I'll be spending the holiday weekend holed up with The Wife for our first Christmas as a married couple. Sleeping in, big greasy breakfasts (hopefully), gifts, etc...
I'm hoping to get a day in the studio again this coming week, to do a few edits and re-takes. Just clean up the recordings a little before starting to mix.
So Happy Christmas/ Kwanza/ Hanukkah, whatever you celebrate. And if you don't celebrate, then enjoy the time off, overtime pay, and/or Boxing Day sales.
Friday, December 24, 2010
Monday, December 20, 2010
Tracking - DONE
I woke up on Sunday morning still hungover from Friday night's Christmas party. The plan was to lay on the couch, watch bad TV, and recouperate.
That didn't last long. By 10am, I had my guitar in hand and was writing another song. This one's about the time I caught my girlfriend cheating on me at the bar, she held onto my coattails as I walked off down the street, and I ended up having to pry her arms off my taxi and throw her backwards into a pile of garbage bins. All as a patio-full of people watched.
I'm sure it'll be a hell of a song…
The inspiration stuck around, and I quickly connected the vocal mic, set up the PC, and got to some serious tracking. The end result: Lies & Speculation is completely tracked. All recording is complete.
This doesn't mean it's ready to pollute the airwaves yet, but it's a hell of a milestone. Next will be mixing. I could end up with an organ-and-maracas version of Welcome To The Nighttime…. I doubt it, but anything's possible. And that's actually how I recorded the vocals - there was so much going on musically, that I couldn't pitch my voice to the right places. So I muted the drums, bass, and guitars. All that was left was a sparse organ and maracas to keep time. It sounded pretty awesome, but I don't think it'll stay that way - too boring. But that's a great example of how songs can change mid-mix.
In fact, if you listen to Porno and Porno Guitar in the player on the right, those were actually the same recording! I just changed the volume on the instruments!
So for now, it's recorded. And I'm off for a week of non-music celebrating my first Christmas with the Lovely Wife. Have a great holiday season!
That didn't last long. By 10am, I had my guitar in hand and was writing another song. This one's about the time I caught my girlfriend cheating on me at the bar, she held onto my coattails as I walked off down the street, and I ended up having to pry her arms off my taxi and throw her backwards into a pile of garbage bins. All as a patio-full of people watched.
I'm sure it'll be a hell of a song…
The inspiration stuck around, and I quickly connected the vocal mic, set up the PC, and got to some serious tracking. The end result: Lies & Speculation is completely tracked. All recording is complete.
This doesn't mean it's ready to pollute the airwaves yet, but it's a hell of a milestone. Next will be mixing. I could end up with an organ-and-maracas version of Welcome To The Nighttime…. I doubt it, but anything's possible. And that's actually how I recorded the vocals - there was so much going on musically, that I couldn't pitch my voice to the right places. So I muted the drums, bass, and guitars. All that was left was a sparse organ and maracas to keep time. It sounded pretty awesome, but I don't think it'll stay that way - too boring. But that's a great example of how songs can change mid-mix.
In fact, if you listen to Porno and Porno Guitar in the player on the right, those were actually the same recording! I just changed the volume on the instruments!
So for now, it's recorded. And I'm off for a week of non-music celebrating my first Christmas with the Lovely Wife. Have a great holiday season!
Friday, December 10, 2010
Breakthrough
I've been having trouble in the studio lately.
All the music has been recorded. Drums, bass, guitars, percussion, keys, synths, all DONE. I just have the vocal tracks left to lay down. And this is where it's getting tough. Because of all the day-job BS and night-school, the rare couple of hours I have for music has left me too exhausted to accomplish anything.
In all fairness, given the training I've received this year I'm holding myself to a higher bar as far as singing goes. My 3-note warble has grown into a 2.5-octave range of solid notes. And like everything else I do, I try to do the best I can.
Unfortunately, over the last few weeks, I haven't been able to sing properly. When I've tried, my voice just sounds tired, not quite… there.
I've also decided to upgrade my Digital Audio Workstation (DAW). That's the studio setup, from the mics and mixers to the soundcard and PC. I was hesitant to upgrade my software in the middle of a project, but figured I had nothing to lose. With no deadlines, I can do what I want. And the benefits to the "new&fancy" could pay off. And they have, in unmentionable computer-geek ways.
This came into play last night. The migration to new software meant a lot of housekeeping, cleaning up and organizing projects and songs. Lots of hours spent staring blankly at the computer doing very unmusical "secretary jobs."
In the midst of a reorganization, I suddenly needed the music. I opened the Sonar file to "All That Mattered," plugged my vocal microphone into the stand, twiddled a few knobs, and burst into "I ran away, I left you to stay with the problems that I left behind…"
Over the next five hours, I laid down the vocal tracks to All That Mattered, Swagger & Twirl, The Dream, Love Isn't Enough, and What to Say. That's half the album done! Verses, choruses, middle-8ths, and background oop-she-doops, ALL DONE!
Keep in mind that Home, Wow, Don't Pity Me, Burn, and Welcome to the Nighttime are all still waiting in the wings...
All the music has been recorded. Drums, bass, guitars, percussion, keys, synths, all DONE. I just have the vocal tracks left to lay down. And this is where it's getting tough. Because of all the day-job BS and night-school, the rare couple of hours I have for music has left me too exhausted to accomplish anything.
In all fairness, given the training I've received this year I'm holding myself to a higher bar as far as singing goes. My 3-note warble has grown into a 2.5-octave range of solid notes. And like everything else I do, I try to do the best I can.
Unfortunately, over the last few weeks, I haven't been able to sing properly. When I've tried, my voice just sounds tired, not quite… there.
I've also decided to upgrade my Digital Audio Workstation (DAW). That's the studio setup, from the mics and mixers to the soundcard and PC. I was hesitant to upgrade my software in the middle of a project, but figured I had nothing to lose. With no deadlines, I can do what I want. And the benefits to the "new&fancy" could pay off. And they have, in unmentionable computer-geek ways.
This came into play last night. The migration to new software meant a lot of housekeeping, cleaning up and organizing projects and songs. Lots of hours spent staring blankly at the computer doing very unmusical "secretary jobs."
In the midst of a reorganization, I suddenly needed the music. I opened the Sonar file to "All That Mattered," plugged my vocal microphone into the stand, twiddled a few knobs, and burst into "I ran away, I left you to stay with the problems that I left behind…"
Over the next five hours, I laid down the vocal tracks to All That Mattered, Swagger & Twirl, The Dream, Love Isn't Enough, and What to Say. That's half the album done! Verses, choruses, middle-8ths, and background oop-she-doops, ALL DONE!
Keep in mind that Home, Wow, Don't Pity Me, Burn, and Welcome to the Nighttime are all still waiting in the wings...
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