Product Details

• Actors: Roger McGuinn
• Directors: Happy Traum
• Format: Closed-captioned, Color, DVD, NTSC
• Language: English
• Region: Region 1 (U.S. and Canada only. Read more about DVD formats.)
  
• Aspect Ratio: 1.33:1
• Number of discs: 1
• Rated: NR (Not Rated)
• Studio: Homespun Tapes
• DVD Release Date: May 14, 2004
• Run Time: 60 minutes
• Average Customer Review: 4.8 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (4 customer reviews)
• ASIN: B000297NMW
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #180,596 in Movies & TV (See Top 100 in Movies & TV)

Editorial Reviews

ROGER MCGUINN'S GUIDE TO HOME RECORDI - DVD Movie

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

16 of 16 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Look past the pacing, and there's plenty of payoff, April 14, 2005

By 

Bruce Kula (Indian Rocks Beach, FL USA) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Roger McGuinn's Guide To Home Recording on a Computer (DVD)

This DVD is for somebody first considering the plunge into digital recording, or somebody who's already bought multitrack software and found it daunting. (That's me.) Don't buy this DVD if you're Jeff Lynne, or if you think you are.

After a snappy and promising introduction, McGuinn fires up the Cool Edit Pro program, picks up his signature Martin 12-string, and lays down a rhythm track. It takes three minutes and change, and we watch the whole thing, with extended close-ups of his picking hand, his chording hand, and Cool Edit Pro counting milliseconds one by one. A thousand things McGuinn can play warrant this sort of inspection, but not the simple guitar part to the lovely "May the Road Rise to Meet You", and one wonders what the editor was thinking. Happily this is the only substantial misstep.

The training session regains its rhythm as McGuinn layers vocal tracks, and what is more interesting, makes a mistake. He expertly chops a few words of a flubbed lyric out of one track and creates a new track segment with the right words, all in a matter of seconds. The result is seamless.

All with speed that will surprise those who haven't seen this sort of thing before, McGuinn records tracks, adds reverb, deletes noise, creates fades, and mixes the song down to stereo.

Along the way we get an excellent tour of his hardware and software, all available off the shelf with the exception Cool Edit Pro, which became Adobe Audition a couple of years ago. However, everything he says about Cool Edit Pro seems to apply to the current Audition.

While we do not again sit through the playing of a full track after that first one, I would've been happy to hear the finished multitrack song polished to McGuinn's satisfaction.

A promotional piece for Dell included as a bonus covers much of the same ground, and serves to show what the DVD could have been with more able and assertive editing and direction.

But any quibbles about the production are outweighed by the quantity of information it conveys. The second time you watch this, you'll want to take notes.

10 of 10 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars YOU MUST OWN THIS!, April 16, 2005

By 

Scott (DETROIT, MI) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Roger McGuinn's Guide To Home Recording on a Computer (DVD)

It's rare to see a rock superstar doing an instructional video, let alone one on digital recording. I have engineered for over 30 years and picked up some tips from this, even though it's geared for the beginner. It's a real treat to see McGuinn assemble a song track by track. His voice is amazing after all these years. If you enjoy The Byrds, folk rock, or just want to learn about digital audio recording, this is priceless. Better hurry, because it seems they don't keep things like this in print forever and this shouldn't be missed.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Best introduction to home recording, May 18, 2006

By 

Michael J. King (cheltenham, Glos United Kingdom) - See all my reviews
(REAL NAME)   

This review is from: Roger McGuinn's Guide To Home Recording on a Computer (DVD)

If you are totally new to recording with a pc this DVD is brilliant! Its a few years old and the software he uses has changed (cool edit is now adobe audition), in fact this is really good because you can download a program for free called "audacity" which is almost identical to the old Cool edit, (adobe audition will have more modern features but these are not necessary for a beginner)

check out his website too!