Bluejuice

Done! Almost...

2009-05-21T16:14:00.002+10:00

Dr Chris Shaw leaves today. He is looking forward to seeing his wife and Sparky and never having to talk to us again. Poor bloke...having to deal with a rabble of annoying morons like us. Admittedly he will have to talk to us a little more cos he's got a couple of tracks to mix when he returns to NYC. Sorry Chris.

We went to Jamie's brother's restaurant Vini last night to farewell Chris and celebrate the (almost) finishing of the record. The food was awesome as usual. We amassed a bill of over a grand due to the copious amounts of champagne, red wine, grappa and limoncello... so we all understandably feel like turd today.

Stav

PS I did an interview today for a community newspaper and the guy said to me "So Stav, that's obviously a nickname, how did you get it?" Um???

Nuts

2009-05-14T16:52:00.003+10:00

So we're 5 songs into mixing and it's way less taxing than the tracking process. For us anyway. I mean it's just as taxing (if not worse) for Dr Chris Shaw. We are yet to see his true black rage but there is a self-confessed sense of impending fury from a man who usually keeps it in his pants. On that subject, I did try to show Chris one nut the other day but the reflection of the glass kept his gaze aloof from my glory. His loss really. Our assistant engineer, Jordan Power, could testify to this as he was fortuitous enough to sight it.

The songs are sounding good by the way.

Hi Georgia.

Love,

Stav

Is Michael Moore a total cunt?

2009-05-03T19:05:00.003+10:00

Thank GOD! Almost over. We should have been done yesterday but Chris, Jake and I got so shtonkered at Purple Sneakers on Friday that we took the day off on Saturday. To deal with my relentless hangover I rented 6 DVDs and spent hour after hour after hour watching them. A bit of pointless Hollywood in "Iron Man", then an intense documentary called "Deliver Us From Evil" about paedophilia in the Catholic Church (which was as excellent as it was painful), then some throwaway journalism about the terrible American Health system in "Sicko" by Michael Moore and finally a documentary called "Manufacturing Dissent" about what a throwaway journalist Michael Moore is. Oh it also mentions he's a cunt. Both fair observations although occasionally the world needs a bit of one sided white propoganda to balance the endless lies we're fed. I guess a ruthless journalist sees the story they want to tell and finds the way to depict that narrative regardless of it's veracity or the manner by which they acquire the elements that comprise that version of the story. Blah blah blah, Michale Moore is a bit of a cunt. But I did enjoy "Fahrenheit 911" and "Bowling For Columbine".

Anyways. Gotta listen to "The Truth Is" then hopefully get home in time to watch the last two films I rented.

Stav

ENOUGH! ENOUGH!!!

2009-04-30T18:44:00.002+10:00

We can't keep being so sentimental and annoying. It ends HERE!!!
So. Here is some fun news about the record.
Me and Stav and Jamie and Jerry and Chris Shaw are still recording overdubs, and its going well. We're using a vintage synthesiser from the seventies called an ARP Quadra. It's pretty hip. It sounds like an orchestra, but an orchestra in a space opera, if you know what i mean.

Other than that, we're almost finished with the recording process, and just have to mix after adding some keyboards and vocals to things here and there. There's still quite a lot of stuff to do, but we're on the home stretch...

Cassette Kids have turned up, and they're recording next to us. It's great to see them after bonding during the O Week tour we did with them, The Music, The Fratellis, Ben Lee and Yves Klien Blue, who are also friends. They were in for a while mixing with Scott Horscroft, and their new stuff sounds excellent.

We all got really drunk last night, and pretty stoned too, after doing overdubs on Ms Johnston, a dark sounding ska tune. It's come up wonderfully, with a couple of vocal layers adding huge amounts to the overall vibe of the song. It's got an absolutely epic end, with Farfisa organ blaring over a crazy timbale breakdown. It's like Latin rave music, or something. You'll love it.

I watched 'Blue Murder' last night, which is absolutely fantastic. If you haven't seen it, it's a mini-series about the late seventies and early eighties crime scene in Sydney, like 'Underbelly' if it was made by the ABC. Roger Rogerson and Neddy Smith are poetry in motion, as portrayed by Richard Roxborough and Tony Martin respectively.

These guys were such unrelenting sociopaths in the mid 80's; they basically ran the Sydney drug and armed robbery scene, often stealing things, confiscating them from their own criminals, and then selling them back on the street themselves. Wacky! They also killed everyone.

There's something fucked about watching Neddy Smith standing on Sally Anne Huckstep's back in a dam in Hyde Park, though. Loene Carmen, who is Bridezilla singer's Holiday Sidewinder's mum, plays Huckstep, just out of interest...
And Sam, the drummer from The Scare, who works at BJB Studios (where i currently are), is going out with Holiday. Six degrees, mofo's!

Anyway, I have to politely hurry Jerry up with his keys parts now...
Jake

Day 27

2009-04-30T17:55:00.002+10:00

Almost done. 2 days to go. Overdub universe. Dear Lord it's endless. But good - I'm sure I'll miss it when we're not making the record.

I watched "Lord Of The Rings - Return Of The King" the other night and the end made me cry. Seriously. Loss of innocence, the loss of dear friendships - that shit is sad. Guess I'm becoming a sentimental bastard in my old(er) age.

Stav

Day 2 Million - Vocals

2009-04-22T15:37:00.002+10:00

WAR IS HELL

It's not easy doing these vocals. A day ago I had a bit of an emo-breakdown, and I had the day off as a result. We've had a couple of slow days doing things, and I'm keen to get in there and do stuff now. We're waiting for Burke R. and Chris S. to finish editing all our scrappy, scrappy takes together. It's what happens when a) you're making a 'produced' kind of pop record, and b) you CANNOT sing. But i figure, i try and do it, and then we'll see how it turns out. I can't really control it in the end, much as i'd like to.

The band have largely finished their work and gone home to their normal lives, leaving Burke, Stav, Chris ani. d I as a weird outpost on the frontier of the album recording. It feels like the last stage is approaching, and i just want to get it done in a quality way.

There are heaps of kids in the studio, making an album of garage covers with Rusty Hopkinson from You Am I. It's pretty wild. They are about 12, and you get the sense that some of them are probably pretty good. I told one of them my age, and she was like '????'

I had lunch with my ex today, which was emotionally complicated, but ultimately good. Tonight we've got a gig for my other band 'The Break-Up' at Spectrum, which should be great. We're under-rehearsed, but you get that. I'm excited.

I don't know. Life is complicated, especially when you get past twenty five, and you've got more things to think about. But if we do a good job on these songs, then I can feel like I've at least been true to myself and the things i wanted to say over the last three years or so, and i think that's important. Especially in light of how remarkably empty the rest of my adult life is.

This isn't meant to sound depressing, just trying to be honest. Whereas the whole start of making the record was all about fun and getting that energy into the playing, as we get to the end of the recording process, it becomes a bit more melancholy and sometimes scary. Or maybe that's the way I'm looking at it, because of what my life has been like it the last little while.

None of this is supposed to make you go 'oh, poor guy' or anything, but you think about those things, don't you? Oh, the song 'Head Of The Hawk' sounds pretty good to me.

x Jake

Bernie Mac

2009-04-22T15:33:00.002+10:00

I've spent the last 25 minutes trying to keep Jake's attention long enough to post something on this blog. He's too busy espousing various views on various subjects. I, meanwhile, am left in the bitterly cold kitchen of BJB, watching Burke Reid (handsome sod) edit our vocal take mess and guff. Only this and a photo of Bernie Mac are here to comfort me. RIP Burnie Mac. I loved you in "Friday".

Ham-Fisted

2009-04-20T20:28:00.005+10:00

Now that the recording of bass has been completed, I've taken my Playstation home so none of my ham-fisted controller-mashing bandmates can play it and ruin my high scores. Unfortunately this has led to a drop in morale, as the social cohesiveness brought about by throwing grenades at pedestrians in Liberty City has evaporated. The card games are getting more violent now, and there's a lot of spitting and aggressive Russell Crowe impersonations going on. Burke dropped a piece of buttered bread on the back of my shirt, but he claims this was an accident.

The record, though, is sounding HOT.

JC

THE VASCO ERA ARE BULLYING US

2009-04-12T22:34:00.002+10:00

The Vasco Era have finished recording and mixing their record, which they performed live, over three days. Every other day they've been in the kitchen, being mean to us and playing Uno. I asked Ted if he'd let me play, and he said he'd slash me with a kitchen knife.

Their album DOES sound good though.

THE VASCO ERA ARE ARSEHOLES

2009-04-12T22:31:00.001+10:00

After the quiz, they really kept on about us being stupid. Those guys are cocks.

2009-04-12T22:26:00.002+10:00

Day 9 - ...And we're back. We've been sitting in the studio all day, hungover as dogs. Nothing very exciting happened last night; we went out with Chris and had a drink. We had a nice Indian dinner, and then we walked around in the 'Cross looking for something to do, walked to the Gaslight, and than drank more.

The Vasco Era are currently punishing us with trivia questions. I am getting a lot of them wrong. We've now switched to a jeopardy varient of the game, just to keep it exciting.

We picked up the work rate recently, and have been getting through a couple of songs every couple of days. What have we done? I don't know... I'll ask Stav. "Knife Fight" today, "Truth Is" yesterday, and "Telling The Truth" also, which was going to be a challenge.

I was worried about it, because it was the first good new song that we'd written for the album, about two years ago. Then we played the shit out of it for AGES. And now, a long time after the original sentiment was written, we had to partially record it.

So I was worried I wouldn't feel the same way about it, especially as we'd already tried to record it once, and it had been shit. So anyway, I had a massive night, came in and then fell asleep on the couch. FOR THE WHOLE DAY AND NIGHT.
And then, Burke is a cock. Sorry, Stav told me to say something about Burke Reid.

Anyway, the long story short is they recorded "Telling The Truth" without me. And it was much better for it. Burke is a cock.

Stav and I watched Lord Of The Rings - "Return Of The King" last night, and I hadn't seen any of the other films in the series recently. I was also stoned, and Stav said maybe we should just watch "The Matrix", but I said no, let's watch Lord Of The Rings...

Anyway, when he turned it on, it was in a battle scene, and I had no idea what was happening for about an hour. And every second of that hour, I asked him "What is happening now?" "Who is this man?", and basically making fun of important parts of the story that he'd been building up to for about 6 HOURS. Even when an important, emotional thing was happening, and Stav was crying, I would make fun of the film.

Here's some things I noticed....

Samwise gets totally shafted in Lord Of The Rings - Return Of The King. He does ALL THE WORK, and even carries the ring for Frodo, who is just on male model duty, pouting and falling down for the majority of the end of the movie. Sam even manages to break the ring's spell and give it back to Frodo, whereas Frodo gets in the same situation, freaks out and turns evil.

So basically Frodo needn't have showed up. Sam does EVERYTHING.

Frodo then gets to fuck off with Gandalf to Arcadia while Sam has to go back to the Shire suffering from terrible post-traumatic stress disorder from his experiences in Mordor, to drink himself to death.

Jerry watched Doctor Who.

Drinking make some of your performance better, and some of it worse. The band is sounding loud, which is a perfectly acceptable substitute for good. We're all feeling like death, but now we have to go and record a uptempo party song.
It's hard, but you know that means its good for you... right?

I have to do a shit.

xx

Studio - Day 6

2009-04-09T11:50:00.003+10:00

Okay so we didn't know we had to write anything for this blog so that's why we're starting at day 6. Then our manager forced us to tell you about fun times in studio. Know that we would never say anything about this process if not for Todd (our manager). Yay! 12 hours of sitting around! Yay! Shouting on occassion! Yay! Playstation! Uno! Backgammon and various nerdy things that you'd expect guys in a band to not do! We are tools! In short...

Day 1 - Chris Shaw (our producer) arrived. 24 hours of flying, so he was tired. He is American, from New York, and fits in with us because he is also a nerd. Like many nerds, he is also a genius. He mixed and produced for artists like Bel Biv Devoe, Public Enemy, Dereck Trucks, Wilco, Bob Dylan and Weezer, and more. So it makes sense that he would be producing us - a retarded ska band or something.

But in reality this album won't JUST be ska. It'll also be OTHER unpopular styles, like RnB, and hair metal. Todd (our manager) says, just kidding about the 'unpopular' bit...

To sum up, pulled some drum sounds and listened to some crazy rock stories from Chris Shaw, and that was about it.

Day 2 - 13 takes of "The Devil". Scrapped the lot of them. Wrong song to start with in retrospect. Too fast, too noisy. Needed to be comfortable in studio before getting into the drunken, brazen, sweaty songs like that.
By night we were into the more mid tempo "Head Of The Hawk". Drums sounded fatter, band more locked in, studio felt more like home. Finally, I don't want to kill myself!

Day 3 - "So Miss Johnston" and "Medication". "Medication" rules! Should probably think carefully about how much like DFA 1979 it sounds.... hang on.... who cares? DFA 1979 are AWESOME. Dance, you slightly behind-the-times hipsters.

Day 4 - "Broken Leg" and "Facelift" (Attempt 1)... The first thing you need to know is that "Broken Leg" RULES. This song has an internal life that i can't get past, I love it so much. I am most proud of this one, and perhaps that's why, when we try to record "Facelift", it just sounds a bit silly. We're tired, so we call it a day after about five relatively mediocre takes.

Then we played GTA4 and i complained to Scott Horscroft (The Presets, Silverchair, heaps of stuff) about not being very good at things, and making an not good album. He was very supportive, and said don't worry. Then we drank wine and made fun of each other.

Day 5 - "Little Emperor" and "Another Lie"... What you begin to learn about recording is that things work, things don't work, and usually in that order. So! "Little Emperor" is a nice little rock and roll song, and once again Chris Shaw has pulled an INCREDIBLE drum and bass sound. He is gifted in that sense. Bourke Reid (a producer who used to be in Gerling, and currently produces records for Jack Ladder, The Drones, and more) is also now subbing for our engineer Simon Berkfinger (who sings in Philly Grand Jury, and produced some of Sparkadia, Deep Sea Arcade), who is sick, and also on tour.

"Another Lie" is a song that me and Jerry wrote, about being a liar. And I like it, but EVERYONE thinks it's "not quite working yet". I take offense, but I'm willing to work with this opinion. It's a krautrock song with a major key melody. It's good, but we'll see...

Day 6 - "Facelift" (Attempt 2)... This worked much better today, partially because a) I was drunk, and b) i was wearing sunglasses. This is the only reason. Now I'm sitting around, writing a blog and drinking beer with our friends, The Vasco Era, who are mixing their record. Sid has recently fallen off the wagon. Which is good for him. He's playing guitar next to me right now.