Saturday, March 31, 2007

Day 11, 12, 13 - Guitar Tedium

After Tuesday’s session wrapped, we had a great sounding foundation of drums and bass that Jeff immediately set to editing. With each pass, the sounds get better and the performances are tweaked to precision.

We moved immediately onto guitars, with Matt Mahaffey taking the helm. Clashes over the guitar work sparked our first true creative conflicts.

Conflict #1 – For efficiency’s sake, we’re getting a good guitar tone up first, and then moving through the songs trying to think of which parts should utilize the selected tone. This is theoretically faster than doing one song at a time, as it reduces hours of transition time it takes to move from one sound to another. However, this causes a tendency to force a sound that doesn’t fit the part, and creates a general sense of chaos and uncertainty in the workflow.

Conflict #2 – Dirty or polished? Those freak nasty guitar sounds can be really effective, but how much is too much? I’m going after a more modern, dare I say radio friendly sound, where the rest of the band (and the producers) prefer vintage grit and some messiness. Is my perfectionist nitpicking counterproductive?

Conflict #3 – Are we trying to recreate our old demos with superb production, or are we trying to break out of the box and freak out? We have some really good arrangements down in our home recordings – is it worth changing them? Matt and Jeff have come up with some excellent new parts, but we’re also asking them to painstakingly recreate accidental nuances from our old demos. We’d like to trim the fat out of our traditionally complicated guitar parts, but find ourselves adding more and more stuff.

And so on. We’re trying to make decisions definitively as we go, to avoid having to fix too much in the mix. This is why I fucking hate the recording process – we’re under pressure to create the definitive version of these songs for all eternity that will make or break our music careers. I want every note to be perfect. I love high production value music and the creative process, but in the studio I turn into a little gremlin that smirks and second-guesses everything.

We do get to have some fun though. Creative epiphanies abound, and on Friday we got to rock some simple stadium guitars in the big room to create the “A&R wall of rock”, as heard in Hinder and All American Rejects songs.

We have this weekend off, and are about to head to a BBQ in Studio City. Surely some Mexican beer and hotdogs will get our heads back in the game.

More updates and photos soon.

Matt

Wednesday, March 28, 2007

Day 9 and 10 – Bass in yo’ face

In terms of musicianship, the rhythm section definitively rules over myself and Larkin. Big time. McKenzie tore through all of his bass tracks in two days, and everything sounds great. We used a punchy old school Fender P-Bass (borrowed from Dreamgirls oscar-nominee Scott Cutler) and a smoother Jazz bass (borrowed from Cold War Kids producer Kevin Augunas) through an Ampeg head. Sick of name drops yet?

We’ve moved from the big room into smaller room to do most of the remaining tracking, but we’ll still use the big room for some theatrical moments – stadium guitars, strings, tambourines and vibes.

We’ll get some more tracking photos up on the photoblog soon. Did you notice that we have a photoblog by the way? Click the link under the title of this blog to see our misadventures illustrated.

Our nightlife also proceeds largely unchecked. We’re surrounded by colorful internationals at our “hotel” who love to play drinking games and tell some of the most outrageous stories we’ve ever heard (I got shot by a sniper and lived, I took out a machine gun wielding assailant, the trees speak to me, and when I tell them I love them they understand). On Tuesday Briks and I went on a tour de local bars and met some West Hollywood denizens, and on Monday I attended a fashionable birthday party with some new friends.

Tomorrow we start on guitars. This means bickering over nuances, tears, and the f-word will occur in abundance. Check in later for more salacious dirt.

Updated celebrity encounters: Nick Stahl, Jesse Camp, The Living Things, Jeffree Starr (?)

Matt

Sunday, March 25, 2007

Day Seven and Eight - Miller Time

So the drums are done, and Matt and Jeff took the weekend to edit tracks, spend some QT with their families, and fix a few noisy channels at the studio. This left Liam and Me off the leash for a long weekend to pursue our true passion – drugs and partying.

LA is a mythical land of excess and historic celebrity overdoses, and who are we to fight it? We got a giant pile of weed, giant pile of coke, giant pile of meth, giant pile of assorted barbiturates, added a fifth of Jameson and some heavy cream as a base, hit puree, and hit the town.

On Friday night Briks and I went to the Roosevelt in Hollywood with some friends where we bought $13 drinks and talked to hip strangers. Later the band united with some Philadelphia ex-pats at a laid-back house party at the Baron’s house in the Hollywood Hills. In bed promptly at 6am.

On Saturday we hung out at producer Matt Mahaffey’s house/studio in Sherman Oaks. He has a great space with some awesome gear, tasteful Balinese décor, and two spoiled Dalmatians. We ordered BBQ, watched Star Wars and some of Matt’s live performance DVDs (solo and with Beck), and had a good bonding experience. Geeking out on bootleg original session files from some of our favorite classic albums was probably the highlight of the weekend. From there we went to an Agency Group party in Silver Lake and met some fine Americans and rock and roll types. It took us back to SXSW. In bed promptly at 3:30am.

Updated celebrity encounters: Eva Longoria, Kelly Osbourne, Amy Winehouse, guitarist from Jet, Josh Frankfort.

Tomorrow we get back into the studio for bass tracking. McKenzie’s time to shine.

Matt

Friday, March 23, 2007

Days Five and Six - Hostile in the Hostel

Good Morning,

It is my distinct pleasure to announce that yesterday, at approximately 10:00 PM, Jon finished tracking drums. After 4 grueling 12-hour days trapped within a cave like room filled with a sea of microphones criss-crossing in varying directions, he triumphantly emerged, and will now be taking a much deserved vacation from the studio's hot seat. So, with this first step complete, and our producers working feverishly on perfecting the drums tracks before moving on to bass, we have all been givin the day off for some R&R. And, aside from a planned trip to Thrive's office to check in, as well as a lunch date with our booking agent, the four of us are face to face with a vacant day, filled with possibiity and potential.

Currently, while the others are getting ready for lunch, I find myself seated in the main room of the Hostel, watching other Hostel residents watching the movie Hostel, which, admittedly, is somewhat disturbing. And so we are off to enjoy the city, keeping our eyes peeled for movie stars and important-esque people at all times. Hope all is well with everyone.

-Dan

Thursday, March 22, 2007

Days Three and Four - Drum Tracking

After four days in sunny California, where the hell is our sun? Rainy, cold, we might as well be in Philadelphia – no offense.

We’re moving along with the drum tracking, changing up the sound a little bit for each song. Mostly we’re switching out the snare drums – Matt and Jeff have a collection of snares with different sounds and names to match, i.e., the Strokes Snare, the Don Henley Snare, The Beat It Snare. These names change as necessary to suit different studio personalities.

Briks is doing an excellent job pounding out the tracks, with only the mildest use of the big red studio magic button. However, we’ve run into annoying, mood killing setbacks every day. Yesterday our Avocet studio controller blew out for reasons unknown, and today a snare head broke mid song (warranting a trip to Chad Sexton’s Drum World – yes that Chad Sexton from 311). Then some A&R suits from Epic, like totally showed up for like, two hours, and, like, harshed our vibe, dude. Later our A&R from Thrive showed up with pizza, red bull, and beer, and that was cool.

Everything seems to be clicking nicely with the producers, and already ideas are being thrown around for how to improve upon and modify the tracks. We catch them humming the melodies and bass lines all the time, which is encouraging. Chris the engineer called in from the east coast where he’s working on Ben Stiller’s next movie “just to check in”. Its nice to know that everyone’s getting fired up about the record.

In other news, we may be going on a great tour immediately after recording is finished. Details soon. Also, we’re listening to lots of hip hop in the car. Also my dog, that I’ve had since I was nine, died yesterday at 16 years old. He lived a long and full dog life, but this is proving to be more upsetting than I had imagined.

Matt

Tuesday, March 20, 2007

Day Two – Drum Sounds

After picking up our rental car and grabbing a quick breakfast in West Hollywood, we headed to Burbank to see the studio and meet the producers for the first time. Production duo Wired All Wrong - Jeff Turzo (God Lives Underwater) and Matt Mahaffey (Self) - are doing the record, having most recently produced Hellogoodbye’s Zombies! Aliens! Vampires! Dinosaurs!, a great sounding record currently burning up the charts. We were all excited and I was quite a bit nervous – though they had our demos and a list of our favorite recordings, I had only briefly spoken to Jeff a couple of times on the phone. We weren’t entirely sure what to expect.

Any trepidation I had was alleviated when we arrived at 2pm. The studio is large and gorgeous, with tons of great vintage and modern gear and a relaxed creative vibe. We have access to classic guitars, basses, and synths, a Steinway piano, preamps and consoles, everything we need. Jeff and Matt are friendly, cool, and super competent, and we got along with them immediately. Chris the engineer and Lee the intern were also on hand to help out. Spinal Tap-esque fake British accents peppered the conversation as abstract music descriptors were thrown about.

The task for our first studio day was to get a good drum sound and run through all the songs live for some light pre-production. Most of our day was spent lounging around being useless will Chris and Jeff lovingly positioned microphones and sound barricades in countless configurations until the drums sounded sufficiently “magical”. It was great to see so much care and diligence being but into the process – several complicated setups were built and later dismantled. There were some technical issues to work out in the studio, but we eventually got through it all with a tight, powerful, and rich disco drum sound that we can turn into whatever we want in post.

Sample dialogue: “I'm not vibing that sweet magical punch. Why don’t we throw up some 4410s up top and place Matt’s 67 and the sub near the Ludwig, try the Matt’s Eagles snare with Jeff’s wallet taped down. Yeah, channel 1’s tweaky and the 480Q-10s are honking kinda bad, lets re-route and try some mid range scooped compression and I can sweeten the Toms with some shammalamma ding dong hooka jook nada surf N87 Bs.” Jigga what?

Finally, at 9:30pm, the band set up in separate compartments to record all 14 tracks live. My voice was totally shot, but we got through it. Jeff and Matt gave us some great feedback, and everyone seemed to get excited about the prospects for the material and making this record white shit hot. A&R Peter Torres was there the entire day helping out, and label owner Ricardo stopped in later during the live tracking. He was so excited by our progress that he doubled our production budget. Yeah right!

Matt

Monday, March 19, 2007

Day One - SXSW to LA

Dear all:

In an unprecedented attempt at web diligence, Liam and Me will try to keep a studio journal in order to keep everyone updated on our progress / setbacks / victories / defeats. We will be as honest as possible to give you an accurate perspective of our creepy lives.

Having just returned from dinner with our A&R, Briks and I are currently sitting in the “lobby” of our “hotel” in LA. Its actually more like a youth hostel with private suites, but it’s a pretty nice setup. Good location in West Hollywood, two bedrooms, two bathrooms, a TV that doesn’t work, bunk beds. Ballin. We are surrounded by good-looking collegiate backpackers from Britain and her former colonies. We are completely exhausted and looking forward to a full night’s sleep.

From March 14 until today, we were in Austin, Texas for the SXSW music conference. This year’s was apparently the biggest one yet, with 25,000 crazy people descending on the city for 4 days of showcases, parties, drinking, eating, and deal making. It’s fun to the point of brutality. Widespread indulgence and alcoholism probably shaves a few weeks off your life. Well worth it. Liam and Me played a few great shows – Purevolume’s nightly party shortly after we arrived, an afternoon showcase for Burnlounge on Saturday, and a super hot set at the Viper Room later that night. We also did our first ever videotaped interviews for Havok TV and Stim TV, filled our rented minivan with 14 people, received and gave lots of free schwag, got kicked out of a hotel room, and enjoyed the finer things in life with the staff of High Times magazine. Our Emmy nominated friend Glenn Anderson videotaped much of the madness, which we will share with you soon.

Great bands we saw: Buzzcocks reunion, Kings of Leon, Lynden, New London Fire, Stock Market Crash, Young Love, Junior Senior, Zack Hexum.

Fabulous celebrity encounters: Perry Farrel, James Iha, Wayne Coyne, Breckin Meyer, the cast of Human Giant, that chick who plays “Maybe” in Arrested Development, Albert Hammond Jr.

This morning on two hours of sleep, we left Austin TX at 9:30am, picked up our manager, and drove 3 hours to Houston, and flew to LA. Tomorrow we meet our producers and see the studio for the first time, and maybe start tracking the drums.

Matt