In The Studio with Eric Levai - Days 1 and 2

It has been nearly 3 years since I actively worked in a studio. I began working with Dean, helping him get his Pro Tools set up back in order. Now that I had the itch to work in the studio I asked Dean if he would be willing to help out a singer/songwriter I've been working with named Eric Levai. Thanks to Dean's generosity we were able to use his studio and gear. Here is a recap of our first couple of days in the studio.

December 31, 2007
Day 1 - 5:30pm - 8:30pm
For our first session we tracked Eric's song "One". We laid down some guitar, vocals and even some Fender Rhodes. Dean played the Fender Rhodes which was both a nice surprise and fitting for the song.

The session couldn't have been any smoother. There were no technical difficulties and it only took a few takes to get performances down for this demo.

I was running the Pro Tools system and just wore my engineer hat for this session. After three hours flew by we decided we had accomplished enough for the first day. Afterwards the three of us went out for dinner to El Compadre.

January 12, 2008
Day 2 - 5:50pm - 10:30pm
For the second session we met again at Dean's studio. Tad Ro, a friend of mine from Helio, came by to help out on bass. After the previous session I decided we could use a few supplies for the studio. I picked up some XLR mic cables, a straight mic stand and a headphone extender. Just a few basics that helped with tracking vocals. Dean has an amazing Neumann mic that magically takes the hard work out of recording vocals.

We didn't have much of a plan for this session so we listened to "One" and Tad ended up working up a bass part. We tracked the bass directly and used the virtual amp modeler plug in Sans Amp to get a sound for Tad. Its becoming clear to me how little I know about guitar and bass sounds. With the Superlatives I knew the sounds I didn't like, but I never knew what sound I was looking for. For me this still seems to be an art of trial and error.

Tad had some good ideas for some background vocals on "One" that Eric was open too. We tracked a few more vocals, some ideas Tad had and then a falsetto from Eric. Eric warned that the falsetto would make us laugh and was he right. I couldn't face him while he recorded because I kept cracking up. However when it was all said and done the part blended nicely with the other vocals.

Tad left after tracking bass and vocals and then I worked with Eric to record a second song of his called "Enough". We tracked the guitar and vocals very quickly and the rough mix of the song sounds much better than I thought it would.

The next day I listened to the rough mixes of both songs and was pleasantly surprised. The mix can still use some tweaking but things are coming together easier than I remember with the Superlatives.

The next steps are to track some drums for "One", and additional guitars and possibly vocals for both songs. I think once we have 3-4 songs that will be enough for Eric to use to as his demo.

Rockband and Rock Bands

Today I picked up Rockband for Xbox 360. Guitar Hero has nothing on this game. Rockband has all the guitar of Guitar Hero, Drums and even karaoke style Vocals. I played for a little bit this afternoon and Darian even sang Blitzkreig Bop. Hopefully this will be fun for the entire family.

And as I get my virtual rock band on I'm now getting active in the LA music scene. It looks like I'll be in 2-3 bands. The first is a singer-songwriter named Eric Levai. He has a number of good songs and I'm helping him put together a band as well as do some recording. Tad Ro a friend from work has played bass and then tonight we are heading to Dean Truitt's studio to do some demo recording and possibly have Dean play guitar.

The second band is a garage alternative sounding band. A little punk, a little rock and a very garage. This band is called Spidersuit and at this past weekend's rehearsal they pulled down the looking for drummer flyers. So I'm officially in that band now. They have 3 cds up on iTunes. We are focused on learning new songs but we are playing some of the older material of their album called The Owl.

The third band I may end up joining is a hard rock band based in the Valley. They are called Outlaw Engine. I auditioned this past week and they emailed me to tell me out of all the drummers they have auditioned they like me best. So the next step is for me to learn their set of originals plus their two covers of CCR's Traveling Band and Metallica's The Four Horsemen. They invited me to come out and see them perform on January 4th with their old drummer for one of his final shows with them.

I'm looking forward to working with some new musicians after nearly 3 years of hiatus from The Superlatives. My only expectations are to play some gigs in LA, hopefully on the Sunset Strip, and maybe even record some material with the different groups. And in the meantime I can play with my virtual rock band on Xbox at home!

Jason Falkner at the Roxy

Thursday night I saw Jason Falkner here in LA. My good friend Dean Truitt continues to be in his band. He is actually getting ready to do a small tour of Japan as part of Jason's touring band next week.

I arrived at the show around 9:45. The first band was a female solo artist named Annie Stela. She was backed by bass and drums. She had both good songs and a good voice. The only critique is the band needed a guitar player. The songs sounded a little empty with keyboards as the primary instrument.

The second band up was Castledoor. They were entertaining and had a great full sound. The had some unique instrumentation including xylophone/bells. I liked their up tempo songs more so then the laid back ones.

Jason Falkner hit the stage right at 11:30 and played an hour and a half set. I stood in front of Dean for most of the set and was able to get some good pictures at the start of the show. I think I worried Dean's girlfriend because I was taking pictures of only Dean and not Jason. Probably thought I was some gay stalker of Dean's, haha!

Since I left my camera's memory card on my desk at home, I was limited to a small number of pictures.

Highlights for me included the songs The Neighbor, and They Put Her In The Movies, I Don't Mind, and Stephanie Tells Me. I can still vividly remembering hearing Dean play the little keyboard riff on guitar at the Viper Room the first time I saw Falkner perform They Put Her In The Movies. A great song.

A good portion of the set consisted of new material so after few songs into the set I walked over to the merch booth to get the new disc. I am not that familiar with Jason's older material other than the Bliss ep but I find I like the newer songs more so than his older material.

The show was great, definitely the best of the three times I've seen them. Jason's voice was spot on and the band was tight. This was also the first time I had been to the Roxy where the sound was crystal clear. Always a treat to be at a great sounding show!

Jason Falkner
September 13, 2007
The Roxy Theatre
Los Angeles, CA

This Time
NYC
The Neighbor
Stephanie Tells Me
The Put Her In The Movies
Runaway
Anondah
Komplicated Man
The Knew
Princessa
Holiday
Contact
I Don't Mind
All God's Creatures
Honey

Encore
This Life
Goodnight Sweet Night
Gimmi Gimmi
Miss Understanding

I met Dean's girlfriend during my picture taking and was able to talk to Dean for a bit after the show. While we talked Jason's mother came over and said hi to Dean. She mistakenly thought I was the guitar player so I had to point her towards Dean. While talking with her and Dean I found out that Jason's brother is the dancer in Beck's touring band. And to think we watched the Beck Saturday Night Live performance over and over because of the dancing.

I ended up talking with Dean and his friends until the club kicked us out. I got home a little after 2am.

Jason Falkner Group

Last night we went to see Jason Falkner Group at the world famous Troubadour. It ended a Thanksgiving weekend of activity and was the last night Randal, Darian's boyfriend, was here. It was good to see Dean playing live again and talk a bit to Tara before the show.

Tomorrow is back to work and back to another month of reality before the Christmas break.