Geoff the bass player reports
On October 26 we all piled into Clowns Pocket Recording Studio to record some tracks for our demo CD.
The studio is made up of three rooms - room 1 for drums and bass, room 2 for the guitars and room 3 for the vocalist. Room 3 is also the control room. Double, sound proof doors between earch room and sound screens between each player meant total separation on each track of the recording
Although we had set up by around 10 am, it was after 11 before sound checks, recording levels and individual mixes for each set of headphones were complete and we were able to contemplate some real recording.
The plan was to record "live" and then do any repairs or drop ins later. Because of the high level of sound separation, each instrument was being recorded on its own channel with no overspill. So even though the drums, for instance, were being recorded through about 8 mics, you couldn't hear the bass on the drum channel even though my amp was next to the drum kit and I was using the speaker cab as a low level monitor. This made "repairs" very easy.
| Studio owner and engineer Derek Nash was a real magician with the computer software. He couldn't make us play better, but he could make it sound as if we did. |
We started with our "theme" tune All That Heaven Will Allow - a song we all know and play without thinking - to ease the nerves. We were all amazed at how quickly we reached a sound we were happy with. I suppose we thought it would take many, many takes. In fact it rarely took more than two.
On the computer, Derek could tighten up the recording by correcting an early or late note, he could delete any strays and even alter the pitch of a "bum" note.
I had felt that we would have most trouble recording our version of Crazy Little Thing Called Love. But even though I missed a few notes and had to record a drop in on my own, it took remarkably little time - in fact I think it was one of the quickest tracks we did.
We had rehearsed five songs in two rehearsals before the session and we thought we would probably only have time to record three. In the event we recorded six!
We came away from the studio with six tracks of "clean"songs. We go back to another studio (November 4) to do the final mix.
Guitarist Pete wants to redo the solo on the last track we recorded. We did it in a bit of a hurry - we had about 30 minutes of studio time available - and it wasn't quite perfect. In fact we were playing All You Ever Do Is Bring Me Down while Pete was playing There Goes My Heart.
The final mix may well involve some adjustment of levels and the addition of some effects (reverb, echo etc.).
The finished article will be pressed as a limited run demo CD to send out to various venues in the South East and we also plan to carry a sample track here on the site. We are toying with the idea of doing a longer run of a pucker mini album to sell at gigs.