Recording Bands - the way you want it

So the last weekend has been hectic with 3 bands over 4 days and I think 20 songs tracked in total between them.

Friday saw a very last minute but exciting opportunity through an old friend who decided to write a World Cup Song. Baz is the songwriter for Dispensable People along with his son Olly. So in less than a full day, but a very intense day, we tracked and mixed the new World Cup Song - guitar, bass, vocals, backing vocals and me on drums plus adding some synth. Overnight I decided it really could benefit from some female vocals and this would include the Lionesses in some small way! Enter Kris Steel one of my long time solo artists and stand alone hard working professional vocalist who I have written many songs with. Kris added some totally on point and appropriate vocals mimicking the main line and adding her own bits. The track was finished by 12.00 Saturday and Im told is to be aired on local radio station Abbey Radio today (Tuesday). So Ive now produced 3 World Cup Songs since 2010 - its becoming a thing!
Kris Steel

Sunday I had repeat clients Long Good Fridays back in, a post-modern prog-punk band that deliver mesmorising songs, hypnotic, dark and a little disturbing but they are top guys to work with and the album they are building will be wicked. We tracked 3 songs and these were subsequently mixed/mastered Monday morning before the football match!

Monday was busy as I managed to catch the second half of the game in a local pub so enjoyed some of the growing mood for England in the Qatar World Cup. Straight after the game i was back to the barn to meet the drummer for Treacle Town and get things set up with him before the band arrived.
TT are long studio friends and have a few albums now - originally from Nuneaton but mainly living in Wales now they are a rhythm & blues band that gig regularly - like nearly every week. They had intentions of making a covers album so set up live to effectively play a gig in the live room. After 13 songs played back to back almost without a break things were going well and listening back began, then Adi decided to play a few of the originals he has been working on and they ended recording them too so now theres plans for a 2nd album to be made - these guys are so professional they are a dream to work with.

Winter here we come!

So, who’s turning the heating off for Winter?
Strangely at the studio we have a wonderful source of heat from burning Biomass - totally eco-friendly and somewhat cheaper than traditional forms of central heating, all provided by the farmer to most of the units in our farmyard area - that said, our costs have risen too, but fortunately (due to the soundproofing/insulation generally) it’s not a bad building to heat.

BB Studio was formed in November of 2004 and frankly I can’t do the maths anymore but we’ve been doing this a long time now. When I started the studio back then there was barely any talk of internet and now it’s gone full circle - there’s so much internet the struggle to be at the top has lost its worth, so much so that the best work comes from those that know and word of mouth.
In only a few years I think there will be more focus on Virtual ‘everything’ too, so enjoy the real world whilst you still can!
Recently I have worked with local poet Siana Bangura on various spoken poems, some set to music with her very talented mates, which was a fascinating listen, I’ve met Doc Scott (who my old business partner used to hang out with years ago) who was very interesting to listen to, whilst recording his Podcast for a enthusiastic Drum&Bass journalist from Wales, I’ve worked with various solo singers making short voicereels and demos including original songwriter Phil Morgan who brought a melodica to the studio - simple but effective, I’ve helped put the music together for local theatre shows and even an equestrian event. It never fails to amaze me where the business is helping people. Band sessions are fewer since the recession but Im looking forward to recording Treacle Town and The Long Good Fridays next.

The studio is also a party venue for kids celebrating birthdays and older people celebrating anniversaries or milestones - I’ve been running my own brand, Pop Star Party, since 2012 and every single one still amazes me with the fun we have. The fact we have so much room and so much for kids especially to pick up and use or pretend to use is one of the things that has made the parties work so well for over a decade now.

Lastly, my own band The Sirens have been hard at work taking a lot of the spare time to make demo recordings, videos and rehearse our now massive 2 hour set. Gigging has been a wild relief from rehearsals and we’re looking forward to the next bunch of gigs. We have a state of the art new PA, some unbelievably bright lights, branded clothing/equipment and fliers, plus our own van making us a very fortunate self-contained and fully versatile act to hire. Stay with us - it’s gonna be an exciting time.
The Sirens Website

King John & Prince Phil

Talent shows itself in many ways and recently I’ve had the pleasure of working with possibly the most talented chap ever to visit the barn. John King got in touch with me some months ago to enquire about recording a song with his son on piano and how it had special meaning and relevance. He explained that Phil was blind and that they had recorded it before but it didn’t quite work, so they felt they should try somewhere different. Well as a (passive) pianist I am always inspired by piano based music but wasn’t expecting quite such a dramatic journey.
Phil has been blind all his life so has never seen a single thing - it still baffles me that concept and is virtually impossible to imagine, cos within your imagination you literally see things you have previously seen and albeit you can twist these things you have to have a starting point, but if totally blind then where is your starting point for imagination?
Phil plays the piano with such ease and agility is an inspiration to watch. Not only this but he knows exactly when and where any note is wrong and somehow between us we correct any (minor) errors effortlessly. Further to this he knows exactly what other sounds he wants in the song and plays all these parts appropriately including drum patterns. So easy it seems that when doing a bassline he often drinks a mug of tea at the same time - I like Phil and we’ve had a ton of fun working on lots of tracks now.
Phil’s father, John, also sings and plays banjo so having just visited the Bluegrass region of Kentucky where banjo based Bluegrass Country Music was born it seems quite appropriate that we are doing these songs!!

Autumn Leaves is a French song originally titled Les Feuilles Mortes which John has literally translated to English in parts and left some parts in the natural French. Singing this was interesting and I was asked to provide a session vocalist, so asked my own bands’ singer Kerry to try and being an actress she had no bother performing it, giving it a subtle French twang! I think John enjoyed the duetting with Kerry and we had to bend a few recording rules to achieve things, but that’s what studio do, right!

Phil himself didn’t sing on this track like he does on some other compositions we have done. Also a very impressive video was put together between myself and John as Director, using lots of great photos and some video footage taken form the initial tracking days. You can check it out below.
Autumn Leaves on YouTube

I should write more!

So what’s been happening since my last blog in May 2022?

Actually a lot in fact it’s been a very busy Summer and year generally, because I have been enjoying the freedom of travel with my family and friends also; there’s nothing cool about being grounded like we were in 2020/21. This year I have visited Finland (Helsinki), Canary Islands (Fuerteventura) and America (twice) celebrating anything that seemed a good excuse. But don’t worry music is never forgotten and 1 of the reasons I visited America was to See Mötley Crüe in concert with Def Leppard, Joan Jett and Poison at Bostons Fenway Park Stadium which was bloody brilliant. All very significant bands in my life to date and i have to admit Tommy Lee is a hero. We also visited Vermont for a moment of picturesqueness where we popped into a house owned by the Lincoln family where there is a 1000 pipe organ in the entrance hallway - well that was a decent excuse to go if not for the history and hope of buying a chimney hat. However the organ was sadly not allowed to be played by the public and actually played itself. I did ask about the organ but the people employed to give tours didn’t seem to want to talk about anything not on their script! A minor anticlimax but we enjoyed the trip.

Some people do think that I don’t get out much and spend all my time in the barn - well I don’t! I love travelling and seeing things for myself.

The second trip to the States was purely self indulgent but a private celebration of my hitting 50 with 2 best mates and a mission of visiting as many craft Bourbon distilleries as possible in 6 days - So we rented a Dodge (of course) and needless to say we did well, clocking up 16 I think in the end. I’m now a minor expert in making Moonshine too but thats another story. At the Wild Turkey distillery I managed to find a unique instrument called the Gobble Call which sounds like a turkey and is now on display at the studio with other world instruments - make of that what you will!! Somehow in the 800 miles of rampaging thru Kentucky in search of fried chicken (harder than you might think - we saw only 3 and 2 were closed) we found a Hard Rock Cafe - in Cincinatti which is in Ohio - so we nipped in there for lunch.

So, this has accidentally turned into a blog about my American adventures oops - I shall do the blog on stranger things happening at the studio next!

Medieval Coventry Web App Sound

It’s always wonderful to see a project go live and this one has been a long time in the pipeline.
https://medievalcoventry.co.uk/

The project takes visitors through history on a journey around the most notable aspects of Coventry’s many important medieval historic places. You can physically go on the tour wearing headsets to listen to the narrative about all the features at various stopping points or look at everything on your phone listening to the information provided in the text, or just read it of course.

Supplying the audio & voice actor for this project was a pleasure. Tony George was superbly patient and helpful and of course had the perfect accent for this project.
Many thanks to Amanda Kay for involving BB Studio in this wonderful project and congratulations on its’ launch.

Check it out:
https://medievalcoventry.co.uk/