Happy Spring!

Hi there.

As the weather changes from cold to less cold, many of the projects I was busy with over the fall and winter are done and mastered and awaiting a release, or they're in the home stretch of mixing.

It was an amazing end of 2012. I feel fortunate to have worked on some of the projects that I did, but am also looking forward to what the rest of 2013 has in store. Let's go down the list, shall we?

Chelsea Light Moving's debut full length saw it's release. There have been countless reviews of this record. Read them all you want.. they're fine.. but I'd definitely recommend going out and grabbing the LP. It's heavy, brooding, and loud. There's beauty to it, as well. It was recorded and mixed at Sonelab by yours truly. Tracked mostly live, mixed OTB, mastered by Carl Saff.

To coincide with the release of their new record, they played our friend Trevor's birthday party at a house in Haydenville, MA. I was hired to come and record the show. I packed up some mics, stands, my mobile Pro Tools rig, and trekked over the river and through the woods to the house where the show was happening. Setup was abridged and the show rocked. My audio was sync'd to the video that was taken and the results are here. It's totally worth a watch/listen!


Central Vermont's Carton came into Sonelab for a series of short sessions to complete their EP. We set up for basics and banged out 8 songs. All live (aside from two guitar overdubs and vocal tracks). Two of the songs were mixed for a split 7" released by Negative Fun Records. Their EP is on their bandcamp. Check it out!

Guillermo Sexo's new record, which will be proudly released by Boston's Midriff Records, is mixed! I've worked with the band for years, and I think I say this every time: this record is their best! It covers a lot of ground and has a lot of layers. At the core is really brilliantly written and preformed music. We had some seriously-high track counts going on here. I broke my record with a count of 80 tracks on one of the songs, only to pull up the next song and hit 84! Since the mix session was largely unattended, I mixed it ITB. It was great to have the convenience of Pro Tools for this one, because with upwards of 84 tracks, I needed the automation! I also got to have a lot of fun with an old Tascam Spring reverb unit I got as a gift years ago. It's a beautiful-sounding two-channel piece, however it's not stereo. The two channels sound completely different and both very useful!

Northampton's Orange Television came in for two days of tracking for their forthcoming full length. The three piece came in with Mitch and Alex Chakour producing. The team-work was great! We had a lot of fun with guitar and bass sounds, switching amps and guitars around often. There was still a great cohesiveness to the tracks, though. Amps used: Vox AC30, Laney Supergroup 60, Fender Bassman, Traynor YBA-1, Epiphone Valve Jr, and even an acoustic guitar with an open tuning set to resonate at certain chords, set off by the guitar cab.. and I think that's it! Once again, badass drummer in our drum room = killer drum sounds!

In November/December 2012, I recorded an excellent band called Aye Nako from Brooklyn, NY. Apparently Pitchfork just posted an mp3 of one of the songs! I really had a blast working with this trio and look forward to making another record with them in the future. The word on the street is that their test pressing has come in, checks out, and is off to the presses... home stretch for that record to be released! Can't wait.

Body/Head came into Sonelab to finish mixing their forthcoming LP. This record is absolutely beautiful! We did a few overdubs but mostly mixed. Kim played some French Horn and Bill slept for a bit. Pictures to prove it all below.. Their forthcoming record is very close to being done. Having worked on their first EP/LP, I can tell you that the progressions they've made, as a duo, are outstanding.

NYC's 1-800-BAND came up for two days to rock Bisquiteen. It was a freakin blast! Four songs in two days, tracked and mixed. I hadn't been to Bisquiteen in a long time so it was nice to use all of J's great gear! The band brought a black and blue Matchless that sounded simply amazing. Apparently it was the guitar amp used on a famous "blue" album recorded in the 90s! Some of my all time favorite guitar tones!!

Dig the photos. Keep in touch. Reach out if you're interested in studio time, or just chatting.

Tascam Spring verb to be heard on Guillermo Sexo's next LP!

Mixing Guillermo hard!

One of two bass rigs for Orange Television's tracking session.

Super-cool-sounding guitar "verb"

typical of me..

Hadn't used the Ampex 601 in a while. Crushed room mics, thanks to the ol' Ashly.

These drums sounded great! More Orange Television

Kim poses with the French Horn.

Bill worked his tail off mixing.. he needed a break

The power of Bisquiteen (1-800-BAND session)

A very special amp.. (more 1-800-BAND)

Long time no post..

Hi and Happy belated New Year!

It's been way too long since my last post and to those faithful folks that keep tabs on this blog, I thank you for your patience.

Let's dig in.

Before I mention all of the great projects I've been lucky enough to be involved in, I'd like to let ya'll know about some upgrades Sonelab has seen in recent months.

First off, I upgraded my Pro Tools rig to version 10. Along with that, I upgraded my interface to a Lynx Aurora 16. The difference is incredible. I'm finding myself fighting with subtle phase issues, poor transient response, and latency a lot less than I was. What that translates to is high fidelity and better workflow! I'm very pleased.

A side note to those considering the upgrade: I debated weather to go with the Firewire or USB interface. Firewire offers more expandability but it's said that it's less stable than a USB connection. That may be true but I'm running an iMac i7 Quad Core with OS 10.6.8 and using the Firewire connection and am having absolutely no reliability issues.

In the amp department, I picked up a 1969 Laney Supergroup PA head. It's famous for it's pairing with Black Sabbath. It's an incredible amp. It falls in line with the best of Marshall Plexis but offers a thickness and heaviness that I don't hear in the Marshalls of that era. May be due to the Partridge transformers!

Rehoused in a custom cab. Sounds classic, though!

We're lucky to be sporting a 1990's Vox AC30, too. It's one of the better issues of this classic.

There's a new house drum set at Sonelab: 1970s Gretsch 13/16/22 with a Chrome over Brass snare drum. I can't begin to describe how amazing this kit sounds!

Let's move on to what's been going on around the studio:

Speedy Ortiz came into Sonelab to record their first full length record. It's just about done with some very small tinkering and tweaking left to go, then mastering.. This record is dynamic, catchy, heavy, fun, and addictive. If you haven't checked this fine four-piece out yet, please do!

Matt worked so hard he passed out.

I mic'd Sadie's amp with a u67 and 421. Go figure.

 

Literally moments after the final Speedy Ortiz overdub was complete, I jumped in the car with Julia and drove down to NYC to record Dinosaur Jr's You're Living All Over Me 25th Anniversary set. I brought the "Studio B" rig from Bisquiteen and was able to set up and get levels by the end of sound check. The show was incredible! I'm glad I was able to document it and be be there to see it!

Sound check

Show time!

We spent the night in NYC, came home, the next day and I packed up for a week at Clubhouse in Rinebeck, NY with one great group: Cold Satellite! We spent 5 days there and cut one hell of a record!

Clubhouse's fantastic Neve 8068

No shortage of tube EVERYTHING at this studio!

After this trip, I dug back in at Sonelab mixing some previously-blogged-about projects and recording/mixing the finishing touches on the forthcoming Chelsea Light Moving record.

And a great way to end 2012 recording: Body/Head. Kim Gordon and Bill Nace came in for two awesome days of tracking! We tracked the record, plus more, and already started the mixing process. It's an incredible record. In my opinion, it shows a lot of progression and development between the two of them. It's a very thoughtful collection of pieces. This is definitely a record of keep on your radar! While on the topic, check out Bill Nace's blog for Open Mouth Records.

A portion of Kim Gordon's Body/Head setup

Body/Head spread

2013 brought the finishing touches on the Rusty Belle record, mixing with Oregon's Sol Riot, and tracking a new record for another asset to the Northampton music community:

Bunny's A Swine! We spent three solid days cutting basics onto my trusty 1" 16 track. We dumped the tapes into Pro Tools and hit overdubs. This record includes a lot of textures that previous Bunny's A Swine records didn't have, such as brass and strings. In addition to those things, Candace and Emerson really outdid themselves in regards to vocal arrangements. They came up with some beautiful melodies, amazing harmonies, and had lots of fun doing it. Any fan of BiAS will dig this.

Shelby tried to tape op, but just fell asleep.

This happened.

The final project I'll mention in this post is one of Tongue Oven. Dan McLeod is the driving force behind this project. He write beautiful acoustic music, mostly on the 12 string guitar, but sometimes banjo. He has a great group of folks on his team, but this last session proved to be the glue that made these songs into a record. We had an amazingly productive day putting a bow on the tracking portion of the record! We recorded cello, violin, and even leaves in bags (see photos below). The next step is mixing and some editing.

Dan wanted to record leaves

So I broke out the 67 and we recorded leaves!

Before I sign off, I'd like to mention a few new releases that I've been lucky enough to be a part of:

California X - s/t LP - This record was and still is a blast!

Guillermo Sexo - Bring Down Your Arms EP - songs taken from the recording session that will produce their forthcoming LP.

Chelsea Light Moving - s/t LP. We worked on this over the course of two crazy sessions. Its release date is March 5th. Keep tabs, go see them on tour. They are crushing!

Bedroom Rehab Corp - Red Over Red LP - we tracked and mixed this beast in 6 kick-ass days! It's out and it's awesome!

Home Body - Traps 7" on Tiny Radars and In Real Life on Feeding Tube Records.

If you have any questions about anything I'm posting about, or just want to geek out, please reach out!

Thnx.

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.

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!

Crazy summer

This summer has been absolutely crazy-busy with nonstop rock! I've hardly had a moment to catch my breath, let alone post to the blog.

When thinking about what to write this time around, I was a bit overwhelmed with thoughts of cool things done in sessions, amazing recordings, fun times outside of the studio, past projects that have been released, new gear, lessons learned, friends made, etc. I also thought it'd be fun to count how many bands I've worked with since my first session on May 6th 2012. I was amazed at the count: 16. I've recorded 16 different bands in the last 4 months. I am forever thankful to the bands for choosing to work at Sonelab with me. Luckily things have gone incredibly smoothly and we've had many happy campers. Here they are:

Fancy Trash
Chelsea Light Moving
Peachys
Home Body
Unicorn
Friends of Yours
Guillermo Sexo
Psychic Blood
Four Eyes (they have no name and 2 new members!)
Black Francis
Baby Grand
Last Builders of Empire
PineApples
California X
Trevor Healy
Egg, Eggs

Here are some pics from various sessions and happenings here at Sonelab:

Julia and I celebrating the new studio!

Matt Krefting, after being bullied by Rory.

Trevor Healy, getting warm on the 12 string.

Ted Lee's 40" and 28" bass drums.

My 26" Leedy bass drum. I love this drum!

Carr amps and great mics!

Train keeps a' rollin'

After being in this new studio for almost two months now, I'm nothing but ecstatic about the workspace, the sounds I'm able to get, the workflow here, and the clients that have been through the door.

Since I last wrote a number of projects have been started, finished, and even released!

As many of you may know, Chelsea Light Moving has released one song from our May session through Matador Records. It's a total rocker, and not to say it's the best from the batch we recorded, but it's one of my favorites and definitely strikes a mood. Dig this tune!

Boston's Guillermo Sexo stopped in for four days to start work on their forthcoming full length. This will be the fifth project I've recorded with them and I know I've said this before but it's my favorite, thus far. The songs range from pretty and quirky ballads to total spaced-out stoner anthems.. with some quick catchy ones in between! Dig it, for sure.

Fancy Trash was the first band recorded by me at Sonelab. Dave, Jason, and I got together to mix said recordings and have them ready for mastering! This will be the first full length started and finished here at Sonelab.. Very exciting!

Sweet Apple is a band from Cleveland, OH, Brattleboro, VT, and Amherst, MA. Recently the four representatives from the three regions of Sweet Apple congregated at J Mascis's Bisquiteen Studio in Amherst to record a new single and a few tunes for their third record. I engineered. It was my first time at Bisquiteen since finishing Dinosaur Jr. 2012 LP and it felt fantastic! The band sounded great, the vibe was good, and we got a TON of stuff done. Look for a fall release for the single!

Friends of Yours is an amazing Northampton duo (and sometimes trio!). The music is emotionally-charged, meaningful, and will totally make you rock out! We started working on a series of recordings in 2010 for a tour single and their forthcoming full length. We gathered at Sonelab to mix said recordings a couple of weeks ago. It is complete and scheduled for mastering very soon. Put it in yer queue!

On the Sonelab front, there is much to report! Hm.. where to being?

Well.. after the first two months, Mark and I couldn't be happier. We're booked solid though the end of summer, and getting calls for sessions quite regularly.. so if you're interested in any Autumnal recording time, I suggest reaching out sooner than later :)

I'm going to make a list of the bands recorded at Sonelab so far because it's really quite amazing and I couldn't be more proud of this facility and the clientele.

Gear talk:

Mark and I installed a Furman headphone mix system. It allows the artist to dial in his or her own headphone mix. It also happens to sound really great and gets very loud! So far, everyone's been very happy with their headphone mixes :)

We have a nice rack that floats between Mark's and my control room. It consists of a pair of Distressors and a pair of Daking mic pre/EQs, as well as a sweet Apogee 2 channel A/D D/A converter. It's been so nice to have these resources available, and to be able to move them from room to room as needed!

Our Coles 4038s are out to Wes Dooley/AEA for rereibboning, which I'm extremely excited about. Not that they don't sound fantastic but now they're going to really turn heads! Our pair of Charter Oak S600s are also out on repair. Cannot wait to get these pieces back and into regular rotation again.

My control room now has the addition of an ADR Compex F760X-RS and a DBX 161 limiter. Two of my favorite all-time compressors. Serious game-changers for me.  

I also got a pair of B&W 805 monitors to compliment my NS10s. As many of you know, I've worked on NS10s, exclusively for a long time now. Finally, I've got another pair of monitors for reference. They actually sound OK, too. I still lean on my NS10s, but when I need to double check low end, I go to the B&Ws.. so far the mixes are sounding a bit tighter, even than before!

Here are some recent studio shots!

Here's the latest state of my control room rack. It's starting to fill up, which is GREAT! I'm very happy with the state of things, here, especially when the Daking/Distressor rack is in my room!

Here's a pic from Bisquiteen this past weekend. I tracked Sweet Apple live and this is what I did with the guitars. Two different heights, separated by a couple of blankets, close-mic'd and almost NO BLEED! And you've got to love the sound of two Gibsons through two Vox amps. The thing about this setup is that I discovered a new tool, and please, reserve your laughter: the Neumann U87. This is a mic that I just never gravitated toward. Over the past couple of months, I'd been using one for oddball overdubs here and there.. the interest started to build up and this past weekend, I decided I'd go for it and put them right up on these guitar amps. Coupled with a 421, these mics sounded awesome! Who'd ever think a Neumann U87 would sound any good??

Big stuff happening..

Hello blog-readers.

It's been way too long since my last update, especially because so much has happened since..

Since my last update, I've worked on about 30 different projects and opened my new recording studio: Sonelab. It's been 2 years since discussion started and almost a year since pen went to paper. We're finally open, up and running, and I feel like I'm doing some of the best work I could possibly be doing.

I spent the second half of April moving equipment with Mark and gathering cabling for my control room. Once the cabling was in my hands, I began the epic task of wiring my console, outboard gear, and lines to the live room. For about 2 weeks, I worked at Bisquiteen for 10-12 hours per day and spent 6-7 hours at Sonelab soldering cables, running lines under the floor, and conducting a series of tests. Everything seemed to check out in the end so I was ready for my first session!

Fancy Trash came in for three days of tracking. They helped me break in the studio in the best way possible! We had Jason Smith set up in the drum room, Paul Kochanski with his upright bass in the small iso, and Dave Houghton in the big room, playing acoustic guitar and singing. On the second day of tracking, Katy Schneider arrived with her pedal steel and sat in the live room. We ran lines to her amp in the large iso. It was amazing to listen to them track all live, using every room in our studio. I can't tell you how proud I was to have pulled it all off and for things to sound simply AMAZING!

The next session I did at Sonelab was with Chelsea Light Moving. This band is made up of Thurston Moore, Keith Wood, Samara Lubelski, and John Moloney. We spent three barn-burning days tracking live, adding vocals, then mixing. It was a wirlwind of rock and noise and was SO much fun, albiet a lot of work. We set up John (drums) in the big room with 10 close mics, plus a series of four room mics, including one ambient mic, which was placed on the opposite end of the live room, providing me with 33 ms. of delay to play with! Samara's bass amp was placed in the drum room, surrounded by large gobos, and Keith and Thurston's guitar amps were placed in the remaining two iso rooms. We were able to achieve perfect isolation yet maintain a very live and raw sound on playback.

After Chelsea Light Moving left, The Peachy's came in to bash out 7 rockin acoustic tunes. This setup was quite different from the other two! I put Keith (drums) in the widest part of our live room and Kevin (acoustic guitar and vocals - LIVE!) directly across from him in the large room with no baffles. Peter, bass, had a wireless device so he was able to walk about while his bass remained in the small iso. There was definitely some bleed but all of it was quite nice! David "Goody" Goodrich sat in as producer and added some of his fine guitar, slide, and piano to the project.

After a MUCH needed week off, I walked back into Sonelab with the Happy Valley Showdown winners of 2012: Home Body. I think this project almost killed me! Electronic sequencing that go from stabbing to BLISTERING and soft to ambient. Add Haley's amazing vocals rising high above that and you have Home Body. Add Noam Schatz's pulsing beats and Justin Fallon's heavy fuzz-echo guitar as a bed and you have an idea of what their forthcoming full length has in store for you. The low end rattled my speakers and my brain, and the melodies have been pleasantly embedded in my head. I can't wait to mix this one!

One day I'll add the pictures I have of all of these events.

The feeling I get when I walk out of the studio and hear our practice spaces roaring and see the parking lot full of familiar vehicles is like no other. This is everything I hoped for an more.

The summer is getting close to fully-booked and the next batch of projects is no less exciting than the past. If you're interested in studio time, please reach out soon. It's going quickly.

THANKS!