EQ Magazine - January 2009 - (Page 26)

AMERICAN MAJESTY and the original ideas often came from one member at a time. When we got in the studio, most of the songs were pretty well formulated, so we would cut stuff in sections in confidence. There were a few songs done entirely live, like “Losing Touch,” whereas other songs like “Human” were constructed from the ground up. Where does “The World We Live In” fall in that regard? That is a good example of a song that came from a demo that Ronnie had originally programmed at home, then they got in the studio and cut new sections. It really took on a life of its own once he handed it off to the other guys. Did they re-record it completely or integrate new sounds with the demo tracks? The drums were from the original demo, but re-recorded, then in the end we went with the demo drums. Sometimes you can record something with cheap microphones and a cheap mixer at home and it sounds better than what you get with an expensive setup in the studio. . . . How did you push the band to bring their best game each day? My approach is to hang a clock on the wall and tell everyone that they have until midnight to finish the song, and the next day we’re moving on. At first I thought that would be met with resistance, but they got really excited about that challenge. To them it inspired an urgency which I think you need to hear on a record. When there is a slight sense of urgency, a slight rough edge, that can make an album exciting. So many musicians think that they can just fix everything later or make all their decisions in the mix, but I think it is good to take a more oldfashioned approach. They may have their own studio now, but we still got this album done in six weeks. We’d start midday and, every night, we’d have another song done. Can you pull that stuff with, say, Madonna? In general, I am a big fan of working quickly. When you work quickly you are more honest with yourself. Sometimes when you have a great idea the best way to get it done is to take the shortest route. That goes for all bands. You keep whatever was good about it in the moment and make that moment what ends up on the record, not an overworked version of it. Don’t let the production overtake the music. There are some very interesting guitar sounds on this album. What techniques did you introduce to the party that the band ended up adopting? We’d start with what I call a principal mic—a Sennheiser 421 or a Shure SM57—on Dave’s Hiwatt, Fender De-Ville, or Marshall JCM. This mic would go directly on the grill. My approach is to settle on a principal sound and the use room mics to build the image around it. Everyone says that you can get a great guitar sound with a 57—and that’s true—but you can’t get a great stereo image with a single 57. So sometimes we would point a second 57, from the same position, towards the back of the room, so that both mics were out of phase. Then we’d pan each mic hard left and right. That makes for an interesting effect. Or, instead of a second 57, we would use the Crowley and Tripp ribbons for their figure-8 patterns, with a bit of stereo decoding. I think it is important to get the right guitar effects going in. You can process other instruments—vocals, synths, drums—after the fact and get a good result, but with guitars any The Killers (left to right): Brandon Flowers, Ronnie Vannucci, Jr., Mark Stoermer, Dave Kuening. ERIK WEISS 26 EQ JANUARY 2009 www.eqmag.com http://www.eqmag.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of EQ Magazine - January 2009

EQ Magazine - January 2009 Contents Talk Box Sounding Board Punch In Bob Dylan The Killers Guitar Trax Bass Management Key Issues Drum Heads Vocal Cords Mix Bus Cheat Sheet Microsoft Windows Vista Apple Mac OS X "Lite" Software Roundup "Lite" Software Gadgets & Goodies Sounds Room With a Vu

EQ Magazine - January 2009

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