PG 165 EP
RECORDING SESSIONS
Last weekend, PG 165 made a historic journey down to KL. It was a very profound moment for the band. Four of us from Melaka (meeting Deric in KL) which was Jason, Justin, Vijay and Zx were all overcome with emotion. Such a feeling was indescribable. It was the feeling of pure satisfaction and accomplishment. We had all waited patiently for this day to come...in fact we were literally counting the days and licking our lips in glee (well, zhen-xin was). Surely God must be smilling down on us today.
Yup, this was a milestone in out band's history...
History was made the day none of us had to drive...because Raj our manager so wonderfully decided to drive us in his brand new, spanking, shinning one month old Toyota VIOS. Thanks Raj, we really appreciated it. =)
Oh yeah, the other thing was we finally recorded the drum tracks...WOHOOO...
OK, seriously it was a big day for the band, escpecially for Vijay. So we soon found ourselves in the nice cosy atmosphere of Sonique Productions owned by Nick Lee, Malaysia's award winning producer for bands and artist like Pete Teo, Pop Shuvit, Altered Frequency, Dragon Red and many more.
Big Day for the drummer boy.
DAY 1: Recording Guitar Guide Track
Part of the song "I Will"...
Part of the song "You're Everything to Me"...
The guide tracks were recorded at SUPAFOOK studios on the 2nd of September 2007. Jason laid all the tracks down using his PRS Tremonti SE.
DAY 2: Recording Drum Tracks
Vijay had the opportunity to use Nick Lee's killer drum kit for the recording. The first part of the process is the setting up. (Justin is helping Vijay to customize the drums)
Keith setting up the drum mics...
The first thing we noticed was the small blue ear plugs Keith, the sound engineer took out from his pocket and then stuffed into his ears while he grinned at us. Then we realised we forgot something essential as Vijay tested the drums and familiarized himself with the kit. It was LOUD.
Did I say LOUD? Nick Lee and the sound engineers told Vijay to play it loud to make it sound alive. To play as loud as possible. To them, loud is good. Drums that sounds dead can't be resurrected by any means of technology. Vijay described the feeling with a methaphor. I quote him "Anyway recording in Nick Lee's studio was an awesome experience. The drum sounded so warm, loud and bright. Let me tell ya, telling a drummer to hit as hard as you can with a killer kit is like giving a full tank, fresh tires, new Ferrari to Zhen Xin and telling him that there is no speed limit please take it for a drive.... Wohoo!! . OK maybe the story tak kena but owh well i had so much fun. =)"
Did I say LOUD? LOUD is an understatement.
The studio was quite a chill out place for the rest of the band as you can see, they're relaxing in a seperate room as Vijay was sweating himself out there...
In a seperate room... shielded from the decibels...
Nick Lee and Sel our tracking engineer talking with Raj our manager.
We were shielded from the sheer volume of the drums in the console room where the engineers track the drums. As you can hear from the videos below...it's still pretty audible and you can hear every stroke.
Before anything is recorded, the engineers (Sel and Keith) will determine the level of the raw signal being captured to see if it is good enough. The rest of us were chilling and in a super good mood...
 The sound engineers told me that it was ok for me to snap pictures from close up just as long as I didn't make any noise during the recording. So there I was in the same room as Vijay. And I can tell you that I nearly fell down when he started hitting it because it was blasting...and the rest of the band was laughing at me through the glass partiton from the safety of the console room.
Here are just some short snippets of the recording session. Vijay was listening to the click and guide track in his headphones. The clips below are part of our punk song, "My World".
The clips below are part of our latest single, "Let It All Out
"
It has a little bit of influence from Swithfoot's weird but creative sense of music.
The recording process was a good opportunity for us to gain exposure and learn many new things. It was challenging but Nick Lee's drum recording sounded awesome. We now know why Alda our producer wanted the drums done here. After about 3 and a half to 4 hours of recording which of course included tea breaks (Otai Burger) and toilet breaks and the occasional discussion of ideas, we were done. Kudos to Vijay for doing an amazing job and to Keith and Sel for their input during the tedious process.
The pace is finally picking up. The EP is slowly taking shape albeit still a long journey to completion. I personally can't wait for the proper guitar tracks to be laid down. This is something we'd like to chronicle as time goes by where are EP is due in December. Get excited people...it's coming. Thank you for supporting us this far, you guys will be the first to know when it comes out. Stay in tune for our gigs and updates on our EP. Feel free to sample our music at http://amp.channelv.com/amp/viewArtist.html?id=2653 Thank You God. Jason - PG 165.
Labels: amp channel V, band, drums, EP, nick lee, recording |
