funny stories of recording songs

That doesn’t sound funny at all.
Not much to speak of in my home recording era, but in the 90s I was doing a demo on tape in a studio. Back then, recording to tape, you could automate a rewind point, so you could just hit rewind, and it would rewind the tape to the exact same point every time (like placing a marker today). In one particular instance, I think I was recording a guitar solo, and I did MANY takes to get it right. The rewind point wound up being in the middle of a semi scream (not part of a song, but studio background talking-type noise) and it would “chirp” or slur every time the tape started and got up to speed again. Every time it would start, we’d all crack up laughing, and of course, I’d blow the take because I was still laughing. Eventually, we figured out we needed to move the marker so I could focus.
That particular demo, after recording at a small studio, we had the opportunity to go to Bear Tracks, where (among MANY others) Dream Theater did Images and Words. We had a free overnight marathon mixing session, because my (really not especially good) singer roomed with one of the engineers that worked there. Cool memories.

Ezequiel – Let’s just say I *really* like digital recording. Analog tape is a pain in the ass. It’s more touchy, and takes longer to do multiple takes. We were recording in a 16 track studio, which means – of course – we were limited to 16 total tracks. If we’d mixed in the same place, we would have had 4 or 5 of us rehearsing over and over the moving of faders and panners and stuff all through the mix, and if someone messes up, you have to just stop and start all over.
Thankfully, we *did* get to Bear Tracks where they had one of only 5 fully-automated consoles in the world at the time, so one person could perform an action on the console, and “record” it and it would do the same thing every time – a function we REALLY take for granted with the automation levels available in digital.
Also, with only 16 tracks, we had the primary stuff and anything used in only part of the song, sound effects, guitar solos or fills, etc, all stacked on one track, almost like bouncing. I can cover 16 tracks without a thought now.
It was fun going to and using a real recording studio, though, and I’m sure Jak will tell us all about that soon from a more modern perspective, but having done both, I very much prefer digital recording. Viva la future tech!

Also, editing LITERALLY involves cutting tape with a razor blade and taping it back together. So there’s that, too. Quantizing did not exist.
That’s kinda why when people shit on Lars Ulrich, I *know* they don’t know anything about drumming or old-school recording. The Black Album? That shit’s near perfect, and there’s no quantizing and as far as I know, minimal triggers/samples. There were punch-ins, for sure, and Rock may have cut and spliced a few takes together here or there, but that’s as real as drumming gets. Then if you go back to Lightning or Master, those are probably all single takes to a click (where one could be used) with some punching, and that’s it.
Lars is older and relying on triggers now, but fucker was a king back in the day. Analog recording was a lot less forgiving because of how time-consuming it was to cover shit with shine.