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April 29
Well, well … are you still out there?
We’re still here, alive & well, putting the finishing touches on the album. Yes, really. “Finishing” as in nearly finished.
Now, what have we been up to?
First of all, we did two sessions with more special guest musicians. Both on the song “Broken”. The first one was very talented flute player called Ilse Vromans. Second, the also very talented Valérie Rijckmans played harp. They both added their magic and the song is taking on epic proportions now. Still more to come, but I’ll get to that in a minute.
Second, we’re very happy to introduce to you the newest member of the Tass, on the keyboards: mr. Alex Heikamp! (fade in the big cheer). Yup, we’re a five piece now. In fact, this is the band and the sound we envisioned from the start. Mark and Alex and I also go way back: we used to rock together in that little ol’ Elvis-tribute band … And we feel very fortunate the opportunity arose to work together again and so far, it’s been a blast. Besides becoming a father, he’s also managed to familiarize himself with the songs really fast. In fact, we’re nearly finished recording his parts for the album.
Some technical innovations and acquisitions for gearheads (skip to the next paragraph if the term gearhead doesn’t apply to you ….): the Universal Audio DSP card is the bomb! This thing emulates all kinds of vintage compressors and channel strips and EQ without the hassle of the real thing and at a fraction of the cost. Highly recommended. But if somebody made me an offer to part with, let’s say, their vintage LN 1167 for a couple of hundred bucks I wouldn’t spit at that, either … ;o). Plugins imitate the real thing, but it is what it is … a copy … More acquisitions … let’s see: a Focusrite trakmaster. It’s a nice clean mic pre, a no-brainer, really. Love it. And: (drumroll, please) some cool new guitars. Yup, new ones, not vintage ones. One I built together with my dad from Warmoth parts: a Telly of course. Color: desert sunset (dark orange sparkle). It rocks. And for that reason, it’s all over the album by now. And the newest member: a keen green cheapo Danelectro! By mailorder. And after fixing some minor setup problems, this baby is turning out to be quite a catch: raw and raucious. She made her recording debut on the song “Broken”.
Even more good news … whew … we’ve aquired the amazing arranging talents of mr. Erik Arvinder. He’s gonna score seven songs for us and arrange and record the string section. By the way, these parts are gonna be recorded in Sweden! (It’s a small world after all … somebody cue the Muppets!). Now, that’s exciting. Of course we’re (still) a rock band, but it’s a dream come true to have a real string section – in fact almost a full orchestra – on some of our songs. A lot of great record have great strings on it … lots of Beatles songs, Eagles, Springsteen, Stones, Zeppelin and lest we forget: Warren Zevon. So, our record’s gonna be in some pretty good company. We’re very excited about this. Everything should come together by the end of may, so especially in our book, that’s pretty damn fast!
And for those of you who actually read these ramblings and don’t know already: we’re playing the Queenpop festival in our hometown tomorrow, Wednesday the 30th of April. Sjoerd couldn’t make it, so it’s gonna be an nice little unplugged set, with a few surprises … we actually sounded good at rehearsal! So we’ll keep our fingers crossed for the gig, hope to see lots of familiar and unfamiliar faces, there.
Until next time, be safe.
Posted by: Ralph
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