Once Bright City Studios got off the ground here in Charlotte, NC the first project we had to work on was with a Christian Singer/Songwriter by the name of Sean Feucht. Sean travels around the world playing his music and documenting quite meticulously the different responses to it whether it be by a group of homeless hippies in San Francisco or churches full of seasoned Believers in Europe. He sets up these things where people come twenty-four hours a day seven days a week to sing or play and pray hoping for a change in their community whether local or global.
Sean has been a long time friend of Joel Khouri’s and came to him in order for Khouri to produce his latest album in a vein unlike most people doing what Feucht has done in the past. Khouri took directions with Feucht’s album that would make it more musically palatable to people not necessarily in the “Church World,” people Feucht wants to hear the music but more importantly the juice behind the music.
Since Bright City Studios was still in the early stages of functionality Khouri decided to track Drums and Bass at a friend’s studio, Threshing Floor Audio run by Elijah Mosely (an old friend of mine- incredible Producer/Engineer/Musician who has worked closely with John Mark McMillan on the majority of his projects). Since Elijah was busy with other work Jeremy Snyder engineered the sessions and I was simply there to get a handle on Khouri’s direction for the tracks as I would be engineering the majority of the sessions after Drums and Bass. Lee Worley (again, another great friend of mine band a greater drummer I met in Brasil years ago while assisting on a project) played drums and Jon Duke (childhood friend of mine who is one of the most creative Producer/Musicians I know. Just check out his project All the Bright Lights with his brother James and Jacob Arnold) played Bass. These sessions were a delight to simply sit in on because in one room we had at times up to seven incredibly creative musicians who could all produce a project yet all worked together smooth as butta (well, most of the time but I won’t get into that, ha ha). I was genuinely impressed with the way Joel Khouri reigned in all the creative minds into one cohesive thought for the direction of this album. You see, Feucht’s songs, from my understanding, were mostly written “on the spot” at his Live Events and had a tendency to either sound very similar or nothing alike, either identical or so different stylistically there didn’t seem to be a context to place them in on one album. Khouri’s genius level of production brought the differences closer together and the similarities further apart to create an incredible album.
Once Drums and Bass were done tracking at Threshing Floor Audio we headed back to Bright City Studios to Comp the tracks to their final takes (decide which takes of which parts we liked better than the others) and Edit. At Threshing Floor Audio Elijah prefers Steinberg’s DAW’s but I prefer Apple’s Logic so we took the project files from Cubase (Elijah usually uses Nuendo but we have a version of Cubase here so he used that in order for us to transfer files “easily”) and exported each file individually so we could pull them into Logic and comp there. I’m certain there was an easier way to do it but I didn’t feel like fiddling around looking for it. Anyway, once in Logic comping Drums was the easiest thing I’ve ever done. Seemless . . .
For Electric Guitars Joel brought James Duke (yes, The James Duke, the one that wisheshewasBono) into Bright City Studios who brought his original Matchless Chieftain 2x12 combo (original as in the circa ’94 model made by Mark Sampson, the good ones not the new ones) and his impressive guitar collection, Gretch 6118 Anniversary Semi-Hollow, Fender ’52 Blonde Tele reissue, and Revelator Strat Clone. All beautiful guitars with nearly as much character and personality as Jims himself. I ended up micing his amp with a Shure Sm7 (my fave) right against the grill as close to center as possible (the Chieftain had a small baffle running down the center of each speaker like the old Vox AC30’s of yore), a Cascade Fathead Ribbon w/Lundahl Transformer about three feet away and four feet high looking down to the center of the amp, a Peluso 22 251 further away in the room (maybe ten feet away and six feet high) set in an Omni Pattern. What I love about Joel Khouri’s production style is he believes in the musicians he brings in so much he gives them a general direction to travel and explore so if they get where he wants great, if they go somewhere new and exciting awesome, but if they go the wrong way Joel knows when and where to yank the wheel back on course. Jims new where to go, sometimes exactly to the desired destination but mostly to new places unforeseen and all the better.
There were certain parts Luke Skaggs, Molly Skaggs, Ricky Skaggs, myself, Leonard Jones, and a few others added that simply brought this project together. I remember a few late nights I stayed behind to add some extra guitar parts to fill in a few holes. I love locking the doors, turning the lights off, putting my nose to the grind, and turning my amp up til Josephine is weeping. I usually begin getting a bit misty-eyed too.
NERD ALERT AHEAD ! ! !
Because we were unsure where we would be in the reconstructive process at Bright City Studios, Khouri had booked a Mix Engineer out of Nashville to mix this project. He uses Protools exclusively so we had quite the interesting time getting him the files in a manner he could work with them. I tried exporting the files as an OMF for each song. The file format OMF, from my limited understanding, was originally created so Audio guys working in Protools could easily share files with Video guys working in Avid. Apparently, the makers of Protools, Digidesign, were the ones responsible for creating the format itself. After the Nashville engineer received all my OMF files he called to inform me he couldn’t open them in Protools. He said he needed a six hundred dollar plugin to make it work. I had exported the files using Logic without any additional plugins which is made by Digidesign’s competition and he couldn’t open it! So, I ended up spending a day or two exporting the files one by one so he could use his over priced DAW easier. I have since discovered a much easier and faster way of exporting files out of Logic so it’s not as big of a headache to make the big guys’ jobs easier . . .
All in all Sean Feucht’s album turned out to be one of the most creatively modern sounding “Church Music” albums without alienating his pre-established market of Church Goers. Joel Khouri and I found a cool rhythm to our creative flow between Producer and Engineer and we found a cool group of musicians we could pull together to make incredible albums quickly and efficiently. The entire process was one of experimenting, learning, and discovering. Even though there were headaches to deal with, I know everyone came out of the project with a certain sense of accomplishment one way or another. Check it out on iTunes if you’re interested in hearing the finished product . . .
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