Table Olives, Tapenades and Preserves
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Diary of an Album The second Figtree Renaissance album, a blow-by-blow, note-by-note account. “STONE FRUIT” 2004 COPYRIGHT RICHARD LAWSON MUDGEE In gypsy mode, lost my licence last week and now have to rely on other people to get me everywhere, but what great people to have on call. Alison picked me up at 9.30 pm from the Quaff and we had to register her son for soccer before driving the 25 km’s to the studio for a meeting/start/session with Dave. Studio looks great and the new additions will be awesome, like a Swiss chalet. Felt a bit how ya’ goin but listened to Dave waxing lyrical about the studio and I joined in…..I love it…..feel like I’m in the Swiss Alps like when I was with the Spiders in AUSTRIA. Then….. we got down to work. Dave said, “What do you want to do and how do you want to do it?” I said,” Just turn on the machine and some real time and let me go!” I knew the main 2 tracks to get me up and running. I was doing “After the Fall” which is a very well rehearsed piece of mine and I have no doubt how it will turn out. Put down the 2 main tracks and watched how the computer will be “quantizing “ everything then attacked the other parts with gusto. Daves keyboard / sound patch expertise will be invaluable as I watched him slink like a cat into his mode. …….we fitted each other like a glove. ……everything was unsaid and I had no problem reading his mind and he had no problem putting up with my foibles. Started at 11am and finished at 5 pm….. About 5 hours serious work ……….Dave has the real work!!! Sunday 14-3-04 A beautiful morning spent walking Molly, and doing some Olive work, rinsing and finishing off yesterdays cutting and sorting. Gave Fiona Harris a Lesson then got her to drive me into the Quaff Shop for breakfast. Got to the studio about midday and started on “ The Dove”, a very short piece which has vocals and will be on CD 1. Put down a click shaker and then the strings, then an acoustic double bass and the main piano melody. Some atmospherics and it was finished apart from the vocal by the blonde one. We broke for lunch before starting on “Midsummer night’s dream” which was a lot quicker than I thought. Will leave a lot of space at the start of the song and at the end for Phil to put down some pipes. Discovered a cool Harpsichord sound which was the main melody over the chorus. Broke again for dinner and short walk up the valley to their Flying Fox. What a beautiful, beautiful place!!!! As the stars came out we settled in and Started “Star Doona’ an old favorite of mine which has no time but a good deep drone in F and soaring chord progressions with heavy reverb effects to render it other-worldly. Sounded glorious. Tentative running list for songs: CD 1Friday 19-3-04 Woke before dawn and was walking down the valley towards Nikki and Dans. Cool, cool morning and the air in the valley was brisk on my hands. All the negativity of yesterdays events seemed to wash away from me as I meditated on this beautiful and serene planet. Back at Daves we all breakfasted and talked and the we hit the studio before 9am. Started on Wysiwyg and the drum patterns. This is a crucial part of the equation and I wasn’t quite sure how it would turn out. Dave had lots of sounds and lots of patterns but it was clear to me after a while that we would have to build the drums from the bottom up, beat by beat. I ended up just getting the pattern for the song and being happy with that for now so I could get the keyboard parts down then later I will come back maybe with Fraser and chuck some much sexier, much groovier , much more NOW patterns in. Probably from his extensive drum sound library in Sydney or we might even sample some drums from the awesome studio mausoleum in town. Gospel Organ. Rickenbacker Bass and then Voice Pad and Piano rounded off Wysiwyg and not much else is needed apart from Limericks vocal and the Classical Guitar solo probably by Ged. Broke for an early lunch then came back and played a newish tune I’ve been fiddling round with out at the Kandos School Piano when Students don’t turn up. It’s in D minor, A minor and C major and has a jazzy cum bluesy feel that is hard to picture yet. Dave just said “It’s a good riff”. Maybe Limerick or Carina might like it enough to improvise some vocals over the top of it? That was it for this session. Only came to do 3 songs and walked away with 5 so I was pretty chuffed. Saturday 20-3-04 Carina arrived about 3pm on the Wednesday and we had a coffee at Elton’s and headed straight out to the Studio. Dave had rung my mobile in the meantime and suggested scrapping the session as the hour was getting late but I did not get the message until we arrived back at the farm. She had been held up because of a late call to go and do some Film work on the Japanese production of “Godzilla” at Fox Studios and was running around getting chased by the Dinosaur at 5.30 in the morning. Anyways Dave was sitting in the Booth waiting for us and we promptly set up the mix for WYSIWYG and Carina put on the cans to open up her lungs for the first time on the Figtree Project. A few takes and it was obvious she had a cold which she had been fighting for a day or two already. Even so the combination of her voice and the music was irrestistible and the last time she’d sung on this stuff was the Solstice Party back in 1997 and before that was the Byron Bay Music Festival in 1996 before my move to Mudgee. We got some OK vocals down but I knew she would do better tomorrow but rightly she said she wanted to make a connection with the studio and get the vibe of the place and Dave. Arrived back at Figtree armed with vino and we started raving about anything that came into our heads. I played her the rushes of what has been done so far and the ones she was going to do vocals on over the next day or two. “Avenue”, “WYSIWYG”, “The Dove”, “Think Twice”, and “Come out and Play” Its all very exciting!! Wednesday 2 June I was up early as usual doing my chores around the farm whilst the Great One snored blissfully. The cold was really running through her now and a few drinky poos last night and the combination of yesterdays frantic schedule made me shy of waking her up before 8.30 but I gently put on Enya on the Stereo so she would arise to the lilting refrain of Carribean Blue. She had a special brew she was drinking for the throat/cold, which had Ginger/Lemon/Honey in it and after a coffee at Elton’s we were away to the studio. First Audio port of call was the Dove as I thought it would ease her into the zone. After a few takes we had it down and then we asked her what she felt like doing so next was WYSIWYG. The emotion was starting to pour out of her now and she was in the zone without too much trouble. Last nights vocal was scrapped as today’s was far and away the better of the 2. The rap hasn’t changed a bit in the 8 years since she originally did and Carina teasingly suggested she was suffering from Demo-it is!! Also scrapped was my idea for splitting up the chorus into 2 parts with a chorus /response. Her vocal was too irrestistible to split up and the vibe was certainly there! I’m not happy with the backing track now. Problem is it is too bottom heavy and plodding and needs to be a lot more bright and bouncy so that might have to be redone, though we have got 3 good vocal rushes to splice together. Next was “Think Twice” which Carina peeled off in no time at all, almost brushed it aside like it wasn’t even there. It was obvious that she was going into character. The Dove was the yearnings of a young girl who has turned into a mother. WYSIWYG is a frenetic sexually charged plea for love. Think Twice is a jaded Berliners take on broken promises. ………her personality and character of voice were superbly interpreted in each vocal and the 8 year hiatus from Figtree had instilled the performance with clarity and insight!! The Avenue was next cab off the rank. Her vibrato had tightened up now and she stated that her nose had dried up so I felt this zone she was in would not last much longer, so all the work carried on now had a sense of urgency. Dave picked up on this as well and the kids got an earful when they barged in with lunch in the middle of a vocal take for the Avenue. A break for some soup and rolls was much needed as our intensity was exploding a bit and some tension had crept in. I quipped to Dave that my piano sounded like it was being played inside a box. I will have to get through to him that we require good playback mixes to get the vibe right for whatever performance is taking place. Never mind the fact that the Full Moon was taking place at this very hour…2.21pm After a much needed break Carina went in with the revised Modus Operandi for The Avenue which was to split up the Vocal with one part being the verse and then on Separate tracks doing the Chorus. Her vocal volume between the 2 octaves is just too strong and no amount of Microphone Technique will give us a tight enough take to mix with. She nailed it this time and then we did the answer in the chorus together which was a good cue for a photo opportunity. Even though Ged or Brian will be doing the Guitars I just had to hear how the guitar would sit with the track so Dave pulled out his trusty $3500 Martin 12 string and I went to town. Played sparse in the verses and then hit the 12/8 rhythm in the Chorus and it sounded fantastic. It was then I got chills up my spine during the playbacks and realised that we might actually have a hit on our hands!!!!!!! That’d be nice!!!!!!!! Then she attempted the high Soprano ad lib at the end of the song which we joked sounded like a cat being stepped on…...which it did!! So now Avenue has 8 separate vocal tracks. 2 in verse, 2 in the Chorus, 2 with the answer/response and 2 with the soprano. Ran off some quick mixes so we could vibe out back at our place and we were off into the night back to Figtree, Red Wine and the Full Moon. When we got home all hell broke loose as we danced around to the mixes which were shocking but that did not take away from the effect of having such great music in our grasp. The Avenue is sending chills up my spine, which I have not got since the halcyon days of the Lime Spiders. We would need to do the Chorus again though tomorrow. Plans were being made for world domination and we played all sorts of music from Led Zeppelin Drum Solos to ELO dance tracks. We were bouncing off the walls and the moon was certainly our Goddess this night. Totally exhilarated, but what do you expect when you get 2 Leos together on a Full Moon!!!!! Thursday 3 June Both of us were feeling decidedly worse for wear this morning after last night’s frivolities. There was a strict time line today though to get through as we both had to be back in Sydney. I bad a Growers market to do at Pyrmont and the great one had a gig at Star City Casino tomorrow night. Stopped again at Elton’s where I got my Tree order form back from Larry and after talking about 1 of the trees which, was called a Peacharine we started writing a song about it with Lyrics and music based round Queen songs. Out at the Studio Dave was set up and waiting for us. He’s very professional this chap!! Brought up Come out and play, which Carina nailed again very quickly, the Lead Vocal that is. Then it was time for 5 part harmonies which I’ve had going though my head for the last few weeks. Wasn’t sure if they would work as I’d never heard them together before. Bottom one by me, the next 3 octaves by us together then the top one by Carina. Basically we went na-na-na-na-na-na-na for 3 minutes 5 times which is a lot of na-na-na-ing!!! Very hypnotic effect and the track will now have a very long outré to do whatever Beatles stuff pops up. Very much like the ending for Hey Jude or All you need is love. The effect on playback was mesmerising and they sounded like tribal vocals from the Polynesian Islands. Subbed off on their own they will come in handy on other parts of the album I’m sure. Then I told Carina just to cut loose with 2 ad-lib vocals, which we’ll lay over the top again. She had the chance now to have some fun with various vocal flavours. We even put a message in that only we 2 know about [La-la-la-la-la!!] That’s 8 separate vocal tracks for Come out and play we will have to mix together. Avenue has 8 separate vocal tracks as well but there is a lot of double tracking on that one; this one has 8 separate parts….I don’t know if the Beach Boys ever got up that far……must meet Brian Wilson one day and ask him?? Finally she had to nail the Chorus vocal in the Avenue to really get it right which she peeled off easy as you please…...first take for both double vocals. Dave mixed off a couple of CDs for us to take and we split back to the farm then Sydney. I was exhausted and happy, Carina was still sick and she drove all the way!! ************************** The Full Moon was rising over Mudgee as we left and it seemed to be saying to us to go out and live your dream. I am definitely on a high and this Album/ Band could be SERIOUSLY HUGE if we do it right. ***************************** Listened to her songs for the “Night and Day” Duo she is in tomorrow night and was just relaxing , humming along and getting inspiration all the way to Geds. Randy Crawford is awesome!!! As if we hadn’t done enough work, Ged pulled out his Classical Guitar and played Carina his new song which practically had us both in tears ……it was that beautiful……written for Bridies Mum when she died!! A gorgeous lilting piece that has some nice Spanish overtones and for some reason has me thinking of the Sea and gently lapping waves next to a jetty. Taped that and sent Carina off to write lyrics for it. After Carina left, Ged played the CD again and I could tell he was getting infected by the vibe and wanted to be part of it. How awesome is that; to have 2 of the best guitarists in Australia [Ged and Brian] playing on your record. Will have to record that version of Mike Oldfield/ Maggie Smiths “Moonlight Shadow” when we have both of them together in Mudgee. Wow……I just got another chill up my spine, as I write this just, thinking about the possibilities!!! Friday 4 June 2004 POSTCRIPT After the markets I went to Ben Coxes place in Sydney with Vanessa and as I walked in his front door what is he doing but playing with 2 decks at being a mixer/rapper and the beats/scratching were exactly what was needed on WYSIWYG to lift the rhythm track out of the Doldrums. Saturday 5 June 2004 Ged arrived at my place around 11.30am on the eve of The Solstice Party and immediately pulled out his guitar and showed me an idea he had for the melody line for ‘The Avenue’ I liked it and said well lets go and do it. Drove out to Daves place and by 1.00 pm we were at work on The Avenue. First Ged wet himself over Dave’s $3500 12 string Martin Guitar and we put that down first including Ged’s melody line. The song soared under Ged’s Tutelage and I turned to Dave and said “As a guitarist I make a great drummer” Next he put down his 6 string acoustic guitar and here’s where his extra 32’s really gave the end of the song that Django percussive like edge Id been looking for. Then we miked up Ged’s amp and tried a clean heavy guitar just doing the power chord thing, which well get the POD onto later. They looked at me and said what next and I said get the Mandolin and improvise!!?? No one was sure what was going to transpire but we all knew it anyone could pull something out of thin air then Ged could. Immediately the Melody line at the front of the song took on a Lute like ambience with all the octaves of the guitar in resonance with each other meshing to create a Medieval/ Renaissance like sound. He fiddled round in the Choruses a bit not really sure what to do so we double tracked another Mandolin part and heres where Dave got excited!! I have not seen Dave excited like this on the whole project and I think this is where he really came alive on the album!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! He was jumping round and grooving and kept on saying “Awesome!!” To say he was excited was putting it mildly and he let Ged know it too. We all sat back on the playback and wet ourselves, well me and Dave did anyway. Next cab off the rank was the Classical Guitar piece Ged had composed. After some nifty mike placement by Dave [Ged, in retrospective was impressed with the mans speed] Ged started and did one run through before laying it down straight and unadorned……as it should be. We sat back on the playback and if you knew the song/composer/player intimately you would be able to suss out a blue or two but overall it was a great take and a great session. We retreated back to the retreat to party into the Solstice Festival…….very happy with the days work. Fri 19-6-04 Its been almost a month since the last session and I felt I was getting my creative edge back. I must admit I have been a bit busy and drained to really even think about doing any work on Stone Fruit. Now I had Ben Cox booked in to come and do his thing with the decks on The Avenue and Wysiwyg. He came out and stayed on the Sunday night before and we had a listen to the Hip Hop beats he had searched out and they ROCKED. I watched in Fascination at his set up with the 2 turntables and mixer and how you can slot in and out of beat to beat seamlessly. Ben played and scratched for about an hour and a half before he even realised what was happening. I could see this was going to be good. I played him some Led Zeppelin bets just to really get his blood up. Next morning we went out and after a preamble of Dave showing him over the place/studio and a tune up and plug in he was off. Dave had no idea what I was doing and I don’t think I did either!! Initially Id thought about just doing sample grabs and then cutting and pasting on the computer but after a few run throughs on Wysiwyg Dave turned to me and said he was tracking really well to the beat and that he should do it live. We pissed off the Bass/ Piano part as they were in a different time now and just left the String/Voice Pad there for the tune and Carinas vocal. After about 3 attempts he had one that he was happy with which even had a nifty scratch at the front and in the Swedish rap section. Now we sound like James Browns Backing band. Then Ben had a cool idea for a heavier Chemical Bros like Bass/ Beat conglomeration over the rap section. I came running in excitedly and said ‘Yeah we should lose all the instumentation in that section apart from Carinas voice!!’ Now it was starting to ROCK!! Then he went spare with some vocal scratching on another track using a “ 1 - 2 - 3 - HEY” Chant which he cut up a fair bit but left the whole thing in time in 2 sections of the song , one of them leading into the Classical Guitar Solo. He was exhausted by now and we stopped for lunch and chatted. After lunch it was an easy matter to bulk up the Bass Drum / Snare part on The Avenue with a Kick ass Hip Hop beat which he had. Have to remember he’s doing all this on Vinyl and tracking the beat MANUALLY with his left hand…….Amazing. It slotted in perfectly with the Drum Pattern already there as I was happy with the existing Hi-Hat and Cymbal and the Bass Drum now has a nice double edge to it. The song now sounds Super Big with block Rockin Beat. Hopefully Dave will give me a good mix of the 2 songs this Sunday so I can take them to Sydney to Play to Ged And Carina. We split and I must say I am mentally exhausted and I wasn’t even the one doing any work. Ben Cox Rocks!!! Monday 19-7-04 Very refreshed after a month away from the Album and a few Lime Spiders shows in Sydney to break up the artistic flow as it were. Carina also had a great time with the Spiderettes at the Gaelic Club and from my point of view it was nice to see how far my music has progressed from the Detroit Cock Rock that I used to play. Dave picked me up from the Quaff Shop on Sundays as he normally does at about 2 pm on the Sunday and I was to stay in the cabin overnight and work most of Monday undisturbed. I was armed with my first Massive Attack on the Sampling scene sans Ben Cox. Had Massive Attack and the Hilliard Ensemble playing for me this afternoon. Dave said “OK Mister Richard where are we going now??” “Into the Land of Danger.” Was my reply. We set up the Sound byte to grab the 2 samples I wanted and this file would now be dedicated to sampling for our purposes. Massive Attack drum loop was easy peasy and then The Hilliard ensemble went down over the top of it and immediately we had the bones of “Parce Mihi Domine” down. I couldn’t get the Piano/ Bass tune down quick enough and here we started hitting snags with the Midi Readouts on The Keys and Computer starting to jam themselves up. Turns out we needed a click down first for the program to read itself properly so it took almost 2 hours to work out EXACTLY the tempo of the Massive Attack drum loop. Then it was all plain sailing. Ended up only using the first part of the chant and repeating it with each Chorus / Response. Meanwhile the chant proper had been left on its own on another track and resurfaced of its own accord at the end of the song……….about 5 minutes and to our delight it slotted back in on itself to conclude the song with the chant just going out on its own glorious sonority to a very polite churchlike nothingness!!!!! Dave loved it and I was getting that chill up my spine again!! That was a rap and it was off to bed in the cabin for me. Up early for one of those beautiful Dawn Totnes Valley walks up to Joe and Sheilas place at the headwaters of the Hunter River. Today was going to be the debut of the drums on the album. Thought I’d tackle “Special Place in my heart” so first down went the click track and I did a coolish beatnik sort of piano guide track that I could play drums over. Then did a scratch vocal as a guide Lucky I know the song well, didn’t have as much luck later on with “Table 7”. I hope the tempo is right……..the drums didn’t sound too bad and the bass drum especially was warm as toast. It all happened very quickly from there with the Bass, Horns, Extra Piano, Strings going down in quick succession. To finish it off I did a flam snare pattern on the keyboard to boost the snare sound. Decided to have a stab at “Table 7” whilst we had the drum sound up and running so down went the click then the guide piano with left hand bass line and the guide vocal but it was here that I realised I didn’t really know the song that well as we never demoed it , there was only a live version from the Harbouside Brasserie in 95. I was rushing now and decided to scotch the session as I was getting frustrated. Still have the bare bones, which we can work on later. A friend of Daves up the road drove me to meet the bus, which was on its return trip into town after dropping kids off. Monday 23-8-04 Ben popped up to see me and give me a CD to get some of the tracks so he could start work on doing some mixes which should be interesting. Carina and I have agreed to give him free rein to do what he wants as far as mixing goes because I reckon this guy has GOT it. The rain had been tumbling down for a few days now and was the perfect backdrop to what was to develop over the next 2 days at the studio. Eno has been in my head in more ways than one over the last few weeks. Firstly his music has bewitched and becalmed and beguiled me, as has his attitude to music, art and life in General. More spontaneity he says. He actually went into the studio to do “Another Green World “ with NO songs and look what came out. I realised Id’ been working to a formula sometimes too much and not paying enough attention to my muse and just go with the flow. This session was to be different. Ambient all the way with a few twists and turns which were totally unexpected. Started out with what used to be Ireland on my demoes. A beautiful Enya like tune, which relied heavily on sequenced Arpeggio. After one run through of Verse/ Chorus we cut and pasted it and quantized it to clean it up a bit Then the Strings and String melody went down and the Basses. Broke for dinner before coming back and trying Night Rider which was another Ambient demo from the early days at Figtree Retreat when John was still alive and I was still married and Tom had lent me his Multi-Track recorder. Wow what memories this tune conjured up. Seems like a life time ago. Fairly simple affair with Click track, String Pad, Bass, Piano and then some Organs and Clavinators at the outro. As it was raining outside we put down some Rain/ Thunderstorm ambience which coloured the song nicely and gave it a faraway look. Broke to go to bed. As I was lying there half asleep the muse finally came to me and the idea was to join 2 other pieces of Music onto what I’d just done and make it a 10 minute piece in 3 phases. The other 2 pieces were from A Day in the Village which was a soundscape I did for the Wine Festival in 1996. [Incidentally tis work went down like a lead balloon and was pulled after the first night by the organisers] It is a constant source of inspiration though as I keep on pulling bits and pieces out of it to use here and there Woke full of beans and we set to work very quickly joining up the 3 pieces which all had receptive tunings to segue in and out of [Mainly Bmin and Gmin]. The first run through into what is basically an Ambient version of Sadness II then the second run into what is a drone in Gmin with sampled Bulgarian Pipes and Laments and a bit of Celtic Harp. I was in heaven as it became obvious this was going to work better than what I thought. Tentatively titled the whole piece “Sadness III” Put down what Dave and ME called Ethereal Doodling because it is the Ethereal Dawning key on his Kurzweil 2000. Very happy and my spirit is sated for now as I have some sensitive quiet stuff which is now starting to fill up the instrumental side of the CD. Home with Dave in the rain Monday 30-8-04 Return to Music Page |
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