Song A Day 2/22/2009

2/17/2009: Welcome to Pleasanton

This number has a lounge-jazz kind of feel up until the chorus, where it switches to more of a Loving Spoonful type of sing-along song. I plugged my 1968 hollow body Harmony Rocket into the tube DI (Groovetubes Brick) and used the neck pickup to get a bassy, 'bloopy' sound. U87 used again for vocals.

2/19/2009: Solid Ground

Another acoustic ballad. Used the U87 for everything. At this point, I've worked out a simple production template for these kinds of songs. I aim the U87 at the 12th fret of the Martin M3SC acoustic guitar and add some gentle compression (usually the Urei 1176 UAD plugin) and (depending on my UAD cpu 'budget'), the Pultic EQ to add a bit of 8-10k and 3-5k. For vocals, I position the mic stand to the left of the workstation monitor, with the U87 aimed downward somewhere between my nose and my mouth. I'll either use the UAD Fairchild 670 compressor or the Waves Rvox plugin during mixdown. For reverb, I add a touch of Plate 140 (another UAD plugin). I master using the UAD UltraMaximizer plugin, using the moderate 3-band limiter setting.

2/20/2009: Waiting

Ho hum, another acoustic ballad about Disneyland. It's just too easy. Added a melodic bass part using the Rickenbacker 2003 directly into the Groovetubes Brick. For bass, I prefer using the 1176 compressor plugin, though I've used the Teletronix LA2A (UAD)plugin. 9 times out of 10 I'll use the Waves Renaissance EQ to tame boomy low frequencies and add a midrange peak.

Peter told me that the opening riff sounds identical to Led Zeppelin's Going to California. He's right, but it wasn't intentional. Call it unconscious plagiarism.