V-Studios

[fiftyonepeg]

Has anyone had any experience recording bands with this equipment? Can you realistically take a project from the first note to a polished/mastered professional sounding CD? Keep in mind the band is 90% digital so the only real variables as far as I can tell would be vocals and guitars...Any thoughts or opinions would be helpful. Currently I am looking at purchasing the Roland Studio Pak for this purpose but I'd like to investigate more before I do.

[mcconaghy]

Originally posted by fiftyonepeg:
Has anyone had any experience recording bands with this equipment? Can you realistically take a project from the first note to a polished/mastered professional sounding CD? Keep in mind the band is 90% digital so the only real variables as far as I can tell would be vocals and guitars...Any thoughts or opinions would be helpful. Currently I am looking at purchasing the Roland Studio Pak for this purpose but I'd like to investigate more before I do.

They're very nice. The quality of the effect boards is good, and they're real easy to handle. The only thing is that all Roland V-studios compress audio in a weird way when rendering. I found you don't really hear it in the mix, but it's obvious when soloing tracks. But that's a common problem with any kind of digital recording, even ProTools gives you some audio discoloration.
The Studio Pack seems like a nice little recording package, the mixer has gotten some good reviews, and as far as I can tell you're getting a Logic version somewhere in between Logic Silver and Gold, i.e. not bad at all.

Stu

P.S. When are you guys playing New England? I really like 51Peg!

[fiftyonepeg]

Thanks!!! Glad you like the band- once we get our transportation situation settled again we can play further down the East Coast.

What is your area of expertise- I mean are you a V-drums user, work for a studio etc..?
If we pull the trigger on this recording package it would be good to know someone who has worked with this stuff before....

[Blades]

Fiftyonepeg,

We've done exactly that...used vdrums with vs1680/1880 (connected together for more tracks and effects). We had live guitar and vocals as well as real bass, some real piano, and keyboards.

I posted this before, but rather than you having to look for it, I'll just re-paste it here.

I posted a snippet of one of the tunes from an album I played the vdrums on. Nothing fancy...but I think they sound good on "tape".
Go to www.freedrive.com
userid : redbrick
passwd : vdrums

In the "My Folder" folder, there is an mp3 called "In the Light". Please give it a listen and post your feedback.

Thanks and I hope that helps,
Redbrick

[mcconaghy]

I'm mainly a V-drums user, who does a bit of home recording, plus we play similar styles of music. I've worked with a VS-1680, and really liked the way it operated, it was very intuitive, IMO.
I mean, for the price the Studio Pack is going for, that can't be beat, seriously. You're getting good software, the top-range VM-7000 series digital mixer works with those RPC-1 cards, and the mixer is great. I'd give it a try.

If you get to New England, get in contact with No Response, all CT club promoters know who they are. That'd be a nice gig package

Stu

[This message has been edited by mcconaghy (edited June 06, 2001).]

[roya]

hi
Where can i read about the studio pack on the net? (not talking about roland site, but some reviews for example)

[Janecorec]

I use the Roland VS-2480 and have done a lot of live and studio recordings, the 8 XLR channels with mic preamps are really handy!
And you can record 16 tracks at once and use a vga monitor directly connected to the bord!

[Dan the Speakerman]

I've been using a VS880vExpanded w/FX card for all my material and have been very, very pleased

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www.mp3.com/entrylevel

[Vibrafunker]

Our band is doing this currently. We make dance music (a mix of St-Germain / Bob Sinclair if you are familiar with them) that we play live (drummer - bass player - sequencer/guitar player - synth/rhodes player.
We are recording at a friend's place. He owns a Mac G4 with a copmlete Pro Tools program running on it (he used to work in a professional studio...). We basically just plug and play. I go first and record the drums/percussion via MIDI and via audio (that way our producer/friend can do whatever he likes, e.g. when he does remixes).
I'm not familiar with that Studio Pak but I can asure you recording with vdrums is heaven in comparison to acoustics (if you're on a budget...)