick ok. When we were starting out, we needed a demo tape for clubs. We opened up our practice room (2 car garage) stall doors, put the camera outside a few feet, taped, and played. It didn't sound half bad. Just make sure you're putting off a good mix. You can transfer this to a cd or cassette tape if you have the equipment. It will sound different on the tape, so it helps if you can experiment. Another way, that would be more pricey, is to get a gig with a pro sound company, and see if they can mix you a board tape, or maybe they have better ways. I don't know what your budget is, or situation is, but that is another quick way to get a good snapshot of what your band is about. Don't rule out video taping a gig either, as long as you get good sound on the tape.

[Daddy Elmis]

if you have a sound company in town, you can usually rent inexpensive mutitrack recorders (4-24 tracks, analog, digital, whatever) for the weekend. If you don't/can't do a true multitrack (i.e, you dont' have the board, and can't get each instrument and vocal on separate track etc.), then rent a little digital mulitrack, put a pair of mics about "ear width" apart and about 10 feet from your PA speakers (like there were in an audience), and record. You can tweak the overall EQ as needed on the recording and have a pseudo-stereo mix. Of course, you won't be able to "fix the mix" if the guitars are too loud, or the vocal isn't loud enough, etc.

Export the mix to your computer, burn CDs. Done.

[clayfeat]

Thanks for the ideas guys. I like the video idea and have kicked that around with the guys a couple of times.

[jaybee001]

a stereo cassette deck, two microphones and a balanced band sound

[tdu]

For a really convenient option, there are so many recording studios around now that you can get time for as low as $20 an hour. I know a lot of people who are recording on their computers almost as a hobby. They do a half decent job and they charge next to nothing. You can do 3 songs live off the floor and have someone else worrying about getting it down on 'tape'.

I personally have done recordings this way for less then $200 (for 3 songs). So to me it's worth it because I generally find the results better then the ways we have tried ourself, and it's no stress on our part. We plug in and play. Personally, when you can get a nice sounding recording done that cheap I try to go that route. It's dedinitely not going to hurt you to have a recording that sounds professional. On the other hand a recording that sounds like total crap could.

If someone in your band has a half decent computer and some computer skills, you can probably set up your own little recording system.

[Marc H.]

One thing we did once was search the local adult education or continuing education programs in our area. One class that was offered was studio recording. I registered for the class and when I realized we would need something to record as our project, I volunteered my band....

The producer running the class was real receptive and made sure the recording sounded OK. We got the recording for free.

You could probably even volunteer your band without being signed up for the course. Of course, your schedule has to fit with the timing of the class, but it was well worth it.


Good luck.

[Tim Armstrong]

Ask around, I'm certain that there are other local musicians who have recording gear and at least some experience doing demos. If they're anything like me, they'd probably record you for cheap or even free, just for the experience.

Good luck!

Tim

[tdu]

Good point Marc I forgot about that. The first 2 demos I ever recorded were done as projects for people in recordings programs. A college near here has a huge media arts program and students are always looking for bands to record. We cut 2 completely free demos that way.