Time is fleeting, and this week proved that to me in a major way. After spending the few spare evenings rehearsing and prepping for a Pinscape show on Thursday evening, I was left with only a few equally-booked weekend days to record this song. Enter Friday night…


The couch is calling my name, but the Korg is glaring furiously at me from across the room. It's clear another impromptu living room session is in order so I grab the laptop and audio interface from the basement and get things wired up. A chord progression quickly comes together on the SV-1 keys which I record as MIDI into Cubase for further refinement. A mere 30 minutes later and we have a full arrangement laid out in the sequencer with some basic drums. Nice!


The main snare needs some more movement which calls for an old favorite effect on a Return channel: Native Instruments "The Finger". I sequence a few glitchy bits through this effect via MIDI notes and call it good. Relative newcomer "BreakTweaker" rounds out the percussion with some punchy kicks, hi-hats, and subtle glitch elements. Of course we fill the lower end of the spectrum with some triangle/sine/square wave bass from Novation's V-Synth, and a reverb-laden lead line from the same plug-in.


Enter Sunday afternoon… and the song is not quite ready for prime time. I grab my trusty Fernandes guitar and have an idea for the final melodic element. The EHX Superego pedal is engaged with the speed, gliss, and effect knobs cranked up to 11. A few quick passes of recording through this granular-synth effect seal the deal, and we're done!


Key equipment/software used for production:

- Korg SV-1 digital piano
- Fernandes Native Pro Sustainer guitar
- Electro Harmonix SuperEgo effect pedal
- Novation V-Station plug-in
- iZotope BreakTweaker plug-in
- Native Instruments Maschine MKI
- ValhallaDSP ValhallaRoom plug-in


Key: B Major
BPM: 93
Time Signature: 4/4