Demo recording – day one

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We need some new demo tracks.

Our cd is still an excellent advert for our instrumental tracks. But as at least half of any live set is normally made up of vocal numbers we need more than the one vocal track that is already on our cd if people are going to get an accurate picture of how we sound.

It may shatter some illusions, but not all bands live communally in big houses with recording studios attached. Nor are we all so time and cash rich that we can hire out Abbey Road for a week. But between Mark and Nigel we do own enough equipment to record ourselves, and Mark has lots of experience.

So yesterday we began the slow process of recording three new demo songs – and doing a video of one.

The trickiest part of any recording is doing the drums. To get a decent drum sound you need to use at least four microphones – one on the kick drum, one on the snare and two overhead that can capture the whole kit. In fact we used a mic on each tom as well, and one under the snare to get its real crack – seven in all. It’s impractical to do this at home too, drums are too noisy and you cannot get away with recording them in a small boxy room.

So we begged and borrowed a bigger room and Mark arrived with all his kit – both drum and recording at 10:30.  Setting all this up takes two to three hours.  Some people have been known to spend days getting a good drum before they record anything.

But after a morning setting up the equipment, Mark and Nigel were joined by Frank and Veronica to lay down some tracks. The real objective was to record the drums and guitar as we will add the bass, keys and vocals later, but it gets a much better feel if there’s the whole rhythm section playing.

The recording went pretty well. After recording Enola Gay we realised that our live version is seven minutes long, which is a bit much for a a demo. So we quickly chopped bits out of each song before recording it – losing a verse here and a solo there so that they all come in at about four minutes.

Once we had worked out the new arrangements we got everything down in one or two takes (not counting a few false starts particularly in My Boy Lollipop – but what’s that between friends?).

In addition we wanted to video Can’t get you out of my head – but as we didn’t have anyone else to operate the camera this meant doing it quite a few times to get enough video footage (not that digital video comes in feet).

We then finished the day – after pausing for some of Nigel’s homemade Christmas cake – by redoing the guitar parts and adding a guitar solo to Enola Gay.

Next it’s Nigel’s turn to add the final bass parts and record Veronica’s vocals and keys. They can all be done at home. Then we’ll finish with the horns.

Some dodgy live recordings

We’ve got a new Zoom H2 recorder (well, actually a refurbished one off Ebay).

It had its first try-out at last Saturday’s gig.

We thought we would share a couple of tunes via the blog.

But first a health warning.

We simply stuck the recorder on a mic stand in the middle of the stage area.

The sound the band hears on stage has very little relation to what the audience hears out front.

This is because the horns and vocals are being projected by the PA. On stage we have monitors for these, but the sound can’t be too loud or we would get feedback. That’s a particular problem with the vocals. Not only was Veronica the furthest from the recorder, but the horns, who are naturally louder anyway, were much closer.

No bass, drums or guitar go through the PA so they have to be loud on stage so that they project with the PA into the audience. The recorder was also close to the drums and bass.

And of course any commercial recording is carefully mixed before issuing. You can’t do that when you just stick a microphone up in the middle of a band.

So if you’re prepared to use lots of imagination to imagine what the sound was like on the dance floor, here’s Man in the Street. This is one of the 60s ska original instrumentals we play, so the very quiet vocals are not a problem here.

Next up is our version of Kylie’s Can’t get you out of my Head – this is one of our bonkers covers.