Day 6 - recording with Tamira - Drums!!!

Despite advice against it from almost eveyrone I mentioned it to, I decided that since Tamira can play the drums we should take a go at putting drums on at least some of the tracks. Drums are notoriously difficult to record have them sound good, but in line with the "lo-fi/let's just do what we can" nature of all my music endeavours we decided to rent a studio for 3 hours at Melody line and see what we could get out of a beaten up old drum kit. 

Tamira kept it simple didn't make any mistakes and we managed to reocrd her drumming 2 takes on 4 of the tracks.... who knows what it will sound like mixed. 

 

 

 

 

Day 5 - recording with Tamira

We continued sorting vocals and adding extra guitar parts and then took some photos for the album cover. Kenneth Clarke is going to do it again. Let's see what he comes up with. 

Day 4 - recording with Tamira

Today we tried to tackle a few of Tamira's harder songs. She's very adventurous with her songwriting and she gives herself a real challenge in the vocal melodies she writes. A capo will help with some of them but the range between the verse and the chorus on a lot of her songs will really be a bitch to get perfect in a recording.

Mixing Hugh Burke

Months ago on a drunken friday afternoon, I recorded Sandra and Hugh Burke playing a few songs each. Hugh is leaving Amsterdam, so I finally had an excuse to mix a few snippets that I had of him playing and sent him to him. They sounded lovely!!

day 3 - Recording with Tamira.

we had a pretty good session - going over lots of the songs, and adding various extra bits and pieces.

Recording Lee Clark - Day 1

Today I started recording som songs for a mate called Lee Clark. We're not quite sure what we want yet, he asked for a 3 song demo, but we might go for the full bhuna. We put down about 7 rough takes so that I have an idea about the sound of his voice and his guitar. He's a fast worker. I was pretty happy with the results.

Adding Guitars to Tamira's tracks

I started recoring additional guitars for tamira songs. I start with Onverwacht bericht - her only dutch song. I want it out the way, cos I struggle to listen to the dutch singing over and over again when I'm mixing it.... then I chose Shut up and Kiss me cos I really like that one and I didn't want to sicken myself when we'd just started.

day 2 - Recording with Tamira

We re-recorded several of the original rough takes where the structure wasn't correct.

Trying to be creative on a Monday evening :-(

I finished off most of the open Mike mixing... and then tried to put down the makings of a song idea that came out during the Jam Session... lazy-arse-itis got the better of me and before I knew it I;d ran out of time.

Sorting... mixing... tidying..

I had a day of sorting out audio.. the session with Tamira... the open mike... the Jam at melody line.... today I could have saved about 3 hours if I had double the RAM I had... I'm not much of a technology junkie, but if I had the room, I'd have a new computer by now.

Day 1 - recording with Tamira

Fresh off my recent recording prowess that I developed with the help of Sandra, I'm going to record Tamira. Day 1 was spent getting a rough recording of each of her songs so that I can have a listen and work out what to do with them.

Starting as we mean to go on....

In an attempt to start as we mean to go on. Fraser Javier and I went Jam Studios(MUZYQ was booked) to make some noise. I forgot how much of a slog it was to carry guitars and cables to the studio

Wi' (not) Jammin'

After 6 months of oscillating between playing rockstar and playing grumpy-organiser-man - the Coco's Jam Sessions are no more. It seems that the Jam Session was the only night that was a guaranteed success, and the bar is going to replace it's stage with a DJ booth.

It was a great experience while it lasted, and I learned a lot, but there is a part of me is glad for a break. As the nerves and worry of managing to get through the night with unknown musicians gave way, it became an organizational chore. How do we plug in 3 guitars in with 2 guitar cables? How long do you give the drunk guy a shot on the drums before you ask him politely to leave? How do you explain to the Reggae enthusiasts that reggae sounds terrible if their timing is terrible? And also is all this shit your responsibility?

Through the Jam Sessions I have met loads of new musicians and contacts and built a lot of confidence in playing and even singing. Thank you to everyone that put up with it and thank you to everyone that participate; we did ourselves proud. Onwards and upwards to the next adventure.