I purchased a Tascam handheld recorder about a month ago so I can record my live sets, environmental recordings, and for digitizing records for listening to in the car. The model is DR-40e. The E is the “enhanced” processor feature according to the Guitar Center rep I talked to on the phone; although there is no real documentation of what this really benefits me anywhere on the net that I can find, and the rep was clueless. It was a good deal, and it is a stellar recorder so far from my limited usage of it. Good battery life so far, although I bought the power supply for it to save on batteries!
The Tascam DR-40e is my new recorder. So far I really like it; I’ve recorded 25 records, a couple of live sets, and some environmental sounds with the built in microphones. Sounds great!
I pulled a random assortment of new and old records and have been listening to them in their entirety while recording them. This has been a really fun process. My card had accumulated 25 records so I figured it was time to dump the WAV files onto my computer and process them for digital listening.
Collage of the records I digitized this September and October.
Here is my workflow that so far is working pretty well…
- Record the vinyl onto the Tascam DR-40E recorder
- Pull the WAV files over to my computer
- In Sony’s Sound Forge software, load the file and normalize it once (to peak value, so no compression occurs) to get good levels. I go in and mark the beginning and end of each track; delete the unwanted sections
- In Sound Forge, once the tracks’ beginning and ending points are marked, I simply double click inside of that region and it is selected. I then <CTRL><V> (cut) and <CTRL><E> (paste to new).
- Now that I have the track isolated, a scan it for any pops or clicks and take care of those if necessary.
- I then normalize to peak values again. This will give me the hottest possible sound.
- I save in a folder with a standard filename. The folder name is Artist – Title – Catalog Number – Year. The filename is Track Number – Song Title. These go in a wavs subfolder. I get the proper filenames and catalog numbers and images from Discogs.com.
- I delete the original sound file and go to the next one.
- Once I have all the albums edited, I can go in and create MP3s for lossy listening; I typically use MP3s for portable devices to save space and given there is a significant amount of ambient noise in “portal environments”, so lossy isn’t that big of deal.
- I drag the WAV files into CD-EX, a great ripping and encoding software using the LAME encoder. Old school but it works great.
- I then drag the MP3s into MP3Tag, I like this program for consistently tagging MP3s. I select the entire album, use the auto-convert feature to snag the track number and song title, I add the Artist, Album and Year manually (using copy/paste form Discogs if there are special characters). I then drag the cover art into the program and save the files.
- I end up with lossless WAV files (someday I may convert to FLAC, but right now I don’t care about space for lossless) and MP3 files with consistent tagging.
All of this does take a while, of course the recording of the records is real-time; and then I processed 25 records (mostly EPs) in about 3 hours. Not too bad. Now that I have the Tascam DR-40e figured out and a process refined, I’m going to pick some of my favorite records that I have never seen digitized files and continue the process!
Here is the first round of 25 records using this new workflow…
New release limited to 333 vinyl copies. Replicast includes Multicast members Jeff Holland and Dave Alexander; with Eric Allen from Apples in Stereo; free-jazz sax player Zach Shaw. Replicast is a loose collective appling the techniques and technology that Multicast has used for years.
Released in 2002 in both compact disc format and limited edition vinyl box set. 300 CDs were available and 88 4x 7″ colored vinyl Box Sets with hand crafted artwork were available.
Since 1996, projects including Multicast, Ted Sturgeon and Freq Modif represented this perspective to the contemporary electronic ideology, but with a more psychedelic and improvisational twist. From tracks constructed with the basics of noise and rhythmic sequences to full on melodic washes, Obliq artists sculpt aural images aimed not at the dance floor but the armchair. These artists employ methodologies of sequencing not too familiar with modern technology, but rather more traditional and improvisational in approach. Multicast, for example, creates most of their tracks from live, late night sessions. Guitars, electric mandolins, kalimbas, modular synthesizers, analog sequencers & effects and digital synthesizers are all part of the Obliq arsenal located at the Larkspur, Wallsteet and Erie facilities. Think of Multicast as an ever-evolving music project. A revolving door of ideas. A meeting of the minds from various individuals involved with the other projects within Obliq. It’s the flagship and corner stone project and even further an ideal representation of the Obliq record label as a whole. If you listen closely to the Multicast material, you will notice a sort of mesh of musical influences and backgrounds from all individuals involved yet close attention is paid in how the various parts are combined. The physical landscape of rural Colorado surrounding members of Multicast play a big part in the environmental influences in the music itself. These are wide-open spaces with room enough for ideas to flourish away from the confines and distractions of an urban environment. This isn’t to say that Multicast lives in a music vacuum or an environment void of art and music culture. Rather, the geographic location gives the project an opportunity to observe the world of electronic music from the outside in and not consumed by a metropolitan music clique. Therefore, members of Multicast rely on each other to be energized and inspired to create and follow through with ideas and bring them into being. A lot of the popular software-based music making tools — the ones dominant in modern day electronic music — are put aside which allow Multicast to focus on improvisational and organic composition. All members of Multicast are DJs, but styles may be surprising as compared to their musical output.
