One Man Bands?
 

I would like to start making my own music. I have been playing with people for years, but have had a hard time keeping anyone interested in a band. Now I want to do it all myself. I have seen people playing one instument with all the backup recorded to play against. This is what I want to do but don't know the first thing about it. I know all the other instuments need to be recorded, but what is the best method of getting this done on an easy to use machine. What is the best way to accomplish my goal of being a one man band?

Can anyone help?

STPATRICK

Jason Webley. One man support act for the Dresden Dolls when I saw them.
Fantastic!
Mobster style top hat, drum on the floor, piano accordian, a grunt like Tom Waits and all the energy of a circus on speed.
Really, really great.

Anyway, check out his site, he'd be full of ideas.:D

Son Of Dave too-the guys a genius.

get a multi-track recorder....record all them and play againt themm

its easy to do

a lot of it will depend on what you want to accomplish as a one man band. are you looking to try to emulate the classic image of the one man band with a bass drum slung across his back, a trumpet in one hand, a flute in the other, with bells, whistles and shakers attached to every open piece of clothing? or are you going for more of a wedding singer deal where the backing track is recorded onto a keyboard first and you just play the keys and croon over your backing track? or do you just want to record your own tracks at home to distribute them online with no plans of public performances?

unless you're making electronic music the biggest problem with using a machine as a backing band is that it WILL sound like a machine. it will be unforgiving on issues of timing and tone. a bum note or missed cue will REALLY stand out, it's not like you have a human drummer who can't stretch or shrink a roll to keep the music flowing when it's just 1s and 0s on a hard drive.

if you know how to play piano then a programmable keyboard will likely be your best bet. probably something by yamaha. korg, or roland. most decent programmable synths will offer some basic drums and percussion sounds along with tons of different guitar and bass tones. the drums might sound decent but they're still a long ways off from getting the stringed instruments to sound right. it'll sound passable but still obviously synthetic.

a multitrack recorder would be perfect if you were only interested in recording all the pieces yourself but i don't think it would really work for playing a show.

I would recommend getting ProTool's as it's one of the best recording systems out there and it's very easy to use.

I have to agree with you on this one. ProTools is a great investment. I wouldn't say it is the easiest to use, but after a little use it works like a charm.

Check out Ben Christophers performance on fabchannel.com it's amazing. He uses a laptop and a sampler with piano and acoustic guitar. Much much talent!
Also Jacob Golden and Tom McRae are two others that pull the one man band off quite well.

Basically if your songs stand up on their own with just vox and guitar then all you need is a interesting yet subtle backing track!

why not try a loop board

Yeah, I'm going with this guy. The whole pre-recorded backing tracks is going to appear cheesy as hell in a live situation.
Check out Any of Keller Williams stuff to see a master in action.