The recording process

I really enjoy the recording process; it's a lot of fun working with folks in an effort to help them capture the essense of their artistic expression the way they hear it in their mind. I've also been fortunate enough to have mostly worked with artists who have a goal in mind for their project, whether it be to simply record a rough acoustic rendition of the song or a full fledged arrangement.

The band that I worked with this weekend falls somewhere in the middle - the goal is a 4 song demo to help them with landing gigs, but the singer/songwriter in the band has a real solid feel of what he wants to hear. The biggest drawback for these guys is that although they have pretty decent chops, they have not been playing together very long so they are still learning the arrangements.

I have had two experiences of a completely different sort, in one case (the first band ever in our studio), a Metal Band - the act had some real internal problems. If you had asked each one of them why they were there, you would have had a similiar answer - something to the effect of wanting a good demo to use for booking - but they obviously were in completely different spaces emotionally. It was full of Spinal Tap moments, from the the singer gargling with cheap whiskey to prep for the session to the guitar player being too wasted to play and wanting to solo over EVERYTHING, to the drummer being the last to show up, and re-writing his parts as he felt like through each take. Needless to say,that session was a bust.

The other "unfocused experience" was with a solo artist who has amazing gifts when it comes to playing, writing and performing and no gifts at all when it comes to focus. He booked the session with the intent of re-mixing some tracks cut at a different studio, showed up without the tracks and decided to lay down some song ideas that had come to him the previous day. We were busy working on things the whole session, and he booked a follow up date. Not so bad so far. Next session date arrives and so does my client along with another musician to work on the tracks we cut at the first session. Instead, he starts experimenting with an electronic drum kit and blows most of the 4 hours booked on that - then has his friend loan him the money to settle up for both sessions to date. He came back a third time and didn't get anything more done on any of the work started at the earlier sessions and never followed up again - 16 hours of studio time, 0 results... Weirdest thing I've run into, but it still beat the Metal Band experience.