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MORE STUDIO STORIES...

23/4/2014

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  Easter's over and we're back in the studio. And since writing about it a couple of weeks ago I think we've finally conquered the new album. 

The mix has come together and, to my ears, it's beginning to sound pretty special. (Ask me next week and I'll probably hate it again.) And it does make me, yet again, appreciate the luxury we have at The Boatshed Studio of taking our time if we want. 

Some of our albums are made very quickly, like the last one, It All Comes Round. Others, particularly the Dylan tribute In The Well took months of tweaking. This is one of those and it's a real pleasure being able to make up your mind on things at your own pace.  

At the moment Sonia's just adding a couple of final trumpet parts and we've got a few more backing vocals to go on but, simultaneously, everyone is reviewing their parts to see if there's anything they'd like to replay or add. Particularly this time around we've been doing a final pass over each song to see if a little extra percussion here and there will accentuate the dynamics. It's a luxury you don't normally get in the frantic (and expensive) business of recording.  

One little thing struck me recently as emblematic of how things are at The Boatshed.  

Nigel and I are both pretty much self-taught at this stuff and operate largely in isolation. This has meant that we've developed a number of somewhat quirky techniques and do some things a little differently from the norm. Which is cool with us. But it also means there are some things that we don't do, or even know about.  

A few weeks back I read about a “new” technique that the engineers at Abbey Road developed at the request of the Beatles. It sounded just the thing for a couple of songs on the album. So I figured out a way to replicate the effect digitally (we no longer have the fantastic old analogue gear that they were using back in the day). Then I spend several days trying it out, on the singing, on the harmonica, anywhere I could. And...  

...and just before last weekend I finally cut the last remaining trace of it. It only lasted on the harp for a couple of days but I stuck with it in various forms on the vocals for several mixes. And I still think it really should have worked. But, whatever I did, I eventually had to accept that it sounded like complete crap.  

And that's the Boatshed in a nutshell. We'll try anything. I find something very funny in the fact that our new pioneering effect this month was 50 years old and didn't work anyway. What the hell. We're not leaving any stones unturned here and everything we discover with Kokomo we can use on production for other bands that come through the studio.  

The next song from Bigger Than Brando will be unleashed on the world at the start of May. It's ready now and is sounding great – can't wait!  

Derek  


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A BEGINNER'S GUIDE TO THE 52nd NATIONAL JAZZ FESTIVAL

16/4/2014

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It's nearly Easter so the whole of Tauranga's buzzing in anticipation of the start of the National Jazz Festival, which kicks off tomorrow night, Thursday 17 April.  

Well, I say that, but it doesn't appear to be even vaguely true. Twice in the past week people have even asked me if the jazz festival is happening this year. One was a hairdresser, one was a taxi driver: given the conversation rates of those two professions it doesn't bode well.  

In fact, it appears to me as if the build-up to this year's festival has been lower-key than any I can remember. There are now billboards up and I assume there is radio advertising (I can't bring myself to listen to the perpetual crap on commercial radio) but there seems to have been a distinct lack of coverage from the Bay of Plenty Times, one of the event's “Gold Sponsors”.  

This is nothing new. The paper have often been accused of crapping on events that they supposedly support, either by lack of coverage or by the sort of deliberately negative story they sprang on the Garden & Arts Fest a few years back. I guess this blog will destroy Kokomo's chances of featuring in their pages in the future. Plus ça change... really – they were meant to interview us and do an article before this festival but no one ever bothered to get in touch.  

Nonetheless, a lot of music fans, including a few of you loyal Kokomo supporters, are coming to town to check out the music at Easter. There's a pile of it and it includes some great stuff. Here's the Jazz Fest website in case you haven't already found it! I would happily recommend any of the evening concert series. Midge Marsden is playing and will be good to see in such an intimate setting where his strength as an entertainer and storyteller can shine. Also well worthwhile: Adam Page, Miho Wada, George Washingmachine... Well, everything really.  

But  most of you will be either at the Downtown Carnival or the Historic Village (er, the “Jazz” Village). The Jazz Fest website has just added very brief information about bands playing in these two places, each described in ten words or less.  

I actually think this shows remarkable disrespect for the artists. The jazz festival has often claimed to be such a strong event because it is all for the musicians. Really? In that case, given the low fees paid, the best thing that the organisers could do “for the musicians” is to actually promote them. Having proper information about the bands would go a long way to doing that. Need I even mention that it would also be of invaluable assistance to audience members?  

Anyway, enough of my whining. Perhaps as a past director of the festival I'm a little sensitive about such matters. I know what a massive workload the organisers have and what pressure they're under right now. And, credit where it's due, they have arranged a plethora of fine music everywhere you go, which is the most important thing...  

DEREK'S JAZZ FEST RECOMMENDATIONS

Yes, there are bucketloads of others, but any of these should appeal to Kokomo supporters:  

AliceSea – An amazing woman who often performs with guitarist Aaron Saxon from the Mauao Performing Arts Centre. She sings (great voice), she plays all sorts of things (including groovy wind instruments), she loops. Fantastic.  

SheJus Greedy – Funky bluesy soul from some of the Bay's finest. Grant Haua plays guitar (what more could you ask for?), Delanie sings, and the rhythm section is Mickey Ututaonga and Rob Paterson, about as good as they get in New Zealand. These are what's known as musician's musicians – everyone I know is a fan!  

Hipstamatics – I'm a sucker for a 10-piece band with horns and an attitude! These guys do funk/soul covers of well-known songs and have energy to spare.  

Spiral – Led by saxophonist Andrew Hall, Spiral do interesting jazzy things and are always impressive. We have a soft spot for Andrew 'cos he came and jammed with Kokomo at the Jazz Festival years and years ago, when he was still a teenager. He was great then and he's even better now.  

Brilleaux – Maximum R&B. Of course.  

The Mike Garner Band – Mike's always worth seeing for a shot of authentic blues. On Monday at the Village he has Wellington's Neil Billington with him, one of the country's top harmonica players and one of the few who can just as easily navigate complex jazz tunes on the chromatic harp. Harmonica fans should definitely check them out.  

Tom Rodwell – I just love Tom's playing – groove-driven, Delta-influenced, Tom plays blues like no one else in New Zealand today, with a distinct echo of Mississippi Fred McDowell, Bukka White and others. A real treat.   

Adams & Gavin – our old mates from the Nairobi Trio. Richard Adams is a fine fiddler but it's Nigel Gavin who blows me away every time I see him play guitar. He lent his talents to our In The Well album and I've been a fan for as long as I can remember.


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Finding the “Kokomo Sound”

4/4/2014

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 First blog for the new website and I'm writing from deep in the trenches of album mixing so excuse any general irrationality.

With most of our albums I've found there's a point during the recording where you're so far in that you can't remember starting, with so much more to do that there seems to be no end in sight. That's where we're at right now...

It hasn't always been like that. A couple of our early albums were recorded down at the (late lamented) Radio New Zealand studios in Wellington so we were on the clock with non-negotiable deadlines. To Be Or What and Stromboling were both like that – five days recording, two days mixing, bang bang bang, all done. That was also the last time we had an outside producer.  

Since then the various Kokomo albums have been self-produced. We've taken our time and learnt as we go. The first Kokomo album I produced was Little Heroes in 1999. I produced, Nigel and I mixed it, Grant did the artwork, Kokomo had become our own cottage industry and that's how it's been for 15 years.  

Some years later Nigel and I were playing in a band backing a wonderful woman singer/songwriter, Jane Sienne. It was a heavy band, all electric, pitched somewhere between Nirvana and The Clash.   
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Jane was a great singer and had written a bag of remarkable songs. She also had the finance to record them at Neil Finn's Roundhead Studio in Auckland with ex-Split Enzer Eddie Rayner producing.

It was a bunch of fun, and interesting to hang at Roundhead for a week and check out the amazing vintage gear they've amassed (I even got to play a couple of Neil Finn's Telecasters and a baritone electric of his - thank you Neil!). (And that weird white 12-string in the pic - don't remember the make but it came from Italy)


So, after our week in the studio (it was always a week in those days) Nige and I returned to Tauranga and Eddie set to mixing and making the album. We did go up to Auckland briefly to do some backing vocals and the bits of songs we heard seemed rather different from the original sessions.  

Then, sadly, somewhere along the line, there was a breakdown between Jane and the band. In all honesty I still have no idea what happened. Irrespective of the details, the far bigger shock was eventually hearing the album.  

It sounded nothing like what we thought we had played on. Instead of aggressive electric guitars it had become something resembling a pop album. Jane's songs were still great but everything had become very mainstream FM radio friendly. No more Nirvana or Clash, it had all been “Eddie-fied”.

Maybe it was a good thing. Who knows? The album had no support and disappeared immediately, which was a crying shame. Perhaps Eddie's version had more chance of commercial success, we never found out.  That's the deal with a producer. To a certain extent, you make the album they want and somewhere along the line Eddie added a whole bunch of “nice”. Perhaps that was his brief – it wasn't my album so I don't know. 

But whenever I think about that experience I feel better about doing it all ourselves.  We may not be the best mixers in the world, and I'm certainly not the best producer.
And the Boatshed's not the best studio in the world (though it does have a swimming pool!). But what we end up with is exactly what we want. We work within limitations of course, but we have complete control.
 
Some have commented that the first song, “Travel All Over The World”, from the new album is a bit heavy, particularly as a first release. It's meant to be. This album is bigger and bolder than anything we've done previously. The last one was all-acoustic. This ain't, and we wanted people to know that emphatically right from the start.

There'll be a couple more free downloads before the album proper and they'll both be a little different from the Kokomo you know.  

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 In some ways I regard this album as a sequel of sorts to that first album I produced, Little Heroes. It's a smorgasbord of sound and in amongst the new directions I think you'll still find plenty of the blues that the band is best known for. But now it's only one element of the “Kokomo Sound”.     

Derek
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    As of this latest website update (July 2018) it is clear that Derek is completely failing in his attempt to write a regular diary/blog/whatever. Everything here is currently really old but he's promised again to have another crack at it. Expect something sometime soon... probably...


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