Better Late Tech Info
Some people have asked about technical details of how the tracks for Manic Xpression's Better Late were produced. Remember, you asked :)
Manic Xpression is Mike Pagano on drums and Chuck Miller (me) on guitars and various electronic instruments, both performed and programmed.
The tracks were in most cases created using Cubase, a computer Digital Audio Workstation (DAW) program running on an Apple Mac Mini computer. All of, the tracks began life as guitar riffs with the exception of the Spring Shuffle tracks which were originally ukulele riffs.
Mike used his Premier 5-piece drum kit on the early tracks. Later we changed to a Drum Workshop Collector's Series Purpleheart 7-piece drum set (pictured) with an 8" deep snare drum. The drums were recorded with multiple microphones (12-15) through Universal Audio Devices Apollo interfaces at Our Glass Studio (my basement).
The electric guitars are in most cases one of my Suhr guitars recorded through my Kemper Profiling Amp . The profiles used are all profiles of my Egnater MOD-50 tube amplifier with a SL2X module. More recent guitar tracks were recorded direct with tube amplifiers through a Suhr Reactive Load I/R. The amplifiers used include the aforementioned Egnater, a Suhr Badger 18 and an Aiken Intruder.
The acoustic instruments include 6 and 12-string guitars, a ukulele and a Godin Inuk.
Bass duties are handled either by virtual instruments or bass guitars including my Ibanez short scale bass, a Shecter Stilletto 5-string bass and a G&L SB2 bass that I've had since 1982.
All of the rest of the instrumentation is some combination of electronic keyboards and virtual computer-based instruments.
Guitars
- Suhr Custom TS with 2. single coil pickups and SSC silent single coil system
- Suhr Pro Series S1, S2 and S3
- Breedlove US C2/R 6-string acoustic guitar
- Breedlove US 12-string acoustic guitar
- Bedell Earthsong parlor acoustic guitar
- Godin Inuk
- Kala Ukulele
Drums
- Five piece Premier kit
- Seven piece Drum Workshop Collector's Series Purpleheart kit
- Zildjian, Paiste and Sabian cymbals
- Tama, Drum Workshop, PDP, Rogers and North hardware with Iron Cobra double bass pedal
- Vic Firth Questlove wood tip drum sticks
- Cowbells (two!)
Keyboards/Synthesizers
- Nord Electro 2 - Organs mostly
- Nord Wave
- Moog Sub37
- Korg Miniloge XD module
Virtual Instruments
- IK Multimedia Modo Bass - Bass Guitar
- Orange Tree Samples Rickenbacker - Bass Guitar
- GG Audio Blue3 - Hammond Organ
- Arturia Synth Collection - Clavinet, Mellotron and Synth sounds
- Others too numerous to mention
Recording Gear
- UAD Apollo 8P, UAD Apollo 8 and UAD Apollo Twin MKII interfaces
- Focal Twin6 BE and Avantone MixCube Monitors
- Presonus Faderport 16 Control Surface
- iPad running Cubase IC Pro
- Streamdeck XL Programmable Keyboard
Well that's it. If you'd like to know more drop us a line using the email address in the contact link. Always happy to talk tech/geek stuff. -- Chuck