I have been reassuringly busy over the last month, to the point that this journal has fallen to the feet of my list of concerns, now that I find myself in a position to re-establish an independent space for writing, music production and creativity. Its been a long and muddled journey that's seen a lot of change in my life, but its culminated with a place to myself where I can build on past experience.

The good news, for any casual observers who may dip-in to check on my progress from time-to-time, is that I have been too busy to actually write on the blog. I have been first-and-foremost building a studio that suffices for my purposes as a creative space, where I can churn out quality demos, with vocals. In the past, I think I over-compensated for having friends in the industry and thinking that I couldn't set-root anywhere, as I would likely be off on some adventure somewhere soon. Be that as it may, I've decided that carving out a few square feet that serves as a base is very productive, and I've already stepped-up a level in my home-productions. Part of this will see an updated web-site (which work has resumed), and some demos with some actual vocals from some amazing singers that I've encountered.

I've also started collaborating with a rock & roll outfit who were seeking synths to beef-up their sound, more on that soon.

The studio

A studio means different things to different people. I need a room where I can create the backing track for a song I've penned, and get it to a standard that a vocalist can work on it. I want then to post the result on-line and make it sound impressive. I reckon that the stuff I'm doing at the moment would perhaps only ten years ago be easily enough to attract A&R people, but in the current climate of zero-investment and forward-thinking from the industry, aspiring musos are having to make-do as it goes. I have a singer working on a demo with me, who can only do weekends, which makes things slower and trickier. At least now with the space here, I can get somethings done to a reasonable standard at home, before we move into the professional studio.

I inherited the weathered back-room of seasoned pro Pete Baikie, a musician well-established in the film/tv scoring line of work; so I reckoned that what worked for him must work for me (apart from the dust).

So I've grabbed a couple of NS-10s from Roller Productions, and found them to provide a quick and decent service. After a bit of nervous research, I settled on a Yamaha P2500 amplifier to power them, as the old NS-10s need a amp with a good wattage to get them going. Anxious to not blow-up the things, I followed the advice from the on-line forums and so far its been great. Previous mixes done on NS-10s at James Sanger's place sound the same to me, and I've been using them as a starting point for my own mixes. Its a bit of an outlay, but once you've got some monitors it makes a huge difference to the sound: all the demos on this site that I made were mostly done in headphones (I had no other option!), which makes it nearly impossible to determine what it sounds like.

I started-out experimenting with layout. I tried to squeeze my live-rig of a Yamaha P90, Korg MS2000 and my electribe sampler into the gap, but somehow found that I didn't really take it it there: now its stripped-back with a Korg M1 rigged-up to a small desk. I will use this room for mixing, or adding parts to a mix.

I've now put my live rig in the living room, which means I have a bit more space in the studio, and have transformed the living room somewhat into a live room. I have the ability to record in there, before moving next-door to arrange and mix the raw material.

So far, I've done a couple of sessions, and hosted about a half-dozen musicians to the place. Each time, I change something to improve the place, and I've found that trying to keep a studio is a constant activity. Amdahl's law is in acute application, and there is always some cable or gadget I could do with. These are nice problems though, and I like the homely feel of the studio, devoid of red blubs or thirty-foot mixing desks. As nothing is locked-down, I can follow a whim and wire things up differently, with different results. I think I'd hate it if my studio looked like those 'ideal' photographs you see on Apogees/Apples/Whoever's website, where a nice clean desk has a multi-tiered table, a perfectly fitted desk built-into the wood... What if I want to swap the desk for something else? What if I want to record in the bathroom today? A lot of people whine about sound quality, but what about creativity?

Anyway, I'm in a position to go-over old stuff and create new stuff. If you're interested in helping-out, or want to collaborate with me, please get in touch, I'd be glad to hear from you.