Snoozeking Music

When it comes to recording songs, I prefer to set up a session with a real live drummer.  I’ve been very fortunate in the past to work with professionals like Jim Evans in Nashville, Coach Hanna in New York, and Charley Newcomer here in Cleveland to name a few.  And as I continue on my recording journey I also am finding that I really prefer the sound of real live instruments.

However, when working on demos or just doing some jamming or writing, it’s not always feasible to have a drum kit mic’ed up, and often there’s not a drummer in the room.  So at that point I have to rely on other tools.  I think that may have been a drummer joke, sorry.

In the past I’ve enjoyed using Acid Pro to lay down ultra-quick drum tracks.  I started using Acid when it first came out, and it’s intuitive to stripe down a series of loops.  It’s also pretty tweakable as far as manipulating the loops that I’m using – I can slice and dice things into completely different patterns if I want.  And I like the way I can add loops of other instruments to fill out a temporary arrangement.

The workflow with Acid has left a little to be desired.  Even though I think you can now ReWire Acid directly into Pro Tools, I haven’t gotten that far.  I stopped at exporting the soloed drum/percussion tracks and importing that audio into the PT session.  I had to make sure that sample rates and tempo of the Acid output matched the PT session, and if I wanted to make changes I had to pretty much go back to the drawing board.

So this year I’ve been tooling around with some virtual drum plug-ins.  So far I’ve used the demo version of BFD Lite and Addictive Drums.  I’m trying to find a demo version of Superior Drummer 2.0 too, but no luck so far.

There’s a lot to like about the virtual drums (beyond the fact that they stay in time): they are MIDI-based, so I can program from scratch or use any of the hundreds of patterns available in the plug-in library; the samples are solid; the plug-ins have integrated mixers and controls that let you mix the drums as if they were actual inputs to a mixing board.  And in some instances you can change other aspects of the drums (damping, bleed from mic to mic, attacks, decays, and so on).

Once again it’s almost a case of having too much flexibility.  I can imagine sitting here tweaking drums all night instead of finishing a track.  But, in the absence of having access to a great studio and a pro drummer, this may be the best option.

I’m still trying to figure out which one I like best.  When I figure it out and pull the trigger I’ll follow up on this post.  Until then, if anyone has experience with these plug-ins, I’d welcome your input.

I came across this remix of the Jackson 5 song “I Want You Back” some time ago.  Every so often (as I’m trying to find some funky flavor for something I’m working on) I like to go back and check it out.

I like this remix because it takes the original tracks and exposes them in ways that I haven’t heard before.  Hearing the sublime complexity of the guitar part still blows me away.  I used to think that this was a “simple” song, but hearing the various parts in more detail has completely changed that.  From backing vocals to a stone groove, this is still as funky today as it was when it was released.

The GeekDesk in "rock" position

Late last year I invested in a GeekDesk.  The main reason I got it was to reduce the amount of time I spend sitting down during the day.  Writing code and working on music both involve a lot of time spent in a seated position, and although I have a great desk chair, I still wanted to make sure I was doing as much as I could for my circulation, alertness, etc.

I got the frame only, and then I went to Ikea and found an inexpensive, lightweight top for it.  After I assembled the frame and attached the top I got it situated and started to use it.  At some point I spilled some beverage (probably, um, idea juice) and realized that the Ikea top would be permanently marked by any spills (it’s just particleboard, after all).

I hit the fabric store and got a sheet of clear vinyl cut to the size of the desk.  Since I put the vinyl on the desktop I’ve slipped photos and fortune cookie fortunes and stickers and all kinds of other stuff underneath.  It’s pretty groovy, baby.

Standing up while working has turned out to be really pleasant.  I feel like I get more done, and I’m more focused when I’m standing.  And there’s a benefit I didn’t even think about: when I’m recording guitar or vocals, I can easily control things with the desk in a standing position.  No more hunching over with a guitar slung around my neck to change things in the session.

Of course I only had the desk for  a few months when I fell down the stairs and sprained my ankle.  Naturally.  But now that I’m back on my feet, it’s therapeutic to stand for some short periods.  As I continue to recover, I’m sure that I’ll be spending more time upright while working, recording and mixing.  Thanks, GeekDesk.

TRS caught in the act

What better time of year to be inside working on some music?

While we on the north coast haven’t gotten hammered like Maryland and DC, we’ve gotten our usual dose of cold and snow.  Tom Smith has taken the opportunity to use this time to revisit the tracks for his second album tentatively titled “Out On Your Own”.

We must have tracked 16 or 18 acoustic guitar tracks during our day-long session.  We had about eight songs to record the tracks for, and we generally did at least two takes for each.  After each take we punched in to clean up any areas that needed attention, or we comped together a master take from all the takes we did.

I like to fatten Tom’s acoustic guitar sound by having at least two, and sometimes three acoustic tracks in the mix.  Generally I like to have one panned right and one panned left, although sometimes having a track in the center of the stereo field works better.  It depends on the final instrumentation.

After we created a master take for the acoustic part in each song, I used the remaining playlists to put together a second acoustic track that I could use for the purpose described above.

After a brief break for dinner, I returned to the studio.  Since everything was already warmed up, and I was feeling motivated, I tracked a whole bunch of backing vocals for Tom’s stuff.  I did some additional vocal tracking for some of the upcoming drunkdude69 material as well.

All in all it was a fantastically productive day in the studio, something which is (mostly) unhampered by winter weather.