How we get it wrong...

So Hicks dropped by the studio last night to watch Kev drum - his dad was around for a while too which was cool. Check out the sexy photo that dan took. We got a take for a song that is temporarily called "The Lesbian Song" done...the name will change before we're done. We also spent ages working out the drum part for a song called 'Shakedown'...we've been playing it live for a little while and Kev has been playing a basic drum part but is pulling out a few stops for the recording.

I just realised that I wanted to use this as more than just an update on progress...I was hoping to give you guys an idea of exactly what's involved in making some parts of the album.

Before our last few live dates we spent about a week tuning the drum kit, learning about how it can affect the sound of each drum etc. Most people think about tuning guitars but tuning drums is super-important too as they need to sund good together and not like Kev is bashing around on old tin pans.

When we talk about 'takes', that's just a name we use for someone attempting to play a part. We are always looking for a really good 'take'. To give you an idea, Kev will have four or five practice takes before he even starts to thing about getting everything right...then run through the song again and again until he gets a take we are all happy with. Recently that been about 2-3 hours of drumming (bearing in mind the songs are around 3 minutes long, that's a lot of drumming).

The most common things that mess up a drum 'take' are: going out of time (he plays a long to a metronome in his earphones to keep him in time, but it's still hard when you're playing something complicated), missing a drum, missing out part of a beat (like not hitting the bass drum in the right place), making a mistake on a drum-fill.

Ok, I hope that makes a little more sense out of what i'm talking about on here....ask me if you have any questions. I know 99% of you won't care at all, but i've always been a geek about this stuff and would love more bands to talk about how they end up putting songs together, recording etc.

Anyway, later,

Max.