Feedback

As this album is also part of my MA (I say this like it's a secondary thing, bad Gabriel) project, one of the main elements of the project is to meet with my supervisor and discuss the project in its current state and to get advice on where I can go from here. My supervisor is Richard Liggins, whom was the one to interview me for the original BA, five years ago. He was also the one to mark my previous album effort (A Place Called Nowhere - which most people will probably never hear). So I figured he'd be a good candidate to see just how far I've come with this latest offering.

I played him all 10 songs, kind of abruptly skimming through them to give him an idea of how everything sounds in general. He picked up on a lot of the things I was hoping he would. He said the songs were much better written and interesting than previous stuff I have submitted to him. He also mentioned he really liked the recordings and improved my intergration of synthetic and real sounds... but the real task will be in the mixing. It's all very bass heavy at the moment and needs to be brighter - but he liked a lot of the rawness too (much better than over producing).

One of the biggest problems (well not really a problem, but something that needs to be taken strongly into account) is that all the tracks are very different to each other and there isn't really a defining sound that is me. This is mostly attributed to the fact I have worked with many musicians on this album and they have all intigrated their own styles to this... of course this is what I wanted but I can see the potential difficulties when creating a musical identity.

One of the ways this can be resolved, he said, is to simply turn my vocals up more in the mix (ho ho ho) and create some kind of consistency in the mixing. Not entirely sure how I'm going to do this, but I'm sure it'll come to me.

Basically, the best thing I can do when I mix in August is to remove myself from the songs as songs and just treat it as a piece of music - or better yet - an array of sound that needs to have a nice balance of low, mid and high frequencies. This will be difficult, but of course I will do what needs to be done.

And as for the vocals? Well his feedback was "it's just going to be a love it or hate it scenario, and that's just something you'll have to live with. Don't try to hard to impress everybody".. and he's definitely right. Still, a little Auto-Tune or Melodyne work can't hurt a bit, right?

Two more days in the studio this weekend and then that'll be it. I feel a lot better about things now.

Vox 1, Vox 2, Vox 185

Another couple of days at the studio this weekend and more vocals have been recorded... well, I think they're sounding a lot better now or "as good as they can be" as I put it to Richard.

Some tracks like "Get It Right" are almost throw-away vocals, and it doesn't even matter if they sound bad because of the stripped-down nature of the song. I recorded it in less than an hour and I'm content. "Lovers and Politicians" is still driving me mad because the song is so full of everything and really depends on powerful lines. I'm happy with the performance, but there are moments where I'm still not in tune. I might just sucumb to AutoTune, if only I knew what key it was in (and what key it's supposed to be in, for that matter)!

I still have to write lyrics for two songs and record them on Saturday, but I'm feeling a lot better now than I was in my previous post. I'm just trying to care less about what people think of them and care more about whether I can live with them or not.

No I won't get another vocalist in, fuck you. As Katia and Steve said to me earlier "would Trent let anyone else sing his songs?"

laaaa laaaa laaaaaaaaaaa

Considering I have recorded a large part of Passion/Aggression in record time (minus finishing touches, of course) it never ceases to amaze me how I will spend just as long, if not longer, trying to record vocals.

It shouldn't be that hard. I'm more confident with my voice than I have ever been. I've been singing to the point of cracking my voice - then I want to sing some more because my voice sounds really raw. I was quite proud of them.

And yet only an hour ago, I'm playing "Lovers And Politicians" to my friend Doug and he asks me to mute the vocals so he can hear the rest of the music. I was partly offended and hurt by this, but it made me panic too. I have such little studio time left and I don't even want to KNOW how many tracks still need vocals recorded on them. (3 songs still don't have lyrics yet) and then I worry even more that nothing I do will make it right. I just don't have the voice.

I thought I should resign myself to producing music and recording other people. Well, fuck that! I'm far too egotistical to let that happen. One of two things will happen. Out of nowhere, everything will suddenly sound amazing, or I'll just end up with a "that'll do" attitude and learn to live with it.

That being said, I recorded vocals for "Inane is my Name" last night and without knowing it, I had recorded 12 tracks of vocals and made something so poppy I burst out laughing at myself and the concept that I am seriously going to fit this in between two dark n heavy Pumpkins-esque tunes. But it's easier to hide behind multiple vocals, that's what Marilyn Manson does and that's what I dislike about his vocals so much. Regardless, I love this and I don't care what anyone else thinks.

As Amanda Palmer (she's also recording an album at the moment and blogs, so whenever she blogs I feel I have to blog too) writes "music doesn't need to be so precious when you're not thinking about it. so i just didnt think about it" and there's probably something to be learned there. I should spend less time worrying about it and just get on with it.

At the end of the day, I can only do my best and if that doesn't work, there's always plug-ins :-D

Judith plays piano for me

Later this week, Mark came over to record some more guitars for me. We didn't have the same amp set up as with Alan or Mike, so this was a 'plug-it-straight-in-and-use-SansAmp-or-GuitarRig' job. On top of this, we recorded some acoustic guitar a la his Pat Metheny style, which has given songs like Get it Right a lot more vibrance.. I'm still not sure about the opening melody here, but I'm not in a state to think about it too much right now.

Yesterday, Judith met me at Vestry hall to record some grand piano for me. After freaking out (a lot) about not being able to get access to the studios, Richard Liggins informed me he'd be in Vestry Hall for the next few weekends and was kind enough to let me use Studio 2 (which is the one I wanted).





For the first time, I was allowed to record the Steinway grand, rather than the shitty old one they usually use. This is probably because it's summer and there's no-one there to say I cannot record it. I wanted to get a really intemate sound, with lots of velocity. To achieve this, I used two DPA microphones (I think the 410s??) and placed them closely over the hammers. The mics are also omni-directional, so they picked up a lot of the room sound at vestry too.






When plugged into some pres as wonderful as the Focusrite 428s, it sounded exactly how I wanted. It took a while to get all the takes right, but the result is breathtaking. I was so glad to finally work with Jude on some music and hope to do more of this in the future!!

After she left, I spent the remaining few hours in the studio trying to get some proper vocals recorded. Richard recommended using the Sontronics Helios mic over the U87. Indeed valve mics always sound great, but it didn't want to work so well with the Focusrite - a lot of unwanted top end. I could have filtered it, but I found better results from the Neve pre/compressor.

I think the vocals are okay, but I can do better. I'm going to be spending a lot of time in the studios for the next couple of weeks.

I'm gonna get it right this time.

Distortion

I've been working for too long without a break. Every day (including weekends) I have been waking to an alarm, which generally puts me in a bad place, mentally. But I've had good reason to keep on going and pushing through the tiredness. It's a bad coincidence that I'm also managing two projects simultaneously in my day job, but at least it's allowing the days to go by quicker.

On Friday, Alan Webb came over to record as many guitar tracks as possible. Neither of us had an amp to hand, so I borrowed (stole) Tim's Trace Elliot Super Tramp, which sounds buzzy and doesn't have a great definition, but there's something so likable about the Super Tramp because it sounds so real.. so rock n roll. DIing guitars is great, but sometimes there's nothing like getting some air in the recording and enjoying the sounds of hisses and buzzes.



We didn't have a head for the amp, so I decided I would use SansAmp as a head. To explain the loop:
1) Guitar is plugged into an input on the Digi003, which is directly recording onto a track in Pro Tools.
2) The output of that track is bussed to an AUX track, with SansAmp on.
3) The Aux is bussed out of the 003 and put to the input of the Super Tramp
4) The amp is miced up with an SM58 at the front and occasionally with an AKG C414 at the back.
5) This goes onto a separate track(s) in Pro Tools




So this not only acted as a head for the amp, but also enabled me to record a clean input of the guitars at the same time, so if I decided later on I was unhappy with the sound, I could still use something like GuitarRig directly on it. This rarely had to happen, though I did ask Alan to do a lot of double-tracking and created a nice phasing effect when hard panned. Not the most original technique, but it really brough out the definition of the songs.

By the end of Saturday, Alan and I had worked through 5 tracks, finishing just in time for him to catch a flight to Spain.



On Sunday, Mike Osborne finally showed up with his Bass cab and his pale blue Bass. Again, a similar story of not having a head, so I used the exact same technique for the cab as I did for Alan's guitars. The only problem here is that the cab is passive, and so all the level coming out of it was powered by the output of my 003. So when micing it, there is a lot of sub-bass coming out, but not so much definition. Regardless, Mike also performed on nearly everything that needed - and for the first time, I let him funk out on some of the songs, which I think he enjoyed lots (we had been listening to Primus, so it made sense).

I could go on, but I won't because I'm so tired, but to summerise, lots of the songs are really beginning to sound like songs and I'm really happy with how the majority of them have turned out. I have a LOT of editing, compressing and EQing to go, but it's not really a chore when you start loving your songs again.



Mark is coming over on Thursday to lay down the final set of guitars on a couple of tracks and I finally managed to organise studio time for the next couple of weekends where I can record piano with Judith Haustein and vocals. Have lots to get ready before then... no change there!!

Drums Drums Drums

As planned, Tim, Mark and I headed to Dirty River Studios in Walthamstow to record drums over the weekend. To say we were drenched is perhaps an understatement.

The Saturday proved to be pretty stressful. With all of us being music technicians, we ended up in a scenario (as Mark put it) of too many cooks. In other words, we all had our ideas on the mic placement with only four preamps on a Digi002. I had hoped for eight and be able to close-mic everything for a very tight sound, but we were resorted to using overheads and not a pair of anything (i.e. only one U87, one Samson, one AKG) and a kick going into the 5th line input - so we had no control over the gain.



Perhaps it was just a mix up on intentions, so I just sat away from it, let Mark do his thing and made the tea instead. We did quite a few takes on about three songs once everything was up and running but it was difficult to tell if what we had was any good. Tim was pretty tired by this point. But at least we had everything miced up for the next day.



I took the sessions home to have a listen on my own speakers and we pleasantly surprised how good the room sounded. My main concern was that there was too much emphasis on the hats and the rides and not enough depth with the tom drums. I didn't feel I could control the sound... that being said, running a Neve compressor for the drums on 'Dead On Red' sounded beautiful, while 'Too Late' and 'Get It Right' didn't quite have the depth I was looking for.



On Sunday, another early start and I spent the 90 minute tube journey haphazardly trying to explain to Mark what was wrong with the recordings and how a different placement might help... but that being said, I hadn't had enough time to hear it with fresh ears to really know what was wrong - which put Mark in an awkward situation of not knowing what he should do about it.



Still, we got in a little earlier and we managed to dig out a Focusrite preamp for putting the kick through. Still limited to five channels, Mark re-arranged the mic array to give more emphasis on the floor tom and less on the cymbols. Once we were all happy with the sound, Tim got much more into the songs. The sun came out and we were all in much better and relaxed moods. Five hours later, we had recorded drums for seven tracks, including the two I wasn't so happy with the day before.



I took them all home, but suddenly freaked out that the drums sounded more flimsy than the day before. Time for lots of plug-ins on everything. Actually, the drums for 'Too Late' needed very little plug-ins - just a little compression and some help from my Plate 140 reverb. 'Lovers And Politicians' needed more work and I've spent all of this afternoon trying to get it right (ironically, partly what the song is about - getting things right). It's very focused on the Toms, so I used some heavy multiband EQs on these but then found the track was just drowning in bass and not enough sparkle of clarity. It's an awesome sound if live, but I often forget that my speakers are a bit weird with bass and as long as the velocity is there, the bass should take care of itself. So I EQed each channel to bring everything out a little. I feel a lot happier with them now.

Still have a lot of work to do for the drums (not to mention some edits required) on the rest of the tracks, and I'm desperately trying to get hold of Mark Osborne to do some bass for me, but in the meantime I got my work cut out for me.