Matt Lenny and The Breakdown

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Bee Gees + Eagles + Queens of the Stone Age?

Night Ranger?  The Rocky soundtrack?

Whatever you want to call it, these are some serious harmony vocals.  Gotta give it up to The Brooklyn Sheiks (Tommy Mokas and Nick Rosenthal) for a pretty kickass vocal arrangement.

Oh yeah…but what the hell is this?  This is what the chorus to my new son,”We Are One”, sounds like acappella.  Sounds even cooler with all the guitars, drums, etc. if I don’t say so myself.

-ML

Hey everybody,

Sorry for the blog slacking.  It’s been a pretty busy month or so and I’m sorry to say that I’ve fallen off the video blog horse.  It just became a little bit too difficult to balance the actual work of making the record with all the filming, editing, etc. of the video blog.  I’ve got one more video to post soon documenting the completion of “In The Clubs”, but I’m afraid that will be it for the first set of songs.  I’m hoping to document the next batch of songs more systematically and maybe even get a little help from people who actually know what they’re doing with a video camera…

Anyway, I wanted to post this photo from last night’s session.  I was doing a cowbell overdub on We Are One and Nick told me to hit the crap out of it.  So, I did.  And I guess I really was hitting the thing pretty hard because I bent it out of shape.  But it sounds good on the track!  Matt Lenny: 1, Cowbell: 0.

The cowbell I mangled while recording "We Are One".

Hey all,

I’m happy to report that we’ve officially finished another track over at the ol’ studio.  This one is called “In The Clubs” and it’s a real departure for me in a lot of ways.

Here’s how the track sounded originally in its acoustic incarnation:

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The song started life (at least in my mind) as a talking blues.  On the guitar, the thumb is holding down a steady quarter note pattern in the bass while the other fingers play the melody. People who can really do this well amaze me and I wanted to try it out myself.  I’m still kind of a hack at doing it, but it’s a lot of fun and it put me in the mood of songs like Subterranean Homesick Blues with kind of funny, impressionist lyrics.  So, again, I decided to try my own version of it.

That’s how the song came about, anyway.  But now that we’ve added electric guitars, bass, and drums, it’s a completely different beast:

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It’s still kinda bluesy in a lot of ways, but there’s something cool and modern going on as well I think (and hope).  That’s why I love (and hate) the recording process…it’s all an experiment and you never really know what you’re gonna get.  All you can really do is set sail in a direction you think will be good and hope you find something cool.

And now, it’s time to leave my computer and go out into the sunshine.  Stop reading this and go do the same!

-ML

The record continues!! We finished the first two songs and now it’s time to start working on new ones. We decided to pick three tunes to work on this time. I wanted another rocker, so I wrote a new one entitled, “We Are One”. It actually uses part of a riff from a song I wrote many years ago called “The One You Buy”. I always liked the guitar riff, but the old melody was no good, so I rewrote and restructured the song overall. Read more…

Hey all,

Part 2 of the marathon recording/mixing session of 4/4 - 4/5/2009.  It gets late, things get weird, and stuff gets broken (not least of which were our poor brains).

Matt Lenny - Making a record - Video 5 - April 4-5, 2009 Part 2 from Matt Lenny on Vimeo.

YouTube version here.

-ML

Hey all,

So, the weekend April 4-5 was a ridiculously long marathon in the recording studio. We started out by rehearsing Good Enough and I Don’t Think It’s Right with Tipsy Brown on keys. (She’s not featured on the record yet, but she’ll be in the live band and will almost definitely be on future tracks in the studio.)

Part 1 of this long session video shows off Nick’s unique and very high class automobile skills and Tipsy and I arranging the songs. Stay tuned for tambourine meltdowns and late night sunglasses in part two…

Oh…and did I mention how friggin’ psyched I am to have the first two tunes completed and released into the wild?!! If you haven’t nabbed them yet, click the “Download” link on the right.  I’m giving them away now in exchange for your email address, but who knows how long that will last?…

You can also preview them on the music page.

Anywho…

Matt Lenny - Making a record - Video 4 - April 4-5, 2009 Part 1 from Matt Lenny on Vimeo.

YouTube version here.

Be well!

-ML

Hey all,

Here’s the next video from the recording sessions for my new album. This one features the inimitable Sonny Ratcliff playing drums and some late night interviews with yours truly and the production team.

One of the things that I don’t think people realize (and I actually always forget) is just how much sitting around and waiting is involved in making a record.  There are definitely nights where that’s not true and you’re singing, playing, etc. for hours on end.  But then there are also nights like this one where you end up sitting on the couch all night doing nothing.  And doing nothing is EXHAUSTING after about 8 hours.

“Nothing” might be an exaggeration, but it’s a weird thing.  I wasn’t playing the drums, setting up mics, or anything, but I do think it’s important that I was there.  I make the occasional suggestion, but, if nothing else, I think it’s important just to be present for the whole process.  That way, I know all the pieces of the puzzle that are available for the final picture.  And, maybe it’s new agey and corny, but I think the energy of the recording changes just by who’s there and that people can contribute just by giving focus during the creation.

Anyway, enough of my low-rent theorizing.  Hope you enjoy.

Matt Lenny - Making a record - Video 3 - 4/2/09 from Matt Lenny on Vimeo.

YouTube version here.

-ML

Hey all,

Here’s some footage from the first rehearsal with my bassist (Bobby McCullough) and drummer (Sonny Ratcliff) for the new songs. We start out by working out some of the kinks and particulars of the drumbeats on the song “Good Enough” and then we actually managed to learn and arrange a whole new song that will also be on the new record.

We actually did practice a whole other song as well, but the audio from that footage was terrible, so I decided not to punish your eardrums. (Although…the footage of Bobby and Sonny singing acappella falsetto harmony vocals is priceless and I might have to dig that out at some point…)

Matt Lenny - Rehearsal April 1, 2009 from Matt Lenny on Vimeo.

(For you iPhone/YouTube people, you can also see the video here.)

More from the studio soon.

Stay well, stay happy, and help me hope for sunshine.

-ML

Hey all,

Here’s the video footage from last night’s recording session (recorded with my brand new, fancy camcorder that I have no idea how to use).  I had originally thought we were going to be doing the final drum tracks, but we ended up doing final lead vocals, some keyboards, and a bit more guitar work.  It was a long night and, as you’ll see below, burgers played an important and tasty role in keeping us rolling ’til the dawn.

Hope you enjoy.

More video coming soon.

-ML

Hey all, here’s a live acoustic version of a track I am probably going to ultimately work up as part of the record.  I’ve wanted for a while to learn how to do that cool blues fingerpicking thing where you keep the bassline going while soloing over the top of it.  Usually, the way I learn things on the guitar is by trying to write something that demands the style. So, I wrote this song and I’m pretty happy with it.

Next step…get the drums, deep fuzzy bass, and some electric guitar and make it into a Beck meets Led Zeppelin meets T. Bone Burnett style production…  I’ll post some demos when we get into reworking it and dragging (my version of) the blues into the 2st century. But, in the meantime, I gave the song a test run in front of a small crowd at Brooklyn’s Bar 4, which is a great little bar/venue.