12-27-10

The Giggle Pit is fully operational. Enough money has been pumped into the studio to produce some great sounds, however as a musician I am at an advantage and a dis-advantage.

The control room sounds great, as well as the vocal area. Fully decked out with acoustic sound foam, and I have a nice spot for the guitar rig. The studio runs off of Nuendo 4 which is the same program that the Sundrown record "The 8th Day Bliss" was recorded from. There are various compressors in the chain along with effects and EQ hardware as well. The microphones have been upgraded as well, and other than moving around some settings, I am good to go with recording.

As a musician, I am learning on a curve. Granted logging in hundreds of hours of studio time has helped with learning tricks and the basics in sound replication, however I'm looking for a great sound, better than any other album I have been a part of. This takes time.

I am currently working on guitar tone in the studio. My drum situation is good to go, however I'm not too impressed with my tone. Guitar tone was never an issue back in my teens. It was "set the distortion to 10, scoop the mids, and throw down." That is simply not the case anymore.

I enjoy my guitar tone live, but replicating this tone in a recording enviroment is a challenge. The acoustic tones are there, but not the thick, yet clear tones of my distorted guitar.

So I have literature, and am studying the right way of getting guitars to sound great on recordings, which is to get a great tone in the system, and coloring the tone with minor EQ adjustments. Once the tone is set, I am good to go. But with the experience under my belt, i have become a tone snob. Rome wasn't built in a day, and with my schedule it's difficult to log in the hours, so studying is my primary focus.

There are a lot of tricks that due to time constraints I was unable to do in the past recording in other studios. Things like cross panning, fades, time-streching, dubbing, and mastering techniques that I always wanted to do. When you're on a budget recording in another studio, you're just praying that the takes were good and the recording is good. There is no sense in reaching for "good", when you have the capability to make some great sounding albums.

So I have a ton of reading to do, and some playing around with settings, and once I have the guitar tone I'm searching for, I can write. I'm looking forward to this. Getting the guitar tone where I want it, and just writing.

I don't have a particular concept, nor do I have a idea on what this album will sound like. I'm not just making a blues album, or a straight up rock album, but it will be aggressive, and some of the tunes will be on the opposite end of the spectrum. At the end, I want the music to pump, breathe, and sound alive.

But I do know two things, the songs will be very guitar oriented, and I will be pushing the boundaries vocally as well.

But for now, back to studying.

Thanks for reading,

Van