Category: Studio Diary (Page 12 of 23)

November was eaten up by being sick and taking a couple of weeks in New Zealand for a family visit. Then I got sick again.

Now it’s back to working on Future Imperfect, re-recording the drums.

I’m so close, I can taste it. After finishing up Into The Shade, I moved on to Interlude #1, re-recording all the guitars and replacing the string pad with a string quartet (thanks to Dimension Pro).

I’ve left Slaying The Dragon as-is for now – but it is only 70% complete so I will have to come back to it eventually – and have jumped into Future Imperfect, re-recording the bass; revising the “trumpet” synth with CS80V goodness; and re-doing the drums with my current SPD-20 + Addictive Drums combo.

Oh, and Cakewalk released a new version of their flagship digital audio workstation software, SONAR X2. I didn’t expect to adopt it (because I hated the X1 release) but I’ve been impressed with the changes – look out for my review/criticism write up in the near future.

One other thing: I’ve decided to give Strange But True another look. I think I rushed the process of review earlier this year, and when I hear it in context of other work I’ve finished recently, it’s not holding its own. That’s depressing for me (see the first sentence in this post) but I think it is worth the extra effort.

Sometimes you just have to acknowledge that things aren’t working out. For whatever reason, I could not get the drum, bass, and acoustic guitar tracks to gel. I got tired of tweaking to no effect, and decided it was time to shake things up.

• Mute the drums and the Chapman Stick.
• Activate the click track.
• And break out the Carvin BK5 and lay down an alternative bass track.

In my head I’d always heard the bass lines played on a Stick, and almost instantly, the feel of the piece changed, but in a good way. The change in feel is inevitable: a normal bass guitar lends itself to a completely different vibe than the Stick, but suddenly I was thinking of alternative cool riffs and laying them down in places where, before, magic was missing. This was a good thing. Sure, that one particular riff that kinda wanted to be a Stick riff didn’t sound so cool anymore, but this was offset by all sorts of good stuff coming in elsewhere.

Once I had a good, clean, complete take, I moved to the acoustic guitar, and re-did any part where it wasn’t locked in to the new bass line. Yeah. 

Now it’s back to the drums for the same treatment. There’s some places that need tidying up, and the second half of the track never had anything more than guide drums on it anyway. So… it’s progress. I wish it was faster, but at least I’m happy with the results.

Here’s a teaser:

Chapman Stick is all recorded.

The timing was getting a little sloppy with all the “guide” tracks, so I went back and created click track that was locked into the acoustic guitar, because that’s a track I’m least likely to want to re-do… then recorded the Stick bass to the timing of the click.

Now, of course, I need to tweak the drums into line, and re-do a couple of places where I need to complement bass flourishes. Progress is good.

Yes, it’s tracking time. “Into The Shade” has crystalized at 110 bpm after all, and the key signature resolved down a 4th from E to B.

For various guitar-related reasons, the middle-8 bridge section really wanted to stay in D (originally the same root as the choruses). I’ve compromised: it stayed in D. So now we have a nice little key signature change from the second chorus in C into the bridge in D, and then we stay up a 4th for the last verse and outro in E. This actually works really well, and makes the piece more interesting harmonically.

A side-effect of dropping the main body of the song by a 4th is dealing with the finger-picked acoustic guitar part. Obvious in hind-sight: Switching to Lute Tuning means that I can play with exactly the same fingering, one string down, and in the appropriate key. Also, it gives me an extra string at the top for added embellishment.

I’ve also learned my lesson: The first serious track recording has been the acoustic guitar followed by the vocals. So next up: lock in those drums and bass (Chapman Stick).

Yup, it’s been quiet around here. That doesn’t mean nothing’s happening, but it does indicate a certain lack of progress. See, I’m working on “Into The Shade” which is a track we haven’t recorded before, and didn’t really have lyrics. What we did have was a great instrumental middle eight, and a rough idea about what the song might sound like.

Since the great reset, I’ve been working through the tracks on Album #1 sequentially, and now there is no excuse. This track has gotta get done.

One thing: I’ve written the lyrics and I’m almost happy with them. This is important, because although we all like working on the music and the arrangement, it doesn’t mean a thing if you can’t sing the words in the same rhythm and key as the music. So, having the lyrics ahead of time? Useful.

Which brings me to now. I tried 100 bpm and the drum track seems too sluggish, so I tried again in 110 and it sounded better. Then I sketched out a full backing track (and yes, spent a little too much time on that infamous middle eight) and burned it on to CD so I could play it repeatedly in the car on the way to work. This lets me sing the lyrics in private and figure out melodies.

I thought it was going to work, but this weekend I tried recording a take and two things became clear that didn’t reveal themselves in The Car Sessions: 1) 110 bpm is too fast for the lyric, drums or no; and 2) I have to lower the key by about a fifth.

For now, I’ve given up on trying to sing in the car. Apparently, I only find out the cold hard reality when the little red light is on. (I mean the one on the sequencer, not the dashboard.)