Wellwell

Sorry for the long absence. I’ve been flooded with work…Did the “Anna mulle Lovee”, mixed “Järven Tarina”, “Onnenonkija” and some other movies, did a mix of “Black Widows” (Scandinavian remake, 8 episodes) and some episodes of “Bordertown” etc etc. Luckily I’ve managed to squeeze time for Liquid Wolf (Drums with Kuoppis = done, brass with Pepa = almost done) and my newest pet project, Inertia. Inertia is old friends Tipi (FlipSide) on bass, Tomi “Laatu” Laaksonen (Kataya Live, KuDos) on drums and my fellow sound designer/musician Janne Laine on guitar. I’m doing some gtrs, keys and lead vocals. We’ve managed to whip 5-6 songs into shape and it’s been a hoot! Hope to have some recordings soon…Will start mixing LW with Samu this month, I hope!

Take care!

Pepa making notes
Pepa making notes

Disndat

Time flies, still. Chapter Two has been moving, but just a bit. FlipSide is slowly gathering new momentum. Liquid Wolf is probably the one that’s moving the most at the time, Kuoppis will come tomorrow for the first session. The new studios are working nicely, we just did a test run of the new Christie projector at Kalevala mix suite. Bright and sharp! I’m starting the post for “Anna mullet Lovee”, that will keep me busy for 6-7 weeks.

Cheers!

Chapter One: Two – looming

It’s been severely delayed but we’re still moving. As You may recall, the plan was to (re)do 4 of the old songs, Behind the gaze, Beyond the vision, Just another role and Wings of amor.

Well, we are – The original plan was just to do them as they were. It quickly became apparent that it was not such a good idea. Let sleeping dogs lie…,-).

The only plan that made real sense was to redo everything, starting from the arrangements. Sami did just that. The songs in effect became different songs. So the lyrics needed to be redone, not all together but some of the fiery youthfulness (i.e.. naiveté) needed to be weeded out. Sami and Hannu did that. As years had taken some toll of Hannu’s higher vocal register, the melodies needed to be adjusted. Hannu did that.

We’re now halfway there; Behind the gaze and Beyond the vision are done. So 2 more to go. Hopefully we get them done soon. As the songs progress, I wanted to change a few things still. The new songs will be under “Chapter Two” moniker ;-). And there will be some guests appearing who were not in the original line-up(s). The first one being Teijo Tikkanen, who will be playing piano on “Behind the gaze” at least. Some talk of female backing vocals has also been in the air.

So here we go!

Hannu

 

 

 

 

 

 

IMG_1468

Studio mayhem

The studio renewals have gotten to the point where PStudio is done. I hire Niko to help me move and redo Sandbox (aka Perfect Sound Studio aka PStudio) and the new Kalevala 2. and 3. We took down and moved 80% of the stuff to Maunula where it waits for the premises to be painted etc. I took some of my home gear and put it to good use next door. And vice versa. So now, once again, I have 2 units here, one upstairs and the other upstairs next door. The home unit has an UA Apollo, Macbook Air, small Genelec 8010’s etc. The Sandbox next door has the trusty DynAudio BM6A’s, Euphonix/Avid controllers, MacMini + Magma chassis for Pro Tools HD-X, some synths and of course my Kumu in the other room that used to have the smaller PT setup.

So the plan is to have music (and some small jobs) done here and all the real work, post etc at Kalevalastudio.

SandBox
SandBox
Playroom
Playroom

Summer’s been cancelled

At least here in Finland. I think we’ve had like 3 days of proper summer…

Well, at least I have a good excuse to stay in the studio ;-). Studio work has actually been two fold: tearing down and building them anew + recording. I’ve made arrangements to move my two units to Kalevalastudio in Maunula, Helsinki where I do the bulk of my post work. We are renovating the upstairs and rebuilding the units with my stuff. As I’ve garnered quite a bit of gear, I still have my home turf next door, now it serves more as a sort of a music playground with Pro Tools HD-X of course for recording and mixing in one room and the second room reserved for the instruments and amps, drums taking up most of the space.

Liquid Wolf 2 has taken some leaps forward as Samu managed to play the first round of basses. I’ve done basically all of the guitars, some solos need work still tho.  Teijo has sung about half of the songs and played some keys as well. Especially the keys have made a huge difference! The songs are emerging slowly but surely. I’ve sent first demos to Kuoppis as well so we might be able to have the drums recorded during the fall as well…

I received the hard copies of SStB, people have seemed to like it, which is nice! Here’s the Spotify link: SStb – Blacks & Blues

Also the FlipSide ep#2, Dead Light, was digitally released a while back. We’re planning to raise the ruckus a bit later as everybody’s having their summer holidays, but it’s here if You’re interested: FlipSide – Dead Light

FS_DL_front SSTB_booklet_HR_front OntheMove

Too long

It’s been too long from my last posting, but it’s really been hectic. I’m still knee deep in audio post, but the light glimmers at the end of the tunnel…

Quick update:

Liquid Wolf 2 – song frames done, 85% rhythm guitars done. Bass sessions imminent.
Flipside –  2nd ep mastered, waiting for layout of the cover
SStB – ready, waiting for me….

Stay tuned!