Arthur Nasson: Ask Arthur

Mixing this was fun there were so many strong elements that at times it was hard to choose what to feature. Benny and I mixed this,he was a good sport about being pulled into odd directions,and added a few unusual aspects of his own. I have this overwhelming desire to not be rearranging the same furniture in the same room.There were backing vocals that were modulated and treated to a point where they sounded nothing like a human voice. Theremin solo's that morphed into guitar solo's and back again. Percussion that became unrecognizable as such,and took on different forms through out the pieces.Among just a few of the fun things we did with the sounds of this album. This approach of expanding boundaries and trying for new things is to some degree in all of my albums.Mixes were done on schedual November 1,2,and3. Mastering was done on November 6th at Jeff Lipton's Peerless Mastering.I can't say enough about Jeff,he is extraordinarily talented and an amazing person.He has Mastered [...]

10/23/11 The last tracking session before mixdown. I brought in a bunch of recordings from home,which were entered into the studios system. Some final mixes,and some sounds to fly into exitisting tracks.Thankfully all sounded fine. My Son Colin came in for the first three hours or so of the session. He played Slide Guitar,Ring Modulated Guitar,Synthesizer,and Percussion on a couple of songs. I then added Backing Vocals with a Neumann U67 this time,Synthesizers,Percussion, Guitar arrangement parts and Solo's,all through the Marshall Cabinet with the Deizel Top. We checked over every song on the album to see if anything else was needed and realized that it was only 3;15 and we were way ahead of schedual. How quickly an album as detailed as this came together surprised everyone. In our excitement we began to prepare the tracks for mix down.Mad Oak has tons of gear, some very modern much of it legendary and vintage,from a time when some audio designers were more concerned [...]

Well of course it wouldnt be an Arthur Nasson production without some home recorded tracks,or sonic excursions thrown in. The album will have 13 tracks as of this writing ,10 tracks done at Mad Oak Studios in Allston 'Rock City' with Benny Grotto Engineering,and 3 cuts done at my home studio Scabbey Road. The freedom of home recording has made the entire process of recording so enjoyable,as well as making it possible to create a larger body of work,without the costs and constrictions of studio recording. I also have learned more about recording at home than in any other forum.Ok,, So Colin and Graham got onto garageband and recorded the sound effects for a ytack called "Robot Trouble" a darting romp of an electronics piece. There will be a synthesizer track that will follow a song that is largely surreal in nature called "From A Window On A Train". The previously mentioned[last post] Piano and Voice piece [untitled still] where I tracked 22 tracks of vocals onto 7 tracks [...]

September 26 and  27th
Ok ,,Monday was schedualed as a half day ,nonetheless very productive,guitar tracks,stacks of backing vocals,keyboards and more moving along smoothly.
Tuesday was a full day all lead vocals are finished,more backing vocals,we stayed with my AKG 414 for vocals, then several organ tracks,Mellotron,Percussion,theremin,many Guitar tracks,some through my  small  Vox and Fender amps. Then Benny brought out the big guns, a Marshall cabinet with a top by a German company called Deizel. I had never heard of Deizel, we put the amp in an isolation booth and turned the rig up so loud the entire room started to hum.What a sound! It was hilarious the amount of noise it generated so I started to stand in different areas of the control room to try and minimize this,it made little difference.The tracks sounded great it became apparent we would have to edit the noise out later. Some guitar sounds got over dubbed with this set up to mix with some of [...]

Introduction; The entire process has changed for me , re-entering a studio and leaving my home set up after more than 10 years as a guerilla home recordist, should be fun,different,and full of who knows what. We will stay analog not for religious reasons but because it just sounds so much better. I embraced digital early on thinking it was the answer to so many issues with recording. I found the truth was I was after a different approachthan most recording engineers. So in finding an engineer[Benny Grotto, credits;Aerosmith,Ben Folds,Dresden Dolls]who is capable of making both formats sound good.We set sail. In the past every aspect of the decision making process was in flux.With only 8 tracks , decisions had to be made quickly,with no chance to redo,given this,  the entire process has been the most fun and exciting time I have
spent recording.I will attempt to chronicle the shift and see if anything is gleaned from [...]