Excelsior!

Tito, DJ and Alisa

We've finished tracking vocals, instruments and assorted percussion.  Excelsior!  That's apparently a catch phrase Al Gore uses for a missions accomplished and quite apropos as our engineer, Willie Samuels, informed us he recorded Mr. Gore a few days prior for an audiobook.  Sweet.  The Hipwaders are using the same engineer as Al Gore - an inconvenient truth for some.

I had more fun with this final session more than any other as I had less stuff to do than the Nick and DJ who still had some back up harmonies and vocals to perform.  Actually, the first thing we did was record (ala Al Gore) a spoken word performance by Nick's better half, Alisa Cromer.  OK, it was only 5 words but it'll be the first vocal heard on the album.

DJ & Tito desecrating George Winston's piano

The next task was to record some mouth "pops".  I remember as a kid seeing an actor named Fritz Feld who was in lots of movies, commercials and t.v. shows like "Gilligan's Island" and "Lost In Space".  His shtick was slapping his hand up against his mouth to make a "pop".  Of course, being a kid I had to learn this trick and perfect it.  Now, as an adult I give it a prominent role on our new album.  Actually, the most prominent "pop" was done by DJ.  But he did it the yucky way by putting his finger in his mouth - don't tell his mom.

Nick and DJ carried on with a few harmonies and backing vocals and I did some hand percussion bits (shaker, tambourine and afuche cabasa).  We all gathered 'round the mic and did some clapping bits that were quite fun and then... we were done.  Woo hoo!

The Hipwaders:  clap yo' hands...

Next up:  mixing.

Hurry Up and Wait

Oh, boy.  We've never recorded so fast over such a long period of time.  This is what happens when everyone has jobs, families and life getting in the way.  We began at the end of January and so far we've only had 5&1/2 actual recording sessions.  We're so close to finishing up the tracking I can taste the sweet satisfaction of knowing there's nothing more to add.  If we were in a position to record straight through we would have been done in less than a week.   I was planning to post after we were all done with all the tracking but I figure I'd forget what the heck we did 3 weeks ago.  So I'll tell you now.

Willie muting DJ's bass strings with foam

With the drums and final guitar bits & keyboards recorded, we decided to put DJ under the (not so) harsh glare of the studio lights and record his bass lines.  Again, Willie (the engineer) astounded us with his ability to get some great tones as DJ ran his Fender Precision through an Ampeg SVT (4-10).  Willie also ran DJ's bass through a direct line and mixed the two sounds together (mostly amp with a little d.i. as needed).  As Willie had done with me during my guitar recording, he constantly "dialed" in appropriate tones with the bass tone knobs and outboard gear for each song.  Sometimes adding "grit" as needed or rolling it off depending on the song.  About half way through the recording we came across a song that needed a more old school R&B sound with deader but sharp attack.  Willie stuffed some foam under the strings at the bridge of the bass guitar and "voila" - there it was.  We even used the muted sound on several other songs.  I know DJ was happy to finish his bits as I took on the role of an armchair quarterback having him try different bass lines out on songs that he had been playing the same way for a very long time.  It's just that with some slightly different guitar and/or keyboard lines having been added, and the ability to hear "clean" recordings of the songs, I got some new ideas.  Sorry, man.  You did awesome!

 

As soon as DJ finished I jumped in front of 3 mics Willie had set up to record my lead vocals.  Why 3 mics?  Because Willie wanted to find the perfect mic for my vocal "timbre".  After listening to me warble for awhile, Willie decided the Neumann U67 was best suited for my voice.  Strangely, when we recorded our last album at "The Hangar" in Sacramento, the engineer found the U67 also best suited for my voice.  I guess I now have "my mic".   Again, this is where being well-prepared for recording comes in as I was able to sing 15 songs in less than 2 hours.  With good pitch and emotion (per Willie - your mileage may vary).

Brian & Tito

A couple of days later, Nick and I came in to record our backing vocals.  We brought in my old songwriting partner, Brian Boyd, whom I've known and played with since high school.  Brian is a great vocalist and vocal mimic.  He does terrific (and terrifically funny) vocal impersonations.  He sang some backing vocals on the first Hipwaders album  - doing some funny spoken dialogue and singing on "Insect Safari" , for example.  Brian also wrote a fan favorite, "Things You Want" ( I added a bridge and some additional lyrics) from our "Goodie Bag" EP

   

On this session, Brian did a spoken vocal bit for us and sang some backing parts.  This is where his talent as a vocal mimic came in. 

He doubled some bits we were singing and we couldn't tell what vocal was Nick, Brian or myself.  Nice.  What was also nice was how Willie truly made us work and cajoled us into trying different vocal harmonies and pushed us into doing things we never knew we were capable of doing.  Also, a special mention should be made of Nick's heretofore unknown (at least to me) ability to sing higher than huMANly possible.  Just as in the Olympics he will have to submit to a chromosome testing procedure.

Brian, Nick & Tito

Next week:  DJ joins in the singing and we clap along.  Tito does his Davy Jones imitation (maracas and tambourine), and Nick looks on perplexed.

Guitar Tone-Seeking Gearhead Obsessives Only (others may be bored)

So I spent a couple of days last week recording my guitar and keyboard tracks for the new album.  As a huge fan of Tape Op magazine (the BEST recording magazine ever), I’ve always enjoyed reading about recording instruments and vocals.  What I’ve learned is there is no set way.  The Tape Op ethos is to experiment and try something different than the norm as sounds are subjective and doing something “wrong” may sound just right.  With that in mind, I’ve tried "right" and "wrong" but have never been happy with my guitar tones.

     Enter Willie Samuels.  Now Willie already impressed me with his ability to get the best drum sounds I’ve ever heard come from our band.  Sure, but he’s a drummer.  It should be his forte.  I wasn’t expecting to get much of a different guitar sound as I still play the same as I always have and I’m still using the same basic guitar/amp set up.

     Willie asked me if I wanted to record my guitar from the “live” room where my amp was set up or from the control room.  I’ve always recorded in the same room as my amp (despite headphone bleed) as I’ve liked the ability to change the settings from song to song without running back and forth from the control room.  Willie had set up a mixer with headphones for me to monitor so I figured I was set.  I explained that my amp was a combo amp (Vox AC15) and I couldn’t replace the amplifier section from the cabinet (1- 12” speaker).  He suggested we try running my amp through a early ‘70’s Marshall cabinet with 4- 12” speakers.  That just frightened me as I didn’t think it would represent my tone.  I asked that I be allowed to try and set up my amp first and see what I kind of sound I could get.  I quickly hooked it up and was amazed at how great it sounded in the room.

     “Yep, that’s my tone and it sounds great in here!” I beamed proudly.

     Willie asked that we now try running my amp through the huge Marshall cabinet.  I skeptically agreed as he went to work hooking it all up.  Once he was set he suggested I try it out.  I played a jangly riff from one of our songs and was stunned.  The Marshall cabinet sounded fantastic.  The tone was huge!  It sounded like my guitar and amp  - but bigger and better.  It was the difference between listening to music on a transistor radio and a nice home stereo.

    “Uh, yeah.  Sure.  I’ll set up in the control room.”

So, we retreated to the control room after Willie set up a different mic on each speaker.  Not a one was the "standard" SM57 but a very expensive assortment of mics that together were worth more than our entire recording budget.  Willie explained that we could switch which mics were being used for each song to tailor the best sound.  Great idea.  He had also set up a room mic to capture some natural reverb and add depth to the sound.

     Once we were ready I began playing along to the drums, the guide vocal & “scratch” bass.  Willie leaned over and began moving my guitar’s toggle switch and tone knobs.  Once I got over the shock of having my personal space violated I realized he was dialing in a better sound.  He also fiddled with the gain and tone knobs on my amp, his own array of preamps, EQ and compression.  It was truly amazing to see how he was sculpting the tone as I was playing and he instinctively knew when the sound was “dialed in” and would stop.  I could hear how the different mics sounded working with each other.  Some sounded more edgy and some softer.  Song after song, Willie would work his magic on the guitar tones – adding more overdrive/crunch where needed or backing it off for a cleaner sound.  My main guitar is a semi-hollow-body Cort that I replaced the stock pickups with Folgers coffee crystals - I mean some TV Jones pickups to give it a more Gretsch-like tone.  I used that guitar on a little more than half the songs for the album.  I had borrowed a Fender Stratocaster for a more snappy solid-body tone from my neighbor, Guyle Tabor.  I was happy to find his Strat (modeled on a ‘70’s era Strats) had a great “out-of-phase” tone I love (think Alex Chilton’s tone on Big Star’s “Radio City” album).  It was a funky, slinky tone that was perfect for the balance of songs I had to record.

       I couldn’t have been happier with the tones I achieved on guitar.  After I quickly recorded a smattering of keyboards (mostly presets with a few EQ changes) I left the studio a very happy man.  Now, what I can’t figure out is why I didn’t always record guitar like that?  Oh, yeah.  I didn’t know Willie!

Got Dope Beats?

The Hipwaders spent last weekend recording the drum tracks for our next album at Studio Trilogy, in San Francisco.  Just prior to recording,  I read an article in Discovery News about the link between dopamine (the “feel good” chemical) and the enjoyment of music.  Apparently, for the same reasons people enjoy sex, gambling, food & drugs, people enjoy music.  This would explain why as a teenager I would head down to Berkeley and buy stacks of used vinyl to fuel my music addiction.  I liked the rush of discovering new music that “moved” me.  This got me thinking about the direction of the material we were about to record.  Producer by default, I’ve always made the executive decisions regarding arrangements of the songs and what instruments to use primarily because I usually write the songs.  With this being

our 5^th album of music aimed toward kids (mostly), I’ve made some observations about what has worked best for us in terms of how the songs are arranged.  It seems, like everyone, kids focus on voices and rhythms.  When it comes to instrumentation, simpler seems better.  Children, for the most part, are unsophisticated listeners.  They don’t understand complex melodies and chord progressions as well as experienced listeners , e.g. adults.

     

In the Discovery News article they explain how people listen to music:

"You're following these tunes and anticipating what's going to come next and whether it's going to confirm or surprise you, and all of these little cognitive nuances are what's giving you this amazing pleasure," said Valorie Salimpoor, a neuroscientist at McGill University in Montreal. "The reinforcement or reward happens almost entirely because of dopamine."

     As you grow older and listen to more music, you’re able to follow more complex music and are capable of withstanding more “tension” prior to “release” in music.  For this reason, I know that as a kid I wouldn’t have enjoyed Captain Beefheart and Pere Ubu as much as I do now. 

     What’s tricky is creating songs - and the recorded arrangement of songs - that allows the anticipation of knowing what’s coming next while still being able to surprise a listener.  If it’s too simplistic it fails to capture listener’s attention.  If it’s too complex, the listener loses interest.  The tight-rope I have to walk is keeping my own interest in the material and still make the material interesting enough to a young listener.

Nick & DJ with our engineer, Willie Samuels

     Fortunately, we’ve been performing these songs for quite a while and are comfortable with the simple guitar/bass/drums arrangements.  With recording, it’s fun to “fill in the spaces” with a lot of other instruments but I think I’m going to make the conscious decision to try and use voices and rhythm instruments prior to other resorting to melodic instruments.  I think leaving as much space as possible so as to not detract from vocal sounds may be the key to keeping a young listener’s attention.  Our engineer, Willie Samuels, has captured amazing drum sounds.  There seems to be a lot of “space” between the drums that I’ve never heard in our recordings prior to this project.  I’d like to continue keeping the arrangements as sparse as possible.  I think it creates music that sounds more timeless.  I can’t wait to see what our next recording session reveals in the music.

San Francisco, Open Your Golden Gate...

It seems fitting that our last gig was just a short distance from the studio we'll be using to record our next album. San Francisco's Recess Urban Recreation was the setting for a very fun show with some very active preschoolers & toddlers. I'm not sure if these kids have previously been exposed to the power of live rock 'n' roll but they sure seem possessed by it now:

The show was put together and promoted by the biggest Bay Area cheerleader of kids & family music, Deb Evans-Braun (who also recorded the above video). Hopefully, Recess Urban Recreation will continue to bring live music as part of their program for young children. The Bay Area certainly has large pool of talented musicians who bring their different styles of music to the youngest of audiences. A new meeting group is being organized to work together to improve the local family music scene under the name, Let's Play! Bay Area Music Collective. It's an exciting time to be part of the scene and we hope to do what we can to let families know that there's a lot of great live music out there that is best shared with their children.

 In less than a couple of weeks we'll begin recording our 5th official album.  Personally, I'm excited to be recording in San Francisco as it's where I first began performing live - Mabuhay Gardens (aka The Fab Mab) and Sound of Music, anyone?  The energy of the city has always thrilled me.  I hope to document the progress of the album on this blog along with any observations I may have about the Bay Area family music scene.  Let's see what happens!