EP tracking: Day 2 of 2

I'm actually writing this the day after our second day of tracking. Why am I doing this? Because I was so pooped after we FINISHED THE WHOLE FREAKING RECORD yesterday.

Well, that's not completely accurate, because it has yet to be mixed, but since I don't actually do that part [that part is for Mr. Stev(i)e (Ray) Fisk], my work here is largely done. Now I get to watch my pile of audio playdoh get turned into succulent (though inedible) spaghetti by a culinary master. [psst: the "spaghetti" is really made of playdoh... that is really audio... yeah. Great analogy.]

But what a pile of playdoh it is! Yesterday we finished basic tracks for Now That She's Gone, recorded the rest of my vocals, recorded Camry and Chad's backing vocals, did some guitar doubling, added a couple tambourines, a couple acoustic guitars, some handclaps, some sleighbells, and trumpet and soprano saxophone courtesy of Derek Worthington and Russell Thorpe, respectively!

The end result is an extremely lush and tight set of tracks that I'm quite confident will yield our best work yet, barring Godzilla or giant rodents eating the DVDs and hard-drives that house our masterpiece. We put a ton of it down live (tracking as a group) and the whole thing just has a lot of oomph.

I'm incredibly excited about this thing, seriously. Can you tell?

Thanks always to the band itself, a harder working bunch of chaps not to be found outside of the Pharoah's slave camps at Giza. Daniel ripped up the skins, as always, playing with more precision and power than ever. Chadwick was unflappable, and brought the shred. Jonathon dropped some righteous grooves and proved himself to be our new resident master of percussive things (he brought a whole bag of tricks.) And Camry aced her keyboard parts (of course), made cookies (!!!) and revealed how much better her voice sounds than mine.

And special thanks to Steph, Cindy, Alicia and Kate for putting up with having your peeps away on Easter Sunday.

So yeah, it was a busy and superproductive weekend. I was mildly shocked that I didn't get any calls from Capitol or EMI this morning, but I guess they're still recovering from all of the colored eggs.

Woot!

- Jesse Kates / The Sexy Accident - Download our music for FREE

EP tracking: Day 1 of 2

What a day! How lovely to be working in a studio (West End Recording) that's literally a few blocks away from my house. I forgot my water bottle filled with yummy throat tea and guess what... I could drive back and get it! This may sound like no big deal to you, but considering that our last record was tracked at a studio an hour from my house, and that the one before that was tracked in Chicago, recording in a local KC studio (and getting excellent results) is a very enjoyable novelty.

Let me also say that Paul Malinowski knows what he's doing. That man can beat any drum into tune. The sounds we're getting are spectacular, and the band's intensive preparations are paying off. And it doesn't hurt that Mike Miller's Westrek gear sounds downright amazing. And it's great to be recording to tape again! But without further ado, let me run down what we accomplished today -

We got basic tracks and vocals (including backing vocals) done for two songs: In Heaven and Savage Love. We've even begun doing overdubs here and there. This is phenomenal progress for one day, even by Sexy Accident standards. Tomorrow it's on to basics for the title track, Now That She's Gone, more overdubs, more singing, percussion, and horns! That's right! Horns!

We were most certainly in the zone. So much so that I realized this evening that I'd had a splitting headache (loud drums in headphones will do that after a while) for about eight hours and just hadn't bothered to notice. I was too busy!

Anyway, It's my hope that we'll be 99% percent done with all tracking as of Sunday evening. We'll see if lady luck is on our side. If all goes to plan, we'll have a hard drive off to Steve Fisk for mixing within the next week or so!

More tomorrow...

- Jesse Kates / The Sexy Accident - Download our music for FREE