2010, July 7
On Monday 5 July this week, the motherBIRD demos were finalized, copied to CDs and packaged into T’s custom covers, and whisked off to FBI’s open day, courtesy of T and R, and for a personal introduction to the sounds contain therein.
The final track list:
- Metal of Hades (T. Vu)
- Ancestry (T. Vu and writer)
- Going to LA (T. Vu and writer)
- Lover’s Ode (T. Vu)
- In Dreams (T. Vu)
Produced by T. Vu
Recorded, mixed and mastered by writer and T. Vu
The (lossy encoded, low quality) tracks can now be streamed from motherBIRD’s myspace
So a big effort from T. Vu and I has come to an end. Many many months and many, many hours of recording, scrutinising, editing, processing, blending, assembling and packaging comes to a close. Well overdue of course. A massive learning experience and once which has forced a rethink of the mixing methods employed.
The mastering was completed over a week or so, with many revisits and changes during that time. As not usually advisable, the mastering and mixing was performed by the same team, so inevitably, there will be imbalances in the end product due to the monitoring system (i.e. speakers + room + humans) being a constant during the process. No doubt, a better master would have been achieved by looking for professional services, and of those employing pleasant-sounding hardware devices as opposed to my purely in-the-box treatments. But the hope is that this finished demo is representative of the time and place of these songs, and that they are durable in some artistic sense.
As for the future? These are uncertain times; the completion of a process will always spawn new paths for the protagonists to select from and follow. Rather than stability, we are at a crossroads for the players. The success, or rather lack of for this project, will appear to impact somewhat on future collaborations, so much is riding on this. Arguably that is an over-reaction for a demo collection, and in the biased perception of the writer, much was done to assure a good result. But it is more than just the audible instructions within the optical media; it is the process and experience which determines the prospective futures, and ultimately a decision which has future growth in its primary interests.
