Friday night I'm engineering an acoustic-and-vocal session for the bluesgoth thing, Saturday I'm doing a bass session (it still counts as bass even if half the bass lines are done on a Prophet, dammit! The other half are proper bass guitar.) for the Garda EP.

I'm curious to try a ribbon mic on that old archtop acoustic...

Sunday is for hangovers and mixing.

Productivity: it's what's for dinner.

Ohhhh that sounds like a good weekend.

Also Krz called back but I was at practice so I have not a word for you yet.

It is, it is! Saturday evening is a spiffy alternative dance party at a rock dive bar I'm known to frequent.

They put in a sweet new PA there a while back, but somebody had buggered it up when they first set it up and there was some phase canceling thing going on and we were getting the karaoke version of everything with whatever was down the center mostly having disappeared.

And cool, thanks. Chris from Garda was actually asking me about that at rehearsal last night, go figure. Thanks a bunch.

That sounds like an epic win of a weekend.


I love tracking, mixing, and all that goodstuffs.

That's the plan.

The bluesy stuff, doing it properly, not just songwriting demos... totally the opposite of how I'm doing the Garda sessions, as in this case I'm dealing with a singer who's either singing and playing at the same time or prefers using a handheld with the monitors loud. Lotsa bleed, I'm sure. Very, very different vibe. I suppose it's taking me out of my recording comfort zone a little, doing something less precise and controlled, but it should be good times.

...and my shitty slide playing will show up on one of the tracks.

Getting out of your comfort zone is usually a good thing... it teaches you new ways to approach things.

'Zactly. As an engineer, it's not my place to dictate to the performer how to make their noise. I'm the one recording the noise they're making. And in this situation, relinquishing some of the control that I'm used to having in the tracking stage. I figure given the context the bleed and lack of isolation doesn't matter. It's supposed to be organic, it's supposed to be raw, and not necessarily hi-fi, or rather, not necessarily slick and glossy.

Correct... You can tell them to hit their instrument harder or whatever, but if they don't wish to, it's certainly not your place to attempt to force them to, unless you're producing the thing rather than simply mixing it.

It can be a whole hell of a lot of fun to play a session as well in a genre you are not used to doing. I've done it a few times and there are always nice surprises on both ends. You tend to learn soemthing new and the person you are working for gets something a little out of the ordinary for what they are doing. Very cool.

Hell, I'm producing and playing on this. And co-writing some of the material... well, that falls more into the producer camp in this context. I'd rather have someone comfortable with their performance than force them to do it how I'd do it and get a shoddy performance.

It's not as if I'm gonna be tuning the vocals or editing this to a grid.

OH, no, if you need the best tunist, you know who to call.

Yay, awesomeness later.

I bought a glass slide the other day. It is nifty. I am still a bad slide player.

...and I tracked lead vocals for the Garda record the other night. And have the bass session on Saturday.

What am I doing, all this "accomplishing"? Feh. Feck that.

yes I much prefer a glass slide to metal/chrome. Metal is too harsh sounding, but it also does not fall off the mic stand when a drunk chick dances up in your face on stage. SOLUTION: bring 2 glass slides.

You will need to work OT for me as well, I haz cold and feel like shit. I tried drinking the cold out of me and that didn't seem to work. Coke and Torched Cherry Rum may taste like cough syrup, but it does not fix the coldzes

I pretty much only like metal slides. The glass one i have is just too "nice"/smoove. Of course, i pretty much only use them for violence.

I like to make them out of cut out sections of broken cymbal stands. My dad used to have a cool one that he made out of a section of very heavy steel back in the olden days when he did a stint as a machinist for HK Porter. That thing sounded huge, it was like being able to slide the fretboard around.

tor: I'll do my best.

Solution for glass slides live: beer bottle.

Chris: once again, with an awesome story. That sounds nifty.

I'm using the thing for old-tyme bloosing. Proper bloose, not Texas Hat bloose. Though I suppose it could have applications for violence?

yes, I've used beer bottle and more recently shot glasses but only in establishments that actually use glass shot glasses. I will not frequent those places in which amatuers need to be given plastic (*le gasp*) shot glasses. Last time someone tried to give me a shot in plastic I told them to put it back in the bottle as I will not drink my booze out of plastic. I have also used mic stands for slides but not for anything speedy...

Ugh, plastic shot glasses. I'll take a mixed drink in plastic if it's at a seedy dive and that's all they have, but plastic shot glasses are a total ripoff- they're always tiny like medicine dosage cup sized things, and really only half a shot. Bugger that.

yes they seem very Nyquil-ly in shot glasses.


Oh - but on the plus side of a cold - NYQUIL! little nikewill on top of a few little drinks makes for a good sleep.

If I'm paying for a whole shot, I want a whole shot dammit.

And usually if other people are paying for shots it's Jaeger for some reason. Which is rather medicinal with a bit of Christmas cookie.

WTF is a fascination with Jaeger? Is it just rock n roll to do jaeger???? no motherfucker buy me someshit I like.....