Why should I (or my band) record a CD?
The people who pay for musicians to play prefer to see a sample before betting on you to entertain their customers.  Nobody likes to buy sight-unseen, and a good many venues won't even talk to you without a demo.  Therefore, it is a mighty big bonus to have a CD in hand when you are pursuing a gig.
Most bands also set aside a few CDs as bait for trolling record labels.  It is rare to reel-in a contract this way, but it isn't even remotely unheard of.  Professionally recorded demos are also great to sell at gigs, on the internet, to friends, family, co-workers and foreign-exchange students.  They are exceptional stocking stuffers, all-occasion-gifts and tangible justification for all the noise you've been making in the garage with your hoodlum friends.
There are several other unseen benefits to recording a CD, aside from the finished product -- better musicianship through the ability to listen to yourself; a chance to hear your songs without playing them; something to show for all the time invested in creating your own music; an archive of your creativity to look back on years from now...the list goes on.
Finally, it just feels good--it's validating: "Yes, I really AM a musician, not just some guy/girl with a guitar."

Why not just record ourselves at practice?
One word: QUALITY.
It's much better if you let us record you at practice.
Sounds come in all flavors, and each instrument has its own unique blend of frequencies.  They each need special attention.  We capture those frequencies with special miking techniques and specific microphones for each individual situation.  Those captured frequencies are then converted to faithful 24-bit digital images on a dedicated audio hard disk where they can later be tweaked and enhanced with effects, equalization and other such professional wizardry.  Plus, you can't give your full attention to recording and your full attention to playing at the same time.
We're not ones to knock low-budget practice recordings.  We're musicians, too.  We've been through the whole gamut, from boomboxes to 4-tracks to the digital wonder.  We've learned that recording practices is a great way to prepare for recording a demo CD.  It gives you a chance to listen to your material for rough spots, overall content and the overall groove factor.
If you just want something to practice against, that's probably the way to go.  But if anyone else is going to listen to your music, it should really be without room noise, airplanes flying over (Led Zeppelin's Black Country Woman notwithstanding), neighbor-noise, and muddy drums.
If you haven't been to a studio, you may not be aware of the things that we can do with sound -- it's pretty amazing.  What is more amazing is that these days we can put it in a box and bring it to you.

How can you put a studio full of gear in a box?
With a Clean Digital image on a dedicated hard disk, and the latest technology in signal processing, we can create cavernous reverbs, warm analog-sound, tube-style fuzz and a whole lot more.  These days it doesn't take a special rack unit to house each effect, the same algorhythms are made available from the same companies for use in Digital Audio Workstations--in many cases with higher sampling rates and more options.  As with printers, higher resolution means more detail and clarity.  Stacks of racks full of gear look impressive, but aren't necessarily the hottest thing going.  You'll never see us holding up progress to change a tape, either.

Don't we need to record in a studio to get a good sound?
Studios are designed around two central themes, isolation and acoustic character.  Instruments, are isolated so that they can be recorded to individual tracks and fine-tuned, by themselves and without background noise.  The character of a room describes the way it sounds when recorded.  We isolate through good miking and digital processing, and can create any sort of room sound you like--from auditorium to bathroom, Taj-Mahal to underwater with a bucket on your head (should you be presented with a need for such a thing.)  Close your eyes and a digital room can feel just like a real one--or at least sound like one.
A studio's special design hails from the days when the best way to create a reverb was to make a room big enough to bounce some sound around.  Building a good sounding room with beautiful natural acoustics and perfectly balanced sound is expensive.  That expense is passed on to you by the studio owner.
All manners of electric instruments can be plugged directly into our system.
We even have metronomes and tuners.

Just how good is your gear?
We believe in appropriate technology.  We go for the cleanest signal path, the best resolution and the flexability and portability of it all.  We can do up to eight tracks of 24-bit audio at once, and a song can have as many tracks as needed (up to a couple hundred or so, we think--we've never needed anywhere near that many.)
So if we use eight microphones on the drums, two on the bass, two on the guitar, three for vocals and three more for lead parts, extra percussion and instrumentation, we've maxed out two ADATs and still have two tracks with no place to go.  Eighteen tracks is child's play on a Digital Audio Workstation.  We don't use ADATs.  We don't need no steenking tape.
Our mobile Digital Audio Workstations use digital/analog converters with a 102 db dynamic range.  We record and process at much higher resolutions than CD quality, then downsample during the mastering process for a sharper, more accurate image.
Unless you have an acoustically isolated studio or an enormous setup of some sort, we won't be seeing a need to record more than eight channels at any one time.  Studios sometimes advertise 16, 24 or 32 channels, but see how many you actually use during the recording process.
Through the use of appropriate technology, we've created a workstation that offers the goods of a recording studio in a four foot square.  We've got a room full of rack effects, hours worth of storage space, CD authoring, MIDI interfacing, analog synthesization and digital sampling...the list goes on and on, but now we're just bragging.

What is the general recording procedure?
There are 7 stages: Deciding, Preparing, Recording, Overdubbing, Mixing, Mastering, and Reproducing.
Deciding: This is where you pick a length (four-song demo, five-song EP, nine-to- fourteen song project, twenty-to-thirty-song double CD) and which actual songs to be recorded.
Preparing: This is where you practice over and over and over again. Then you get together your recording money, get your gear in shape, and book time by E-mailing or calling us. Then practice some more.
Recording: This is where all that practice pays off.  It is the time you actually spend in your chosen location, crooning, picking, slapping, shaking, smacking, beating, sliding, strumming, humming, harping, and generally doing that thing you do. Compared with the time invested in everything else, it's woefully short and terribly exciting. It's also the most fun.
Overdubbing:  Overdubbing is simply re-recording a part, or recording additional parts over existing ones.  Accidents happen, mistakes occur, memory lapses come and go--we all mess up.  Sometimes we just want more instruments, more vocals, more, more, more.  With our Digital Audio Workstation, we can stack up track after track, unlike ADATs and other tape-based systems, which are limited by the amount of tracks and time that will fit on the tape.  The amount of actual tracks that we could consume if we really wanted is positively ridiculous--so many that we aren't really sure where we'd hit that ceiling.
Mixing: Once everything is tracked (captured to the hard disk), and our ears have had a day or so to rest from all the mirth and mayhem, the material needs to be prepared for mastering. Everything is made to sound just right--noise is subtracted, reverb is added, effects are artfully applied, decisions are made, envelopes are used and everyone is smiling and happy.
Mastering: Engineers run your mixed tracks through the appropriate filters for creating an optimized master disc. The dynamic range may be compressed or expanded, the whole mix is EQ'd, and the levels are normalized for consistency from track to track.
Reproducing: Exact reproductions of the approved master disc are created and packaged for distribution.

How about recording a live show?
Some bands find it difficult to take the live energy and reproduce it in the studio. You can capture the energy of a live show by having us there to record it. You also have the option of capturing the live-venue audience response, which is unavailable in even the most elaborate of studio settings. There's usually less recording time involved--only a few hours on-site.  We can work in conjunction with your usual sound technician, or if you would like, we can also do your sound and PA work for an additional fee--from professionally miking your stage setup to setting the levels and recording it all with 24-bit digital quality.

How much does mobile recording cost?
That really depends on the project and amount of time involved, but to make things easier, we've created several packages and a very simple, yet comprehensive list of prices.  You will find that we are much less expensive than the average studio, and much more flexible, too.  Because we are mobile, you aren't paying for our studio mortgage, several rooms worth of electronic goodies and a few full-time employees.

Which songs should we record? 
Your best ones. It's better to record fewer, better songs than to record more, average-to-crappy songs.  Record songs that are fun for you to play. Odds are you will be playing them quite a bit.
Record a variety of songs. If you've got some hip-hop, some metal, some pop, and some country songs, maybe pick the most outstanding of each.

Should we record cover tunes?
No, because we probably won't record them.
Even if you have put a new spin on a Dylan tune that would get Bob himself excited, we can't record it unless he shows up to okay it in writing.
If you have a desire to cover all the classic drunken and bawdy sea-shanties, we won't fault you, because they probably aren't protected by copyright.  We aren't easily shocked or offended, but we aren't up for a lawsuit, either.

How do we prepare for recording?
First and foremost, make sure you are ready musically. Be certain that you are comfortable with the material to be recorded and that it is truly ready for immortalization in optical media.  When it comes to recording, time really is money--it's cheaper to make sure everything's ready beforehand. Practice time is free, or at least closer to it than recording time. Take advantage of the economics of really knowing what's going on. Practice the songs over and over, until everyone can play their part backwards and in their sleep.  When sufficiently practiced, you may not be able to help it.
If there are going to be any changes to the arrangement, sounds, or lyrics, now is the time to make them.  Music is a creative process of inspired evolution, and you may decide to change some things during the recording stage, but it really is best to have it all straightened out before we get together.  Being comfortable with your material is also a huge step toward overcoming the nervousness inherent in recording sessions.
Get your gear in shape. New strings, drum heads, batteries, or anything else you might need. Get the guitars and bass set up the way you want them. Get the piano tuned. Get the Theramin out of the shop. Eat your Wheaties.
Please make your runs for spare strings, picks, tubes, and whatever else you think you may need before we arrive, though.  The clock waits for no man.

How does the actual recording process go?
There are a few approaches to recording musical ensembles. Some bands prefer to track everything live, with the whole band going at once. This helps capture the interplay of musicianship better, but it can make for looooong times in the studio and many, many takes. This is the best way to become fed up with one another, your songs, the recording process, your instruments and us. Tracking everything live sometimes results in synergenic feats of improvisational musical comraderie previously attributed only to legendary bands like the Grateful Dead.  Most of the time, though, it's just a big pain in the butt.
If it isn't a "live" situation, such as a concert, we like to take the incremental route. The foundation of it all is the drum track, so it's imperative that it be as flawless as possible.  We can feed a metronome into your drummer's head, if you think it will help.  The drum track is tackled first, either with one or two other musicians or the whole band playing along. Once the drum track is perfect (or acceptable to everyone involved), the bass track is laid down to complete the rhythm section, and the other tracks are overdubbed, building up the finished song. Generally, vocals are laid down as the last major track, then atmospherics like tambourine or backing vocals.
None of this is set in stone, but it is a good start.
Electric guitars are miked at the speaker or run straight into the mixing board. Same deal for bass. Acoustic instruments are miked off by themselves somewhere.
The mikes, or instruments themselves, are run to a mixing board, where they the levels are adjusted for maximum resolution and clarity going into the workstation.
The engineer handles the "monitor mix" -- the mix used for the monitor headphones. It's not the same mix that's actually laid down to tape, however; that's mixed according to the dynamic range of each instrument, and the way it fits into the song. Monitoring is generally done with headphones all around.
Expect to have to overdub lots of things. Remember, this is your chance to get it right, or you'll be hearing that one flubbed note over and over again for the rest of your life.

What are the basic Do's and Don't's?
Don't come unglued at someone for making mistakes--it happens...frequently.
Don't expect to get it exactly right on the first try.
Don't waste a lot of time; in this case, time really IS money.
Don't be too wasted to play or sing. A buzz might be okay if it helps, but make sure that you really can work that way.  It's your money, and your location--if you want to play inside a vat of industrial alcohol, wearing a nothing but a diaper, that's your business.  We're just there to make sure it gets tracked cleanly.
If you're unsure, don't settle unless money is really an issue. 
Do have backup instruments if possible.
Do be nice to the engineer.
Do bring snacks, drinks and anything else you will need. (cigarettes, blacklight bulbs, good-luck charms and mojos, etc.) 
Do avoid dehydrating drinks (beer, coffee, soft drinks) if you're singing.
Do play nicely with our equipment, it is mobile but not indestructible.

What is mixing?
Basically, you sit around and listen while an engineer tries a bunch of different things with the mix.  A song is mixed the same way it was recorded; drums first, then bass, then everything else, with vocals last. Each track gets its particular sound down, effects are added at the board, and general levels are set. Once the sound of each track is dialed in, the whole song is run through to listen for any places where special attention is needed. 
Once everything's set, the mixing engineer does a "dry run", running the entire song through with all the settings and all the tweaks.

What is mastering?
Mastering is the final stage in your music's journey before it reaches the age of reproduction.  It is in this stage of its development that it becomes normalized, receives its final personality shaping and receives the blessing of the engineer.  Every  professionally produced CD in your collection has been mastered.

What are the basic do's and dont's during mixdown? 
Do voice your opinion if you don't like something.
Don't touch the board or other equipment. Leave that to the engineer.
Do try to be patient, and so will we.

What are we waiting for? How do we get a session going?
You can call us or E-Mail us with your preferred date and time, and the basic project you have in mind.  We'll let you know if it is open and give you a quote.  It is best if you try to let us know as soon as possible before you want to record, so that you can be assured of getting the booking you want.
When you contact us to reserve a session, we will give you an quote for your project.  *A deposit of one-third of the estimate will be due within three days in order to reserve the booking.
When we arrive for the session, another third of the money will be due.
Upon delivery of your finished CDs or other media, the balance will be due.

Three easy payments, easy on us...easier on you.

If you need to cancel your booking, please let us know as soon as possible.
*If you cancel within two days of the session, we must retain a $50 service fee for all the pain, suffering, and heartache you've caused us.