Well, dear readers, we’ve finished the first day of recording the cast album of The Brain From Planet X. Yes, you heard it here, dear readers, we’ve finished the first day of recording the cast album of The Brain From Planet X, and I, for one, am feeling older than springtime because it was a very long session, the kind of long session I haven’t done in ages. I can barely keep my eyes open as I write these here notes because I am feeling older than springtime and twice as persnickety and I think we all know how persnickety springtime is, especially in fall and winter. Where was I? Oh, yes, the first day of recording The Brain From Planet X. I am eating some salt-water taffy as I write these here notes. I just thought I’d mention that in case anyone was interested. In any case, yesterday, I toddled off to Westlake Audio, home of many of my recordings, at around ten o’clock in the morning, for our eleven o’clock start. Our musicians arrived, and shortly thereafter, Merrill, Lauren, Kevin, and Alet arrived as well. We began with a band track, the Entr’Acte, just to let Vinnie get the band blend right. We knew immediately that the session was going to not be a smooth one for our replacement synth player – he simply didn’t know the music well enough, and there are many quick patch/sound changes in each number, and it was obvious that he wasn’t going to be able to make them and do a credible job of playing. So, we just decided to mush ahead, knowing we’d fix whatever problems we had after getting everything in the can. After the Entr’Acte, we did all the vocals involving our four singers, and they all did a very good job and sounded great. The synth missed a lot of stuff as each song went down, and it was a little frustrating, frankly. But, we mushed on, getting things as good as we could. We were a little behind where I wanted to be by lunch, but not by much. We brought in a yummilicious luncheon from Astroburger, and everyone loved it. Then we resumed the session, caught up, and I was able to get the band out by about five-fifteen, which was exactly when we needed to get them out by (they would have stayed longer if we’d needed it, but I was happy to keep my end of the bargain by not having to ask). The synth player was very nice and stayed without asking for more money, as did our wonderful musical director, Richard Berent.
And so, at about six we began the arduous task of going through every single thing we recorded and replacing what either hadn’t been gotten, hadn’t been performed well, or with fixed sounds. We ended up overdubbing and replacing over eighty percent of what he’d recorded, and it took about five hours to do so, but we got it all. It put us into serious overbudgetland, but that’s the way it goes, sometimes. While we were doing the overdubs, I could hear how well the CD is going to mix, so that was fun. I finally left the studio at eleven, came home, and sat in front of my laptop like so much fish.
I was so annoyed at myself for eating so much food yesterday – in addition to my bacon cheeseburger and zucchini fries and my Swedish Fish and my Sharon McNight’s Nuts, we also brought in pizzas for dinner and I had three count them three slices. I think I’ve gained back between five and seven pounds over the last two weeks and I am here to tell you I will be losing said pounds in the next two weeks.
Well, why don’t we all click on the Unseemly Button below because I must stop eating salt water taffy and if I don’t get my beauty sleep soon I shall feel older than springtime, summertime, falltime, and wintertime put together.
Today, I must ship about ten packages, and then must do nothing else but catch up on mailing Christmas cards and sending out invites to my annual Christmas Eve party. Then I’ll be taking Merrill to the airport and then I’ll be watching movies on DVD all the livelong day and night right through the end of the year.
Tomorrow at six, we do the big vocal session for The Brain – I’ve got three hours booked and I’m praying we can do it in that amount of time – the group numbers should go fairly quickly and we’ll do them all in a row first thing. Then we’ll do all the solo stuff and I hope that everyone has focus and concentration because that’s the only way we’ll get through the evening without going into overtime at the studio.
Well, dear readers, I must take the day, I must do the things I do, I must, for example, jog, ship, lunch, drive in my motor car to the airport, and then watch DVDs. Today’s topic of discussion: What is the most embarrassing situation that you’ve ever been caught in – one you can discuss in public. A situation where you just wanted to run and hide, but one which was also, in hindsight, really funny and weird. Let’s have loads of lovely postings, shall we, as I rest my weary head upon my bed.