You gotta love it when...

[The Bear Jew]

On Friday, I had a session. Specifically, I had a session where I was supposed to go in and "fix" my bass lines from a previous live session. See, this band records live in order to nail the drum parts with a groovy feel, and then we go back and "repair" the bass lines, etc, and do our vocal/guitar layering. So I went in early on Friday, hoping I'd be able to fix everything on the six tracks we recorded and get to work producing the vocals and guitars. I'm lucky... in this band, even though I'm "just" the bassist, I usually wind up doing a lot of producing on the vox and guitar parts because the singer/guitarists usually plays things too safe in the studio. Oh yeah, did I mention the studio is FREE? Yeah, the singer/guitarist for this band owns a fuckload of cool gear, and, since he's a teacher at a fancy-pants private suburban school, we get to use the school's classrooms for tracking. Therefore, studio time is always free, and we can take as long as we wish on the weekends when we record. Since these sessions are sometimes marathons, I occaisionally make "tired bassist" mistakes when we record. Hence, I sometimes have to fix stuff later. So, I hit the studio early, helped set up and kinda chilled while J. (the singer/guitarist) cued up the tracks. Listened to the first track. No bass glitches. I'm right in there, on top of the bass drum, hitting the fills, laying it down. Nothing to fix there. Same thing with the second track. Guess what? We went through every track (all six), and there was not ONE place where I had to "fix" anything. Man, I love that. I got right to work producing the guitar tracks. I LOVE doing this.... J. is a great guitarist and vocalist, but, as I mentioned, he's not a big risk-taker when it comes to recording. However, when I'm around, I can usually convince him to get a lot looser with stuff like guitar sounds, etc. He's sort of scared of anything that doesn't sonically resemble things he's already heard, while I tend to mess with stuff until I get something I've NEVER heard before. To me, this is what makes a cool recording. Since we already had a damn solid foundation of bass & drums finished (pats self on back), J. laid down some basic backing guitars, but he had some trouble with a lead sound.... It wasn't cutting right, so I told him he wasn't allowed to see what I was gonna do to the EQ on his amp. I went into the amp room and FUCKED UP his settings, big time. I am not lying when I tell you that this was the worst, throatiest, mid-rangiest, disgusting guitar sound you ever heard. I loved it. J. hated it, but I made him track his solo with it. The sound was SO awful, but, man, it cut right through that heavy mix like nothing you've ever heard. It fit right in. We managed to nail the entire session with tricks like this in about 4 hours. We were done so quickly that I was able to come home in time to eat dinner with the ol' lady and watch a movie. I love it when that happens.

[Sylver]

LOL, after reading some of your diaries, Eric, you deserve some good luck.

[BP3]

It's great when things come together like that. Especially for free! :D

[videoeditor1]

[quote]Originally posted by CMDN: [b]...I tend to mess with stuff until I get something I've NEVER heard before. To me, this is what makes a cool recording...[/b][/quote]Ditto that, and thumbs up! :thu: