06.21.05: [SB] Yikes! This is going to take awhile for me to get this out. Sorry if you've been waiting for the thrilling conclusion to the 'Transformation' recording sessions. Well, here it is... The last we left off, we were re-recording an old song called Overdue... The verse vocals for Overdue were recorded using an old Shure 737 mic. It gives you that notch filter feel without needing anything else on it. We didn't end up using those takes for *feel* reasons, but it will be a trick I look to in the future. I can't remember why, but the keyboard arpeggios were written with the keyboard on the floor. I think it was that I discovered that my monitor was creating a high pitched hum across the line, so I was trying to get the keyboard away from it. I finally got to the point where I would turn the monitor off before recording a track. This only popped up when recording midi gear. I didn't have it when recording guitars or voice. I should probably tell you all that at the same time that I was trying to do all this work, my day job got incredibly intense. I had so much work to do that I was at my job for 10-12 hours a day, and every weekend. Therefore, most of February and March are a blur. And let's say that nothing much got done music wise during that time. No movies either. :-( OK. So we had this song that I named Aaliyah, because of a remix that I heard way back when that had that rad Timbaland feel to it. The beat was very hip-hoppy and relentless. I initially thought that the keyboards would be the stars of the show, and I intended to do lots of vocoder and talk box effects. Nothing really worked until I tried removing most or all of the drums. This was the trick. Everything else came into place and Caving In came to be. Remains was another tricky one. The original sketch was nothing more than a pad and some cheesy drums pitched up high. I had a guitar part that I liked, and was doing a lot of intricate stuff between that and the e.piano. I ended up cleaning that up a bit. I tried soooo many different drums for this one. I was feeling stumped until I asked myself, 'What would The Notwist' do? That was the trick. [Tangent] Another thing, and this actually applies to every song on the album, there are sounds of me doing beatbox, hand claps, body thuds and other such human sounds. Overdue and Accusations have the heavy breathing. Boardwater has actual human beat box sounds mixed in. Was The Day has a lispy hat line. Remains had the sound of me rubbing my hands. Also in Remains is some pounding on a water bottle for a low thudding sound. With those sounds, I remembered some samples that Evan and I created back in the Battery days. One of those became the snare sound in the verses. Once that stuff was in there, I came up with some Phil Collins drums and some Art Of Noise key stabs, et voila! OK. So we had all these songs. And it came time to mix. Remember, I was working like crazy at my day job. Now, it takes a while to produce the CD. Disk Makers says 10 days, but that's 10 business days. And that isn't really true, because they make sure that you have all of your files and payment and all that taken care of before hand. On top of that, I really wanted a digipak - that adds another week. Another problem we discovered that DiskMakers closed their west coast production facility. It used to be in Fremont, which is about 30 miles away, we would have been able to pick them up on site and save some money. Their production facility is now in Philadelphia ONLY. Oasis is in Virginia. We found a place to do digipaks in St. Louis, and finally one in Ashland Oregon. Awesome! This meant that we wouldn't need to pay sales tax, and the shipping would be fast. I'm rambling about this because as you may know, our first ever tour began in Raleigh NC on April 19. We wanted the CDs in hand prior to our departure so we could mail out promos and all that. I made every single deadline in order for this company to get the product completed and shipped in time. I did the artwork in 2 days (I'll post some of the rejects soon). I had to take a sick day to master the album. We lucked out in that there's a FedEx office at the Oakland airport, where they take your package and throw it on the plane right there. I made it with the master with 15 minutes to spare. I was bouncing and converting all night and day. I had never used the CD authoring application (CD Architect) before that day, and I had maybe an hour or two before FedEx closed. I managed to get the album sequenced and burned in that time. I'm very sorry for anyone who may be annoyed with the fact that there is no track tags on the CD. I discovered the checkbox for those when I burned the backup copy when I got home. I got the artwork done. I got the master and it actually plays in a CD player. I sent everything off in time to make it to the plant. What happened? It turns out this company doesn't actually create the CDs in the USA (they didn't even mention that when I had the USA thing proudly displayed in the artwork. They actually outsource all that to Singapore! That was probably the delay. They had to put it on a boat and sail the master across the pacific! Then it probably sat in a queue for a while. The final outcome was several emails back and forth with the company to have them break up the shipment and have most of it sent to our house, and the rest sent to Raleigh. I got off work on April 15, and we hauled ass to NC. We made it to the FedEx office in Raleigh about an hour before they closed, but we got lost a couple times before finding it. The shipment was sent in 3 separate packages. One of them was eaten by a customs officer, or left out in the rain, so all of those copies were lost. I created a complaint with FedEx and the pressing company, but I haven't received my $300 in lost revenue. This concludes the recording drama. Next time I'll try to give more details and stay on top of things for y'all.

02.01.05: [SB] Overdue: Synths, Synths, and more Synths!

01.31.05: [SB] Still recording Overdue. i discovered a little *feature* of Digital Performer That doesn't exectly allow for sample accurate recording. I always thought it was just me being over-sensitive, but I confirmed it - once in a while a snare hit will end up a tick or 2 off. I was trying to layer 2 very short snare sounds, and noticed that they varied slightly - quite annoying. This appears to be only on continuous sound files. Whatever. I snipped out the hits and re-aligned them all... Movies: Catwoman (poop) This Girls Life (2003)

01.27.05: [SB] I got the 'beefy' kit together for Overdue. I ended up compressing the sounds like 3 or 4 times. Once with a plugin, once with an Alesis 3630 and then through the Focusrite ISA220 and then another plugin. Yum. The new sounds inspired a much more interesting hat line than what was there before. This might impact the whole synthpop feel a bit, which is fine with me. I will defer veto power to I-Li...

01.26.05: [SB] I work on a kick drum sound for 3 hours. 3 Hours later, I delete it.

01.24.05: [SB] Overdue was a bit of a tricky birth. We decided to embrace our synthpop roots on this one. I spent most of Saturday creating some massive synth hits. On Sunday, I woke up at 4AM for some stupid reason, and got right to work. I didn't have much luck musically until around 4PM, when I stumbled on an arpeggiator pattern that works well in the chorus. It has a bit of a Hate Dept feel to it, which I really like. Also, We recorded vocals for Hallway last week. I still need to get the music sorted for that one. More arpeggiator madness is likely. Movies/Crap: Cellular (2004) The Forgotten (2004) Paparazzi (2004) Resident Evil: Apocalypse (2004)

01.17.05: [SB] We've Resurrected one of our early original songs, Overdue. The original version can be found on the SFSGI Compilation. I kicked up the tempo to 122 bpm, probably as fast as I want to get nowadays. 120 just didn't roll the way I wanted it, plus I feel guilty using 120 for anything. Also bringing up a sketch of ours called Hallway - the original makes good use of a Synsonics drum intro... Movies: Raising Arizona (2003) Code 46 (2003)

01.05.05: [SB] We brought to life an old sketch originally called Ah-Gong which is Taiwanese for 'Grandfather'. It's a tender song, with shoegazery music. I sort of ruined that by making it a heavy hitting pop song. Well, as heavy hitting and poppy as I can be.

01.01.05: H A P P Y . N E W . Y E A R ! ! ! We've been real busy workin on Absence, Accusations, and Was The Day. More info soon. Movies: Lord Of The Rings: Fellowship of the Ring (2001) Lord Of The Rings: The Two Towers (2002) Lord Of The Rings: The Return of the King (2003) Yup. back to back to back. Extended versions of course. It took about 12 hours...

12.13.04: [SB] The microphone fix is done, and it sounds great! Mojave Audio did a great job of making it easy, even for a color bind individual such as myself. We immediately recorded vocals for Absence. We will record vocals for Was The Day tonight. I started recording the acoustic guitar parts for Was The Day. Movies: Maria Full of Grace (2004) Johnny Belinda (1948)

12.09.04: [SB] Long time. No update. I'm still working on the microphone. Finally got the power supply put together. I-Li got real sick after Thanksgiving (not Turkey related) and I've been working 12hr daze @ my stinkin job. I have most of the music done for Was The Day (working title, we think) I Need to record the acoustic guitar parts and vocals. Movies of the day: Dark Passage (1947) Dodgeball (2004) Alive (2002)

11.23.04: [SB] Yeah, the 23rd. My favourite day. Not. Why? Now Playing: THE SOUND from the lions mouth

11.15.04: [SB] More on the Microphone update soon.

11.12.04: [SB] Just got the Hungry Lucy's Reigndance EPCD from Alfa Matrix. Beautiful artwork! Movie of the day: The Iron Giant (1999)

11.12.04: [SB] Working on a new song that started as a Thorn Apple sketch, but was a little too aggressive and hipity-hopity. I'm afraid it will be a little too newy wavey before I'm done with it... Movie of the day: The Incredibles (2004)

11.10.04: [SB] Happy Birthday to me. Whoo hoo. Movie of the day: None - wassup wit dat?

11.06.04: [SB] Got started on the Microphone fix. Movie of the day: Eyes Without A Face (1960)

11.04.04: [SB] Too tired. Still depressed about the election. Movie of the day: The Hole (2001)

11.03.04: [SB] We recorded vocals for Accusations. I wasn't happy with the way the vocals sounded using our default AT4033A. There was too much in the high-mid range that was sounding kind of nasal. I tried scooping, but it just wasn't working. Yuck! I-Li doesn't sound like that at all in person! So, I tried the MXL2001. It sounded good on the softer vocal parts, but I had to scoop out more highend than I would have liked. Some time ago, I bought a kit from Mojave Audio to hot rod the MXL2001, so I'll try building that this weekend. It changes a regular old condenser mic into a sexy tube jobby. We'll see! Lesson of the Day: Don't give up!

10.31.04: [SB] Happy Halloween! I got some *wet* guitars down for Boardwater and came up with a new piano part that just might work.

10.29.04: [SB] I-Li got all sick, so no updates.

10.28.04: [SB] I spent all day thinking about that damn crash sound...

10.27.04: [SB] Why do I feel the need to spend 2 hours on a crash sound? Sheesh.

10.26.04: [SB+IC] We went to check out The Chainsaw Mafia's Indie Horror Film Festival at the always enjoyable Parkway Theater. We had a great time, and saw some surprisingly good films. Check out details about The Chainsaw Mafia here.

10.25.04: [SB] It's actually 12:30am on Tue. the 26th. Lesson of the Day: Too tired to think of one. Movie of the day: Out of the Past (1947) [IC] We just finished re-recording vocals for Boardwater. It's pouring down rain so it will probably add a nice effect in the backgound. I guess it suits the title!

10.23.04: [SB] All the old Boardwater parts I can't reproduce have been converted. There's a sound from the Wavestation that was recorded with bad wires so the sound cuts in and out - there's no way I can recreate that. Also, I recorded some drum parts through the Metasonix Agonizer and the Alesis Bitrman.

10.22.04: [SB] We are resurrecting the song Boardwater from The Thorn Apple Project 2001. It's a song that I-Li and I wrote based in part on a photograph by Christa Belle (Hungry Lucy) titled (what else?) Boardwater. We also checked out some great songs by Juana Molina and Keren Ann @ Cafe Du Nord in San Francisco.

10.21.04: [SB] Thought there were enough keyboard parts for Accusations? Think again! I had an epiphany about the Myth of Rock, and discovered that I was trying to follow it (big guitars, bigger drums). I Made some changes and I'm much happier with it. Lesson of the Day: Rock is not Reality Movie of the day: I'm Not Scared (2003)

10.20.04: [SB] Even more keyboards. I came up with tag line. shared by the Waldorf XT and Alesis Ion. Lesson of the Day: Sleep is good. Real good. Movie of the day: [none..believe it!] [IC] So, what have I done musicwise? Nada! But hey, I'm the one working on the website!

10.19.04: [SB] More Keyboards. Re-strung my guitar. Yucky intonation problems with the new strings. I'm using drop-D on this song, and the damn dropped D don't stay in tune. Lesson of the Day: Don't even think of recording guitar with those new strings, boy! Movie of the day: I Walked With A Zombie (A HREF="http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0036027" target=_new>1943)

10.18.04: [SB] Today we worked on a new song called Accusations. It comes from a sketch I did for the Thorn Apple project last year. It started out as my personal spin on the Massive Attack template. I even called the sketch 'Attack Massive.' Well, exactly 13 months later, I-Li busts out some awesome lyrics! This prompted me to re-think my entire approach + re-do the music. Drums were finalized and recorded as well as the base (and Bass) keyboard lines. Lesson of the Day: Pick a sample rate and stick with it! Bouncing back and forth between projects is apain. Lesson 2: Pet Food Express closes @ 6pm on Sunday, so don't wait, go get that kitty litter!

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