Put the brush down

You gotta know when to put the brush down. Sometimes when you work on something for a while, you start to overthink things and question everything. Right before getting to this point is when you should stop. Here are a few quotes from American architect Frank Lloyd Wright and some pictures from our last recording session:

"Less is only more where more is no good."

"'Think simple' as my old master used to say - meaning reduce the whole of its parts into the simplest of terms, getting back to first principles."

"Simplicity & repose are the qualities that measure the true value of any work of art."

Stay there!

TVA
http://facebook.com/velvetants

And it starts again...

I thought we were done recording? I guess not. Something made me re-visit some of the tracks today and I ended up adding additional parts. Mainly on keys (ie: synthesizer/moog sounds.) Not quite sure what will stay on there but it was nice to fill in some of the empty space. We're almost there! Today really felt good. Tied some of the loose ends for sure. Sometimes you get this adrenaline high... Or maybe there's another term for it... But it's some kind of rush and it just feels right.

Off to practice.

im

"Radio, Radio"

The Velvet Ants will be featured on DC101's Local Lix tonight @ 10pm.
For more info visit: http://dc101.com/pages/locallix.html

We're also going to be featured on Unmutual Radio an online podcast featuring punk and alternative music. Their page is here: http://UnmutualRadio.libsyn.com
So be on the lookout for that!!

Last but not least, a little while ago we were played on Black Collar Radio out of Philly, PA. Check out their website @ www.BlackCollarRadio.com

Thanks to all the DJ's who included us on their stations & shows and tune into DC101 tonight @ 10!! (or visit: http://iheart.com/#/live/2525/?autoplay=true)

-TVA

Exportations

The last 4 tracks we've worked on are a bit more involved than the others.. not to say we play the most complex music to begin with but I guess you could say they have more than 3 chords and change direction here and there. We were able to finish tracking drums this past week and considering we only had a handful of hours to work with I think we made out pretty decent. Also happened to notice we'd re-recorded drums for Across the Waves so that was a nice surprise (must have been nodding off at some point.) Some of the only time we had to record was between 8pm and 1am. Still not quite sure what the final song list will be, and it will also depend on what we can finish by next week as songs are due for mixing!! but I like where things have led us. There's variety in there. Definitely more of a controlled sound than the first demo, and on the intimate side.. of course it wasn't intended to be some huge rock record, but rather the next step for The Velvet Ants. Look at My Bloody Valentine, or Elliott Smith though.. you don't always need to shred vocal cords to make a profound effect. Only a couple left to export.. any final touches will have to be made before Halloween.

See you,

im

Just a LITTLE announcement

We'd like to officially announce that the next Velvet Ants album is being mixed/produced by none other than the legendary Ken Stringfellow (of The Posies, R.E.M., The Disciplines, and Big Star) It's a real honor to be able to work with Ken on this. As for the tracks.. it will be interesting to see what Lo-fi meets Hi-fi sounds like!!

Stay there,

ian and trevor

Roughed out

Got a few more tracks roughed out: Favorite Words, The First Time, and Shebore (a track I wrote for some friends who were in a band of the same name.) About halfway to completing drums. -im

And everything sputtered

Of course the recording program would only wanna work on days where we have 45 minutes to roll versus days where we have plenty of time, right?? Gotta love it, no way around it. Songs we actually got a stab at: Colorblind, Interference 1, and maybe one more but as soon as we got to Shebore everything sputtered... Distorted, glitch-ridden dropouts lead to a slow, certain defeat. On a happier note, our first demos were accepted by the Copyright Office. Not that we'd be worried about infringement, no, of course not, not in this day and age. Booked another gig, and we're also nearing trio status!!

Recording lead/solos!

Stopped by Roscoe's house yesterday to record solos etc. Only took 2 hours to get the damn software to record properly. We worked on: Shapeless & Round, Interference 2, and Anyone. I think there are only 4 or 5 tracks that need any additional lead, so we should be in good shape for now. I swear, the more I use computers to record the more I miss my 4-track. Already learned my lesson once (lost all the original Velvet Ants demos from a hard drive crash in 2010) you'd think I'd smarten up and go back to tape, or at least one of those fancy multi-track recorder deals... Anything to separate the songs from any sort of operating system! Still not sure if Roscoe will be joining the band on stage, but it will be great to have him contribute to the new album.

stay there,

-im

XOXO, Copyright Lady

You know you're making a name for yourself when the lady at the Copyright Offices won't stop talking to you.

Recording drums!

It's been very hurry up and wait with this album. I had been about 400 miles away up until now so it's been long overdue. By the end of August almost all of the basic vocals, guitars, and bass had been completed... leaving out drums was sort of strange, and if I had to do so all over again it wouldn't have been like that. It's always been apparent that starting with bass or drums allows a better blueprint for the rest of the song (unless recording everything live, at once.) Luckily the songs were in time and we're well into our 3rd track already, roughing things out and coming up with changes etc. along the way. Songs we worked on: Anyone, Digitalis,  Interference 2 (a slower, more country-fried version than the 1st), and Let's Go With Alice which sounds twice as good as it had before. I just hope we can keep up at this pace, cause that would be great and we'd have the most to choose from later on. -im

Auditions have begun

Practice went well, now we're onto auditioning bassists. After a few years apart, Trevor and I seem a little rusty but I'm pretty confident that with another few rehearsals we'll shed whatever we need to get back in sync with each other. Before, we could jump in and out of things with much more grace (but that could've also been due to the fact that we had drilled those songs into out psyche and them some.) I think recording the first demo helped out a lot... we finally got to tie down song formulas, which we weren't extremely reliant on doing in the past. So here we are. There's a ton of recording left to do as well and it's due for mixing by the end of the month. We've got 14 tracks we're still working on, plus a handful of covers we're doing for fun. It will be interesting to see how we pull this off. -im