Back in the good(bad?) old days.....

[The Y_man]

When I started playing around with synths and was recording my own stuff, it was when 10MB (yes MB folks - not TB or GB!) was a huge hard disk on a PC.

Back then, before these new fangled arrangers and software etc, this is how I would do the recording.

Now I was on a very limited budget with all second hand gear:

• Fostex 4 track cassette recorder,
• Yamaha QX5 sequencer
• Roland TR505 drum machine
• Ensoniq ESQ1
• Roland JX3P, later traded for a Juno106
• Akai Sampler (can't rememebr the model)
• Korg EX800 (rack module version of Poly 800)

First I would do the backing track typically:

• TR505 - drums
• EX800 - bass
• ESQ/Juno - chords (stereo)
• Akai - odd fills

These would be MIDI synched together through a Yamaha MIDI hub and recorded onto track 1 and 4 of the Fostex (I used 1 and 4 as track 2 towards the centre of the tape wlays came out louder than 1)

Then I would do a hand played lead or guitar on track 2 and vocals on track 3.

If you had to remix, you had to redo the whole thing!

The Y-man

 

[DickR]

Hahaha Yes the 'good' old days. What a job it was recording!
And memory in computers.... The Commodore 64 and the Atari with a seperate floppydrive. Say no more. What about the large floppies, as big as a pancake. When the smaller floppies came onto the market I was wondering how the heck can you get all the information on a small thing like that?

 

[YeahDoIt]

I used a cassette tape recorder. When I had more money I used two cassette recorders for sound-with-sound recording.

 

[Oyst3h]

I had an Akai 4000DS 2-track open reel tape machine, and an EDP Wasp synth and a Boss DR-55 rhythm machine.
You could bounce a (mono) recording from 1-track to the other on the Akai while overdubbing a second take. After about 6 or 7 bounces you couldn't hear the first track any more, not that that stopped me adding more tracks on top!
Them were the days!

 

[b3maniac]

You guys are talking "newer" technology. Anyone ever play a Farfisa organ?
Back then there were 2 track reel to reels (unless you went to a pro 8-track studio). Reverb was the standard effect back then ............All of this pre-dates the introduction of the Custom PA systems with padded column speakers....lol

 

[DickR]

Yes my father had a Farfisa all these years ago and after that an 'Eminent' made in Holland. Advanced!! as it was it had 2 buttons 'Echo 1 & Echo 2'.

 

[Travst]

My dad was into jazz and recording, so I grew up fooling around in the military studios that the GIs were given access to. We had two reel-to-reels in the house, one was a clunky portable suitcase model that came with two mics. I'd lug it around to record my band in high school. One of my buddy's older brother had a Farfisa, probably in the late sixties. I remember goofing around on it and him yelling at me to get away from his keyboard.