#196: What Gear Do I Need to Produce Music at Home? Our Essential Home Studio Setup Tools

Maybe you need to actually refine your understanding of what equalization is .

Hello folks , Welcome to Inside the Mix and in today's episode , my friend Tim Benson , aka R9 , and I are answering your questions again . So you've submitted questions , a question , and we are answering it on the podcast . So this is an anonymous question . Put my teeth back in . What do I need to start music production at home ?

So this really is going and harking back to right at the beginning . So we're talking about basics here today . But before we dig into that , Tim , how are you ? And welcome back .

The scaffolding's up , so , uh , perfect time for them to do it so I don't get a deluge of water coming into my uh , into my property while they're doing it . But uh , folks , if you've got a question , we would love to hear from you , so click the speak pipe link in the episode description to submit your questions .

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I love coffee , so I will share that with you .

If you want to get an idea , if you've never listened to the podcast before of what this format sounds like , obviously listen to this episode , but also go back and listen to the first one , episode 175 , what's the Secret to Mixing Without Muddiness , which dropped on New Year's Eve and has been the most popular episode of the podcast to date , which is amazing ,

which is amazing . So in this episode , we're going to talking about starting music production at home . So , whether you're completely new to music production or thinking about upgrading your sort of home studio setup , obviously it can be quite overwhelming .

So we're going to be breaking down maybe some do's and don'ts and some gears and basically just our own experiences of when we started out as well . So we're going to keep it simple , practical and , ideally , budget friendly .

So the extent , the essentials , the essentials that you need to start , and we're talking about computers or laptops , desktops , laptops , whatever it may be . Now I've got a mac , I've got an apple mac and I've got a mac studio and that's what I'm using , and you've got a windows device , tim .

Um , you know , that is ideal if you're going to be doing audio and most modern stuff is up to the task these days . But , um , I don't think it's very easy to get into the mac pc sort of debate .

But I would say , if you haven't got anything and you were going to start out and you're going to go and purchase something , getting something like a macbook , you know , would probably be the better option , I think , because it's simpler .

I do think , having worked on both of them extensively , pcs are fantastic but they are not easy necessarily to configure for audio , although they do have lots of software availability and stuff . And you know there's lots of good sides to it , I think .

Um , you know , and it's easier to just buy a hard drive and pop it in a pc often than it is a macbook , you know , they're a bit more user-friendly in that way but they're not out just straight away the easiest thing for audio . I think macbooks just work very well and very reliably .

You know you could buy a macbook and we're discussing if we get into software , something like logic or something . It's quite a straightforward route into it without lots of complications and I do think if you have too many technical complications it can put you off actually just getting started and getting music made .

I mean , I remember when I was starting out and when I first properly got into music production , I was using Logic 9 and this was back in 2012 , if I remember rightly , and I had an HP laptop before that and I toyed around with I think it was Cakewalk at the time and like bastardized the connection , going into it and tried to record my guitar .

Before I did a , I did like an evening course in music production , which then introduced me into Logic 9 and I bought a Mac MacBook If I remember rightly this was in 2012 , which I had for about six or seven years .

And that's the beauty again I think of I'm not an Apple salesman here , but of Apple devices is I had that for so long and I had no issues with it . Now I'm going to touch wood here because I got a mac studio and I don't want that to die on me , um , having tempted fate .

But , like you said that , I think it's important that with max and with apples in particular , you do have that entry level . You got garage band and I've spoken to and helped artists as well who started out with garage band and even like you could think it is , yeah , it's that entry level .

It's not overwhelming , it's a watered-down version of logic and it doesn't mean to say that you cannot then go on to use other daw's , because I think for the most part you've got daw . We're going to daw's in a minute but the idea , the concept behind them , is pretty much the same across the board . It's's just different in how they operate .

But I think , max , straight off the bat , when you open the device , it's easy to get started . However , I mean , there is the argument to say that they are more expensive . But I guess it all comes down to budget , doesn't it , ultimately ?

But I think , in terms of specs for devices , we're not going to go into too much detail on specs in terms of what you need and how much you should spend , but just spend within your budget and then work within that . But it'd be interesting , you know what ? I've never actually used a Windows device for music production .

I've only ever used I'm au fait with Windows devices , but never actually used a Windows device for music production . Challenges , or maybe benefits , are there any in comparison to a ?

It was like I , I got into building my own machines and like I could spec them all up with all the stuff that I wanted and , of course , if I wanted to add another hard drive or another couple , you know , I've got I don't know how many hard drives built into my machine now and like , uh , you know , and I mean , yeah , it's , it's just like if I wanted

to add some ram , I just go off and buy some ram and stick it in there , whereas if that isn't so easy with a lot of macs they're more designed that you you do need to send them to apple or you need to buy them with what you , the amount of ram you need when you buy it , or the hard drive size that you want internally , you know and then , but you

know I say that you know there are many reasons why that going the mac route is is just easier , you know . But like , um , certainly , uh , yes , software wise , I mean I don't think it makes a huge difference . You do get a lot of . I mean there are tons of sort of random windows options for things . There are tons of sort of .

It's a more diy approach , I suppose you know . But I think it matters less these days perhaps than it used to , but you know yeah I .

I suppose I could overclock it , but you're going into weird territory there . So I think I think it comes down to usability . Use both and find out which one is preferable to you , which one's more conducive to your workflow and easier to use .

Yeah , cubasis yeah , exactly cubasis or something on an ipad and , uh , our good friend rogue rogue effects like , has used for years like sort of producing his stuff on that and I know he's actually changed over to mac now and he's got a sort of like a full version of the software and it's a bit like daunted by what a change it is and it's trying .

It feels like he's learning something completely different now . But like , yeah , it is entirely possible to do that . I think there are some benefits very portable and very easy to go everywhere with , like um , ipads . There are disadvantages in what you can really run on them and you know the plugins and stuff is limited and the things you know .

There are some limitations to it , but like , but for some people it's the place to get started . They've got an ipad and they can get cubasis or something down on it and get going .

So I think if we move on to DAWs now , for example , and choosing the right DAW which can be I mean with that I used when I started out , I used I had a go with Logic , reason , ableton , pro Tools I think those were the ones that I tried and then I sort of came back to Logic .

But I think if you start with something like GarageBand or you start with an iPad version of it , that's a good way to go , I think , because you won't be daunted by opening up a DAW and then just seeing this great screen in front of you and not being able to navigate around it , like Reaper , for example . I use Reaper a lot .

That's quite a steep learning curve . Fantastic DAW . But would I advise people to start there ? Probably not . I use Logic myself and I think Logic's a great place to start . Logic is very user-friendly . I find it Very , very user-friendly . Yeah , it is now . I think yeah , yeah , find it very , very , yeah , it is now .

Yeah , it is a lot more user-friendly than it used to be . I think it's pretty good . I mean , I'm a big cubase user . That's what I use since I started using cubase on an atari . So there we go I hadn't even got to pc at this point , but like , um , so I guess I just followed on from what I knew .

But like , if I'm honest , I think it's a great program . You can buy it . It in the , for instance . I mean it runs on PC and Mac .

But I still wouldn't . I think it's phenomenal , I think it's a great program , but I don't know that I would say it was the easiest way in . Maybe it isn't , you know , maybe something like like garage band is probably the winner on the simplest place to start . But like , yeah , but otherwise I'm sure it's true with ableton .

I know they've got a light version , most things have got a slightly cut down , simpler , beginner version and that that could be a good idea to sort of go for one of the big sort of DAWs but go for the cheapest , simpler .

I mean you do have to buy the Apple device to get it .

Um , uh , and it wasn't my chosen thing , but I , like you , I've learned a few different ones to a degree . Pro tools I've done as well . Um , which I don't know . I know again , there are quite a few people who have actually started on pro tools , which surprised me but yeah , but you know , um , personally I I wouldn't be what I would choose .

But , like you know , I mean again , I don't know that it matters , as long as you can find it , get your head around it . And of course , quite a lot of these have free sort of trial periods , don't they that you can ? Logic's got a big one , I think three months or something like you can have Logic and trial it . Yeah , it's quite a long period .

So do make use of that , as I would suggest . So get your mac or your pc , um , and get a trial of some software and like , actually , if , if the company does it , like , you know that you'd like to try , you know , I think there's a trial version of most of them and like , try it for a while and go what's this like ?

Do I actually like using pro tools ? Do I like using logic ? Can I make some sense of it ? Um , before you put out your cash , I guess you know ?

But what you'll find is when you buy an audio interface which never will move on to that now is that , yeah , you get a light version often with an audio interface . I know it comes with it . Yeah , yeah , the first one I bought was native instruments , complete audio six great piece of kit . It's like brick 2-in , 2-out audio interface .

But it came with a light version of Ableton , if I remember rightly , was it Ableton 9 ? Might have been Ableton 10 . Can't remember , but no , that was great . So often with audio interfaces you'll get a light version .

So think about what audio interface you're going to buy and then maybe pick one with a particular daw that you like the look of and maybe tie the two in together yeah , definitely well worth shopping around on .

Um , you know I wouldn't get swayed massively by it , but like is sometimes worth looking around because like there are deals on some things and you go like , oh look , I get all these sort of things bundled in when I get that interface and it can be a good way of doing it , yeah , yeah I remember with it with the audio and , uh , with the native instruments

audio interface , I think I've got a like a light version of complete with it as well it was .

Whatever suits you best , whichever one you find is conducive to your workflow for producing , whether you're recording , it might be Pro Tools , whether you want to go down the sort of in-the-box producing route , it might turn out to be logical . Cubasis , obviously You've got Cubasis . Cubase , you've got Fruity Loops as well .

Fl Studio One , daw , I've never tried FL Studio . No , no , never tried that one .

If you're thinking of producing in a studio and then maybe going out live as well with it and using it live , ableton , ableton might be the place to go . But if you're more of a studio person , then maybe Cubase and Logic and Pro Tools more sit in , that sort of thing .

But I think an important thing to say is that they can all do the same stuff basically it isn't like you know . If you choose this , you're you know it will be much better than choosing something else in terms of audio quality or production or what you can do yeah , I think it's um what's the phrase ?

Yeah , definitely , from zero to 100 pretty quickly , whatever 100 looks like . But audio interfaces now . I mentioned that I started with a complete audio 6 , 2 in , 2 out , which was a great audio interface , um , but I mean , I've now got the ssl 2 plus , which I ?

I mean , I spent some time in a studio working with an ssl duality desk and unfortunately , when I said studio , I couldn't then afford a duality because they're quite expensive and I don't have the room for duality , so I then resorted to I narrowed it down to an SSL 2 Plus interface , which is 2 in , 2 out , which does everything I need .

So I got the two inputs , channel one , channel two . You've got the 4K legacy on it so you can get that harmonic saturation which I don't . Maybe I should do that in my voice on the podcast . Maybe that'd be quite nice . You've got two headphones out on it as well .

And then obviously you've got the monitor , control and then just the headphone mix as well , and that's pretty much it . I think that's all you really need to get started with an audio interface . I don't think there's any need to go wild like a focus right I know focus right online it gets . You see , on social media it gets panned a bit .

A focus right uh , what are they ? scarlet scarlet , yeah , yeah , um , but yeah , man , whatever does the job , like I don't think when you're starting out , I don't think you need to go crazy and spend , spend big no , I think you have to think what , how many things you're going to be recording at once , and if , if ?

I'm just going to be like creating beats or whatever , and I'm not , you know , electronic music . I'm not actually going to be recording any vocals or any guitar .

So you know you won't be using any of the inputs you know , you're only really wanting it to as outputs , um , and then you've got , obviously you know you need outputs to , and we all come onto this studio monitors or headphones so that you can listen to what you're doing .

But there are people who might be going like , well , actually what I want to do is want to get into production and I'm recording my band and I want to record the drummer and I want to record , you know , and then you might have a bit of a different sort of needs .

You might want to go and get , you know , more inputs on your thing , but I think for most people , two in , two out , is enough for most people . But some people , you know , might want four in or six in or or something more , um , because they're planning on recording lots of things all at once .

But for a lot of us we don't record more than one thing at once . Really , you know , we might record . It's like I record guitars and I might record many guitars on a track , but I only record each one , one at a time .

This was years ago and I had this yeah , flight case and I created a mobile recording rig basically . So I had a headphone out and then I had it's going to bug me now what the name of it is Audience listen , I'll put a link to it in the episode notes so you can go check it out . But it was a basic .

I think it was 18 , if I remember rightly a Behringer interface . Yeah , behringer , do some really .

I mean there's like native instruments , do them . Um . There's , like you know , ssl . There's lots of . I mean , universal audio is what I use , and apollo , and that's very well loved , but it's a lot of money .

I mean they do do a cheaper one , I think , um , than the Apollo , but like they're definitely the more pricey end and I think you would have to think do I want to spend that ?

rather than , you know , behringer , make them , steinberg , make them , lots of people , m-audio , make them , you know there are lots of pre-sonus , lots of these kind of companies , and we'll do a two in , two out interface and you know , I don't know that you really need to spend more than that when you're starting off no , I I do agree , and , um , I think you

could always upgrade .

But moving on to headphones , I've got headphones versus studio monitors in my notes here . So way back when I was doing it , when I started out , I started out primarily using headphones and I've still got them now . Actually , it's these , uh , audio tech net , a technica ath m50s uh , great headphones . I mean , I think you got the same . Are those the same ?

Yeah , there we go . The band itself has like lost all of its .

I mean , obviously they do have a particular sort of frequency curve to them , ultimately , as with any headphones , but they are fantastic and I think you can pick these up for about 150 , 130 , 150 , something along those lines .

But I , If I were going to start out again , I'd probably maybe consider starting out with open back , specifically if I haven't got monitors , Because I find when I wear these for too long , the bass response and then around my ears it's a bit too do I want to say overwhelming . It does a bit , I find , when I'm wearing them for too long .

Yeah , but there are a lot of cheaper options that you could get that are probably usable um . You know cheaper studio headphones , um how reliable they are . When you come to mix you may find that they're not that accurate um , that's the problem . But you could definitely start with any sort of enclosed sort of headphone because you want it enclosed .

If you're going to be recording , if you're going to be using a mic , you don't want it to be open of course , yeah , you don't want the bleed .

I mean there's probably some sort of you know , cheaper makes of studio headphones that in fact I think stack do a really good pair of headphones , bizarrely , because I think a dj friend of mine's got them . Um , but like you know , it's it .

There are some ones that are more like 40 , 50 quid kind of range , which are not going to be quite as good but will get you going , get you started , I reckon yeah , I what you say .

Otherwise , you're going to get that If you've only got money for one set of headphones , you're going to get that bleed . I think that bleed , I think what you mentioned there about you can get get them for less than 100 pounds is , and then obviously , your mixes are going to be subject to whatever you're hearing . So you can think of it as a like a filter .

Those headphones are going to apply a filter to your mixes and it's going to influence what you hear . But I think the advice there would be to , just before you start actually mixing or maybe even recording using these headphones , just listen to a shit ton of music through them and get used to listening to what sort of high quality audio sounds like .

So you can use that as a reference , as a benchmark , to think , okay , well , if that , I know that music is of a high quality and I want to replicate it using these headphones and go down that route . I suppose you could then think okay , well , I could use some sort of corrective software , but then that's another expense .

And then you might think well , why don't I just go and then buy some more expensive headphones ? But it depends which route you want to go down .

You can keep using them and go like , oh , I've got the same pair of headphones that I've been using for like 20 years , whereas , like the cheaper headphones have a habit of not lasting very long in studio use sometimes .

They're not a hundred percent . There's something a little bit odd about them , so maybe maybe they've been a little . I'm not convinced that left and right side are a hundred percent on them , but like they're a really nice sounding pair of headphones but like for two quid I was like , well , it's worth a punt , isn't it so ?

yeah , yeah , yeah you never know , you can sometimes pick these things up cheaply on ebay or cheaply on , you know , because again , secondhand pair of headphones that's working well . I mean , maybe the people's just like , oh I don't really love these headphones , I'll get rid of them , and you know you could pick them up .

So if you're trying to save money on on on gear , headphones can probably be acquired for a bit less than the you know yeah .

You know you can have more issues sometimes with computers and bits and pieces like second hand and some things I don't know . You know you can have more issues sometimes with computers and bits and pieces like second hand .

Um , oh , the fleece in bristol , yeah , the fleece yeah bristol and I played that gig with that laptop and I did a whole load of stuff with it and I mean unbelievably enough . Like you know , a macbook like that that cost 250 qu did a whole load of stuff with it , and I mean unbelievably enough .

Like you know , a macbook like that that cost 250 quid a very long time ago is still perfectly able . You know , works okay and you could , I could sit down and record on it now . So you don't necessarily have to go spending thousands . You can be a bit canny about it and just buy some slightly old tech .

You can be a bit canny about it and just buy some slightly old tech CEX somewhere I don't know , you know what I mean Somewhere and get something decent off FaceBay or something and get started . Yeah .

But that individual who buys a high sort of I was gonna say high fidelity set of golf clubs , high fidelity golf clubs it's the case of just like , look for that second-hand equipment , and then not all of it to be second-hand , as you say , but like there's no need to go and shell out a shit ton of cash and buy the the best that there is , just start and

then replace over time , replace over time .

So I think to wrap it up nicely would be the the mindset really to get into the mindset for starting a or upgrading your home studio , and I think one key part could be is to not get caught up in gear acquisition and just that you just have to die I think this goes back to what you were saying then just by the most expensive stuff or just accumulating

loads and loads of gear , um , and just for me , I mean , this is my , this is my personal work , but the way I like to work is I like it to be relatively streamlined and that's the way I like to work and it's all conducive to what I do .

But I think it's quite easy and I think gear acquisition in particular it can be quite easy to fall into gear acquisition syndrome with plugins .

But like you know , it's just you . It's surprising what you can get and get yourself started . I have one client who I do quite a lot of stuff for , who seems to for some reason record his vocals on a phone and release them . So there we go .

It wouldn't be my suggestion for the way to go , but it's not stopped him from getting into making music and producing music and releasing albums . So you know , don't get too hung up on .

It could well be linked to maybe you just need to go back to basics and look at what you have at hand , and it might be . Actually you don't need to go out and buy the best EQ plugin out there . Maybe you need to actually refine your understanding of what equalization is and tonal balance before actually going out .

So building up your skills before maybe having the ultimate perfect setup could be the way to go .

You've probably got a ton of things to learn within what you've got , you know and most definitely , most definitely .

Look at what is out there in terms of secondhand and then gradually build and replace over time , but make sure that you sort of pay attention to the skills , music production as well and don't just think spending loads of money is going to result in a in a smash hit . Uh , you need to get . Well , it could do , could do , um , but you need to .

Uh , there was actually this is a bit of a tangent um , my fiance , she shared with me a producer and I cannot remember his name , but he was a .

He is a producer and he produced loads of songs for artists , top tier artists in like the in the noughties and into the tens as well , and he said that a lot of those songs are at 120 BPM because he didn't know how to change the BPM in his DAW .

That's great , didn't know what it was , so they're all 120 BPM , so that might just spit in the face of everything I've just said . And he's obviously got . He's a lot more successful than me and he's probably got a lot more money as well . But yep , cannot remember his name .

But fair play , man , if you managed to do that , I wonder if he's managed to work it out by now .

You can just use your mobile phone and you can record an audio message just like you're sending one via WhatsApp , facebook , whatever it is . And then I said , as I say , one lucky person each month will receive a coffee voucher . But before we go , tim any upcoming releases At the point of this going live .

Your most recent release would be live Liquid , blue Liquid .

So if I was really lucky , I might get that out by the end of may , but if not , the end of june . So yeah , I've definitely got an album in the pipeline . Yeah , exciting stuff , mate .