Ok, up next, these two guys have been here for the last couple weeks. They asked me to read this:

Sorry, not finishing that quote. Anyone that knows what it's from gets a shiny new penny!

So much is happening right now in the world of Saints at Sundown! As you all know, William went into the studio last week and laid down his drum tracks. He brought the thunder and dropped some of the most devastating beats of all time!! Shout out to Tom at T-mix studios. He did a great job tracking and is a heck of a nice guy. www.tmixstudio.com for those of you in the DFW area.

Ok people. We are excited to show what we have been working on!! Below you will be able to hear TEASERS FROM THE ALBUM!!! WHAAA??? Yes, this really is happening. Accept it. Feel the joy that only ridiculously loud rock and roll can bring. Weep, rinse, repeat. You will hear the drum tracking that Will did last week, and the "scratch" guitar tracks that I recorded when I first wrote these songs. The next time you hear these, they will be full blown studio productions. Enjoy. We love you.

Song number 1: You ever see that scene in scanners where that dudes head blew up??

http://soundcloud.com/saintsatsundown/saints-at-sundown-song1teaser

Song number 2: I'd like to thank Black Sabbath for giving me hundreds of riffs to rip off.

http://soundcloud.com/saintsatsundown/saints-at-sundown-song2teaser

If you are still alive at this point, then I assume you are filled with joy and want for nothing. That is all I could ask for. That'll be 100 dollars, please. =). Oh, and if you like what you hear, please spread the word. Share the link to our blog.

Stay tuned, folks. There is still much hard work ahead, but good things are happening!

The Diary of a Mad Tragically White Drummer

PROGRESS!!! Today Will went in to the studio and laid down his drum tracks. It went great! Both drummer and engineer left happy with their bellies full of ROCK SAUCE!!! He took along a camera, but he was busy making the best record of all time, so no photos of this historic event were captured. Fortunately, this evening William wrote me the following:

I wrote a blog. Here it is:

Hello, my name is Will and I play drums. Today I recorded drum tracks for Saints At Sundown. I always enjoy the studio. I enjoy the challenge of nailing a perfect take (though I don't think it's ever happened), and I love dialing in a good and heavy drum sound... It's loads of fun to do, and it's cool to listen to the playback and hear the kit sounding all professional and whatnot. 

Well, I didn't take any pictures, unfortunately. I brought my camera, but left it in the truck, and didn't even think about until I left the studio. Oops! Well, since I don't have any photographs, what I can do is be a bit of gear nerd for all you gear nerds and tell you all the gear nerdy details about the kit I used today. 

The drums are my trusty Ludwig Vistalites. 10x14 tom, 16x16 floor tom, and a 14x26 kick drum. The toms have clear Remo Emperor batter heads with clear Ambassadors underneath, and the kick has an Aquarian Force 1 batter, with a Force 1 front head. There's an offset 4" hole on the front head for miking, and no additional muffling on it (or any of my other drums, for that matter- I like to move as much air as possible). A lot of drummers don't understand not having a pillow or something in the kick, but I like to use 2 self muffling heads to soak up any unwanted resonance, and this allows the inside of the drum to be free of clutter. It makes it easier to mic up, it makes it louder (ALWAYS a good thing!), and it makes the kick end up sounding meatier. We all love meat, so that's definitely a good thing. 

The snare I used is my 5.5x14 Tama Copper shell, with die cast hoops. I've got some Puresound snares on it, a coated Remo Emperor batter (again, no muffling), and a Hazy Ambassador snare side head. This snare has a pretty thick shell, which makes it cut, but the copper shell makes it a little darker, and a little more natural sounding than most other steel shelled snares I've heard. It is a beast that can not be tamed. 

Just to reiterate, for any drummer out there who might be reading this and wondering why I don't muffle anything: Move air, son! A good recording always starts with a good source. Your drums are going to get mixed down, have a bunch or different effects thrown on them, and then they'll be compressed all to heck and back, so why on Earth would you want to suck even more life out of them right at the start?! 

Anyhow, the cymbals I used are 14" Soultone Hi Hats, 18" and 20" Sabian APX crashes, and a 22" APX Solid Ride. Nothing fancy. Meat and potatoes. This was the first I've recorded with my Sabians, and I was really impressed. Very clean and musical. 

And, as always, my sticks are Pro Mark American Hickory 2Bs with wood tips. 

So there you go. Tracking these tunes was a load of fun, and I'm stoked to hear the final product. Hope you'll enjoy it!

So, there you have it folks. That's the real stuff right there! Yes, we are nerdy. Speaking of which, I have to go. Star Wars is on SPIKE tonight. That is not a joke.

Love,
Saints At Sundown

No alarms and no suprises please.

At this moment in time, Will Jaeger is at T-mix studio in Dallas, TX laying down his drum tracks. I'm so excited I can barely speak. Ok, I can speak fine, but it's nice to see this project starting to take off. I wish I could be there, but alas, I'm a working stiff and I'm at work. Hopefully pics coming tonight! More lyrics to share soon, as well. Good stuff ahead folks! Just think, you'll be able to say "I knew them back when they were just a couple of over the hill morons playing way too loudly and ripping off Led Zeppelin." YEAH!!!

Bringing a knife to a gunfight

When I first conceptualized this record, I wasn't quite sure how to make it happen. There are a lot of logistical issues when the other half of this duo is a 12 hour drive away. This is not an easy way to work, but it is possible and we are making progress. Will goes in to the studio on March 20th for drum tracking.

It was suggested by a friend that it would be much easier to find a drummer here in Denver, or just do it myself. Well, there are a couple of reasons that I really wanted Will to be involved in this project. Mainly, Will always gets what I'm trying to do in a song, and supports that vision with his drumming. I trust him completely to make the right decisions for the song. It doesn't hurt that he brings mad chops to the table that are way beyond what I can do on my own.

Below is a short clip of Will demonstrating one of the songs we are working on. He sends me these clips so I can hear what he is doing and we can discuss it. He has my guitar parts and a click track in his headphones. Notice the rock faces and the stick twirls at about 12 seconds and 30 seconds in. If only we could get those on the record somehow. =).




So, that's a little bit about how we are working over long distance and why we are choosing to work this way. I hope you enjoyed the video, and feel free to share it. Check out Will's other youtube videos as well. Subscribe to our youtube channel, more videos soon.

Until next time.
S.A.S.

Noodles and Lyrics

Today, as I clumsily slurped up soft rice noodles from an over sized bowl of pho, I realized something: I have the worst chop stick skills in all of human history! I work as quickly as possible, but it takes me a while to finish. Still, compared to writing lyrics, this meal is a piece of cake.....except that it's noodles. 

For me, writing lyrics is something like eating a bowl of noodles. Really? That sounds weird. Well, it's not. It's hard to do, it takes me a long time, and I'm pretty sure that if I'm not careful I could poke my eye out.

Many times the hardest part is just figuring out what to write about. I'm sick of hearing love songs and dudes who are angry. Quit whining, man! Tell her how you feel and go kick your dad in the balls! I could go the AC/DC route and write 15 songs about rock and roll, but I could never pull that off. Rock n' roll is just rock n' roll, indeed. One technique I use a lot is just to start writing stream of conscious style paragraphs until I stumble upon something that I connect with. A few days ago, I was struggling with lyrics for a Saints At Sundown tune so I used the above method. I ended up with this short verse:

I'm trying to find a way back home
It's slipped away
No one wants to live this life alone
Or so they say


After all this time are you still mine?
We spent all of our lives and we're still trying
After tonight, there's nothing left but the crying

Ok, It's got a good beat and you can dance to it. Unfortunately, this is NOT going to work for the song I was working on. Even worse, it's a love song. I did take time to work up a quick demo for a song possibility for these lyrics. Check it out below: 
http://soundcloud.com/saintsatsundown/onlythecryingclipmp3 


Yep, I ripped off Led Zeppelin bigtime....but if Jack White can do it, then I guess I can, too. I have no idea if this song will turn into anything, or just go in the "vault." But I found it interesting in the context of making a record. Sometimes, inspiration takes you somewhere that you didn't think you were going. It's useless to fight it, you just have to keep plugging away and hope that you finally end up where you want to be. 

E-mail subscriptions

SO, I have discovered that on blogger.com your followers do NOT get an e-mail when you update your blog. I have added a new widget on the right that allows you to sign up for e-mail updates when the blog is updated. Those of you who signed up to follow the blog, I went ahead and put your addresses in(for those of you that I have e-mails for). Just click the link in the confirmation e-mail and you should be good to go! It would have been nice to know this earlier. Oh well.

Thanks!
Jacob

Studio Time booked!

Amazing news. Studio time booked in march for drum tracking! Now just to beat these songs into submission over the next couple of weeks. Stay tuned for more fun.