Tuesday 22nd July 2008

Recorded vocals with Cath and Pete from Chronicity this evening. Nervous about mixing my first guitar-based venture. It's all in the drums: compression, limiting, too much, too little, this way, that way, up a bit, down a bit.

Their music makes for compelling listening. Pete and I talked long into the night about Penny Rimbaud and other such d.i.y. luminaries, and how a former band of his (Razorblade Smile) once shared a spot in an 1992 NME feature on exciting new bands with a group from Oxford called Radiohead. We were both adamant that the route furthest from the stadium concert gleans the best creative ventures.

Thursday 18th July 2008

Monday 14th July 2008

New recordings from a band that shows the way for all us studio hermits. Listen carefully to the vocals on KFCC for the Dildano influence.

Have been mixing Adrian Martineau material, with mixed results. However, Jez's playing on the old Wallsend ivories sounds beautiful.

Friday 11th July 2008

Mixing on headphones, with left lug full of ear wax. I'm putting olive oil in it, but it means I've lost all my high end on that side.

I wanted to get And The Trees Don't Mind into shape, by making the beats more interesting, and injecting some dynamic into the proceedings. I also put some of the finished mix through the Kaoss Pad and fed it back into itself; something I've done when making compilations for people. It's a nice touch sometimes, since the song begins to feed off itself, but I think I'm at risk of repeating the same KP motifs too many times across the board. Time to get some new boxes and learn how to sing again.

Spent the journey home listening to My Attorney's Filler/Release. If done properly it could be a really good b-side, with raw guitar building up and then ebbing away, distant repeated vocals and an organ of some sort in the background. In fact, all the MA songs I'm interested in at the moment appear to be headed for the flip side.

Wednesday 9th July 2008

Outstanding recording projects:

Mostly Noise LP - Live recordings from summer 2002, including music from Litmist, Pond and Mellowdramatic. All it needs is the artwork to be finished for the tape cassette j-card (which will be screen shots from the 8mm video documentary) and the cash to pay for it.

This Is Closure LP - This has evolved from being a compilation of music from North Coast bands, into a flagship release of experimental offcuts from each of the Libris acts. Will include previously unreleased material from Nes Gr_Advantage, Grilly & Freinds, Rebecca Jones and Steve: From Fragment. Artwork and audio has largely been completed, again just the financing and time need to be found to make it happen.

Nes Advantage EP - Compiling the best moments of The Banjo Sessions from February's brief recording session.

Adrian Martineau EP - Similarly grouping together the tunes recorded by Adrian and later added to by Jeremy Williams on piano.

Chronicity EP - The current priority. Five tracks have their rhythm parts done, and just need Pete and Kath to do their vocals.

My Attorney LP2 - A bit like the Cistine Chapel ceiling. Twenty five songs and counting. No further comment.

Tuesday 8th July 2008

An incomplete resume of current side projects:

iddqd - Grilly/DJ Gallow_Slutt versus DJ IBM PC-COMPATIBLE think tank, that could encapsulate anything from Grilly's new solo work (not to be confused with the new Bruised Pilgrim material he's currently working on) produced by me in a lush Eagles-esque fashion, to a boxes n' light show death match between two bearded men with several xy axes and a delay pedal. Whatever it is, it needs to be extreme, unfathomable, unlistenable and danceable.

Future Loss - A sparse, post-punk kick in the teeth from Patiosounds' bassist Brian Magee; with bags of energy and thin white guitar parts. Although initial plans don't extend towards tracking a couple of songs, I would dearly like this one to evolve into a proper live concern, mainly because I need to play the kind of gigs where I end up on the floor with my head inside something.

Death of a Salesman/Blue Screen of Death - Has the potential to be a brilliant album, if only Luke and I could dedicate the time and energy to it that it so desperately requires. I'm especially keen to grab Luke's voice, which has an aesthetic all to itself, and pair it to the Scott Walker/Liars/John Peel's Festive 50 sound that began as being described as "brown" and is now called "yueah".

Airstrip One - Tapes from the archives show that Ian Courtney tracked the guitar parts for the songs that were played by live in the Newcastle acoutsic scene during 2006. Further delving into the MD8 minidisk collection at Colerabbey Headquarters revealed click track versions of Credits Roll and Follow Me Around. FMAwas intended to be a Band Aid-esque play-a-thon for This Is Closure, with everyone associated with wtss/Libris contributing to the track in some way. Instead, it rusted on the shelves after it became clear that Warner Chappel would have to be approached for the rights to record the song. I'm still very attached to the Airstrip material: they contain some of my favourite melodies, as well as some of the best stuff Ian's ever written, so this deserves to be tidied up and finished.

Friday 4th July 2008

Thursday 3rd July 2008

Stills from the xlrgig002 aftershow gathering; February 2008, Wallsend, Newcastle.

Wednesday 2nd July 2008

Tuesday 1st July 2008

Tuesday 17th June 2008

In the bowels of Newcastle University music department, is a windowless room with hushed air conditioning. The desk meant nothing to me. The mic cupboard provoked gasps of wonder: AKGs, Neumanns... the lot. Set up the kit, chose some expensive amps from the orchestra store room, the band arrived and nailed everything first take. Fortunately Will was familiar with all the equipment, including the routing on the patch bay, which made my life much easier. For much of it I sat back, hit spacebar, and listened to one of my favourite guitar bands while bopping around the control room. Left at midnight with five songs in the bag. An invigorating experience.

Sunday 26th April 2008

My first contact with Ableton Live rendered the usual bleeps and squelches. I'd use it more, except the cogs inside the Mac don't go round fast enough.

Thursday 10th April 2008

Rebecca Evans plays with a number of Newcastle-based groups, most notably the Sunday School Adventure Club, and her crowning achievement from the Jones Sessions was her playing to Ode To Love (a Piaf title misspelled in French as Hymne a l'Amour.) This song was demoted to b-side status fairly early on in the sessions, since Ne Me Quitte Pas took precedence as the foreign language cover for the record. One of the microphones on the clarinet in this take was placed up a chimney.

Monday 31st March 2008

The first thing to be recorded in the new Colerabbey Offices in Benton was Bec's recorder part. Done in the kitchen, amid much cheese, wine and salmon.

Thursday 20th March 2008

Baseball Bat never made the cut on the final tracklisting. Still, three words spring to mind; one of which is 'closure'...

Here's an extraction of Bec's fantastic slide electric guitar part. It was done on Adam Schofield's Epiphone, through two Kaoss Pads and an amp. The beats were flown in from the Casio CA-20, using the "Ethnic Percussion" preset.