Into the fire

My recording activity has been pretty limited. I make sound clips, do some casual playing and so on. Suddenly I find myself being asked to make a record for my brother. I have 14 songs to choose from and most of them are pretty good. Every person he has worked with has had a major problem that took them off the project. The poor guy that was producing it just had a brain hemorrage at age 42.
 
So here I sit, being asked to take over when I don't even have a studio to work in. I've recorded the songs with just vocal and guitar for my own listening and evaluation. Best of all, I won't get paid a nickel.
 
What to do........

Didn't have a brother, but as my daughter got into her teens and early 20s, we would sing and play together, as well as record songs we both liked. Haven't done it in a while (life gets in the way), but I still enjoy going back and listening and remixing. Sounds like it might be fun project for the two of you.

You're doing Dokken covers? 

What???
 
We're coming over in 2 weeks to enjoy cool weather.
 
Do you live over in the desert?
 
 
edit to add: "Yikes": http://fox12weather.wordpress.com/
 
 
 
 

Maybe I should fly in to Detroit and offer to be a record assistant for John. It's probably cooler up there.
 
:-)

IIRC John is over the bridge in the nice part of "town". 

:-)
 
Is there any thing you really want help with? I think of you as a perfectly capable sort of person... 
 
I find the transition from pre production to production can range from super easy to something akin to walking through a field of land mines. It really depends on what the musician is up for.
 
The first things I try to figure out is:
 
1) Does the musician have any experience and resulting skill playing to a metronome or click track.
2) Is the musician in the practice of, and capable of, playing an overdub to a previously recorded track (as opposed to playing simultaneously with living breathing musicians)
3) When the musician says "we can punch that in" do they have any idea how to perform a punch in.
4) If the musician confidently announces that they can play to click track, can they quickly tell you (with accuracy) what the bpm of the song at hand is (If not... take that as a clue that they haven't been practicing to a click track)
 
 
When I think I have a handle on that I try to proceed with a work flow that adapts to the musician's strengths and avoids their weaknesses.
 
Some musicians get it (the multi track recording process) and it is really easy to crash through the process and some want to get it but don't practice being a studio cat enough to pull off studio work.
 
The first step when moving into the production phase is to identify what is going to be the best "scratch track". That can be a nice singer songwriter demo recording, a raw metronome click, or maybe some basic chords playing on a synth/sampler... it all depends on what the musician is bringing to the table.
 
 
 
Other than that... I hope that maybe you will post some specific questions if/as they occur to you, and maybe someone can offer some help.
 
 
 
 
 
Oh yeah, I have one last guideline... lately I have limited projects to 3 songs actively being worked on at a time just to make it easier to stay focused on the project.