That's awesome! I really like the production on your releases too, too many death/black bands nowadays have very sterile, hi-fi production quality that just takes the soul right out of the music. Some bands nowadays like Teitanblood (first example that came to mind) do it right, and you do too.

So you don't have a home studio as of right now? How do you produce/mix/master? You get a great sound. I'm all ears!!

Thank you on that, it was something I def felt was missing from more modern bands. I love clear yet raw recordings. It all goes back to that feel and atmosphere. I mean I def try to make sure there are songs there prior to drapping some atmosphere on there.

Well I guess in a sense it's a home studio but I rent a space and that's where i record everything. I record everything all natural, so everything you hear is exactly how it sounds live maybe some slight eq later but it's as simple as it could be... I'll be back later right now I'm running to the gym to go lift and then maybe go record. but I'll go into more details on how I do what I do.

Sounds cool! Looking forward to more details.

Hah! Completed all GTA V main story missions as well as a bunch of side quests. Back to the metal!

I'm going in tomorrow to track what we've got new of the new Blacksoul Seraphim record. Gonna be my first studio session since last December.

Well good on ya.

Somefella, piss on you. You must have much more time to sink into it. I've put in like 40 hours and I'm only at 64% but I've been doing every mission and every sidemission and any other random thing that pops up. But haven't spent the time to do things like races aside from that very first street race or all the parachute jumps I've only done 2.

THEMICRULAH, all right i'm back and going to fill you in the basic run down how I record and what with.

My set up is a firepod presonus 8 channel that's run into my desktop with a firewire. My DAW is Reaper. I use a Shure drum mic kit to mic my kit with an extra kick that I actually use for my floor tom. so it's 2 overheads, 4 toms, kick and snare. For vocals, guitar, and bass I use a Shure SM57.

Once I have a song I do a scratch track of the main guitar track. Then record my drums, and then guitars and bass after that. I play at slightly below concert levels for my amps. I feel it gets the most out of the amp and the proper sound and livelyness that I like in my recordings. That works for me might not for everyone.

I also do vocals in my shed, sometimes I do them at home but i have to bring my firepod there and it's kinda of a hassle but I do it if I have a ton i want to do and feel that I probably couldn't do it all in one session at my practice space. My practice space is 30mins away so it's not like I'm always willing to go down there during the weekends if I don't have any other plans in that area. It's easier for me during the week cause I work in the immediate area of it.


Once I get all tracks for a song completed and it's ready for mixing. I bring it home on a portable harddrive and hook it up to my home desktop. I have reaper and Cool Edit Pro2. I mainly mix in cool Edit cause I had been using it for years and I'm most comfortable with it, and overall I just like working with it much more.
To get the production I have where you can still feel the music be it raw but still can make it out.. it's all about capturing good tracks to begin with. I don't do a ton of Eqing. that's mainly on drums how I want the toms to sound and how to get the kicks to punch through without it just drowning everything. I spend a good amount of time getting the snare and kicks consistent in their strikes ona track so I don't have that issue of loud single hits and quieter blasting. I've been doing it for so long I have a normal set of numbers I punch in for everything. The only eq I really do on the guitars or bass is maybe adding a tiny bit of mids, really depending on the project and what I'm doing. Sometimes I just leave them raw, no hiss filters or anything like that to clean them up.. but like I said all depends what I'm doing.

Once everything is eqed roughly it's all about balancing vol to everything so it doesn't drown everything out. I hard pan my guitars left and right and I set the vol for them where I think it's a good loud recording that doesn't clip, once I have that set everything else is moved to according to be heard and cutting through but not suffocating everything. Once I'm happy with a mix I burn a copy and listen to it on my stereo, or in my truck, or my wife's car, also I may or may not get some opinions otherwise from some friends that know what I directly like mixing stuff down to and get the style I'm going for and see what they say and once I'm happy with that... i basically take all the settings I did for the single song and plug them into every other song that's set to be part of that session/ release cause they are all recorded the same way with the same settings so I don't have any issue with volume being different from track to track cause I don't mess with shit inbetween recording sessions.

and that's it in a nutshell.

I've been working on GTA V, but I keep getting sidetracked stealing nice cars, running over people, and escaping police. I can seriously spend 4 hours straight just doing that and listening to their talk radio station. GTA 4 had the best talk radio though.

Seeing Carcass and Immolation in about 5 hours. I'm pretty stoked, even though I don't like that word. I'm about to head up to Duff's, which is apparently like THE metal bar in NYC, then over to the Grammercy theater to rock out. Really looking forward to it.

Once I get back I should have my templates in the mail, so I can finish cutting out my les paul. Finally decided on a bridge, now I just need to pick out which pickups I want to use. Also may pick up a cheap guitar on eBay that I'm watching right now, just to fuel my addiction. When I get back I'm going to try to write some more music, probably deathgrind-ish but who knows. Basically one take songs, just press record and play and see what all comes out.

You know, one of the benefits to your recording guitars at such a high volume is that the mids and highs keep up with the lows. At quieter levels you can end up with a boomy low end sometimes, especially with big tube amps - they're notorious for huge low ends that border on boomy. That's the reason I have a tubescreamer. On Heartwork, Bill Steer actually ghetto rigged a custom super deep 4X12 cab to get a better bass response - NOT something you would do at a lower volume. I'm glad I have my isolation cab so I can crank it a bit. I've been thinking of switching back to my vintage 30 (from the 50 year old speaker I use now) so I can get more volume.

@SLK:

Sounds like an ideal set up and way of doing things, at least for me. Ideally, I want to eventually have my own kit so I don't have to resort to using Drumkit From Hell. I actually use Reaper too, I use it with the Drumkit From Hell plugin. I hate having to use a drum machine but I don't know any drummers and I don't know how to play drums yet. I've gotten pretty good at writing drum parts though, at least I think so, and it'll do for now. I've figured out how to put effects on the drum tracks in Audacity so they don't sound so much like a drum machine. I really really hate having to resort to that.

I don't have a bass either, and I don't know how to play that either. So what I do doesn't have any bass in it at all. Kinda sucks.

I actually tried doing a line out recording yesterday. I've done a lot of research in the past week about micing amps and guitars. The only microphone I have is on a webcam (I know >_<) but yesterday I set it up with my amp so that I can record line out with it and have the guitar sounding good without hearing the strumming in the background.

But anyway I recorded the guitar parts for the songs I'm going to be releasing yesterday and I made a few tiny little mistakes but the track turned out good, I'm going to use them as a reference point for finishing up the drum parts, which I'm almost done with. I'm about 80% done with the drum parts.

For vocals I also use that shitty ass webcam mic. It's poop, but it works.

I have three songs and together they add up to be around 10 minutes. I realize I have really shitty equipment and no bass but I'm at the point where I just have to work with what I've got because I don't have any other options, ya know?

EDIT:

I did another recording today and put drums with it.. so I have something tangible right now. Granted it's only two minutes and a little snippet of a song with no vocals... but I'm very pleased with it the new recording set up that I tried works very well. I have the webcam mic a couple centimeters away from my amplifier on a table in front of me, on top of my computer. I have an auxilary wire going from my computer to my record player and the drum track goes through the speakers. So, I play the drum track on my computer and play guitar along with it while recording the guitar with the webcam mic. I think it turned out pretty well!!! If anyone is interested in hearing it I'll upload it and post it. It's nothing special but I'm really happy!!!

Nothing wrong with drumkit from hell as long as you take the steps to make it sound more like real drums. I've used it for 5 albums now, and i think its a great drum program.

If you have no bass that's okay, I recorded an entire album with no bass. Just a pitch shifter on a guitar. It can work if you have some studio magic. Okay, immolation is warming up and carcass is next so gotta go

Playing a good live show is pretty much the best thing ever.

Been almost 2 months since my band played live (which is long for us) and in the duration I went through a break-up, moved to a new apartment, a bout of depression, and serious doubt about whether I wanted to keep playing. It's been a rather fucked up time. But last night we had a show and it was awesome. Played a bunch of old favorites, had a great turn out, girls dancing, called out for an encore, got paid well and had a decent bar tab to boot. I feel fucking fantastic today.

Music, man. It's the best.

Hell yeah. That rules you had a good time and everything worked out. I haven't played a show in two months and I feel pretty down about everything.

Man I wish there were proper shows and organisers like that where I live. Metal bands over here always play for free in shitty venues with shitty equipment/sound/crowd.

@SLK I didn't do a lot of the parachute or racing missions either, the main story was addictive enough to make me rush through it. I usually just do the Strangers and Freaks missions, robbing armoured cars or the impromptu "He stole my bag!" missions(keeping the loot all the time, wahaha)

@infinitenexus, yeah I always screech to a halt and get out whenever I pass a nice looking car just so I can grab it and show up to the next mission in style!

Work proceeds on the next Oshiego album, never mind that this one isn't even released yet. I'm gonna let the label handle most of the promotion/marketing anyway. If Great Architect was our Beneath The Remains/Arise, this next one's gonna be our Chaos A.D (Y)

ps: i enjoy that album immensely so haters can eat my balls >:[

Chaos A.D. is great. I honestly like that one over Arise.

Haven't heard much after Beneath the Remains. Now I'm having flashbacks to listening to that album and Human by Death in church years ago

Really don't care about Chaos A.D. I only give a fuck about Beneath the Remains and Arise. So that kinda sounds like your next album is going to be asshole at worst, or something I won't give a fuck about at the best.

No care for no fake drums! Only real drumming is real!!!

I am considering getting a drumkit in the future, probably after my divorce. I think I'd enjoy it quite a bit.

The Carcass/Immolation concert was incredible. I got to meet them all and they're all super nice. I also asked Bill about the amps he used on Surgical Steel, and he said he used the new EVH amp and a Bogner. Jeff is a really funny guy also. Someone on here once said Jeff's voice isn't strong live... Wrong. He sounds great live, as do they all. Probably not as good as the concert Exodus played for Gary Holt's wedding, but definitely one of the best I've seen. And the guys in Immolation were also great as always.

Awesome to be able to meet the Carcass guys! What was the set list like my friend?

I was kinda hammered so I don't remember it all, but they played plenty off their new album, and a few from Heartwork and also a few from Necroticism. They played Corporal Jigsore Quandary as one of their last songs. I believe they opened with Thrasher's Abattoir. It was a great, energetic set. Jeff jokes around a bit between songs. No clue what Immolation's set list was because I don't really like their music. They're a great live band though, I'd say they're better live than on their albums. I'll always support their band though, because they're really good people.

And today I'll wander around Brooklyn, enjoying awesome food.

Sounds like a great day!

And a very productive day at the studio ends. Tracked all six songs currently written for the new Blacksoul Seraphim record, equaling out to over 30 minutes of new material at the moment.

Here's the dilemma I'm running into with an aspect of the material. The new Blacksoul stuff is not straight doom metal anymore. There's a lot of black metal in it now, including two songs that are completely black metal (one is crazy wall of sound blast-till-you-die black metal and the other is very atmospheric, Wędrujący Wiatr style black metal) and one that's mostly doom with a black metal section ending the piece. Would "blackened doom" still be fitting for this new material, or would something else fit better?

As someone who incorporates black metal elements and chords into a base of sludge/doom I usually classify my music as Black/Sludge/Doom.

Whoa. So as I was walking out of work today I got a song that felt like it had potential. By the time I was home I had a verse, bridge, chorus and maybe 2/3rds of the lyrics so I knew I needed to get it down. As I typically do I quickly programmed the beat and drew a big line of that into my DAW, then hit record and put down a rough demo of keys and vocals.

It felt good as I was playing and singing, did a little improv lead that totally works, everything was feeling right, and then as I came to what seemed like the right place to end the song and hit the last note the drum track just stopped. I was surprised at first but then checking my DAW I saw that by complete fluke I had randomly slapped down drums for the exact number of bars that the song should be. I hadn't even know how long the song should be when I started playing, it just felt right!

I don't believe in providence but I'm going to chose to interpret this fortuitousness as a sign that this song must be finished and properly recorded.


I think not to over think those things myself, otherwise the labels just get to be too much. If you're not totally sure about blackened doom go with black/doom.

BTW Subrick: Listened to a Blacksoul Seraphim track. I absolutely loved it!!! You're a talented group of people. Can't wait to hear this black metal influenced stuff you're talking about, I'm sure it'll be great.

infinitenexus - that's cool that you're thinking about getting drums, they're so much fun. I played guitar for years before playing drums, but drums are definitely my fav to play.

Why thank you. It's definitely shaping up to be some of the best music I've ever had a hand in putting together. There are a couple songs that are more reminiscent of the first album too, with predominantly doom metal aspects and pretty much no black metal to be found. The general direction, however, is going towards black metal, right down to a dramatic increase in harsh vocals (which will be performed by me when the time comes, might I add).

As for the first album, I was not actually a part of any of that. The drummer on that album was a guy named Clay Neely, who around here is very, very well known as the drummer in a stoner doom band called Black Pyramid. Their last show before going on hold this year was at Hellfest of all places.

You play drums right? That's awesome you can do vocals and drum at the same time. That's always been one of my favorite things about Autopsy; the fact that Christ can play like that and do vocals. Dino from Asunder does that in his projects too.

I've been meaning to listen to the Black Pyramid debut for the longest time! I think I'll do that now.

I am indeed. All three bands in my signature I'm the drummer for. Although I can and have done it before, I don't like playing drums and doing vocals at the same time though since it's much harder than it seems, especially when you're playing fast music.

Just installed a set of Duncan JBs into the bridge of my RG320 and that takes it's kick to the next level. I can probably use it for Oshiego material already, previously the heaviest thing it could probably do was Arsis or Emperor.

I'm sure it's one of the most difficult things a musician can try to do. I can play guitar and do harsh vocals, but barely and I have to really practice to be able to really get it down.

I think it depends a lot on phrasing. I can play chords or a drum a simple beat and sing no problem, but once a lead or a tricky fill comes into the picture I train wreck.

A lot of it has to do with phrasing or feel, but like anything, it can definitely be learned with good practice habits. Just like when learning to play one instrument, slow it down and metronome your way to the top!

With me, it's less that it's really hard for me to do both at the same time and more that it's just not very practical. Between all the headbanging I do during a set and my kit being as bit as it is, having a microphone off to the side on yet another stand is just more clutter than anything really. Same would go with using a headset mic, more for the first reason.

Just finished recording some leads... my demo will be ready by the end of October, most likely. One song just needs vocals. Everything else isn't finished. But I'm making progress.

I've never had a problem playing drums and doing vocals at the same time. I've had plenty of practice and not just in slower stuff which I do most often in Raum, but in 2 of my old tech grind bands. But I never bothered to headbang that throws me off equilibrium while playing.

Hope to hear it soon themicrulah, post a demo up on these forums.

I've never had to do vocals whilst playing guitar, my other guitarist does it. I prefer the relative anonymity(and ensuing mysteriousness!) of a guitar player

Just finished the instruments for another song! So that's two down, one to go, and a short little intro I decided I'm going to do, to set the mood for the demo. After these are done I just need to record my vocals and the demo will be finished.

Just wrote a song, kind of a one-take deathgrind song. I just plugged in a guitar and hit record. It actually turned out pretty decent, and now I'm redoing the guitar tracks a bit cleaner. Once I lay down the bass, I'll post the temporary song here.

mixed down the possible final Ishimura Ep. Remixing these Draug songs for a split with Unlife that's about to be out as well.

I'm at a standstill playing guitar. I can play and learn new songs just fine but I'd really like to have an organized practice routine where I can learn what I need to learn to become a better player. The problem I have is that I don't know what the practice since there's so much to learn and I don't want to waste my time learning things that won't do me any good. Any advice?