Digression #2 (skip this if you already know how rock* records are made)

I don’t mean to be tediously insulting, but I live in such a narrowly defined world I don’t know if everyone knows this stuff or not. I figure if I'm going to write about us making a record I should cover the basic terms. (see first sentence) Anyway, this is how most rock records are made in my experience. The band goes in to record basic tracks. Basic tracks consist of drums, bass, and rhythm guitar. Everyone usually plays at the same time (including scratch, or temporary vocals) but your primary goal is to get good drum tracks because everything builds off that and because they’re the most complicated to record. (lots of mics and such) After that, if you’re lucky you might keep a few parts from the other instruments, but in general you go back and re-record them one at a time in a process called overdubbing. I recently read that’s how Paul McCartney did his bass parts in the Beatles so he could craft them and make them melodic. (You should read "All You Need Is Ears" by George Martin. It's awesome) And yesterday I read an interview with Brendan O’Brian who said Pearl Jam still does this technique as well.  On the other hand the E Street Band recorded all of the “Born in the USA” album live with only one overdub. One of the things you need in order to record a whole band live is a big enough studio to get enough isolation between the instruments. Or in other words if you have all these noisy instruments getting their sounds into everybody else’s microphones** it can get crappy sounding quick. Of course that’s exactly how they recorded things in the old Sun Studio Elvis days, but that was a long time ago. Shit, there’s an exception to everything.

Anyhow, we spent a lot of time polishing the Strawberry turd to sound the way we wanted it, but like I said in the previous post, we loved everything about “Little Miami “ so much we wanted to do the next record as much like that as possible. Of course we’d never actually been able to play well enough to keep all the parts without having to fix them. Funny thing though, we spent a good chunk of the year touring the Strawberry album, and I guess we got better. I don’t know, doesn’t feel like we are but by the end of this week recording at Ultrasuede we will have recorded the basics for 15 songs and kept all the parts for all of them. Actually, on our first night, after getting all set up we had time to record one song and got a version of “Beautiful”*** done. We did that on Friday, recorded Saturday and Sunday, took Monday off and finished all basic tracks with drums by Tuesday. Not bad really.

I was hesitant to write about making the album because it’s frankly pretty boring. I mean, it’s not boring to us, but it’s a lot like going to a job where you muddle along, order take-out, wait around a lot and play some music. It’s the greatest fun in the world but not a lot happens that’s anecdote worthy. To that end I think my approach is going to be to tell one story for every song by the time the record comes out; even ones that don’t make the record. Throw in a few funny quotes and boom. Done. You good with that? 

* I’m differentiating because I make no claims this is how other genres go about their business. A  bunch of Bluegrass musicians propagating a dead style around one microphone is different than a beat driven Hip-Hop record is different than an orchestral recording is different than your mom slathering herself in canola oil and turning on the camcorder and singing "Volare'."

**  Reese’s commercial voice

*** Most if not all titles will change. We don’t really fuss about titles until right before the record comes out. We just call the songs whatever will help us remember which one is which.

Digression #1 or How Little Miami Came into Being

Quotes:

“Gold Bond’s Powder? It’s like mint for your balls”

“I’m from Clinton County. A cocktail’s on a fucking chicken.”

And now for a digression.

On our last record there was a moment that still stands as my favorite ever making records and is in the running for top moment playing music. After we had pretty much finished the record we were in the rehearsal space and Chuck brought in the chords to “Pulverized.” We worked it up a bit but we weren’t necessarily convinced. Now the way we write some of our songs is that someone plays something just fucking around and everybody starts playing along with them. On a good night it turns into a song. The rule seems to be that whoever starts singing first then it becomes their song to write the lyrics for it. Well that night Lisa starts playing a chord progression that was super pretty and we played it for a while. The next week we work on “Pulverized” a bit more and decide that we should go back in and record it. Someone brought up the Lisa thing and we kind of screwed around with it a bit more but nothing really came of it.

We didn’t have a lot of time or money (Strawberry had already taken longer than any other of our records to that point) so we had to get “Pulverized done in one night. We were set up in a circle all facing each other and we flailed away at “Pulverized” for hours. We were sucking on a Dead Kennedy’s dick and at one point John Curley (JC from now on) said he hated the fucking song. After we’d given up, hoping we got something we could use Lisa said, “Hey, you guys want to try something? Remember that one song we were playing? Well I’ve been working on it.*” Within 3 takes we had arranged and recorded the version of “Little Miami” that went on the record. Somewhere along the way Chuck had played the wrong chords and it sounded so cool it became a feature of the song. It was the first song in the history of the band where we kept everything we recorded on that take. The feeling of connection between us, the feeling that something rare had happened was almost overwhelming. Even though everyone had made some little mistakes we told JC we wanted to keep it as it was. We’re still really proud of it.

OK, so the whole point of that digression was because it directly influenced how we wanted to make the new record. We wanted to record it as live as possible.

The Remarkably Boring Story of the Making of Wussy's 5th Record

Writing about making a record is as interesting as talking about fishing. It's less interesting than talking about fucking but more interesting than writing about people talking about Jeff Buckley. Anyway...

I love making records. It’s a daunting process and you never know how it’s going to go. They tend to take a long damn time to make and at some point it’ll feel like the whole thing is going to fall apart and never get done, but it’s also one of the greatest things in the world to get to do. (nestled somewhere right in there between licking an angel’s tears and rubbing the fur on the belly of a fawn) It can be super contentious, emotions run high, and the things you play that are just fine live suddenly become not so hot under the microscopic glare of the recording process, but in the end you have an actual record. You know, like Led Zeppelin III or ABBA’s Arrival, just not as good. Wussy is fortunate that Shake It has always fronted the money for our records and we pay them back as the CDs sell. This is a luxury compared to every other band I’ve been in where you try to save up a few thousand dollars and record ‘till the money runs out. We’re at Ultrasuede with John Curley (he smells of lavender and wet  leather), the man who has recorded and mixed every record except Funeral Dress. I thought maybe it’d be interesting to write about us making our 5th record. Turns out it really isn’t. Not much happens for the vast majority of the time. We’re not the Rolling Stones in some dilapidated French mansion* but then who the fuck is? So I’ll post a few bits and then go back to shutting up.





*We haven't paid our taxes this year yet though. I filed an extension though so it's really not that similar.

It's a Good Life Damn Right

Tipitina's Empty

That's a basketball hoop right in front of you.

Stay Gold Pony Boy

I watched this guy spraying himself with gold paint while smoking a cigarette. Presumably getting ready to go to work.

When Wussy Went to New Orleans Part 2

It’s been a month since these shows. I’m pissed that I’m writing after the moment. Steinbeck wrote, “Travels With Charley” long after he got back but I’m pretty sure that has no relevance here. Regardless, I’m realizing what a luxury our summer tour was. And for the record everything, except Lisa and Rene seeing a roadrunner, that pissed me off has faded and I have only romantic, epic memories left. All that time to write and no real life to intrude. As soon as I got back from this one I was sick for the requisite week, and then back to keeping my head above water. I guess it just proves how little time we allow ourselves. Anyway now back to our regularly scheduled broadcast. I will finish this tour, it just may take awhile.

Tipitinas is a flat out legendary club in a warehouse district right within view of the dike separating us from the Mississippi. This kind of tour was a new experience for the band, if not Chuck and John exactly. (Throwing Muses tour in the ‘90s) When we got there the Whigs were done with their soundcheck, so we could load-in and head up onstage. It was a pretty small stage all told, and here’s the thing about being an opening band: all their gear is still onstage except maybe the pedals that might line the front of the stage. It’s kind of like sneaking your girlfriend into your buddies house because his parents are out for the evening watching Andrew Lloyd Webber’s “The Phantom of the Opera,” (with Justine Bateman and Lorenzo Llamas in the lead) and you want to be impressive in the hopes of boob touching but in no way fuck anything up in the house so you don’t get busted. I’m going to spend this tour stage left right next to the Whigs keyboard set-up, and I live in fear of messing up any of the million pedals and cables snaking everywhere. Add to this their tour manager spends the night yelling at us. (By the end of the tour we will be BFF’s and all, but tonight we’re new to the pack and it is necessary to let us know who gets to sniff whose butt and who had better like it) It’s also the first night where we get to have a rider. (the wish list you give to clubs) Our rider has things like towels (for Chuck), tea (for Lisa), beer (for Joe, me, and Rene), and a fresh fleshlight for John. And tonight we got it! Well except they put all our stuff into the Whigs dressing room. The Whigs don’t really use their dressing rooms much, (they have a bus) but people wander in and out. They also had bags of PopChips, which I love, and chocolate. Thus began the fine tradition of sneaking into their dressing room and helping ourselves to our things, and maybe a few of theirs, but once again not enough to get busted. We would offer up a prayer to Anne Frank and go once more unto the breach, only occasionally having to shove a whole handful of chips into our mouths and look casual.

We played OK. No one was particularly nervous, but as the tour went on we definitely got looser. Seems to take a few shows no matter what before we feel like we’re ourselves. The awesome thing about these shows was that very little of their audience knew who we were. So after the first song maybe some polite applause, a little more after the second, and slowly but surely you could feel the audience swinging around to our side, giving us a pretty good shout by the end. It’s an amazing feeling I tell you; didn’t happen every night of course but often enough to be encouraging. I mean really, the Whigs audience treated us great the whole time.

Now I haven’t seen the Afghan Whigs since back in the day and since I am not a born and bred Cincinnatian I didn’t even see them until the “Gentleman” tour. They were always good but nothing prepared me for how much better they are now. I stood off to the side and stared slack-jawed the whole show. Greg has never sounded better. I think he’s finally singing like he always thought he was. Listening to Curley night after night was like going to school. I should’ve gotten continuing ed. credits.  He somehow manages to keep driving the groove while still being very melodic. Just a joy to listen to every night. I watched most of every show on the tour and I wasn’t even close to tired of it by the end.  I’ll talk about the rest of the band later.

And that was it. First show over. We got yelled at some more, (“You need to not park behind the bus ever again.”) and loaded out. Then we sat in the van (hence all the quotes from around the van) for around an hour and a half waiting to get paid and watching our shot at a decent nights sleep slip away like sands through the hourglass these are days of our lives.*  Ask Rene sometime about why it took so long to get paid, not my story tell but a good one.  We get back to the hotel and configure ourselves for the night. It was a tiny room being an old hotel right in the Quarter. We had three people in the king sized bed and one on the rollaway. Chuck and Lisa had bought two blow up mattresses that day and Lisa had wedged hers in the little foyer next to the door. Chuck was wedged between the bed and the air conditioner. John however is not a late sleeper and gets squirrelly in the morning. So he tried very gently to open the door and escape. Lisa said she felt her mattress rise up in air on one side until she rolled up against the wall. When the door closed the mattress quickly began losing air until she was on the floor. The son of a bitch had a hole, lasted less than 24 hours in Wussy world. Then it was time to get up and bust ass to Atlanta.

* My grandmother’s favorite “story.” It was a good time to visit because she’d be on the couch with her notebook that had the weather and any visitors for that day written down going back for time immemorial. Ah, I miss them so much.