Our new album will be finished pretty soon. The majority of it was recorded this past December at various locations all across America. And by America I mean My house, My office and my Church. The latter of the three would be Calvary Chapel Boca Raton thanks to one kind hearted Andrew Strickland. My office can be seen in major film releases such as "White as Snow" and "MXR Analog Delay". My home can be seen in last year's Blockbuster "Bass and Rhodes Ableton Jam".
One of the "Singles" on our new album is called "Girl Of My Dreams". It is basically "Don't take the Girl" by Tim McGraw lyrically but way more shallow. It follows a couple from the time they rode BMX bikes on the Avenues during the summer in Elementary School to a Proposal later in life.
For the people who like recording nonsense:
Drums were recorded with three mics: Kick, Snare and Overhead into a Digi 002 at 24/41 into Ableton Live by non other that Tony Scialabba.
Bass was recorded in my house by one Daniel Diaz. We ran his Music Man Bongo 5 string through a Groove Tubes Brick pre-amp into Ableton as well.
I recorded the rest of the Vocals, Keys and Guitars at home as well using various techniques including The Brick, Vox AC4, 70's Fender Rhodes, MicroKorg Vocoder and a Roland SH201 Synth. The Pizzicato Strings part is one of Ableton's EIC instruments as well as the Shaker on the choruses that has a heavy Swing.
In general, We went for a more organic sound rather than a heavily programmed one which in retrospect can be quite laborious with some sections having over 100 takes just to get the right sound which sometimes still has to be edited. The basic outline of the song was developed on my laptop en-route to Germany last year and has gone through a few different choruses (Lyrics, Chords, Everything) to get to the point that it is now.
Though I mixed it at home I did send it to Alexander Lowe in Atlanta Georgia for mastering who did a great job and was a pleasure to work with. I would recommend that any one who is writing and recording themselves (who pretty much everyone these days) to get your final mixes mastered by someone else. It is more than worth the money.
-Jonathan
It is debatable as to whether or not we actually look like this:
