Inevitably computing technology became cheaper and general consumers had more bang for buck than ever before. The 'holy grail' in the minds of many was to be able free oneself from the degradation of tape. Even after the initial recording each time magnetic tape is played it degrades in some fashion. This was the inevitable consequence of dragging tape physically across a playback head. I have been in sessions where you might do 20+ takes on a 4-track machine, by the end of the day you have lost something.

I built my first PC that was capable of pushing 44Khz audio and Midi around in 1995 and it transformed everything. The ability to record without quality and time limits, endlessly arrange and so on was embraced enthusiastically. The unfortunate consequence however is that I noticed that we didn't rehearse as well before a session, because we could do as many takes as we wanted we kept doing them until it was finally right. The arrangements became more dense and complex and inevitably the sessions became longer. Additionally the new technology further increased the expectations from the non-technical musicians, the end result being that the tech guy worked through the night to meet those expectations long after everyone else has gone home. But the dream of mere mortals to be able to produce music to the same technical quality as the pro's had finally arrived. From the mid to late 1990's to the present day the step changes were fairly predictable. More CPU power means you can do more with audio, the most significant recent development probably being the ability to stretch, pitch and tune audio in real-time.

What we have also seen is that devices that can do multi-track recording and arrangement can get smaller and more portable. With the right software tablets are being increasingly used for the budget conscious and mobile musician. How mainstream this becomes is anyone's guess. Further while the Internet has not being directly responsible for affecting the recording process it has introduced a new way of thinking. What we are seeing now is a number of audio products that allow collaboration across Internet connected individuals. The issue here is that there has to be, by definition, a controlling entity and in a world where the number of individuals making music has increased dramatically, because technology has enabled that, they are now outstripping the number of groups making music. I could imagine that these collaborative DAWs work best for no more than two people at a time.

 As we explore how recording technology has changed over the years we can make some observations about the effect this has had on the average or aspiring muso. Remember we are not talking about the already established artist. First and foremost I have seen the prominent rise of the 'tech guy'. In the old days musicians didn't need to understand technology particularly much, in fact I would also argue they were not allowed to in many cases. Their role in the recording process was always very straightforward in that all they were required to do is bring their core sound and just play. What was useful is if at least they had some studio experience if for no other reason that they could translate from an environment that required them to perform together to one where they were often asked to play their parts separately, that was extent of it. For the majority with limited access to professional recording facilities the advent of affordable equipment meant that inevitably someone had to be delegated to know how to operate it. As more related technology came within reach the role of the tech guy increased dramatically. The traditional engineer has also had to adapt. The typical studio recording session was characterised with very controlled and understood roles. The musicians played, the engineer engineered and the two rarely overlapped. As musicians were introduced to affordable technology outside the studio and then ended up in one engineers found themselves dealing with the consequences of this breed of artist and their new found knowledge. Sometimes this worked well, other times it caused friction. Engineers wanted to remain the central part of their domain while artists would often want to flex their technical knowledge.