Recorded by Joey English and the Kelly Bros in 2011. Mixed and MFI 2016.
Fred Kelly:
We met Joey English through a local talent contest, in which he won (among other prizes) several hours’ worth of time in a local recording studio—our studio. Joey already had the structure worked out for “Beast” beforehand, and when we sat down for our first preproduction meeting, he said that he had been working on “Beast” in his own DAW, and wanted to know if we could work off of that. We said no, we couldn’t, and then we immediately said that we were joking and that we could do that with no problem.
Joey brought in a multitrack with a few vocals and both acoustic and electric guitar on it. I think he recut the vocals and some of the guitars, then added more guitars, after which we overdubbed bass, drums, and percussion. The trumpets at the end were particularly fun.
The arrangement worked so well that as a result, there had never been a “bad” mix of “Beast”, but we wanted to put together a more “definitive” mix so it could be considered finished, and so it could be shared with everyone. Joey had another version of “Beast” that he released, so this is a fun alternate version that we like very, very much.
Jonathan Kelly:
Instead of rising and falling, some songs start small and gradually build up to a big release. "Beast" is one of those songs, and I think it works really well for that. There are lots of fun little bits and pieces going on, but the vocal performance is the real centerpiece here.
I'm also pretty happy with my drumming here. The three of us worked it out together: where the kick drum should come in, how the toms would come in, how the snare rolls would work, and how big the release would be. That's often how I'm approaching drumming in the studio: part performer, part producer. It's a little nerve wracking, actually. Writing parts is very different from performing parts, so I'm almost always starting these songs with a really crummy performance while searching for something interesting. I have to let my performer ego go a little bit while slopping through the song and trying things out.
Recorded by Jeremy Bain, Mike Crouch, and the Kelly Bros. in 2008. Mixed and MFI 2016.
Fred Kelly:
I don’t even remember exactly how we came to record “I Need A Shelter” but I’m glad we did. We had been friends with Jeremy for a long time, and had taken a look at some tapes that his band Slick has recorded elsewhere (and which had some restoration needed), and we’d also worked with Holly Briggs, who was in a band with Jeremy called May Gray.
Anyway, Jeremy is musically omnivorous, and seems to have no problems with any style or genre whatsoever along a wide musical spectrum. I really like and respect that about him. For “Shelter” he was in a fairly Fleetwood Mac kind of place, and we were only too happy to try to provide that atmosphere for him. Jonathan played drums, then Jeremy layered his vocal, bass, and guitar onto it, and we all added percussion and backing vocals.
Jeremy’s friend Mike Crouch (also of May Gray, and both a great guy and a great guitarist) came in and put the electric guitar lead lines in the choruses and acoustic lines in the verses (the latter of which was run through EchoBoy to give it a wide, ethereal nature). I love this song, and I’m happy to present it to listeners in a finished form.
Jonathan Kelly:
This song was recorded in our second bedroom (thank you Val!), before we had a dedicated location for the studio. It's one of those deceptively simple recording. We were going for something very, very precise, and there's just not a lot of room for error when you do that.
I've always loved the feel of this song. It was surprisingly challenging to mix, but even after all these years I still enjoy listening to it. Smoooooooth.
Written by Christina Horn and Performed by Hudson K
Recorded by the Kelly Bros. at FLRS in 2010, Remixed and MFI 2016
Fred Kelly:
For "I Gave It All" we recorded similarly to how we recorded several of the other songs on Hudson K's "Shine": we cut scratch vocals and fake piano at FLRS, overdubbed real drums onto that form/scaffolding, then Christina went home to record several passes of grand piano. Then we overdubbed strings, a lot of Jeff Christmas guitar, and then Jonathan and I added odds and ends (percussion, horns, more guitars and keyboards, etc) here and there.
We put a lot of overdubs on "Gave", and we had trouble getting a mix to work. Track after track of really cool ideas did not equal a sum greater than its parts. We ran many rough "in progress" mixes, and none of them really worked. So in the end, we went with a stripped-down version of the song---pretty much just Christina playing piano and singing, with a backward guitar solo played by Jonathan.
Recently we began playing with different variations on the arrangement of "Gave" and we hit upon a combination of parts that we think works really well. This new version uses only about half of the overdubs we originally attempted, but this particular combination of sounds sits and plays together nicely. Nate and Jeff's backing vocals are great, as are Nate's drums (two different passes of it, one Left and one Right), and the strings. I'm really enjoying everyone's parts in this mix.
Jonathan Kelly:
This was one of those songs that, as you added new elements, the older elements just kept sounding worse. It happens from time to time. The arrangement was just getting more and more complicated, but not in a cool way. By the end of the project, we were tired, and we just couldn't find clarity with this song. We would have figured SOMEthing out, but as luck would have it, about two weeks before were were due to be finished with the recording, Christina wrote "Fade." It was a strong song, and we really wanted to include it on the album.
So a deal was struck: we'd strip "I Gave it All" down to its essence (which worked better than anything we could come up with at the time), and use all the extra time, energy, and sanity we'd save by not having to wade through that mix to record and mix "Fade." We knew we could do it. In the course of a recording project, if it's going well, you develop a shared language and understanding what everyone needs to do. By the end, we had a shorthand for putting it all together, and "Fade" went from zero to done in about two weeks.
We always felt there was a cool arrangement of "I Gave it All" in there somewhere, and the remix project happened to be a good time to revisit with some fresh ears and see what we could do. I think it came out really great.
Recorded by J.D. Reager, Brendan Danley, and Justin Jordanin 2008, Remixed and MFI 2016
Fred Kelly:
An early project of ours was a real treat: our longtime friend and talented multi-instrumentalist J.D. Reager had finished recording his solo debut after years playing with several successful bands (including Pezz and Glossary), and he asked us to mix it. We did. I’m still happy with how that album (which J.D. named The Repechage) turned out.
One song that was radically different from its released form was the album’s final track, called “Indirect Ways”. We’d had trouble making the track work the way we wanted it to, and really struggled with it. It’s a strong rock track, with thick guitars and aggressive drums, and what we tend to do with tracks like that is to mute everything but a few elements (say, the vocals and a guitar) and see what works.
With this track, we liked how just the vocals, piano, tubular bells, and acoustic guitar sounded (with some horns at the end). And that version works! But this version is the full-on rock track, and we’re glad it’s finally seeing the light of day.
Jonathan Kelly:
In addition to playing with the bands Fred mentioned, J.D. was also a member of several of the FLRS House Projects. These include the henrys, Bishop, and The Passport Again.
The Repechage was our first big mixing project in Pro Tools, and "Indirect Ways" was just getting left behind the other tracks. There were a lot of heavy rockers on the album, and this song was just looking worse in comparison. Sometimes we'll look for an unconventional solution to a problem like that, and one solution is to just strip the arrangement down to its core. Now the song had the distinction of being different from all the other songs on the album, and it took the listener to a different place.
Years later, with more know-how and more equipment, we thought we could make the original arrangement work better, and I absolutely think it does. I still think we made a good decision at the time for the sake of the album, but I'm happy to be able to put this song out there with its original arrangement. There's at least one other Remix Project song that went through a similar process.
