SCHEMEN

SCHEMEN

Schemen was the last song I wrote for this album. Initially it was meant to be the only testsong, and its main purpose was to serve as a crashtest-dummy to see how far we can get with our recording method. I was 'secretly' writing this song on my own and when it was done I showed it to the other guys and asked them if they are with me on the idea with the testrecordings and to use this song for it.

A few years back in time, I think it was 2009, I became quite fond of the Post-Rock genre with bands like Sigur Rós and through my activities in my other band Agrypnie which has quite a lot of 'post' influences in it. I started to really like this genre and always wanted to write epic songs like bands in this genre do.

So I had this old old acoustic piece I wrote for my old band, that doesn't exist anymore, which was written for 2 acoustic guitars and I fooled around with it after I stumbled upon the band 'Tides From Nebula' from Poland in 2012. I really liked the atmosphere and the dynamics the tunes of the acoustic piece had and I started to change everything. The acoustic guitars became electric guitars full of reverb and delay effects and I added some drums to it. One thing came to another and I kinda got my own style within it and it was done, I could finally reveal my idea with the rest from the guys of High Rise Fall.

So we rehearsed it and we figured out that it would be a huge waste if we don't release it somehow. All of us really liked the atmosphere of this song and we all thought that it would suit High Rise Fall's open-mindedness to have a song like this. I personally thought the song would be great as it was without any vocals in it but Gundi finally broke my stubborness and convinced me that lyrics and vocals would suit it well.

The lyrics of the more ambient feeling of this song are a scene description. They were popping up infront of Gundi's eye as he was listening to the song several times. The sound of the song reminded him very much of 'Silent Hill' with its dark and grey world. At the part where the guitars start with the bendings he thought it sounded like sirens. In 'Silent Hill'  the sirens announce the transformation of the cloudy grey world turning into hell. 'Schemen' means something like 'Silhouettes', it should describe the creatures that hide in the misty darkness of 'Silent Hill'.

High Rise Fall Anno 2013

HERE WE ARE!

Finally! Here we are! High Rise Fall Anno 2013! This is how we sound today! These are the results of our hard work and the time we put into these songs. As I said in the last post:

We were trying to create a reasonable sound which suits our music with our own know-how and our possibilities without paying any money for a studio or a producer or anything like that. Almost all on our own, with some connections we had. A BIG THANK YOU goes out to Martin of the JUZ Heusenstamm the youth center where we already played a few concerts with the old and the new line up. They lent us their recording interface for free! Again a BIG THANK YOU!
We all are really proud of ourselves how far we got, and I personally wouldn't have thought that our know-how developed this much that we can create a sound quality like that.

Sure you could argue that we could have an even cleaner and more polished sound, if we went to a studio, but we all in this band got this "Do-It-Yourself"-mentality and we are really satisfied with the reults!

Let us introduce you our songs:

FACE/OFF

and

SCHEMEN

(click on the names to get to the own segments of these songs)

FACE/OFF

FACE/OFF

Face/Off was the first song ever which we wrote together in the rehearsal room with all bandmembers attending the songwriting process, or at least the start of it. It was although the first song we would write after our 'Morbide Unterhaltungsmusik' album. 

Although we didn't finish writing the song in the rehearsal room, we all had our influences on the song, how the instrumentalists play their parts and so on. If I remember correctly, after 3 or 4 rehearsals more the music was done and it kicked off the songwriting process for the next songs for the upcoming album of ours. It also showed in which direction we were heading at that time, although we are quite openminded.

This song is quite important to us because it showed that, if we all work together we can write awesome songs, that pleases everyone in the band! It motivated me so much to write more songs for this band like never before. This pretty much IS High Rise Fall, how we sound, that we embrace not only black and death metal music but it hinted also to something more, to the fact that we don't want to write "just" metal music.

Lyrically, 'Face/Off' is about a collector who collects the most beautiful part of the human body. The face. The lyrics describe the whole collecting process from meeting the victim, hunting, preparing the amputation and the amputation itself. The name of the song plays around the movietitle 'Face/Off' . The lyrics aren't about the movie, but more about the getting-your-face-cut-off-part.

"Screeching Sounds Coming Out Of The Depths From The Loung Pressed Out Via The Throat Of Demons" - aka Vocal Recording

REALLY WE'RE ALMOST DONE! TRUST ME!

We're getting REALLY close to the end of the recording process! Coming to the last bit, the recording of vocals, I cut a little video together again, that will show you (again) how we joke around instead of work.

So let's get this Blog started:

Sunday, 30th of December 2012

Dat 'stache!

I got picked up by Gundi early in the noon driving to the rehearsal room while listening to some The offspring to meet up with Jules....yeah I know we're trve!

We arrived, set up the computer, set up the interface, set up the mic's and voilá Gundi-san can start warming up! He wanted to get some reverb on his voice so he wouldn't hear just his dry voice. We wired up Gundis effect interface with the recording interface and of course we would fool around with it instead of starting to record!...geez that discipline! Soon Julian had left us because he had to do some other stuff and it was just Gundi and me from now on and we finally started to record for real this time.

So we tried around with some different vocal styles for the first song, and Gundi finally warmed up enough so yeah let's record that voice...or go eat something. We decided to eat some delicious döner kebap and got back to the rehearsal room and continue recording the vocals for the first song! We also changed around the lyrics until we were satisfied with them and I got to record some screams too and by doing that I crushed my voice for about 3-4 days...that's what happens if you don't use any technique and just scream around like an idiot.

The last vocal parts for the first song were finished and Gundis voice weakened a bit so we decided to stop right there and start the second song the next day.

Monday, 31st of December 2012

Trollface?

For the last day of the year 2012 I got picked up early in the morning, because we had not so much time that day because we were going to a new years party later that day. So we got to the rehearsal room early where everything was still set up from the day before and we started to record the second song...or do we? Gundis voice decided to troll us and got worse, he caught a cold and his voice was weakened so much that we had to improvise with the stuff like changing the position of the microphone so he could sing better and stuff but we were close to stop it right there and leave it be...but we wouldn't be cool if we couldn't find a way to make it work, right?

So I experimented with some delays and reverbs in cubase with the test recordings for the second song and I found a way we both were satisfied with, so we continued recording with those settings, and it sure does fit the song in our opinions!

We finished up, packed our stuff up, and drove home where we would have enough time to just change and take a shower (seperated of course :P) to get to the new years party...so yeah...Recordings are DONE! Finally!

That doesn't mean I'm done with it. Sometime after new year ( I can't remember exactly when ) I started mixing and mastering the two songs, which got changed a few more times until they sound like they do now. We're really happy with how far we got with the know how and possibilities we have to record songs on our own, without spending too much money for it.

We are going to release the songs on Sunday the 3rd of February at around 01:00 p.m. CET via this Blog, our Facebook page, our Youtube channel and our SoundCloud page!

We will write some narrations to the songs which you can read here on this blog, too!

You will hear from us!

Stay Tuned

Martin

Almost Done!

Miced up Amp!

So we're coming closer to the end! In the 'actual timezone' the songs are ready and done, but in the time zone of this blog they're moving more and more to the final state.

We're at the last third of the recording process:

THE REAMPING

Saturday, 29th of December 2012

As with the previous blog post, most of it will be narrated by the video I cut together. Full of stupid jokes in german and showing myself how I fail at cables again but also slightly filled with some more clips of the guitar parts from the 2 songs we recorded, so if...IF you can't wait to listen to the fully recorded song, you might see in what direction they developed and enjoy those clips a little bit!

Reamping: [quote 'Wikipedia'] "Reamping is a process often used in multitrack recording in which a recorded signal is routed back out of the editing environment and run through external processing or reverb chamber. Originally, the technique was used mostly for guitars: it facilitates a separation of guitar playing from guitar amplifier processing—a previously recorded audio program is played back and re-recorded at a later time for the purpose of adding effects, ambience, or modified tonality. The technique has since evolved to include many other applications. Re-amping can also be applied to other instruments and program, such as recorded drums, synthesizers, and virtual instruments." [/quote]

So that's basically what we did the whole day, and that's why Gundi, our vocalist, got a hold of so many goofy clips from that day on camera.

You can see the USB Interface on the far right of this pic...

We set everything up, searched for the right sounds and just let the computer play the guitar for us which we previously recorded. Or so you think...after i set up the Mic's for the amp, we tried to use my little USB Recording interface for playing the dry signal AND recording the wet signal from the amp which resulted...well basically it resulted in massive feedback (which you can see and hear in the video for just a second...srsly u don't want to hear it longer than that!).

I think I've seen this fellow around here before!?

After fixing our ears first, we called Jules to come over and bring the interface we used for the drum recordings with him and set that up. It finally worked! We recorded some parts and listened to them to figure out if the sound was any good or not. The right sound and mic placement had been found and we recorded the first song completely just to have me discover that I had some false routing settings set up in cubase, so we had to record everything again...yay me! But at least the very talented computer guitarist had to play everything again and not me! :P

The last note rang out, and we packed everything up and Gundi drove me home where I immediately started mixing the guitar sound, which as you would guess got changed quite often until it sounds like the one does now.

And we are:

ALMOST DONE!

It's just one more part left to record. Vocals to be precise, but this is another story which will be told in the next and final update before we will reveal the 2 Demo songs we recorded! :)

Cheers,



Martin

Look at this mess!

Breaking The Silence!

Max riffin' it up!

It has been quiet for a while around here. Yeah...so I had no time to update this blog and was busy with the ongoing recordings of the bass, guitars, reamped guitars and vocals and the mixing and mastering of the two songs and I was a bit busy with work and illness...so yeah here it is the new update!!! Mostly is going to be narrated by the videos I made (which kept me away from updating the blog too...) So I hope you can enjoy them and see how we record our songs, what our methods were and I hope you enjoy our german retardedness a bit...so sorry it is mostly spoken in german, but yeah...we're germans speaking german to each other, just this blog is in english. Don't ask me...I don't know why!

Thursday, 27th of December 2012

On thursday Denno came over to drop the bass and he did quite a good job for his first time recording anything ever! Props to him! I forgot to took any pictures of him while playing so this section is without one :( But he is featured in the video! :)
After he finished recording the bass quite fast, I tried to figure out the sound for it and found some nice sounds, which in the end sound a bit different now ( in 2013 ;) ) than at that time.

Friday, 28th of  December 2012

Ghost hand!

It's friday, friday...oh shut up...

Max came to my place to record his parts and we figured out that he learned some parts different than I personally thought he would play during rehearsals...because you know...during our rehearsals it's always quite loud and I don't always recognize what he does. So we cleared that up and recorded the first song, the short one, after a few more takes and experimenting with some playstyles.

Max using a footrest to play more efficient.

The second song though...was quite a frustrating experience with all those clean guitar parts...we had to take more time for this song because you can hear every missplay when playing with the cleanest sound there is, so there was nothing to hide and it took us quite a while. But we eventually finished so that Max could catch the last bus driving from my place.

And yeah I lied in the previous blog post...I too had to rerecord some parts that I didn't play good enough the first time I recorded them...shame on me! But I got that cleared out too and I could finally do something else than recording related stuff...yay!



So that's it for now. As I said this post will be mostly narrated by the video I cut together.
I will update the Blog soon enough with another video I made during the reamping process with some more funny german jokes!

See ya'll!

Martin

And So He Wrote, And So He Wrote...

Soooo...Drums are DONE! I was quite busy with editing and mixing the drums so that's the reason why there was no Blog update. I will provide information with a recap of what happened while there was no update:

Saturday, 22nd of December 2012:

Jules picked me up at around 10:30 a.m. and we took my pc with us, so we could record the second song (short reminder: due to the exhausting recording day 1 we decided to record the second one on a seperate day). While he was warming up, I set up the pc and checked if everything was working like the day before.








The beginning of the second song went well and we came closer to the end and because of the faster nature of this song Jules burned his energy also quite fast, so we took a break after 3/4th of the drums were recorded. Right after eating some delicious asian fast food Julian was trying his best to fill the last quarter of the song with his drum play...well he tried...his foot pedal broke for some reason, and we couldn't record double bass parts for the song anymore. We tried stuff around and rearranged some drumplay I had in my mind for this song and the solution was really satisfying! Work done, Drums recorded; now let's start packing our stuff up!

Arch Enemy!

"So we meet again...my arch nemesis! You tried to stop me for the first time Sir Cablelot and this time I won't let you get this far!"- were the thoughts I was thinking while trying to get the cables back together how they were when we got them...

Stupid cables!!!

and I really...I REALLY STRUGGLED with those things...I hate them..I despise their wiggly nature for being so stubborn!!
It took me way longer to round up the cables than Julian took for disassambling the mics from their tripods and putting those back together...and he even helped me finishing the cables...what a sad sad day.

BUT VICTORY IS MINE!

That's how it's supposed to be!

So it didn't took us as long as the first day, but that's because the second song is only half as long as the first one. After we packed up everything,  Jules drove me home and I immediately listened to the recordings and was quite satisfied with it and started editing them...with started I mean reading every god damn good page on the Internet about multitrack drum editing techniques and stuff like that, after 2 hours reading and studying I finally started editing and it lasted for as good as 3 hours...for nothing! Because of one stupid brainfart from yours truly I had to reset everything at around 11:51 p.m.! That's it...I'm out!

Sunday, 23rd of December 2012:

I didn't sleep well...I slept for merely 6 hours and began editing at like 8:30 a.m. and I did nothing else for the whole day...after over 13 hours I was done editing the drums and two and a half hours later I was done with the first mixing, too! Yay, let's go straight back to bed were I came from!

 

Monday, 24th of December 2012:

Nothing much happened for High Rise Fall. It was the day for some quality family time, and damn...it did good to take a break!

Tuesday, 25th of December 2012:

There I was on Christmas day! Totally motivated to edit and mix the drums for the first song we recorded, and it went well! It took me not as long as for the first time doing these things, I developed kinda my own technique and pace for doing the editing stuff, but man...it's a really boring and dumb work...I got trolled by my brain for doing something so dumb so it had to play this nice little tune for the whole day while editing drums:

and after about 13 hours or so of this catchy tune everything was done!

The last bit to export for that song!

Today, Wednesday the 26th of December 2012:

Today I took the first step to record the guitars! We're going to use the reamping method for them and the first step was: organizing the band and asking them when everyone can come over to my place to record their parts! After that was done, I began recording my own parts and got through it in about 3-4 Hours I guess with a long lunchbreak and dinner break in between! :) So my job is done until we're going to record the amped versions of the guitars...well not quite:
tomorrow Denno will come over to drop the bass and on Friday Max will get over here to record his dry guitar parts and hopefully on Saturday we're going to amp those dry signals! And if everything guitar related is done on Saturday we're going to do the vocals on Sunday!





Stay tuned, I will keep you up to date!


Yours truly,

the brainfarting and cablehating Martin!

Yours Truly.... :/