Theme from the Doubtful Sounds

Video is now here: http://www.myspace.com/thedoubtfulsounds

Theme from the Doubtful Sounds

Matt & Richard were both around today, so we got to play with recording in the front room of Darkest Karori. We all got a bit acoustick - Matt & Richard on guitars, me on my trusty mando (that really does need new strings - if not an upgrade). Matt overdubbed bass (see if you notice, should sound out of place if you listen hard). Then, there is the first ever real video coming soon to you-tube near you: low-res goodness in an imitable style. After that things degenerated. Matt does look cool with the Rick (but then everybody does). And Richard got to unleash his inner guitar god. (Hmm, but we didn't record any of that. Duh).

On the Move

So around 10 December we moved a kilometer down the hill. Still Dark, still Karori - if anything moreso than ever because we're right in low-lying fog by the park, now, instead of 100m above it. Frosts in Winter, yum.

And when we moved, the "studio" had to move too - but we've only just now recommissioned - starring a couple of brand new monitor speakers that really are quite lovely. Matt's down for a few days, so we're re-recording bits that need it.

The really hard decisions lie ahead: how do we go from 14 tracks at 60 minutes to about 10 tracks at somewhere between 40 and 45 minutes? And them - what do we need to re-record until we're happy with it all; how do we mix; how do we master; how do we put it out for people to get? Will anyone want it?

November in Auckland

November, we went to Auckland. Another iteration. That's (almost) all I remember.

Onwards Slowly

More of a record than anything else: Matt was down a couple of weeks ago, 12-14 October, and we filled in more gaps. Left with apparently 14 tracks in varying versions of completeness. I think we have to start worrying more about mixing than recording - the current versions sound great on headphones, but not very good at all on the stereo.

Made a bunch of two-track bounces of what Matt & I recorded. mostly surprising how bad the singing and mixing is. Have to do something about that. And I uploaded them to myspace, but I'm not telling where.

Recording with Matt

Matt came down for a couple of nights this week, and we used the time to start re-recording a batch of songs from the old Heybabies - stuff we'd recorded before but lots the masters for, or if we had them, well let's say they were demos but not really good enough.
Matt turned up with a list of two album's worth of songs (OK, three if you're happy with only 12-14 songs instead of 20 on each disc) and basically we started at the top and worked down. Got about five or so done - at least the bare bones - before Matt had to head back to Auckland.
Anyway, I have a big list of things to do, but at least some of them now relate to music!
And: given that there are something like 20 variants of "Hey Babies" and 4 or 5 "Doubtful Sounds" already on MySpace and Amplifier, we'll probably need a new name sooner or later.