Vocals vocals vocals...
Thursday night (5-18) Randy and I met up at Sonic Arts to work on vocals. Walked in with no notion of what we might record... didn't bring lyrics or practice anything. Randy had "Everything To Me" up, so we started with that!
Randy has done a lot of guitar work on this one and it was great to hear what he'd laid down. Cool acoustic/electric combos, very interesting stuff.
"Everything To Me" was in the upper register for my voice (everytime I write something in the key of E I get into trouble) but since we'd started playing it months ago I'd gotten more comfortable. The mood of the song is this kind of desperate joy which lends itself to a higher vocal sound. The first take was pretty close but had some technical flatness... the second pass was much stronger. Randy and I chopped elements from both together to create the final version... a line here, a verse from this take... the funnest part was finally singing the "bridge" they way I'd imagined it - combine two vocal takes so that they almost overlap. Live this part comes off a bit rushed, but the recording will reflect the original vision.
"Superdave" was next. Note the lower case "dave" in the title. Very important. This song is more along the lines of some of my older material like "Wedding Day" and "Man on the Phone"... the character singing is a bit of a sad sack and is confessing to his love that he will never be the romantic hero she deserves. In my own relationship it was a big blow to my ego when I realized I had limits - I couldn't pull off the impossible and be a knight in shining armour all the time. We're only human... and though our relationships make us stronger, we'll always have our weaknesses.
This was a fun one to sing... the intentional falsetto bits at the end of each stanza used to be tough to pull off but listening to the first and second take together it was very consistent and had a nice effect. It took me a couple tries on the bridge - I wanted some power in my voice there but I'm singing some pretty rapid-fire lyrics. The best was the "up up and away" bit - we did a big series of these and picked the best and repeated them... they kind of grew more operatic was we went on. It was nice to pull this off after I choked on them so badly at the last gig... sometimes your voice just can't do it (particularly in cold air!).
"Only Love" was next, the oldest song of the bunch... I wrote this right after we finished recording "Live My Life" and it was one of the first songs we introduced to Jim when he rejoined the band. This song is very emotional and personal and has a lot of dynamics... I didn't know how far to go with the whisper/scream stuff. Don't want it to sound "over-wrought". In the end I think we found a good mix, although it took a lot of takes on the post-guitar solo breakdown... got right in there and kissed the microphone for that bit.
Randy and I had a nice discussion about lyrics and I explained some of the "Bonnie & Clyde" references.
After that Randy bounced out backing tracks to "Suddenly" & "Happening" so I can start laying my guitar bits down. I've been looking forward to these two songs because they are very different from some of our other material and I get to play guitar god on them. "Suddenly" will require some new sounds and strange approaches and "Happening" is more of a classic rock approach from my teenage years. Rock rock on!
Randy has done a lot of guitar work on this one and it was great to hear what he'd laid down. Cool acoustic/electric combos, very interesting stuff.
"Everything To Me" was in the upper register for my voice (everytime I write something in the key of E I get into trouble) but since we'd started playing it months ago I'd gotten more comfortable. The mood of the song is this kind of desperate joy which lends itself to a higher vocal sound. The first take was pretty close but had some technical flatness... the second pass was much stronger. Randy and I chopped elements from both together to create the final version... a line here, a verse from this take... the funnest part was finally singing the "bridge" they way I'd imagined it - combine two vocal takes so that they almost overlap. Live this part comes off a bit rushed, but the recording will reflect the original vision.
"Superdave" was next. Note the lower case "dave" in the title. Very important. This song is more along the lines of some of my older material like "Wedding Day" and "Man on the Phone"... the character singing is a bit of a sad sack and is confessing to his love that he will never be the romantic hero she deserves. In my own relationship it was a big blow to my ego when I realized I had limits - I couldn't pull off the impossible and be a knight in shining armour all the time. We're only human... and though our relationships make us stronger, we'll always have our weaknesses.
This was a fun one to sing... the intentional falsetto bits at the end of each stanza used to be tough to pull off but listening to the first and second take together it was very consistent and had a nice effect. It took me a couple tries on the bridge - I wanted some power in my voice there but I'm singing some pretty rapid-fire lyrics. The best was the "up up and away" bit - we did a big series of these and picked the best and repeated them... they kind of grew more operatic was we went on. It was nice to pull this off after I choked on them so badly at the last gig... sometimes your voice just can't do it (particularly in cold air!).
"Only Love" was next, the oldest song of the bunch... I wrote this right after we finished recording "Live My Life" and it was one of the first songs we introduced to Jim when he rejoined the band. This song is very emotional and personal and has a lot of dynamics... I didn't know how far to go with the whisper/scream stuff. Don't want it to sound "over-wrought". In the end I think we found a good mix, although it took a lot of takes on the post-guitar solo breakdown... got right in there and kissed the microphone for that bit.
Randy and I had a nice discussion about lyrics and I explained some of the "Bonnie & Clyde" references.
After that Randy bounced out backing tracks to "Suddenly" & "Happening" so I can start laying my guitar bits down. I've been looking forward to these two songs because they are very different from some of our other material and I get to play guitar god on them. "Suddenly" will require some new sounds and strange approaches and "Happening" is more of a classic rock approach from my teenage years. Rock rock on!
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