MIDI Lesson: First Two Weeks ( 21st and 28th September)

We spent the first lesson deciding on what videos to would be good to use. We wasted quite a bit of time on this, as initially we were all just showing each other videos that we feel would be ‘cool’ to use, not even thinking what we would do musically with it. Then With Ben suggesting that we think about what type of music we would want to play and then think of a video that could work well with that. They all suggested SKA and even though i don’t listen to SKA, i have no problem playing it and would enjoy it at the same time. Then Jacob also suggested funk, which i completely loved the idea. As my drumming tends to naturally be quite funk influenced. Therefore, we agreed on the type of music. Then Joel had the idea of using a scene from the TV show ‘Rick And Morty’. The idea was great and we could all see it working. However, we had to see if we had the teachers permission. As their was some doubts on whether it was appropriate enough for the audience we will be performing to. Luckily, they were okay with the video and we are allowed to use it.

 

Second Week (28/9/17)

Objectives: Get a simple DI bass recording for the sound to picture song. – Run through the song and figure out possible different drum parts, to be able to record next lesson.

This lesson Jacob recorded the demo parts such as guitar and bass. For me it was about figuring out what i could play and figuring out the structure. I wanted to play along with the track but the studio with the drums was already being used. So i booked it out for after the lesson and waited. I then spent about 45 minutes in the studio.  I spent twenty minutes listening to the song and writing down ideas:

Intial ideas (may not make sense, however, it helped me remember different parts/ideas).

I ran the logic track and then went in the drum booth with the sheet. Listening to it through the headphones, i played along and tried different variations of beats and fills. I only ran through the track about three times, as i didn’t feel the need to run through it more times. I already knew what i was gonna play and was confident to record it the next day.

Overall, this lesson was really useful. As i got to run through the track without any distractions and play along. Therefore i had met the objective set at the beginning of the lesson

Recording: First Week (29/9/17)

Session Objectives:    Consider backing tracks  –Develop A/V (Audio visual) project with recording focus  -revise recording techniques 

Even though this wasn’t officially the first Recording sessions back. It was the first one for me and the first one where we had actually used the studios. Either way, this was such a productive lesson.  Our aim was to just use the whole lesson to record drums for the sound to picture song. Whilst Jacob re-recorded a bass demo using the D.I. box, i set up the drums for me to record on. Joel got all the microphones, stands and cables. It was quite a simple set up. I used a D112 for the bass drum as well as having an SM57 inside the Bass drum . I feel like having the SM57 adds to the sound of the bass drum, whereas just having the AKG D112 gives you quite a flat sound (depending on what type of drum you’re using). For the overheads, i used two C430’s, and had them quite spread out to get a good stereo sound. I had two D40’s for the Only two toms i was using, and then two SM57’s, one for the snare and then i wanted to mic the hi hat.

Even though usually people don’t use a microphone for the hi hat as they feel like the sound is picked up by the overheads anyway and it tends to bleed. However, as the type of drummer i am. I feel like it is important as it captures certain accents that gets lost with just using the overheads, then when it comes to mix it, you can’t just increase the Hi hat volume, the whole sound gets turned up. Therefore, even if when you use a microphone for the hi hat and it makes it too loud, you can just cut the track out. We run the Bass drum mic’s through the top TL Audio Ivory-series Compressor, The overheads through the Focusrite pre-amp, we decided to experiment with the focusrite, as it gives you quite a sharp sounding recording. Then the snare and toms just through the bottom TL Audio pre-amp.

I didn’t get to learn massive amounts of how to to get a great sound from all of these and how to setup the  patch bay, as i was in the booth playing for Jacob to set up the levels. Initially, Joel was in there, as i wanted to be outside the booth to learn setting up. However, again it depends on the type of drummer you are recording and i went in the booth instead of Joel. I am quite a hard hitter; therefore, if we had setup levels for how Joel plays drums, we may get a great sound with compressors and what not. but when i would go in to record, the levels on logic would most likely peak as he was hitting the drums differently. However, our aim is to not waste time and just get it down and there will be plenty over times that i will be able to learn and improve my skills on the producing side of things.

The recording session went great. As i had already ran through the track once before the day prior, i already had an idea on the structure and what i would be playing on the song. To help me out i also added in simple midi drums a bar before the song would change. This was so i knew when the song was about to change to the next section, i did this because the song has different styles of music. Such as; ska, funk etc,etc. Therefore, i have to change my style of playing several times in the song. This helped me massively during recording.

Recording drums would not actually take as long as they would in the first year. We went through the song once before getting the final take. The drum was all in one take, rather than recording the different parts separately. We got a good sound that fits well with the track and once all the other instruments are recorded, it will work really well with the video.

 

Performance Lesson: MY First Week (2/10/17)

Technically, this is the third lesson back, but i missed the first two lessons as i was ill. However, i was still up to date with all the work and knew what was going on. This lesson was quite straight forward for me. As it was mainly for Joel to figure out guitar and vocal parts with the rest of the group. Even though i could sit around and help figure out parts, from working with them before. I feel like they do a great enough job adding their creativity to whatever project they’re working on, that I’d rather focus on learning my parts and trying to play it to the best possible.

Especially with this track, as it is sound to picture. Everyone can be trying to add all their ideas into the mix and the whole aim of the objective gets lost and the sound and picture don’t end up working together. But mainly because i already loved the way the song was heading and didn’t feel the need to add anything.

Anyway, the main part of the lesson was running through the song live with the video, in the performance hut. Toby played the track through logic, but just muted the drum recordings and bass. So all that was playing was the video and the metronome. Jacob played the bass, Joel was figuring out guitar parts and i was on the drums. We ran through the track times and i found it really useful, as it is quite a diverse structure and  even though i remember what the changes are, it is hard to remember when they are. Therefore, running through it live helped give me an idea.