12/01/2010 10:34Joe Bonamassa Black Rock Album | Recording Joe Bonamassa Black Rock Album
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Home » Recording » Recording: Mixing » Music: Bonamassa's 'Black Rock'
Music: Bonamassa's 'Black Rock'Music: Bonamassa's 'Black Rock'Jan 1, 2010 12:00 PM, By Barbara Schultz
INVENTING THE NEW GREEK BLUES
The introduction of folk instruments is especially effective inBonamassa's cover of Leonard Cohen's inspiring “Bird on a Wire” — asong that's been recorded by singular artists such as Johnny Cashand Joe Cocker, but Bonamassa makes it his own.
Shirley, who records all of his projects live, also took Bonamassa outof his guitar comfort zone on this album: “Normally, Joe plays a LesPaul guitar, but on this album I wanted to try to challenge him, so Iasked him to put away his beloved Les Paul and we recorded with himplaying a Telecaster and an amplifier and nothing between them.Then I just I dangled a [Shure SM] 57 over the speaker, just trying toget an edgier live feeling. After five or six days of that, we went backto Joe's comfort zone; we put up the huge stacks and miked them upproperly with a 57 and the Beyer 201 and a Royer R121 and aNeumann 67 back into the room to give it a little bit of ambience.”
Shirley's mixing process, done this time on the SSL console andlistening through KRK VXT6s, also seems to be part and parcel ofrecording live: “We don't mix separately,” he says. “I always mix as Igo, and my rough mixes are what make the album. I feel that whenit's coming off the console, you're right there, into the music, andyou're aware of the minutiae when you're that close to it. When youwait until four weeks later, it's, ‘Why did we put that guitar part inagain? I know I had a good idea at the time.’ The rough mixes reallycapture the way we heard the song.”
Bonamassa and friends were so happy with what they heard at BlackRock that they named their album after the studio. Black Rock, thealbum, comes out March 9, 2010, on Bonamassa's own J&RAdventures label, and he and Shirley plan to return to Greece torecord a follow-up next year.
“I love the studio; it's absolutely the most creative studio I've everbeen in,” Shirley says. “There's all this traditional Greek architecturewith concrete, concave ceilings. Once you're inside these things, youget this amazing resonance and explosion of sound, which is a littleuncontrollable, but it's fantastic. And staying in the place and beingable to go in at 7 a.m. or coming back after dinner and cutting a trackat 11 or 12 at night — it's a wonderful environment to be able to dothat.”
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12/01/2010 10:34Joe Bonamassa Black Rock Album | Recording Joe Bonamassa Black Rock Album
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12/01/2010 10:34Joe Bonamassa Black Rock Album | Recording Joe Bonamassa Black Rock Album
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Kevin Shirley at the studios local restaurant. Ta Delfinia. €20 willget you a gorgeous meal.
Kostas Kalimeris and Kevin ShirleyPreviousPrevious 11 2
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