Here are some photos and videos to go with Gregg's last post on Clay's recording session.


Who ever said a singer's job is easy?



If only adding effects were as easy as expressing them vocally...

The Singer.

Gregg feeding melody to Clay.

Stay Sane - be silly.

The rig. The Composer. The Petrucci. The Veggie Phad Thai.

Redlining alert!

The Singer sings with his voice and speaks with his hands.

Click (Gregg) and Point (Clay). Anyone that gets my corny jokes wins.


"You talkin' to me?"

And that's all folks! I would have taken more photos, but apparently I fell into the habit of not dumping my camera memory card.

Stay tuned!

Suspyre Recording Catch Phrase of the Day:
Let's get that 'I'm the.'

(06/10/10): Vocals

Clay came down to do vocals for the first song we're going to release. April was kind enough to snatch up some vegetable Phad Thai and take some videos and photos.

We worked really efficiently and actually kept most of the first-draft vocals we did weeks ago; we started around 8 and were done before 11, when Andrew got there. This song is really catchy and even radio-friendly...but then again, with the advent of Sirius XM, I've heard progressive and fusion bands on the radio on a regular basis.

Now it's my job to clean up all the tracks and do a preliminary mix on the song that makes it listen-able. Maybe we'll release it early next week!

-Gregg

(06/06/10): Bass, keyboards, guitars

This was almost a 12-hour recording session....still exhausted! I am officially getting sick, so I'm going to take it easy this week.

Andrew, Sam, and April all arrived at the studio around noon and I didn't get home until almost midnight. We started by doing the bass tracks for SotC, TFD, and TMMoS. That's over 23 minutes of music, so we have almost half of the bass done, besides editing the parts.

April began her keyboard tracks for TDS around 7pm; it was her first time recording for a release and Suspyre's first time recording an official keyboardist (all other "keyboard" parts were programmed or just a small section to add a little something to the song). We had a lot of fun with all her sounds that I don't have to program anything. Also, since she prepared the parts with a metronome, her playing was spot-on, so I really don't have to edit anything either! That's another great thing about recording keyboards, there is no noise at the end of the tracks (like on distorted guitars) that requires me to split the tracks between every rest and fade out each clip. Very tedious indeed.

After she finished this one song, which will be released in a week or so, Andrew did his parts for C1. We used a different guitar micing scheme, but I won't know how it worked until I track my parts and mix things. Still not sold on the guitar sound we're getting, but a lot has to do with the plug-ins I decide to put on them.

Anyway, Clay is scheduled to come sing on Thursday, so keep reading for updates!

-Gregg

Final Day of Drums (05/31/10):

Andrew arrived with Gabe at about 1:00pm on this hot Memorial Day. Our goal was to finish all drum tracking for the new album and get some new footage for the DVD. I gave an awkward tour of the studio, but I'm not sure we will leak that video just yet. As always, if Gabe is happy with some of the video he captured he'll post some to his YouTube channel.

After we finally finished setting up / got food, we started the beefy track, TaS. It took until almost 6:30 to get this one down, so then it was time to track the final song, C (or should I say C2; there are two songs that are currently one-word-titles that start with C). He finished that song by 6:45; obviously the easiest song on the album.

Now it's my job to edit and mix the drums, then this weekend we're planning on getting more bass. I will do some guitar recording as well, and we will leak the first song mid-June!

-Gregg