I've been reading a lot lately about how Waves Audio, Universal Audio, Slate, Softube etc. are trying to recreate classic hardware and their analogue behaviour & then present this in digital format.  Whether this is actually approximate or not is another story. Then I got thinking, what if somebody actually mimicked how artists of the day would record and bounce to tape.
 
What if you were to follow the record techniques as close as possible including the track limitations of those times. I'm not saying it's ideal for every style of music however in a way by limiting what effects and techniques you use will force you to be more creative.
 
I'm going through an experimental stage at the moment where I don't want things to sound digital and precise at the moment.
 

My Old School

I've always done it old school. I don't do midi. Couldn't program a synth if I had to. Almost every drum track I've ever used was done by a real drummer playing acoustic drums. I've used drum loops a few times, but they were made from acoustic drums. I don't do a lot of splicing and dicing when editing. I like my stuff to sound as live as possible.
 
I've used Sonar as an old school 2" tape recorder because that's what I know. Same with mixing. A little EQ, reverb, delay, etc. 

interpolated
I've been reading a lot lately about how Waves Audio, Universal Audio, Slate, Softube etc. are trying to recreate classic hardware and their analogue behaviour & then present this in digital format.  Whether this is actually approximate or not is another story. Then I got thinking, what if somebody actually mimicked how artists of the day would record and bounce to tape.
 
What if you were to follow the record techniques as close as possible including the track limitations of those times. I'm not saying it's ideal for every style of music however in a way by limiting what effects and techniques you use will force you to be more creative.
 
I'm going through an experimental stage at the moment where I don't want things to sound digital and precise at the moment.
 

This begs the question (to me, anyway), which times, and what genre? Just curious.
 

I was thinking more acoustic or organic sounding stuff rather than electronic sounds. Or real instruments as musicians and older people often refer to them as.
 

Nice track bapu.
 

interpolated
I was thinking more acoustic or organic sounding stuff rather than electronic sounds. Or real instruments as musicians and older people often refer to them as.
 

Oh, you mean real talent?  

A friend of mine did this recently, with his super-tight backing band.
Direct to PC (in a full studio), he recorded 13 full songs.
Drums, bass, rhythm guitar live off the floor.  Vocals and 2nd guitar were overdubbed.  No digital trickery.
All 13 songs were mixed.
Album was mastered.
 
All this in one 16-hour day, and it sounded amazing.  

Slugbaby
A friend of mine did this recently, with his super-tight backing band.
Direct to PC (in a full studio), he recorded 13 full songs.
Drums, bass, rhythm guitar live off the floor.  Vocals and 2nd guitar were overdubbed.  No digital trickery.
All 13 songs were mixed.
Album was mastered.
 
All this in one 16-hour day, and it sounded amazing.  

Knowing how it was done, I'd love to hear something like that......is any of his stuff on Youtube or online?

interpolated
I was thinking more acoustic or organic sounding stuff rather than electronic sounds. Or real instruments as musicians and older people often refer to them as.
 

I can highly recommend a book called 'Are We Still Rolling?' by Phill Brown. There are many stories of old school recordings, but with varying methods - Robert Palmer with Little Feat as his packing band for example, the band playing together in the same room, then Talk Talk by contrast, recording hours and hours of drums beats, picking sections and looping them by splicing tape, then painstakingly building the songs layer by layer over the top.
 
Might give you some inspiration.