hi everyone,

i was just wondering what you guys use to record shows and put them onto your computer, because im going to the scala gig in june and would like to do it

thanks
elsie xx

doesnt anyone know?

please guys

Justin is our usual expert on this topic, I'm sure he'll chime in soon.

Elsie~

Some people use a Sony MD recorder but how they transfer the songs to their computer I don't know.

I did it a really complicated hard way...I recorded the shows on one of those handheld recorders like people use for school to tape lectures or whatnot and then I recorded each song individually onto my computer using a mic. Had to have total silence while I was doing it which was hard since there are a lot of people in my family, most of them loud.

Good luck with your recording endeavors

there are many ways to go about recording a show.

- you can hook a laptop (that has a digital input) up to the soundboard, or to audience mics running into a preamp.

- you could get a set of mics and set them up in the venue, record to a DAT deck.

- you could take a DAT deck and patch in to the soundboard.

Hooking a laptop up to the club's soundboard is probably the easiest way to go - provided the club is willing to oblige.

I've used my Sony mini-Disc recorder for boots. It's easier than dragging around my laptop, since the MD fits into my pocket or my purse. True, the soundboard would give better recordings because there would be less air, interference, fuzz, and static. But very few places lets someone without written permission to be plugging into soundboards.

Then, I connect the MD to my computer via an aux cable (though a newer computer might have an optical connection) from the "sound out" port(where one would plus in headphones) to the "sound-in" on the back of my computer (where one might plug in an external mic, record the files, convert them to MP3s, and burn them onto a CD.

It's actually not that hard, just time-consuming.

I also record on a minidisc (though I use Sharp, not Sony, because the Sony MDs offend me on a deeply personal level) with Sound Pros mics. A soundboard patch would be cool, of course, but your chances of being allowed to do that (especially to do it for free) are pretty out there.