Good recordist reading?

What do you folks read, as far as recording-oriented sites, magazines, and books?

I don't do much regular or focused reading on recording, and I'm interested in knowing what you find worth keeping up with (as far as blogs and magazines) and what you've found useful in the past (books, static web resources).

I've been a subscriber of TapeOp for a long time (and you should be, too—it's free in the US), and discussions here in Music Talk in the last few days have made me aware of Hometracked, but I have to imagine there's a ton of good stuff out there I don't know about.

posted by cortex (20 comments total)

Check your mefi mail.
posted by dersins at 1:32 PM on July 9

Check your mefi mail.

I knew it! A MeFiMu cabal!

I love you like cabal and chain, love you like cabal and chain...

chay-chay-chaaaaaaaiiiin,
chain of fools...
posted by flapjax at midnite at 3:56 PM on July 9 [1 favorite]

This probably won't be news to you, Josh - but as it might benefit others, I find Sound on Sound near-indispensable. Older issues (longer than 6 months old I believe) are free to read online, and the forums tend to be friendly, passionate and informed. I don't work for them or anything, but to be honest I often find their articles - especially the gear and software reviews - down-to-earth, critical, human and very much erring on the safe side of straying into gear porn territory, so that's good for me. It's British, so you may want to remember that capacitor mic = condenser mic, valve = tube, etc. But there you go.

Also, I'm still miffed about not being able to get TapeOp in Europe.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 4:10 PM on July 9

Without paying.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 4:10 PM on July 9

Gearslutz
Electrical Audio

I don't get why Hometracked gets the respect it does, as it's only updated once in a blue moon, and when it is the articles are often reposts.
posted by bunnytricks at 4:15 PM on July 9

The TapeOp book is even more concentrated goodness than the magazine. Have you seen that?
posted by umbú at 4:49 PM on July 9

Not that it would necessarily have a whole lot directly to do with home recordists like us, but I reckon Recording the Beatles would be a great and interesting read, and who knows, there might be an applicable trick or two to be gleaned from it. I've been meaning to get it, actually. Anybody here seen it/read it?
posted by flapjax at midnite at 4:59 PM on July 9

Ooh, I'd almost forget, I bought the TapeOp book. It's pretty good, but as far as I remember, more for the recording anecdotes and DIY tidbits than as any sort of reference/essay work. I do understand maybe this is what TapeOp does, but it wasn't exactly what I had expected. On the whole though, I liked it.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 5:09 PM on July 9

Volume II of the TapeOp book is out now.
posted by Karlos the Jackal at 6:02 PM on July 9

The first Tape Op book is a little dated, but probably has more info for people with home studios. I'll probably wait for the second one, but it looks good as well. Oh, and Tape Op is free in the UK and Europe as well as the US (or at least it says it is) so chin up gnfti.

Homerecording is a decent board. The ones linked above are pretty good as well I've found.

I like to know how things were used in sessions more than what. So, to that end, I've actually found the 33 1/3 books on In The Aeroplane Over the Sea and Murmur to be really interesting reads in that department. It's not extensive, but it's enough to give you ideas to try things on your own (plus, I like those 33 1/3 books--I can never explain it but I like them). The Loveless one has a little in it as well. But, yeah, I like anecdotes.

There's other books/pages/articles/etc., but I need to go look at them... just as soon as I finish the chicken on the grill.
posted by sleepy pete at 8:56 PM on July 9 [1 favorite]

I got Recording the Beatles last Christmas. It is very detail oriented. I haven't even gotten half way through. I learned a lot so far about why things sound a certain way on certain recordings. There is also a definitive explanation and diagram of ADT and how it worked and why it was such and integral part of the Beatle's sound,

It has also made me approach my recording of drums differently. In a pinch, 3-4 Mics can do the job; it's all about positioning and phase control.

But mainly, It reinforced my HUGE respect for the engineers that worked in recording studios back then. They were real engineers. They truly grasped how acoustics and audio signal worked. They had to understand how the equipment worked and how to fix them if they broke.

I was impressed with how they would do tracking and bouncing on the fly due to the track limitation they had back then. It is amazing to read how they dealt with their technical limitations (track count, lack of headphone monitoring during overdubbing) and just got on with it through ingenuity and experimentation.

I'm just talking about the engineers here. As far as the actual 4 Beatles were concerned, it also reinforced the notion that , no matter what kind of gear, mics, plugins etc. you have, it all comes down to talent and how you use it to express yourself. No outboard doodad or plugin can do that for you.
posted by chillmost at 4:02 AM on July 10

Whoops, forgot to come back in here. Another book I've picked up recently is Music, Physics and Engineering. It's also on Google Books, but I like to hold things that I'm reading.

It's essentially a textbook from the late 60s, but has some interesting information.
posted by sleepy pete at 9:14 AM on July 10

Not really reading material, but if you can track down the DVDs of the Classic Albums series, they're definitely worth a watch.
posted by Sys Rq at 9:21 AM on July 10

OMG sleepy pete, you have just made my day! This must be fairly recent, no?

And I second the 33 1/2 for In the Aeroplane Over the Sea, which, it should be noted, was written by a Mefite.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 4:12 PM on July 10

Although, upon subscribing, the confirmation email tells me "Issue 58 will include John Fry, Jody Stephens, Matthew Herbert, Fade Out Fatigue, Terry Manning, The Posies and should mail out after April 15th, 2007."

Well, we'll see.
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 4:14 PM on July 10

I did forget to mention Scram, so thanks for doing that. She's also got a great book on Bubblegum Pop. And I was wondering if the UK/Europe thing would go through, but I didn't really have a way to check. I'll keep my fingers crossed for you.
posted by sleepy pete at 4:42 PM on July 10

Insanely thorough article on 10cc's "I'm not in love", from the excellent, above-mentioned Sound On Sound.
posted by flapjax at midnite at 7:15 AM on July 11

I wish there were more decent recording sites/magazines. Most seem to be 90% gear advertisements and 10% worthwhile information. Lately I've been experimenting with keeping an audio forums page in Netvibes as forums seem to be the best place to keep your finger on the pulse.

Here's what I subscribe to, though I'm looking to diversify a bit (and many good forums don't have RSS which is SO annoying):

KVR Forum: Effects
http://www.kvraudio.com/ssi/forum_6.rss

KVR Forum: Hosts (Sequencers, DAWs, Audio Editors, etc.)
http://www.kvraudio.com/ssi/forum_7.rss

KVR Forum: Instruments
http://www.kvraudio.com/ssi/forum_1.rss

KVR Forum: Production Techniques
http://www.kvraudio.com/ssi/forum_62.rss

Sound on Sound Forum - Music Recording Technology
http://www.soundonsound.com/rss/RSSForum.php?board=MRT

Ableton Live Forums
(private feed - i hacked this one into RSS)

Home Recording dot com BBS - Recording Techniques
http://homerecording.com/bbs/external.php?type=RSS2&forumids=2subscribe=rss
posted by frenetic at 2:23 PM on July 13

I hope anyone is still following this thread - I just happened upon Wikirecording. It looks pretty fantastic so far - it looks like good reading, and a good project to contribute to.

I'd especially recommend the Compression article.
posted by god hates math at 10:51 AM on August 7

Update:
Tape Op Issue No. 66, UK/EU edition, is here!
posted by goodnewsfortheinsane at 8:43 AM on August 30