Tag: home recording

Dancing Barefoot (Patti Smith cover)

dancing barefoot studio session

Raw Studio Footage “Dancing Barefoot” (cover)
(no shredding here, only good old fashioned acoustic guitars 🙂 )

Yesterday someone I got to know trough Facebook, Herman, and I came together in my home studio to record the basic tracks for a set of cover songs we both like. Including this one, by Patti Smith’s “Dancing Barefoot”. Audio you hear is taken from the smartphone we used to record the video.

We also recorded Daniel Amos Band’s “Shotgun Angel” and U2’s “40”. All in one session! Drums, one guitar and vocal. Now it’s up to me to re-record the vocals and also add bass.

This song will have female vocals, to be recorded later. Making music with someone you’ve only known online for a few years can be a little tricky — but we had a lot of fun today and worked out very well!

That’s the basic idea of the ‘Solid Rock Blues Band’ concept. While it’s a one-man-band, I love to work with others to play and record music. We might be doing a few additional recordings in the future!

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New song release – Mountain High

Mountain High Song Release Solid Rock Blues Band

Mountain High (Valley Below) is an uptempo song, countryrock and bluesrock influenced, by the Solid Rock Blues Band project. Inspired by a short holiday trip to the Harz region in Germany.

While on holiday this song was written by Rudy and it took a few months before the melody and music were composed. After that was ready, recording and mixing the song was done in one day. Recorded, mixed and released on May 2, 2021 at The Loft Studio.

Video Mountain High

Audio only (Soundcloud)

More details about this recording

Recording
Drums – Digitech Trio
Bass – Harley Benton MM84ASB
Acoustic Guitars – Samick Greg Bennett (Electro Acoustic)
Electric Guitars – Ibanez AS53-TF Hollow Body
Vocal Mic – AKG C900 Condenser
Audio Interface – Behringer UMC404HD
DAW – Harrison Mixbus6

Video
Free stock video from https://www.pexels.com/nl-nl/videos/ and footage shot in the Harz region, Germany. Edited using Flowblade

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Don’t Say We’re Over. Out now on Spotify!

Don't Say We're Over Album pre-releaseIt’s here! Don’t Say We’re Over has been officially released this week and is now available on Spotify and other online streaming services! Of course it is also still available on BandCamp since that’s where we have made our complete (back) catalogue available.

The official album release was done trough Amuse. We are considering re-releasing some older albums trough Amuse also, making them available (again) to the public trough services like Spotify and Amazon Music. Our experiences with DistroKid were fine so far but didn’t turn out to be successful in terms of sales. So we’re giving Amuse a try for distribution! So far, so good! Amuse has delivered the album to all platforms we’ve opted for and all went perfectly well.

Download or stream from BandCamp
https://barkingaunts.bandcamp.com/album/dont-say-were-over-2

Listen for free at Spotify
https://open.spotify.com/album/0tLnwkIbovvo0fAXgWWgQy

 

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Don’t Say We’re Over – Album pre-release at Bandcamp!

prerelease Don't Say We're Over

Rocking blues from the LoftStudio by the Solid Rock Blues Band. The new album “Don’t Say We’re Over” is now available at BandCamp! Stream for free or download the 8 original tracks for only €5.00. The pre-release at BandCamp includes a free download for the song “Pandemic Blues”.

Download or stream from BandCamp
https://barkingaunts.bandcamp.com/album/dont-say-were-over-2

Album Release BandLab Mastering and streamingPowerful Blues and Rocking songs about Love, Life, Society and Religion. Little stories based on observations not prejudices based on beliefs, politics or personal views. The new album by the Solid Rock Blues Band is now available.

Some of the songs have been around for some time already, including the video for the title track. All songs have been mastered using BandLab (you can stream the album from Bandlab also). The album will soon also be available from our SoundCloud and Drooble accounts.

Tracklist

Some of the tracks included were released as single. To read more about the tracks, click on the highlighted titles.

1. You Ain’t What I’m Dreaming Of
2. When A Woman Drinks Alone
3. Don’t Say We’re Over
4. Written In The Heart
5. Why’d She Call You My Friend
6. One Day She’ll Be Proud To Call Me Her Son
7. Pandemic Blues (free download)
8. Shattered Dreams

Spotify, iTunes and Amazon Music

The official album release will be around October 4th. The album has been submitted for release trough Amuse. We are currently considering re-releasing some older albums trough Amuse also making them available again to the public trough services like Spotify and Amazon Music. Our experiences with DistroKid were fine so far but didn’t turn out to be successful in terms of sales. So we’re giving Amuse a try for distribution! In the end it’s not really sales that are our main goal but getting the music out there the most effective way. It seems Amuse will fit the bill for us.

We, however, always release our albums on BandCamp first. So here it is!

Official Video “Don’t Say We’re Over”

The album was named after the previously released single, included in the album, “Don’t Say We’re Over”.

Stream or download the album at BandCamp.

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Studio upgrade: Acer Aspire (Intel i5-9400, Linux Mint 20 “Ulyana” and Ardour6)

The “LoftStudio” has gotten a major hardware and software upgrade. Because of the fact the old coputer, a DIY Intel i3 computer, decided to call it quits after having been a trusty companion for many years we had to buy a new computer. We bought an Acer Aspire with an Intel i5-9400 Hexacore(!) cpu on board, 8 GB of RAM, a Saumsung 256GB SSD and Western Digital 1TB Sata-disk.

We’re not going to bore you with lots of technical details but in the end we decided not only to upgrade the hardware but the software also. So we’ve installed Linux Mint 20 as well as Ardour6 and of course re-installed Mixbus5. For those that can understand Dutch, here’s an unboxing, test & review video.

ARDOUR6
For those of you interested: Ardour 6.x now comes with Linux 20, for free(!). It’s available in the Linux Software Manager as a free download. They do ask if you want to support them and as far as I’m concerned I’d say: Do so! If you use it on a regular base, just pay them for their efforts. It’s great software.

STUDIO SESSION
Of course we did some testing, after installing all the software. Here’s a video of a short recording session. Including a tip on how to get a nice, full, guitar sound.

NEW ALBUM
It’s been quit here because we’ve been working on recording a few new songs. We finished them the day before the old computer broke down! The new album is getting close. Some of the tracks are available at Soundcloud (some are free downloads!) at https://soundcloud.com/barkingaunts.

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Don’t Say We’re Over!

Slow rocksong, lovesick, broken heart. Male vocals. Heavy guitars. Don’t Say We’re Over. The new single by the Solid Rock Blues Band has been released today on SoundCloud and BandCamp.

Free streaming at BandCamp as well as on SoundCloud. If you’d like to download it, you can buy the single at BandCamp.
It’s yours  for only USD $0.79

The single was recorded at our home-studio and written and performed by Rudy using a Digitech Trio for Drums & Bass, Gretsch Electromatic, Harley Benton Telecaster and Fender Starcaster Stratocaster, so yeah you guessed it: lot’s of guitar on this track! There’s clearly heavy blues influence but it sure ain’t your standard 12-bar blues song. It’s more a slow rock or perhaps blues rock song.

VIDEO

ABOUT THE RECORDING

Details about the recording, for those interested:

  • Drums, Bass: Digitech Trio
  • Gretsch Electromatic & Stratocaster effects: Mooer effects pedal (review)
  • Telecaster: JoYo “American” sound (Fender Amp simulation)
  • DAW: Ardour
  • Interface: Behringer UMC404HD
  • Vocal mic: MXL770

Want to read more about the studio? Just check out the Studio-page.

 

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Radiohead – Creep (Acoustic Home Studio Sessions)

Radiohead’s “Creep” is one of those songs that I have been listening off and on for many years now. It never bores me. This is classic rock songwriting as it should be done. I recorded an ‘acoustic’ version today at my Home Studio, using my Samick electro-acoustic guitar, my Washburn and added some additional guitarwork using my Gretsch Electromatic. Vocal mic: AKG C900, a gift from a friend in the United States and I really like this mic a lot!

Mind you: after recording the initial guitar parts and vocal I re-recorded the vocal track because that would allow me to edit the vocal without effecting the guitar sound since the acoustic guitar was, of course, causing bleed in the vocal track and your really don’t want that to happen!

Anyone who knows the original will notice I left out the bridge. Impossible for me to sing!

DAW: Mixbus5 / Linux Mint.

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Pandemic Blues – Acoustic Home Recording

pandemic corona virus blues

There’s no way to escape from the coronavirus and the news about it these days. It inspired me to write a song, recorded in my living-room. Fear mongers and fake news aside, this is a critical situation we’re in. A pandemic that is sweeping over the world. It has spread and still is spreading like wildfire at the moment.

For all of you that have been hit hard by the corona crisis and those worried what’s going to happen next. This pandemic will change our lives for months, perhaps years or even decades to come. Stay strong! Don’t be overwhelmed by fear and please listen to those in charge: keep your social distance and if possible stay away from others as much as you can.

Acoustic session – Live from the livingroom.
Recorded using my Motorola Moto G7 smartphone
Edited with Flowblade (Linux Mint).
Guitar: Samick Greg Bennett.

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Your Life On Facebook (Twitter, Instagram, Tinder, ..)

Your Life On Facebook Solid Rock Blues Band

Social Media is all around us. Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Tinder, SnapChat, Youtube. We can’t live without, can we? Well, perhaps we can but we love being online. And of course we all like to life that glamorous life we see others have. So we fake it. Fake it till you make it right?

Here’s a song about Social Media. How one portrays him or herself on it. And how someone else might be looking at this social media life of the other person.

The song was written in parts on snippets of paper, collected and put together, over a period of time. Video was created using free stock video downloaded from Pexels.com. Recorded at the LoftStudio Home Recording Studio using the Digitech Pedal for drums and bass, Harley Benton Telecaster and MXL770 as vocal mic. Recorded using Mixbus5 (DAW). It is, for now, available on Youtube and BandLab.

VIDEO

BANDLAB

By the way: if you’re looking for a great place for some free, basic, mastering, checkout BandLab. For the Solid Rock Blues Band we use bandlab all the time for the final mastering.

LYRICS

LIFE ON FACEBOOK
All rights reserved ©2020 R. Brinkman/Solid Rock Blues Band

May your life, be as great
as it is on Facebook
May the sun, always shine
as it does on your Insta

No I got no interest
for your feed on pinterest
don’t care for your moodboards no more
And I really don’t know
why I should be looking
at the carpets you want for your floor

(chorus)

And your tweets on Twitter
always sound so bitter
is it really that cool to swear
Do you really think we all
want to know
you don’t know what clothes to wear

Swipe left, swipe right!
Where to spend the night
Who’ll be knocking at your door
It’ll come as no surprise
some won’t be nice,
it ain’t love they’re looking for

(chorus)

It ain’t me stalking
I can just see you walking
SnapMap tells me all
I want you to be,
happy and free
but can I just give you one call?

(chorus)

May the sun, always shine
as it does on your insta
May the sun, always shine
as it does on your insta

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New tracks available at SoundCloud!

SoundCloud has decided to stick to it’s old policy so our music still is and will be available trough SoundCloud. Today two new tracks were added – fresh mixes and 100% original songs! Two completely different tracks: one song leaning towards hard rock and the other is ‘christian rock’.

— update: tracks moved to the new released album “Solar Powered Love”

Let’s start with the Christian song, it’s not the average gospel song. Of course it’s a song about a christian theme in fact about Jesus but I think the music won’t fit in the standard ‘gospel songs’ you know. Writing the lyrics took a lot more time than expected despite it’s simplicity.

Both songs have an original approach and chord progression. For the songs two different vocal mics were used and both were recorded using a different DAW. The first one was recorded using a MXL770 vocal mic and Mixbus as a DAW. The second one was recorded using an AKG C900 with Ardour as a DAW.

Guitars: Hondo H-175 (vintage) guitar for rhythm, Harley Benton Telecaster for lead guitar and Harley Benton bass.
Drums:  AVL Drums (plugin)

The Mad Men’s Show

Well the fires in Australia triggered this; that is: environmental damage. Done by lunatics who deny this world is going down hill fast. The power of crazy guys at the top also inspired it. So it all got mixed up in this song. And in the end the “master of slaves” shows his face. Hope you like it as much as I did writing, recording and mixing it.

Guitars: Harley Benton Telecaster for rhythm, Gretsch g5420t for lead guitar, Washburn WD-42S (acoustic) and Harley Benton bass.
Drums:  AVL Drums (plugin).

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