Kiss Me, Judas

It's a cold, wet Thursday in January 2008 and we are at Sound Arc Studios, Shefford, Bedfordshire. By the time, Rob, Dave B and I get there we are twenty minutes late and time is ticking away. Dave Reid our previous drummer is on time as usual. He and Gareth, the studio engineer, are in the LIVE room and have pretty much completed setting up the drums. Too efficient!

The rest of us bugger about hauling guitars and effects pedals into the other sound rooms and generally get in each others' way while we bombard Gareth with questions and stop him from doing what he should be doing.

Eventually we are all set up with the amps in the individual rooms and we then trail our guitar leads and instruments through the LIVE room for a sound check. It is noted at this time (with much immature hilarity) that three of us had eaten curries the night before. Four men together in a warn room for a whole day with no extraction fan or windows. Hmmmm.

Sound checks done we are ready to unleash the first number. The intension is to get four tracks down, but Shefford time is running out and we know we are going to lose this race. The initial mix done we then spend the final three hours or so redoing some vocals, a couple of guitar parts and so on until Gareth is ready for the final mix. The speed that this guy works at is impressive and he makes many helpful suggestions along the way. John, the studio owner arrives late afternoon to make sure we are happy with everything and asks how the day has gone.

Finally, we end up with three tracks and we take away sample CDs to listen to. We listen in ours cars, home stereos, computers, portable players - you need to because things leap out at you later which you can easily miss in the studio. We comment and agree on some minor changes, then Rob and I go back a couple of days later just to fine tune the mix.

All in all a great day's work and a big thanks to Gareth and John for their support. You can contact the guys through their website, www.soundarc.com

A brief bit of info about who is doing what on the tracks

Smoke on the Water and Black Night is Brian on lead vocals and lead guitars with Dave Barber on backing vocals and rhythm guitars. Steamy Windows is Dave Barber on lead vocals and lead guitars with Brian on rhythm guitars. Rob handles all the bass and keyboard duties and Dave Reid features on drums and percussion.