We All Fall Down

Overview

A put up the mics and run with it night in the studio at DNA Studios

100210 Practice Notes

Involved

Mark Whitcomb

Cliff Hammer

Tom Ray

Scott Beardsley

Started on a song jam with bass and drums.

Hit on an idea we liked.

Main jumping point:

Cliff's bass part consisted of notes A G

noted Guitar goes to a G B

Tom came up with a verse melody. Mumbled scratch melody referenced the word "Sethropod" then he asked if that was a real word?

Chorus tease added first before real chorus. We debated on whether it should be 2 or 4 measures.

Mark suggested the vocal verse start on the upperchange of the guitar part rather than the low repeat.

On a run thorough the teaser part, Scott didn't do the spike line and Cliff thought that seemed more like a teaser for the first time

Decided Tom needs to sing the verse more with Cliffs bass ramp up line instead of the melodic part.

Doing this totally changed how the chorus comes in... in a good way.

Tom suggested a spiked piano part during the verse using the G and B chords with each change ending on the flat single note offbeat.

While Tom showed them this they ramped up the A part for what Cliff and Scott thought would be the chorus and Mark and Tom werent sold on that yet. Tom said it was more like an advanced A part.

We agreed that this would be more of a chorus and the original chorus "Teaser" would now be a bridge into the new chorus build.

After a few trial and errors the structure of the different parts came together the way mark had thought it should.

Video

The song still has no lyrics but Tom sings the melody idea being used for the song.

Audio:

100210 Last Take

100217 Practice notes

involved

Mark Whitcomb

Tom Ray

Cliff Hammer

Eric Bruzewitz

Worked on vocal ideas for the chorus part

Tom and Mark kicked around 2 ideas and thought they actually worked well together.

Eric added an idea he had for a 3rd part melody

Mark stated that even though he liked it, it sounded like it dragged and Tom said he'd re-record his part.

Mark thought the song was as far as it would go for this night and said maybe it wasn't the best part. Tom said he still liked it.

Audio:

100210new_vocal_chorus

100219 Practice Notes

Involved

Mark Whitcomb

Scott Beardsley

Mark thought the song should be sped up about 5 bpms so him and Scott laid down a new track from scratch at that tempo to record drums.

Mark for the session added new scratch guitars and bass on top of Scott's drums.

Audio:

100219-got-it-going-on

100224 Practice Notes

Involved

Mark Whitcomb

Scott Beardsley

Cliff Hammer

Eric Bruzewitz

Tom Ray

Eric laid a keyboard left/right part on the choruses using our old Wurlitzer keyboard we had from the first album that Tom used to use. Mark got the broken old reeds in it repaired.

Tom said Eric should watch out for accenting the high parts cuz they were louder on the off beats of the rhythm.

Mark wanted him to make sure he wasn't playing it too weak while he concentrated on that.

Then Cliff plugged in, to record over the scratch bass track.

Tom stepped into the vocal booth to re-lay the scratch vocals for a reference point Eric could follow on the keyboards so his part could match up closer to it.

Tom started out using a condenser mic with a nylon spit screen and it didn't have the same sound as the original recording. Tom said we used the Heil mic no spit screen grabbed and right up against the mouth and we wanted that sound again. So that's what we did.

Eric punched in some parts to match up with the new vocal track.

Mark doubled up his guitar lines. The distortion pedal he used added too much of a twang so we tracked it clean.

Tom said to Mark that the clean sound made it lose some of the mystisizm and asked him to add a 3rd track overdriving the amp on the head. So Mark switched to the Marshall head and pushed the gain and the bass.

Mark having the 2 other guitar tracks was able to play a little looser and improvise a bit on this one.

Scott said the beginning part shouldn't do the strum as much on the 3rd guitar layer track we were recording so the notes rung out instead of the 1234 like on the other tracks.

Both Tom and Eric commented on a part in the chorus where a guitar is mismatched and we should "Bing-Bong" them in the speakers stereo-wise.

From the scratch vocals Tom's part on the chorus sounded like he was singing "Get up, go down. we all fall down". Which brought on the idea that when we do write lyrics, do a sort of House of Cards theme for the lyrics.

Mark added his Ooo's to the chorus.

Eric added a vocal idea for the chorus part and told Tom and Mark they could take it or leave it :)

Mark focused on one part that Eric had sung where he harmonized with him and added it as a loop to the chorus and blended it to his "ooo" part.

After listening we thought it would work more at the last chous than all the way through.

Photos were taken by Scott and Tom and need to be added.

video by Scott needs to be added.

Audio

got it going on 100224

100225 Notes

Involved

Mark Whitcomb

Tom Ray (via Email)

Mark redid the end of the night mix he did the day before and emailed it to Tom with these notes on the changes.

Mark's email:

Here's a new (better) mix.  

Ditched the wurly in chorus.  Weird part, not right yet.

Edited the Bridges to be tighter.

Lowered the backup vocals, balanced out the guitars and raised them up.

-- 

Mark Whitcomb

Producer, Co-Owner

DNA Studios

www.dnastudios.us

From the non-sense Scratch vocals Tom sang for the melody of the song the chorus sounds like he says (or very well may be saying) "All fall down" and we liked it so that line may stay. So Mark temporarily renamed the file all fall down.

Audio

all fall down (got it going on) 100225

100327 Practice Notes

Involved

Tom Ray

Mark Whitcomb

Mark re-recorded/overdubbed his guitar line.

Think we want to re-do the keyboard line and come up with something new for it. Thought it wasn't quite there yet.

Lyrics wise we stayed on the deer hunter theme this beeing the second part of the story

referenced Queens ot stone bronze and Julian and sparklehorse

Quickened vocal rythmn on verses and held out the ends

after recording verse one and two we added the new chorus

Mark and Tom kicked around harmony vocals.

Lyrics

1st chorus -- second one starts with the second part of the first

They don't get on

we all fall down

We dont get up

if We all fall down

Get up get on

we all fall down, down, down, down

email from mark

So yesterday I took the mix to almost near readiness, and here it is, along with you got to feel it tonight, unmastered version.  If u have any ideas on Fall Down, let me know.  

Also, I talked to Trevor at Mastermind.  He will master the ep for 300.  I am afraid that I must insist ( 8--0 ), so we should figure out what needs be to do that.  I think it it will be invaluable.

Also included in the email audio for "you got to feel it tonight"

Audio

Lorenzo get up stay down 100811 Recording

100818 Recording Notes

involved

Tom Ray

Mark Whitcomb

Had a vintage RCA ribbon mic in the studio and used it to double the vocal lines cuz we liked the sound.

100831 Recording Notes

Involved

Tom Ray

Mark Whitcomb

Doing the mix of the song to sent out for mastering.

We thought the chorus guitar was still kind of lacking so we added another guitar to give it a little push since it seemed it was being over powered by the horn part instead of blending with and turning up the original guitar didn't cut it for us.

Mark played more of a 1234 solo pattern at the end chorus to build up the momentum.

Tightened up some of Marks background vocals using the RCA ribbon mic.

Added some high end and slight distortion to the vocal track cuz Tom didn't think that it had the same kick as the demo version did. So Tom and Mark pulled it up and tried to match it in the mix.

Mixed it down for review.

july2010 mixes we all fall down34 (mix file name)

Changed the song name to "We All Fall Down" since Mark kept labeling it that.

100902 Recording Notes

Mark emailed Tom about a new mix and some additions he added to the song.

Email Thread:

Mark: What do u think of this? I added a (little) organ on the chorus and mixed the guitars at the end a bit.

Tom: Is that the leslie on the organ? I'm not sure what I think yet. I first listened on my phone and the end sounded crazy. But then I listened on speakers and it was better. Let me try again and see.

Mark: Damn right that is the leslie and the organ!!!  Fun hitting that little fast/slow button...

I think it adds a little support to the entire part, but I could be wrong too. Lemme know what you think after another listen.

Cliff: Very Nice!

The organ is definitely a nice touch - it really opens the chorus up and makes it feel big. I like it quite a bit.

Same with the guitars at the end - they are really screamin', but the way you eq'd / compressed them keeps the focus on the vocals. I wouldn't be opposed to bringing the end guitars up a little more in the mix (though I could easily be persuaded otherwise).

Tom: ok. so I listened again and it sounded better on a normal speaker setting. 

I was just wondering if we should add the organ with small parts in other places so it doesn't sound like it comes out of nowhere. Just a thought. as I'm typing this I'm thinking it's not a huge deal it was just something I thought of as I was listening, so we don't necessarily need to do it.

Audio

100902-lorenzo-recording-weAllFallDown

101004 Recording Notes

Involved

Tom Ray

Mark Whitcomb

Setting up the mix to be mastered

Brightened up the EQ on the drums as it seemed kinda muffled.

Decided we didn't like the muli-tracked vocals so we picked out the ones we liked. Kept it on the choruses though we just tightened them up.

Set the vocals with mids and high-ends on the EQ so it would sound like and analog tape vocal that was just recorded a little to loud with natural distortion and added to it with an analog emulator turned all the way up.