Michael Gaither

Eleven songs. How hard could that be? Really? As I’ve been gathering and working up material for the new record the past couple of years, I’ve been joking that “writing the songs is the easy part”. And it is. Sorta. But while recording isn’t necessarily easy – it’s work – it’s a fun process when you’re in the right hands. If you’re looking for formal instruction, audio production schools
might help you understand the recording process in more detail.

Today we finish our third, two-day stint in as many months – that’s two days, once a month, for the past three months, if you’re doing the math – at Bear Creek Studios in Santa Cruz. Justin Meyer is engineering this new record. Dayan Kai is producing, playing drums, and listening intently to every take, and we’ve brought in just a small handful of musicians to give this storytelling record a sparse band feel: When we finally wrap this up (end of April is likely), you’ll hear Steve Uccello (standup bass), Steve Kritzer (mandolin), and Brynn Albanese (violin) on different tracks. Yesterday, my pal Aaron Bagchee added his telecaster to a couple of songs. And in a few hours, Breanna Eddy will drop her wonderful vocals into a few songs.

It might seem odd that we’ve had almost a whole month between sessions. But that between time seems like where the real work lives: After each session, you listen to what you’ve done and then schedule and practice with the other players for the next couple of studio sessions.

You also make sure you don’t spent too much time on a blog post talking about it, so you have time to hit the road and be in the studio by 11:00 am…