Fitter. Happier. A studio journal.

I'm sitting in the lounge area at Supernatural Sound as Jordan is prepping things to start the mix of our record. We finished tracking Saturday night just after midnight. The whole idea behind this record was to stretch out a bit from Let Go Afterglow and make a move toward something much more organic, and in my opinion, much more real. As opposed to the tired recording process of tracking drums and then overdubbing everything else...essentially re-learning all the nuances of the drum track without actually playing in the same room with him which really does affect the energy a great deal...we chose to track the entire record live to good old-fashioned 2" tape, to capture the raw energy and huge sound that we were getting in rehearsals. It took Jordan about two minutes to convince me of this, we had the talent in place, why not go for it? Sure, it was a bit of a gamble since we only had seven days to track a nine song album, but we had done our homework. Ryan and I had been demo-ing the songs at my house since November and doing new demos everytime I ripped one apart and re-wrote it and everytime I re-wrote the vocals...which was often on both counts! Jordan and I did some final tweaking to the song structures and talked about how we wanted the record to sound. We definitely saw eye-to-eye from the start. I couldn't imagine anyone else co-producing this record. Jordan's production style is amazing because he has the ability most producers I've met don't have...he doesn't try to make you sound how he thinks you should sound. Instead, he uses his skills to bring out the most powerful things in the sound you already have. He pays attention to your vision, or at least that's what he's done in our case. That's huge! In the end, we walked into the studio incredibly tight on Friday, January 11 at 10am to start recording. This is a little "behind-the-scenes" diary of the week. Here's how it all went down...

Day One:

The dark cloud. Woke up to an email that the 2" tape machine was kaput. I was teetering on feeling deflated and the whole "why is this happening" complex, but chose to forge ahead just knowing things would work out, though I was pissed, so I took the time to share my feelings with the studio owner about the situation, just so I wouldn't be all resentful. But, shit happens, and Supernatural gave us a free extra day to make up for it which was cool. After set-up we took our time getting sounds and then proceeded to sit around for six hours while they tried to figure out what was wrong with the 2". It was looking like the machine might be done for which would have really sucked, but around 9pm the tech got the tape machine rolling and we were good to go. We dialed in the sounds and hit some tape. Despite, or maybe because of, all the tension surrounding those six hours, we banged out a raucous keeper take of "Oblivion", took a few low energy stabs at "Limitless" which we decided not to keep and then we called it a night. The story of my life...the best things are those that come from overcoming adversity. You gotta just let that stuff roll...

Day Two:

Please Please Me. That's my nickname for day two, cuz that's exactly what it was like. Back in 1963, The Beatles recorded 10 songs live in 10 hours for that album. We came in at 10am knowing we were under the crunch and that because of interwining schedules our time with Beau (drums) was limited...and we absolutely killed it...tracking the remaining six full-band songs in under nine hours live to tape and then called it a night. I know, we aren't The Beatles by any stretch and sure, it was only bass, drums and guitar that we tracked...we didn't do vocals that day...but it felt damn good to know that we are good enough musicians to go in and cut all the intruments live for seven songs in about 11 hours! In this day and age of needing many days of drum tracking and overdubs to get the basic tracks, that kinda time frame is practically unheard of. We were pretty excited. Most of the record was already done and it sounded big. Bam!

Day Three:

Uh, burnout? Ha. Day two had taken a bit of a toll and we were kinda fried, so we strolled in a little later that morning. We decided to re-do the solo in "Ladysmith" which took a few passes to nail. Then we cleared the main room of drums and whatnot and set up for overdubs. Keeping things minimal, we only overdubbed one thick guitar during the heavy bridge and ending of "Oblivion" and threw one overdubbed guitar on the last chorus and outro of "Limitless" and a cool little clean guitar during the second verse. That took all of about an hour. We briefly toyed with putting some Hammond on the end of "Limitless" but Ryan put the kai-bosh on that real fast. Thank heavens for Ryan, the editor-in-chief. I believe his exact words were, "what the fuck are you doing, that sounds like shit!" Priceless. Instead of floundering when we weren't feeling it, we just took a long dinner break and came back to do some vocals. We started with "Oblivion" and I sang my ass off and nailed it in very few takes. The only downside was that I pretty much blew out my voice in the process. After a few attempts at "365" we decided to pack it in cuz I was sounding like Tom Waits in a hardcore band! I think Ryan and I were both a little worried that night about my voice, it was sounding amazing but would it hold out? We only had four days left of tracking and 8 songs left to do, one a day wasn't going to cut it. I chose to not worry and went home and stayed up late into the night watching the movie Pump Up the Volume instead.

Day Four:

Behind the 8-ball. This is where I started getting too far inside my own head. Letting some of those "maybe I can't do this" voices get too loud. Our starting point was "Limitless" and we did a few passes but it just wasn't clicking at all, which would be no big problem if we weren't running out of time. In my mind a wee bit of desperation was brewing and I was getting frustrated. I pulled the plug and chose to do "Perfect" instead. Pretty sure we did six passes, two groups of three, while taking alot of breaks and sucking down loads of hot water and honey. It turned out to be an awesome vocal, but my voice was beat. So be it. After that we hit a wall and decided to go see a movie! I thought it was pretty funny that while we were getting bogged down and Ryan and I were concerned about time constraints we would choose to kill three hours of studio time and go see a flick. I snoozed during the movie, came back somewhat refreshed and we did some passes at "365" which was tough cuz it's the heaviest, screamiest vocal on the whole record. It was some serious work, and some will, and alot of pushing thru my own mental state...but in the end it got nailed beautifully. We had two days off coming up but I was supposed to work at the bar and I figured two days of inhaling smoke and yelling in the bar wouldn't help my throat any, so I took one off and had a full day of rest before we came back in on Thursday. I ended up not resting, but spending the day out and about with Jen and then I stayed up real late again watching, you guessed it, Pump Up the Volume. Love that movie!

Day 5:

Hello Mr. "one time". I was a little nervous about this day initially. We had the baby grand tuned during the down time and were set to track "Heart Shaped", and I'm not a piano player by any means...and it's a long, very slow song...so I thought we might chew up most of the day working on it. The beat was something I had already recorded at home, playing some sweet kick and snare on my Roland TR-707, and I had tracked some synths too. We dumped all that to tape and then hit the piano. It was a beautiful day...lots of snow was falling outside, free-falling on the other side of the huge windows right next to the piano. Couldn't tell ya what it was, maybe the snowfall, but I nailed the entire five and a half minute piano song in a single take. I was impressed. We ran some synths thru Ryan's bass cab and I tracked the synth bass and a haunting little pad part at the end of the song. It went really fast, the whole song was done in about three hours including all the set-up and getting sounds. Time for more vocals. We started with "Blacksheep Energy", and that went real quick, maybe six passes. The last chorus is pretty blistery vocal wise and we did some extra takes for that part, to make it thick. Next up was "Ladysmith". If memory serves, we probably did four to six passes of that as well. And a few extras at the very last chorus, which is probably the heaviest vocal moment on the record. After that my pipes were shot and we called it a night. Two days left and only four vocals to go. The energy was great...all the vocals we had finished were spectacular and we knew we had plenty of time left.

Day Six:

Redemption. Probably my favorite day of tracking. Under some pressure, I came to life at the end. After blowing out my voice again (damn rock singers!) the previous night, Jen had the foresight to get me some throat coat tea. That shit is magic! I drank three cups and we went back to the vocals on "Limitless". It took me a few passes before I found the right voice for the song but then it clicked and the song was done a few takes after that. Then I did some takes on 'Too Soon for Always" , maybe three, and that one was in the can. We moved on to "Heart Shaped" which has a pretty basic lead vocal but the end is a bit involved. The outro has four voices singing, they weave in and out of each other...it's pretty sick...a re-creation of the constant, and often annoying, internal monologue that takes place inside my head. That constant chatter. Maybe you experience that too? I get it alot. It only took two, maybe three, passes to get the lead vocal. Then Jordan and I started talking about the end part and the how it's supposed to be internal chatter. It's repetetive. Jordan came up with the idea of making the voices into a bunch of tape loops and having each voice/set-of-loops have it's own mood. A great idea! This became the most enjoyable time of tracking cuz we had time to experiment and fuck around a bit, since I had nailed all the other vocals. I did one set of vocals singing thru his Rickenbacker amp and we recorded that. Another voice was done with me hunching over and singing into the speaker of an NS-10, the dated industry-standard studio monitor. That one sounds pretty cool. Over the years I've heard my voice coming out of a zillion NS-10's and I got a special kick out of having the opportunity to sing "into" one! The most interesting one was done with the baby grand. Since we had paid to get it tuned and used it for all of six minutes recording the song, Jordan decided to throw it back into the fray. He opened the piano up and put a mic under the lid, right on the strings, and I shouted the vocal parts into the piano so my voice was resonating off the strings. It sounded fucking brilliant. It was a great day...I did lots of video-taping and Jordan and I danced like fools to mixes. It was awesome. All that was left was the acoustic song, "Something Boring". A few weeks back, when I was writing it, I had been having some trouble getting the pieces to come together, thinking it was a full-band song. One night after a long shift at Belmont's, I came home and did some takes of it on the acoustic, while weary and singing in a very husky, smoke-soaked voice. Writing it on the fly. As the night wore on, into the 5am to 6am period, I was about to give up but decided to do one more take. The demo came out pretty amazing. Just my voice and the acoustic guitar, and my foot tapping. No overdubs. A single live take. I didn't really want to try to re-capture that...the moment when it first wandered out of me. It has this whole country shuffle feel to it...with me playing with my fingers. Not a crafted song at all, just a moment in time, one shot of inspiration, and I think the lyrics reflect that. So, we decided to go with the original and just dumped the vocal and guitar I had recorded to tape. It sounded sweet. As I said, a great day!

Day Seven:

Don't overdo it. That's been our motto for this record. From the songwriting to everything to do with the recording we've been sticking to the minimal, the real, the absolute emotional impact. We started late on this last day. Jordan got busy making the tape loops of the "Heart Shaped" vocals. Since we didn't actually have a bunch of extra tape machines around to do them by hand, he had to get pretty creative. I watched him making them by using the 2" tape machine and some crafty ingenuity while I filmed it and wandered around the studio talking to myself and just generally loving the day and what I was hearing coming out of the monitors. It took him a few hours to finish those and we checked in on a rough mix. Done. Next, we listened to everything we had, song by song, to see what we needed to finish. We cut some harmony vocals for the choruses of "Limitless", did a double on the vocals of the last chorus of "Too Soon For Always" and I wanted to re-do the last line of the first verse in that song...so we hit that real quick. Then we busted out Jordan's Gretsch and did a few final guitar overdubs. A nice fat guitar in the bridge and outro of "Blacksheep" and an over-driven guitar on the intro and the end of "Too Soon..." and a real simple lead that doubles some of the vocal in the last chorus. Some acoustics got overdubbed to the chorus of "Perfect" and the pre-choruses of "Too Soon..." and that was that. Probably 90% of what you will hear instrumentally on the record was tracked live. It's sick...everything we wanted it to be. The night ended with on "Too Soon for Always". First, a little background. That song used to be two different songs...one was a newer song that started from a groovy bass line of Ryan's that I put this guitar riff to...and it had this weird, plodding part that enabled a key change and took it to a long chorus that we would build up until I was screaming the melody. The other song was something I had written a few months ago...just a verse riff and a chorus with a chorus melody that I was particularly fond of. Naturally, Ryan preferred the song that started with his bass line and I liked the one with the killer chorus melody. But, as it happened, both of the choruses had nearly the same chord progression in different keys...I had essentially ripped myself off when writing the newer chorus...and it just so happened that the chorus of the song I originally wrote was in the same key as the bass riff Ryan came up with. We ditched the plodding part...which I had grown to dislike anyway...used my original chorus as the pre-chorus...my original verse became a one-time bridge which took us to the chorus from the newer version at the very end...similar to the pre-chorus but with the newer chord progression and different melody, if that makes any sense. I'm rambling. It was so totally meant to be combined in that way. Songwriting really can be a fantastic journey! To make a long story short, once we had put the two songs together the screaming melody from the chorus of the newer song was now in a different key and pretty much out of my vocal range. And when we tried to track it at the end of the night it became very apparent. I spent an hour tearing my throat to shreds trying to scream a part out of my range before Ryan came to the rescue as the voice of reason. He pointed out that the way the song had evolved, we didn't really need that vocal part anyway...it wasn't this totally aggro song anymore. Would it sound good if I nailed it? Sure. Was it necessary? No. In fact, by it not being there, the song has a different feel from the rest. That's why Ryan is the editor-in-chief. Sometimes he doesn't say much but when he does, he's usually right on. As for me? I got to leave that night with the satisfaction of accepting my own limitations. And we all left with the satisfaction that the record was done. And amazing!

Yeah, so that's the story of this record. Hope I didn't bore ya...
Gotta go. Mixing is in progress. We'll be done on Friday.

Take care,
-tommy

About this new album of ours...

Whoa!! I just woke up a short while ago...I've been waking up in the middle of the night lately and sleeping in weird 4 and 5 hours bursts...and I started to reflect about the new record.

Rehearsals with Beau have been going amazing. We've tightened everything up so much, the songs feel fantastic. During the last month and a half, I have gone thru our songs with a fine-toothed comb with Ryan as editor-in-chief, and we have trimmed out all the stuff we didn't need. Sculpting and re-shaping and re-writing things and often, in the process, we've thrown out huge chunks of mediocre parts that we were once attached to and replaced them with simpler stuff that really serves the song. And Ryan has been there for me totally, being real patient while I was seeking and always letting me know when I found "it" and when I went to far and needed to go back to the drawing board. It's been the most amazing process to be a part of and the end result is nine songs that I absolutely love. There is not a note of music or a single word on this record that doesn't have alot of meaning to me!

As opposed to having a longer record with less spectacular material, we've chosen to stick with 9 amazing songs. It covers the gamut...from the rockers to some mid-tempo/slower ones to a bare acoustic and vocal song and a piano tune with electronics that reminds me a bit of the last record. In fact, many of the themes from "Let Go Afterglow" get re-visited all over the new record but my perspective is so much different now. Partly because I was so unsure of myself as a person and as a musician when I made that record.

I fully relate now to the idea of the "sophmore slump" when it comes to making albums. Back then, when I was writing/recording "Let Go...", I had no idea what I was capable of and by the time I finished it, I had caught a glimpse of my capabilities which blew my mind and made me feel like I had found nirvana. I mistakenly thought I had somehow arrived somewhere when in fact, I hadn't, and that illusion left me high and dry after two years of touring. At that point , I felt more insecure and unsure of myself than I ever had, though I was going thru some pretty intense life-stuff too at that time. But still, I felt like I had no footing...like I might never again feel like I did when I finished recording "Let Go..." like I might never be able to top that original creative fit. That feeling led me down a path of some serious growth that involved taking a real honest stock of who I am, who I wanted to be and who I needed in my life. And the feeling of needing to top that last record was my guide when Ryan and I went thru some painful choices about who should and shouldn't be involved in the making of this record. We really had to believe that we would get what we needed and deserved if we let go of everything that was less than that and just walked boldly into the future. And that is exactly how it went down.

Fast-forward to today...Jordan and I did some pre-production vocal tracks at his studio yesterday and it went well. He has "the gift" when it comes to recording. No doubt. I've never heard my voice sound that good with no effects and working with him is pure joy. He completes the deal. Everybody around me has been a part of this process. Ryan is the absolute tops, head to toe. No other musician has ever done for me what Ryan does creatively, inspiration-wise and otherwise. And I've never interacted with an engineer/co-producer like I have with Jordan. The man has serious skills and everything he's brought to the table and the songs has only made them better. And then there is Beau....who came in for a simple jam to cover a gig and ended up bringing even more to the project with his amazing playing, great ideas and sheer inspiration that he provided at a time when Ryan and I really needed it. We wouldn't be making this record at this moment in time if it hadn't been for Beau. And I can't even begin to forget the other important people like Jen and my son Brice, who've provided the inspiration, ears, patience, love and support that have kept me together during this process.

Today I think I figured what this record is about for me...and it came to light as I was driving back from Jordan's house. We had been talking about the unfinished verse lyrics to the last song. I was explaining to him about what I had in mind and how I kept just getting stuck spending countless hours trying to write those words and coming up with nothing. How the verses were this conversation between two people that were interrupting each other, essentially talking at the same time about a subject so the first and third lines are actually one statement coming from one person and the second and fourth lines are a single statement coming from the other person and the alternating lines are just broken pieces of single thoughts...born of the attempt to communicate at the same time. Ok, now I am rambling...but anyways...after talking with him about what I was after and us discussing a bit, the lyrics finally hit me on my way home. And I almost smashed into a Ford F-150 as I was turning left off Powell cuz I was scrawling the words on the back of a notebook mid-turn. That's what this record is about. It's reflected in the process I went thru to find the words. Yeah, sure, I tend to agonize over words. But this time it went to a new level. I wrote and re-wrote lyrics and melodies. Sometimes 6 or 7 times and in the end, I think the lyrics on this album are far and away better than anything I've ever done. And that's my take on this whole record for me personally. It's about just that. The realization that inspiration, however necessary, is only this brief and very small part of a process that is mostly good old-fashioned stubborn hard work and absolute dedication. It's about fore-going the easy in a search for something deeper and more meaningful because deep inside you, in your core, you know it's already there....it's already inside you and all around you. You just have to believe it's there and keep looking until you find it.

So yeah, we start pulling 16 hour studio days this Friday. Seven days of tracking and then we mix. We finish mixing on January 24th. This is it. This is the album that Ryan and I have waited our whole lives to make. Hands down.

I'm excited. And I'm grateful. I'm a grateful, grateful man.
Much love.
-tommy