Wednesday, November 28, 2012

A Bit of Press

Last week I did an interview with the Boston Phoenix's Jonathan Donaldson.

It was a lot of fun and the fruits of his labor can be seen here.

In other news..

November has been amazing. Acts include but are not limited to:

Rusty Belle
Guillermo Sexo
Aye Nako
Lord Jeff
Speedy Ortiz

*::ALSO::*

Major Pro Tools upgrades happening in my control room. Getting out of the dark ages of Pro Tools 8 and bumping up to 10. Patiently awaiting the arrival of a Lynx Aurora 16 A/DD/A converter.

Here are some pictures of recent Sonelab antics.

Some new (to us) drums at Sonelab.
Shelby weighs in on the mix.
John brings us all back to reality.

Friday, November 9, 2012

November update.

After another long run of sessions, it's high time for an update.

Sonelab has been completely rocking. It's been one awesome project after another and I couldn't be happier in this new home.

Last time I wrote an update, it was the end of August. I made a list of some of the bands that've been through Sonelab.

Since then, we've started a number of fantastic projects and have completed some, too!

Here are some pics and stories of said projects:

September brought on some cool stuff with The Bunnies. They recorded an epic concept album consisting of two songs: Side A and Side B and came to Sonelab to mix it.

We spent a day breaking each side down to movements or pieces. We treated each movement as it's own "song" and worked through each side of the record accordingly. It was totally smooth sailing. The band had a vision, and we just had to make sure it came across in the mixes.

Violet Clark of Grand Duchy fame came in for a couple of weeks to track her forthcoming effort. She had two thirds of the Bunnies come to accompany her. Matt Newman played some drums and Jeremy Dubs played guitar. Violet directed the band with her bass and keyboard stylings and then, over the course of the next two weeks, we edited the live improvs down to songs and began overdubbing and arranging. It sounds fantastic. Be on the lookout!

October started off with a band, as New London's Bedroom Rehab Corporation came in for 6 days to start and finish their forthcoming full length. We cut basics, overdubbed, and mixed all within this time. The results: huge huge huge! This record will kick your ass.

The next session in line was with Chelsea Light Moving. They came in for two days to finish mixing their forthcoming LP. It will be out in March on Matador. It's so unbelievably heavy. There is no mercy in this record.
Panoramic console shot!

The heart of the Chelsea Light Moving mix: Compex!




Shortly after that, Sol Riot from Eugene, OR came for a 6 day session. We set up, tracked basics, and spent the remainder of the time on overdubs. This record turned out to sound great and is very heavy on full-on-rock guitar arrangements. Very much looking forward to mixing this record!

New old Traynor bass cab mates with it's old old head. Delivered just in time for Sol Riot's session!


October ended on a really nice note. Rusty Belle came in for six days to track their forthcoming full length. David "Goody" Goodrich was at the Producer's Desk for this one. This recording takes a different direction from their last two. This time, they decided to forgo the concept of recording everything live and relying on life performance.

We cut the basic tracks live, keeping most stuff, but all vocals were overdubbed separately. There was a lot of experimenting with guitar tones, alternative sounds for percussion, keyboards, vocal arrangements, etc. This was SO fun to work on and mixing this should prove be AWESOME.

Matt Lorenz's stash.


November has already been rocking. Guillermo Sexo came in for two days to finish up tracking on an amazing batch of tunes. We say this every time we make a record, and we've been saying it again this time: this is their finest batch of songs and best recording to date. I cant wait to continue working on these tunes and begin the balancing process!

Reuben's stash. Guillermo Sexo guitar overdubs are always AWESOME!