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Roughs done

posted Aug 19, 2011, 11:08 AM by Frank Adrian
Sorry I didn't post this earlier, but mixing went late on Tuesday and I've been busy. Although it took thirteen hours of work, we did get roughs of everything done. However, the first four songs we mixed (Bittersweet, Bringin' It, One Hit Wonder, and License to Fly) were much easier than the last two (Flotsam and Takeaway). This is because by the time we mixed the last two, I was tired and my ears were fried. Luckily, after listening to them over the next couple days, the mixes held up pretty well. Brad Wager at The Vault is a really good engineer. He doesn't have a lot of gear, but he has a nice selection of microphones and the gear that he does has, he knows how to use efficiently. One of the reasons why the tracks mixed so quickly were that they were recorded really well.

All that being said, the mixes are still roughs. We have a half day or so of recording particular parts that (a) we forgot to do, (b) were performed so poorly that they couldn't be salvaged (i.e, some vocals by me), (c) weren't of high enough quality, or (d) are ones we need to fill in parts of songs. In addition, there are still mix notes that need to be incorporated. I don't think it's possible to produce a sonically perfect record with a budget of less than about $30K but, given that we'll probably have spent $1200 on the recording by the time that this is done, it doesn't sound bad. I've heard worse records that cost a lot more to make.

My one issue? I wish we had time and budget to edit the lead vocals more precisely. They sound pretty good, but there are a few places where I'd really like to boost or cut a phrase or a word. Unfortunately, I don't think we as a band have the will to do that and I don't think that Brad is that interested in doing this either. This is one of the reasons you learn to record and mix your own stuff. Then, no one is telling you that you can't do this.