Blog

As most of you already know, we have been working hard in the studio recording our upcoming album (check out our latest video blog for a sneak peak at one of the songs).

We are excited to announce that our album is being produced and engineered by Darryl Neudorf, the former drummer for the band 54-40. He has been honoured with production credits on several albums of well known Canadian artists, including Sarah McLachlin, Neko Case, Blue Rodeo, and he was just nominated for a Juno Award for his recent efforts.

We are learning many 'tricks of the trade' from such a talented professional and we are trying some "out of the box" techniques to achieve some unique sounds on the album. Like this for example:

Darryl is also a great coach when it comes to performing the songs in the studio. He really goes deep into the meaning of the songs and the messages that need to be portrayed in our performances to sound convincing. Anyone can sing a song, but if you're not singing the words like you mean it then you lose the whole message of the song.

For example, when I was in the studio on Saturday to sing the lead on one of my original songs, I finished my very first take and I was pretty happy with my performance, I figured I would have to do one extra take as a backup and that would be it. I mean, I wrote the song so how could I have sung it wrong, right? I was SO wrong! When Darryl told me his feedback of my take, he said that it sounded pretty, the tuning was good, but he didn't believe it. I wasn't convincing!

So, we stripped down the song and got to the root of the song's meaning. I tried take after take until finally, after two hours, I "got it"! It was definitely worth the time and effort to capture the best performance. It feels very rewarding to finally get that perfect take (plus, I'm so excited that two of my songs were chosen to be recorded on this album!).

However, sometimes it can be hard to keep your sanity in the studio. You can't always be perfect! :)
I've come up with three "essentials" for surviving life in the studio:

1. Pre-production and rehearsals – It is very important to come to the studio prepared and ready to sing your parts so that you're capturing the best takes and using your studio time efficiently.
2. Get as much sleep as you possibly can in your down time away from the studio - It's easy to get run down when you're spending so much time and energy into a project like this...which brings me to my next point...
3. Stay healthy! – When you're run down, you're more susceptible to catch the common cold or flu (which happened to me and took 2 whole weeks to get rid of!) Take multivitamins, drink lots of water, and try your best to eat your fruits and veggies in order to stay healthy.

 

Next time around, I will try to practice what I preach! :)

And now, the moment you've all been waiting for...it's Q&A time!

Q: Do you have a favourite motto or saying?

Thom: "Just Do It!", "That's my mama!", "Don't touch that!", "Where's Dan?!"

Joe: "Die trying or try dying." (Ok, I really don't have one, I just made that up now.)

Dan: "Enjoy your success but never quite believe it". Inspired by a former roommate, Mike Therriault, from acting school. He never believed that he would succeed with his acting but his hard work and dedication has landed him some very successful jobs (Stratford/Broadway, London's West End. He also was the original Gollum in "The Lord of The Rings" the theatre production).

"I've often thought that playing a musical instrument is an obsessive-compulsive disorder or a symptom of being socially inept, but I can't decide whether playing an instrument makes you socially inept, or you're a sociopath to begin with and you play an instrument as some sort of consolation." –Sting

Janet: "Perfect!" (I tend to use that word a lot!)

"Yeah, that's a good one...sure glad I found that one" (Quote from Jerry Seinfeld Stand-up)