The EP that Kevin Cogliano and I have been working on (as "Pico and Alvarado") is available for download from Bandcamp! It's $2 for 25 minutes, and if you think you've already heard most of the songs, I've got news for you: they've been thoroughly remixed and remastered. Plus there's an extended remix in the style of the typical '80s twelve-inch dance mix...I think you'll like it!
Oh, and about those figures on the cover...they are -- you guessed it -- Pico and Alvarado themselves. Knit-vixens Annissa and Lydia have spent the last two months destroying their fingers to make those things. I wish we could give you a free pair with every album because they're terrific!
Showing posts with label Pico and Alvarado. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Pico and Alvarado. Show all posts
Tuesday, June 28, 2011
Monday, March 07, 2011
"Kaffe Katt" by Pico & Alvarado
Several months ago, Kevin Cogliano -- the "Alvarado" in "Pico & Alvarado" -- sent me a demo titled something like "That's What I Call 80s!"
And he was right. It was a perfect distillation of the fun pop songs we'd grown up with, all jangly and bouncy and downright carefree.
My task -- as I saw it -- was to maintain that feeling while simultaneously beefing up the song and over complicating it, adding enough twists and turns to make even the most ADD listener happy. One reason I wanted to do this was because I felt that "Style Kitchen" had never gotten the loving care it had deserved (an opinion -- I realize now -- more to do with overexposure to the song than to any actual defects), but also because I know I shy from experimentation...I don't like throwing in big changes, moving things around a timeline, or trying anything new.
So consider the final result -- "Kaffe Katt" -- as a journey outside my comfort zone. And while I'm still too close to it to give it an honest evaluation, I think it's pretty darn good.
(Photograph "Awning" by Patrick!)
Want to know more? Here's the finished timeline:
You'll notice a LOT of guitar tracks this time. The first track is the ongoing "cha-cha-chung" with a nice flange, and many of the rest are Kevin's experiments with doubling. The final four guitar tracks are more recent versions that he sent along during the course of the project, but I loved the rougher ones in the original batch...the cleaner tracks (including a nice delayed guitar) provide a good gentle conclusion.
My first real bombastic addition was the "G Blast" guitar, which coincides with a hyperactive series of crashes at the end of every verse. Kevin's guitar was already going manic during those segments but I really wanted to bash them out...so "G Blast" gets the "Modern UK Stack" treatment with Guitar Amp Pro, and the "crashes" are just a re-routed track from EZDrummer boosted all the way to heaven.
EZDrummer provides the main beat, while Ultrabeat provides a non-stop 4/4 kick and iDrum adds a snare and -- during the high point -- all those cheap drum effects. Lots and lots of drums in here, but I think it works.
Kevin's original tracks had included a Hammond-ish organ and a synth bassline...I kept the organ (augmented with the EVB plugin) but used his MIDI files with the same Minimoog/Taurus IK Multimedia "SampleMoog" preset I'd created for an earlier song. Also from IK Multimedia is the choir in the third section and the recurring pizzicato violin that I hope is "interesting" instead of "annoying."
This song's big additional experiment: Loomer's brilliant "String" instrument, which emulates 70s string machines WITHOUT eating all your CPU (and all your money). I'm totally in love with Loomer String and I highly recommend it.
The really abrasive portamento synth is Tal-Elek7ro, based off the "LD Club Saw XS" preset. There's also some Ensoniq ESQ in there with the organ stabs and the bells, and some really inconsequential DOD pitch/echo modulation on the plucky violins.
And there you have it!
And he was right. It was a perfect distillation of the fun pop songs we'd grown up with, all jangly and bouncy and downright carefree.
My task -- as I saw it -- was to maintain that feeling while simultaneously beefing up the song and over complicating it, adding enough twists and turns to make even the most ADD listener happy. One reason I wanted to do this was because I felt that "Style Kitchen" had never gotten the loving care it had deserved (an opinion -- I realize now -- more to do with overexposure to the song than to any actual defects), but also because I know I shy from experimentation...I don't like throwing in big changes, moving things around a timeline, or trying anything new.
So consider the final result -- "Kaffe Katt" -- as a journey outside my comfort zone. And while I'm still too close to it to give it an honest evaluation, I think it's pretty darn good.
(Photograph "Awning" by Patrick!)
Want to know more? Here's the finished timeline:
You'll notice a LOT of guitar tracks this time. The first track is the ongoing "cha-cha-chung" with a nice flange, and many of the rest are Kevin's experiments with doubling. The final four guitar tracks are more recent versions that he sent along during the course of the project, but I loved the rougher ones in the original batch...the cleaner tracks (including a nice delayed guitar) provide a good gentle conclusion.
My first real bombastic addition was the "G Blast" guitar, which coincides with a hyperactive series of crashes at the end of every verse. Kevin's guitar was already going manic during those segments but I really wanted to bash them out...so "G Blast" gets the "Modern UK Stack" treatment with Guitar Amp Pro, and the "crashes" are just a re-routed track from EZDrummer boosted all the way to heaven.
EZDrummer provides the main beat, while Ultrabeat provides a non-stop 4/4 kick and iDrum adds a snare and -- during the high point -- all those cheap drum effects. Lots and lots of drums in here, but I think it works.
Kevin's original tracks had included a Hammond-ish organ and a synth bassline...I kept the organ (augmented with the EVB plugin) but used his MIDI files with the same Minimoog/Taurus IK Multimedia "SampleMoog" preset I'd created for an earlier song. Also from IK Multimedia is the choir in the third section and the recurring pizzicato violin that I hope is "interesting" instead of "annoying."
This song's big additional experiment: Loomer's brilliant "String" instrument, which emulates 70s string machines WITHOUT eating all your CPU (and all your money). I'm totally in love with Loomer String and I highly recommend it.
The really abrasive portamento synth is Tal-Elek7ro, based off the "LD Club Saw XS" preset. There's also some Ensoniq ESQ in there with the organ stabs and the bells, and some really inconsequential DOD pitch/echo modulation on the plucky violins.
And there you have it!
Monday, December 27, 2010
"End Credits (To A German Film)" by Pico & Alvarado
When I'm not writing I'm usually working on music, and since I rarely updated the blog this month you know what that means: a new "Pico & Alvarado" song! This one is called "End Credits (To A German Film)" and contains piano and music box contributions by Kathryn Jones:
Photography by Patrick!
Here is the usual track postmortem, for those who enjoy that sort of thing.
As so often happens, Kevin Cogliano sent me tracks containing a number of electric guitar variations and a bass guitar. He'd envisaged a "Krautrock" sort of song, and though I'm not sure if we achieved that in the end (my knowledge of that genre is still limited) I think we came up with something sort of special.
After adding a Moog bassline of my own (the same pedigree as the one that showed up in "Scrubland") and some stoic electric drums courtesy of EZDrummer, I found myself playing with some samples that I'd recorded on my SP-404 SX hardware sampler. I added a sampled Bif Naked acoustic guitar and a looped country-style guitar courtesy of The Weepies (which you can barely hear), but "Sweetkraut" really kicked into high gear when I added the "BASH" track: a guitar, drum, and bass slam culled from the same Bif Naked track and DRENCHED in reverb.
By delaying the "BASH" until the melody had played a few times we already had our first big hook. I added an abrasive ARP-style synth (the TAL U-NO-62 plugin) and some extremely atmospheric Camel Audio Alchemy pads, and Kevin sent additional guitar figures, and we got very excited indeed...excited enough to call in Kathryn to improvise some keyboard accents that were far more deft than I could have accomplished.
I arranged Kathryn's work throughout the song (using the beautiful Steinway EXS24 samples and the EVP88 for the "music box" middle)...
...but I started to worry because it just kept repeating, and I couldn't think of a way to break out of the melody, particularly considering the wonderful structure that had already been built. I couldn't just tear it all down, and I wasn't even sure if that was the right direction...maybe the repetitions were part of the song's strength, and I was only getting paranoid because I'd heard it 1000 times already?
Kevin and I decided on the latter opinion, and I decided that all the song needed was a bit more punch and variety. I played a Roy Orbison sample with the SP-404 -- using the hardware's live pitch adjustment to conform to the melody, and then using Melodyne to correct the wildly off results (hence the final oddness) -- and added some distorted Front 242 drum loops and the angsty German samples because I like a nice burst of speech (you can figure them out for yourself!)
All that was left was to use pan and EQ to resolve a crucial problem: the "slowarpdelay" guitar, the punchy guitar, the piano, and the "Moody Bloody" Chamberlain melody all shared similar frequencies...and they all tend to play at the same time. I couldn't bring myself to cut any of them out so I spent a lot of time tweaking, riding virtual faders, and sobbing. This was the best I could do. I also had a terrible time removing sample clicks from the guitar fadeout and eliminating a high-pitched artifact in the Orbison sample...next on the list of planned purchases is a good spectral editing program.
Harmonic excitement, a bit of compression, a touch of loudness processing, and...we decided to change the name. "Sweetkraut" suddenly seemed rude when a German woman was shouting during the song. Kevin's new title is much better and adds an evocative touch, I think!
Photography by Patrick!
Here is the usual track postmortem, for those who enjoy that sort of thing.
As so often happens, Kevin Cogliano sent me tracks containing a number of electric guitar variations and a bass guitar. He'd envisaged a "Krautrock" sort of song, and though I'm not sure if we achieved that in the end (my knowledge of that genre is still limited) I think we came up with something sort of special.
After adding a Moog bassline of my own (the same pedigree as the one that showed up in "Scrubland") and some stoic electric drums courtesy of EZDrummer, I found myself playing with some samples that I'd recorded on my SP-404 SX hardware sampler. I added a sampled Bif Naked acoustic guitar and a looped country-style guitar courtesy of The Weepies (which you can barely hear), but "Sweetkraut" really kicked into high gear when I added the "BASH" track: a guitar, drum, and bass slam culled from the same Bif Naked track and DRENCHED in reverb.
By delaying the "BASH" until the melody had played a few times we already had our first big hook. I added an abrasive ARP-style synth (the TAL U-NO-62 plugin) and some extremely atmospheric Camel Audio Alchemy pads, and Kevin sent additional guitar figures, and we got very excited indeed...excited enough to call in Kathryn to improvise some keyboard accents that were far more deft than I could have accomplished.
I arranged Kathryn's work throughout the song (using the beautiful Steinway EXS24 samples and the EVP88 for the "music box" middle)...
...but I started to worry because it just kept repeating, and I couldn't think of a way to break out of the melody, particularly considering the wonderful structure that had already been built. I couldn't just tear it all down, and I wasn't even sure if that was the right direction...maybe the repetitions were part of the song's strength, and I was only getting paranoid because I'd heard it 1000 times already?
Kevin and I decided on the latter opinion, and I decided that all the song needed was a bit more punch and variety. I played a Roy Orbison sample with the SP-404 -- using the hardware's live pitch adjustment to conform to the melody, and then using Melodyne to correct the wildly off results (hence the final oddness) -- and added some distorted Front 242 drum loops and the angsty German samples because I like a nice burst of speech (you can figure them out for yourself!)
All that was left was to use pan and EQ to resolve a crucial problem: the "slowarpdelay" guitar, the punchy guitar, the piano, and the "Moody Bloody" Chamberlain melody all shared similar frequencies...and they all tend to play at the same time. I couldn't bring myself to cut any of them out so I spent a lot of time tweaking, riding virtual faders, and sobbing. This was the best I could do. I also had a terrible time removing sample clicks from the guitar fadeout and eliminating a high-pitched artifact in the Orbison sample...next on the list of planned purchases is a good spectral editing program.
Harmonic excitement, a bit of compression, a touch of loudness processing, and...we decided to change the name. "Sweetkraut" suddenly seemed rude when a German woman was shouting during the song. Kevin's new title is much better and adds an evocative touch, I think!
Friday, November 26, 2010
"Style Kitchen" By Pico & Alvarado
Thrilled with the results of our first collaboration, Kevin Cogliano and tackled the next one: "Style Kitchen." Kevin sent the guitar and bass to me and I added drums, keys, mixing, and mastering, without altering his original style much at all. Here it is (with another great picture by Patrick):
Want more demystifying details? Here's the arrange window for the project, slightly more sane and restrained than "Sandbar" was:
The bass has been treated with some amp simulation and CamelPhat's "Acid Movement" preset, which adds a certain bum-shakiness. There's a rhythmic "jangly guitar" in there which was hellish to separate from the lead guitar, which I tried to fatten by panning two separate instances, detuning one slightly, and carving each a separate set of frequencies in the EQ.
I'm not entirely happy with the lead guitar...it can sound flimsy on some speakers, and there's a terrifying lopsidedness around 3k throughout the entire song (even more terrifying when mastered to bring the guitar out further). But they always say "trust your ears, not the meters," so I decided to just go with it, aware that we were deliberately invoking the tinny-guitar sound of '80s pop.
I made the mistake of choosing iZotrope's iDrum for the fundamental drum pattern, because I wanted it to sound like it was programmed on a somewhat limited pattern-based drum machine (which is what iDrum IS). But this program is SO goddamn flaky for me. Every time I wanted to tweak the mix a bit I had to weigh the possibility that iDrum might refuse to give me a workable drum track; about 60% of the time it will miss a beat during a bounce, stuttering a bit, which means you can't even walk away and let the bounce happen, you need to sit and listen to the whole damn thing.
In conclusion: I am finished with using iDrum as a pattern-based drum machine. It turns any sort of serious work into a nightmare, and all their technical support can say is "Have you tried reinstalling it?" I can still use iDrum as a MIDI-controlled sample-playback plugin, but I won't waste any more time trying to get it to do what it's supposed to do.
Reader, if you're looking for a drum machine, do not buy iDrum.
On a plus side I've discovered the joy of Logic Pro's EXS24 sampler, and their Steinway Piano patch is the piano stuff you're hearing throughout. I can't play the piano to save my life, so it's pretty much just a bunch of chords cut up to sound the way I imagine a semi-proficient (but ham-fisted) piano player sounds.
The pad sounds are also thanks to the EXS24, and they're from a beautiful set of Solina multi-samples courtesy of SampleTekk. People swear by them and I love all the samples I've purchased from them (the Solina, the Prophet, the Baroque Organ, and the "Anvils and Churchbells"), but their download procedure is archaic and they provide no installation instructions, just a bunch of samples in a bunch of cryptic folders.
Anyway, the Solina sounds beautiful. I melt every time I hear it, thanks to the opening minutes of Mike Oldfield's "Hergest Ridge."
The lead synth is a layered series of ARP waveforms from SampleTank's "SonikSynth 2" collection, the tinkly bells are from Logic's EFM1, the wobbly bass is actually a funky electric piano pitched very low, and the squishy rhythmic guitar mutilation is -- surprise -- CamelPhat and CamelSpace.
One other thing: I had a high-minded plan to live up to Kevin's proposed "Style Kitchen" title by actually RECORDING myself making food in my kitchen, along the lines of Pink Floyd's "Alan's Psychedelic Breakfast." The song would start and end with eggs cracking, bacon sizzling, and water boiling, and right in the middle there'd be the "DING!" of my toaster oven.
There were two problems with this plan: the only sounds my cooking usually produce are the sounds of my microwave running, and actually recording all that stuff would be a pain far out of proportion to the potential benefits to the song. Instead I just grabbed the "small bell" sample from Logic Pro's library and played with it until it SOUNDED like my toaster oven. Same result, no grease-spattering.
Want more demystifying details? Here's the arrange window for the project, slightly more sane and restrained than "Sandbar" was:
The bass has been treated with some amp simulation and CamelPhat's "Acid Movement" preset, which adds a certain bum-shakiness. There's a rhythmic "jangly guitar" in there which was hellish to separate from the lead guitar, which I tried to fatten by panning two separate instances, detuning one slightly, and carving each a separate set of frequencies in the EQ.
I'm not entirely happy with the lead guitar...it can sound flimsy on some speakers, and there's a terrifying lopsidedness around 3k throughout the entire song (even more terrifying when mastered to bring the guitar out further). But they always say "trust your ears, not the meters," so I decided to just go with it, aware that we were deliberately invoking the tinny-guitar sound of '80s pop.
I made the mistake of choosing iZotrope's iDrum for the fundamental drum pattern, because I wanted it to sound like it was programmed on a somewhat limited pattern-based drum machine (which is what iDrum IS). But this program is SO goddamn flaky for me. Every time I wanted to tweak the mix a bit I had to weigh the possibility that iDrum might refuse to give me a workable drum track; about 60% of the time it will miss a beat during a bounce, stuttering a bit, which means you can't even walk away and let the bounce happen, you need to sit and listen to the whole damn thing.
In conclusion: I am finished with using iDrum as a pattern-based drum machine. It turns any sort of serious work into a nightmare, and all their technical support can say is "Have you tried reinstalling it?" I can still use iDrum as a MIDI-controlled sample-playback plugin, but I won't waste any more time trying to get it to do what it's supposed to do.
Reader, if you're looking for a drum machine, do not buy iDrum.
On a plus side I've discovered the joy of Logic Pro's EXS24 sampler, and their Steinway Piano patch is the piano stuff you're hearing throughout. I can't play the piano to save my life, so it's pretty much just a bunch of chords cut up to sound the way I imagine a semi-proficient (but ham-fisted) piano player sounds.
The pad sounds are also thanks to the EXS24, and they're from a beautiful set of Solina multi-samples courtesy of SampleTekk. People swear by them and I love all the samples I've purchased from them (the Solina, the Prophet, the Baroque Organ, and the "Anvils and Churchbells"), but their download procedure is archaic and they provide no installation instructions, just a bunch of samples in a bunch of cryptic folders.
Anyway, the Solina sounds beautiful. I melt every time I hear it, thanks to the opening minutes of Mike Oldfield's "Hergest Ridge."
The lead synth is a layered series of ARP waveforms from SampleTank's "SonikSynth 2" collection, the tinkly bells are from Logic's EFM1, the wobbly bass is actually a funky electric piano pitched very low, and the squishy rhythmic guitar mutilation is -- surprise -- CamelPhat and CamelSpace.
One other thing: I had a high-minded plan to live up to Kevin's proposed "Style Kitchen" title by actually RECORDING myself making food in my kitchen, along the lines of Pink Floyd's "Alan's Psychedelic Breakfast." The song would start and end with eggs cracking, bacon sizzling, and water boiling, and right in the middle there'd be the "DING!" of my toaster oven.
There were two problems with this plan: the only sounds my cooking usually produce are the sounds of my microwave running, and actually recording all that stuff would be a pain far out of proportion to the potential benefits to the song. Instead I just grabbed the "small bell" sample from Logic Pro's library and played with it until it SOUNDED like my toaster oven. Same result, no grease-spattering.
Tuesday, November 16, 2010
"Sandbar" by Pico & Alvarado
Feeling like my musical development was stagnating, I asked Kevin Cogliano to let me remix some guitar tracks he was working on. I added keyboards and drums to his bass and guitar, then he sent more guitar tracks my way, and before we knew it we had "Sandbar." Kevin and I kicked around band names before we decided on "Pico & Alvarado." I am Pico, and here is our first song.
This was, by far, the most complicated piece of music I've ever worked on. This partly because of the changes that the song goes through, but also because I overdid the "wall of sound" by a factor of ten; many of the subtleties are not apparent in the final mix, and many of them could have been accomplished without duplicating tracks quite so much. See below for the final project (excluding auxiliary sends and buses without automation).
Care to know more? Well, the bass is reminiscent of New Order partly because that's how Kevin plays it, but also due to the Logic Pro Bass Amp plugin set to Top Class DI Mid, and also due to the "Guitar Dream" setting in CamelPhat.
There are four drum tracks, each with multiple outputs for individual treatment. The electronic-type drums are thanks to Toontrack's "Electronic" EZDrummer plugin, and the acoustic drums are from Toontrack's default settings. Both of those were sent to my DOD delay processor for additional weirdness, and some additional "sub" kicks were added with iZotrope's iDrum when necessary.
The guitars! Kevin sent me a whole bunch of guitar tracks...rhythmic pieces, hooky stuff, accents, etc. The hardest part was making sure they all stood out in the mix, and I thank Roey Izhaki's book "Mixing Audio" for panning, reverb, and EQ guidance. The "crunchy" guitars during the "harsh" section use CamelPhat's "Gtr American" setting for added presence. I love all things Camel Audio. I use their plugins in every single project.
The keyboards! Some of them are patches from my ESQ-1 synth, including the primary marimba sound (which is complimented by a Korg M1 Le patch and one of Logic's EXS24 harps). The "sample and hold" synth from the intro is Logic's ES1, and the choppy keys are from the free TAL U-NO-62 Juno-emulation plugin. The angelic keys that end the song are from Camel Audio's brilliant "Alchemy" sampler/synth, Logic's "Strings" plugin, and a bit of bassiness thanks to Logic's ES M soft synth.
The samples? Besides the recurring "brrrr" sound (which I snagged from EZDrummer), there are some crowd noises and quotations from the "Gimme Shelter" documentary...I initially just wanted Grace Slick saying "Easy...easy" to follow the "harsh" section, but I couldn't isolate her voice without making it sound weird. Instead, the "yahoo!" crowd noises found their way in, as well as a brief snippet of a Hell's Angel about to make a speech. Happy accidents!
Add to it all some guitar pedal "wash" effects provided by Kevin, some mixing advice from Vanilla, some Lexicon reverb, and the removal of a whole bunch of extra sounds that didn't need to be there, and "Sandbar" was born!
Then it needed to be MASTERED...which is a story I'll tell some other day. You'll also get to hear about the "video mix" and maybe even see the video (if I ever get around to finishing it). In the meantime you can just enjoy the photograph, which Patrick took with his Holga camera and kindly allowed us to use.
This was, by far, the most complicated piece of music I've ever worked on. This partly because of the changes that the song goes through, but also because I overdid the "wall of sound" by a factor of ten; many of the subtleties are not apparent in the final mix, and many of them could have been accomplished without duplicating tracks quite so much. See below for the final project (excluding auxiliary sends and buses without automation).
Care to know more? Well, the bass is reminiscent of New Order partly because that's how Kevin plays it, but also due to the Logic Pro Bass Amp plugin set to Top Class DI Mid, and also due to the "Guitar Dream" setting in CamelPhat.
There are four drum tracks, each with multiple outputs for individual treatment. The electronic-type drums are thanks to Toontrack's "Electronic" EZDrummer plugin, and the acoustic drums are from Toontrack's default settings. Both of those were sent to my DOD delay processor for additional weirdness, and some additional "sub" kicks were added with iZotrope's iDrum when necessary.
The guitars! Kevin sent me a whole bunch of guitar tracks...rhythmic pieces, hooky stuff, accents, etc. The hardest part was making sure they all stood out in the mix, and I thank Roey Izhaki's book "Mixing Audio" for panning, reverb, and EQ guidance. The "crunchy" guitars during the "harsh" section use CamelPhat's "Gtr American" setting for added presence. I love all things Camel Audio. I use their plugins in every single project.
The keyboards! Some of them are patches from my ESQ-1 synth, including the primary marimba sound (which is complimented by a Korg M1 Le patch and one of Logic's EXS24 harps). The "sample and hold" synth from the intro is Logic's ES1, and the choppy keys are from the free TAL U-NO-62 Juno-emulation plugin. The angelic keys that end the song are from Camel Audio's brilliant "Alchemy" sampler/synth, Logic's "Strings" plugin, and a bit of bassiness thanks to Logic's ES M soft synth.
The samples? Besides the recurring "brrrr" sound (which I snagged from EZDrummer), there are some crowd noises and quotations from the "Gimme Shelter" documentary...I initially just wanted Grace Slick saying "Easy...easy" to follow the "harsh" section, but I couldn't isolate her voice without making it sound weird. Instead, the "yahoo!" crowd noises found their way in, as well as a brief snippet of a Hell's Angel about to make a speech. Happy accidents!
Add to it all some guitar pedal "wash" effects provided by Kevin, some mixing advice from Vanilla, some Lexicon reverb, and the removal of a whole bunch of extra sounds that didn't need to be there, and "Sandbar" was born!
Then it needed to be MASTERED...which is a story I'll tell some other day. You'll also get to hear about the "video mix" and maybe even see the video (if I ever get around to finishing it). In the meantime you can just enjoy the photograph, which Patrick took with his Holga camera and kindly allowed us to use.
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