How to start recording music from scratch

Based on real events from Riri’s personal experience

Note from Riri: I’ve been asked more than once on Substack how to start recording music from scratch. On the one hand, I doubt I’m the best person to answer this question given that my publication is called “Fear of Music”, ha! On the other hand, maybe someone with a true Fear of Music like myself could be just right to guide those even more scared and confused. However it might be, I hope I can be of help here!

And now, on to the story :)

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I live in a pretty small apartment in Berlin that has this classic setup where the living room is combined with the kitchen and the dining area. Most of the area that is not devoted to food consumption is designated for my home music studio.

Here’s my little home studio - say hello!

I have a shelf full of drum machines, percussion, pedals, cables, stands of all kinds and books on the history music, music recording and production. I own a cheap clarinet, an expensive ocarina, and an averagely priced flute.

I have an analogue Korg Prologue synthesiser that cost me over a 1000 EUR (a heartfelt thank you to my decidedly uncreative day-job for that!). My home is also currently hosting four (!) guitars, three of which belong to me. I probably won’t even be able to tell you off the top of my head how many microphones are collectively residing at my studio.

What I can tell you though is that listing all of this I myself am taken aback by the abundance of my music-related possessions. If someone showed me a studio like this some seven years ago and told me I could build something similar for myself within said seven years, I would think them delusional.

Because where do I start? What do I buy first and why? Should I even invest into music equipment at all if I can’t tell for certain I’ll be serious about making music in a year or two?

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These are all questions I asked myself with every purchase, not matter how small, until I finally accepted the thought that I just might really be a musician, and that I therefore just might be justified in getting all these things.

But this is a psychological hurdle that takes time to get over, especially if you’re receiving any kind of discouragement from the outside world that then sits on top of your self-doubt so that the both of them can break your determination to get that guitar you wanted under their combined weight.

So let’s get one thing down first: it’s ok to doubt whether you really need any piece of music gear at all. The impostor syndrome is always out there and it rears its head every time you set your sights to something new.

Now, if you want to give music a try but don’t know if you can stick with it - what exactly do you get first? What’s the minimum setup to record your first demo?

First of all, music equipment comes in different price ranges. You can get a guitar for 200 USD or you can get one for 2000 USD. Same applies to keyboards, flutes, microphones, recording software and what else have you. If you’re uncertain about your intentions with music and if you’re on a budget on top of that, I would always recommend going for the cheapest decent alternative. You can always upgrade later if things get more serious and sell your old gear to someone else who’s just starting out and looking for an entry-level instrument.

Secondly, you don’t have to get everything at once. As I mentioned above, I could have never dreamt of having all of the things I have in my studio today at the moment I clicked “Purchase” on my first music gear order.

Which reminds me that, ironically, I don’t even have that first piece of gear - an electronic drum kit - anymore. And that brings me to my “thirdly”: you probably will miscalculate what you need on more than one occasion - especially at the very beginning when you don’t have enough experience to form expectations that would even remotely coincide with reality. So just keep in mind that it happens to most everyone.

Now that I’ve philosophised enough to create an illusion of knowing what I’m talking about, let me give you a short list of actual things you can get to start your recording musician’s journey.

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/No.1 - A LAPTOP/

Duh!

/No.2 - A DAW OF SOME KIND/

In order to record your music into your computer you need a software that can host your project. This type of software is generally known under the umbrella term of a Digital Audio Workstation or a DAW in short. With a software like that you can record and store different parts of your song as audio or MIDI tracks, build parts of your song digitally, arrange your tracks and put effects on them. In principle, you can start and finish your song without leaving that one session, given the right skillset.

Like every type of music equipment, different DAWs vary in complexity and, consequently, in price. If you’re just starting out, you might want to consider cheaper options with a limited functionality.

A lot of paid DAWs have so called light versions which usually cost somewhere under 100 USD but you have to read their specifications carefully before getting them - the biggest limitation they have is in my opinion the number of tracks you can have in one session. Sometimes it’s 4, sometimes 8 - which in my opinion is problematic for a full-fledged demo with a beat, a baseline, guitar, vocals, synths and so on.

For starters, it might also make sense to look into a free DAW. I don’t have much experience with those personally, seeing as I’ve been using Ableton Live from the very start, but here’s one article on the best free DAWs of 2025: https://www.tracklib.com/blog/free-daws

If you happen to own an Apple device of any kind, it would be a no-brainer to start out with GarageBand which is basically a free DAW with more than enough possibilities for your first demos. Apparently, you can make projects with up to 32 tracks on your phone and with over 200 tracks on your computer. Imagine a song with 200 tracks, it’s crazy! Your laptop will probably crash before it can process that monstrosity anyway!

/No.3 - A MIDI KEYBOARD/

Ok, so honestly, you can probably make a whole instrumental piece with a DAW and a MIDI keyboard. Connect that bad boy to your software, use the preinstalled standard samples and just plonk away until you make a melody, a bass line, a chord progression - honestly, anything you want.

A MIDI keyboard was the first thing I got when I decided I wanted to try my hand at some really, really sucky demo bits and sad girl ballad covers. Apart from being potentially really cheap it’s also super light - and I used to bring it with me on business trips to cry my heart out to the sounds of GarageBand’s Wurlitzer Piano. The one I had was an AKAI Professional LPK25 MKII - it weighs only about half a kilo and would cost you about 50 USD new. I’m not sure about other countries, but in Germany they also deliver it with an access to a light version of some DAW, so… win-win!

Here’s what the AKAI baby looks like:

AKAI Professional LPK25 MKII

Keyboards like this can usually be connected to your laptop directly via a USB cable so you don’t need anything else to make this work.

Now if you want to turn your instrumental into a song with vocals or any other analogue instrument let me introduce you to the concept of an Audio Interface.

/No.4 - AN AUDIO INTERFACE/

An Audio Interface is what I try to think of first when I hear the abbreviation “AI” cause it’s more fun that way. To put it simply, an audio interface is what allows your computer to communicate with the rest of your gear. It’s a small (or maybe a not so small) box that lets you to connect various instruments to your computer as well as send the signal from your computer to all sorts of equipment (like, say, speakers).

If you want to start recording music at home, it’s most likely that the simplest AI will suffice. Think of one with two inputs and two outputs. A setup like this will already allow you to play an instrument and sing at the same time, which is usually more than enough. A 2-in-2-out audio interface model is what I personally still use years later and honestly, I can’t complain.

You can find an audio interface in any price range, the cheapest models being probably about a 100 USD new. One of the most budget-friendly brands of audio interfaces is Focusrite - a scarlet red box of awesome that - I swear - every single one of my musician friends has had at some point, including myself, obviously.

Here’s what it looks like:

Focusrite Scarlett 2i2 3rd Gen

The AI will connect to your computer via a USB cable but in order to feed the signal from your instruments into the interface itself, you will need quarter inch cables for instruments like a guitar or a bass guitar and XLR-cables for your microphones. So depending on what you want to use for recording, make sure you get the right cables as well.

/No.5 - A MICROPHONE/

If you’re interested in laying down your first demos and recording vocals for them, I would recommend getting an inexpensive dynamic microphone - if you use a dynamic microphone (as opposed to, let’s say, a condenser one) you don’t really need to worry about it picking up anything but your singing which in turn means you could record something decent without sound isolation in your room. You’ve definitely seen a dynamic mic before - most likely a Shure SM58 - which is only the most popular singing mic in the world.

Now, an SM58 costs a bit upward of 100 USD but as I was researching the pricing for this article, I have seen easily around 30 dynamic microphone models that go for under a hundred. The cheapest one was 13 USD NEW! Maybe don’t get the 13 dollar one if you can afford a better option, but seriously - I’ve seen one for around 40 USD that would definitely do for a beginning.

/No.6 - HEADPHONES/

Well, of course you can use whatever headphones you use in your every day life for those sweet-sweet listening seshes. Take those Apple earbuds and conquer the world!

However, if you want to mix your first songs yourself, you might want to look into studio headphones, especially if you have an access to a physical store where you can actually try them on to check out the sound.

Headphones are much like microphones when it comes to pricing in that you could get a potentially really cursed pair for about 15 USD but there are lots of budget options with really good reviews online that you might want to check out.

/No.7 - WHATEVER ELSE YOU WANT TO ADD/

There’s a ton of possibilities to try your hand at various instruments - these days almost everything has a budget alternative (maybe with the exception of oboes). This can give you an opportunity to try out an instrument in a relatively non-committal way before you decide to invest into a better model.

If you want to try playing guitar on your first songs, there are brands like Squire, Harley Benton and such. If you’ve always wanted an analogue synth, there’s this firm Behringer out there making a crazy number of legendary synth replicas for a more than fair price. If you want to try the flute - get a really cheap flute like I did and see if you like it! Your possibilities are nearly limitless these days.

Anyway, I hope this rambling little article was helpful to those of you who want to start recording music and have no idea how. Now go and get it! I believe in you!

Forever yours,
The Ririverse

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