Click track advise

[burno70]

I'm heading into the studio in a couple of weeks with my band, Quandrant - a heavy rock/ metal/ slightly proggy type originals band. Now, we were working an tempos for a click track and noticed that two of our songs have unintentional tempo changes in them. I've never been a band where this has happened before and it does bother me a bit.

Does this mean we should play these songs on 'feel' alone? Just concerned as we'd usually have the drummer use a click track to ensure we get it right but it doesn't look like we can do this here. This recording sesh is costing us all a bomb and we don't want to leave anything to chance.

Anyone got any ideas, or has anyone else been in a similar situation? Am I worrying about nothing - pre-recording nerves perhaps?

Cheers

Ste

Edited April 15, 2013 by burno70

[BigRedX]

What's the click track for?

To help you keep a constant tempo or to make it easier for edits and overdubs?

[charic]

If you know both tempos and exactly where the change should be then theres no reason the click track cant change

[bremen]

I've been in many bands that have been recorded professionally, amateurishly and by "name" producers, and have never used a click. Is it the default nowadays?

Isn't it just a tool that's brought out when there are timing issues and/or the tune needs to have a constant bpm to sync with something later?

I'd suggest speaking to the producer before going into the studio.

[jakenewmanbass]

It's biggest use today is to allow for comps and edits, so that 'best bits' can be used to create a take.
Tempo (or metric) modulations can easily be written in to a click track, following them is less easy, but is done often by experienced players...
It might be a bit shocking for your sensibilities if you are not used to playing to a click

[paulpirie8]

[quote name='charic' timestamp='1366092396' post='2048161']
If you know both tempos and exactly where the change should be then theres no reason the click track cant change
[/quote]

+1

We've had to create a "tempo map" before where the click is at a certain bpm and then changes for a section and then goes back to the original. It can be tough to get used to on the first few listens but if you've got the tempos right then it should be easy enough to play along with once you get used to it!

If you want an example of tempo changes within songs, listen to any Mastodon song ever!

Paul

[chris_b]

Don't you trust your drummer?

[Low End Bee]

We drove our producer to distraction as the quiet verse in one of our songs is about 10-15bpm slower than the rest.
He asked us to play to a click and it sounded flat and lost all the feel and dynamics. We then played it again without a click and we come in bang on the same tempo after the slow bit. He's worked a lot with Depeche Mode and the Cure so I guess he wasn't in this sort of zone. He did say our way was best after though. We'd never noticed the tempo change before it's just how we'd always played it.
I guess you should just have faith in your playing and your drummer. You could record it in sections but that sounds that time and money.

This is the (very non prog) song if you're interested. .[url="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qxnnlo5PFFk"]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Qxnnlo5PFFk[/url]

[lowdown]

Playing to click tracks is not a problem, but quite often it can feel unnatural if you are not used to doing it.
Click track recording is not unique to DAW recording, or even new in the past 10 years or so.
Many of you would have been listening to music recorded using click tracks, way back to the Tom & Jerry days,
and from then onwards.

[url="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Click_track"]http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Click_track[/url]


Garry

[ironside1966]

Clicks with tempo changers are quite normal I often increase the tempo by a few BPM at the chorus and maybe at the end to give the song a more natural feel.
To use o click or not depends on what is going to give you the best results. if you are tight with a drummer who doesn't drift in temp too much and you can play your songs all the way through with no mistakes ( every band says they can but not that many nail in a couple of takes) on the other side I have wasted hour trying to get a usable performance out of a drummer who can't play to a click.
if you want to record a live session you need to check that the studio has the space and experience to get good results.
My advice would be to get a daw or a friend with one, work out the tempos and create a click then take that in the studio has a audio file, that way you are not wasting valuable studio time. I would go a step further and record and create the guide tracks beforehand too. use the studio time wisely if it not going to be on the finished mix try and do it at home.
Don't worry about the sound quality but make sure the performance is good enough. Then Practice practice practice to the tracks

[burno70]

Many questions and some excellent points - cheers for that.

To be honest, I think if it were not so expensive, as we, like most unsigned bands, are self-funded, then it simply would not be that big a deal. I've recorded many times, sometimes used a click-track, sometimes not. Personally, I've always left it down to the drummer's preference. As this recording is so important to us, we really want to get it right and thought using a click track may be best, we hadn't realised that there were changes in tempo and it caught us by surprise. Chatting with the band at rehearsal tonight and I think we're going to play be feel instead, just like we always do - so fingers crossed! Hopefully we won't balls it up and I'll have something half decent to post on this forum!

[BigRedX]

Some songs work with a click which keeps everything nice and tight, and sometimes you need those tempo changes (even if they're only 2-3 bpm). Every time my band prepares for a recording we try each song with and without a click to see which route gives the best feel. It generally works out that we do half the songs each way, although at the last session we had a song with 3 distinct tempos that we recorded in three separate takes and then assembled in place in the DAW.

As other have said you can create a tempo-mapped click, but IMO it's only worth the effort if you know you're going to be doing a lot of post-recording editing or you want to use lots of tempo synchronised effects.

Edited April 17, 2013 by BigRedX

[timgosden]

I nearly exclusively record bands to click... even if that means mapping the tempo with different speeds for different sections. Here's why:

- comping, it's much easier to put together a great take if everything is in the same place each time

- editing, most commercial records are using beat detective/flex time to quantise the drummers... this means tightening up the performances. You'll be hard pushed to find many rock records where this isn't the case to a certain extent

- programming, more and more bands are using tracks live or wanting to add synths/loops to their recordings... it's much easier to do this if you're using click

- copy and pasting, believe it or not people DO copy and paste... often backing vocals on chorus' etc.

- delays, it's much easier to get all your delay times sync'd with click. A lot of guitarists can input BPM's on their delays pedals or I'll add a delay sync'd to my DAW's tempo.

Hope that helps mate,

Tim

Edited April 30, 2013 by timgosden