what's it all about?

i have a good buddy who i really don't see anywhere near often enough called jason bell.  jason also happens to be an awesome bass and chapman stick^® player.  on a trip up to york, he and i met for an all too brief recording session.  this was one of those glorious pieces that just came together on the first go.

it was a sunny sunday morning and we just left the vs running.  jason wrote and recorded his truly wonderful and inspired part in one go. it immediately suggested a lead line to me and i stuck the solo straight on.  to keep the spontaneity, those are the takes we've used!  sure they could have been tighter and more in tune and a little neater, but hey, who cares?  i tried rerecording the guitar solo about a month later, and it just sounded too regimented.  so here it is, in all its groovy glory.  

it has meant that for live performances, i've had to meticulously work out a completely improvised guitar part, which for anyone who has never had to do that - is not recommended to preserve sanity!!!

and 'contact' - jason & i can spend hours on the phone making each other incapable with laughter, but the time when we really communicate is when we play.  that's when the contact really happens.  it's named after one of my favourite films, mainly because of the misunderstanding that it is about trying to talk to aliens - it isn't - it's about the communication between humankind, and all our belief systems.  sometimes we just need to find a different way of communicating. in contact, ellie arroway asserts that the aliens chose mathematics to communicate in because it is the only true universal language.  i would disagree, there is always music.  music has that universality which transcends words.  that's why i try not to write lyrics.  i can't express my feelings as openly as i can in what i feel when i play - so why bind the meaning?? 

instruments & tone sources

the stick went through all sorts of stuff in jason's rig before it got to the vs880, but i seem to remember that there was at least a yamaha delay pedal and a boss digital dimension pedal, plus a couple of swell pedals.  a second track of ebow stick (which jason and i feel may be the first time this has been done on an album..) went down - quite high.  a guitar ebow track then went down, ibanez through the vs880 guitar multi-effects direct.

then the solo guitar which was put down the same morning as soon as the backing track was finished; again, ibanez through the vs multi-effects.

nearly two years later, the keyboard part at the very beginning was added, plus the clean guitar run in the intro.  a harmony lead line was put in during verse two for the beginnings of phrases.

some handsonic percussion was added towards the end of the track, along with a killer piano part from steve gale that blends perfectly with the stick part at that point to give a very full backing at that point.

a couple of keyboard pads finish off the track.  i think the symphonic pad from the jv1080.

production comments

one of the key things about this track was the lack of a click track at initial record.  the internal metronome on the vs880 wasn't great (improved on the 1680) and i had no midi source with me.  so we did it with the best foot-tapping money could buy.  it led to some interesting timing problems later, but i don't think it sounds too bad.  just meant that it was almost impossible to sync anything afterwards.

there was very little post processing on this track, except for the transfer from vs to computer which again went through the vitalizer.  this track suffers from a very middle heavy sound, mainly due to the lead guitar going through the VS effects unit which doesn't have a great EQ section, and it was a real trade off between bite and clarity.

this was a hugely enjoyable track to do, it was completed in a little over one morning and then an afternoon of overdubs etc and then very little till it got to the album and final mastering through the Masterworks compressor & limiter.

thanks jason.  let's do it again soon.