Coming Back To Life

"I took a heavenly ride through our silence
I knew the moment had arrived
For killing the past and coming back to life"

- Pink Floyd, "Coming Back To Life" from the album The Division Bell.

At long last, I have finally been able to piece my recording studio together. I had a couple of things working against me. First, it isn't easy to get a project off the ground during the holiday season, especially if you are travelling. You don't really want to create a situation wherein you start recording and then have to interrupt the process for a week or so, breaking up your creative process just as it is getting warmed up. Secondly, although I had intended to get quite a bit done during the holiday break, I found myself too fatigued to do much of anything. I worked myself really hard the last few months, and ended up exhausted just in time for Christmas. Christmas itself was a whirlwind flurry of activity that took a lot out of me, and after driving all night from Las Vegas through Salt Lake City to Cheyenne, it took me a few days to recover. Driving through the night was easier when I was in my twenties. Now it just wipes me out for about a week.

The third, and most compelling factor, is one which I'm almost ashamed to admit. I'm not even sure how to explain it. My recording studio is complicated. It consists of two main components: the MIDI (Musical Instrument Digital Interface) sequencer and the digital audio workstation. Both components are controlled by one program, called Digital Performer by a company called Mark of the Unicorn. A USB cable runs from my Mac to a MIDI interface, which is daisy-chained to two other interfaces (and I need one more). Each interface is connected to 8 devices (keyboards, synthesizers, drum machines, samplers, etc.) which are each capable of playing 16 different instruments simultaneously on as many as 384 channels. This may sound complicated, and it is, but typically it only needs to be set up once (if done correctly) in order to have instant access to all of the sounds on all of the devices.

MIDI is great for programming arrangements on drum machines, synths, and keyboards, but doesn't allow you to record actual sound from a microphone. And digital audio recording, at least in my studio, has been a headache from day one.

When I first began putting my studio together in the early nineties, I was subscribing to several music related magazines. "Musician," "Electronic Musician," "Keyboard," and "Recording" all contained great articles about the recording process as well as valuable information about software and equipment. By the time I had decided upon purchasing an item, I had read all about it and was able to make an informed decision. Frequently, a magazine would offer a side-by-side comparison of similar products. This was how I decided upon which software to purchase to manage both the MIDI sequencing and digital audio recording in my studio.

To step back just a bit, on my early recordings I used a primitive MIDI sequencer called Master Tracks Pro to flesh out most of my arrangements, and then attempted to add vocals and guitar by recording everything to a Tascam cassette multitrack recorder. This process resulted in a number of compromises that adversely effected the finished recording. First, the sequencer was so primitive that there was a limit as to how many notes a song could contain. On more than one occasion I would find myself half way through recording, say, a piano part when the program would inform me that I had used up all of the available notes. As a result, I would find myself going through the individual parts and removing notes or drum hits here and there, or even deleting entire instruments in order to have enough notes for as many instruments as I could manage to complete the entire song. Needless to say, this wasn't very satisfying.

The next compromise would come when attempting to add guitar or vocals. I had access to a four track-recorder, which meant that I could dump the stereo mix of my MIDI sequences onto two tracks and still have one track for guitar and one for vocals. If I was planning to have a harmony vocal, I'd have to either sacrifice a guitar part or dump my MIDI sequences as a mono mix. Also not satisfying. The straw that broke the camel's back was that I never had the recorder in my possession for long enough to really learn how to make it work properly. Having roughly 48 hours in which to record ten songs on an item of gear that you don't kow how to operate (and don't really have time to figure out) meant that my first recordings were extremely noisy - unlistenable to all but the most forgiving. I was fortunate to have several very forgiving friends who were enthusiastic and encouraging.

As I mentioned in another post, I wanted my next recording to represent a significant improvement over the ones produced by this method, and one of the first things I started looking for was software. When Apple introduced its first high-end Macs, the quality of music software jumped exponentially. I decided to work with a program called Studio Vision Pro by a company called Opcode. At the time, it was pretty much the industry standard. The software cost about a grand, the Studio 5 MIDI interface cost about $1250.00 (and I owned two), and of course the computer itself wasn't cheap - plus you needed a considerable external hard drive. In for a penny, in for a pound, as they say.

I started working on the backing arrangements to my songs through MIDI sequencing, and it was quite some time before I got around to playing with the digital audio functions. Frankly, I didn't need to do any audio recording until all of my backing tracks were completed, so aside from some basic testing, the digital audio portion of the program was neglected for several years. Once I started recording audio, I quickly realized that the system was buggy and problematic. This resulted in a frustrating cycle of contacting tech support, upgrading software version, updating operating system, calling Opcode tech support, calling Apple tech support, throwing money at the problem with little or no results, and repeating the process ad nauseum.

Then one day it was announced that Opcode was being bought by Gibson, a major musical instrument manufacturer. I was excited, as I felt that a big company like Gibson would have everything solved in no time at all. As it turned out, Gibson bought Opcode in order to dismantle it for some reason that I'll never understand. Within days, Opcode was history - no product support, no further development, nobody on staff to answer any of their telephones. Gone.

And I still couldn't record any digital audio. I found myself completely stranded, with a system that wasn't working and nobody, anywhere, who could try to help. One more desperate attempt to get the system working resulted in a crash so severe that I nearly lost my MIDI data - representing several years' worth of work - and was fortunate to have it salvaged by a Mac tech. I came very close to losing every single note of my work, ending up with a useless system and having nothing to show for a substantial investment of my time and money.

For a brief time, Gibson hinted at the possibility of reintroducing Opcode with an improved line of products, which gave me hope but also caused me to wait for an extended period of time as I expected them to deliver on their promise. Eventually, it became obvious that Gibson was doing nothing, that Opcode was as dead as Julius Caesar, and that I was going to have to start over. I have never really forgiven Gibson for this, and as of this date have not spent a single dollar on any of their products in protest (although that might change soon).

So basically, if I wanted to have a digital audio workstation at this point, I needed to purchase new software from another company. BUT, this new software would only be compatible with the latest Apple operating system, and the latest OS wouldn't work on my now several-years-out-of-date Mac. Having invested thousands of dollars to get this far, I would now have to invest thousands more to continue.

It was around this time that I heard of a local musician named Michael DeGreve who owned a small recording studio. Perhaps, I thought, instead of shelling out thousands of dollars for a studio upgrade, I could simply pay an hourly rate and finish my album. DeGreve's "Spirit Wind" studio was impressive, with a huge mixer and formidable digital audio capabilities. I met with DeGreve and we got along great. I was convinced that I could finish the album at Spirit Wind.

Unfortunately, Spirit Wind was extremely popular at the time, and three other local bands (including a rock band called Graffiti Bridge and a blues band called Fatt Cat Freddie) were dividing up time with me. Further, since I was the new guy, I was getting the worst time slots in which to record - such as Saturday morning at the crack of dawn. This was bad for two reasons: first, nobody's voice is in top form at that hour, and secondly, DeGreve had a Friday night gig that went into the wee hours of the morning. Suffice it to say that neither of us was on our "A" game during these sessions, and after several months of work, we sat down to take inventory of where we were. It was obvious to me that I was nowhere near what I had hoped to accomplish. I felt that almost everything needed to be re-recorded, but since I had already spent over $4000 at Spirit Wind (at $40 per hour) and wasn't getting the results I had hoped for, I had no choice but to bite the bullet and invest in a new system.

At this point, I made a critical error - perhaps the most important mistake of this entire process. I played tapes of my instrumental arrangements for two people close to me whose opinions I valued, but who were genuinely disinterested in my work. They made sport of my music, taking great effort to top each other with clever put-downs and insults. I recognize now that this was simply a natural part of our relational dynamic (which, I suppose, says a lot about our relationships) and wasn't really intended to be mean-spirited, but I suppose that the difficulty that I had experienced with the project up to this point had left me particularly thin-skinned. The not-so-serious evaluation of my work, while intended as funny, struck me as cruel. To have worked so hard on something only to have it ridiculed so mercilessly sucked the wind out of my sails, and as I realized the investment that would be required in order to build a new studio of my own to complete the album, I began to have serious doubts that the music that I was attempting to create was even worth the effort.

And I gave up. Quit. For ten years.

Well, sort of. I never really lost the hope of eventually completing the album, but at that point I had experienced so much frustration, disappointment and even heartbreak over it that it seemed almost unbearable to devote more time and money towards it - not to mention the emotional investment (all of which had taken a pretty thorough beating at this point).

To satisfy my desire to be involved in some form of creative undertaking, I got involved with community theater. It had been a while since I had been on stage, but my instincts seemed sharper than ever. Plus the fact that everything about the theater process relied upon specific, inflexible deadlines and that, no matter what, the show went on regardless of whether or not the circumstances were perfect stood as a welcome relief to the "I'll work on it until it is perfect" mentality that I had fallen into with my album. Plus, the rewards were immediate. If you're doing you job onstage, the audience lets you know. It was nice to be creative and feel appreciated. I went on to write an direct a feature length film for the theater, which, as difficult and complicated as it was, was STILL easier to produce than this friggin' album!

Eventually I sat down and listened to some rough mixes that we dubbed at Spirit Wind, and while the flaws were still glaringly obvious, I thought that the songs were good and deserved to be completed properly - even if nobody ever heard them. And I've made several attempts to get back into the swing of things, but have continued to meet resistance. Due to the complexity of my set-up, glitches seem to be fairly frequent and can vary from minor mysteries that take a few minutes to solve, to unexplainable, illogical, mega mind-f***s that leave you tearing your hair out and cause you to walk away for weeks at a time. Additionally, my basement (the location of my studio) has the nasty habit of filling itself with an inch or so of water from time to time, requiring that I dismantle and move my equipment - a process which requires hours in which to put everything back together and troubleshoot in order to make sure that everything is up and running.

So, as much as I want to complete this album, I approach my studio with trepidation. I know that technology (and a healthy dose of Murphy's Law) will be antagonizing me every step of the way. It seems, at this point, to be par for the course.

But this time I've given myself a deadline. It's a little lesson that I've been reminded of as a result of my theater experience - that art thrives on limitations. You can rehearse a play until you're blue in the face, but it will never feel ready for an audience until you announce (and approach) an opening night. One of the mistakes that bands make (and a reason why so many break up) is rehearsing endlessly without scheduling an actual gig. When you know that your work is going to be presented to an audience as of a certain date, you buckle down into the process more seriously than you will if your schedule is unlimited.

Last night I completed a frustrating series of troubleshooting and problem-solving. Before the night was over, however, I had completed recording the twelve-string acoustic guitar part for half of one of my songs. It's the first measurable progress that I've had in quite a while, but I'm happy. I hope to complete the guitar part tonight. After that, I move on to vocals and then the song will be ready to mix. I know that more glitches lie ahead, and that I'll be waving my fists in the air and wondering why it's been so unbelieveably difficult to record a fistful of songs in the two decades that its taken me so far, but I'm slowly getting there.

It's going to be good. At least, it will be to me. Maybe a handful of other people will like it, too. We'll see.