MIXING THE TRACKS----------------------------------TRIDENT STUDIOS
March 21, 2002
Vehemence members Mark, John, Bjorn and Jason enter Trident Studios after a 12 hour drive to Pecheco, California in the San Francisco suburbs to meet Juan Urteauga and Mike the Pro Tools engineer for the project that had been working on it since March 11th. We decided to get a different mix at a different studio for our kind of music. Metal Blade suggested Juan at Trident Studios to mix the album so we agreed since Juan is a singer of an Extreme Death Metal band called Vile from Concord, CA. Juan had a nack for our sound and took the direction to a whole new level. Juan and Mike equalized around and found the sickest sound for us and had it dialed in when we got there. All the instruments can be heard, effects and layering tricks were added according to editing notes that I Bjorn and I created as a guideline check off sheet. We wanted vocals like the previous Metal Blade Demo that Aaron Carry did at Pipeline Audio. Nathan's vocals were dialed in 2 hours to create a sickening guttural chorus sound Drums were cleaned up and everything is done from the drummers perspective on this disc, so if you are a drummer you can play along with the album realistically and it would make sense. Bjorn's guitar is on the left side, and my guitar tracks are on the right speaker side. We worked on I Didn't Kill Her, Fantasy From Pain, and Lusting For Affection on the first day and we had to double check each mix after the day was done on the ride back to the hotel. I Didn't Kill Her contained Bjorn's wah Solo that fly's on this album! At the end of I Didn't Kill her there is a sample made of a man replacing a body he removed from the graveyard then walks away only to return later all underneath a storm. Fantasy From Pain contains radio am intro noises into his am guitar sound then blasts with volume to the original mix. Lusting For Affection contains 2 808 booms during the break down riff of the song that carries our small tradition on to this album. Subwoofers will pick up the frequency but high end speakers will not so don't worry. The first mix was unbalanced in levels, so we got that balanced the next day and had no complaints about the first 3 songs mixed after that.
March 22, 2002
We worked on the next 3 songs which were I Must Not Live, God Was Created and She Never Noticed Me. I Must Not Live had a lot of work such as going track by track leveling the dual solos from hell creating the atmosphere for them. I Must Not Live is a very powerful song that sets the scenes by the music itself. There are some parts on I Must Not Live that we do not play live, but when it comes to playing overdubs we always pick the heavier rhythm track to play instead (since each rhythm track is just as technical as the overdub itself) and maybe we will switch it up from time to time. She Never Noticed Me sets the school scenario with the intro of a classic high school sound. I am sure everyone at a young age in high school can relate to the silent crush that someone has against someone but we take that shit to a different horrid level he he. Jason's keyboard element is present on this song and is well respected to have that element of violin orchestra synth during this song. The next song we worked on was God Was Created and is the title track of the album. The chorus's of God Was Created are said with violent passion so watch out for I AM MY I AM MY I AM MY OWN SAVIOR! The song ends with an acoustic fade out along with the music, and I may add that Bjorn's Acoustic tracks came out more than excellent using that cheap Jasmine Guitar. There is a certain Chime/Church Bell strings sound about the guitar that makes the sound unique so he uses it on all albums. God Was Created's drums are excellent, you'll notice that Andy does a lot of new tricks from the previous drumming style on the first album The Thoughts From Which I Hide. By this time we were getting fidgety calling each other nicknames such as (Mike was Homeboy) then later conformed to (Homer), Mark was (Homer) in the beginning because everyone seems to guess at his name, (DMK) still sticks to my ass, Bjorn (Bajorn) and Jason seem to keep their regular names. Now we had 6 mixed songs to listen to when we went back to the hotel.
March 23, 2002
We had 6 mixes that we had no complaints about and proceeded to move forward.
The next tracks Made For Her Jesus, Christ, I Fucking Hate You, and The Lords Work were ready to be grilled and cooked. Made For Her Jesus starts out with JESUS! Then we had it get lower in pitch with a delay (US US US US) for that evil demonic intro sound we were looking for. NOTE: Nathan's vocals are not pitch controlled throughout any of the songs, he is really that LOW .we only use this pitch effect for Made For Her Jesus.
For this song I designed a perfect CD layout picture of what is to be imagined when reading the lyrics along with this song then it connects with school binders to the She Never Noticed Me artwork. Christ, I Fucking Hate You is one that your mom would hate! The lyric is said repetitiously and with violent angered emotion. There is a sick effect added to Father knew better than to take that away, his dick only went in her mouth and her ass! which was a Mike Schomig edit from The Saltmine studios. The Lords Work mix hits you like a elephant stepping on your face and wont get off. The song includes all the song tittles of this album within the lyrics combined along with additional lyrics to link them all together. There is a phaser effect I included in my guitar riff to give the song an errie change of pace.
March 24, 2002
The Last Fantasy was a hard song to mix because it had so many clean tones that we needed to balance out along with solos. Juan and Mike work excellent together when it comes to getting done what needs to be done. At this point we started getting familiar with the custom slang words such as Hella cool, Hella hard, and some other choice words. After all of that , we did a run down of all the songs we worked with for last minute level changes, and panning. We all look forward to working with the same studios and engineers in the near future for our next album Vehemence 3. We have 4 songs we are working on for a new one so we are pretty much on track. The new material will differ from this album because it will not be in concept form, and will sound somewhat different in style kind of way, lets say an even more experienced Vehemence album.
RECORDING THE TRACKS---------------------------SALTMINE STUDIOS
JANUARY 19TH 2002
Today was the last day for recording. John recorded his solo for I Didn't Kill Her, overdub for Fantasy From Pain, and The Last Fantasy Of Christ. This was a very long day where Bjorn, John, and another friend named Mike stayed all night till 10AM to the next day finishing the project. Our determination to get this done has paid off. There are some tracks missing such as one part that Jason will record soon on She Never Noticed Me. Things also left to be done are Fade ins and outs, and finding volume levels for this 64 track production. John can finally go to sleep at night knowing he has finished all the tracks that he forgot.... There are some pitch corrections that need to be made with some solos held out in sustain on I Must Not Live and Fantasy From Pain, other than those kind of edits the record will be killer. Mastering process is under negotiation. We don't know the street date yet until Evil Dave finishes the artwork. Evil Dave 2 will be born soon, so congrats to his new born child. As a whole group of band members and friends everyone got along just great and we give great respect to Mike Schomig, and Will Solaris for them not snapping and killing us. We will all wait patiently to hear the final mix of this CD and get back to you with more progress in further updates.
JANUARY 18TH 2002
Today Jason did his keyboard tracks for She Never Noticed me and Bjorn's overdub tracks where done in the morning and Jason's in the night.
JANUARY 17TH 2002
Today was an entire mix down day we await to record forgotten tracks.
JANUARY 16TH 2002
Keyboards were added by Jason only on She Never Noticed Me, and excessive mix down is being done. We wait! Let Mike the Magician handle it! Some tracks were forgotten and must be recorded still, but we will get those recorded after mix down/minor adjustments afterwards.
JANUARY 15TH 2002
Mix down is going in order of the song list, so far only 2 songs mixed, excessive work in mix down is being done. Vehemence is couch sitting, monitoring Mike and Will's work. Interns Grayson and Phil are helping out with food orders doing a good job. Bjorn presented a drawing he had made with glow and the dark paint and marker on the wall of recorded artists in the studio. A picture will be posted when the pictures are developed.
JANUARY 14TH 2002
Bjorn and John did guitar overdubs, including all acoustic guitar tracks finished. The Mix down process is just starting.
JANUARY 13TH 2002
Today was the end of Marks, bass session finishing up the songs perfectly. Mark took his time and really nailed all of his tracks down, some new ideas were brought up and completed as well like on the song The Lords Work. Nathan did awesome at his vocal tracks to day, The song Christ I Fucking Hate You, had some new Vocal ideas to it that captures the word Christ to be recognized. Bjorn accomplished his acoustic tracks on beginning of Made For Her Jesus, and the end of God Was Created. The acoustic element added gives it a medieval old century sound, with classical influence. There is a lot of harmonies that all come together in unison setting the flow of the song. Tomorrow is over dubs and John starts college, again. Solos will be dissected and made sure they come out to be wonderful takes.
JANUARY 12TH 2002
Today was a pretty exciting day to hear Nathan's vocal tracks and Marks vocal tracks. The album sounds explosive due to the techniques and textures used to form the vocals. Nathan as usual, pours his sweat on the ground he stands on from the amount of effort he puts into his Vocal tracks. Half of Marks bass tracks and half of Nathan's vocal tracks were recorded. Mike spent a whole night re listening to everything cleaning up wav forms. Mike, being a new friend to this band is more than comfortable with our music. He knows were every riff is now as if he were in the band. This has been a first for Mike working with this type of music. He can make anything talked about come to reality on the recording equipment. Along with Will's help in the punching in and mixing board help, Vehemence's confidence in this album is high enough to say it will be something new for the ears, in a high quality package that brands the band in metal history.
JANUARY 11TH 2002
Started recording John's basic guitar tracks at 3:00PM. The guitar session went on till 11:30PM, with a break to set up Marks Bass rig which sounds sick! The guitar tracks were spent well, getting all riffs as tight as they can be. We are running three microphones on Marks Bass rig to get the sound that we need. John is thinking of Re-doing She Never Noticed me on his guitar part after the bass tracks are finished. Mark recorded bass lines on Made For Her Jesus. Payments, Paper Work and Phone calls were made as well to clear up the rest of the negotiations.
JANUARY 10TH 2002
Vehemence would like to say there will be pictures shortly, we are extremely busy around these times and getting lack of sleep pushing our limits. Today at 2:00PM Andy finished his drum tracks with the help of John's guitar scratch tracks. Around 6:00pm it was lunch break for some of us, and Bjorn, Will, and Mike stayed to create the Vehemence Distortion to be used for the Guitars. The Distortion is made up of Line 6 Flextone, Line 6 POD Preamp, Mesa Boogie Dual Rectifier, Custom Krank Amp which is really a hot rodded Soldano amp. We have major confidence that this album will sound explosive and work perfect of Vehemence's sound/song structures. Andy did most of his drums in one take or less than 10. Bjorn recorded all of his guitar tracks from 7:00PM to 11:00PM. Rhythm tracks were recorded to Analog to maintain the heaviest sound possible. John started his recording of these three guitar tracks below. Hearing the guitars in stereo for the first time really gave us more confidence to know that we will create solid, flowing, head banging, flawless tracks. Mike and Will have helped with there input with being yes/no if each song was at its tightest after knowing the Vehemence songs, and repetition of the riffs being played. We have about 15 ears listening all at once, room full of musicians, technicians to insure that we will have a great take for each song.
1.MADE FOR HER JESUS
2.SHE NEVER NOTICED ME
6.THE LAST FANTASY OF CHRIST
JANUARY 9TH 2002
VEHEMENCE - "GOD WAS CREATED"
The first day consisted of arriving at the studio at 2:00PM for drum/microphone set up by Mike Schomig, and Will Solaris. Drum sound checks were done by Will Solaris hitting on the drums while Mike was setting the levels. Most of the bands waiting time is spent in the Green Room. A new room built for the Salt Mine Studio that is a lounge area for the bands. We play some Playstation 1 and 2,watch some dvd's, monitor how the recording is going by the camera monitor channels that are connected to the TV that is in the lounge area. Bjorn came in to do his fair share of the unrecorded guitar scratch tracks for Andy's Drum tracks for the day. Drum tracks for these songs below in this order, have been recorded. The track listing for the album will be different though, "according by the number that's the way they will be track listed."
1.MADE FOR HER JESUS
2.SHE NEVER NOTICED ME
6.THE LAST FANTASY OF CHRIST
3.FANTASY FROM PAIN
7.I DIDN'T KILL HER
8.GOD WAS CREATED
Vehemence Studio Report on Metal Blade's Website
March 21, 2002
Vehemence members Mark, John, Bjorn and Jason enter Trident Studios after a 12 hour drive to Pecheco, California in the San Francisco suburbs to meet Juan Urteauga and Mike the Pro Tools engineer for the project that had been working on it since March 11th. We decided to get a different mix at a different studio for our kind of music. Metal Blade suggested Juan at Trident Studios to mix the album so we agreed since Juan is a singer of an Extreme Death Metal band called Vile from Concord, CA. Juan had a nack for our sound and took the direction to a whole new level. Juan and Mike equalized around and found the sickest sound for us and had it dialed in when we got there. All the instruments can be heard, effects and layering tricks were added according to editing notes that I Bjorn and I created as a guideline check off sheet. We wanted vocals like the previous Metal Blade Demo that Aaron Carry did at Pipeline Audio. Nathan's vocals were dialed in 2 hours to create a sickening guttural chorus sound Drums were cleaned up and everything is done from the drummers perspective on this disc, so if you are a drummer you can play along with the album realistically and it would make sense. Bjorn's guitar is on the left side, and my guitar tracks are on the right speaker side. We worked on I Didn't Kill Her, Fantasy From Pain, and Lusting For Affection on the first day and we had to double check each mix after the day was done on the ride back to the hotel. I Didn't Kill Her contained Bjorn's wah Solo that fly's on this album! At the end of I Didn't Kill her there is a sample made of a man replacing a body he removed from the graveyard then walks away only to return later all underneath a storm. Fantasy From Pain contains radio am intro noises into his am guitar sound then blasts with volume to the original mix. Lusting For Affection contains 2 808 booms during the break down riff of the song that carries our small tradition on to this album. Subwoofers will pick up the frequency but high end speakers will not so don't worry. The first mix was unbalanced in levels, so we got that balanced the next day and had no complaints about the first 3 songs mixed after that.
March 22, 2002
We worked on the next 3 songs which were I Must Not Live, God Was Created and She Never Noticed Me. I Must Not Live had a lot of work such as going track by track leveling the dual solos from hell creating the atmosphere for them. I Must Not Live is a very powerful song that sets the scenes by the music itself. There are some parts on I Must Not Live that we do not play live, but when it comes to playing overdubs we always pick the heavier rhythm track to play instead (since each rhythm track is just as technical as the overdub itself) and maybe we will switch it up from time to time. She Never Noticed Me sets the school scenario with the intro of a classic high school sound. I am sure everyone at a young age in high school can relate to the silent crush that someone has against someone but we take that shit to a different horrid level he he. Jason's keyboard element is present on this song and is well respected to have that element of violin orchestra synth during this song. The next song we worked on was God Was Created and is the title track of the album. The chorus's of God Was Created are said with violent passion so watch out for I AM MY I AM MY I AM MY OWN SAVIOR! The song ends with an acoustic fade out along with the music, and I may add that Bjorn's Acoustic tracks came out more than excellent using that cheap Jasmine Guitar. There is a certain Chime/Church Bell strings sound about the guitar that makes the sound unique so he uses it on all albums. God Was Created's drums are excellent, you'll notice that Andy does a lot of new tricks from the previous drumming style on the first album The Thoughts From Which I Hide. By this time we were getting fidgety calling each other nicknames such as (Mike was Homeboy) then later conformed to (Homer), Mark was (Homer) in the beginning because everyone seems to guess at his name, (DMK) still sticks to my ass, Bjorn (Bajorn) and Jason seem to keep their regular names. Now we had 6 mixed songs to listen to when we went back to the hotel.
March 23, 2002
We had 6 mixes that we had no complaints about and proceeded to move forward.
The next tracks Made For Her Jesus, Christ, I Fucking Hate You, and The Lords Work were ready to be grilled and cooked. Made For Her Jesus starts out with JESUS! Then we had it get lower in pitch with a delay (US US US US) for that evil demonic intro sound we were looking for. NOTE: Nathan's vocals are not pitch controlled throughout any of the songs, he is really that LOW .we only use this pitch effect for Made For Her Jesus.
For this song I designed a perfect CD layout picture of what is to be imagined when reading the lyrics along with this song then it connects with school binders to the She Never Noticed Me artwork. Christ, I Fucking Hate You is one that your mom would hate! The lyric is said repetitiously and with violent angered emotion. There is a sick effect added to Father knew better than to take that away, his dick only went in her mouth and her ass! which was a Mike Schomig edit from The Saltmine studios. The Lords Work mix hits you like a elephant stepping on your face and wont get off. The song includes all the song tittles of this album within the lyrics combined along with additional lyrics to link them all together. There is a phaser effect I included in my guitar riff to give the song an errie change of pace.
March 24, 2002
The Last Fantasy was a hard song to mix because it had so many clean tones that we needed to balance out along with solos. Juan and Mike work excellent together when it comes to getting done what needs to be done. At this point we started getting familiar with the custom slang words such as Hella cool, Hella hard, and some other choice words. After all of that , we did a run down of all the songs we worked with for last minute level changes, and panning. We all look forward to working with the same studios and engineers in the near future for our next album Vehemence 3. We have 4 songs we are working on for a new one so we are pretty much on track. The new material will differ from this album because it will not be in concept form, and will sound somewhat different in style kind of way, lets say an even more experienced Vehemence album.
RECORDING THE TRACKS---------------------------SALTMINE STUDIOS
JANUARY 19TH 2002
Today was the last day for recording. John recorded his solo for I Didn't Kill Her, overdub for Fantasy From Pain, and The Last Fantasy Of Christ. This was a very long day where Bjorn, John, and another friend named Mike stayed all night till 10AM to the next day finishing the project. Our determination to get this done has paid off. There are some tracks missing such as one part that Jason will record soon on She Never Noticed Me. Things also left to be done are Fade ins and outs, and finding volume levels for this 64 track production. John can finally go to sleep at night knowing he has finished all the tracks that he forgot.... There are some pitch corrections that need to be made with some solos held out in sustain on I Must Not Live and Fantasy From Pain, other than those kind of edits the record will be killer. Mastering process is under negotiation. We don't know the street date yet until Evil Dave finishes the artwork. Evil Dave 2 will be born soon, so congrats to his new born child. As a whole group of band members and friends everyone got along just great and we give great respect to Mike Schomig, and Will Solaris for them not snapping and killing us. We will all wait patiently to hear the final mix of this CD and get back to you with more progress in further updates.
JANUARY 18TH 2002
Today Jason did his keyboard tracks for She Never Noticed me and Bjorn's overdub tracks where done in the morning and Jason's in the night.
JANUARY 17TH 2002
Today was an entire mix down day we await to record forgotten tracks.
JANUARY 16TH 2002
Keyboards were added by Jason only on She Never Noticed Me, and excessive mix down is being done. We wait! Let Mike the Magician handle it! Some tracks were forgotten and must be recorded still, but we will get those recorded after mix down/minor adjustments afterwards.
JANUARY 15TH 2002
Mix down is going in order of the song list, so far only 2 songs mixed, excessive work in mix down is being done. Vehemence is couch sitting, monitoring Mike and Will's work. Interns Grayson and Phil are helping out with food orders doing a good job. Bjorn presented a drawing he had made with glow and the dark paint and marker on the wall of recorded artists in the studio. A picture will be posted when the pictures are developed.
JANUARY 14TH 2002
Bjorn and John did guitar overdubs, including all acoustic guitar tracks finished. The Mix down process is just starting.
JANUARY 13TH 2002
Today was the end of Marks, bass session finishing up the songs perfectly. Mark took his time and really nailed all of his tracks down, some new ideas were brought up and completed as well like on the song The Lords Work. Nathan did awesome at his vocal tracks to day, The song Christ I Fucking Hate You, had some new Vocal ideas to it that captures the word Christ to be recognized. Bjorn accomplished his acoustic tracks on beginning of Made For Her Jesus, and the end of God Was Created. The acoustic element added gives it a medieval old century sound, with classical influence. There is a lot of harmonies that all come together in unison setting the flow of the song. Tomorrow is over dubs and John starts college, again. Solos will be dissected and made sure they come out to be wonderful takes.
JANUARY 12TH 2002
Today was a pretty exciting day to hear Nathan's vocal tracks and Marks vocal tracks. The album sounds explosive due to the techniques and textures used to form the vocals. Nathan as usual, pours his sweat on the ground he stands on from the amount of effort he puts into his Vocal tracks. Half of Marks bass tracks and half of Nathan's vocal tracks were recorded. Mike spent a whole night re listening to everything cleaning up wav forms. Mike, being a new friend to this band is more than comfortable with our music. He knows were every riff is now as if he were in the band. This has been a first for Mike working with this type of music. He can make anything talked about come to reality on the recording equipment. Along with Will's help in the punching in and mixing board help, Vehemence's confidence in this album is high enough to say it will be something new for the ears, in a high quality package that brands the band in metal history.
JANUARY 11TH 2002
Started recording John's basic guitar tracks at 3:00PM. The guitar session went on till 11:30PM, with a break to set up Marks Bass rig which sounds sick! The guitar tracks were spent well, getting all riffs as tight as they can be. We are running three microphones on Marks Bass rig to get the sound that we need. John is thinking of Re-doing She Never Noticed me on his guitar part after the bass tracks are finished. Mark recorded bass lines on Made For Her Jesus. Payments, Paper Work and Phone calls were made as well to clear up the rest of the negotiations.
JANUARY 10TH 2002
Vehemence would like to say there will be pictures shortly, we are extremely busy around these times and getting lack of sleep pushing our limits. Today at 2:00PM Andy finished his drum tracks with the help of John's guitar scratch tracks. Around 6:00pm it was lunch break for some of us, and Bjorn, Will, and Mike stayed to create the Vehemence Distortion to be used for the Guitars. The Distortion is made up of Line 6 Flextone, Line 6 POD Preamp, Mesa Boogie Dual Rectifier, Custom Krank Amp which is really a hot rodded Soldano amp. We have major confidence that this album will sound explosive and work perfect of Vehemence's sound/song structures. Andy did most of his drums in one take or less than 10. Bjorn recorded all of his guitar tracks from 7:00PM to 11:00PM. Rhythm tracks were recorded to Analog to maintain the heaviest sound possible. John started his recording of these three guitar tracks below. Hearing the guitars in stereo for the first time really gave us more confidence to know that we will create solid, flowing, head banging, flawless tracks. Mike and Will have helped with there input with being yes/no if each song was at its tightest after knowing the Vehemence songs, and repetition of the riffs being played. We have about 15 ears listening all at once, room full of musicians, technicians to insure that we will have a great take for each song.
1.MADE FOR HER JESUS
2.SHE NEVER NOTICED ME
6.THE LAST FANTASY OF CHRIST
JANUARY 9TH 2002
VEHEMENCE - "GOD WAS CREATED"
The first day consisted of arriving at the studio at 2:00PM for drum/microphone set up by Mike Schomig, and Will Solaris. Drum sound checks were done by Will Solaris hitting on the drums while Mike was setting the levels. Most of the bands waiting time is spent in the Green Room. A new room built for the Salt Mine Studio that is a lounge area for the bands. We play some Playstation 1 and 2,watch some dvd's, monitor how the recording is going by the camera monitor channels that are connected to the TV that is in the lounge area. Bjorn came in to do his fair share of the unrecorded guitar scratch tracks for Andy's Drum tracks for the day. Drum tracks for these songs below in this order, have been recorded. The track listing for the album will be different though, "according by the number that's the way they will be track listed."
1.MADE FOR HER JESUS
2.SHE NEVER NOTICED ME
6.THE LAST FANTASY OF CHRIST
3.FANTASY FROM PAIN
7.I DIDN'T KILL HER
8.GOD WAS CREATED
Vehemence Studio Report on Metal Blade's Website
