Blue Jay July 11th

This bird thing is following me everywhere now, for some reason. The studio I am now working in, is way out in the Massachusetts countryside (in a bunker underground actually.) The owners decided to call it Blue Jay, which sounds innocuous enough. Kevin Richardson from the Backstreet Boys being one of ‘em (owner not bird) Don’t let that put you off. This place is amazing.

We used this facility last time for the Clan Destiny album and this time I’m laying vocal tracks down on my own, plus tidying up some of the guitar parts. I’ll send the tracks over to Bob and Muddy and they will do their vocal tracks somewhere else on another continent. We’ll probably mix here though. The engineer, Giles Christenson and I are putting in 12 hour days which sounds a lot but it means nothing in an underground studio, since you are in a cocoon with coffee and food on tap and the concept of time disappears. Most musicians love the studio environment for that reason. It can be addictive if you can afford it. We have young interns from Boston’s Berklee School of Music to do our bidding with supplies etc.

So far I’ve worked on my tune “Your Indulgence” and “Muddy’s dark and mysterious “Dancing with the Shadows” plus “ Growing Up” and a song written by my son Aynsley and myself called “Disappearing.” I did escape last night, playing hooky, in order to check out Roger Water’s show at the Dodge Amphitheater in Hartford. I’d seen him last year and was blown away for the second time. Do yourselves a favor; this is unequivocally the best rock show out there at this present time. Snowy White and Dave Kilminster do a great job on twin leads.

I’m not necessarily a Floyd fan but this show has it all. Imax style back projection, the inflatable pig and floating astronaut, cool pyros and 5.1 surround sound. It was a great vibe sitting out on lawn chairs being entertained for 3 hours along with the stoners and party animals. Our tickets cost 35 bucks and we were back a ways but nothing was lost – real value for money show in these days of ridiculous concert ticket prices. Coincidentally, I met sound man Dennis Marturano and his wife Mary. Dennis has mixed sound for us at certain East Coast venues.

Back to the Ash; I expect we’ll finish this project this month and hopefully mix it by the end of August, once we have the festival dates out of the way.

Oh yes, one final thing. The guys in the studio naturally have Apple I Phones now and I got to check one out, at close quarters…. even better in real life than on the TV adds. This thing is a ‘must have’ even with the limited I Pod storage facility.

Later ~ A.P.