Mellobrass Studios Week One

My first week of my internship has been an eventful one. The first day I landed I was met at LaGuardia airport in Queens by Dave Painchaud. He showed me around the city after I landed. We went to Grand Central Station, Rockefeller Center, Time Square, St. Patricks Cathedral, and a few other cool areas around the city. After we were done sight seeing we made the hour long car ride out of the city and to his home in Carmel. He showed me his studio and all the pluggins and software he uses. I learned how to use Sony Acid which is the DAW we will be working with.

The next day we started working. For most of the internship I will be helping Dave with his new album, "Multitasking in the Multiverse." Most of the first day of work was spent setting up time signatures in the DAW for the first track we would be working on. This was hard to do because the song is constantly changing time signatures from 6/4, 4/4, 7/4, 3/4, 2/4, ext. Next we had to find the right rhythms in his WAV loops that he purchased. He wanted the "groove" of the song to consist of bass and taiko drums.

After all of the setup on the session was over. We made some decisions on what rhythms to use and in what order they would appear in the mix. We then proceeded with what we call "creative layering" and started cutting and placing the loops in the right sequences. We are still in the middle of this process but it is starting to sound very cool!

Along with work, I helped Dave record and pick out tracks for his radio show, "Harmony of the Spheres". The show aired on RadioBuzzD in Santa Clarita, CA and online as well.

I am having an awesome time out here in New York! Dave and his family have been awesome and extremely kind. I also made a new buddy while I'm out here. Me and Dave's son Beck are hanging out every chance we get. Playing video games, swimming, and more. All of us went to a Mets game on Sunday and we plan on doing more extracurricular stuff along with our work.

One of the most important parts of coming out here was listening to all kinds of music and being critical of my own work
. While listening and talking with Dave, we came to the conclusion that my songs are a bit diatonic and I tend to play it safe with my chord changes. Dave has encouraged me to go outside of the normal chord progression when writing and I will keep that in mind for my future projects.