I was talking to a friend the other day about some songs that he is recording. During the conversation, he mentioned that he was using Audacity to mix some demos. I was reminded that I haven’t spoken about Audacity on this site, but I probably should.
Audacity is a free, open-source audio/sound editing application available for Windows, Linux, and Mac OS X. Using Audacity, you can record up to 16 tracks of audio at once, import and export WAV, OGG, and MP3s, edit multiple tracks of audio, add effects, such as Echo, Phaser, and WahWah, and much more.
Audacity is also pretty popular among podcasters due to the fact that it’s free, stable and performs many professional-level tasks. I know of quite a few podcasters that use it to record and/or edit their podcasts.
My friend was quick to point out that he’s probably going to send his raw files to someone who can mix the songs using something more professional than Audacity, but pointed out that Audacity was great at letting him do rough mixes to release to friends and to analyze the song. Furthermore, Audacity has enough professional-level features that you could probably use it as the primary method of recording and mixing demos. It’s especially good for the hobbyist or student who wants to learn more about recording techniques and procedures without spending a lot of money to get started.
I’d definitely recommend looking into Audacity if you want a good, solid (and free) application for recording songs or guitar tracks.