Recording Day 3

Me and Will arrive at the studio armed with guitars and Wills cafetière of course. Grant greets us and we immediately set about working on some of the drum arrangements from the previous sessions. Grant spends around 2-3 hours on some minor drum edits whilst me and Will wake up. I have breakfast from the local cafe. I also spend time talking with some guys in The Netherlands about doing an extra show on the tour. After lunch is when the good stuff usually happens. We decided to work on the more acoustic songs on the album as we haven’t laid down any of the bass tracks yet. We load up ‘Mi Corazon Part 2’ first. Will lays down a very basic guitar track on his Gretsch. We even record the sound of the amp just humming for some atmosphere. Then I laid down my acoustic guitar. Afterwards we work on ‘Mentira’ which I would like to keep very minimal and I was going for a very clean sound but my guitar on the demo happened to bleed through and it sounded lovely and it inspired Will to come up with some subsonic layers. The next song is going to be an absolute beast to work on. I’m still stuck on a name for it. It was written after the first two recording sessions. It’s very cinematic and dramatic. It could even be the Epic last song. The working title is ‘Once upon a time in the north’ after the album title but I think it will end up being called something like ‘The End of the World’. The song itself just builds and builds. It has everything. We load up my demo and we set about recording the Acoustic guitar. Will is trying to work out and evolve the lead guitar part I wrote. Grant is enjoying this song a lot. The key to this song will be the arrangement. We decide to sit on this song for a bit and instead work on ‘Mi Corazon Part 1’ we load up Joel’s drums and decide to loop them in order to give us some freedom with ideas we have for this song. It may be decided later that we extend or shorten sections in the song depending on the personnel who we can get to appear. I hear accordions, violin, trumpets, double bass, and broken hearts. The guitar I recorded on this track so far is just a guide to check that the drums fit and they do. Lovely. Not the most exciting day in the studio but very worthwhile. We have laid the foundations today for the next session and we’re raring to go. 

Me and Will also discussed other ideas. I said at some point to someone that this album could be our ‘Sandinista’. That thought keeps coming around. We talk about maybe we should collaborate with King Zepha and do something completely different. LSK’s name is also thrown into the pot. I always thought this album should be a double album even before we entered the studio. Now we’re at a crossroads. Soon we will have to make a decision. Do we release the album on LP Vinyl as a single album or do we release a Double CD album? We don’t have the funds to do both. We’re also at a very time critical stage. In order to have a vinyl ready for the tour in July then we must complete by the end of April. It’s looking highly unlikely. If we decide on a Double CD then we must have not only the album proper but the second disk completed by the end of May. Either option is a very difficult challenge. We could miss both deadlines. I’m more in favour of the two CD’s than the vinyl. That also depends on the availability of the people I wish to collaborate with. One thing is for certain. My head is full of ideas and I’m dreaming out aloud.


Leave a comment