Recording days for album production

Day 3 – Wednesday July 27th 2011

Today we had a special recording experience as we were feeling more confident with using the studio equipment and the songs were starting to take more shape.
We recorded a great Algerian musician by the name of Abdelkader. He is a multi talented multi-instrumentalist who could play great percussion, Guitar, sing and play keyboards.

Abdelkader recording percussion

His vibe was incredible and we recorded him on the song “Wake up”, playing Darbouka, Daf, Tambourine and more.. Then just from vibing on the song he started singing over it and we decided to record him singing on this same track (“Wake up”) in his unique traditional Algerian style.

AbdelKader recording guitar

It was truly a magical moment in the studio and both Alex and I felt like something big is happening in there. It’s those moments that you can never plan but you just need to be open to let it flow when it happens and just hit record. We had a guitar part on this song which I went in to record on Kader’s guitar and Alex was operating the pro tools so we sort of switched rolls for a brief moment there.
At the end of that day we recorded Alex on piano because it was the last full day at the studio and we wanted to use the cool set up we had there. He recorded piano takes for “Wake up” and with that we finished the session.

Day 4-  Friday 29th 2011

I went in the studio early in the morning to start sorting out the sessions and do some clean up work so we could keep recording more material. It’s all about being organized so I worked on cleaning up the session takes and getting a basic rough mix for further recordings.   We then recorded Janie Armour on Accordion. Janie is taking our MA course at Goldsmiths and as well as being a wonderful composer she is also a great Accordion player.  We recorded her on “Wake up”, “My name is Jesus”, “The leaf world” and “Sleep through the summer”.

Janie Armour and Alex Jeffery

We recorded at studio three with my own setup of Macbook pro, Mbox 2 pro and used her external pickup as well as an external condenser mic (Rode) which produced the sound I was looking for.

In the afternoon we went upstairs to the rehearsal room and recorded the Fender Rhodes they have up there. I used the stereo out straight from the original Rhodes amp and stuck them in the mbox. It produced a wonderful familiar Rhodes sound. I love that tremolo of the Rhodes, it just works every time. We recorded Alex on the basic track for the song “Feed mine eyes”.
That was the end of our busy week recording in the studio. We still have two days of recordings at the EMS next week. We will record Cello and Violin and Flute as well as start recording some vocals.

Alex Jeffery recording Rhodes

The project will be finished by August 25th 2011 and we still need to get lots of extra recordings done, mix and master. A lot of work ahead of us but up until now everything is going according to plan and we’re super excited about the project. I think the songs are great and Alex has a genuine chance of breaking into the music industry in the UK and internationally.

now back to work….