Screaming Mimes Blog

I've been working tonight on some of the guitar parts for songs, like "Superdave" - wondering how many bells & whistles this song should have... Well, working on it at this point is carrying a guitar outside with me to play for the dogs before they come in for the night. Tinkering on a solo lick or little noodly accent for the chorus. One of my great musical passions is the tasteful coloring that a choice guitar part can add to a song. Not just the chunky rhythm parts I usually slog out... some sparkles, some icing... maybe a plastic choo choo train on the top of the birthday cake. How much is too much? I guess that's up to the final mixing to decide. In the meantime I'm thinking it's better to go over-the-top now and remove ingredients from the cake batter later. Kind of reverse-engineering the cooking process... "Ugh, that doesn't taste good, I hate coconut! Take that out and add a layer of frosting in the middle!" Or, "Cripes, that stupid chimy guitar part during the verse is really distracting and fruity - just pull the damn volume down on that one!"
"Prove My Love" off of Live My Life was a lot like that... there was WAY too much going on in the song and Randy and I had to keep reducing, reducing... less less less - until we got to the song. Chipping away at the marble. Subtractive art. I've always been an additive guy - slop the paint on, throw the clay - build! That's why I love the recording process. Mixing is subtractive - pull the back, balance it all out, take the guitars down a hair... wiggle-shift-cram-thank-you-man got it all in there... can you still hear the bass?

- Dave