Clap Clap Riot Guitar Teching.

The Aftermath. Nice work Steve.

Yesterday I was guitar teching for Clap Clap Riot who were playing 3 shows in 24 hours. They had played the Friday night in Christchurch, flew back to Auckland at a ridiculous time in the morning ready to play Music In The Parks with the Datsuns where I met them to then go on and play Ellen Melville hall with the Checks and the Naked and Famous in the Evening.

Much less eventful shows and much less stress than at Splore, guitars all behaved themselves except for a string break at soundcheck and a tuner dying.

Lisa Crawley came out and Sang at the park with them too for new song "Yoko Ono" which she features on the recording of.

Really fun day, both shows ran really well, the kids at Ellen Melville were going nuts! Steve stage dived at one point. Crazy.

Lisa On Stage

Ellen Melville Show

Great North Album - Guitar

Strahan came round and we finished the guitar parts for the Great North Album (I think we finished... maybe there will be more, who knows.) in the picture above he is modelling one of many solutions to many problems.

Often when you start to record there'll be squeaks, buzzes and rattles that you won't usually hear. In this case what appears to be an ordinary yellow cloth is in fact a special string mute; muting all of the strings behind the slide to prevent them making noises. Very high tech. The string mute is a custom peice of equipment that I designed and made myself out of a yellow cloth. Haha.

Anyway recording went well, we made some very loud sounds (and some not so loud sounds) ate some cheese toasties and then Steph came round and we watched one of my favourite films of all time that they recently found second hand in a video hire store on VHS.

Mannequin. Incredible.

Splore

This weekend I took a visit down to Splore with Clap Clap Riot as their guitar tech. It was my first real guitar teching job and it was somewhat eventful; basses getting knocked out of tune, straplocks exploding, stage hands hiding guitar amps from me, guitars just not going along with the scheduled guitar changes etc.

Despite this everyone held it together and the boys played a great set to a very appreciative audience.

Feeling slightly worse for wear and in need of some clean toilets we headed home today. Splore is an incredible festival set in an amazing location, however with the majority of the lineup being DJs or Dance acts its just not really my scene music wise. Had a pretty good time despite this though, bumped in to my good friend Tom, had a few drinks, watched Lupe Fiasco, ate some Jamaican food. Good.

(filming a song on the beach)

Great North Album - Guitar tracking.

More Great North guitar today. More geeking out with pedals and amps and guitars and cello bows...

Album is getting to a point where I think its close to being all tracked and ready for mixing. Just piano left to track on some songs, exciting.

Juice Bar - Artisan Guns, Glass Owls, Welfare Mothers

Friday night I was doing sound at the Juice Bar for Artisan Guns, Glass Owls and Welfare mothers. It was a pretty fun show. I am not the biggest fan of Juice Bars PA system, they have a limiter on the FOH that kicks in really early and all the mids are sucked like crazy. But this is all as protection from people who have no idea what they're up to. Really I don't blame them for being overprotective, its just a wee bit frustrating.

Despite this I love a good "family show" as Anthony from Glass Owls put it. Great turn out, Great performances and fun was had by all (especially when members from all 3 bands were on stage to cover Time of the Season by the Zombies and then Light and Day by The Polyphonic Spree) Also I really enjoyed Welfare Mothers set! Good.

Next weekend; Splore.

Glass Owls

Artisan Guns

past couple of weeks

This past couple of weeks I have been mainly mixing and mastering some of the stuff I have been tracking recently and thus have spent my days looking at something like this;



However I think that was taken a few days ago and now there are multiple other envelopes and scrap papers with notes on them...

On Wednesday I had the Pink Pound Experience here but didn't take any photos, we tracked another song, much less dancey this time, with lots of falsetto vocals, should be fun to mix!

I have a fairly decent backlog of songs to work on now, so time to get stuck back in to mixing.

Teacups Album Review

Teacups album got a nice review in the NZ Herald a few weeks back, I just realised I should probably link to it here.

Teacups-Forest Fiction NZ Herald Album Review

"Forest Fiction is rustic, but it is by no means rough." Good, I think thats what I was going for.

Kingston and Best Before Hamilton and Tauranga

(Hamilton-Elevate Youth Hall)

Just got back from the other dates with Kingston and Best Before, all the bands were great to hang out with. I had a great time in Tauranga with Grace and Best Before on Sunday before their show on the Monday.


As it was the last night of the tour Kingstons manager (and current session guitarist!) Tim decided that each band could do whatever they wanted to the other band...

Kingston introduced Best Before as "The Fags" and played Gay Bar through the PA while Best Befores new band name was put on the front of the kick drum. Later while they were playing Kingston got up on stage and put hats, bras, make-up and feather boas on Best Before and in their last song sprayed silly string all over them.

Best Before retaliated with a special show in Kingstons last song. The following video should explain all...

(Making the most of Kingstons special gifts.)

Kingston + Best Before tour

Started the first date of the Kingston + Best Before shows tonight (I don't think 3 dates really constitutes a tour) tonight was at Zeal, which is always a nice venue. I am a big fan of the QSC HPR series, they never fail to impress. Zeal has four of the 3 way powered cabs loaded with a 15"s, four 18" powered subs and 4 of the 12"monitors. I am so glad that my friends at Jands sorted them out with such a great PA. (and enough DI's for ridiculous synth bands who need 6 DI's, plus a DI on the bass = 7! Crazy.)

Kingston are fresh back from recording their album in Canada+America, so fresh that Scotts guitar etc is still in customs and he's borrowing my Tele, tuner and Hotcake for these shows. I love hanging out with the Kingston guys and am looking forward to the drive to Hamilton with Ben Barter tomorrow.

Best Before and Kingston (despite not really being the sort of music I would choose to listen to at home or on the bus etc) both really stand out as well rehearsed bands who have sussed out their live performances. Really great performers, confident, engaging, interesting and exciting.

Looking forward to the next 2 Dates, looks like it could be fun! (I forgot my Camera so photos are courtesy of Sha's IPhone, she runs a cool website here)

Glass Owls Day 4

Finished tracking for all 6 songs yesterday, got some more guitar, handclaps, tambourine, shaker, vocals, backing vocals and clarinet all done!

It was my first time tracking a Clarinet (well up close anyway, I have recorded them in orchestras before) and I think it was a success. I opted for a mic that I knew was very sensitive and not too coloured; the Blue Kiwi (it also happened to be already set up!) Sounded great, captured all the air and detail!

EP is sounding really good, now I have to get cracking on mixing it all!