Album #2, Recording Day 2

We got back to Rave's at 9:00 this morning, reestablished our headphone mixes, and officially launched into the home stretch of the album around 10:00.  The two epics we worked on today have a lot of cool pieces that interlock.  Playing them live, we have the luxury of eye-contact and spontaneity, but for studio purposes, we had to record them in smaller chunks and will later stitch the segments together.

Part one of the album opener (as yet unnamed) is a monster to navigate for recording.  It's only 2 minutes and 21 seconds long, but the tempo and time changes galore meant listening very, very carefully to the click track.  My parts for this section still need some fleshing out, so I took the opportunity as the rest of the guys were working to shoot some video (well, shoot some video, get interrupted by out-of-storage notifications, delete a bunch of stuff off of my phone to make room, keep filming, rinse, lather, repeat...) and also jot down these notes.  It took us a significant number of attempts to get decent takes for part one -- probably 7 or 8 before we had enough quality material to work with.

Part two is a straightforward ballad that we nailed down in two takes.  I love that piece for its simple but compelling melody, shared between Geoff's keys and Jeff's guitar.  We only hiccuped once before going to tape, trying to remember how many passes through a solo section we should go around.

Because we worked out a confusing issue with the click track for the opening section, the third part of the monster -- a reprise of part one -- avoided one potential pitfall, but still had its challenges.  We had to work through overthinking one segment and also blasting through another section that, in a live setting, we would likely play a little faster.

We began part one of the final number, currently titled "Timepiece Creator," at 4:30.  Richmond switched over to the 5-string bass, and I also got to set up the auxiliary keyboard.  Because we prioritized drums and bass for the weekend, we omitted the other keyboard parts I typically play for overdubbing at home.  The final section, however, has an integral Moog lead that anchors a very loose and ethereal section.  We'll still need to address the strings pads I play in Part 2 (maybe tomorrow).

By 8:00pm, we had locked in the final template for Part 3 of the finale.  After that, a certain member of the crew worked for a little bit longer on a special section of the song that we simply can't wait to unveil to the public.... but won't spoil here.

Tomorrow: a 9:00 AM start time to listen back to all the takes in order to identify the keepers, spot-check things we like for minor edits, take notes on what we want to spend special time with in production, and then -- as time allows -- punch in to fix little things here and there that would make more sense to correct with Rave's setup than with ours.  I'm looking forward to sitting in the control room and listening back with a critical ear.  Even if we walk away with finished drum and bass tracks, there will still be tons of work we still need to do at home with guitars, keyboards, and vocals.  But it's amazing how quality microphones and equipment, noise insulation, and experience at the console can create stellar demos that almost... almost sound finished.

Non-contextual quotables:

"You mean after I cradle them against my face?" - Joe

"It was arguably the worst movie of all time, and that's what makes it great." - Rave

"We're just discussing our failures as humans." - Joe

"You've got your blmph.  You got your space.  You've got your click.  And you've got your music.  Or at least your song." - Rave

"The roof of your toe, or just your toe?" - Jeff

"There's this great sense of relief, and also this great sense of 'O gosh, what have I done?'" - Joe