What is the “Home studio” sound?

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mophilly
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What is the “Home studio” sound?

Post by mophilly » Sun May 16, 2021 8:35 pm

A recent review of our work from another service said, among other things, “It’s kind of home studio”. Well, we thought the work was the best we had produced to date but, indeed, it was done in a home studio.

This got me to wonder, what characteristics of a recording give it a “home studio” sound? Typically, the goal is to provide a pro sound. OTOH, one might need to create a home studio sound for a project.

So what elements create a home studio sound?
Conversely, what comprise a pro sound?

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Re: What is the “Home studio” sound?

Post by cosmicdolphin » Mon May 17, 2021 1:37 pm

Boxy and not professionally mixed

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Re: What is the “Home studio” sound?

Post by AudiniAudio » Mon May 17, 2021 5:06 pm

Basics would be a tuned recording space; to start with bass traps in the corners and acoustic panels in strategic places or some other solution like wrapping the vocalist/instrumentalist and their mic in a gobo. Next look at the signal chain. Are you using the right mic for each recording job? Taxi's Studio Buddy tells how to record everything. Next issue is to have the right mic preamp. The preamp in your console or the software preamp in your virtual DAW aint gonna win prizes most likely so a dedicated rackmounted external/physical preamp is the correct beastie. What comes to my mind is people often buy an expensive mic and all that does is let us hear even better how terrible the room sounds. Gear is sexy. Bass traps aren't but that sexy gear can't do it's job without them. Next is software for knowing the strong and weak frequency ranges of your room so you can compensate with eq. If your room is completely dead or waaay too hot then there's little EQ can do to help.

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Re: What is the “Home studio” sound?

Post by lesmac » Tue May 18, 2021 9:27 pm

The NOT home studio sound:

1 In tune

2 In time

3 Performance, arrangement and mixing? Learn your stuff, don't blame your tools, apply a quality principal and don't let it out of the studio until you are proud of it or you want a critique.

4 Room sound - Too dry? Close mic and add ambience later
Too many reflections? Close mic and filter out any resonances


It's really about taste. There are no excuses these days. Everyone has access to high quality samples and processors.

Andrew Scheps mixes 100% in the box.

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Re: What is the “Home studio” sound?

Post by mophilly » Thu May 20, 2021 7:15 am

Thank you all for the replies. Greatly appreciated.

Here is the song at the heart of the question.
https://soundcloud.com/jamacha-project/missionarys-son

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Re: What is the “Home studio” sound?

Post by cosmicdolphin » Thu May 20, 2021 9:51 am

mophilly wrote:
Thu May 20, 2021 7:15 am
Thank you all for the replies. Greatly appreciated.

Here is the song at the heart of the question.
https://soundcloud.com/jamacha-project/missionarys-son
Yeah the mix and production is not up to scratch and there are timing issues with the drums

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Re: What is the “Home studio” sound?

Post by Kolstad » Fri May 21, 2021 5:11 am

mophilly wrote:
Thu May 20, 2021 7:15 am
Thank you all for the replies. Greatly appreciated.

Here is the song at the heart of the question.
https://soundcloud.com/jamacha-project/missionarys-son
You should try putting it up for mix reviews in the peer to peer forum before submitting. It may help you polish the production before sending it in.

Tracking sounds pretty solid here, but everything sounds sort of in-your-face and a bit stale in the mix, and doesn't come across with depth and balance. Production sounds pretty raw and "demo" like.
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Re: What is the “Home studio” sound?

Post by mophilly » Sat May 22, 2021 7:10 pm

Thank you for the replies.

I haven't found Taxi's Studio Buddy. Links, hints appreciated.

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Re: What is the “Home studio” sound?

Post by mophilly » Sat May 22, 2021 7:14 pm

Kolstad wrote:
Fri May 21, 2021 5:11 am
You should try putting it up for mix reviews in the peer to peer forum before submitting. It may help you polish the production before sending it in.

Tracking sounds pretty solid here, but everything sounds sort of in-your-face and a bit stale in the mix, and doesn't come across with depth and balance. Production sounds pretty raw and "demo" like.
Thank you. I will look into mix reviews, as well as learning more about “depth and balance”.

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Re: What is the “Home studio” sound?

Post by mophilly » Sun May 23, 2021 12:28 pm

I learned that the studio buddy site has been taken down. However, for those who may be following this thread, there are lots of good articles in the FAQ section of taxi. A number of different topics, each with a bunch of good articles. Here is a link to the one about home studio recording.
https://www.taxi.com/music-business-faq/home-recording/

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