Hi Folks. Sorry it’s been a while since the last update. It may not look like it but we’ve acually been pretty busy this month. First of all, we wrote and began recording a brand new song which will hopefully find its way onto a split at some point this year. We’ve tracked drums and bass so far, and approached recording in a similar manner to when we recorded ‘Boat Race’ – but with a higher production value. Mike Randle is helping us record this one, so we were able to use the knowledge we learned from recording with Jase and couple it with 16 track digital simultaneous recording – where ‘Boat Race’ feature only 8 track recording. This means expanded drum mic setup, which has massively improved the audio that we’ve captured.
I recorded bass about a week ago – that’s sounding great too. I’ve been experimenting with different mic setups and pedal combinations. After my thrid attempt at tracking I was finally pretty happy with the end result. Greg’s been ill recently, so we haven’t had time to track guitar, but hopefully we’ll get that done – along with the vocals – once we get back from our tour with Beasts.
Yes we are heading off on tour with Beasts on Wednesday and will be playing a few dates in Belgium and Germany. This is our second outing to Europe this year. Here’s the dates:
Tomorrow we’re headed down to Barnsley to put the finishing touches on the album. According to Jase we need around 5 hours extra mixing time and then we just need to get the tracks mastered and they’ll be ready for distribution. Hopefully a track will hit your ears by the end of the Summer and we’re hoping to get the record out by early next year, when we are planning to tour extensively.
Hi folks. What a fun couple weeks we’ve had. We headed out to Scotland 2 weeks ago for some shows with Shields Up and Joey Terrifying. We had a really excellent time. On the way to the first gig in Dundee, we had a slight issue with the van in that the exhaust fell off just outside of Edinburgh. After being initially stunned, it turned out we were able to continue on our exhausting (groan) journey. The van managed to hold out for the whole weekend, despite sounding like a wartime aircraft. We don’t call her Thunder Road for nothin’.
After 3 great shows, we headed home with Andy Duncan at the wheel. I got a call from Greg (who was staying in Edinburgh for the film festival) who said Shields Up’s van had broken down just outside of Glasgow on the last night. Pretty ridiculous. I think we managed to make it home before them. Three shows, three bands, and two bust up LDV Convoys.
Despite these problems we had a great time. Long over due thanks to Shields Up for being amazing guys, helping us out, giving us a place to crash and lending us their guitar amps. Fucking awesome. And to Joey T, who were really great guys, its a shame they’re breaking up. They are a great band to see live. More shows with Shields Up coming up in September. I can’t wait.
After having a gig cancelled due to a stabbing in Lincoln (I know – fucked up!) we headed down to Cambridge on Sunday for the sole purpose of playing the Walk the Plank All Dayer with Above Them and lots of other amazing bands. It was a really good time. Well worth the drive. Thanks so much to Raph for sorting that out. Everyone played great and we were really pleased to be a part of it, meet new people and catch up with old friends. It was especially encouraging to be so well recieved.
Next show is going to be with the Smoking Hearts, Glass Avalanche and The Disaster March in Newcastle. 28th July. Here’s a flyer.
Oh yeah, I gave the website a bit of an overhaul too. I think its looking a bit better now. There’s some cool new features and pages, so check them out. We’re going to be working on a new song this week, hopefully to go on a split. We’ll be recording it this month. Exciting times.
This weekend we went back to Barnsey for the final time to finish tracking. It feels good but also kind of sad. Amongst the stress, I’ve actually really enjoyed the experience. The songs have come out really well, and a lot of them in entirely different ways to what I initially expected or what was initially concieved.
We had some vocals to finish off since we really ruined our voices last time we were down there. I was amazed at how much we managed to track, and me and Greg managed to finish up all the lead vocals fairly quickly on Sunday, leaving the rest of the day to comp all the different vocal takes. Greg made some vegan cakes. They were nice.
Monday was the second and final day. I had already DI’d the bass, so we needed to run that through some amps. We spent a while setting up but I think we got a really nice tone. A little bit of distortion and a really punchy sound. We set about picking drum takes for a few little extras we hadn’t touched, then tracked some bass lines, and spend a few hours messing around with guitar tones to put over them. It sounds pretty cool. I think it might be one of my favourite parts of the album.
We then decided to beef up the vocals. Me and Greg added some extra harmonies. That was pretty fun. We like to get between 4 and 7 parts to play around with. I did my shouty parts. Since all the “nice” singing was over with we could stress out our voices again. Finally we tracked room mic vocals and gang shouts. That was pretty fun too. I was drunk at this point.
Jase suggested some really cool stuff with vocals throughout, and we added a sprinkling of tambourine, some claps and even beat some drums and took part in some gregorian chanting. Its pretty funny stuff guys. I look forward to hearing it all mixed.
We are playing gigs this week! Details below – Friday in Leeds at The Fenton, Monday in Newcastle at the Northumberland Arms. Beware!
Hello folks. How have you been since we spoke last? Really? He did what? And she didn’t know about it? That’s ridiculous! Anyway, I thought it best to post something to make you aware of some upcoming shows this month. We haven’t played since October since we were severely restricted by the all consuming, all encompasing production of our yet to be finished album. Luckily, the end is in sight for that living nightmare and we’ve managed to rack up a fair few dates for the coming months. Here is a selection of flyers.
So that’s a punk rock fourgasm in Leeds March 19th, and our debut Newcastle gig (can you believe it?) March 22nd. Pure insanity. I hope we managed to learn some new songs to play at these dates. We’re so slack. Aside from these two little gems there is actually shitloads more dates listed on the gigs page, including weekends with Pure Graft and Shields Up in the coming months.
We’re headed to Barnsley to finish tracking once and for all (we hope) at the weekend. We’ll be there, bothering Jason Sanderson on Sunday and Monday. I feel for the guy, I really do. We have a few extra vocal parts to add. A few guitar parts and we need to run the bass through an amp. Then I think we’re offcially finished tracking… unless we want to add a little tamborine. Hmmm…
Well friends what a week it has been. We were booked in to record vocals for the album over the weekend of the 19th – 21st February. I spent much of the preceding 3 days scrambling around trying to think of better melodies and lyrics in a vain attempt to prevent the inevitable regret which I have regularly suffered after a few months of reflection on ideas that “seemed good at the time”. I think I largely suceeded.
We planned to head back to Jase’s on Friday night but decided to stay in Sunderland since his flat is currently undergoing extensive renovations. Three hours sleep later, our hungover posse dribbled into Jonny’s car and we were on the road.
Things got started quickly. Greg was nailing his lead vocals. It was sounding great. But things gradually started to take a turn for the worse. Greg was sick 4 times while he was recording and struck down with a facial tick and severe headache. That’s what you get for giving it your all. He had to go sleep in the practice room for an hour or so while we picked takes and started recording some of my lead vocals. Here is a picture of Greg recording.
But seriously. Here’s how he actually looked. I managed to rattle through about 6 songs before I started feeling the same. Doing 4 takes of each line of each song takes it out of you. I went to lie down and handed the banton to Jord, who managed quite a few tunes while I slept.
Sunday was decidedly more relaxed. We woke to white-out conditions, not an unusual sight for us when recording with Jase. We started the day with some cures for our sore voices. I went down to the shops and bought some whisky, root ginger, lemons, brown sugar and paracetomol. Seemed to work fairly well for me, but Greg’s voice was seriously fucked up. I managed to finish the vast majority of my vocals and got some pretty sweet takes. Jord nailed all of his stuff I think. We got an early finish on Sunday, and decided we should go back once we were in full voice. The stuff we did get done sounds fantastic. We’re all really pleased. We rounded off the session by adding a few pick slides and things.
We’re back in the studio on 14th/15th March and hoping to finish tracking everything then.
Lots of shows are being planned with our buddys in Beasts and Shields Up, as well as Europe and more UK plans so watch out. Chris Randle’s going to take some goofy photos of us this week apparently. I can’t wait. Ahem.
Hi Folks. Sorry it’s been a while since the last update. It may not look like it but we’ve acually been pretty busy this month. First of all, we wrote and began recording a brand new song which will hopefully find its way onto a split at some point this year. We’ve tracked drums and bass so far, and approached recording in a similar manner to when we recorded ‘Boat Race’ – but with a higher production value. Mike Randle is helping us record this one, so we were able to use the knowledge we learned from recording with Jase and couple it with 16 track digital simultaneous recording – where ‘Boat Race’ feature only 8 track recording. This means expanded drum mic setup, which has massively improved the audio that we’ve captured.
I recorded bass about a week ago – that’s sounding great too. I’ve been experimenting with different mic setups and pedal combinations. After my thrid attempt at tracking I was finally pretty happy with the end result. Greg’s been ill recently, so we haven’t had time to track guitar, but hopefully we’ll get that done – along with the vocals – once we get back from our tour with Beasts.
Yes we are heading off on tour with Beasts on Wednesday and will be playing a few dates in Belgium and Germany. This is our second outing to Europe this year. Here’s the dates:
11/08/2010 – Elewijt – (B)
12/08/2010 – Trier – Exhaus (D)
13/08/2010 – Giessen – AK44 (D)
14/08/2010 – Tholey – Juz (D)
15/08/2010 – Borstalsee Volleyball Tournament (D)
Tomorrow we’re headed down to Barnsley to put the finishing touches on the album. According to Jase we need around 5 hours extra mixing time and then we just need to get the tracks mastered and they’ll be ready for distribution. Hopefully a track will hit your ears by the end of the Summer and we’re hoping to get the record out by early next year, when we are planning to tour extensively.
I’ve put some UK dates up with our friends Fast Motion and Above Them which will be taking place over the next few months. Here’s a flyer for the Sunderland show which is on September 9th.
More updates from the road, hopefully.
Posted in Band News, Photos, Recording, Tour | No Comments »
Hi folks. What a fun couple weeks we’ve had. We headed out to Scotland 2 weeks ago for some shows with Shields Up and Joey Terrifying. We had a really excellent time. On the way to the first gig in Dundee, we had a slight issue with the van in that the exhaust fell off just outside of Edinburgh. After being initially stunned, it turned out we were able to continue on our exhausting (groan) journey. The van managed to hold out for the whole weekend, despite sounding like a wartime aircraft. We don’t call her Thunder Road for nothin’.
After 3 great shows, we headed home with Andy Duncan at the wheel. I got a call from Greg (who was staying in Edinburgh for the film festival) who said Shields Up’s van had broken down just outside of Glasgow on the last night. Pretty ridiculous. I think we managed to make it home before them. Three shows, three bands, and two bust up LDV Convoys.
Despite these problems we had a great time. Long over due thanks to Shields Up for being amazing guys, helping us out, giving us a place to crash and lending us their guitar amps. Fucking awesome. And to Joey T, who were really great guys, its a shame they’re breaking up. They are a great band to see live. More shows with Shields Up coming up in September. I can’t wait.
After having a gig cancelled due to a stabbing in Lincoln (I know – fucked up!) we headed down to Cambridge on Sunday for the sole purpose of playing the Walk the Plank All Dayer with Above Them and lots of other amazing bands. It was a really good time. Well worth the drive. Thanks so much to Raph for sorting that out. Everyone played great and we were really pleased to be a part of it, meet new people and catch up with old friends. It was especially encouraging to be so well recieved.
Next show is going to be with the Smoking Hearts, Glass Avalanche and The Disaster March in Newcastle. 28th July. Here’s a flyer.
Oh yeah, I gave the website a bit of an overhaul too. I think its looking a bit better now. There’s some cool new features and pages, so check them out. We’re going to be working on a new song this week, hopefully to go on a split. We’ll be recording it this month. Exciting times.
Posted in Band News, Recording | No Comments »
This weekend we went back to Barnsey for the final time to finish tracking. It feels good but also kind of sad. Amongst the stress, I’ve actually really enjoyed the experience. The songs have come out really well, and a lot of them in entirely different ways to what I initially expected or what was initially concieved.
We had some vocals to finish off since we really ruined our voices last time we were down there. I was amazed at how much we managed to track, and me and Greg managed to finish up all the lead vocals fairly quickly on Sunday, leaving the rest of the day to comp all the different vocal takes. Greg made some vegan cakes. They were nice.
Monday was the second and final day. I had already DI’d the bass, so we needed to run that through some amps. We spent a while setting up but I think we got a really nice tone. A little bit of distortion and a really punchy sound. We set about picking drum takes for a few little extras we hadn’t touched, then tracked some bass lines, and spend a few hours messing around with guitar tones to put over them. It sounds pretty cool. I think it might be one of my favourite parts of the album.
We then decided to beef up the vocals. Me and Greg added some extra harmonies. That was pretty fun. We like to get between 4 and 7 parts to play around with. I did my shouty parts. Since all the “nice” singing was over with we could stress out our voices again. Finally we tracked room mic vocals and gang shouts. That was pretty fun too. I was drunk at this point.
Jase suggested some really cool stuff with vocals throughout, and we added a sprinkling of tambourine, some claps and even beat some drums and took part in some gregorian chanting. Its pretty funny stuff guys. I look forward to hearing it all mixed.
We are playing gigs this week! Details below – Friday in Leeds at The Fenton, Monday in Newcastle at the Northumberland Arms. Beware!
Posted in Band News, Recording | No Comments »
Hello folks. How have you been since we spoke last? Really? He did what? And she didn’t know about it? That’s ridiculous! Anyway, I thought it best to post something to make you aware of some upcoming shows this month. We haven’t played since October since we were severely restricted by the all consuming, all encompasing production of our yet to be finished album. Luckily, the end is in sight for that living nightmare and we’ve managed to rack up a fair few dates for the coming months. Here is a selection of flyers.
So that’s a punk rock fourgasm in Leeds March 19th, and our debut Newcastle gig (can you believe it?) March 22nd. Pure insanity. I hope we managed to learn some new songs to play at these dates. We’re so slack. Aside from these two little gems there is actually shitloads more dates listed on the gigs page, including weekends with Pure Graft and Shields Up in the coming months.
We’re headed to Barnsley to finish tracking once and for all (we hope) at the weekend. We’ll be there, bothering Jason Sanderson on Sunday and Monday. I feel for the guy, I really do. We have a few extra vocal parts to add. A few guitar parts and we need to run the bass through an amp. Then I think we’re offcially finished tracking… unless we want to add a little tamborine. Hmmm…
Posted in Band News, Recording | No Comments »
Well friends what a week it has been. We were booked in to record vocals for the album over the weekend of the 19th – 21st February. I spent much of the preceding 3 days scrambling around trying to think of better melodies and lyrics in a vain attempt to prevent the inevitable regret which I have regularly suffered after a few months of reflection on ideas that “seemed good at the time”. I think I largely suceeded.
We planned to head back to Jase’s on Friday night but decided to stay in Sunderland since his flat is currently undergoing extensive renovations. Three hours sleep later, our hungover posse dribbled into Jonny’s car and we were on the road.
Things got started quickly. Greg was nailing his lead vocals. It was sounding great. But things gradually started to take a turn for the worse. Greg was sick 4 times while he was recording and struck down with a facial tick and severe headache. That’s what you get for giving it your all. He had to go sleep in the practice room for an hour or so while we picked takes and started recording some of my lead vocals. Here is a picture of Greg recording.
But seriously. Here’s how he actually looked. I managed to rattle through about 6 songs before I started feeling the same. Doing 4 takes of each line of each song takes it out of you. I went to lie down and handed the banton to Jord, who managed quite a few tunes while I slept.
Sunday was decidedly more relaxed. We woke to white-out conditions, not an unusual sight for us when recording with Jase. We started the day with some cures for our sore voices. I went down to the shops and bought some whisky, root ginger, lemons, brown sugar and paracetomol. Seemed to work fairly well for me, but Greg’s voice was seriously fucked up. I managed to finish the vast majority of my vocals and got some pretty sweet takes. Jord nailed all of his stuff I think. We got an early finish on Sunday, and decided we should go back once we were in full voice. The stuff we did get done sounds fantastic. We’re all really pleased. We rounded off the session by adding a few pick slides and things.
We’re back in the studio on 14th/15th March and hoping to finish tracking everything then.
Lots of shows are being planned with our buddys in Beasts and Shields Up, as well as Europe and more UK plans so watch out. Chris Randle’s going to take some goofy photos of us this week apparently. I can’t wait. Ahem.
Posted in Band News, Recording | 1 Comment »