1st Song online now! Recording Travel II - "the Cabin"

As promised, tonight is the debut of the Travel II album! The first song "Hills of Indigo" is up on myspace now.

RECORDING LOCATIONS
The Travel II Album is the second EP out of three. Both of them are self produced by me (Eric Owyoung), and the second one was Co-Produced by T.J Hill. Four different locations contributed to the sound of Travel II:

1) The cabin - a HUGE private cabin (it has been known to house over 30 people) in the subdivision of Hume Lake Christian Camps. The main room has 30 foot ceilings and an enormous sound.

2) The Recording Studio at Hume Lake (also called the "Tuneful Yeti Studio at Hume Lake) - a spacious commercial recording studio with large tracking room, 3 isolation rooms, and a control room filled with great out-board equipment.

3) The Sanctuary - the prized acoustic choice of the San Diego Symphony for concerts involving the enormous pipe organ at College Avenue Baptist Church

4) Eric's studio - where most of Travel I was recorded in Oceanside CA


THE CABIN
All of the album was written in the cabin. We spent over 2 weeks there total. Most of the first week and a half was creating. I really wanted the album to have a sense of hugeness in rhythm, so we filled the place with a ton of drums, a taiko drum, percussion, guitars, etc. To write and simultaneously record, I set up my recording system (Pro-tools), so we had at least 8 tracks of HD recording at all times.

A plus was the balcony which stretched between the many bedrooms on the second floor of the cabin. We experimented a lot, bringing drums up there, mics up there, clapping up there, stomping up there. The distance between the downstairs and upstairs really brought some acoustic space into some of the tracks. Even though the recording gear was downstairs, we utilized playing and miking as far away as possible. Another fun part was being able to go into the kitchen and find any interesting noise making devices (usually cooking gear) to add to the tracks.

The acoustics were amazing. The floor was carpeted while the ceiling and wood paneling was beautiful authentic wood. Then, when you think it can't get better, you realize there is a 30 foot wall of odd shaped stones for the fireplace. There were no bad "flutters" or bass build-ups that you usually find in a non-commercial studio. This was heaven for us. Oh, did I mention the jacuzzi outside?

Best part of being there? The fun, the space, getting away from the cellphones and being a part of real life. It was "Future of Forestry" to the core! Back to what C.S Lewis called our "Eden" state in his poem "The Future of Forestry." We were living it. Taking walks through the forest, then coming back to create. One month. Six songs. Music, lyrics, and recording...that was it. Never have I accomplished an album in that amount of time before. At least not writing AND recording. This cabin was a huge part of making it possible.


See you next Tues at 7pm!