It’s hard to believe, but it’s a fact – the rathole sessions are over, we’re done! David “King rat of the rathole” Castillo, Jonas and me have spent the longest studio sessions this far with nearly every hour of the day (or night) since we finished up with the vocals. Picture this: Mix down, reference listening, un-do, re-do, mix down, reference listening, repeat x 100. There’s always something you find to correct, whether it’s one drum hit thats not loud enough, or a backing harmony that doesnt cut through, or a frequenzy in the bass that makes the rathole sound like a steamboat, yeah basically hundreds of things that fight for their position and balance in the sound picture. One song even reached a staggering 136 (!) active tracks. That’s quite a contrast to the days were we were given 16 tracks for the whole package. Everything has to be optimized and you end up going back and forth improving and updating versions of the mix to replace the previous efforts and you can do this for eternity, unless you have a deadline. We just managed to complete the mix at the very last day and let me tell you, the album sounds fan-fukkin-tastic! It’s heavy, punchy and crunchy. It sounds very 3D in headphones. We put this album back to back with a couple of other band’s albums and it is either right up there sideways with them, or it simply sits with it’s azz on their faces. Crushed!
The last two days was spent on the final stage – mastering with Jens Bogren twiddling on his knobs down Fascination Street in Örebro, while we were stand-by in the rathole for urgent repairs an reference listening. Uploading and downloading the files of the whole production via ftp enabled us to communicate and do the same things we normally would, but now in two different towns. Can’t say no to ez living for the hard working modern man. After about 4 attempts, we got there. The album has now been approved by everyone. It got the green light and now in peaceville’s hands. Our work is done, yet it has only just begun. On saturday the band will hook up and we’ll have a private pre-listening session with some of our friends and colleagues and celebrate we’re done! Then on monday we’ll have an official pre-listening session all day as Peaceville will fly in journo’s from the daily papers, music magazines and radio stations from around Europe. A few photo sessions will round up that night. Then next week it’s time for the mini-site to go online. Are you ready? /Anders
