The song I’m The Ocean, was the first to be recorded for the album, and at the moment it is the first song to be finished. The reason being, is because I recorded it in Australia on my last visit. I was out there for nearly 5 months checking out my home land again and playing gigs there for the first time. Good times.

The opportunity arose to put this track down in a studio near Surrey Hills in Sydney, called Limestone Studio. It was a great little place run by two great guys, Louis Schoorl (from Holand) and Steeve Body (from France). Those guys were a laugh to work with and it was a bit of fluke finding two gents with whom I could feel completely comfortable recording from the word go, having only done a few google searches to find them.

The reason I chose their studio was because, they are producer songwriters, which meant they had all the instruments already in house set up ready to go. This was perfect for me as I only brought my Strat and Vibrolux with me from London, so I had all their stuff at my disposal. Louis and Steeve had some great ideas and I was thus really happy to share the producer title with them for this recording. We all worked well together. If you’re looking for a studio in Sydney, definitely look them up!!

This video has been slapped together fairly quickly as I didn’t have a lot of footage to work with, I need to get someone to film properly next time I’m in the studio! It serves it’s purpose though, documenting the place and the great guys I worked with.

I asked Paul to go through, in a little bit of detail, what equipment was being used to record the drums. I thought it would be nice to document for my future reminiscing of recording this album.

There was a lot of cheese and banana eating and general procrastination this day. We did manage to record drums for 3 songs eventually, contrary to the impression that this video may give.

This is a little clip that I bodged together the same evening after being in the studio. It marks an official start to recording drums for the album.

The process behind the album has already been under way for a couple of months now, demo-ing, chopping and changing, and making guide tracks for this moment. I’ve got all the material I need for the album sorted, although there are still lots of lyrics to be finished off. This didn’t hinder making a start on drums though.

So, I took my portable hard drive with my album on it to a ’secret’ studio (secret, because the owner of the studio doesn’t know I was there using his stuff and with his engineer at the helm!), where we plugged in and I played drums along to the guide tracks. Guide tracks being, full demo versions of the songs that I play drums along to, listening with my headphones (because it’s just me in the studio, no-one else to play with ). Then once the drums are completed I’ll re-recorded everything else over the top of the old guides, along side the new sexy live drums. It’s a long process (should be finished within about 10 years or so!), but it’s just how it has to be when your doing it on your own! I love it though.

I’ve had two days in the studio so far and completed 4 songs for drums which is not too bad. It always takes me longer than I think it will, but that’s all good. I will be heading back there soon to finish the other songs that need drums. I’ve since been at home choosing the best takes and doing a preliminary mix, and I am extremely happy! I can’t wait to finish the album and show you all. I am loving it. Some of the songs take a fairly big diversion from what I normally ’sound’ like! It’s going to be cool to see how people react. For now though, it is all slightly on hold until I work out how to pay next months rent in 15 days, so I’ll be piecing it together as I go… somehow!!

Oh yeah, I was recording to 2 inch tape, it sounds the dogs and it got me excited, so I had to mention it! You know… I’m usually just recording in my bedroom, not through £100,000’s worth of equipment , it’s the simple things in life that get me pumped! ha! But it reminds me, I have some massive thank you’s to shout out at some point. There has been a lot of support from people already in these initial stages, and I’ll mention those a little later on. For now though, seriously, I would probably have moved back to Australia if it wasn’t for my friend Johnny lending me his Pro Tools rig and Apple (fast-as-they-come) Mac to be able to do the majority of the recording at home! So thank you man! And to Paul in the studio… what a privilege it’s been! Many thanks to you too!

I have some more video footage to come for the second day of the drum session, which I’ll edit together soon hopefully.