Immolation Studio Report November, 4th 2009

Posted November 5 by Chris D.

By Ross Dolan (Immolation)

It’s been a busy day here at the studio. It’s Wednesday night, and we have been hard at work all day. Our drummer Steve [Shalaty] just left a few hours ago, not really looking forward to the 8-hour drive back to his home in Ohio. He really did an amazing job and really had so much input not only in the drum department, but also in some of the arrangements, lyrics and in just lending his ear to make sure certain aspects of the guitar and bass parts flowed correctly over the drum parts. His playing on this record has just raised the bar for future Immolation albums, and I think it will be a welcome step up in our song dynamics that our fans will really enjoy!

It’s my turn in the hot seat tonight. Bob [Vigna] and I have been trading off between guitar and bass rhythms since Monday. We have developed a routine over the last few days where Bob will start on the early side, usually between 10 and 11 in the morning (since I am not out of bed until 11 or 12), and then I will usually start tracking bass in the late afternoon. Today, I got started on the later side and managed to get through three songs by 8:30 in the evening, so now we have rhythms done to seven out of the ten songs. If all goes well, we should have rhythms all wrapped up by tomorrow evening and will be ready to start tracking vocals and leads.

So far it has really been a very smooth process, and things have been falling into place quite nicely. As far as the bass tracking goes, there have been no major problems aside from the last minute on-the-spot changes which are always par for the course in the Immolation camp. I got a great sound in no time using my 19-year-old road-hardened Mesa Boogie cabinets along with one of Paul’s old Ampeg SVT heads. We are still very much on schedule and should be all wrapped up by the weekend. Paul, as always, has been very patient and is always lending his expertise in times of need. It’s not only been a productive week and a half, but an enjoyable one.

Behind the scenes, I have been busy working on lyrics during the day and up late at nights with Bob, sharing ideas and concepts and trying to get things to where we are happy with them. I am just about there, and thanks to Steve’s last minute concept and a page full of great lyrics, I think we may have everything wrapped up tonight. It’s been a less stressful process this time around compared to other albums which is mainly due to the fact that we had a lot of ideas and half developed concepts before even getting here. Also the amount of down time we have here makes for a very productive environment with no distractions.

We are at the point in the recording now where we can really see the songs starting to come to life little by little. This is always the coolest part of the session, and the most exciting for us, especially after only hearing the songs in the rehearsal room and on our pre-production demos. We are extremely happy with what we have so far, I think more so than ever before, and we are really looking forward to hearing everything mixed and finished. Almost there!!!

** Immolation studio report, Part I.

** Immolation studio report, Part II.

** Immolation studio report, Part III.

** Immolation studio report, Part IV.

** Immolation studio report, Part V.

** Immolation studio report, Part VI.

** Immolation is on tour with labelmates Nile in 2010. Check out the dates below:

01/15/10 Sonar – Baltimore, MD
01/16/10 The Palladium – Worcester, MA
01/17/10 The Trocadero – Philadelphia, PA
01/18/10 The Blender Theater at Gramercy – New York, NY
01/20/10 Peabody’s – Cleveland, OH
01/21/10 Metro / Smart Bar – Chicago, IL
01/22/10 Rave – Milwaukee, WI
01/23/10 Station 4 – St. Paul, MN
01/24/10 The Beaumont Club – Kansas City, MO
01/25/10 Bluebird Theater – Denver, CO
01/27/10 El Corazon – Seattle, WA
01/28/10 Hawthorne Theater – Portland, OR
01/29/10 The Boardwalk – Orangevale, CA
01/30/10 Slim’s – San Francisco, CA
01/31/10 House of Blues – San Diego, CA
02/02/10 House of Blues – Hollywood, CA
02/03/10 House of Blues – Las Vegas, NV
02/04/10 U.B.’s Bar – Mesa, AZ
02/05/10 The Rock – Tucson, AZ
02/06/10 Gator’s – Farmington, NM
02/08/10 House of Rock – Corpus Christi, TX
02/09/10 Scout Bar – San Antonio, TX
02/10/10 Scout Bar – Houston, TX
02/11/10 Trees – Dallas, TX
02/12/10 Marquee – Tulsa, OK
02/13/10 Headliner’s Music Hall – Louisville, KY
02/14/10 Jaxx – W. Springfield, VA
02/16/10 Gil’s Bar & Grill – Virginia Beach, VA
02/17/10 The Masquerade – Atlanta, GA
02/18/10 Amos Southend – Charlotte, NC
02/19/10 Volume 11 – Raleigh, NC
02/20/10 Music Farm – Charleston, SC

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