cparmerlee
 
Possibly, but the client might want to be present for the final edits.

Then the client is more than welcome to do their project in a studio that is setup with the proper facilities, equipment, paid staff, liability insurance and business licenses to handle that sort of thing. And they are more than welcome to pay the rate which generally goes along with having all that stuff.
 
You're trying to offer a low cost alternative for bands and artists who could not otherwise afford to produce quality recordings of their music correct? Go to a soup kitchen and ask them how often they have filet minion on the menu.

JohanSebatianGremlin
Go to a soup kitchen and ask them how often they have filet minion on the menu.

Sorry.  I wouldn't treat clients that way.  I might think that, but I take on a client, I try to treat them with respect, regardless of their budget.

No lack of respect toward anyone was implied nor is any required. Soup kitchens don't serve filet minion because they can't afford to do that and stay on budget. Doesn't mean they don't want to serve it, I'm sure most would love to if they could. Business is business. Like I said earlier, its great that you want to help the community by offering a low cost alternative. But if your business model isn't sustainable, the business goes away. And if the business goes away, no one benefits.

IMHO you're adding a lot of complexity and inviting a ton of head aches and extra time investment to something you're designing to be a low budget, low margin product. I'm not saying its impossible to do that profitably, but it certainly does add some extra challenge. I'm just big on simplifying things like that I guess. I wish you best of luck with it though. It could be a terrific thing if you can make it fly.

One thought that's occured to me is that "live" recordings by some of the most famous bands there is often have parts that have been re-recorded in the studio. There are even "live" albums where it's reputed that the only thing on them that was recorded at the gig is the audience noise.

Many bands, especially though not exclusively new and/or young bands actually don't know what they sound like "out front" even if they're only using PA for vocals and backline for everything else. Band members sometimes have widely varied ideas about how they think the band should sound as well.

And what a band might easily get away with in the atmosphere of a live gig may not be acceptable in a format that's going to have to stand up to repeated listening in a completely different environment.

I guess I'm wondering about how much re-tracking and error correction might be necessary to produce something the customer is happy with.

In principle I can't see why the idea being put forward won't work technically, whether it can make money is a different matter, but I am a little concerned about the managing customer expectations side of things.

All of tlw's comments reflect my own experience working with young/inexperienced musicians and bands. In their head, they sound awesome. And garbage in, garbage out is the last thing they want to hear when they complain that you didn't make their drummer's $39 snare with heads that haven't been changed since 1971 sound as good as the snare Bonham played on Zeppelin III.
 
A quick and dirty (but otherwise clean and decent sounding) live recording was the proposed premise in the first post. You want the bass and kick a little less in your face because that's your perception of how your band is supposed to sound? No prob, email the mix engineer and revised copy will be delivered in a day or two. 

But invite them in for the final mix session and next thing you know, you're spending 45 minutes with drum replacer because the kick and snare are ok but I'd like it better if the kick had more slap and if the snare was deeper, and oh can we pull the acoustic back a bit during the first verse but make it just a tad more up front during the chorus and then can you pan the rhythm guitar more toward center during the intro and solo, but not dead center, just closer to the center yada yada yada. IMO that's not what was originally proposed and its also why recording studios cost what they cost.
 
It'd be great to be able to offer that level of service to everyone for pennies on the dollar. But if you do, you'll either end up operating at a loss or you'll end up using mix engineers who are worth only what you can afford to pay them. 

There's a sign that hangs in the lobby where I work. Good Fast Cheap, pick any two. When it comes to certain things these days, it really ought to read pick any one.

imho "collaborative" mixing would be the artist and mix engineer in "parallel" sharing the same listening environment.
The proposal sounds more like mixing in "series" which might make sense if the intent is to farm out the effort required to generate a rough mix.
 
This may have value for fledgling bands who might benefit from hearing how they actually sound. But this could also be done with a hand held 2-track recorder.
 
If the expectation is for a more "polished/professional" sounding treatment then I expect you need a strategy to manage the challenges noted by JohanSebastianGremlin.
 
Maybe set expectations for Cheap. Not so Fast. Good enough? with a before/after example?

tlw does have a point. I have been involved in both live album releases that were not *cough* true to the original live recordings and have also been involved where the studio mix engineer had only sat through one live gig and created a sound a million miles away from the raw energy of the live set.
To deliver an economical service, it would help to have some guidance as to what the end product should resemble as long as turd polishing is not expected. and as posted above, tweak requests (if reasonable) could be fed back to whoever is mixing. Having musicians in the studio when not charging an hourly rate is a loss maker for sure.

JohanSebatianGremlin
A quick and dirty (but otherwise clean and decent sounding) live recording was the proposed premise in the first post.

I take your points about getting into an expectations spiral, and I will have to be careful about that.
 
Regarding the original premise, this is evolving somewhat.  There is a music store that has something of a studio set-up.  It is nothing like a full professional grade studio, but could be better than a live show stage.  I am trying to keep the work/cost down, so even if I were to record in that quasi-studio, I would want to treat it more like a live show with maybe a couple of takes, but not 4 hours of dubbing on each solo.  And I will want to push off most of the mixing work to a private session where there wouldn't be 5 band members breathing down my neck.

What are you thinking as far as prices go?

JohanSebatianGremlin
What are you thinking as far as prices go?

I don't know.  If it is a simple mix of a 3-4 minute song with a dozen tracks, maybe something like $100.