Mandatory Recording Gear

Alright, I have a Tascam analog 4 track and a microphone. That's it really. When I record the guitar always sounds thin and nothing like what I'm hearing. What I want to know, what do I need to most accurately catch what I'm hearing? A mic preamp is what I'm thinking, but are there other things people throw in as a standard item when recording guitar?

For bass, I just plug my bass straight in through a compressor. I should probably buy one of the Sansamp DI boxes. Any bass recording suggestions are also welcome.

I need all of your help to build my mini-studio.

a tube-pre and an SM57 would be a good place to start.

I basicaly use Korg D12 for my recording. For mics I use a SM57 in front at an angle and another one more near the side of the amp about 3 feet away. I find mixing both tracks into one later gives me a decent thick sound.

However if you really want a deeper sound just record the same line a couple of times that will normaly do the trick. Then again any and all suggestions are coming from a know nothing about recording guitar/computer nerd.

I really enjoy recording the same part multiple times with different amps on each pass. Just makes life a bit more intersting. Of course both amps are Mesa's.

IMHO, for guitar nothing really beats a 57 at about 1/4" from the grille. There are other mics out there that are fantastic for guitar, but none offer that big ol' compressed crunch of a 57. *Move the mic around in front of the speaker and experiment with different tonal coloring available at different points on the cone. You would be surprised at how much of a tonal difference you get just by tilting the mic one direction or another just a few degrees.

The Sennheiser E609 is another mic that's been getting a lot of positive press lately for guitar. I've never tried one, but they are cleaner sounding than the 57 from what I've heard. Also, as Dylan suggested, a decent tube preamp might give a little warmth where needed.

I would recommend a larger diaphram dynamic mic for recording fatter sounding bass. Also, you really can't close mic a bass cabinet. Remember that bass frequencies are much longer in wavelength, so you have to give the mic a little room to work.

Consider a Sennheiser 421, an EV RE20, ar anything that you might use for something like a kick drum. I use either an AKG D3600 or a Blue Ball for my setup. Back the mic up at least 3 feet and get a little thump coming out of the amp. Try using something like Auralex Aural-Xpanders (around $40 from most online music stores) if you are concerned with sound from other sources sneaking in with distance miking.

Please don't take my suggestions as gospel. It's just what I've tried and found to be useful in my studio.

Thanks for all the responses. A SM-57 purchase was highly considered before reading all this, but now I would consider it imminent(sp?). Does anyone has any suggestions as far as brand mic preamp? I'll probably ebay it, so if I can find one under $100 on ebay that would met my definition of budget project studio.

For what you are doing, you may find something like the Presonus BlueTube to work fairly well. I have a couple of them in my rack that I use for spare channels. They aren't as warm sounding as most of the more expensive units out there, but as entry level units, you can actually get a fairly decent "budget" recording out of them. And I'm pretty sure that they can be gotten at your price point.