Blog
08.07.2012: This is (almost) the end...
...of the current full-length production I'm working on. Recording is all done, mixing is all done, mastering will be done in the next few weeks - ohh yeah! This was quite a project I tell you - learning, playing and recording all the drum parts myself took some time and energy. I'll write more about that when finished.Name one thing you can't have enough of? Yeah, for sure, SNARE DRUUUMMSS!!! Since I read lots of stuff about building your own drums in forums and on the internet in general, I decided to give it a try and build a first snare drum prototype segment shell - here while gluing and aligning the first segment ring:
The raw segment shell is finished in the meantime, it'll be 6" by 14". Next step will be to mill the outsides and insides round to get the final shape, but first I have to build myself some router jig to get this done. Hopefully the diameter is large enough to really use it after that, but I think my measuring was a little off that day, so maybe it's really just a prototype to mess around with. I think it's a good start nevertheless.
Another crazy thing I started about two weeks ago is a huge drum sound library. My plan is to record all my drums and cymbals with different mics, at different mic positions and with a large range of different dynamics from extremely soft to insanely loud and then put this whole drum library in the internet for free. I already finished some samples of my Mapex Saturn bass drum and toms. For instance the bass drum is recorded with a D112, a 421 and a 57 inside, each at three different positions, then outside with a subkick+D112 and at last outside with a NT1 at three different distances, from somehow close to quite far - everything at 6 different dynamic steps(with two versions of each step). I tell you, this is an unbelievable amount of work with a very serious possibility of being absolutely crazy. The toms are finished too, but I kept it a bit simpler here: Just the NT1, a 421 and a 57 for the 8"x12" and the 14"x16" toms. I also did some snare recording, but this'll have to wait until some other time. It's very complex to record 4 different snares with 3 different mics at different dynamics, then the carpet, sidestick stuff, recording different tunings from very low to very high with different drum heads...was this really a good idea?
So once again that's it for now. I'll keep you updated on current and future projects and wish y'all a wonderful summer!
Cya and thanks for reading
18.04.2012: News from my recording vault...
Hi!It's been a while - again - but I'm still alive...somehow ;-)
I've been working on this little homepage here for the past few days, I was bored with the old one, so something new has to be made.
What else?
I'll upload some information about some of my electronic projects(preamp, tube amps, speakers,...) in the next few weeks. Just need to take some more pictures and write something about them - could take a while.
As for recording(and stuff) I just did a small recording session with the guys from Skandal a few weeks ago. At that time this whole acta-thing was quite big in the media and pissing everyone off, so they wrote a little song about it, which you can find here:www.skandal.cc
The very special thing for me about that song is, that I used an Ludwig Supra from the 60s(pre-serial keystone) for the first time. If you don't have any idea what I'm taking about: This is a snare drum. A very very awesome snare drum I must say. A friend of mine had it lying around in his basement in very bad shape. So I took it and spent some hours cleaning and polishing it, one can say restoring it, and put on some drumheads and snare wires and almost lost my mind because it sounded soo sweet. Or did I loose my mind...
For guitars I used one of my selfmade tubeamps - it's somehow a rip off of a Marshall 20th anniversary JCM 800. The guitar cab used is my ultra-secret-super-cab which in the meantime I often prefer over anything famous loaded with Celestion V30s or G12T75 and so on. It just sounds different and it's very easy to get cool and cutting distortion sound out of it - perfect.
The rest was pretty standard, nothing special to say about that.
What else?
In Jannuary I started working on a full length album production again, which is still in progress. Besides recording the whole thing, I also play the drum tracks on it, quite some work I tell ya. But I'll write more about that when the production is finished.
I think that's all for now, back to practising!
Thanks for reading!
Mathias
29.09.2011: Not dead yet...
After not writing a single word in here for half a year I decided to pull myself together and write a few lines about the last few months...Finished Album #1:
Sahara Surfers - Sonar Pilot
This turned out to be much more work than we thought at first so it was far from realistic to release it in may or june. But after all I'm glad we waited a little longer, it was worth the time.
It's beeing sold now since the 9th of september 2011 and so far listeners really really like it - you can order it here: http://www.soundzero.net
It's been a while since mixing and mastering(and recording of course) so I can't remember that much about how I mixed or mastered. But I remember that I wanted to keep the whole mix very simple and dry(at this time many records with lots of reverb&compression - or fx in general - bored the fuck out of me. I also disliked most live engineers "fx quantity opinion", I hate it when live vocals have too much and too bad reverb or delay for instance). So everything is quite clear and upfront, just right in your face and somehow very natural like a real band really playing together in a real room but listen to it and decide for yourself - it's late and I'm talking bullshit:
Sahara Surfers - Sonar Pilot by Sahara Surfers
By the way, the amazing artwork was made by Julia Stubenböck(Check it out!). She also made the new Sahara Surfers shirts and a bunch of other things(like the Sound Zero design etc.). Check out her blog... loads of her awesome work to see there!
Finished Album #2:
Skandal - Stammtischphilosophie
This shure is a great one, 11 songs of ska-punk-pleasure with funny German lyrics. It was so unbelievably much work that I almost went insane.
We recorded the whole thing in about 6 or 7 days, with more than 12 hours of work on most of these days. There's nothing special to say about the recording technique or equipment I used, it was all pretty standard and almost all equipment was quite cheap. It was the first brass section I recorded and in the beginning I had my doubts if I could get any usable results recording them because of my lack of experience. Now it's finished and the brass section(as well as all the other instruments and the vocals) sound great and the guys from Skandal are very happy with it(and I am too).
Check out their stuff here: www.skandal.cc
What else?
No recording at the moment, came back from tour with Sahara Surfers & HOME, awesome...and working on our label...startup and such. Hanging around much and slowly starting to prepare for an LP with my band HOME - writing songs, rehearsing, practising. That's it for now, it's time to catch at least 10 hours of sleep, hehehe.
Thanks for reading, dudes! Cya next time
Mathias
22.03.2011: Work, work, work… (Sonar Pilot Pt.1)
Hi there!At the moment I'm working on the new Sahara Surfers album, called "Sonar Pilot". This 9-track stoner rock bulldozer will (hopefully) be released in late May/early June 2011 so the schedule is tight and the demands on the production are high since it's their second release. Check out their myspace(click) or facebook(surprise), their first album "Spacetrip On A Paper Plane" is available as free download or you can buy the CD for 5€+shipping. Enough free advertisement, let's get some shallow recording-dude-facts about the new release, hehe ;-)
The first recording session took place from Feb. 18th to 21th and the mission was to record all drum tracks and as much bass and guitar tracks as possible. My main thought on drums looked like this: record the whole band in a "live-rehearsal-room-atmosphere" to get excellent sounding natural drum tracks and maybe some awesome bass or guitar leakage into the drum mics to add a little dirt. I used a quite unspectacular mic setup on the drums, Sm57/58s and MD421s on toms and snare and D112 and Sub-Kick on the bassdrum, and some condensers for overall kitsound, cymbals and ambience. Simple but effective.
Next. Bass. Also nothing exotic here, one track D112(I think) in front of the amp, one track DI. I placed the bass amp in a very very small room with some damping to get some natural reverb through the mic. That's it.
We recorded all guitars on the 20th/21th with a very simple guitar setup but a few days later I decided that I don't like them, which means that we'll re-record all guitars in the next few weeks to make them sound just a little more ÜLTRABRÜTAL.
That's it for part one. Next weekend I start recording with the ska-dudes from Skandal(kyyaahh) - looking forward to it!
Thanks for reading,
Mathias