Recording - February 2011 - 36

By Rick Barrio Dill

Commit, Execute, Deliver
Back-to-basics band sessions—when old is new again
At the core, recording music and making records should be both fun and artistically rewarding. Many of us have to fulfill two roles simultaneously, as both the musician and the engineer, or as the songwriter and the producer, be it for reasons of sheer convenience or perhaps economics. Extra hands in the studio can seem like a hindrance to such a one-man operator. Doing double duty means having greater control. But the flip side is the distraction that comes from the technical concerns, they take the focus away from the artistic side of our brain—often for too long. The trap: spending too much time chasing better sounds and not necessarily enough time creating better music. Recently, and for the first time in quite a while, I had the privilege to leave the “self-producer’s” hat at home and shift back to only being on the performance side of the glass, as I went back into the studio with my band Vintage Trouble to record our second record this year. Our sound comes from an old soul mentality, like that of early Ike Turner or Otis Redding, with rock influences from that era à la early Cream, and our recording styles tend to follow suit. Involving a trusted confidant Our first record, The Bomb Shelter Sessions, was recorded earlier this year over two and a half days, ten songs, all in one room, with virtually no overdubs. We reached out at the time, looking to get help with perspective, and we were hooked up with the immensely talented producer/mixer Rogers Masson who came in to mix the first record and make it truly stand out. From our very first conversation, he completely understood our vibe, our intent to keep things honest and vibey, and the end product of this first record exceeded all our expectations. During mixing, he got so caught up with our sound and what we were going for, he offered to help produce and mix the new record and dive even further into our almost “anti-modern” way of recording. Since we all agreed on the direction of the music, it was a no-brainer to involve Rogers further, to benefit from having this independent confidant who could take things off our hands, help us focus better on our artistic goals and, most importantly, save us from ourselves. I’ll always be concerned and involved with the sonics of our recordings, of course. But it was great to relax, concentrate on my job as the bass player, and work together with someone whom we all trust. A chance to do it right We had all made records the way records are mostly made these days. But this was intended to be different. Not necessarily new, but different. We wanted to capture the band live, in the tradition and spirit of old Stax and Motown recordings, where—as long as the song is right and the vibe and performance in the room is happening—any minor mistakes or warts on the recording just make it all that much more real. We wanted to continue to go for “entire band takes” and keep the focus on the music, not the technology, and we actively chose to minimize the microphones, maximize the sound, with the goal of capturing the moment. To do this requires a shift in mindset, to say the least. At its basic level, we boiled down our focus to wanting to dive deeper

The band tracks in Bombshelter.

The drum miking setup

RECORDING FEBRUARY 2011

Recording - February 2011

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