Noodles, Folk and Vocoder

Friday
Well what a busy weekend.
Friday night I spent an evening catching up with an old friend. We went for a few beers and had a nice meal at Wagamamas.
We eventually ended up at a late bar where we bumped into 2 members of upcoming band Captain Dangerous.

A good night was had by all.


Saturday
Today had more of a creative air about it. I started by going over to the Lilley Pad to assist Mark with some keyboard parts for his next album. We had great fun experimenting with vocoder parts on a piece called Architecture. The final result sounds great and works well within the soundscape Mark has created.
After this hard work we sat and had an impromptu nostalgic listening session. This involved going through some of our 13 year old multitrack recordings and deciding that we should archive and release them at some point.
We then spent the evening at the Derby Assembly rooms being entertained (in a some what lack luster fashion) by folk songwriter John Tams. As much as John is without doubt one of Britain’s top song writers, this evening was spent mostly listening to his tall stories and jokes. I suspect we only got half an hours worth of songs in a 2 hour gig.
The highlight was the support acts, Mitzi and Bryony, truly breathtaking.

Sunday
After a well deserved lie in I installed my new monitors into the studio.





This took me quite a while as I needed to re-route a lot of stuff.
They sound brilliant and make good things sound great and average things sound awful.
The rest of the day was spent sequencing a cover of a well known indie bands song for next year’s gigs (sounds great).


Until next time.

Recording, Gigs, Monitors

Well what a busy few days.
Since the last blog I have written 5 of the 6 instrumentals for my EP. Although none of them last more than 1min30 I am very pleased with how they are sounding, just one more to go.
So not to keep you out of the loop too much, here is the track list with additional production notes.



TRACK ..................................................TO DO

Still love.........................................Completed
Beautiful (instrumental).....................Record/mix
She was all....................................Completed
Enchanting (instrumental)..................Record/mix
Planetary solitude .........................Completed
Captivating (instrumental).................Record/mix
Talking in maybes Record..............Vocal/Mix
Kind (instrumental)...........................Write/record/mix
Alive with you...............................Completed
You (instrumental)............................Record/mix
In my life........................................Record Vocal/Mix



I the last two days I have also been organising some gigs for next year. As it stands I have 2 confirmed and 2 in negotiation.


March 07.......... Nu-electro .....................Thirsty Scholar, Manchester
March 07......... ElectroTease ..................The Charlotte, Leicester
May 07............. Dream Sequence No. 4 .Sussex Arts Club, Brighton

TBC

Early 07........... Gig organised by Electraset....... Nottingham




Hopefully I can add a few more to the list.


On a different note while I was writing this superblog I got a phone call from Digital village saying that the Edirol monitors I had ordered had been discontinued.
So now I have to scour and research more speakers for my studio, sigh.

‘til next time.

The First Superblog

Hi all, I thought I would start a blog so everyone can get an insight into what it’s like being a Silver Factory Superstar. For starters don't expect a blog on a regular basis, this isn't becoming of a SF Superstar but I will try my best to keep them as frequent as possible.



These past few weeks I have been quite busy making a promo video and documentary for a Nottingham band called Captain Dangerous. I am doing this with Stephen 'Bob' Loynds from Pullfocus.



As well as the above I have also been busy recording and mixing songs for my new EP. This cd is being produced to coincide with a live date I am playing in May 2007 at Dreamsequence in Brighton.



I have just completed a song called 'She was all' and I’m in the process of recording the vocals for a song called 'In my life'. This song is proving to be a bit of a nightmare though. After a week of recording my vocals, I am still not happy with my performance and I have decided to leave it a bit until I can face it again.

The Extended Play cd will feature 6 songs recorded in the last year as well as 5 short instrumental pieces that link all the songs together (very Pink Floyd). I have only just started to write these instrumentals and it’s proving to be quite enjoyable.



Draft sleeve for the Cd what do you think?

Finally I have recently been helping out fellow musician and honorary SF Superstar Mark Lilley with a live performance. This gig was Lilley's first for almost two years and it was good to see him back where he should be (a return favour for assisting me when I played an acoustic gig last month at junktion 7).

Phew that’s it for now