Studio Day 13 - A Time for Peas

I am not sure people understand the amount of stress that comes from
working on a project that takes every ounce of concentration that you
can muster. Tonight we took 17 takes to get a 4 measure instrumental
that no one will even notice while listening to the album. Yet we spent
the time to bring in the musician, get the sound right, had him play the
original part, which we then changed, had him re-record, and then spent
3 hours editing the piece to make it perfect.

After all of that we still aren't sure we will use the piece, which is
why I won't say who played the part or what instrument it was, because
that would give the person away, and we wouldn't want to do that now
would we?

Now it is time we do a typical studio, artsy thing and go get some sushi
and alcohol to ease the pain that most will never know and never understand.

Studio - Day 10

Charting the winds of change can be a tricky course. For the most part, music has become a very disposable thing. Well, perhaps not disposable but definitely interchangeable. It is much more of a background noise now that a forefront experience as it has been in the past and while sad, even I am not immune to it. Making music portable was probably its death knell. First came the 8 track and then the walkman; which would allow people to do something, anything else while they listened to music. Understand I am not a Luddite, but when is the last time you sat in a room with no tv, no computer, no other input but an album and really listened?

We went through this in the eighties and people say it’s cyclical, it will come back. But those people are wrong. In the eighties everything went electronic and to drum machines. Musicians were losing gigs left and right to keyboard players and good drummers were learning how to program shitty sounding drum machines in order to feed their family and still stay in the game. It did come back around. But by then MTV had it’s claws in deep and f---ed everything up again. Music is an auditory art, it’s not visual. If you think I am exaggerating about the importance of this take any novel that you have ever read and re-read and loved; and then watch the movie. If you never loved a book enough to read it again and again, then you probably don’t understand what I am talking about. In fact you are probably listening to an iPod right now, as you read this. Regardless, chances are the movie didn’t even come close to the grandeur in your head while you read the book. MTV has raped music more than any movie has ever destroyed any great novel. The most insidious part is, once you have the visual in your head, it’s not coming out. It’s there with you. Every time I hear 'Lust For Life', I think of a giant white cruise ship carting around a payload of attractive upper middle classers. I don’t want this image, I want to celebrate the hedonism that the song promotes. But it’s gone, forever snuffed by a 30 second blip on the radar of good taste. Mind you I don’t begrudge Mr. Pop for making money, he’s earned it I guess and I have written a few jingles in my day, when money was short and my “need” was high. It’s just a tricky course to sail. I mention this because there has been a fight brewing with the label for some time. My refusal to release any of the current batch of songs for licensing has put us on somewhat of a collision course.

Yesterday, we hit the rocks.

Studio Day 9

Number Nine..., Number Nine..., Number Nine...

A day which will live in infamy. Today started with our guitar tech,
or should I say the studio's guitar tech informing us that 8 gauge
strings were all that were available for our arch top guitar. Needless
to say our guitar player freaked and refused to do anything we said, and
who could really argue with him?

So we calmly drank some earl grey and then unleashed a torrent of words
upon our A & R rep. Our A & R rep then informed us that the label would
only allow us to use the 8 gauge strings because that is the deal that
was signed with some new company that claimed only 8 gauge strings were
needed by a guitar player.

A call to the lawyer later and we are now yet another
indie band out in the wild. My facial hair is growing as I speak.

Studio - Day 1

We arrive to find the studio occupied by, apparently from their appearance, a group of twenty year old mountain men. They looked like a sixties stoner band with massive beards, but this was 2009 and the music I heard on playback could only be described as “crippling depression”. They were over on their booked time and apparently from the look on the engineer’s face, they had long overstayed their welcome. While in the middle of putting the final touches on the last mix an argument broke out about the level of the vocals.

“You’re right” I said agreeing with the singer, “they are way too loud. If it were me, artistically speaking, I would bury them. Keep em real low and add a little more effects.”

If I thought they were smarter I would have masked my sarcasm a bit more.
“Yeah, exactly!” said the singer. “F--- you guys.” He added and pulled the fader down.

Personally, I would have hit the mute button. That would have brought his warbling out of key excuse for a melody down to an acceptable level, but that’s just me. My work in the control room was done. John, the engineer, shot me a knowing look and I walked back into the live room to check on the equipment load in. I have worked with John before, way back when I had label backing and a big budget. Similarly John was at a nice full service studio in LA at the time. Half the reason I am here is for John. Finding a good engineer is like finding oil. Anyone can make a record these days; in a basement or a living room or a spare bedroom. But I can’t do that. I have to stretch out on a couch behind a big old nice console and listen. It’s a privilege to spend time in a nice studio. It’s like any thing in life; if you drive a Ferrari every day then it’s just another car. If you get to drive one once a year, it becomes something more.

Rehearsal Space

Day 32

The interminable misery that was the audition process has been over for a while. Through word of mouth we were able to fill in the last few spots and have been rehearsing for the last several weeks.

Tomorrow we load in to the studio for what may or may not be the first and last willy album.

RIP

The journey continues, but much like the Oregon trail many
travelers are interned in dirt. Today was a particularly
interesting day in that the people that applied for the open
drummer position were all unbelievably unprepared to fathom a performance
worthy of our attention. Sometimes I wonder why I even try. If I hear
one more Chinese symbol I think I may just fill my ears with clay.

The rain continues, and in the cold and damp we are becoming
discouraged, but hope renews with each passing sunrise that
we will finally put a wrap on this and move on to an acceptable
plateau of acceptance. I doubt that will happen though based on
what I have seen so far...but one never knows...