vox y rough y juan in a million

Now that you've been dishwalla'd, we'll get to our activities of the day.  We arrived at the studio around one in the afternoon and decided to get right to work on finishing up some vocals.  As Adam started in on putting the finishing touches to Where You Sleep, Jesse and I headed over to an east Austin brunch favorite called Juan in a Million for some (you guessed it) impressive mexican dining.  Kinda had some hipster love in that joint for sure but it wasn't overbearing or gross.  Austin's cool like that.  We brought food back to the bros of the band as Adam moved over to the Sheet.  Here's what the vocal room looked like-

Now we're doing some rough mixes for the 7 tracks as Adam starts drinking a couple of Tecates and we start in on the last of back porch bb gun practice.  

It's 74 degrees, sunny, and it's January in Austin.  I'm already missing it and I haven't even left. We'll start packing our gear soon and making our way back to the tundra.  But it looks like we'll be coming back for sxsw, where we'll not only be playing some shows but working on final mixes with Erik.  blick/blamm/poof/pow.

We have a show coming up in February at Metro w/Prairie Cartel and Mr. Russia.  See you peeps then... 

Apteka "discovers" Dishwalla!

 I was noodling around on the piano and Adam was convinced he could almost guess what I was playing (I thought I was onto a pretty sweet original, actually).  We were casting about trying to think of what it was--The Cure?  Some other maudlin 80's song of yore? And then in a flash of inspiration it came to us--of course, it could only be...that's right, Dishwalla!  In fact, it was their one hit "Counting Blue Cars."  Dino came in just in time to catch the chorus and add his own falsesetto stylings to the mix.  This is how great music is made, by stumbling across mediocre FM alternative rock from a decade + ago.  Enjoy! 

Jesse

Here come the drums

Saturday's alright for tracking the vox

Indigenous in the making...

So yesterday was an awesome day of relaxation and recuperation.  We hit the reset button on the ole ears and took the day off from the studio.  We watched a marathon of Arrested Development and then hit up one of the best BBQ places in all of Austin called the Salt Lick.  It kind of did number on us.  Adam called it one his most satisfying meals ever.  We went back Beth and Mike's place (where we've been staying all week) and lazily crashed out to more big screen TV and sleepy dogs.  

Today is all about tracking vocals and finishing up aux percussion stuff.  Really getting excited to hear some rough mixes.  The board, the gear, and analog effects we're using with Erik are really exciting and interesting to hear in action.  They seem to be bringing a depth and fullness to drum and vocal tones that we haven't really had access to in our own recordings.  It's fun to see it come together and give the songs another layer of goodness.  More to come...

droppin' the update on y'all

Straight from the studio, I present Dino182 to the masses.  He churned out some sick guitar tones and a couple of one-take jakes this morning.  It was quite amazing to see this character emerge from the bowels of the Cacophony Recorders studio and perform so honorably for the aptekans.  

In other news, it was 57 degrees here in Austin.  We are not sorry that we chose this week to leave Chicago.  It was quite interesting to take a look at the front page of the Chicago Tribune today and see the headline "Why DO we live here, anyways?"  Yikes, folks.  Really feeling for our fellow Chicagoans right now.  

We're almost done recording guitars and started working on vocals last night.  Things have been going swimmingly with our new pal Erik the Great.  He and Maverick (aka Ranger) have given us eleventy-four mind blowing analog sounds to contend with over the past couple of days and we're eternally grateful.  Louder than Love got some love from the board we're working with and there's plenty of other goodies that have seen glorious sessions over the years.  It's so kind bud.  

Apteka does the classics

remaking the image Austin style

Austin has us re-thinking our image.  This is the look we're leaning towards.  Let us know what you think.  We're getting ready to call in the pedal steel player and fiddle folks.  Foreigner's "Cold As Ice" coming up shortly...