Saturday, July 16, 2011
Listen
I just realized I haven't posted anything since putting the album out! Here, listen to this. I've got some stuff in the works, I'll be blogging more in the next few weeks to be sure.
Thursday, March 24, 2011
We're Gonna Make It After All: Re-Mastering Today!
For those of you wondering why you haven't gotten your mail-order copies yet, the time table has shifted slightly.
It doesn't happen often, but once in a while, you can catch yourself in the middle of a mistake, as I did this time around. I was coming very close to putting out a version I didn't love of an album I love with all my heart -- and when the feedback from impartial sources started to match my nagging doubts, I stopped the manufacturers from pulling the trigger, and got the thing remixed.
Allen Farmelo took the job under his wing and took a take-no-prisoners approach to mixing, completing the 10 tracks of Here Goes Nothing in two days. We had two meetings about it: in one, his assistant, Nicole Pettigrew, and I pored over the tracks and made sure all of the elements were there, and that all of the start-stop points were correct. The second one was the absolute bomb, though.
Allen had asked me to give him some albums for reference of how I liked things to sound, and what we ended up really lighting on was the Cardigans' Long Gone Before Daylight, a bittersweet, dark delight of an album put out by the Swedish megastars after a long hiatus. Far from the sound that made them popular, this album had an almost total lack of synthy bleep-bloops, abandoning the computers for acoustic instruments and clean tones. It's one of my favorite albums by anyone, ever.
We talked about how the album reminds me of a candlelit dinner of comfort food and red wine, and he made it very clear that he understood how I wanted Here Goes Nothing to sound -- warm but full, an escape from even one's harshest surroundings (anyone who can't ride the subway without an iPod knows exactly what I mean here) that isn't jarringly loud, but has the sonic power to block out the outside. It was an amazing conversation.
We accomplished this 48-hour mixing in a very age-of-communication way -- he'd send me emails with mixes attached, I'd pop my headphones into my Droid and listen to them, then make fine adjustments through email, texts, and phone calls. We hit on some snags, but talked through them easily and without real conflict. I'd work with him any day of the week, although my Rockethub campaign would have to be for a LOT more money.
He's mastering it today, and I think in the end we'll have an album well worth every penny spent on it, and everybody will, well, win.
It doesn't happen often, but once in a while, you can catch yourself in the middle of a mistake, as I did this time around. I was coming very close to putting out a version I didn't love of an album I love with all my heart -- and when the feedback from impartial sources started to match my nagging doubts, I stopped the manufacturers from pulling the trigger, and got the thing remixed.
Allen Farmelo took the job under his wing and took a take-no-prisoners approach to mixing, completing the 10 tracks of Here Goes Nothing in two days. We had two meetings about it: in one, his assistant, Nicole Pettigrew, and I pored over the tracks and made sure all of the elements were there, and that all of the start-stop points were correct. The second one was the absolute bomb, though.
Allen had asked me to give him some albums for reference of how I liked things to sound, and what we ended up really lighting on was the Cardigans' Long Gone Before Daylight, a bittersweet, dark delight of an album put out by the Swedish megastars after a long hiatus. Far from the sound that made them popular, this album had an almost total lack of synthy bleep-bloops, abandoning the computers for acoustic instruments and clean tones. It's one of my favorite albums by anyone, ever.
We talked about how the album reminds me of a candlelit dinner of comfort food and red wine, and he made it very clear that he understood how I wanted Here Goes Nothing to sound -- warm but full, an escape from even one's harshest surroundings (anyone who can't ride the subway without an iPod knows exactly what I mean here) that isn't jarringly loud, but has the sonic power to block out the outside. It was an amazing conversation.
We accomplished this 48-hour mixing in a very age-of-communication way -- he'd send me emails with mixes attached, I'd pop my headphones into my Droid and listen to them, then make fine adjustments through email, texts, and phone calls. We hit on some snags, but talked through them easily and without real conflict. I'd work with him any day of the week, although my Rockethub campaign would have to be for a LOT more money.
He's mastering it today, and I think in the end we'll have an album well worth every penny spent on it, and everybody will, well, win.
Wednesday, March 23, 2011
How I Learned To Stop Worrying And Love Rebecca Black.
It's out there, we've seen it, and now that she's appeared on the Tonight Show, it may be over. That's as high as it goes, right? You get on Jay Leno, the world gives you a round of applause, we all move on. Maybe.
Or maybe, the Arc Music Factory pumps all of their resources into making sure their first authentic success doesn't stop barreling forward. Maybe the album drops in June, to correspond with the top 5 episode of American Idol. Maybe we're all in this together, and we should all learn, like we always have, to buckle down and weather this, as a nation.
I wasn't at that show, but Martin sure seemed to actually have fun with it, and so did the roomful of Rockwood regulars, who were no doubt asking themselves the whole time whether they were enjoying it juuust a bit more than they ought to have.
For performers trying to make it, to hear Ms. Black's story as told to Leno is to experience the gnashing of one's own teeth to powder: she had, like, "always been interested in music for a long time," and had her mom call Arc, and nextthingyaknow. Her reason for choosing "Friday," however, was because it was the only song presented to her that didn't try to sell her as a sex object, which I can totally respect -- remember Mandy Moore at 15? No?
My best guess is that after being told that this song and that song were too this or too that, the writers at Arc threw her this banal tidbit as a joke: who on earth would sing a song about eating cereal and taking the bus to school? ....And Rebecca Black answered their question, and ran at it full boar. The fact is, it went viral, which any independent performer will tell you is the gold we pan for every time we click "upload."
If anything, we can learn from this. If you want this attention, you have to be willing to go where Ms. Black went, you have to be willing to work with the people she worked with, and you have to be willing to take, and maybe be in on the joke that you'll become. Otherwise, keep working the trains to get those 50 asses in those 50 seats, because those seem to be the options here.
Alternately, Simon Cowell may be fishing around for song submissions for the full-length, so if there were a song you wanted to write about taking a sun-dappled walk in the park, you might want to put down the haterade and pick up a guitar.
....I'm just saying.
Or maybe, the Arc Music Factory pumps all of their resources into making sure their first authentic success doesn't stop barreling forward. Maybe the album drops in June, to correspond with the top 5 episode of American Idol. Maybe we're all in this together, and we should all learn, like we always have, to buckle down and weather this, as a nation.
I wasn't at that show, but Martin sure seemed to actually have fun with it, and so did the roomful of Rockwood regulars, who were no doubt asking themselves the whole time whether they were enjoying it juuust a bit more than they ought to have.
For performers trying to make it, to hear Ms. Black's story as told to Leno is to experience the gnashing of one's own teeth to powder: she had, like, "always been interested in music for a long time," and had her mom call Arc, and nextthingyaknow. Her reason for choosing "Friday," however, was because it was the only song presented to her that didn't try to sell her as a sex object, which I can totally respect -- remember Mandy Moore at 15? No?
My best guess is that after being told that this song and that song were too this or too that, the writers at Arc threw her this banal tidbit as a joke: who on earth would sing a song about eating cereal and taking the bus to school? ....And Rebecca Black answered their question, and ran at it full boar. The fact is, it went viral, which any independent performer will tell you is the gold we pan for every time we click "upload."
If anything, we can learn from this. If you want this attention, you have to be willing to go where Ms. Black went, you have to be willing to work with the people she worked with, and you have to be willing to take, and maybe be in on the joke that you'll become. Otherwise, keep working the trains to get those 50 asses in those 50 seats, because those seem to be the options here.
Alternately, Simon Cowell may be fishing around for song submissions for the full-length, so if there were a song you wanted to write about taking a sun-dappled walk in the park, you might want to put down the haterade and pick up a guitar.
....I'm just saying.
Sunday, October 3, 2010
Studio update
It's been forever since I posted here, and I'm gonna work on that, but for now, let's get to the business at hand.
At this point, we have a big picture in frame where the album is concerned -- this is, by far, the most well-planned project I've ever done, with Mark and I constantly checking to make sure we're on the same page before a string is plucked or a skin struck. Through that, the album has gained a sense of identity, strong enough that it spoke to Mark in the last session.
I swear I'm not a hippy.
We had just finished laying down my piano part for Astoria (look, ma, two hands!), and re-recording the part for Calling You Out to give it the benefit of my hard-won confidence at wrangling the monster with 88 teeth. The mics hadn't been struck yet, but we were moving on to the next task: adding atmospheric electric guitar to Enough.
Mark had sold me on the idea over beers and bourbon one night, insisting that tastefully done, this wouldn't interfere with the acoustic vibe of the album. As we were listening through the track, he had a change of heart, using words like "personality" to describe the album. He assigned actual sentience to it! As the one in the room who is usually getting branded with the Crazy for talking like that, I was all-too on board for this discussion.
We made an executive decision: there will be no electric guitar on this album.
You guys. You guys.
You guys.
....also, it was amazing amounts of fun to develop a piano part and commit it to disk all at once.
We have a few more vocal sessions, then a string session, then we're going to try to record one more in one day, then comes mixing.
The end of the tunnel never looked so sweet.
At this point, we have a big picture in frame where the album is concerned -- this is, by far, the most well-planned project I've ever done, with Mark and I constantly checking to make sure we're on the same page before a string is plucked or a skin struck. Through that, the album has gained a sense of identity, strong enough that it spoke to Mark in the last session.
I swear I'm not a hippy.
We had just finished laying down my piano part for Astoria (look, ma, two hands!), and re-recording the part for Calling You Out to give it the benefit of my hard-won confidence at wrangling the monster with 88 teeth. The mics hadn't been struck yet, but we were moving on to the next task: adding atmospheric electric guitar to Enough.
Mark had sold me on the idea over beers and bourbon one night, insisting that tastefully done, this wouldn't interfere with the acoustic vibe of the album. As we were listening through the track, he had a change of heart, using words like "personality" to describe the album. He assigned actual sentience to it! As the one in the room who is usually getting branded with the Crazy for talking like that, I was all-too on board for this discussion.
We made an executive decision: there will be no electric guitar on this album.
You guys. You guys.
You guys.
....also, it was amazing amounts of fun to develop a piano part and commit it to disk all at once.
We have a few more vocal sessions, then a string session, then we're going to try to record one more in one day, then comes mixing.
The end of the tunnel never looked so sweet.
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Tuesday, July 13, 2010
Pittsburgh: Papa J's Centro
This past Saturday, I tried out a new venue in Pittsburgh! Papa J's Centro, right across from PPG Plaza, is an Italian restaurant converted from an old-school brothel, which they advertise fairly prominently. Why they do that, I'm not sure -- rarely do you see marketing that lowers your expectations for sexual conduct -- but they're happy, and I'm happy.
My expectations weren't lofty (especially after I found out that the Dave Matthews Band was playing at PNC Park, less than a mile from my little venue), but you guys came through! It was so great to play to a nicely crowded (if not vacuum-packed) house, full of receptive fans ready to receive new tunage while reliving some of our favorite moments from the "days of auld lang cafe-au-lait" -- and it was so much fun that we're going to do it again!
Right after everyone left, Jeffrey and I scheduled our next date, for August 28. Mark yinz calendars!
My expectations weren't lofty (especially after I found out that the Dave Matthews Band was playing at PNC Park, less than a mile from my little venue), but you guys came through! It was so great to play to a nicely crowded (if not vacuum-packed) house, full of receptive fans ready to receive new tunage while reliving some of our favorite moments from the "days of auld lang cafe-au-lait" -- and it was so much fun that we're going to do it again!
Right after everyone left, Jeffrey and I scheduled our next date, for August 28. Mark yinz calendars!
Thursday, July 8, 2010
Studio blog: Jerk
....So you've all heard "Jerk" by now -- it has a driving four-on-the-floor rhythm, which lends itself to an implied drum part. I was on the way to the studio a few weeks ago and was listening to Elvis Costello's "Get Happy," and thinking about how much I love "King Horse," a song that I don't think was very popular but which features one of Pete Thomas' best drum lines:
Start with four kicks on the beat. (1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4)
Add, in alternating occurance, a snare, a high hat, and a floor tom, on the 'and' between 4 and 1. (1 2 3 4 snare 1 2 3 4 hat 1 2 3 4 tom 1 2 3 4 snare....)
The chorus explodes into a more straight beat, dropping the polyrythm before it can resolve. It's so rad. I decided I wanted tosteal it pay homage to it with "Jerk."
Mark was on board, but while he was checking his level, he started doing a pattern that went (kick kick kick tom kick-snare hat kick kick....) and it was so cool I dropped the straight lift in favor of that.
For the bridge, he started out with a four-snare approach, and I said, "It feels like it's too long a bridge for that snare to have any impact. Why don't you try four-on-the-floor and throw in scattered discourse from the toms? The kick will totally drive the bridge."
IT WORKED! It sounds so good, you guys. Drums all over the place. I can't wait for you to hear it.
Start with four kicks on the beat. (1 2 3 4 1 2 3 4)
Add, in alternating occurance, a snare, a high hat, and a floor tom, on the 'and' between 4 and 1. (1 2 3 4 snare 1 2 3 4 hat 1 2 3 4 tom 1 2 3 4 snare....)
The chorus explodes into a more straight beat, dropping the polyrythm before it can resolve. It's so rad. I decided I wanted to
Mark was on board, but while he was checking his level, he started doing a pattern that went (kick kick kick tom kick-snare hat kick kick....) and it was so cool I dropped the straight lift in favor of that.
For the bridge, he started out with a four-snare approach, and I said, "It feels like it's too long a bridge for that snare to have any impact. Why don't you try four-on-the-floor and throw in scattered discourse from the toms? The kick will totally drive the bridge."
IT WORKED! It sounds so good, you guys. Drums all over the place. I can't wait for you to hear it.
Wednesday, June 9, 2010
Studio Blog: State of the Union.
It needs to be said that I'm still buzzing off of the success of my TRAF set, partly because you can YouTube the living hell out of it! Thanks to David Oleniacz for:
.... and
.... and
.... and
I think my favorite thing is the two crotchety guys who full-on have a conversation about which way to go while standing in front of the camera, and nearly crash into it while heading past it. Like, "Damned if some kid on stage bein' filmed by some flim-flam flappin' flibflob is gonna tell us where to stand. We beat England for you!"
_____
Today, Mark and I had a whole rundown of the remaining candidates. We determined a few things:
I am over "Afterglow." I don't know what I hoped to accomplish with that song, and I feel like it captures the weakest attempt I've ever made at salvaging joy from the wreckage of a regrettably premature encounter. RETIRED.
"Astoria" needed a little work. We negotiated a bit on the sustained note at the end of the chorus, and getting the theme back in between the first and second verse. What was great was that Mark was frank and honest about where the song fell apart for him, and we found a solution instead of scrapping it.
So much for "So Much For Us." I think the bug up my butt about recording this because it didn't make the last album is made moot by Mark's assertion that it is suffering from too much bridge. Looking at it objectively, I agree -- if you're going to have a bridge, it should expand on the song, but looking at it now it feels like a lot more lyric to repeat the sentiments that were already there. Which, in fairness to the person I was in the moment that I wrote that song, probably what conversing with me on that subject was like: lots of reiterations on one monotonous theme. I'm going to try to rework it, but it's sidelined for now.
"Jerk" is a kick-ass song! You pretty much knew that.
"Here Goes Nothing" is better than Andy thinks it is. Andy Mac and I co-wrote the title track for this album, and I think it's one of my favorite crush songs since "Under My Nails."
"January" can start eight different ways. We looked at a lot of variants on the open, and it's still up in the air as to which one we'll use. It all depends on how we end:
"Home" does not need to be changed to sound less like other songs. I get a lot of flak from other singer-songwriters about small phrases that stick out to them, but after reworking it, Mark was like, "That's stupid. Put it back the way it was. Nobody is going to think that." Thanks, Mark.
"Hey Hey Hey" is not that big a deal. OK, it's a huge deal. But it's a bigger deal that we don't make a big deal out of it. Right?
"Enough" is better than I think it is. I'd been wish-washing on it, then Mark got enthusiastic. I may turn it into a duet.
"Boy Meets Girl" is recordable. I swear, guys, we're gonna get a good version of this song. I will not rest until it happens.
So there you go. Currently we're looking at this as a 10-song record:
Calling You Out
Wonderful Lie
Hey Hey Hey
Enough
Astoria
Boy Meets Girl
Jerk
Here Goes Nothing
Home
January
I can't wait to start delving into this stuff.
Next week, we're going to go in and try to get basic guitar and vocal tracks for 3 or 4 songs at once, to experiment with our process a bit. Wouldn't you love to listen to this stuff as it happens? Stay tuned to find out how you can!
.... and
.... and
.... and
I think my favorite thing is the two crotchety guys who full-on have a conversation about which way to go while standing in front of the camera, and nearly crash into it while heading past it. Like, "Damned if some kid on stage bein' filmed by some flim-flam flappin' flibflob is gonna tell us where to stand. We beat England for you!"
_____
Today, Mark and I had a whole rundown of the remaining candidates. We determined a few things:
I am over "Afterglow." I don't know what I hoped to accomplish with that song, and I feel like it captures the weakest attempt I've ever made at salvaging joy from the wreckage of a regrettably premature encounter. RETIRED.
"Astoria" needed a little work. We negotiated a bit on the sustained note at the end of the chorus, and getting the theme back in between the first and second verse. What was great was that Mark was frank and honest about where the song fell apart for him, and we found a solution instead of scrapping it.
So much for "So Much For Us." I think the bug up my butt about recording this because it didn't make the last album is made moot by Mark's assertion that it is suffering from too much bridge. Looking at it objectively, I agree -- if you're going to have a bridge, it should expand on the song, but looking at it now it feels like a lot more lyric to repeat the sentiments that were already there. Which, in fairness to the person I was in the moment that I wrote that song, probably what conversing with me on that subject was like: lots of reiterations on one monotonous theme. I'm going to try to rework it, but it's sidelined for now.
"Jerk" is a kick-ass song! You pretty much knew that.
"Here Goes Nothing" is better than Andy thinks it is. Andy Mac and I co-wrote the title track for this album, and I think it's one of my favorite crush songs since "Under My Nails."
"January" can start eight different ways. We looked at a lot of variants on the open, and it's still up in the air as to which one we'll use. It all depends on how we end:
"Home" does not need to be changed to sound less like other songs. I get a lot of flak from other singer-songwriters about small phrases that stick out to them, but after reworking it, Mark was like, "That's stupid. Put it back the way it was. Nobody is going to think that." Thanks, Mark.
"Hey Hey Hey" is not that big a deal. OK, it's a huge deal. But it's a bigger deal that we don't make a big deal out of it. Right?
"Enough" is better than I think it is. I'd been wish-washing on it, then Mark got enthusiastic. I may turn it into a duet.
"Boy Meets Girl" is recordable. I swear, guys, we're gonna get a good version of this song. I will not rest until it happens.
So there you go. Currently we're looking at this as a 10-song record:
Calling You Out
Wonderful Lie
Hey Hey Hey
Enough
Astoria
Boy Meets Girl
Jerk
Here Goes Nothing
Home
January
I can't wait to start delving into this stuff.
Next week, we're going to go in and try to get basic guitar and vocal tracks for 3 or 4 songs at once, to experiment with our process a bit. Wouldn't you love to listen to this stuff as it happens? Stay tuned to find out how you can!
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