It's Christmas!!

That's right! Love it or hate it, it's on the doorstep. Sorry for not updating too often, I've just been really busy (which can only be a good thing right?!) But for me, Christmas this year means being whisked away to the middle of nowhere to record with the absolutely fantabulous Matt Stalker and Fables. We are heading off to Allenheads, Northumberland to record the bulk of their second album, "Knots" and you can follow all the news on that by following the blog at http://wealltieourselvesinknots.tumblr.com/ . I'll be in the middle of nowhere just surrounded by my recording gear, and some amazing talent. I couldn't be happier.

Also, the lovely Meghann Clancy's new album "Take Flight" is finally finished, and will be ready to order digitally and as a physical copy from http://www.meghannclancy.co.uk as of Monday 10th December. We spent a lot of time on this one, and I also play electric bass on the album. You can hear some samples on Amazon by clicking here

Hmm what else has been cooking? Well, I've been working behind the scenes with Vinyl Jacket on some new demos... They have definitely upped their game songwriting-wise, but unfortunately these demos will probably not see the light of day for the general public. Hopefully they'll want to release one or two one day, but for now they will stay locked in the vault and I can release them 50 years from now and make myself some nice retirement money ;) Also, the very first song we ever worked on together, "Got The Badge" made it's debut on network television, on the show "Hollyoaks" on Channel 4. I'm sure many of us have fond memories of being students and watching that show, and to hear them play the entire song was certainly quite nice.

Following on from that, I have been working on some new BoxBoxBox tunes from Greg Genre, and you can hear them in the player below. I also saw him play live for the first time last week, and what an experience! Certainly a very unique line up timbre-wise, and also just great fun to watch!

Down at BaseHQ, I have been working on a couple of projects including a new Victory Mansions single, which is close to being completed, and some recordings from Newcastle band Revolver, and you can hear one of the tracks from that upcoming disc here:




Away from production, I've been gigging a lot more with my original band The Juggernaut Love Band, and we recently played a great gig at Hoochie Coochie in Newcastle. We're back there in the new year so you can keep an eye out for that, by either following us on twittier @Jugloveband or joining the facebook page at
https://www.facebook.com/JuggernautLove.

Thanks for reading if you made it this far, and have a great christmas!
Liam x

Updates as of July 2012

Hello to all you readers out there. I haven't updated this news page in a while (surprise surprise) so here's what's been happening since the last post.

Let's start things with some truly remarkable music from Ditte Elly. The genius that is Matt Stalker produced the disc, and I was happy assigned mixing duties. It's a very true record, and remarkable considering she has only been writing for a year and a half. Check it out!

Moving on from that, I've been playing bass a little more for Maiden England, the UK's greatest Iron Maiden tribute! It's a total blast and different to what I would normal be playing, especially on stage. It really makes you think harder in terms of stamina and playing efficiency. They're also all great guys which makes it much easier. We're playing 'Live after Death' in its entirety soon down at Trillians, so get yourself down if you can make it. Played a pretty fun gig at The Office, in South Shields also and that one got filmed:

My original funk/soul/disco band The Juggernaut Love Band have also started to do the occasional local gig, which is very fun. You can like us on facebook here:
https://www.facebook.com/JuggernautLove

And of course, coming in for the finale is Vinyl Jacket, who finally released their new single "Moment". It was recently played twice by Huw Stevens on Radio 1, and you can hear that below. If you want to hear it in it's glorious un-radio-fucked quality, you can get hold of it in a 'Pay By Tweet' promotion, just click those words on the soundcloud widget!



And that'll do for now. There's some other stuff happening too, Meghan Clancy's album is in the final stages of mixing, Matt Stalker is brimming with wonderful music but is holding onto it for now, and the lads from Cloud City Trap are also working on some more music. This will all be posted when there's some tracks up :)

2012 is well underway

Sorry I haven't updated the news here in a while, but i've been busy working hard which can only be a good thing!

I've been working on Meghann Clancy's new album, which is starting to sound really really great with the addition of cello and viola. Sprinkle of strings, a dash of rhythm section (with yours truly on the bass) and it should be ready to mix. As soon as a track is released you'll be able to find it on my Facebook page, which is at http://www.facebook.com/liamgaughanppt.

Also had a few very productive sessions with the interesting Greg Genre and his band BoxBoxBox. You can hear a demo of one of the tracks at their Bandcamp page

Continuing the singer/songwriter trend is Sam Donaghey who I have been working with over the past couple of weeks to get 3 tracks recorded. After a few attempts at various genres, we seem to have hit on something that is going to work well, and one of the tracks even includes a rare guitar solo from myself. Again, when these tracks see the light of day I will be sure to repost them.

Finally, had a bit of a taste of the big smoke, when Johnny B Goode came up for the weekend to record 4 demo tracks. The wonderful Steviekeys and Johnny always know how to have a laugh and it was a thoroughly enjoyable weekend. Just waiting on some mix revisions and they should be good to go!


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Outisde of the production world, I have also finally released a few of my own tunes to the world, and you can hear them at http://liamgaughan.bandcamp.com/.

I've also been working hard with my original funk/soul band and we should be gigging in the next month or two. It's not often I hit the stage with original music but this is sure to get your booty shakin' so be sure to make it to a gig if you can! Funky bass galore!

Winter 2011 Roundup

As we enter into 2012, here's a recap of what happened towards the end of the year.
I've been busy working at BaseHQ studios, on the new Victory Mansions album. It's now finished and you can hear one of the songs right here right now:

Corridors by victory_mansions

They are having an album launch night at World Headquarters in Newcastle, Info @ http://www.facebook.com/events/285053051543718/


Also, as I write this I am patiently awaiting the new Vinyl Jacket single to air on the Huw Stevens show on Radio 1. The track is called "Red Light" and the video is coming out very soon. In the meantime here's an embarrassing youtube clip they released:


There's also new music coming from Matt Stalker & Fables very soon, and I can't stop gushing about that band. Just push the faders up and the job is done. Sublime.

Last but not least we have a lovely singer-songwriter called Meghann Clancy, she is working towards a short album's worth of material. Next to be recorded is strings, which will be great as the opportunity only rears its head rarely. As soon as any clips come online you'll be sure to hear them, but her website is at http://www.meghannclancy.co.uk/.

Outside of this, I'm having a blast playing some good ol' funk with Black Snow and we should be recording another tune or two in the next few weeks with three new members.

Hope everyone has a great 2012,
cheers,
weez x

Summer draws to a close...

In typical British fashion, the summer has been and gone, with only perhaps a few days sunshine at best. However, the music's been flowin' well and there's lots to discuss.
In the wider world, there's new Red Hot Chili Peppers, Dream Theater, Nero, Opeth albums to name but a few which I'm totally loving, but there's lots going on in my own personal world too.

Danny Apple has just released his latest double A side online, and you can find that here:

http://www.amazon.co.uk/Feelin/dp/B005M8F9V0/ref=zg_bsnr_118633031_8


DANNY APPLE Feelin' by Narc Records

It seems to be selling quite well, and hopefully he'll be back to record more!

Also, the amazing Matt Stalker & Fables came to the studio to record their new Ghost EP which was released for charity, and you can hear that here: (Don't forget to buy it! It's all for charity, and music of this calibre should cost more than twice as much!!)

http://mattstalkerandfables.bandcamp.com/


Matt Stalker & Fables - Ghost (Children North East EP) by Matt Stalker & Fables

Bernaccia came in and did a 4 track session too:
Roadrunner by bernacciamusic



And last but of course not least, my boys Vinyl Jacket have something new coming up very shortly...

Gearing up for the new VJ Single release... Moving House....

That's right, it's that time again. Vinyl Jacket's new single 'Koala' has been finally finished and is doing the rounds online ready for it's physical release next month. You can have a sneek peak here


I also ended up doing live sound for them at NewcastleGateshead Evolution Festival which was a total blast:

Outside of this, my bands have started gigging a bit more. Had the first gig with my disco/funk band Black Snow, which is just great fun all round. Below is the demo we recorded:

Black Snow Demo by Liam Gaughan

I'm also gigging with Soul Technique a little more and we have our next gig on July 11th supporting Alex Clare at the Cluny 2, so that's worth checking out!

Finally, I'm moving across to the other side of Newcastle in july, over to Fenham. Excited about that, as i've been based in Heaton for so long. Couple that with a new computer and things are looking promising for the rest of the year.

Recent Happenings

Well, things are off to a great start this year. Vinyl Jacket are storming the world with their single "Painting Stations". It's getting plenty of airtime, including a full play on Radio 1, Capital FM, BBC6 Music, and every regional BBC Station. Have a deeks below:

Painting Stations - Huw Stephens [Radio 1] : 23 February 2011 by vinyljacketuk

Also, Matt Stalker & Fables are getting ready to release their new album with a show at the Independent in Sunderland, on April 1st. So get yourself down if you appreciate great honest music with exquisite harmonic and melodic gold!

http://www.facebook.com/event.php?eid=168217483215989

You can also hear a sample of the new album right here too:
Welded To Me, Barnacle To Bow by Matt Stalker & Fables

Even more special is that both bands appear together in NARC magazine this month, so be sure to pick it up. It's free!


Recording also re-commences with Cloud City Trap, after a christmas hiatus, so expect more tasty treats from them, hopefully in the shape of an album release!

Also, if you're visiting BaseHQ any time in the future, we're now rocking Pro Tools 9 down there, which means I can work much more quickly, confidently and efficiently than ever before, and the first session was with the band Kobadelta which went swimmingly.

Outside of the production world, I am starting to get in the swing of things with Soul Technique and for good measure here is their latest single, Move With Me:


Move with Me [Single] by Soul Technique

Radio 1 Airplay

That's right! On Monday 11th January, Vinyl Jacket's new single "Painting Stations" was played on the Chris Moyles show to an audience of 7.2 million people. Excited doesn't really sum it up. Shaking profusely is probably more accurate. I can't imagine how the band felt. It was their hard work that got the song there, I am merely a background player who put a lot of time and energy into it, and explaining why you're even excited to the uninitiated is a job in itself. Regardless, it was a huge moment for myself and most importantly the mix survived the wall of BBC compressors very well! Have a deeks below :)
Vinyl Jacket - Painting Stations [Chris Moyles Show, BBC Radio 1 11th Jan 2011] by Liam Gaughan

In other news, Cloud City Trap are coming back to continue with work on their as yet untitled album and I've also joined a new funk band, called Soul Technique which you can find out more about, at http://www.soultechnique.co.uk. Needless to say, as a bass player it's a very fun gig and playing in a band with an MC really does excite me seeing as I religiously praise a lot of hip hop, especially the way the rhythms interact with the beat. Lovely.

Cee-Lo Green - Forget You

Pro Tools 9... and upcoming work!

So Avid finally did it, they have released Pro Tools from it's hardware and now it's out in the wild for all to use. Greatest move ever if you ask me! I took the plunge the other day and it's a lot more stable than 7 or 8 ever was. It's great to have ADC, multi-track Beat Detective, better import settings, higher track counts, and basically everything it should have been from the start. Regardless, this is all useless without some great musicians to be filtering through it, and before Christmas we should be seeing some more music from the likes of Vinyl Jacket, Cloud City Trap, and I'm also excited to be mixing the new Matt Stalker and Fables record. This guy's chord choices will make you weak at the knees!! Hear more from each band below:

http://www.myspace.com/vinyljacketuk

http://www.myspace.com/cloudcitytrap

http://www.myspace.com/mattjstalker

So keep an eye out for some great music coming your way at the end of the year!

Thanks
Liam

Moving House...

There hasn't been much news in a while, I've been busy recording and mixing Boogie Down, (which you can hear in the player above) and Vinyl Jackets, whose next 3 tracks are nearing completion, and there's some tasty production coming up on those so hopefully you will all enjoy that. It was also the first time I used a Heil PR-30 dynamic mic for the vocals, and to be fair it sounds pretty hot, and I'm considering making the purchase!

I've also come to use melodyne for more than it's pitch correction alogrithms. It's also an amazing gate, seems to know exactly where the note starts and ends and it is much cleaner than a real-time gate. You can also use it to level out dynamics, such as when a vocalist changes from main to falestto, there's usually a big volume drop and increasing the volume of those syllables sounds a lot more transparent than letting a compressor do the work. It's something I had to pay attention to using the Heil because it captures the body of the sound so well, but some of the intricacies become a little to quiet compared to other phrases and melodyne really nailed it.

I'm also moving house at the end of the month, so want to get the mixes done before then. There's nothing worse than battling with a new room especially when there's pressure to get mixes finished! So hopefully even more audio gold being released in the next few weeks!

Weez x

Mixes of Epic Proportions

Thank christ that's over, note you can only see about 2/3rds of the tracks on the edit window, and about half on the mixer. Not to say bigger is better, but it's certainly my most intense mix yet, sounds great though, the songs should be released soon!

The computer just couldn't handle it at all however, and the only way to open the session was to bypass plugins (by holding shift as it loads) and then enabling them one by one and praying that it did not crash, or refuse to play with DAE errors. :( Really is time for a new computer I think :/

Muse - Undisclosed Desires

sm57 saves the day!

I'd heard great things about wrapping a Dynamic microphone in some sort of cloth and pushing it down behind the bridge/tail of an upright bass. I didn't know anything else about it, but at a recent location recording faced with my first upright bass, and no really capable condensers, I thought I would give it a bash. I was as sceptical as everyone else at the recording, and wrapped up my kick drum mic in a shirt to an array of pulled faces. Unfortunately, it was just too fat to squeeze in there, and the DI on the upright bass was dodgy at best with a pretty weedy tone, so I tried it with a 57 and it sounded average in the cans, but did pick up a surprising amount of bass for the size of the mic.

The true gold came out when I got home, and realized the 57 behind the bridge had worked a treat (at least enough for me). The low end is very solid, and it also captures great what I'd call "wood frequencies", which really distinguish the tone. Add a touch of RBass which makes some great sounding sub-bass and the end result was brilliant. (If only i could have got a larger diaphragm down there, could well have scrapped the RBass) The only downside was a lack of really high frequencies, which would have been better for solo passages perhaps. The line up was just the upright bass and acoustic guitar/vocals which let me keep the bass's character a lot more than in other line ups perhaps. It was a small house concert with a great vibe and I hope you can pick up on that from how the 57 performed on the night. Recordings here:

Little Gaps.. Huge Difference!!

Just working more on some mixes for my friend Greg, and thought it was worth highlighting how much difference leaving space in the bass line can make to a groove. Take the first example, the groove as I received it. Notice there's no rests in the line at all, but it does follow the kick drum quite nicely :

Audio Clip - http://www.liamgaughan.com/nogaps.mp3


However, just adding a little rest before the second note, really helps those first two kicks punch a lot better:

Audio Clip - http://www.liamgaughan.com/gaps.mp3

The technique was really brought to light to me by Dr. Dre and his bass player Mike Elizondo who commented once in an interview that Dr. Dre really opened his ears and showed him how effective the space could be used. It can be heard in use all over the first two Eminem albums, and 2001. There's a tidbit for the day.

Liam

Transcription : Jamiroquai - Seven Days in Sunny June [Bass]

Made this for a student, and thought it was worth a share. Great work for looking at 16th rhythms and really being in the pocket with the kick drum. Also has a great set of chords, plenty of theory to chew on for the harmonies. Oh yeah, it also is great fun to play!

Working on Ashananay mixes.. and the joys of Pro Tools.

I think everyone who has used Pro Tools for more than a week has shouted some pretty impressive obscenities at it, at one time or another, and today has been no exception. Aside from random lock ups, and spikes in the CPU usage which make recording nigh-impossible after inserting one EQ into the session, I've been presented with this more than once, today being no exception:



Of course you can remedy this by trashing prefs, but why should we have to do that every time we want to just get on with some bloody work?! And why does it even happen in the first place? No one has any real answer, apart from regurgitating Digidesign spiel which covers their lazy asses for having such a buggy program.

That aside, I did manage to get a decent mix going. Mixing works okay (for the moment) as I can just crank up the buffer size and get to work, but if I want to track anything that's a different matter. I have to load a new session and record the new tracks there, and use the Import Session Data command to get it into the mix. I hate working this way, I had none of this trouble using a USB MBox2 Mini, and Pro Tools 7. Now I use a Firewire M-Audio interface (yes with the recomended Digi firewire card as well) and it's always been a real mess or various errors. It's about time they scrapped the entire program and started again seeing as some of the code is over 11 years old, and on top of that the developers have admitted themselves on the DUC that they daren't change some of the older code because they have no idea how it works. Great. To think I rely on this program to make some sort of a rep for myself, and sometimes even keep a roof over my head, continues to perplex me. It's certainly a love/hate relationship

New News/Blog Page

Hello there world! This is my first post to my new blog, which will hopefully replace the news page on my website. I also hope to offer the odd tutorial, lessons, sheet music etc. Just random musical offerings of all shapes and sizes.
Thanks for reading
Liam