Tag: Dean Drouillard

Mixing, and why not to show my husband before it’s finished

Everything has been recorded, except for those last few vocal re-do’s that I know are inevitable. The mixing stage has begun. It’s a weeknight and I have gone up to bed earlier than my husband Andrew, which never happens. I am listening to the first mixes from Dean on my super sounding Bose Soundlink speaker. When Andrew comes in, he catches the last part of one of the songs. I want him to say how great it sounds (of course), but instead I see a confused look on his face.

My very concentrated face while listening and making mixing notes

“It sounds different” he says, “What happened to the other version?” Andrew has heard the songs from their inception, just me singing them on guitar or piano. He has heard early demo versions, and he has heard the songs as they’ve been recorded and with parts and musicians added the way. He has grown attached to one ‘edition’ of the song, somewhere along its journey to completion. We’re both tired and I am feeling particularly sensitive, so this reaction sends me into a teeny tiny rage.

Mixing is where all of the parts that have been recorded are blended and placed, creating a cohesive song. It’s a mountain of a job, and takes a great deal of patience and an incredible ear. The songs have upwards of 30 different tracks, with vocal harmonies, keyboards, guitars, strings and percussion to name a few.  Mixing is the reason you don’t usually listen to a song on the radio and say “Gee, that horn part is way too loud,” or “That lead guitar is sticking out like a sore thumb.” A good mix means you are experiencing the song as the sum of its parts and none of its parts are out of whack.

A few weeks later, Dean is done mixing and ready for my notes. I have to listen to the songs on headphones, in my car, on my monitor’s computer, and on my iPhone. My biggest challenge is how self conscious and critical I am of my lead vocal. I have to try really hard to let that go and listen to everything else that’s going on.

Mixing notes

My first round of mixing notes

During one of my listening sessions, sitting in my favourite rocking chair in our sunroom, Andrew is within earshot at the kitchen table. After all 10 songs he says: “Yeah babe, it sounds really good, nothing jumping out at me at all. It just sounds like an album.” From my understated husband, this is as good as I’m going to get and I realize my earlier mistake: Never show your mixes to your non-musician spouse until it’s finished! Have a listen to this clip of one of the songs which had a total of 58 tracks!!

Recording The Bed Tracks for Living Proof

Day 1 of the recording of Living Proof

Walking to the recording studio on day 1,

The week had finally come to head into the studio and start recording the bed tracks for the album. The beds are the main instruments that lay down the groove and feel of each song, in our case drums, bass and keys. They provide the framework that everything else is built on. For me this week was when it really home that I was able to make this record. My producer Dean Drouillard helped put together a top notch group of musicians: Mark Mariash on drums, Robbie Grunwald on keys, and Dean on bass.  We were recording at the Lincoln County Social Club with the Juno nominated John Dinsmore at the engineering helm.

Dean took the gear and I walked up to the studio. It was a beautiful sunny spring day and I put my earbuds in and listened to our recording demos on the way up. I remember looking up and letting the sun warm my face and feeling like I would burst. Being a mom, it’s often hard to have those moments where you are totally and utterly doing something for yourself, so I let it wash over me.

Recording studio meeting between takes

The guys writing notes and looking very serious

When I got to the recording studio the guys were almost set up and we had a meeting about the first song. We listened to the demos, we played around with the tempo, and Dean gave some direction about other recording artists we could conjure up as influences.

Recording studio art

Recording Studio Art – Some of my favourites from the walls of the Lincoln County Social Club

My job for this part of the recording process was singing a ‘scratch’ vocal along with the band. Although I would go back in and record my final vocals later, it helps to have the singer so the band can feel the arc of the song, the push and pull of emotion, when to scale back and when to really give it. Once I had done one scratch vocal for each song, I was then there to listen, give notes, look at John’s many odd posters on the wall, get coffee for the guys, and search the internet for obscure musical gear with Robbie.

Three 10 hour days later, we had successfully recorded all the bed tracks and I was more exhausted than I had been since having my youngest child! I was able to record some footage of us in action so here’s a little video for you to enjoy with a sneak peek of some of the songs from the album.

The Making of the Emma Cook Voice Instrument

Although my voice is already an instrument of sorts, this week we created an instrument using many layers of my voice, and it sounds dope! (Yes, I just wrote the word dope, and?)

My producer Dean Drouillard and I are trying to get the first single from Living Proof finished so I spent a few hours this week recording vocals. Dean had this amazing idea to make an instrument out of my voice that he can play as an added backing track layer on the album. He got this idea from the iconic 1975 hit I’m Not In Love by 10CC. Take a listen to the first 45 seconds of the original version of the song and you’ll immediately know what I’m talking about. There is this really cool sounding effect made up of layering the bands voices and ‘playing’ them so they swell up and down. In order to create this instrument back then, it would have taken days as they didn’t have computers and were recording to tape!

In our case, Dean made tracks for just shy of two octaves and had me sing Ah’s, Oh’s and Ooh’s held for as long as I could and without any vibrato. He then cut off the beginning and ending of each and spliced them together so there was essentially a never-ending sound. I had to do this for each note, going down chromatically from a high A. I was really thankful for my classical voice training for this exercise, because it sure took a lot of breath control to hold the notes and stay perfectly on pitch AND not have any vibrato.

I am super happy about the way it sounds and can’t wait to see what Dean does with it on our first single I Will Stay. Take a listen to the example Dean sent over of how the instrument sounds with my voice.

How I Picked the Right Producer

Emma Cook - Same Old Song, producer Mitch Girio

Same Old Song (2016), producer Mitch Girio

Finding the right producer for an album is quite possibly the most important part of the whole process. The songs have to be there of course, but having badly produced songs is like having mushy pasta: there may have been nothing wrong with the pasta itself, it was just overcooked. I have been lucky enough to work with some amazing producers, including Mitch Girio for my last album Same Old Song. There is a magic that happens when someone brings out the ‘true’ nature of the songs, or can bring forward some truth that you didn’t necessarily even know was there when you were writing them.

Producer Dean Drouillard

Dean Drouillard

I came across producer Dean Drouillard by happenstance. Although I didn’t meet him on Yelp as he likes to joke, our kids became friends in JK at our local public school. An amazing musician and composer in his own right, he is also a sought after guitar player and has played with everyone from Royal Wood to Buffy Sainte-Marie. I asked Dean if he would produce a few demos for me to use to for licensing opportunities and to apply for an Ontario Arts Council grant. Working with Dean for the demos was a pivotal time for me. I hadn’t really admitted to myself that I was ready to get back out there and record another album. I wasn’t sure I could do it with my continuing health struggles, and I felt a mixture of fear and self-doubt.

The songs however, and what Dean was able to bring out of me, told a different story altogether. Listening to the finished product, I heard someone who had both a story to tell and the drive to tell it. I heard power and intimacy and sadness and strength. It was then that I finally admitted to myself that I had to do this. It was Dean who pushed me to apply for the coveted FACTOR Juried Sound Recording Grant which I later received and which is making the dream of Living Proof into an exciting reality.