Continuing with pre-production for "Live And I Learn" in the control room on Blackbird Studio A, Vance and The Weird Sisters continue to iron out the song and prepare to cut the main tracks.
See how Vance Powell:
Adjust the settings on Gabby's Moog Subsequent 37
Work on the bass line for the solo section
Iron out transitions between sections
Work on the end tag
Discuss running the Pro Tools rig with Mike Fahey to keep the session moving quickly
Explains the data backup workflow to make sure the session is backed up throughout the day
Recaps the pre-production phase and prepares to move out to the tracking room
This is your chance to join Nashville legend Vance Powell and The Weird Sisters at the world-famous Blackbird Studio and watch them craft "Live And I Learn" from Start To Finish.
00:00:23 Gaby, I don't really have a
real comment on your part yet
but I think that you could make it
a little bit more of a thing.
00:00:30 OK.
Do you know what I mean?
You mean like, everywhere or...
00:00:33 Yeah, like, you know.
Just kind of, you know.
00:00:36 Also, let me hear it a little bit
because maybe I wanna add a little bit of
something to it.
Just play it over for me.
00:01:02 That's on the 1073,
that's all of the
1.6 kHz that it has,
it's wide open.
00:01:10 It just needed a little bit
more bite.
00:01:13 And then when we cut it I think
we'll probably crank the amp up
and get it rocking.
00:01:19 Alright, cool. Let's hear it again.
00:01:31 So we're coming in on two?
Yeah, you're coming in on two.
00:01:34 Nothing is changing.
00:01:35 Nothing has changed.
00:01:36 Yeah, that wasn't a change.
00:01:38 It's the same riff,
it's the re-intro part
that we were talking about.
00:04:04 Hey, in the chorus...
00:04:05 You want this longer?
It's just the last note.
00:04:08 So, play the chorus riff.
00:04:10 Like the whole riff?
Just the chorus riff, yeah.
00:04:37 Yeah.
00:04:38 Just that little longer that makes it...
00:04:40 -Totally agree
-A little more 'supreme'.
00:04:43 A little more portamento too.
00:04:45 OK.
00:04:48 A little more?
Let me hear the riff.
00:04:58 That's the one?
-Groovy.
-OK, it's right on 3.
00:05:01 Chase portamentos!
Can we just take it from the bridge?
I wanna try that re...
00:05:07 Yeah, we'll have to figure out that.
00:05:09 I like what you did.
00:05:10 I think the bridge needs an end,
like, you guys gotta stop.
00:05:14 And then,
he can pick it back up
but maybe we still don't need
that re-intro groove.
00:05:22 Maybe it's just him picking it up
into the solo.
00:05:24 He could do that same...
00:05:26 You know what I mean?
Give the drummer some.
00:05:29 Yeah, I would love...
00:05:30 Because what you did was great.
00:05:32 OK.
00:05:32 So, don't worry about the re-intro,
you guys,
just come right back, right into the solo.
00:05:38 Yeah, AKA the verse.
00:05:39 AKA the Verse.
00:05:42 So you wanna start at the Bridge?
Yeah, let's just do the bridge man.
00:05:45 OK, beginning of the bridge or second
part of the bridge?
Let's do the whole bridge.
00:06:58 So what would be awesome is the bridge,
I want to start to sound like you guys
run off a cliff.
00:07:04 Like, in other words, that means like,
it's really gotta be tight,
the end of that bridge.
00:07:12 Just like...
00:07:14 Yeah, exactly.
00:07:15 Do you want us to play the next downbeat?
Or no downbeat?
Yeah, no downbeat.
00:07:22 Yeah. So it's running off the cliff,
snare back in
and that waits...
00:07:29 And then, I think,
I think the solo,
your part, we need to figure out
something that's a little more,
because we're gonna
have electric bass too.
00:07:40 Electric bass,
would you play like, kind of the
thudy groove part?
Yeah, I was thinking just
holding down like the one.
00:07:51 You know, kind of...
00:07:52 Or maybe like, pulse, you know?
So maybe I'm just wondering
if Gaby should just pulse.
00:07:58 Play the riff but without
the overdub like...
00:08:01 You're talking about
the 'Solo/Verse' part?
So the play the riff and I overdub the...
00:08:06 Maybe like a pulse or something.
00:08:07 Anything on the bass guitar?
Maybe on the bass,
maybe we'll do it on the bass.
00:08:11 I just feel like it should
be a little bigger there
the low-end part.
00:08:15 Agreed.
00:08:16 And then, at the very end,
those 3 little re-intro triggers,
you could be a little out,
you could play a little out of those.
00:08:24 They can still do the, coming on the two,
do those hits,
but you can...
00:08:29 You know what I mean?
You could maybe do
a little something there.
00:08:32 Give the drummer some.
00:08:33 So, let's figure out,
let's do the back half of the bridge,
to the break, to the solo.
00:08:39 And let's us get that part down.
00:08:42 The latter half of the bridge?
What's your rhythm on
the end of the bridge?
Are you guys playing the 'and'
of four or stopping on four?
Two...
00:08:50 It's on three, I believe.
00:08:55 -We're stopping on...
-Are we gonna stop on 4 or 4 'and'?
We're stopping on...
00:09:02 It stops on the 'and' I believe.
00:09:04 -On the 4 'and'?
-I believe so.
00:09:10 You wanna count while we play?
Yeah.
00:09:21 So 4...
00:09:24 Yeah.
00:09:25 I like how you're doing
the orchestra there.
00:09:27 Oh god, my default,
whenever I'm counting I do that.
00:09:30 Old habits.
00:09:31 She was doing an orchestra,
I was like
'Oh!... Orchestra!'
So let's try that.
So, back half of the bridge
to the break, solo.
00:09:37 And just a little bit of the solo.
I just wanna get that tight.
00:09:41 Yeah.
00:10:25 What happens if you play the root
and then play the root and
then play the riff over the root?
So it slides back to the root.
00:10:33 I'm not sure what you mean, though.
00:10:35 Well, just hit whatever
the root chord is,
hold that.
00:10:39 So, hold that,
play the riff over the top of it.
00:10:43 So hold that and then play the...
00:10:57 Cool, play that part, solo.
00:10:59 From the pick-up,
you do the pick-up into the solo.
00:11:31 There's a little homework you're
gonna have to think about there
but that's the way to do it.
00:11:36 OK. I'm feeling like some
of those notes are too long.
00:11:39 I don't think so.
00:11:40 -They're good?
-There will be things going on.
00:11:43 Do you want it that way in every verse
or just the solo?
No, just the solo.
00:11:47 Just to break that part
from everything else.
00:11:51 So let's get the ending tight.
00:11:54 OK, let's get the ending what we think
it's gonna be tight.
00:11:57 And then we'll play it a couple times
and actually pause.
00:12:02 We'll take a lunch,
we'll start tracking it for real.
00:12:07 For 'reals'.
00:12:08 So let's go from the
middle of that last chorus
or eight bars of the chorus
and then that tags at the end.
00:12:17 Yeah, OK.
00:12:18 If you give me a little body language,
when you're about to
start doing the accents.
00:12:22 -At the end?
-Yeah.
00:12:23 Yeah, when you start doing those accents.
00:12:26 Yeah, OK.
00:12:27 We're doing
the last eight of the chorus.
00:12:30 -Chorus.
-And then we're doing the stops...
00:12:33 And then the outro.
00:12:34 Yeah, when we get to
the outro just kind of lean in
but I'm still trying
to get the feel of it.
00:12:38 Yeah, me too. And is there
a break before those 3?
Well, there is for you,
not him, he's gonna play throughout.
00:12:46 OK.
00:12:47 There was a break.
00:12:47 But we're coming on two,
so we basically only have a break on one.
00:12:51 -Yes.
-OK.
00:12:52 But he's gonna play it.
You're gonna play through it.
00:12:54 Yeah, I think that's cool.
00:12:55 Alright, we'll see how it goes.
00:12:57 Let's try.
00:12:59 Till somebody comes with a better idea.
00:13:36 Yeah, basically, something like that.
00:13:38 We just gotta get it really tight.
00:13:40 You know what I mean? It's OK.
00:13:42 One more time, just keep going.
00:14:20 That's kind of the idea.
00:14:21 Yeah, something like that.
00:14:22 Should I be doing more...
00:14:27 I'm playing double-stops.
00:14:29 Yeah, let's see in singles.
00:14:31 OK, right.
00:14:43 And I'll just play the same thing,
eliminating one note?
Yeah.
00:14:47 I think if we could be the
least amount of busy we can.
00:14:49 That's actually better,
that works better.
00:14:51 You guys wanna try from the top?
Yeah, definitely.
00:18:28 -My bad.
-That was cool.
00:18:29 Actually.
00:18:31 -I made a mistake.
-Yeah, I know.
00:18:32 But what I heard was kind of cool.
00:18:36 In that chorus, if you...
00:18:38 when you went to the bridge riff,
the second chorus and sort of,
led us to it.
00:18:44 -Did the two riffs work together?
-I don't know yet.
00:18:46 The first three notes I heard
sounded cool. So let's try it.
00:18:48 OK, so me playing...
00:18:50 You just keep doing what you're doing.
00:18:52 She's gonna play the Bridge riff.
00:18:54 Play the Bridge riff, see if it works.
00:18:55 And then, play the chorus and then come in
with the Bridge riff.
00:18:58 Halfway through.
00:19:00 OK. So don't play yet?
Play what you're normally playing.
00:19:43 It's just a little slippery, you know.
00:19:47 -But that might be cool.
-Maybe more legato?
Yeah, maybe.
00:19:52 Or maybe just an octave up.
00:19:55 Yeah, it could be.
00:19:57 Yeah.
00:19:58 Alright cool.
00:20:00 It feels really good right now.
Can we just take a break?
-Yeah.
-Cool.
00:20:05 A couple things we're
gonna talk about here,
Mike has been over here
recording and doing stuff
I'm just gonna let him explain
basically, as the track has been
going down, what he's been doing.
00:20:14 What tracks we're recording.
00:20:16 And
if he ever really stops or anything
and once we've taken a little break
what happens then.
So Mike,
take it away.
00:20:25 Alright, so throughout this whole process
I try to stay in record the entire time.
00:20:30 People kind of take a
break I just kind of feel that out
and we'll stop recording but I will
keep the tracks armed
pretty much the whole time.
00:20:39 And that's just because
we don't wanna miss anything.
00:20:41 Vance might wanna hear
something played back
to reference so I always make sure
I'm capturing everything that I can.
00:20:48 As the track is playing down,
I'm putting in memory locations
and that will help me find
a reference point that Vance might
wanna hear, something from the Bridge.
00:20:58 As it's playing back I'm getting
the structure of the song also,
I'm familiarizing myself with that.
00:21:05 And that's helpful for the future.
00:21:07 I'm also operating the
click track for the drummer.
00:21:10 The drummer is the only
person hearing the track.
00:21:12 So I kind of have to time that,
I don't want the click
track to be banging away
in his earphones when Vance is trying
to communicate something between them.
00:21:21 So, I'm kind of just
playing a little dance back and forth of
when the right time is
to engage the click track.
00:21:28 And also to shut it off
so that it's not bothering the musician.
00:21:32 After we've recorded now
we've got a lot of information
so I'm gonna go ahead and...
00:21:39 We have Carbon Copy Cloner,
it's a great program for backing up
any session so I'm gonna go ahead
and save and close this session.
00:21:48 And I've already made
a little
task here.
00:21:54 On the left you have
your source and that drive is this
work drive that we've been working off of,
provided here at Blackbird.
00:22:03 I just drag that folder into the source,
it's there.
00:22:08 And then we brought
a little SSD hard-drive with us,
I already made a folder called
'The Weird Sisters - Puremix Safety'.
00:22:16 I drag that over to the destination
then once in the program
I wanna copy all the files,
I wanna make sure I don't delete anything,
there's a couple different
SafetyNet options here,
I always just kind of default
to 'don't delete anything'.
00:22:29 That way we're not backing
up over any information.
00:22:33 And then, another
cool little advanced option here
in the advanced settings is,
at the bottom,
'Unmount the underlying volume'.
00:22:43 And that's after the script,
this task that I have here,
has run,
and that will just unmount the drive.
00:22:50 And then what's also
nice is if I run this task
it will automatically
mount the safety for me.
00:22:55 That's all good,
I'm just gonna hit clone and let that run.
00:23:00 Carbon Copy Cloner is absolutely
one of the coolest pieces of software
for the Mac for what we do.
00:23:08 There's all kind of things
that Mike can explain
but one of the coolest things
is that you can write scripts
and schedule them.
So, over at Sputnik
my entire studio,
the backup system,
everything runs off Carbon Copy Cloner.
00:23:23 It backs up,
it backs up to safeties, near safeties,
it backs up to my Synology
Archive System,
really really fantastic.
00:23:32 And if something goes wrong,
a drive drops offline,
something there's an error
it sends me an e-mail.
00:23:38 It's a really beautiful piece of software,
I think it's like 39 bucks,
it's well worth it,
to buy it.
00:23:47 And it was designed by a guy who actually
still works for Apple
OS division,
setting up and building new OSs
and it was designed
for an internal Apple
job
to update computers that were
running new builds.
00:24:05 And Apple said:
'Hey, you should sell this,
it's really great!'
It's really nice, it keeps
getting better and better.
00:24:11 Like I said, it's 39 bucks man, come on!
Back up your drives, do it!
Up to this point we have
set up in the Control Room here.
00:24:20 We set up a little thing where
everybody could play.
00:24:22 We've worked on the arrangement,
the band had some cool groove
but really no sort of real song yet,
so we've sort of figured out:
'OK, now we have a chorus, a verse.
Let's make a bridge.'
We just kind of worked
all that out between us.
00:24:37 And we've cut a little demo,
basically, of it,
here in the Control Room.
00:24:43 Now we're gonna tear all this down
and we're gonna move out to the
Tracking Room and cut it for real.
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Vance studied electrical engineering in Missouri and started his career in live sound as a front-of-house engineer. In 2002, he moved to Nashville in order to become studio manager and chief engineer at the legendary Black Bird studios in Nashville. In 2006, he co-founded Sputnik studios along with Grammy-winning engineer Mitch Dane, still in Nashville.
Vance Powell has won 6 Grammy awards working with rock artists such as The Raconteurs, Kings of Leon, Jack White, Pearl Jam, The White Stripes, The Dead Weather and more.
Powell's domain of expertise is definitely mixing and producing rock music. As shown in his pureMix videos, Vance likes to experiment and create new fuller and exciting sounds using all kinds of pedals, echos, analog outboards and plug-ins. Vance was used to recording to tape and definitely has an analog approach that makes him commit to fewer good sounding tracks rather than piling up takes in Pro Tools.
His goal is to make something new and warm that fits the band's vision with upfront snare drums and powerful guitars. Rocking.
