Everyone look here...

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tubedude

tubedude

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I have a friend here in Louisville that is the bass player for Lava/Atlantic national recording artists Outspoken. I thought it would be an interesting and cool idea to invite him here to talk about what went into recording a national release, his bass sounds (fat bass sound! that we all have access to or may have already heard) and any other ups and downs about the process and just to answer any general questions we may have.
They currently have a single that is getting almost hourly radio play across the nation, and is very popular and requested here.
I dont know how long Frank will stay, but I'm sure we can glean plenty of useful and cool information from him while he stays. If you are familiar with Outspoken already or already have some questions to shoot him, go ahead and start.
The current Outspoken web site is here:

http://www.outspokenmusic.homestead.com/

I think that page address is changing, I'll let Frank keep us updated on that. There is a cool story there about how that band got to where they are, so far, so you might check that out in the meantime.
He will probably be under the name Rawkgambino.
Anyway, enjoy, and please be respectful as he is our invited guest here.
Peace!
 
By the way, the current single is called Farther, and is a good place to start if you havent heard it...
Paul
 
You showed! Welcome, man... I'm rather surprised no one has jumped in yet, but they will ( I think, I hope! ) :)
Anyone have any comments of questions or anything? Is this a bad idea? I dont think it is, but we'll see.
Maybe you can break the ice with a good (or bad) studio story, Frank...
Peace
 
Hi Frank. Glad you dropped in. I used to back a dude from Louisville. He was a killer Pianist and singer. Lot`s of good folks from that area. Ok here`s the media quiz... :)
what axe do you use?
what is in your live rig?
what do you use when recording?

Ken
 
Blech... Real Player sucks balls... my advice is to try the other instead.
Did you use any of your live rig in the studio? Did the guitar players?
 
Everyone sit tight, I think the national release was actually today, so they are probably quite busy...
 
I could only get the real player stream to work, btw. A mp3 would be great, if even just a snippet.

oh, and congrats
 
wow yeah that bass really comes through nice :D...cool tune, defiantely I would be interested to hear "how it was done"...as per above questions.
 
lets see...
signal path
the record was recorded in its entirety with a fender 57 p-bass reissue...one piece maple neck and fingerboard..alder body.
into an ampeg svt 2 all tube 300 watt head situated in the control room.
i believed it was called an earth d.i..and distribution box.
all cabs were placed in the storage room at the studio.(london bridge in seattle where pearl jam ten, temple of the dog, numerous alice in chains, mother love bone, candle box, blind melon records were made).in the storage room was a large walk in box...in that box was my ampeg pr-410hlf cabinet...which is really about the most guy wrenching 4-10 i've ever heard. it was miked with various sennheiser, ev, and shure mics. along with some speakers that i believe were like 4" or 5" wired to act as microphones...this box was used as isolation and was a bulk of the girth of the sound...
outside the box was an old peavey bass combo...like a 100 watter...tall and not deep...but it was used for the pronounced midrange bark that shallow box bass combos have...
the rest of it was purely that bass with a flat eq...i got such compliments from rick parashar and geoff ott(producer and engineer)about that was about as natural and warm a bass as they had ever recorded...and that made me feel good considering some of their track record...
we didn't use amp farm at all for any bass sounds...
during mixdown i was adamant about jacking the bass up and boosting the highs...then hitting it a little with a compressor so it could have presence and bite but still sit well within the track...
live rig is follows.
fender 2-57 pbass reissues
fender jazz
boss tu-2 tuner
ampeg svt 2 tube head
ampeg svt 4 mosfet head (i will shortly be getting another 4 so i can leave the 2 at home...the 4's will sound the same every night...although i prefer the sound of the 2 overall)
4 ampeg pr410hlf cabs(carry 4 usually only 2 come out of the cases)
occasionally use an mxr phase 90 and boss ds-1 distortion.
the guitar players used their live rigs for the studio.
both have 3 channel boogie triple recs. the rhythm player uses a soldano hot rod 50 as well.
most effects used for guitars were stompboxes...
rotovibe
phase 90
small stone
cry baby
some old dod chorus pedal
and various effects generated by the blue line 6 modulation pedal...
they did use amp farm for some effects on guitar...
guitars were recorded thru a mesa cab and a marshall cab for both gtr players...using close miking and some distance miking...nothing really over 8 feet maybe though. using akg, shure, neumann...
all drum tracks were recorded with a full band initially...when we found the right tempo and got a good backing track for the drummer in pro tools, the band could leave and the drummer could stay and do the track to that song...it made it nice because he had a band performance to play with that was with a click. which eliminates the whole band staying and repeating the same performances over and over until he's done tracking. so as soon as a good backing track was laid down in correct meter and a listenable scratch vocal, we were out.
gtr players use:
lead:all strats... with 2 singles and a stacked humbucker(ala jb jr duncan style) in the bridge.
rhythm:all les pauls. black 70's standard. gold 70's deluxe. cherry burst 90's standard.
album hits on feb 18th nationwide...
heres our old site
www.outspokenmusic.homestead.com
and board
http://outspoken.proboards7.com
and new site that will go online next week
www.outspokenmusic.com
 
What was it like working with Parashar? Did he have a lot of input? What kind of role did he play?
Man... Livin' the dream....
 
Thats a pretty healthy lineup for your bass rig. I could dig having a couple of svt`s again as long as I dont touch em. I used ampegs for a while myself, but I swear I never want to slip my hands through one of the handles again and won't. They be too damn heavy. :) I felt that might be a Fender in your bass track, but the smooth low end and the snap&growl on the high end made me think it was jazz. That was interesting using the transducers as an open air pickup. I Never seen that done before professionally.
 
workinh with rick was a dream...he's areally fun guy and loves to hang...but he's all about business once we were in the studio...he's a major drum stickler...we spent 12 days in preproduction and i bet at least 50% was spent making sure the drum parts were up to snuff...his focus was drums, lead local, and main guitar. myself and the rhythm player tracked mostly with geoff ott the engineer. which was really a blessing for me because i was more relaxed with geoff...my biggest thing with tracking was intonation and perfect tuning. rick was fanatical about that. he has a neve board and on top of the console was a korg rack tuner...and i sat on the couch and played and watched the tuner the whole time. making sure the grip wasn't too tight or i wasn't picking or plucking too hard. i never expected that to be thrown into the mix...but its a major component...i tracked 13 songs over 3 days. doing the finger songs together. and the pick songs together. and allowed for time to reset up the bass for the last song called elastic. which i tune the e string to c for...i put the e and a string from a .110 guage bass set on the bass to make up for the loss of tension(which would have made correct tuning and intonation on the track a nightmare.)on the e string and make it taut enough to not sound flubby.i used the a string from that set to add continuity of tone in string gauges.
also we had strings put on a song by paul buckmaster. who if you dont know was elton johns main string guy back in the day. as well as putting strings and arrangements on major tom by bowie and winning the grammy for drops of jupiter by train last year. his resume' is way too big to start on but it was amazing. he got the track calle the way i am and spent about 2 weeks on it. then flew to seattle to conduct the recording of the strings. this was done at studio x/bad animals. 24 piece string section with members of seattle symphony and seattle ballet orchestra. he spent maybe 2 hours getting a lot of different takes...it was cool watching him basicallt scold the players for lagging and saying "this isn't a symphonic piece...this is a rock song...it will NOT wait for you...the marks need to be hit." it was amusing...but it really was like a dream...and then it was done...and shaun and i walked and ate pizza on a raint night thinking "did that really just happen?".
very surreal.
as far as input rick let us have final say...he never said "it has to be this way." he knew how to handle situations where there were different opinions. but he was definitely the producer...without a doubt calling the shots and orchestrating...
my svt's are in a rack...so its at least got wheels!!!haha...but i have a 1970 head and i know the pain of the handles...its a monster...but so worth it to me.
the transducers was a nice idea it filled out the track well...rick and geoff were really traditional in a lot of senses...they were open for anything...as long as the sound was good then lets go with it...
check this out...sometimes evern with the neve board before protools some things needed warming up...so certain things were either :a/recorded traight to a studer 2 inch machine then bounced over to protools. or occasionally recorded in pro tools,then bounced over to the studer, then BACK into protools...they were all going for warmth and presence without sounding harsh. one of our main requests was that we wanted a big, full NATURAL sounding rock record. and its really been accomplished!
any more questions?
 
Thats a really cool way of doing a 'click' track. I never really thought of that - but it sure does get tiring for the guitarist, etc to sit there a play the track over and over again until the drummer gets that one fill right. And its way better than trying to really feel a song while playing along with 'click, click, click...' too.

Anyhow, the stream kind of sounds crappy, but thats just the stream. It definitely doesn't have the ultra squashed sound that a lot of songs in this genre have though. The chimes or whatever were a nice touch - what are those exactly?
 
Wow!!

Love the song. Love the sound.

Congrats on getting there dude :)
 
I just heard it in the car, and I couldnt hear any chimes anywhere...
Who mixed this?
 
I thought this would get a tad more attention from everyone, guess I was wrongelo.. oh well... Thanks Frank!

:)
 
"I thought this would get a tad more attention from everyone, guess I was wrongelo..."

Hmm.. probably because of the subject name. It appears to be a spam message or something unrelated. Perhaps next time something like this for the subject:

National Recording Act Bass Player Recording Techniques!

Or something similar. :)
 
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