Ridin' the Coaster

Music production is an emotional roller coaster.  For any young person thinking of getting into music production, or any person of any age, for that matter, I'd just say prepare for riding a constant roller coaster of ups, downs, feelings of devastation, and then minor triumphs.  It just seems to be the way that it works, at least if you're more or less doing it yourself.

In the olden days, the days of MWP, you were more or less simply the band that showed up with songs, hired somebody to help you shape them and ultimately lay them down to tape, and then the mix was handled by some third party that you may or may not have had any say in whatsoever.  A month later, the magic mix shows up, you listen to it, I'd imagine there's some sort of approval process, and then the record label takes it from there.

This, of course, is not the way of the home studio or independent artist.  Instead, you go into doing a recording knowing that you want it to sound like X album that you love by X band, and then start the process of falling on your face, over and over, until you hit a wall and realize that you can't overcome the bizarre issues that you seem to be working against.  This was pretty much my experience through the entire "...Opsimath" album, except that I don't believe I really had many "minor triumphs" whatsoever.

All that aside, I do really believe, after all of this time, these countless years, and definitely endless hours, that I'm finally getting some triumphs.  If I continue on this path, I'd dare say that I might even be comfortable with charging for my mixing services and opening it up to other projects, not that that's my priority, mind you.

I listened to my mixes last night that I did over the weekend and they pretty much went as expected.  I can't tell you the joy I experience when I go into listening to a mix and a) things work that I think will work and b) I can more or less suspect where potential issues are beforehand.  In the past, it was all blindsiding, meaning you had no idea what issues would be thrown at you, etc.  This has really changed in the past year...thankfully.

For example, I have been fighting with the song "Scapegoat" from the Defrost Nixon material for quite some time.  I felt I had it...and then the next mix sounded much worse and I couldn't figure out why initially.  In looking at it over the weekend, I noticed that I had a plugin on the mix buss that even by wording sounded aggressive in nature.  So, I switched it to something calmer...and what do you know?  That was in fact the issue.  I also spent a good hour adding some "spice" touches to the mix, thinking it would work, and by george...it did.  So, this trouble child mix went from being the biggest blocker to now the first one basically done.  I dare say that 10 years ago I probably would have fiddled for another 10 years on this one and only mix, desperately looking for the issues.

Actually, all the mixes sounded as expected, most of them fairly close to being done.  Two of the four are ready to be locked down but unfortunately are on different releases, meaning I still have trouble spots in the other tracks.  I'm still struggling with "Only With You" from the "Mirror Land" EP, mainly with making the vocal sound consistent and normal.  This has been a bit of a thorn in my side but I have quite a few ideas on how to fix it.  "The Effects of Connection" is pretty close but just needs some minor mods.  I haven't been doing much mixing over the past month because of my ear but I have at least been really pleased with the little work I've done.  Another way that I know that I'm getting better is that the new Jazz Machine tracks sound pretty good right out of the gate, something else that would have been completely unheard of a decade ago.

I'll be heading off to my Moh's appointment shortly.  I'm unfortunately fairly convinced that my graft is not taking on my ear, after doing some online research and putting 2x2 together based on what they told me yesterday.  Sigh.  If I need another graft taken, etc., this is really going to be pure ick.  And so, I don't really know what I'm headed into today and I'm doing my best to brace for pretty much anything.  Talk about being agile.

Who Needs Frets?!

I finally got around to working on the real bass line today for "This Town's Not Big Enough (for You and I)".  I had actually intended to work on it earlier in the week but it just never happened.  I also laid down a small acoustic part for the refrains in an effort to liven up that area.  I feel that I really want the core pieces of these new songs put down fairly early, just so that I can judge the songs in a better manner and start mixing them from the get go.

With this bass part, it was my maiden voyage with my fairly new Fender Mod Shop Fretless Jazz bass that I purchased a few months back.  I must say that I really dig this instrument so far and it's quite nice having a bass that doesn't have frets and also has flat wound strings, neither of which I'm used to at all.  I usually use my P Bass for most bass lines but having this new fretless bass is quite a nice addition to the arsenal.  I wasn't sure if it would be the appropriate choice for this song but it actually worked perfectly, especially since my own personal bass style is to do a lot of sliding (I now have a blister on my index finger to prove it as well).  I was also tickled to hear, when listening to the song later this evening through my stereo, that I had the bass volume almost perfectly set and the bass sound/tone overall needs almost no EQ.  I don't know if that's just a coincidence or literally something about this bass but it's quite a bonus.

The song is really coming along and is getting closer to done each time I tinker with it.  I also did a bit of a remix on "Younger Days of Manchester" and again I'm blown away by how far these two new songs for the next Jazz Machine album already are.  If I really wanted to, I could have these songs completely wrapped up probably in about a week or two since they're that far along and without a ton of instruments on them.  In other words, I think I'm filling the space of a song better than I used to...which is great.

I'm really enjoying this new album so far and I'm looking forward to working on the next track, "Do You Bump?", once I can get back to recording, probably not until late July or August.  It's going to be a real drag not being able to record for the next 2 months but I plan to occupy my time with mixing through the monitors since headphones will pretty much be off the table for me for awhile.

Speaking of, I'm mentally trying to prepare for my appointment this Wednesday.  It feels like I'm going in for voluntary body mutilation, to be honest.  I have no idea what will be left of my ear post Wednesday and it's a bit unsettling.  I'll then be going in weekly for a different spot to be removed for the next 4-5 weeks.

I need to lay very low for the week following this upcoming procedure so that the skin graft takes.  I imagine that I'll be writing a bit here since my options will be a bit limited.  I also think I'm finally going to start doing posts here about albums that have really influenced me over the years.  I have thought about doing a separate blog of those for probably a decade so it's probably best that I just start posting them here instead, especially since it hits me at random moments about different albums.

Here's to a good week!  I'm personally keeping my fingers crossed.

Last Day

Well, another recording week has come and gone.  I ended up working on the three solo parts today for the 2 songs that I'd been working on all week for the new Jazz Machine album.  The first solo, the one for "This Town's...", took forever.  Geesh.  I think I worked on it for like 2-3 hours which is a bit absurd, I'll admit.  I'm still not the greatest at laying down a really inventive solo for a fairly long musical passage so clearly I need to work on this more.  I did finally get something down that I really like, though, and I just listened to both tracks on my stereo so I think they'll pass with flying colors.

It was pretty late by the time I even started messing around with the two solos on "Younger Days of Manchester".  I had a feeling that this song would be a bit easier since both solos are shorter in nature, plus the song has a fairly slow tempo.  I pretty much laid down the first solo right away; the second took me a bit of time, mainly just to figure out what I wanted to play and then actually learn how to play it.  I used the Gibson ES-335...it seemed like the perfect choice since it's kind of a bluesy solo, really, and a bit different for me, to be honest.  Using only 2 pedals, the sound recorded perfectly, I think, and it's got exactly the tone I was looking for.

I've also been experimenting all week with different mic placement, although I've been primarily using the same 2 mic's, namely a Royer R122 and a Neumann U87ai.  In the beginning of the week, I followed some advice that I read online but today I decided to try something a bit different, making the U87ai the primary for most of the sound.  I think it worked quite well and this configuration may just become my goto going forward.  The biggest difference from what I've done before is that I hanged the U87ai upside down this time, primarily for the reason that I can get the two mic's closer together.  Everyone seems to talk at length about how they love the sound and tone of the ribbon mic's.  Whereas I got a much better tone out of the Royer this week using the advised placement, I think I still much prefer the U87ai for it just sounds bigger to me.  The key with the U87ai, though, is that you absolutely do not want to overload the condenser for it sounds like complete crap, in my opinion at least.

The only thing I didn't get done today or this week was the bass for "This Town's...".  I'm going to try and put that down sometime this week, just because I don't want it to sit too terribly long.  It's also an opportunity for me to use my new fretless bass and see how that goes.  I record most of my bass parts direct so I also won't be bothering my neighbors when doing it.

All in all, even though I didn't get tons done, it's been a pretty good recording week, putting my eyes, nose, and finger issues aside.  Even with those things, I still got through it so I feel pretty good about that.  What can I say?  I'm learning.

Oh, that Bond theme...

I finished up the main guitar part today on "This Town...".  It ends up that I actually had everything I needed and didn't have to record any more for the part, even though I was convinced yesterday that I'd need to.  It's funny how that happens.  Sometimes, especially when you're in the thick of it and listening to a track over and over and quite frankly too close to it, you can't really judge what you're hearing.  It's sometimes best to walk away and return with fresh ears, and much to my surprise I liked everything that I had down already for a take.

I did redo one very small literally 5 second bit, where I hit a string in a strange way, and knowing how I am, I figured I might as well do the correction now rather than later.  Trying to correct something later can be a real nightmare since it's very hard to get all the same settings, sounds, mic placement, etc., so that it sounds seamless.  It's not impossible, mind you, and I've done it multiple times, but it can be a bit of a headache and so I do what I can to avoid that sort of thing whenever possible.

After editing the main part, I worked on all the little tidbit guitar parts.  Unfortunately, I burned over an hour just trying to get the right sound/tone and effects settings for one of the little parts.  It's amazing how you can burn time in this manner.  I'm sure I was also driving my next door neighbor nuts by playing the same little riff over and over, probably around 50-70 times.  I'm sure he was thinking, "...what the hell is he doing over there?!"  This is the same guy that in the past yelled out his window very loudly, "Shut up!!!", when a car alarm kept going off down the street.  I feel bad about making the neighbors have to listen to this sort of thing (the guitar riff, not the alarm...because that wasn't me) but then again it's their choice to not have a/c and keep all of their windows open all the time.  Living next to me, I'm not sure I would recommend it.

I think most of what I did today worked and will stick but I still have some questions about some of the guitar tone.  I did end up keeping my rough version of the Morricone guitar bit but I recorded a new version for the James Bond styled guitar.  As I always say, I don't consider anything closed until I've had a chance to listen to it the next day on the stereo.

I was hoping to also do the solos today but I ran out of time.  Sigh.  I'm going to try and do them tomorrow but I'm not sure if that'll happen since I have other chores that I also need to attend to.

By the way, I'm trying to get used to looking at my nose.  It's far from healed but all the Steri strips finally fell off.  The stitches made quite a few imprints in my nose and I do look slightly Frankenstein like from the front.  I think it'll probably heal fine but I get the feeling that it takes a very long time to heal.  Speaking of, another joy of getting older...your body just doesn't heal like it once did.  I swear...I have cuts on my legs and knees that happened six months ago and just never seem to heal.  Ah, the joy.

In the "...Town.."

I worked today on starting to record the real guitar parts for "This Town's Not Big Enough (for You and I)".  It's always a bit challenging to work on guitars this quickly, right after blueprinting the track, and it's frankly a bit easier to do if you have an opportunity to play around with melodies during the blueprinting.  Because that wasn't my approach, it's been fairly slow going and I didn't get to finish the main guitar part.  I'm hoping to get back to it tomorrow and also work on some of the minor guitar parts that I already have worked out in my head.

I did try a different mic'ing approach today, one that I saw online earlier this week, and it seems like it's not all bad.  Mic placement is pretty fascinating and it's amazing how much an inch left or right will make to the overall sound quality.

Other than that, I don't have much to report.  My left eye is so far hanging in there, which is good.  I also got to finally watch the movie "Infinity Pool" last night and I was quite enthralled with it.  I haven't seen many movies this year as of yet but this one quickly rises to the top.  For anyone that likes a film like David Cronenberg's classic "Videodrome", I'd highly recommend checking out Brandon Cronenberg's "Infinity Pool" (and if you've never seen "Videodrome", well, check that one out as well).

Old Ways

I was hoping to sleep in this morning, especially since I woke up so early the previous day.  I kind of thought that I'd go to bed early last night but somehow the night seems to wake me up unless I'm completely beyond exhausted.  In any event, I was disappointed to look at the alarm clock and see that I actually awoke around 7:10am, mainly since one of my two cats decided that it was time to get up.  The thing about young cats (or cats in general) is that if you get up at 6:30am one day they more or less think that's the new norm.

I actually had a pretty productive day, although I didn't work on any of the things that I thought I would.  I decided it was time to revisit "Yet I Tried for You", the song that I worked on with Seth Tiven of Dumptruck that's been collecting dust for quite some time.  I've been arguing with myself what exactly to do with this track.  I originally wanted to do a 4 song EP, of which I have the 4 songs, but then MWP stepped into the mix and so I was debating about rerecording the track with him, and then thought differently of that, and so on.  My latest thought process is actually to go back to the original plan of the 4 songs and not do them with MWP, and instead come up with something totally new to work on with him.  We'll see if this thought process sticks.

I hadn't listened to the song since Seth sent me his completed guitar track.  It was a bit of mess because his track did not completely line up to the grid in my session, and why I don't know, and so I had to do a bit of digging to figure out how to make it work.  I guess I had finally gotten it lined up but burned out after that since that's where I had left off.  I listened to the track today, started working on how I'd use Seth's parts, and then just started messing around with harmonies, etc.  Needless to say, I still like the track quite a bit and it sounds pretty damn good, I think.  It really only needs a couple more things and is completely done, now that I've put the harmonies down.  I'm thinking I might get the other 3 tracks in motion drum wise.

Next, I decided, since I was already in mix mode, to open up the Defrost Nixon song "Scapegoat" which is one of Cameron's songs that I had been fighting with for quite some time.  I finally got the drum replacement to work about 2 weeks ago but there were a few vocal ideas I wanted to try out before sending him my progress.  So, I messed around with a small harmony and an effect vocal that I think is kind of cool.  Of course, he may not like it, and it's ultimately his call since it's his song, but I like to try this kind of thing out and see if it flies.  More often than not, it does.

After that, I made a few more changes to "Across the Desert" after listening to it last night.  It's getting better but there are still a few hurdles.

And lastly, since most of the day was already gone, I decided to attempt getting the dreaded last few redo phrases down for "Only With You" which is the latest thing that's been holding up the finishing of the "Mirror Land" EP.  This EP is of course so overdue that it's disgusting.  I can't even begin to tell you how much I want this thing done and over with.  Ironically, though, this EP is almost a record of my entire mix learning so far, since I started working on it so very long ago and then I have to keep updating the session with new mix techniques, etc.  It's been a real b*tch of a project but, if nothing else, it's a living testament of everything I've learned thus far.

I'm now debating if I'm going to go back upstairs and try to work on something else.  Hmm.  As much as I didn't work on any new music today, I'm kind of pleased to maybe make some positive progress on this older stuff laying around.  I'm anticipating that I won't be able to wear headphones for most of June and all of July so it would be beyond amazing if I could get at least one of these EP's wrapped up mix wise in the next 2 weeks.  It is possible...fingers crossed.