Valve Compressors and Angry Bees / August 28 2008
What the hell is happening in the control-room?
Insects and other creepy-crawlies love it in there: spiders, earwigs, flies, beetles, even Audrey – who is, of course, not an insect – has chosen an area under the mixing desk as her favourite sleeping-place in the whole house. And whenever anyone comes to visit, they always gravitate [...]
Evil Science / January 15 2008
Computers, like cars, are entirely problematic creations.
Yes, I know that without them, the world in general, and my life specifically, would be, in many respects, a far less remarkable place. I would not be writing this blog, for instance, if it were not for my PC; and I would have to maintain very bulky and [...]
Eye of Harmony / November 9 2007
For some odd reason, whenever I spend a few hours singing backing vocals, my right eye gets really sore and sometimes becomes slightly infected.
I spent most of yesterday evening recording a lower-third harmony to That Little Copycat – one of the songs destined for the new Enormous album. When I decided to wrap up the [...]
Studio Monkey Enquiry / September 24 2007
I have just received a phone call from a young man who used to be one of my students when I was teaching at WNC.
I taught a two year BTEC course in Sound Engineering, but over the six years that I was doing it, I am sorry to say that out of the hundreds of [...]
Smell the Gloves / September 16 2007
Work began in earnest yesterday on the new Enormous album which is provisionally titled Give the Boys a Great Big Hand.
We began the session by recording the backing tracks to That Girl Again and My Type – the latter being a well-loved, classic Enormous song, an earlier version of which appeared on our second album [...]
Oh Brother, Where Art Thou? / August 31 2007
Nelson returned to London yesterday. We have been working so hard on his new songs that the past week has absolutely flown by - so much so, in fact, that I have not been able to find even a minute in which to write a quick post.
Sitting writing this, alone in the house with Audrey, [...]
Lipgloss Weekend / August 24 2007
All the decks have been cleared in the studio ready for Nelson’s arrival later today. He will be here until Tuesday. We are due to begin work on his first full-length album. I shall be producing it, whilst drummer Graham Boffey, trumpeter Ash Morgan and sax-god Paul Varga, my Enormous cohorts, will also be lending [...]
Official Warning / June 14 2007
The Baby Jesus has threatened to smack my head in if I don’t get some work done for a change.
Actually, it is a little odd at times being self-employed. One has to be very disciplined and if the work rate begins to drop, you have to seriously castigate yourself.
If things get really out of hand, [...]
Air Indoors / March 26 2007
I’ve just bought a new air ionizer for the studio and it’s brilliant.
Ionizers reduce the amount of positively-charged molecules – ions – in the air that lots of electrical equipment such as one might find in a recording studio can produce. These positively-charged ions are converted into negatively-charged ions such as one might encounter in [...]
. . . And All That Jazz / March 24 2007
Aren’t guitars great? I’ve just bought a new one: a gold seventies Fender Jazz Bass. It’s gorgeous.
I don’t play bass much but I needed one for various recording duties and this beauty winked at me in the dusty shop and whispered: ‘We should be together.’
I have several guitars: an 80s black and white Fender Telecaster [...]
