loweringthetoneuk-blog

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Lowering the Tone, song no#5- "The Original 6/8".

 "This song was inspired by one of the many random and usually nonsensical notes I jot down on a daily basis; "Awake when unconscious, and conscious whilst asleep".  I used oxymora throughout the song, to create the image of contradicting things that seem to coexist and make perfect sense when you're asleep, but in reality appear to be completely bizarre.  I wanted my guitar parts to sound hypnotic, so I experimented with different effects including delay and reverb. I'm not entirely keen on delay as an effect, simply because I think it is often used in a way as to cover up un-imaginitve playing, however in the context of this song I feel it helps to add texture and create a pretty, yet somewhat unsettling sound.  Tying back into the theme of two contradicting things, I wanted to merge complexity and simplicity. This was achieved by using repetitive guitar riffs and fairly simple vocal melodies, combined with a mixture of different time signatures, including 6/8, 7/8 and 10/4, and swaps between half speed and double time. That way I felt the meaning of the lyrics was also portrayed through the instrumentation itself". - R.Z.A

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Release of our new self titled EP

Having released Wide Eyed as a free downloadable single, and sold a limited amount of CD's featuring our Intro and Revive on, we are now ready to release our full self titled EP online. All songs have been mixed and mastered and are ready to be ordered for CD release and online playback. The date we have set to release our EP is Friday 21st June. We will be putting it up for free download on our Soundcloud. We are all very excited!

R.S

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FMP Recording Revive Write-Up

  FMP Recording Write up – Revive When preparing for the recording of this song we did our usual pre recording preparations which included checking what equipment would be used, what day and when we could transfer the equipment to college as well as what order we would be recording things. As we were going to be recording two songs in one day, Revive and Close, it only seemed common sense to plan well ahead of our session in the studio. We did this to make sure on the day we could follow our timetabled plan in a way as regimented as possible so as to avoid any hiccups including technical problems and any time over-runs. As it has been very tight over the year trying to find enough time to produce semi-pro recordings, we have pushed ourselves to be as organised as possible with the time we have. As mentioned above we plan well ahead. However the night before our full day of recording we have gone into the studio and set up the projects on Nuendo with all correct buses linked to the corresponding mics on the drum kit, this so that between the time of us setting them up an us being in the studio the next day, no-one will have been able to tamper with the connections on the bus box in the live room etc. Doing this gives us a massive head start the next day as it is surprising how often you can trust everything will plan out smoothly doing the preparations on the day, however find that problem after problem can occur, leaving you with less and less time! When we came in at around 9am, all we needed to do was turn on power, check connections again and crack on because all the levels were set on the drum kit and Rachels guitar cab to make sure there was no clipping.  As with Wide Eyed, Rachel wanted to use her own head and cab, the Orange Rockaverb, for the reasons that she preferred to use a sound familiar to her and which she felt was better suited and better quality than the marshall stacks in the studio. Unlike before she used just two SM57’s on the cab, one in the back and one off axis. She did this so that the off axis mic placement would give her more resonance and bass tones rather than trebly tones off an On-axis mic placement as well as the back cab placement to pick up the low end to give more depth. This created a nice tone which was well suited to the darkness of Revive. Rachel recorded certain parts twice so that they could be panned either side or to create a thick wall of sound when needed. Richard again chose to record his guitar parts through his own audio interface at home using realistic simulators which he could spend enough of his own time finding the right tones. He used two mic placements, one off-axis and one on-axis for the distorted channels and same again but different tones for the clean channels. These were panned accordingly.  We recorded the drums on Sophie’s drum kit again as she did not feel happy about using the kit in the studio as she preferred the tone and sound of her kit as well as it being easier to play on to. Sophie’s kit is a large rock kit with big booming sounds which suited the heavy parts of the songs very well, whereas if it was a jazz kit for example with a small kick drum and a low floor tom, they would have not stood out as much in the mix and had as much power. It didn’t take many takes for Sophie to record the drums however found it more practical to record to the song in sections so as to avoid a perfect take minus one slip up in the end which would not be easy to fix. Unfortunately due to missing mics i.e. the Shure clip on mics which were used for most drums excluding kick, snare, hi hats and cymbals, we had to use SM57’s on every single drum apart from the overheads which we used the Senneheiser condenser mics. This was impractical as it resulted in the bottom snare and mid tom picking up lot of bleed from the cymbals. Although we had this problem on our hands, we managed to get a quite a nice tone out of the drums this way anyway and were better recorded due to us spending more time on the recording input levels to make sure nothing was clipping as we experienced clipping on the mid tom in Wide Eyed. Once the drums were recorded, Rachel recorded her guitar. With both drums and Rachels guitar parts down, we then agreed to do the bass as well as Richard’s guitar parts at his house. Rhiannon wanted to do this due to her then Bass guitar not being up to a good standard playability wise for recording and felt it would be best to wait till her new Fender Jaguar bass arrived so she could record with a better tone. When we recorded the bass, we used bass amp simulators and other plugins to give the bass as much real sounding tones as possible for it to stand out in the mix. Once the levels were checked on the bass channel we set to record her parts which were done with ease in one take however she felt one or two bits could be better so we then cut those bits out using the snipping tool and re-recorded those parts. Again like Wide Eyed we used a skeleton track which Richard had recorded a long time ago at home for the demo version of this song last year. Sophie used this to record her drums in time and for her to remember the amount of bars of each section whilst doing it. Doing this also ensured that she could put feeling and dynamics into her playing which in turn would help us used feeling dynamics in our playing too.

R.S

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O2 ACADEMY!!

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The Big 02 Gig

So our final college gig was on Tuesday the 11th of June and it was at the O2 Academy! Our flyering and promotion paid off and there was a decent amount of people there which only added to the excitement of setting up and sound checking. As it was our biggest gig so far we all had our little pre gig good luck routines, Rich re stringed his guitar with new sexy strings and Rhiannon went one step further buying a new bass. Rachel bought a new tuner, spare leads and picks to ensure that she always had a back up on stage and after the incident that occurred at the London gig ( her guitar falling off the strap ) she put strap locks on in preparation. I unfortunately didn't buy my obligatory new sticks however i had already planned getting all my breakables and equipment needed days in advance so I wasn't stressed. Due to Damian ( drummer from Unknown Catastrophe) providing his entire kit, it was only necessary for me to bring my crash cymbals, pedal and snare drum but did mean i needed to be at the O2 Academy at 3pm to help him set up, whereas the other members didn't have to be there until 4, we had time to sit in the dressing room and get comfortable before sound checks begun. Unknown Catastrophe were playing last so sound checked first, ours began at about 5pm- we had prepared a section to check. We chose to do the verse of wide - eyed that incorporates Rachel's vocals softly to begin with then progresses on to a full band instrumental section, this enables the sound engineer to check levels when we were playing at our hardest as well as a softer level. From this point in the song we go onto test Richards' main vocals and the final chorus, testing now Rachel's' harder vocals. In hinds sight this was the best thing to of done because we had several [problems with the sound check, at times Rachel's vocals were causing feedback through all of our monitors. The reason being that having a soft higher voice the sound engineer was having to boost the signal from her mic into our monitors so that we could hear her clearly- created strong feedback. This meant out sound check was nearly 45 min long, ensuring that we could get the best possible front and monitor mixes. Overall we had good but not amazing sound in our monitors, the vocals were still hard to hear for all and Rhiannon could only hear Richards guitar. Rachel had the worst monitor mix of us all and struggled to hear her own vocals and guitar making the sound check quite stressful- not necessarily the best start to a gig! After the sound check was done and we ran through the intro and revive until we were as comfortable as possible, we then had 2 hours to spend backstage enjoying the process of being in the O2 Academy's dressing room! Having our passes and names on the stage time walls was a surreal experience. Made and Misused opened the night at about 7.30, getting the crowd busy and played a great set- it was the second time we had not opened for the night so for me watching another band play before us made me excited yet nervous. we went on stage at 8.30 but had 20 min to set up all our equipment, for me to put my breakables on and for everyone to set up leads etc. We planned a big entrance on stage by giving the sound engineer a copy of ' Tip-Top through the tulips' to be played before we walked on. The lights were turned off and as the song finished we took to the stage. As Rachel tunes her guitar directly before playing as well as tuning in advance, unfortunately the music started before Rachel had time to get her guitar off stage so her only option was to quickly tune on stage before starting the Intro. I think if we had spoken to the engineer prior to playing, and been clearer about the timing of when our  music was going to start and finish, this problem could have been avoided. As an entire set I think that all of us made mistakes and slipped up in certain songs, however the experience of being on the o2 stage meant that we all played at our most confident, providing what I believe to of been a performance with the most stage presence. We also sold singles that we had made up that day of our Intro, Revive and Wide-Eyed - we made 25 Cds and sold all of them for £1 each, we've had some awesome feedback and cant thank everyone who came, supported and bought our singles enough!

 S.H

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Do us a solid and spread this round the interweb?

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update #7

Big things are happening recently. we dropped an online release of 'Wide Eyed', which had a good reception. You can also download it for free. (link below)

https://soundcloud.com/loweringthetoneuk/lowering-the-tone-wide-eyed

and it's also only 6 days till our big o2 gig! We're just trying to push it on facebook and get as many people to come, we're really looking forward to it. A facebook event for the gig can be found below. Be a doll and click attending. 

https://www.facebook.com/events/483375778400625/?notif_t=plan_user_joined

RBJ

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update 6 or something.

iya.

We've been busy practasing our set list this week. We've been putting lryics and melodies to our latest song, and also been busy planning the o2 gigs, which have just been announced on facebook. Which can be found here:

https://www.facebook.com/#!/events/483375778400625/?notif_t=plan_edited

Hope too see you there.

RBJ

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Update #5

Our last OCVC was a good one, we played well and even unveiled our newest song as an instrumental. Wasn't a big crowd, but the people that we're watch were supportive as always which was good. 

We also had our last recording session on friday, and as we are a little behind on our recording project, we decided to get the drums down too two tracks (revive and close), we managed this successfully and Rachel even managed to get her guitar parts down for the tracks as well. We shall hopefully be recording Richard's guitar parts and my bass tracks at his, using his home studio, and then adding on vocals at a later date. 

We're in the midst of trying to write another song at the moment, although we have enough material for the o2, we feel like we would like another song to perform as well. We may go more in the direction of punk for this which i'm persoanlly quite excited about. 

Look out for our gig at the Wheatshef on the 24th with Children of the sun, Mordecai and Columba. It'll be a good en :)

RBJ

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OCVC GIG

yo! we have a gig at Oxford and Cherwell Valley College at 4.30 today, its our last one there, so if you're around come down and support us!

LtT

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Update #4

So last week we continued working on our new song (number 6 as its titled at the moment ha), as Soph was back. We've now finished all of the musical elements for the song and only have to add vocals. Hopefully it will be fully finished by the end of next week. 

We also jammed out a few ideas, one of which that seemed to progress was one of Rhiannon's bass riffs, which we were able to expand upon, so we'll also be working on this throughout the coming weeks.

If you haven't already, give us a like on facebook:

www.facebook.com/LoweringTheTone

RBJ

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check out my band?

www.facebook.com/LoweringTheTone

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Cellar Gig 4/4/13

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Cellar Gig 4/4/13

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update #3

First week back after our Easter holiday break and things are going pretty well. We've written a new song, with just the drums and vocals to add on. It's sounding pretty rad so far, hopefully Soph will be back next week to get some ideas for drums parts. 

Our next gig is on the 24th of April at the Wheatshef. We'll be playing with our buddies, Columba, Mordecai and Children Of the Sun. Should be a good night, and only £3 advance so come down! 

RBJ

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London Gig

London gig @ 229. 13/4/13

ahhhhh, where to start with this gig!

We had it booked for a couple months before we were due to play it, but even though we'd prepared ourselves pretty well for it, still stressed out over it. We had trouble shifting our tickets, the headline band pulled out leaving us no drum kit/amps and we had run out of money to get to the venue. 

After a few phone calls from the promoters (absent kelly), we discovered that none of the other bands had a drum kit we could use, and only one guitar amp. 

Luckily, Sophie's mum was kind enough to drive us down to London. We managed to get four people, two guitars and a full kit into one estate car. Impressive eh? Rachel also brought her amp down, and all her family in her car as well. 

We arrived a little late (traffic) and set up the kit and then waited to sound check. We had the best monitor mixes we've ever had on stage. After that we had a walk around Great Portland Street and got some food. 

We got back to the venue at half 7, and watched two acoustic acts, one band and then had to go get ready, as we were committed to a tight scheduled and only 15 minutes to change over. By this time, the venue was quite full. After the second band, it was our turn, so we went on stage and set up. Kicked off with revive, the difference a drum monitor makes it such a significant to the way we perform, Soph could actually hear what we're playing, and thus, we all stayed in time throughout the set. After revive, we played wide-eyed, which went down really well, but on the last chorus, Rachel's guitar strap fell off just as she was about to sing. I quickly started singing the lyrics and then Rachel started singing again and then finished playing her guitar parts. When Rachel lost her guitar, Rich also started playing Rachel's guitar parts to compensate. Handled professionally by all of us in my books. We then played 'Close' and finished our set with 'The Original Six, Eight'. We got the loudest round of applause and cheers I've heard to date, and even got an encore! HAHA.

This is the best gig we've played to date and left all of us in such a good mood to make some more music. 

RBJ

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port mahon gig

We played port mahorn on the 12/4/13. On the bill were: Jack Holmes, Lowering the Tone, Unknown Catastrophe and Mordecai.

Things seemed to running a little late right from the word go. I was meant to miss soundcheck due to being at work, but I arrived at the venue at quarter past seven, to find that the equipment had only just been set up. This meant that we did actually get to soundcheck with a full band, which is a plus side to the event being late, but we were an hour late on stage. This meant that the majority of the people that came to watch us had to leave due to parking/other commitments. In hine sight is a shame, but we still played to a decent crowd.

Nick, the soundman/our lovely tutor, was battling the venue over sound. The drum kit took up most of the stage and the mics were picking the kit up, which was then feeding back pretty bad. He did a good job despite the difficulties and we had a good sound on stage.

We busted out our cover of aerials by system of a down. Having only practiced this two days before the gig, I think we actually pulled it off pretty well, even if it was an awkward key for Rachel to sing in.

Overall, it wasnt the best gig we played, but it was still fun and we also learnt a lot.

RBJ