Recording some guitars

Recorded all the guitars for opening track tonight. This time not in a relaxed way but seriously, kind of a test for final recording. Not sure about the guitarsound yet, but at least the recording felt good - and already this first song got some changes into guitars while recording it now seriously. That didn't surprise me; I have a feeling that there will be lots of "final shaping" while getting into recording the final guitars.

Anyway, that's enough for now. Happy 2012 !

The final drum programming session

That's how it seems at this point anyway. Just got the last 1/3 of songs worked, the machine drum parts of them. Some songs will get bit longer in this re'working process. Currently the package is about 31 min and 30 sec long - but all the songs contain 4-8 seconds extra in them so ... it's quite close to the 30 minutes with quick calculation. Without the possible / likely dark ambient / scifi soundscapes which are yet to be built, as well.

Now I'm keeping another break from the material, and start preparing guitar recording. Which is likely the next stage. Gotta find the kind of basic guitarsound I like (as well as what Timo likes, too) which is fitting for further processing then.

Advancing once more

It was an amazing evening tonight when it comes to how the drumtitudian abyss aka machinery drum sessions went. I got about 1/3 of songbases done in just tonight. Wow! Currently that means 16 songs done, 9 songs to go. I didn't expect this, but now it looks and feels like I might get this part of the work finished even before christmas.

... and them drums go on

I had few days complete break from the drum programming matters thanks to being sick (and also because of some christmas matters under works). I returned into the drumworks late yesterday and especially tonight I advanced big time. More than 1/3 of the songbases now have pretty much final drums (when it comes to machine part of them).

While advancing with this drum stage, I have a growing vibe to get into recording the final guitars ... since the songs start to sound so good with the final drum samples and re'worked drums. And I haven't yet even dived into making the final base guitar sound either ...

Drum mach... drumtitudian abyss sessions vol. 131211

I've had several smaller drum machine / programming sessions since last blog post. Have completed few more song bases, making the drums more varying and lively as well as I can. With trying to not to lose the grind edge of it all. This "machine work" is not exactly the most exciting stuff to do, but it's rewarding to hear how the song bases turn out with the work. While doing these drumworks, I've also noticed that some songs would benefit from slight re-work - and so I've done also some changes. Another factor that feels good. And it's easy to do at this stage, since the recording of final guitars & bassguitars (not to mention live drums for steel department) is all in the future.

It seems that the toms will be machinery. Why? Mainly because it would be really demanding to throw in just some tom rolls'n'fills into the drums recording them live. With these tempos the songs have. This feels like a good decision - I'm using four high quality tom samples and adding all kinds of basic (and less basic) rolls here and there, while adding some snare rolls etc too. So, ... Timo will be recording "just" all the cymbal/hihat works live when the time comes.

Why I wrote it like "just" all the cymbal/hihat, you might ask? Well, let's just say that it won't be "just", not at all. If the vision I'm having turns out in a way I dream it to turn out - there will be lots of cymbalworks! ;) ... and Timo will have some work ahead while recording them. Certainly both hands will be fully used and then some. Ha!

Drum machine session 2

There was a longer break than what I thought with continuing the drum tweaking thing with SF but ... such is life sometimes. Lots of things to do. Anyway, Tonight I finally continued the "machine drums finetuning" thing, though I only got 1 song's drums completed. As there's no deadline, not to mention rush, it's just good to have time with these things.

While doing the drumstuff, I noticed some technical things that might add more impact to the drums department: Going to separating all the samples used, yes. In past we've never bothered with that (or should I say I've never bothered), but this time it's different in this sense, too. Better make it all the best possible way when making it. Even that it's "just a hobby".