Christmas Album - Cool Rainbows

So I said all the tracking was over for the Christmas album, well it was nearly done...

Today Alex added some drums for Cool Rainbows song we recorded on Tuesday. We were going for a kinda wierd roomy sound so I got Alex to set the drums up in the corridor, something I've not tried before. 

In the past I've put mics out there for wierd room mics etc but never moved the drum kit out there. Fortunately with Alex's stripped down kit we had just enough space to fit him in (although I'm sure we could've squeezed a floor tom in there too) Drum sound was really nice, probably wouldn't suit most things but fits in really well in this song. 

Christmas Album - Cool Rainbows

I recorded a Cool Rainbows Christmas song on Monday for the Album. For a while we tried recording it live outside and all the birds and occasional cars sounded really cool in the background but then we opted against recording it live and moved inside so Djeisan could focus on playing+singing it better individually (he mostly wrote the song that morning) Emily came out later and added some vocals too but I was really slack with photo taking.

Drums with Alex. (Cool Rainbows and Mali Mali)

Yesterday afternoon Alex and I ventured out to Waiuku to the wonderful Revolver studios to meet Cass and Djeisan who had been there all day working hard on finishing the Cool Rainbows album.

When we arrived Djeisan was just finishing off a mix before we moved on to tracking drums and bass for 3 songs. One of which we originally recorded about a year ago! I Can't wait to hear it all done now, its sounding amazing.

By the time we finished for the evening it was about 1.30am. We decided to sleep over at Revolver and head back early the next day. So we woke at 7 and after picking up some drums from Alex's house and dropping Cass home we made our way out to my house for breakfast before starting recording drums for Mali Mali's EP.


The drummer that was booked in for the recording fell through and I recommended Alex for the Job, he did incredibly well (as I knew he would).

With the Mali Mali EP we're not really going for a full drum kit sort of sound (bar one song when we set up a full kit with the usual mics) its more based around percussive ideas I guess. I knew its the sort of area where Alex shines and he came with some great ideas but also had some really nice tonal contributions using different drums and tunings etc

We tracked drums for all the songs today and I was happy that my Highland Marching Pipe Band Drums got a look in and sounded GREAT. I think the Mali Mali EP is coming together in a way that I really hadn't anticipated (its sounding better than I thought) and its not even finished yet, Bass and Vocals next!


Overall a very productive 2 days!

Cool Rainbows-Revolver Studios

I met Djeisan probably about 2 or so years ago when Dan from Bearcat bought him round for a cassette tape manufacturing adventure for a limited edition Bearcat release at a Wellington show.

Djeisan does alot of recording himself (Dear Times Waste, Brand New Math, Trees Climbing Trees) but so far I have only really helped out on a vocal tracking session with an artist he was recording at the time. Anyway a few thursdays ago I got a call “hey Dave, wanna come out to Waiuku to Revolver Studios and engineer on recording my new project cool rainbows all weekend?” “umm…yup.”

Had a really great weekend tracking drums (Alex Freer) and bass (Cass Mitchel) and percussion and some extras for 7 songs. Really great to get in to a beautiful sounding studio with a crazy amount of cool gear and track some great music with some amazingly talented and all round lovely people.

I’ve posted some of the photos below. (some are stolen from the wonderfully talented Cass who I'm sure wont mind!)

http://coolrainbows.blogspot.com/

http://www.myspace.com/djeisansuskov