Side project session and updates

For a side project, I worked on recording vocals in the NEVE studio for artists, Tanaka Utete (Chief Tuté) and Kudzai Johnson (GHO$T). For Tanaka, I recorded his vocals over an instrumental that he wanted to lay a hook over so that he could use it for his performance at Coast2Coast Live in Melbourne. For Kudzai, I recorded his vocal over three instrumentals what he wanted to showcase on his SoundCloud and also to show on his Coast2Coast Live profile.

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For the session I decided to use the AKG C414 for both artists, I then experimented with using the Neumann U87 for the next session. The client had requested me to double up the hook and record and place some Adlibs. This didn’t take very long and the session ran smoothly, the only thing that slowed down the startup process was that someone had left monitor cut buttons on the console engaged which is something that can be easily overlooked in the initial stages of signal flow and hearing sound.

After a few takes the artist was happy with his performance and I had prepared a quick bounce for him to listen to after the session. Since it was a small job, I mixed and did a basic master for the track and sent it to him so that he could use it practice for his live performance. The only thing that I could’ve prepared better, which Guy Gray, our audio lecturer and industry professional, had taught us during a drum recording session, was to create a stereo audio track which had the input of the headphone send to create a bounce version that replicated the one they heard during the performance in the booth.

Apart from that, there weren’t any other issues. For the second artist, I was asked to record his original rap vocals over three instrumental tracks. The artist had a tendency to run out of breath and mix up his words because of the fast pace of his rap, I had to work around this by setting up playlists in Pro Tools and setting up quick punch to drop him in before his record verse would drop out where I had quickly edited and faded before so that there would be no clips or pops when he would hear his recorded verse back in his headphones.

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In the end, we ran out of time and only got to record one and half of the second track which wasn’t an issue because we had discussed more studio time in the future. The only thing that I believe set us back from completing all three tracks was that the artist could’ve practiced his verses more before coming in to record, however, the artist was fully aware of the time I had booked out and made it on time and was very easy to work with and worked quickly to get in the zone and prepare himself. Between takes, I would suggest both artists come back into the studio and listen to what it sounded like in the control room, also, made sure they stayed hydrated by providing them with water.

Our second session in the Neve was only and hour session as I had asked them last minute if they could make it to the session as my classmate, Jolon Silk, had asked me if I could help him record his artist from 1 to 5 pm, 2nd July. Jolon mentioned his artist had not got back to him at around 12pm so I decided to contact Kudzai if he was free to finish off those two tracks and he got back to me straight away saying he was keen however because he lives in North Lakes, it takes him around an hour and a half to get to SAE. I couldn’t confirm with Kudzai if I could record him as Jolon had said wait until 1:30 pm to see if the artist showed up, he didn’t. So I quickly message Kudzai and told him that we have confirmed the booking as Jolon’s artist was a no-show. I made my way to the studio and reached there around 2:30, I then went into the Neve to discuss with Jolon, that if his artist doesn’t pull through again, he can join my project 2 which an EP I'm making with Kudzai and Jordan Fonua (Skamux) and maybe Tanaka. Jolon was keen on the idea as he had seen how motivated and the strong work ethic both Kudzai and Tanka show by coming into a session that wasn’t planned in advance and was a last minute call that even I didn’t expect them to show up. This is why I work with these like-minded artists why I continue to try to build myself and our group (ZFG) which consist of myself as the producer/engineer and GHO$T and Skamux as the vocalists and producers that make their own original tracks.

More updates will come through as we progress through this EP, still untitled by we currently have around three to five tracks that are yet to be confirmed to be used on the EP, awaiting confirmation from both Jordan and Kudzai as they will be the ones rapping/singing over them.