The Grinding You Hear Is Not My Teeth

It is my clock, grinding to a halt. Nah, not really, but this is taking a lot longer to finish than I had anticpated. Last week we were able to get the first part of the Epic tracked (re-tracked is more like it) with a set-up we are using in our rehearsal spot. The reults are fantastic. Aaron and Claude have a great rapport. We play as a band but tend to keep just the bass and drums as the sax and guitar bleed into the drum mics. We tend to track guitar through an amp modeller instead (the mighty Adrenalinn) to replace later, and the sax is eschewed altogether. Ange does get to play her keyboard parts though. So.

The last version we did has 6 takes which the rest of the band are sorting through now (in terms of approval; I already know which one I like best !). I took my favorite version and transferred it to my Logic software and tempo mapped it. We don't use a click track or record to sequences, so we are very concious of time. The song has is eight minutes long, has 21 time signature changes and two tempo changes, so there is a certain amount of drift to be expected.

We start out at 150 for tempo I and stay there all the way through the first 12 time signature changes (the song is in 9/4 but leaps about to 10/4, 11/4, 12/8, 7/8, 11/8, 13/8, 14/8). When it goes to the 12/8 groove we slow down to 146 (tempo II) then ramp it back up to 150 when we go back to a 1/4 note pulse. Through-out the whole piece tempo I drifts from 150 to 149 to 151, and tempo II from 146 to 148 (a set-up for a fill). That's pretty fucking amazing for an 8 minute complicated outing ! YayAaron. Yay Claude.

We also got some very cool news this week but I'll share it when and if Claude gives me permission.

In other news, my cat Mousey Mooser, has decided to crack his otherwise nonchalant veneer and has been coming up to my studio nightly for belly rubs. If the other cats were to see him right now he'd be laughed out of the house. For such a cool customer during the day, in these wee hours he becomes a huge suck. He also impedes my ability to type (which is already impeded enough!), so...good night for now.

if you rebuild it, they will forget

So. The new bassist Claude Prince is working out very well. He is a fast study and is learning song after song. He is a very welcome addition to the band, so much so that we have re-evaluated some of the tunes we tracked before he joined and have decided to re-track them with him on bass. Originally we were either going to use David's bass parts on some tunes, and replace the existing bass parts Gary and David had done on other tunes. Now we figure we'll re-record the whole epic song again, and replace the bass on the songs we feel are sitting well as is.

That obviously puts a serious dent in our schedule and we look like we aren't going to make our June release anymore. Pity. The amount of work David has put into the songs since they were tracked is HUGE, but even still, we all feel it is a better idea just to re-do the majority of them and miss our deadline.

On the plus side, at least half of the Cd is VERY close to being done. We have divided it up with the songy songs on the first half and the epic tune for the last. The first half is almost finished. All we have to do is re-track a bass-line, redo a vocal and track vocals for one other tunes. Oh, and add a keyboard solo from Guy Leblanc. And a fretless solo from Guy Dagenais. And...well, judging from the current addendums and add-ons: who knows? Still the album has a definitive shape and the last batch of mixes are very close to being final.

We hope to be done tracking and mixing by August and have the mastering done by September. This is taking a whole lot of time (more than any thing I have ever done before, and I typically grind out at least a 1/2 hour of finished, broadcast ready music a month).

No matter, the band is gearing up and the music is tighter and cleaner than before and that is very exciting!

A new wheel

In January charter member Gary Lauzon left the band and we have been auditioning bassists since. Last week we had out last audition and we are excited to announce bassist Claude Prince will be the newest wheel. Claude has immaculate prog credentials having been a member for Nathan Mahl for their arguably most popular albums "Clever Use of Shadows" and "Heretic". As well he was the bassist for their now famous live gig at Nearfest, back in 2002, when they blew away many prog fans.

We had auditioned quite a few players, both formally and informally and were getting a little worried that we mightn't find the right fit. Quite a few had expressed interest but most of them balked when they realized both the work involved playing the tunes, and the distances needed to travel to rehearsals, (while we are basically an Ottawa-based band, we rehearse outside of the city). No matter, as it turns out, Claude came along and blew us all away with his chops and his personality. Not only had he learned the requiste tunes (pretty tricky ones at that), but he had also taken a trial drive by our rehearsal spot just so that he would know the way on the day of the actual audition.

Given his lineage, all of us felt that his audition was more a matter of finding whether the personalities were a fit. Nevertheless he played the pieces with such aplomb that even if they weren't, we would still have been eager to have him join. As it turns out though Claude fit right in regardless, so the band is now poised to enter what all of us feel as being our strongest phase yet.

In other news, we are still tracking parts for our new CD, as well as another tune for a 10T complilation of twisted cover tunes called Undercover. The idea here is for every band on 10T to submit a re-worked version of an influential tune. We have chosen Cross-Eyed Mary and have almost finished it. Quite fun that.

So here are some pictures of various recording sessions we have done lately. We have used Shattered Wings, my studio and our rehearsal spot for the various tracking sessions. The mix is to be done in my studio (as before) and the mastering is tentatively set to be done at Raven.

If You Build It They Will Leave

We have been taking a wee break these last few weeks. Well a break from rehearsals anyway as I have been slogging away mixing the tracks we have already recorded, as well as recording beds for some of the other tunes. I am just about to begin writing up the score for the epic The Discovery Of Witchcraft. Right now some parts are fully scored, but mostly it exists as several dozen pieces of paper with very quick jottings on it (those pages at the top are the kind of thing I mean).

The search is still on for a bassist. We have several people coming out to audition still and we excited about the calibre of player we are attracting. Of course, there are always those people who get in touch acting like playing the tunes will be a cakewalk only to show up barely able to play their instrument let alone some of the pretty convoluted tunes we do. It makes you wonder if some people actually take the time to read the ads they respond to (or check out the rather lengthy list of links we provide). No matter, we are pretty impressed with most of the people who have come out and those who we have scheduled.

Our next in-depth recording session will be in two weeks, where
we will be recording in my studio. It will be a week-long session so I am hoping we can pretty well finish all the band tracking and just tidy up some solo and vocal parts afterwards. We'll see.

upward and onward

So we are proceeding quite well with the CD and have five songs pre-mixed and awaiting a few final details before they are in the can. Given that these songs are very long (even the short ones) we have gotten quite a lot done so far. The art-work is finished and only needs the final details regarding song length and order to get the templates all finished for the CD replicators.

Gary, our bassist has informed us he will be leaving in the next few weeks as the band is consuming too much of his time and effort. We are all sad he is leaving but look forward to the aspect of some fresh blood as well. As far as the album goes, the tracks he is already on (three) will stay as is but David will probably step in to finish the others. As David is a bassist anyway that poses no real problem. We still have plans to co-write Arachnophobia 2 and include it on the album, so Gary's presence will certainly still be felt on the CD. We of course wish him all the best and thank him for the six years of hard-work and effort he has brought to the fold. Adios amigo.

So we are now on the look-out for a new bassist. Ideally we get someone before we finish tracking so that they might be on the CD. As Aaron's knee is still on the mend we do have a bit of breathing room, but there is still a lot of work we need to do regardless. This coming week we will start auditioning and hope to find a replacement. A band is a delicate thing and we are going to take our time to get the right mix of personality and of course chops. We have a pretty bass-heavy sound so it will be tricky getting the right player, but Ottawa has lots of really good musicians and we are confidant we will find one without too much stress.

Here is a glimpse of a new track we are working on. There are no lead vocals yet, but there are bgs. This song was premiered at the Nuance Art-rock Fest with great success. This particular version has a lot more texture (live was just two vocals and gtr) and is been fun producing. It also is the first song David has played bass on for the CD (but not the last!)

This of course is a rough mix, but close enough to get a feel of. The song is called The Settling of Bones and is on our Facebook player:

http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Rebel-Wheel/41568152308

Studio Hijinks

Well we have been hard at work in the studio getting the CD ready. We tried to get as much done before Aaron had knee surgery so we booked a 12 hour session at http://www.shatteredwings.com/ and tracked four songs. Considering each song is around 6-8 minutes long and we did quite a few takes of each that was quite a job.

We are trying to get a fairly live sound on the CD, which is not to say we won't be doing overdubs and punch-ins, or even some editing, but we want the thrust of the project to be live-off-the-floor (does anyone actually use that term anymore?). We were able to get good takes of all the songs and we were also able to video tape parts thereof. I just finished a video of Aaron playing drums on MadNight take 1 (a take we didn't use). This is all live in the studio except I processed the sax solo with an amp simulator and re-amped my di'd guitar into my Mesa. We are missing some keyboard parts and the mix is obviously a rough one, but all in all it is a fairly accurate representation of what we sound like. Listen to it here http://ca.youtube.com/watch?v=ZLlGSHCl3g4

Now we are finalizing the art-work and looking at a myriad of mock-ups. Francis has done a superlative job and once we decide on our final choices I'll post some of the stuff he has come up with. It seems that most bands these days are eschewing CD releases in favour of downloads, but we decided to not only release a CD, but to make it an elaborate and full-blown one at that. Our label 10T records, has a new download site they'll have up and running soon, so that those who want to just dl tracks can do so, but being an old-fashioned guy, I still want to have the complete package done up for those who prefer that kind of thing (me mostly it seems). No matter.

WE also have a new Reverbnation account AND a Facebook account (finally) so here are the links: http://www.reverbnation.com/therebelwheel and our facebook account is http://www.facebook.com/pages/The-Rebel-Wheel/41568152308

They are both new accounts so stop by and share the love.

Ok, that's it for now. We are continuing our recording (or will be once Aaron is on his feet again...or as is more appropriate given the fact he is a drummer, on his butt) and are working on the group keyboard parts for the interludes that string our massive 35 minute epic "The Discovery of Witchcraft" together (how corny is that?).

The work continues

Ahhh...what a great feeling! We are in the midst of rehearsals for our new CD and are currently working on our 37 minute epic, "The Discoverie of Witchcraft". We have been approaching it section by section (essentially 4 long convoluted instrumental variations of a signature riff, and 3 pastoral sections with vocals and 4-part keyboards), and are at the 28 minute mark. I am happy that the band has the discipline and the motivation to tackle something this unwieldy (and so easily denigrated!), but not only have we sunk our collective teeth into it, we are having a blast doing it.

We only have one section left and one other tune to do and we can hit the studio running. Aaron has a knee operation in January so we will record about 3/4 of the album before then and the remaining sections after he is back on his feet again. Our target date to record is January 4-14th.

On others fronts, Francis Dupuis is doing a great job putting our design together. At this rate we will have a package ready to go by the spring!