Project 5 is Here!!!!!!!!!!

Preamble..........

Ok, the first thing anyone needs to know about recording music is that it is exhausting. The second thing you need to know is that recording Beatles music is next to impossible. Weeks after the project 4 deadline I became obsessed with recreating an artist's music. This obviously translated into project 5 however I wanted to put an interesting twist to the process - I wanted to play on the fact that British musicians in supergroups such as the Beatles always quarrel! So much that it leads to breakups (The Who, The Police, Led Zeppelin, oh yea and The Beatles!). This is where the idea to recreate a Beatles song as an "unreleased track" came from as well as me conducting a fake BBC interview with the two remaining Beatles, Paul McCartney and Ringo Star. The "mixed reality" concept is drawn from the idea that there are such things as The BBC, Paul McCartney, and Ringo Star. These are all indeed real things however my creation and rendition of these elements are purely fictional. Furthermore, I wanted to test my new music recording software and see how close of a duplicate I could make of the Beatles hit "Don't Let Me Down." So HERE IS THE LINK to the project blog which includes the comical BBC interview as well as my version of "Don't Let Me Down." Overall, the recording process of "Don't Let Me Down" took about 16 hours and the mock interview about 3 hours. Well, enjoy!


Here's how I did it................

*Equipment*

Bass Guitar - Fender Precision Bass (2000)
Acoustic Guitar - Ovation CS257 Special Edition
Electric Guitar - Fender Telecaster (2004)
Upright Bass - Devilli 4-string classic
Microphone - Sennheiser e835
Recording Software - Sony Acid Studio 2009 Edition (I think could be 2008...its the newest one)
Amp - Crate Combo Amp
Bass Amp - Fender Combo Stack
Headphones - Sennheiser

*Recording Process*

Step 1 - Acoustic Guitar. My first step was to record the song all the way through with just acoustic guitar. This would act as my skeleton track for all the other instruments to go off of. This took about 25 takes each 4 minutes each. I used slight reverb and slight eq on these tracks.

Step 2 - Chorus Vocals. On the part where you hear "Don't Let Me Down" There are 5 voices all overlapping and harmonizing. These all took about 20 takes and I had practically no voice afterwards. I used heavy reverb backed with dry reverb to give a concrete yet ambient feel to the vocals.

Step 3 - Verse Vocals. These were relatively easy for me. I had to do about 8 takes total each 4 minutes a piece. What I did was copy them and overlap them to thicken their sound.

Step 4 - Electric Guitar. Again, not soo bad. I did about 9 takes and this was all improvisational. Heavy rever and slight eq on these tracks.

Step 5 - Bass. I am most proud of how these bass tracks turned out. I feel like I nailed McCartney's bass sound right on the money. VERY VERY slight reverb and high eq to thicken the bass sound.

In a nutshell, that was my process and with mixing and all these tracks to make sure they all sound like they came from the same space was very difficult and actually consumed most of my time. I'm very happy with the finished products considering I'm not using the most Professional equipment.

The Interview.......

Step 1 - Get intoxicated. I wouldnt have been able to do anything like this if I didnt have some of my liquid love juice handy.

Step 2 - I recorded about 8 or 9 takes of this each about 8 minutes a piece. I chose the best one. These were all improved and all the voices are your's truly. My British accent is pretty good huh? Again, I used Sony Acid to record this.

Video Collage ...........

All I did was make a video collage with Beatles Pictures on Mindows Movie Maker. Nothing too hard. I wanted to use real Beatles photos to try to convince my audience a little better

Recording Pictures.............

HERE ARE SOME PICS OF ME RECORDING

The Beatles - Newly Released Rare Version of "Don't Let Me Down"

I have just received word that The Beatles, the best band of all time, are going to release a rare version of "Don't Let Me Down" free to the public. Here's the catch - it is not available for purchase in stores, online, or even on vinyl! The only place you can find it is on my blog. YES! Nate Maruso's freaking blog! Keep an eye out for this rare masterpiece around midnight on December 11th so you can be the first to hear such a GEM! Also, there will be a short interview with the two remaining Beatles, Paul McCartney and Ringo Star. They will be discussing the release of this rare track, the recording process, and some other British jargon you probably won't understand. That's all for now.....Remember, you will only be able to hear it on my blog!