I guess the main message here is ; Get going, what ever the budget you have. Waiting for better gear or taking that as an excuse to not to do any music will get you nowhere ! ;)

I agree that there is a big variance among home studios. The ones that the hype is referring to are the pro home studios. Rick Rubin has a home studio, ya know?
Mic technique and to a certain extent the production and coaching part gets lost in many of the lesser budget recording situations. Being able to blend your love recorded tracks with samples is also a very evasive part of the art. Be a bad blend crap samples or cheese city bad samples and rigid programming ruin a lot of non electronica based home productions.
The compromise of a semi professional 'live' drum recoding is usually the big presence and fullness from samples. And the art of the blend is born.

pcrecord, post: 432637, member: 46460 wrote: I guess the main message here is ; Get going, what ever the budget you have. Waiting for better gear or taking that as an excuse to not to do any music will get you nowhere ! ;)

And I support this. I just get a bit concerned when pro's publically state that "you don't need the gear that we pro's use to get professional recordings"...
It's when a pro engineer - like Huart - says that any home studio - using that cheap gear - can have the same level of quality that a pro room has.

If he really believed that, he could make a pretty decent amount of money selling all that pro-level gear that surrounds him in the video... and then just use cheap stuff instead.

I also feel that there's an advantage to going through a period of using cheaper-level gear; in that the more you can get out of the budget-level stuff, the better you'll be when you do eventually upgrade. If you hone your chops on the less expensive gear, get to know all the tools of the trade, and manage to turn out decent mixes on an entry-level rig, you'll be able to really shine when you step up to more professional equipment. You'll also be able to hear that much more of the difference between the two levels when you do step up.

Even you've said it yourself, Mon Ami'.... that when you stepped up to your first pro level preamp, you heard a huge difference, and right away. Part of this - I think, is because - like most of us - you'd been forced to work with cheaper gear up to that point, but during that time, you were still honing your listening skills and mixing chops ... So when pro level gear did become available to you, you were able to discern the difference that much more, and, to use it with that much more knowledge.

That's not to say that you can't have a pro level studio in your home these days, because you absolutely can, if you know what you're doing, and if can afford to stock it with pro-level gear ...and many here have done this.... but you're not going to achieve that pro level of sonic quality if you're using a Behringer C1 and a $89 Tascam Pre as your primary gain chain.

I don't have any problems with musicians/songwriters using what they have to showcase their creativity and talent. I think they absolutely should use whatever they have at their disposal to do this, and if this means having to use the Behringer C1 mic and Tascam Pre, then so be it. Cheap gear should not be an obstacle to creativity.

It is, however, an obstacle to fidelity. ;)

IMHO of course.

d.

It's weird because good gear can both make you sound better, and reveal weaknesses. None of these commercial records are using the stuff you get at GC. Compared to a Tascam 4 track today's entry level gear is far more capable, mainly in electronica, making it possible to produce fully fleshed out productions. Other than that the gap between home and high end professional hasn't changed much, they have always been and remain three steps ahead of home recording.

I think there a lot many home recordists out there limited by the gear they use. It's an art yes, but I bet if everyone's basement was full of the best gear, we would hear a ton of high caliber recordings from homes.mive heard many good home recordings, they just almost always have an identifiable sound to them that gives them away as home recordings. I've never been able to not make home sounding productions at home, but Ive also never had a studio either, just regular rooms w some panels.

kmetal, post: 432658, member: 37533 wrote: It's weird because good gear can both make you sound better, and reveal weaknesses….

That is VERY true Kyle. For example, as most of us know, good reference monitors are not very flattering, and often aren't even especially 'musical', but you'll hear depth and details you cannot hear on garden-variety speakers.

DonnyThompson, post: 432653, member: 46114 wrote: Even you've said it yourself, Mon Ami'.... that when you stepped up to your first pro level preamp, you heard a huge difference, and right away. Part of this - I think, is because - like most of us - you'd been forced to work with cheaper gear up to that point, but during that time, you were still honing your listening skills and mixing chops ... So when pro level gear did become available to you, you were able to discern the difference that much more, and, to use it with that much more knowledge.

This is very true, I started very cheap and grow out of my gear while Learning the craft.
I get you that saying the recordings could be pro caliber with cheap gear wasn't his best affirmation.
But, I'm force to say that cheap gear has it's purpose of giving easy access to newbie to start recording, train their ears and learn how to record and mix...

The funny thing is, encourraging people to record instead of hiring a pro makes a dillution of general quality we can expect in the future.
I guess the ones that will profit the most of this are the mastering engineer. I can go to a pro studio and even without mastering, the recording would be nice to present to friends, get gigs and sell some off the stage. If I do start to record, with cheap to average gear, I'm bound to have many defects in my recordings and chances are, I'll have more needs for a mastering engineer than if it was professionnally recorded.

But one very important thing most musicians are forgetting is that while you learn recording and mixing skills, you ain't playing music anymore. You're just turning knobs and moving a mouse and learn analytic skills that are far more creative then playing an instrument.
So my take on it is to say : Know what you want to do.

• If you want to put out an album, find a pro or home studio that fits your buget to do it for you.
• If you want to record others, buy a setup you can afford and start recording yourself and anyone to learn... Then when you'll be ready to charge for it, it'll be time to gear up for higher quality..

pcrecord, post: 432660, member: 46460 wrote: This is very true, I started very cheap and grow out of my gear while Learning the craft.
I get you that saying the recordings could be pro caliber with cheap gear wasn't his best affirmation.
But, I'm force to say that cheap gear has it's purpose of giving easy access to newbie to start recording, train their ears and learn how to record and mix...

The funny thing is, encourraging people to record instead of hiring a pro makes a dillution of general quality we can expect in the future.
I guess the ones that will profit the most of this are the mastering engineer. I can go to a pro studio and even without mastering, the recording would be nice to present to friends, get gigs and sell some off the stage. If I do start to record, with cheap to average gear, I'm bound to have many defects in my recordings and chances are, I'll have more needs for a mastering engineer than if it was professionnally recorded.

But one very important thing most musicians are forgetting is that while you learn recording and mixing skills, you ain't playing music anymore. You're just turning knobs and moving a mouse and learn analytic skills that are far more creative then playing an instrument.
So my take on it is to say : Know what you want to do.

• If you want to put out an album, find a pro or home studio that fits your buget to do it for you.
• If you want to record others, buy a setup you can afford and start recording yourself and anyone to learn... Then when you'll be ready to charge for it, it'll be time to gear up for higher quality..

I have breakfast periodically with other home studio owners. Most of them are musicians first and studio owners second. There objective was to have the convenience to record when they wanted. But what I hear at breakfast is they just want to" hit record and lay it down "while they have that inspirational moment.
However the recording skills are lacking and their workflow is poorly set up. By the time they get their studio turned on and running, they have lost the inspiration or desire to do it. This has been the main theme...
I think , "know what you want to do" pretty much sums it up.

However, the art of recording is an "action" , you can read about it all you want but if you don't put it into play, you haven't learned anything but a concept. It would be better to record on "pro-sumer " gear and learn the skills and develop your ear. If anything the lesser gear will make you work harder to get the sound you want.

I don't get the sense that he's talking abut anything on a professional home studio level. Suggesting a 2 input interface will be all you need if you aren't doing drums or a whole band live pretty much rules out pro home studio in my mind. Sound like it's geared towards if you are musician singer songwriter that wants to put out your own album at the most.

I was totally fine with the whole " you can get good recordings at home without huge amounts of money" thing, because it's true... you can get good recordings. And I was still right there with him when he said that "creativity is the most important thing for a songwriter"... I couldn't agree more. It is crucial to get those ideas down as fast as you can, because every songwriter knows that when those gems hit you - and often all too rarely - they will often come out of nowhere, and fast, too. But, they can also disappear just as quickly as well, so time is of the essence, and in that scenario, creativity counts more than quality... in that scenario.

It's when he made the suggestion that " you don't need to use what the pros use to get professional sounding recordings" ... while at the same time sitting in front of thousands and thousands of dollars worth of professional level recording gear, that I did a double-take and winced.

Because of the affordability and easy access to digital recording gear and platforms these days, perhaps the term "professional sound quality" has become somewhat skewed and subjective to a lot of those people. It hasn't become subjective to me, I can definitely hear the difference between a track off of James Taylor's latest album and what "Joe Smith" is doing in his basement with a $59 AT2020 mic and an $89 Tascam pre - but I think that in recent years, the bar of what true quality is has been lowered to accommodate the perceptions of those masses of people who have entered into the home "studio" scene - at least half of whom can't hear the actual difference between what they are using in their bedrooms and basements, and what studios like Ocean Way or Blackbird are using... and, it's entirely possible that these people might not ever be able to hear that difference, even if you had them compare the two "qualities" side by side.

So, I suppose that if we widen the definition of "professional-sounding recordings" to include the sonic results of those who have managed to successfully print a signal from their USB microphone to a track on their DAW - then yes, under that criteria, I guess that would be considered as being "professional" in sound quality.

I have nothing against entry-level gear. It serves several useful purposes - one of which, as Marco mentioned, is to get these people immersed in the process, and learning the craft with what they have. Limitations can be a good thing; because the only way we learn is to do everything we can to get past those limitations, and the result is that we learn, and gradually, we get better at what we do. And, when those people eventually do step up to better gear, not only are they now more sensitive to the differences in quality - because their ears have become better-tuned to those differences - but they will also do better work because they were trained on gear which forced them to learn the other things that matter - gain structure, mic placement and technique, EQ, GR, etc., bettering their knowledge to where they can take full advantage of that better equipment.

IMHO of course.

d.

It depends, when I hear stuff like the Strokes, and Iggy pops lust for life. I don't think that material was recorded with the most fidelic stuff around. Loser by Beck was recorded with a home studio 4 track or 8 track. To me his focus is on "Don't think you can't make good music without the best gear"

His suggestions are for a beginner home studio guy that just wants to make music. Also sometimes cheap stuff has a great unique sound. He was more focused on Silvertone guitars than mics but I would rather use a 57 to get a strokes kinda vocal sound than a U87.

There might be some people out there than take the suggestion that only need a cheap 2 channel interface and Behringer mics are all you need to put out a Grammy but I doubt it. It's more words of encouragement and to don't have the idea that it's not worth doing if you can't afford the best.

I hear ya... and those are pretty good examples to support your opinion. I would counter, however, that those examples you gave are exceptions, and, were intentionally recorded and mixed with that lo-fi vibe in mind to begin with.

Beck's Loser or Where It's At were meant to be lo-fi - that sound was intentional for the overall effect, vibe and presentation of those songs - and the other artists you mentioned - like The Strokes or Iggy - aren't known for caring all that much about fidelity to begin with, because that's also a big part of their styles - they don't want to sound "studio"... and that's fine - and it works great for them. The various warts and sonic fugglies in their music are a part of what makes them attractive to those who are into them.

And still, there are others who are after a certain sonic purity as part of their signature sound - Steely Dan, Alan Parsons, etc., are artists who are known for placing as much priority on the hi fidelity of their recordings as they do with the quality of the songwriting and performances that they record.

But those are exceptions, Chris, on both extremes. The internet is flooded with awful-sounding mixes from people who aren't necessarily doing as such intentionally - a'la Beck - but more from the approach that they are convinced that their stuff sounds great... when it doesn't.

I guess my point is, that I hear a lot more stuff online these days that sounds like it was recorded at home through cheap gear ... and ultimately, they show up here, (or on one of the other recording sites) - either wanting to know why their mixes don't sound as good as what they hear with commercial releases ( which is fine, that's why we're here) - or - perhaps not so fine - convinced that what they are getting is professional in sound quality, and they're looking for confirmation, and then they get pissed when they don't get that confirmation. Thankfully, we seem to get more of the former here on RO then we do the latter.

But that doesn't mean that there aren't plenty of those out there who still release bad-sounding mixes, while at the same time thinking that they're the cat's ass.

FWIW, I'd like to see encouragement continued to given to beginner artists... it's important that they know that they can write good material if they work hard at it...and for what they are doing, they don't need a Neve desk with racks of second-mortgage priced gear. It's just that at the same time, I would also like to see them encouraged to eventually work towards upgrading what they use, and to not accept a Behringer or Tascam pre with a $59 dollar Chinese condenser mic as their "I've now got everything I need, my go-to, end all-be all to get professional sounding recording" rig.

I will say this... I do like those low-budget gear users for one reason: They make the quality that I get sound a lot better by comparison. LOL ;)

Most of the issues on quality of material in forums is due to people not knowing how to use the gear they have. Very rarely will better gear fix the main issues of mic placement, performance, crappy mixes levels etc and people with little experience.

He mentioned knowing your DAW inside and out is more important than having high priced gear. I know that I know Cubase well as I've used it for 15 years but I can't say I know it inside out and I'm learning new features all the time that I never used before.

In the end better gear is better unless you are going for a low fi sound. Only if you know how to use it though. Being clueless as to how things work with expensive gear will be far worse than knowing the fundamentals of recording with budget gear. To me I got the impression that he expected the user to know how to use the gear.

There just aren't that many, if any recordings that were commercial successes done on Berlinger or presonus gear. No way. 4/8- track has a particular lo fi sound that I personally like. Limited bandwidth and tape noise doesn't mean you make bad mixes or recordings. But those have a particular sound, like a rat distortion pedal. People use them now for that sound they offer, not because it's what they can afford.

The recordings that were done 'at home' on these big budget things are often redone, and it's a few of the tracks, not the drums and bass, Ect the main backbone of the song. And these are done by pros, on even modest pro gear. The Adele rolling In The deep vocal comes to mind, I believe it was an apogee duet, and a ride k2? They couldn't top the performance. Give it to Tom elmherst and have him mix on his ssl and a Grammy you have.

The type of guitar center gear isn't what 'records' are made on. If it were, that's what studios would use across the board. You can still make good recordings just like on a four track, but they will not have the polished big studio sound. Nobody will argue it's not listenable or even good really good sounding, but it won't sound like the best money can buy. There's a difference between the production didn't get away of a song, and that huge commercial sound.

I'll stop believing that it's just marketing hype, when I start hearing a lot of hit records done on presonus interfaces in rooms with $200 of foam in them. If it was possible people would be doing it. The biggest problem out there is lack of creativity and subjectively good songwriting.

I'm not sure how saying being creative and good at what you do is more important than having the best gear gets turned into marketing hype. Most gear now days if you know how to use it can make a decent recording. In alot.of case better tha pro gear from the 80s and 90s that you would see in pro level home or demo studios.

The hype is simply that budget gear will somehow make you more than a budget recording. None of these home recordings done on this budget gear is supporting national tours, or selling thousands of copies. Unless it's purely electronic/sample based music, the big time sound is just as expensive and hard to attain as it ever was.

kmetal, post: 432911, member: 37533 wrote: The hype is simply that budget gear will somehow make you more than a budget recording. None of these home recordings done on this budget gear is supporting national tours, or selling thousands of copies. Unless it's purely electronic/sample based music, the big time sound is just as expensive and hard to attain as it ever was.

Indeed. (y)

When you struggle for many years on budget gear and then get a glimpse of highend, you go AAHHH !! It simply just get easier. :)

If you are truely pationnated about recording, get the gear your budget can buy because any gear will get you going.
But if you are not very pationnate about recording and just want to record an album.. Please don't waste your time, energy and money.. Go to a pro studio and worry only about delivering a good performance !!

That's what I'd say to anyone asking about recording !

pcrecord, post: 432922, member: 46460 wrote: If you are truely pationnated about recording, get the gear your budget can buy because any gear will get you going.
But if you are not very pationnate about recording and just want to record an album.. Please don't waste your time, energie and money.. Go to a pro studio and worry only about delivering a good performance !!

Absolutely agreed. I never said that people shouldn't do it just because they can't afford pro gear - everyone has to start somewhere, and I don't know of any one of my colleagues who, when first starting out, were using Neve/SSL/Trident desks and racks full of LA2's, 1176's, Lexicons, Eventides and Focusrite Reds.

Most guys in my generation - guys like audiokid , Boswell, Thomas W. Bethel, and others who are now in their 50's and 60's, all of us pretty much started out on 1/4" -1/2" tape, and maybe a simple split 8 or 16 x 4 x 2 desk, one really nice condenser and a handful of good dynamics and maybe a ribbon or two. As time passed, we upgraded along the way to wider, faster formats, bigger desks with better pre's and EQ, more mics, better mics, and began adding certain OB pieces to our racks that we could occasionally afford... like Pultecs, LA2's, 1176's, Lexicons, etc.

When midi came along, we dove into that, too ( at least those of us who were able to foresee how huge it was going to be with modern production did ). And when digital began to rear its head as "the next big thing", we bought DAT machines, then computers, ADDA audio cards, and we learned as much as we could about that technology, too.

But all of it was a gradual process. No one - or maybe I should say almost no one - started out in the craft with a half million dollars worth of audio and midi gear in their basement or attic studios. We all started small and basic, learning every chance we could get - about gain structure, mic technique, EQ, GR - and then about digital, which involved computers, time code, converters ... so it was always an ever-changing process that we learned. We made countless mistakes, learned from them, and pushed the limitations of the gear we had at any given time. And as time and money allowed, we improved our situations. But I don't believe that any of us ever let the fact that we didn't have an SSL E Series in our attic studios stop us from creating, or helping others to fulfill their creative visions. Like everyone else who ever started out in the craft, I also started small, and made do with what I had.

But ... I never fooled myself into thinking that I could ever compete with - or get the same quality of audio as - places like Criteria, or Sound City, The Record Plant or The Hit Factory.
And, for as far as we have come in technology, ( which is amazing) and for as good of quality as we can now get with the affordable gear that most home studios use, as Kyle ( kmetal ) said in his previous post, "the big time sound is just as expensive and hard to attain as it ever was."

Eventually, if you stick with it long enough, there'll come that one moment - that single particular point in time, when you finally get a chance to work with and hear what truly pro gear sounds like and how it responds, and it's like an epiphany, like a bolt from the blue - as Marco (pcrecord ) said, it's that "ahhhh!!" moment, where you can't help but to be knocked flat on your ass by how huge of a difference there really is, because it's just so obvious...

But as an artist, as a creative spirit, the gear being used - or lack of it - shouldn't ever hold anyone back from recording and pursuing their artistic visions. If they are truly passionate about writing and creating music - then they should absolutely use whatever they can afford; and make the best with what they have ... but if they really want a pro sounding product, then at some point, they'll need to seek out a facility that has that truly pro gear, and that is staffed by cats who are also professional, and who know how to use that gear.

IMHO of course. ;)

d.

DonnyThompson, post: 432925, member: 46114 wrote: "the big time sound is just as expensive and hard to attain as it ever was."

I think most musicians who set up home studios go into it with the intention of capturing what they create in an easy and affordable way.
If I had put every dollar I'd ever spent in rehearsal and recording studios in the last 25 years into my own little space then maybe I'd be closer to attaining that big time sound at home than where I am now. But hey, no regrets and no disrespect to the pro-guys out there at all.(y)
What attracts me to being able to do it in the comfort of home is the ability to be able to walk in, press record and enjoy what I do in the process, without having to be stuffed around trying to co-ordinate 4 or 5 like minded people, all working to their own timetables & schedules, booking rooms all the while trying to juggle full time jobs and families along the way.

Anyhoo, I rubbed those stars out of my eyes years ago ;)

Sometimes life gets in the way when you are trying to juggle all that and have a hobby like music, as I'm sure we have all experienced in one way or another.
But it gives me the ability to do what I love and are passionate about without costing me an arm or a leg (or another wife for that matter....)
I like the fact that it doesn't have to cost me the earth to enjoy what I do at home, I can work to my own time frame, not have to put up with other tortured genius musicians with wanna-be rock-star egos, and at the end of the day have something to show for it and enjoy listening to.
I know my budget gear is not going to get me the pro-level sound I could get if I paid good money to do so in a studio, but for what I do and why I do it, how I do it suits my needs.
But I suppose like the many others out there and on this forum who are bitten by the bug, eventually over time the need to purchase better and more expensive gear kicks in and there is a natural progression to upgrade along the journey when the wallet allows, otherwise I'd still be recording on the old Boss BR-1180.

But thats the joy of the hunt I suppose...one day I'd love to look back and see a lot more high-end gear stuffed in my little home studio....
- I'd just have to work out how to sneak it all in there without being caught by the Minister For War & Finance:sneaky:

Hopefully I won't be too old to use it by then:(

kmetal, post: 432911, member: 37533 wrote: The hype is simply that budget gear will somehow make you more than a budget recording. None of these home recordings done on this budget gear is supporting national tours, or selling thousands of copies. Unless it's purely electronic/sample based music, the big time sound is just as expensive and hard to attain as it ever was.

Typically home recordings don't have great players and a level of preproduction, producing, engineering skill and songwriting ability that a big budget album has. That to me is more important than the gear. Jack White records with old antiquated gear with no computers or anything cutting edge,. he sells a few albums. He's an exception to the rule.

I think that the idea that better gear will fix your problems is just as flawed as thinking that budget gear can sound as good as high end.

Nowdays the difference between expensive and cheap gear is alot smaller that it used to be.

I also think pro level recording is a subjective thing. What is pro? What is the home recording owners goals,...

To make and sell their album? You could say that's pro, as they are making money from it.

Is it get you songs placed in T.V. and movies? that's also pro.

Is it to get a publishing deal with their songs? So not for release but good enough for the Publishing company to get the idea. Once again, also pro.

Realistically those are goals that can be achieved on a pro level with budget gear.

Will they create an album that gets released on a major label?

Not likely, but someone who's looking to do that probably doesn't need to watch a video breaking down the basics of the core things you need to have a home recording studio

Lets get this out of the way: if the music itself sucks, everything sucks.. But after that, lets talk shop here and set some things up so we really shed some light on this.

Generally speaking, not pointing at anyone here:
Do your acoustic tracks really sound comparable to what we are aspiring for?

If you say yes, I am happy for you but I bet you are most likely not being completely truthful to yourself either. I have never been happy. I am close but I do not believe I am capable of wearing all the hats and if I ever write a song or work on a song that I know has that special thing, I will most certainly take the time to pull out the big guns. I am going to need all the help I can get which includes good tracking and mixing steps.

Anyone who is up to it, upload a track to what you think is commercially comparable and lets talk serious.

I would bet most of us, including my mixes will not compete with pro mixes without team intervention. I think it takes a team to make a song greater than what we expect of ourselves. It all starts with the song and performance, then the ability to capture or produce it. Some songs are really simple, black and white and others are complicated.
An in phase mix no matter what playback system it passes through is about all I care about today. This is where the capture, gear and mixing plays a huge role to me.

Does your system keep all your tracks in phase? If so, then all you need to worry about is the music and how it translates to your audience.

If you can do it all yourself, start to finish, using cheap gear, all the power to you. I think its worth posting your song and writing a book about how to do it. You will surely become a billionaire.
I think I'm close to this answer but first I need a great song. And I'm getting too old to know what the difference is between what I think is good.
So, I spend more time reading what I should be doing over making music I was once so good at doing with almost nothing more than my guitar and voice. I think I'm going insane. lol.

audiokid, post: 432933, member: 1 wrote:
Generally speaking, not pointing at anyone here:
Do your acoustic tracks really sound comparable to what we are aspiring for?

What does that mean? Who is we and what are the standards? If you are going for highest and most fidelic sound possible then no, budget gear won't get you there.

But that doesn't mean you can't make money, thus being professional using budget gear.

I think we, you, me, anyone can make money doing anything we are good at. The true test is how long you can keep doing throughout your life. I mean, if there comes a time where we can't seem to get ahead, then its worth investigating why. That is, if we care that much about it.

Some of us will never want anything more out of this business than a way to capture our work for ourselves. And that is really where I sit in this business. I've never got into recording or mixing to make a living working on other peoples music. To me, that leads me directly into big money and serious acoustics. And always having to fix it in the mix which is a loosing battle really. Its a horrible way to make a living so I want no part of fixing other peoples problems. But, I would love to work in a team. A team that understands what the other guy needs to make a goal happen.

I agree with you completely.

I'm telling my kids to get a great converter/pre combo, something like an SF24 mic and the best vocal mic they can discover, put it up in a suitable room and track yourself. If they do something really awesome, we will send it to someone that wants to take it to a team that has more time to produce it. I know my limits and it is more about what I don't know than what I do. What I do know is if you don't have the song or profit margin to warrant the expenditures, you don't have a reason to invest in special gear pro's use.
Simple yet high quality tracking equipment and a DAW is where I start. That goes a lot further than a rack or library full of bloat.

In a home based recording situation a team is definitely an asset. On a pro level album you'll have a tracking engineer (sometimes 2 or 3 of them) and then one or more mix engineers. Different rooms, different gear, different playing talent. the more options you have the better.

Having access to all of that when getting a label to front the cost is huge as far s the final product goes.

A Bricasti and a vocal booth would be on my list as well. Vocals trump everything and nothing sounds better to my ears than a well captured voice through a Bricasti.

PS:
Contradicting myself... if I was collaborating...
If whomever gets my tracks, providing the best capture I can, with the least amount of detrimental room signature, has the best opportunity to use their best spacial equipment to fit my work into their studio. This is why I am so big on conversion and avoiding bad room bleed etc.

Which is why I would rent a big room over using a small boxy studio, then start thinking about gear and so it goes. the nightmare begins again. .

I get ya ya Sean. that me me, not Donny you quoted btw. I also have mostly budget gear, and I enjoy the freedoms I have at home versus working down at the studio. I need nothing more than I have for what I do at home, and in fact I'm selling some things off.

Once people get the hang of recording and have a need or burning desire for good gear they fall into a trap. High end gear holds its value at least twice as long, and/or increases in value. The problem is the incremental upgrades of one piece at a time, offer incremental improvements. Not only do things go obsolete while this 'no end in sight' process of upgrades occurs, your talking upgrades that are marginal in improvement when you step to high end pieces. So while being 10x more expensive than the budget version, it's probably only 15% better. (Numbers for illustration only lol) so the preamble gets bought, and it sounds good but not quite 'there' then the expensive compressor, same deal. Mic rinse wash repeat. Eventually it gets down to room acoustics and monitoring and conversions (although some people start there). The when the million dollar facility is purchased, it's like " okay who's got the hit song now, let's lay it down".

I think you have a solid grip and expectations Sean, I respect that. I think the average home studio can rival decent pro studios in a lot of areas. Given most work is done as overdubs these days a few nice channels, a reasonable tracking area can accomplish fully professional results.

I think a lot of people are mislead. They don't realize that one or two of the pieces of that high end puzzle will be enough. Just cuz it's the same pre amp, doesn't mean it's the same everything else, that went into a particular sound.

@ Audio Kid, I would just focus on a great song performed well. Unless you have the budget for everything under the sun don't worry about it.

To me it's more important to do things than think about doing things as far as gear goes. There is always someone who makes do with subpar anything and always someone who will have the latest and greatest room, mic, etc.

I will always be in the middle of those 2 extremes.. I'm ok with that.

kmetal, post: 432939, member: 37533 wrote: I get ya ya Sean. that me me, not Donny you quoted btw

Sorry kmetal, I think I quoted Donny who was quoting you.
I think you have to look at this as what you want to get out of it.
In my case, and probably the case for most home studio owners, I'm not out to make the next Thriller album...I'm aware that what I have only allows me to achieve a certain sonic quality that reflects my budget. Shriller maybe, Thriller, I think not.
OTOH, if I wanted to create the next Thriller album (not taking into account the talent & collaboration that goes into creating such a hugely successful album, talent which arguably I do not possess & collaboration I do not have),;) I'd most likely have to mortgage the house, hock everything I own, sell the wife into slavery & beg, borrow & steal to even get close to the amount needed to set up a pro-level studio to even entertain the idea of achieving that level of sonic quality for a start, let alone come up with some amazing creative material to make it happen and the knowledge & understanding to bring it all together at the right time,....and then rely on the audio gods to shine down on me somewhere along the lines.

The end justifies the means.

I suppose I would compare it to, lets say, home renovation. (stay with me here....no long bow intended.....)

-If I was a DIY home renovator who tinkers on weekends with the odd bit of reno around the home, am I going to go to my big-box local hardware chain and buy a relatively priced cordless drill / power saw or any other tool that allows me to do the job?
- Most likely.

-Or am I going to go head down to my local Makita or Metabo trade supplier and buy all top quality, high-end stuff worth big $$$ for small jobs around the home??
- Probably not.

-But say I was a tradie that relied on my tools every day to make a living, and my clients expected a level of quality & professionalism that justified the cost of my work, then the investment in those expensive power tools and that $2000 cordless drill that drills holes by itself would be a no-brainer.

Now I'm not begrudging those that buy quality for the long run, but unless I'm going to use that piece of hardware every day, week-in, week-out in my line of work and make a dollar out of it along the way, then I most likely will buy at a pricepoint that reflects what I want to do with it.

After all, that el-cheapo $49 cordless drill purchased is still going to drill that hole I require, just maybe not with the quality the high-end cordless drill would day-in day-out.

You have to look at what you want to get out of it.

audiokid, post: 432933, member: 1 wrote: Generally speaking, not pointing at anyone here:
Do your acoustic tracks really sound comparable to what we are aspiring for?

-Probably not, but then again, I'm not spruiking my wares or talent to record labels or sticking my hand out to charge other people big dollars to do it either.
In most cases, I'm doing it for myself as a record (pun intended) of my work.

I would love to have a home studio chock-full of pro-audio OB gear, who wouldn't?
But I'm also a realist and know to make that type of investment I'd need to take what I do a lot more seriously than I do now, and in doing so expect that investment to make a return for me in the long run, otherwise its just another overly expensive hobby, and I already have a few of those with my race car & fetish for restoring 50s' era classic cars.(y)
There is always a desire to improve on the sound that you have, otherwise everyone would be satisfied with budget & pro-sumer gear.
And I agree that with the expansion of the budget & pro-sumer gear market comes a dumbing-down of the quality of audio out there, but it also allows access for more people to enjoy their music creativity like never before.
After all, its those that start out with the budget stuff, that learn the craft and eventually move up through the ranks to buy the high-end gear down the track if they wish to do so.:)

kmetal, post: 432939, member: 37533 wrote: I get ya ya Sean. that me me, not Donny you quoted btw

Hey kmetal....
-Is there an echo in this thread in this thread ???

-Somebody please turn down the ratio.....;)

I'd say the level of gear you need coincidences with who you are working with or for. Unless you're independently wealthy.

If you're making your own album to sell by your self the level you need is determined by whether or not you can sell it. Most likely if you are a good band and have fans budget gear now days will do if recorded well.

If you record tracks or mix/master for other artists they will determine the quality needed and that has to do with what it's used for.

If you have clients that work for or are major labels or major T.V. and film. then you need high end gear. If not, having high end gear is nice but not necessary.

I don't think its impossible to produce a hit in a small home studio, eg Goytes' Somebody That I Used To know

It has topped charts in the US, UK, and Australia, as well as 23 other national charts, and reached the top 10 in more than 30 countries around the world. The song has sold more than 13 million copies worldwide, becoming one of the best-selling digital singles of all time.

Here is something that defies the logic and was produced in a barn at his parents home, admittedly, it did sample Luiz Bonfá's song "Seville" from his 1967 album Luiz Bonfa Plays Great Songs in which Goyte signed an early agreement to pay estate 45% of all royalties for using the sample.
Edit : over 1 million dollars in royalties paid to date for use of the sample to the late Luiz Bonfá's estate

http://www.songfacts.com/detail.php?id=25093

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Somebody_That_I_Used_to_Know

So I don't think its impossible to produce a hit in a home studio, but I think you'd have more chance winning the lottery.;)

totally agree. Possible but not probable.

Sean G, post: 432945, member: 49362 wrote: So I don't think its impossible to produce a hit in a home studio.. Here is something that defies the [="http://www.apple.com/logicstudio/"]Logic[/]="http://www.apple.co…"]Logic[/] and was produced in a barn at his parents home,

Okay... fair enough. But let's dig a little deeper into the Gotye track... shall we? ;)

Yes, it's true that it was recorded at his home ( or at his parent's home in their barn) and yes it was done with Ableton and Pro Tools as the base platforms ( which is neither here nor there, you don't need PT to record a great-sounding song).
But I'll stake my reputation on the premise that he wasn't using a Behringer mic and a Tascam preamp, either. You can hear an obvious quality there that is commensurate with higher end gear.
And, as you'll see below, the song wasn't mixed at Gotye's "barn".

To continue...

The song was mixed by François "Franc" Tétaz, an Australian film composer, music producer and mixer, who won the [url=http://'https://en.wikipedi…']Australasian Performing Right Association (APRA) / Australian Guild of Screen Composers (AGSC) 2006 'Feature Film Score of the Year' Award for Wolf Creek (2005).[1] In 1998, Tetaz built a studio in a converted chocolate factory in Richmond, Melbourne. The studio was designed by Martin Gill and Roger Wood at Wood Marsh. The acoustics were designed by Chris Morton of Aro Technologies. Franc's mastering discography includes Merzbow’s Merzbox 50 CD box set of noise music for Extreme and the remaster of classic Triffids album Born Sandy Devotional for Domino.

From SOS interview:

"Seven songs, including 'Somebody I Used To Know', were mixed 'in the box' at Tétaz's all-digital studio, Moose Mastering, while the remaining five were mixed on an analog desk ( SSL) at The Mill, a mostly analog studio owned by Andy Stewart, who mixed 'Giving Me A Chance' and assisted Tétaz and De Backer on the four other songs mixed at The Mill."
-----------------------
"Wally's main vocal microphone was a Neumann M147 that went into a mono SSL Alpha Channel.'
-----------------------
"The main room here at Moose is six metres wide and eight to 10 metres long, and has a wall with Schroeder diffusers at the back. I have a large Pro Tools rig with a whole bunch of plug-ins and DSP. Other than an Avid Command 8, I don't have a desk, and very few bits of outboard gear. My main piece of outboard is the Cranesong HEDD.
-----------------------
" Designing and building the room here was quite expensive, and I invested in Duntech Sovereigns, which are my main monitors. They have ATC mid-range drivers with a very clear mid-range and bottom end that extends flat to 27Hz. The acoustics of the room are very even as well, so I have a really good sense of what is happening in the lower two octaves. I also have a 5.1 set of Mackie HR824 speakers, which I don't like that much, [Yamaha] NS10s, Auratones, Genelec 8050s and Event Opals. I used the last a lot when mixing Wally's record."
----------------------
"François Tétaz chose to work at The Mill on the tracks that he felt would benefit from its high-end analog equipment". For those we went to The Mill, Andy Stewart's studio. It's an analog heaven, and I really enjoyed going between Moose Mastering and Andy's place. His studio sounds completely different than mine, and it has lots of different colours and flavours that I can reach for; I liked using his SSL bus compressor and EQ to make the mid-range a bit harsher or to add some top end."
-----------------------

The album was mastered by William Bowden: http://www.discogs.com/artist/174717-William-Bowden

SSL... Genelec... Event... Cranesong... Neumann. Gear by these particular manufacturers is not what you would typically find in the "average" home studio, or that would be used on the typical home-produced album.
And, having a mix engineer who has award-winning credits for major films is also not "typical"; nor is having your project mastered by an M.E. who's credits include The Finn Brothers, Kylie Minogue, The Church and Olivia Newton John.

So, I think it's safe to say that this isn't your "typical" home-recorded album, as we would normally hear. ;)

DonnyThompson, post: 432948, member: 46114 wrote: But I'll stake my reputation on the premise that he wasn't using a [="http://www.behringer.com/"]Behringer[/]="http://www.behringe…"]Behringer[/] mic and a [[url=http://="http://www.www.tasc…"]Tascam[/]="http://www.www.tasc…"]Tascam[/] preamp, either.

For starters, I never said anywhere in my posts that he used any of these.

DonnyThompson, post: 432948, member: 46114 wrote: And, as you'll see below, the song wasn't mixed at Gotye's "barn".

Secondly, I never said it was mixed at his barn.
The fact of the matter is that he worked on the production of this song for a number of years from the barn at his parents home on the Mornington Peninsula near Port Melbourne, which would be fair to say, would be closer to the average typical home studio than where the song was finally mixed, and then mastered at a later date.

Goyte: How I wrote 'Somebody That I Used To Know'

Wouter de Backer, aka Walter, aka Wally, aka Gotye (a stylisation of Gautier, the French translation of Walter) recorded Making Music and 'Somebody' in a barn on his parents' property close to Melbourne. His main tool was an Apple MacBook Pro laptop, running Ableton Live and Pro Tools. "Ableton was the starting point for most of the songs,” explains de Backer, "and I used Pro Tools for engineering instrumental and vocal recordings and editing. My main vocal microphone was a Neumann M147 that went into a mono SSL Alpha Channel. I also sang many vocals directly into my MacBook Pro mic, and used things like Speakerphone from Audio Ease to emulate different microphone EQs and different spaces and settings. Plus I borrowed some other Neumann mics, Audio-Technica mics, and a Carillon Axis 70, a very cheap Chinese ribbon microphone for some of the vocals on the song 'Brontë'. My dad put together some acoustic tubes made from glass wool and wood and stretchy fabric. I also spent a lot of my time searching for strange instruments and old vinyl records for me to sample.

"I occasionally used a TEAC A3340 quarter-inch [tape machine] for some bass recordings and other stuff, mostly when sampling notes of acoustic instruments to turn them into virtual patches. I hit the tape hard to get harmonic distortion. I also recorded samples with other bits and pieces, like a Dictaphone — a little handheld cassette recorder — and the Edirol 09. I used the latter to record the Winton Musical Fence in the outback of Queensland, which became the bass line for the song 'Eyes Wide Open'. I dumped all these recordings into Ableton or Pro Tools, and then had to edit them to bring them into time. Another piece of gear that I used a lot was the Novation Launchpad, to trigger samples in Ableton. I'd chop my samples up in Drum Rack in Ableton and triggered them with my Launchpad to try out melodic ideas. Many of the main hooks for 'Somebody I Used To Know' and part of a song like 'Brontë' was me playing samples with the Launchpad to come up with melodies.

"I made my first two records just moving coloured boxes around on the screen with a mouse, and being tied to a desktop computer, so it was nice this time to record using different things. One of the main differences with Making Mirrors, in terms of the sampling approach, was that I tried to incorporate more live performances to come up with more original melodies and ideas. I am still using samples for texture and like a platform to work from, but I then used particular interfaces like the Launchpad or a MIDI keyboard or a set of drum pads to interact with those sound snippets and come up with different sequences and different ideas. The MIDI keyboard I used was a Novation Remote SL, which is actually broken now. One of my favourite patches that I created for the album was the autoharp one. Live, I just pull that patch straight out of Ableton Live and play it with the MalletKat. It is like having a large hammer dulcimer on stage.”

Other gear that Gotye used in The Barn during the making of Making Mirrors included a Minimoog Voyager Old School synth, a Suzuki Omnichord, and the huge Lowrey Cotillion D575 home organ, bought for $100 in a second-hand store, on which he created most of the track 'State Of The Art'. Unlike some sample-oriented musicians, de Backer does not lack instrumental skills — he's an accomplished drummer and a respectable keyboardist. "I really wanted to involve more actual playing and more musicians on Making Mirrors,” he says, "but probably half the songs on the new record were still inspired by a break that came off a vinyl record. In the case of 'Somebody', it was the nylon guitar sample that came from Luiz Bonfa's track 'Seville'. It was just two downbeats and two offbeats, and I took the offbeats out and turned them into their own little kind of separate top line, and I then crafted a bass-note line out of the two bass notes in the first two beats in my track, and put these two sets of notes on top of each other to create a repetitive two-note loop that I found quite hypnotic. The other parts, like the xylophone and the wobbly vibrato guitar, are also from records, but chopped up into individual notes and re-pitched. The wobbly guitar line is the second hook in the song, it occurs between the verses, and the vibrato came from me manually manipulating the turntable as I recorded the guitar sample.

"Writing 'Somebody' was a gradual and linear process. I started with the Luiz Bonfa sample, then I found the drums, and after that I started working on the lyric and the melody, and added the wobbly guitar-sample melody. After that, I took a break, and a few weeks later I came back to the session and decided on the chorus chord progression, wrote the chorus melody, and combined that with sounds like the Latin loop and some of the percussion and the flute sounds that further filled the space. At that point I hit a brick wall. I was thinking: 'This is pretty good, how can I get to the end really quickly?' and I was trying to take lazy decisions to finish the song. I considered repeating the chorus, an instrumental bridge, a change in tempo or key, I even considered finishing the song after the first chorus. But nothing felt like it was strong enough. So the third session was all about writing the female part and changing the perspective. The arrangement of 'Somebody' is reflective of me moving towards using sounds that provide me with inspiration for a texture or a platform for an idea, and then through sonic manipulation and coming up with original melodies and harmonic ideas to make it my own. I guess the balance of sounds taken from records and samples I created myself is perhaps 50-50.

"When you see the 'Somebody' session, you realise that there are many more sounds in there than is apparent on first listen. It may sound like quite a minimal song, but there are many different small things happening at key moments that provide minor accents for the lyric. During the mix, Franc [Tétaz] helped me make decisions on the right amount of noise versus cleanness in samples and on the overall dynamic arc of the song, like how soft can the verse be for it to still be engaging and intelligible to an audience that's using all kinds of different speakers, while still also having a huge powerful dynamic jump in the chorus. Clarity and well-controlled dynamics are often lacking from my rough mixes. Frank is good at massaging my arrangements of samples and soft synths and bits of live performance into a coherent sound stage. It is not easy to create that from sources that come from so many different places.”

- I don't know, apart from a few borrowed Neumann & Audio Technica mics, sounds like a typical home studio to me, with a cheap chinese Carillon Axis 70 mic, a $100 organ from the Salvation Army Op shop and his Dads' homemade acoustic tubes...

but hey, I could be wrong;)

Now what I'm gonna say is not directed to anyone on this forum.

Chris Perra, post: 432934, member: 48232 wrote: budget gear won't get you there.

But that doesn't mean you can't make money, thus being professional using budget gear.

This statement is the cause of the disolution of quality in current recordings. I know what you ment Chris, what I'm saying is some people out there, in my region in Quebec anyway, had that same line throwed back at me when discussing quality recordings. I have no problem with people who wants to learn how to record and I in fact encourage them to pursue this pation if they really have it.. What I don't like is when a newbie with an audiobuddy advertise quality recording and charge thrusty musicians for mediocre results.
I had countless customers saying, ''Well I went to this guy to record and after paying good money it was a total waste, I hope you can do better!''
Or this other one saying '' I went to a pro studio and I think I'm able to do the same thing'' when in fact it was not a pro studio but just a home studio with a vocal booth..

I have a problem with anyone who pretends selling pro sound quality while being convinced of it because they only compare themself to other low budget places.

I woud say ; ' If you are about to charge for recording services. Before you do, go to a big pro studio and book a few hours' How to know if it is a pro studio? Check your where artists who sell 50K or more album recorded them. You need to experience a pro session at least once before pretending offering it to others..

Man I had this guy charging for a collaboration album (6 signers), he was so lost at mixing time that he came to me for help. The tracking was so bad, it was pathetic.
He had built a vocal booth out of carton boards and foam. The fact that he charged to track unusable tracks just pissed me off..

So budget gear to learn and/or record your own stuff is ok. . . Charging pro fee for budget sound.. that's not !!!

Those things happen for sure. I see it all the time and hear the same things. I do a ton of drum tracks for people that aren't happy with stuff they've recorded somewhere else. I'm not a great example of budget gear as I have higher end end mics and pres. The only thing I use that's budget is my A/D. Eventually when I get around to it I'll most likely upgrade that as well.

The main thing when I hear the stuff that they bring in recorded previously somewhere else is not always the fidelity of the gear, it's the quality of the engineer and a terrible mix.
Your studio with better gear and you being a better engineer will be far better than a studio with weak gear and a crappy engineer.

That said , that's from the perspective of someone competing for work in an industry and is irrelevant as far as someone who would write their owns songs, program their own drums keys etc and sing or play guitar using a 2 channels interface.
To me, that's the target audience the video was for.

Sean G, post: 432954, member: 49362 wrote: Goyte: How I wrote 'Somebody That I Used To Know'

Wouter de Backer, aka Walter, aka Wally, aka Gotye (a stylisation of Gautier, the French translation of Walter) recorded Making Music and 'Somebody' in a barn on his parents' property close to Melbourne. His main tool was an Apple MacBook Pro laptop, running Ableton Live and Pro Tools. "Ableton was the starting point for most of the songs,” explains de Backer, "and I used Pro Tools for engineering instrumental and vocal recordings and editing. My main vocal microphone was a Neumann M147 that went into a mono SSL Alpha Channel. I also sang many vocals directly into my MacBook Pro mic, and used things like Speakerphone from Audio Ease to emulate different microphone EQs and different spaces and settings. Plus I borrowed some other Neumann mics, Audio-Technica mics, and a Carillon Axis 70, a very cheap Chinese ribbon microphone for some of the vocals on the song 'Brontë'. My dad put together some acoustic tubes made from glass wool and wood and stretchy fabric. I also spent a lot of my time searching for strange instruments and old vinyl records for me to sample.

"I occasionally used a TEAC A3340 quarter-inch [tape machine] for some bass recordings and other stuff, mostly when sampling notes of acoustic instruments to turn them into virtual patches. I hit the tape hard to get harmonic distortion. I also recorded samples with other bits and pieces, like a Dictaphone — a little handheld cassette recorder — and the Edirol 09. I used the latter to record the Winton Musical Fence in the outback of Queensland, which became the bass line for the song 'Eyes Wide Open'. I dumped all these recordings into Ableton or Pro Tools, and then had to edit them to bring them into time. Another piece of gear that I used a lot was the Novation Launchpad, to trigger samples in Ableton. I'd chop my samples up in Drum Rack in Ableton and triggered them with my Launchpad to try out melodic ideas. Many of the main hooks for 'Somebody I Used To Know' and part of a song like 'Brontë' was me playing samples with the Launchpad to come up with melodies.

"I made my first two records just moving coloured boxes around on the screen with a mouse, and being tied to a desktop computer, so it was nice this time to record using different things. One of the main differences with Making Mirrors, in terms of the sampling approach, was that I tried to incorporate more live performances to come up with more original melodies and ideas. I am still using samples for texture and like a platform to work from, but I then used particular interfaces like the Launchpad or a MIDI keyboard or a set of drum pads to interact with those sound snippets and come up with different sequences and different ideas. The MIDI keyboard I used was a Novation Remote SL, which is actually broken now. One of my favourite patches that I created for the album was the autoharp one. Live, I just pull that patch straight out of Ableton Live and play it with the MalletKat. It is like having a large hammer dulcimer on stage.”

Other gear that Gotye used in The Barn during the making of Making Mirrors included a Minimoog Voyager Old School synth, a Suzuki Omnichord, and the huge Lowrey Cotillion D575 home organ, bought for $100 in a second-hand store, on which he created most of the track 'State Of The Art'. Unlike some sample-oriented musicians, de Backer does not lack instrumental skills — he's an accomplished drummer and a respectable keyboardist. "I really wanted to involve more actual playing and more musicians on Making Mirrors,” he says, "but probably half the songs on the new record were still inspired by a break that came off a vinyl record. In the case of 'Somebody', it was the nylon guitar sample that came from Luiz Bonfa's track 'Seville'. It was just two downbeats and two offbeats, and I took the offbeats out and turned them into their own little kind of separate top line, and I then crafted a bass-note line out of the two bass notes in the first two beats in my track, and put these two sets of notes on top of each other to create a repetitive two-note loop that I found quite hypnotic. The other parts, like the xylophone and the wobbly vibrato guitar, are also from records, but chopped up into individual notes and re-pitched. The wobbly guitar line is the second hook in the song, it occurs between the verses, and the vibrato came from me manually manipulating the turntable as I recorded the guitar sample.

"Writing 'Somebody' was a gradual and linear process. I started with the Luiz Bonfa sample, then I found the drums, and after that I started working on the lyric and the melody, and added the wobbly guitar-sample melody. After that, I took a break, and a few weeks later I came back to the session and decided on the chorus chord progression, wrote the chorus melody, and combined that with sounds like the Latin loop and some of the percussion and the flute sounds that further filled the space. At that point I hit a brick wall. I was thinking: 'This is pretty good, how can I get to the end really quickly?' and I was trying to take lazy decisions to finish the song. I considered repeating the chorus, an instrumental bridge, a change in tempo or key, I even considered finishing the song after the first chorus. But nothing felt like it was strong enough. So the third session was all about writing the female part and changing the perspective. The arrangement of 'Somebody' is reflective of me moving towards using sounds that provide me with inspiration for a texture or a platform for an idea, and then through sonic manipulation and coming up with original melodies and harmonic ideas to make it my own. I guess the balance of sounds taken from records and samples I created myself is perhaps 50-50.

"When you see the 'Somebody' session, you realise that there are many more sounds in there than is apparent on first listen. It may sound like quite a minimal song, but there are many different small things happening at key moments that provide minor accents for the lyric. During the mix, Franc [Tétaz] helped me make decisions on the right amount of noise versus cleanness in samples and on the overall dynamic arc of the song, like how soft can the verse be for it to still be engaging and intelligible to an audience that's using all kinds of different speakers, while still also having a huge powerful dynamic jump in the chorus. Clarity and well-controlled dynamics are often lacking from my rough mixes. Frank is good at massaging my arrangements of samples and soft synths and bits of live performance into a coherent sound stage. It is not easy to create that from sources that come from so many different places.”

- I don't know, apart from a few borrowed Neumann & Audio Technica mics, sounds like a typical home studio to me, with a cheap chinese Carillon Axis 70 mic, a $100 organ from the Salvation Army Op shop and his Dads' homemade acoustic tubes...

but hey, I could be wrong;)

Like I said in an earlier post, if your talking electronic/sample based music, it's much easier to be commercially relevant sonically. This is becasue besides the monitoring side, your equipment has nothing to do with sound quality of the material your working with. In fact much of electronic based music is based on mangling and degrading otherwise "good" sounds.

So this all just re affirms the notion that the home studio is a place that can start ideas, or perhaps put the final tweaks on, but it's not a place where full commercial productions/hit songs will be made start to finish. Mixers always swap samples out and chop things up, especially on electronic based music. Glen Bullard did Alana's morrisettes jagged little pill in his "home studio" which had nothing short of top of the line everything, still re recorded the basic rythym tracks at a studio with a band.

Down did the classic album 'nola' in a big ol barn out in Louisiana swamps with a 4/8 track.

If you turn on Spotify, or Amazon, or iTunes, Ect, you will not hear home productions often, if ever. Especially in music where acoustic/live instruments are involved. You will certainly not hear recordings done on an le system using t racks, make it to the final cut. if your talking a minor threat style hardcore band sure, maybe on the grunge channels you'll hear some tape or live recorded tracks.

Just listen to artists home recordings and then the final products. Sublime, and Death both have put out their outtakes. I the case of deaths 'symbolic' a classic Tascam and drum machine demo, it's fully fleshed out. It's essentially the same song on the album, just re recorded at morrisound. Would the demo make the cut as a finished product on the underground back in the day? Sure. Did the studio album version create a more filled out complete version of the idea. Absolutely.

When your using sampling budget gear is an entirely different conversation becasue pre amps and all the stuff that went into the sound, was done by someone else, professionally, on pro priced gear.

I can reheat a gourmet meal in my oven and say I cooked it at home....

Most people with 2 channel interfaces doing home recordings are using samples for drums, keys etc. Many top tier studios do the same.
There's so many huge pop albums with programmed drums and keys with live guitar and vocal. A home studio can easily do that.

This forum is primarily for live recording of actual instruments but much of rest of the recording world programs and uses samples on everything.