Studio Sessions
In mid-2006, Bloc Party travelled to Lee's Grouse Lodge Studios in Westmeath, Ireland, to record A Weekend in the City. The band members initially worked by experimenting with their respective instruments and sound check arrangements. Moakes additionally focused on using different types of synthesiser. All parties soon moved to the main recording room, a large area with "a lot of natural ambience" according to sound engineer Tom McFall. A makeshift booth was built around the back of the drum kit to reduce any sonic interference, while a roof was sometimes used over drummer Matt Tong to isolate a pure sound. Different types of microphones were used for each component of the drum kit. The miking scheme was crucial to prepare the drum tracks for the looping and processing Lee planned using production program Logic.
The band worked by setting up all the instruments with only a single power amplifier. McFall has pointed out that distorted and heavily compressed mics were used to capture some of the room's ambience "to add a bit of grit" to the instrumental tracks; the recordings were often processed further using distressors, special types of compressor noted for their distinctively aggressive sound. The production staff tried other unconventional effects once the basic tracks were recorded. The band sometimes performed while Tong's kit was re-amped and played sections live while a brick was placed on the sustain pedal of a piano to capture the vibrations during the performances. During the six weeks at Grouse Lodge, Bloc Party tried multiple versions of songs and, at times, attempted playing live alongside recorded versions of the same track.
Lee recorded everything using Digital Audio Workstation Pro Tools and treated the parts as individual stereo files in Logic. The drum and guitar tracks were processed using computers. Much of the synthesiser-sounding parts of the album were generated by Russell Lissack's lead guitar following his extensive use of pedal effects. Lee added the live string, synth, drum machine, sample, and ambient noise tracks to create an expansive, hyper-stereophonic final product. After finishing the instrumental album, Bloc Party left Ireland to continue touring. Okereke later returned to Lee's studio to add the vocal tracks to the album; he has noted that he tried to "convey range and dynamics" rather than simply yelp the lyrics. Several track names were changed following the voice sessions: "Merge on the Freeway" became "Song for Clay (Disappear Here)", "A Prayer to the Lord" was renamed "The Prayer", "Wet" became "On", and "Perfect Teens" was renamed "Where Is Home?".
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Famous quotes containing the word studio:
“Again and again, I struggled though the storm. Once I fainted—and it wasn’t in the script. I was hauled to the studio on a sled, thawed out with hot tea, and then brought back to the blizzard, where the others were waiting. We filmed all day and all night, stopping only to eat standing near a bonfire. We never went inside.... The blizzard never slackened.”
—Lillian Gish (1896–1993)