How to Come Across as the Weirdo Next Door

It was finally my turn to step in front of the microphone — and potentially alarm the entire neighbourhood.

I’ve recorded plenty of demos over the years, but I’ve never paid much attention to things like levels, peaking, or gain setting. My usual approach is to shout into the microphone, turn the vocals down in the mix later, and hope for the best. If it distorts slightly, so be it. Historically, there’s always been someone else handling the technical side.

This time, that person was me.

My setup was simple: one microphone plugged into channel one of a sixteen-channel interface (fifteen backups felt sensible), a Rode PodMic, the cheapest cable I could find, a pop shield of questionable origin, and a budget sound deflector stuck behind the mic. I then screamed into it while turning the volume down until the warning light disappeared. Producers massively overcomplicate this stuff.

The bigger issue was having no one there to tell me to redo takes — which is usually producer-speak for “that was shit.” Recording alone makes it very hard to judge your own performance, especially when your ears are effectively decorative.

All of this took place in an untreated box room in a semi-detached house, behind blinds that turned out to be completely transparent from the outside.

Somehow, I got all the vocals recorded. Whether they were any good was no longer my problem — that was for the producer to deal with.

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