Adam Crowe

The Second Echo – Leavin’ You (Live)

Adam Crowe — Sun, 21 Jun 2015 09:23:30 +0000

Back in February this year, we hire Nambucca on Holloway Road for a special night celebrating the launch of Rouge‘s new single Myself and celebrating my birthday. Supported by the talented Jesse Wong, Rouge and The Second Echo played full sets to a packed room of wonderful people. Assisted by dear friends, the night was a great success and everybody had a brilliant time.

With the FOH mixing desk at our control we thought to take the opportunity and record the performances. Then we thought, if we’re recording the audio then we might as well video the show as well! This superb performance if The Second Echo‘s new single Leavin’ You was filmed by Alex Cantouris and Louis Marsh, and edited by yours truly.

Listen, enjoy and share!

Leavin’ You is available for exclusive download at http://secondecho.bandcamp.com

Discover The Second Echo at http://www.secondecho.co.uk
Follow on Twitter: https://twitter.com/TheSecondEcho
Follow on Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/thesecondecho
Follow on Instagram: https://instagram.com/thesecondecho/

Joe Foster – Vocals, Guitar
Oliver Marks – Guitar
James McKone – Bass
Ben McKome – Drums

Video filming by Alex Cantouris and Louis Marsh
Audio recorded live at Nambucca, London by Adam Crowe
Mixing and mastering by Adam Crowe (http://www.adamcrowe.net)
Video editing by Adam Crowe

Rouge – Myself – New Single and Video

Adam Crowe — Sat, 21 Feb 2015 12:48:08 +0000

Rouge are back with a new single – Myself – and a brilliant new self-produced video featuring the talented Polly Shields as the lead character. Shot almost entirely on a GoPro camera with a DIY bodycam contraption made by yours truly.

Mostly shot in one long day, the video chronicles the day in the life of a girl – from getting up in the morning, her thoughts, journey throughout London to a psychedelic night out in a club.

The song is the first release from the upcoming EP, the name of which I cannot divulge just yet. We launched the single on the 18th of February via a exclusive limited edition hard-copy hand-made Rouge-style release at a major gig at Nambucca in London. All 100 copies are unique, made by Becky Wixon, signed by the band and include a single artwork and a print with a written message. These can be purchased on the band’s website for £2 + postage.

Recorded at Snap! Studios, the new single showcases the band’s continuing musical growth with more complex arrangements, harmonies and textures. I will do a full blog post closer to the EP’s release about the tracking and mixing process with photos from the studio. But in the meantime, please enjoy and share this video, buy the single and come down to see Rouge play live!

Written & Performed by Rouge
Produced, Recorded & Mixed by Adam Crowe at Snap! Studios
Mastered by John Webber at Air Studios Mastering
Video Directed & Edited by Mirko Zandarin

The Second Echo – Sugar Mama

Adam Crowe — Sat, 06 Sep 2014 12:00:03 +0000

For the past few months, I’ve been working on pre-production, recording and mixing the debut album of The Second Echo – an incredible band of four top notch young musicians with an exceptional affinity for rock ‘n’ roll, blues, melody and groove. Described as a mix between Jimi Hendrix, Led Zeppelin, Deep Purple and King Crimson, the group are the rehashed next generation of everything that I’ve grown to love about the guitar rock music of the 70’s with a young twist augmented by foot-thumping rhythms and groove.

Armed with theory, strong musical background and already years of experience despite their young carbon footprint, this amazing ensamble of four seasoned musicians features strong performances on every instrument, catchy hooks and melodies with stellar guitar riffs and licks. Co-written by frontman and guitarist, Joe Foster, and lead guitarist, Oliver (Ollie) Marks, the lyrics deal with women, love, relationships, politics, government, life and redemption. Complex yet approachable chord progressions, signature changes and crazy solos are only a small part of the tricks The Second Echo have up their sleeve, as the rhythm section of brothers Ben McKone and James McKone will have you dancing, jumping and head bobbing.

Over a period of about three months, the band and I have been meeting up at band rehearsals to go over the songs, discuss arrangements, vision and sound. By the time we got to Snap Studios to record the songs, we had a pretty clear idea of our agenda and a plan of attack. I have prepared printouts with lyrics and a chart of parts that needed to be recorded for each song, so that I’d have a good overview of the session progress and nothing gets forgotten. The band played live together with the drums setup in the live room, bass amp in the vocal booth and guitar amps in the studio lounge. Guide vocals were sung in the control room live and later overdubbed. No click was used throughout. The performance relied entirely on the band’s natural feel for the song and skilful playing.

With awe I watched these musical geniuses deploy the kind of skills one only gets to hear stories of from ageing colleagues who got to witness something so spectacular on a session once that the memory was permanently inscribed into their consciousness to be told and repeated over and over again to the younger and less fortunate generations. How lucky am I?

With little tile to spare, we cramped eight songs into four days – all including rhythm guitars, solo guitars, drums, bass, vocals and BVs where necessary. We simply could not have done this if the guys didn’t practice their brains off in the months leading up to the session and if they simply weren’t as skilled and hard working as they are!

Taking a few days break after the exhausting session, I opened the files which had no effects on them, just the levels from the tracking session, I pressed play and smiled. “They really do sound good” I thought. I immediately started working on the first track which was decided by the band and I to be the first single that would introduce the band to the world. The song is called Sugar Mama and I am very proud to be able to share it with you. It is available for free as a SoundCloud stream and on Spotify, but please support the band and purchase the track on iTunes if you like it.

[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/164817061″ params=”color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_artwork=true” width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]
Buy Sugar Mama on iTunes

Credits

Joe Foster – Lead Vocals and Guitar
Oliver Marks – Guitar
James McKone – Bass
Ben McKone – Drums, BVs and Percussion

Written by Joe Foster and Oliver Marks
Recorded at Snap Studios. Assisted by Ben Mclusky.
Engineered and Mixed by Adam Crowe
Mastered by John Webber at AIR Studios

Rouge’s Debut Single Wilderness

Adam Crowe — Sun, 09 Mar 2014 21:38:22 +0000

Back in July 2013, I came across four demo tracks from a band called Rouge – four girls playing and singing the blues with rock and soul overtones. It didn’t take much thinking to realise that I was listening to something special. I immediately got in touch with the band and asked for a meeting. We agreed on a production partnership and commenced work on the first EP headed by the single Wilderness.

Rouge aren’t a terribly conventional line up because they feature two leads vocalists with both playing guitars, but whatever force in the universe had made this band happen wanted these voices to meet because they blend seamlessly. Becky Wixon and Simone Picknett share the vocal and guitar duties perfectly and by far in the most respectful manor I have ever witnessed. They are also the chief songwriters in the band.

Nicole Burnard provides powerful drums, and it is still a mystery to me where the strength to make so much noise comes from this little girl, but boy does she deliver, and spectacularly in time too! Moreover, Nicole is a multi-instrumentalist playing bass and guitar in addition to mastering drums and percussion.

Ruby Rose Lee picked up the bass just for this band! With background in guitar, the prospect of joining Rouge was enough to motivate her into some serious crash courses and bass practice. By Rouge’s first gig, Ruby was playing flawlessly like a natural.

I’ve adopted a methodology some time ago that seems to work well for me when doing production work. It involves attending rehearsal and getting to know the band, the environment they feel comfortable playing in, understand the dynamics in the band and of course learn the songs. This idea is to be involved in the process as much as possible so that by the time we get to the studio, everything flows naturally and I don’t look like an outsider to the band. It also gives me an opportunity to have input into the songs early on in the process and we are not wasting any precious time in the studio making changes. If this process starts early enough, there is even an opportunity to test the changes live during gigs and see the audience’s reaction.

Rouge had been very clever and were renting a permanent space on the outskirts of London which they have converted into a rehearsal space called Red Box a few months before I met them. This gave us more than usual opportunities to rehearse and go over the songs.

“

It’s a great force which pushes their music and live performance in your face.
Matthew Clewley

On the 12th of September, 2013 we went into Snap Studios to record Rouge’s Edge of the Bed EP. Three very long days of intense work fuelled by Red Bull, coffee, music and the girls’ spirit. We’ve taken a considerable time to set up the drums and the drums sound. It may sound ridiculous saying that drums are important in a track, but it really is! Especially since this is a four piece and we were really going to a raw sound without much additional studio performances that the band could not recreate live. So with every instrument and part to be more exposed than in a conventional pop/rock production, we had to take a bit more time to get everything right. Furthermore, to get the real “old school” rock drums sound, we decided to record to a 24-track tape machine (Snap’s Otari MX80) on high-bias tape quite heavily pushed for tape compression and saturation. The click was fed only to Nicole for drums with the rest of the band playing live to Nicole’s drums. We used Snap’s awesome tie-line system to place the amplifiers in other rooms while the band are in eye-contact with each other. Everything was played live with overdubs afterwards when we had the perfect drums and bass takes.

Also in the studio was my dear friend and Rouge’s “guitar tech / musical god / rouge daddy” (this is the actual quote!), Toby Hawthorne – the Big Man himself. Toby is the embodiment of everything that is good in this world and always makes me a better person by just being around him. Toby was instrumental (excuse the pun) in setting up guitars, making sure the band’s gear was in order and had brilliant input on the band’s performance. Toby knows the band and the material intimately and I could rely on him to give me honest feedback regarding sound and performance. When I was tweaking microphone positions in the live room, Toby would give me the “thumbs up” if the mic was in the right place. I can’t say enough how important it is to have a trusty pair of ears around. Whether it is the studio assistant or someone in the band or just someone you know, while running a complex session, there’s bound to be something you miss and someone like Toby can crucially save the day by saying something like “what happened to the bass?!” or something rather.

“

…this track is downright awesome.
The Musical Melting Pot

Wilderness

Enjoying the incredible collection of vintage amplifiers and vintage microphones at Snap Studios is a privilege in its own right. Each one with a story, a date, a sound… Sometimes it’s like a time machine that lets you travel to a certain period in time and record through somebody else’s famous rig. I’d like to say that we took advantage of just about everything the studio has to offer at one point or another, and I hope the results speak for themselves.

All the tracks were transferred into Pro Tools via Snap’s Prism converters, and I’ve mixed the songs in my studio. After the mixes were approved by the band, I sent them off to the always brilliant John Webber at AIR Studios for mastering.

Rouge released the first single off the EP called Wilderness on the 25th of November, 2013. You can buy the single on iTunes and a physical handmade copy off the band’s website. It is also available for streaming on SoundCloud.

[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/117669425″ params=”color=ff5500&auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_artwork=true” width=”100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1p53bI7MEvM

Buy on iTunes Listen on Spotify Rouge on SoundCloud

Rouge Website Rouge on Facebook Rouge on Twitter

Credits

Becky Wixon – Guitars and Vocals
Simone Picknett – Guitars and Vocals
Ruby Rose Lee – Bass
Nicole Burnard – Drums and Vocals
Adam Crowe – Hammond

Tobias Hawthorne – Guitar Technician / Musical God / Rouge Daddy

Written by Rouge
Recorded at Snap Studios. Assisted by Ben Mclusky.
Engineered and Mixed by Adam Crowe
Mastered by John Webber and AIR Studios

Mercia – Breathe EP Recording and Mixing

Adam Crowe — Tue, 01 Oct 2013 19:58:59 +0000

Earlier this year I was very fortunate to work on a very special project with a band called Mercia. It was (and is) special to me because I got to meet some truly talented individuals, got to spend a lot of time with them and have input to their work, got to record them and mix this wonderful EP.

Mercia are essentially a duo – Simone Picknett on guitars, vocals and songwriting; and Dan Endersby on drums. Additionally, the EP features a giant of musical knowledge, heart and spirit of Tobias (Toby) Edward Hawthorne; pianos and violins by Dan Richards, marching drumming by Tom Ashcroft, and stunning additional vocals by Luke Crawford.

Simone’s writing is way too mature for her age. Augmented by a brilliant sense of melody, alternative tunings and open chords, she creates lush textures that create the basis for her beautiful storytelling. Equally, Dan’s solid drumming and Toby’s exceptional bass work all create a head-shaking and foot-stomping performance. Luke adds exceptional lead and backing vocals to Simone’s lead vocals which interleave like a elegant dance.

I’ve attended rehearsals with the band prior to the recording and we’ve done simple pre-production at my studio. With a recording plan and a schedule in mind, we went into Snap Studios for three days to track the songs. Starting with drums and bass, and working through guitars, piano, violins, vocals and percussion. One by one, every piece of the puzzle came into place.

After three long days and very little rest, the EP was mixed in my studio and mastered skilfully by John Webber at AIR Studios Mastering. In hindsight, I’m not sure how we had the time, but we managed to also record all the four songs as a live performance in the studio’s live room! You can watch them all on the band’s YouTube channel.

Very proudly I’m happy to say that the EP is now available digitally via iTunes and Amazon. Please buy, list and share!

Buy Breathe EP on iTunes
Buy Breathe EP on Amazon

Here’s a little sample (or listen before you buy) from the EP:

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/113239299″ params=”” width=” 100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]
[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/113239792″ params=”” width=” 100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]
[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/113239872″ params=”” width=” 100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]
[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/113239971″ params=”” width=” 100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

I regret not having enough time to take as many photos as I would like, but here’s something.

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Do follow Mercia on the various social networks. They are actively gigging and uploading new stuff.

Follow Merica on Facebook
Follow Mercia on Twitter

Lizbet Sempa

Adam Crowe — Sun, 26 May 2013 20:03:55 +0000

On the 30th of March I’ve been asked to engineer on a simple piano and vocals session at Alice’s Loft Music but little did I know what mind-blowing talent was about to come through the doors!

A very young, shy and very well mannered girl came in, introduced herself, sat down at the piano and proceeded to sparkle aural fairy dust. A haunting and majestic voice came out of this 17-year-old that I never heard before. Lizbet Sempa’s voice is young yet mature, wise, graceful and experienced. How can anyone so young sound so old?

Throughout the one-day session, we recorded each song twice – once live at the piano for the video cameras, and once for the album release. Many times I found myself forgetting my duties as an engineer, loosing myself completely in Lizbet’s enchanting voice, playing and lyrics which are way too deep and insightful for her age!

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I cannot tell you how proud I am to be able to say that I had worked with this extraordinary artist. Lizbet Sempa will no doubtably shoot to stardom. She has already conquered SoundCloud with 255,000 followers and nearly 60,000 plays with hundreds of comments from other who fell under Lizbet’s spell.

The recording was for Lizbet’s upcoming EP release Indirect Thoughts which is scheduled for later this year. Here is one of the live videos that was shot that day for a song called On These Hills:

[youtube=https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s-VnTRCqwGg&rel=0&w=500]

And here’s is Mistakes from Lizbet’s SoundCloud:

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/tracks/87849874″ params=”” width=” 100%” height=”166″ iframe=”true” /]

If you’ve listened to the above songs, I know you feel the same way I do. Follow and support Lizbet on:

SoundCloud — Facebook — Zap Records

King Lizard – A Nightmare Livin’ the Dream

Adam Crowe — Sun, 03 Mar 2013 00:33:39 +0000

I admit, this post is WELL overdue! I started recording this album back in August 2011! But it’s been a long project and I had loads going on so I do apologise for the delay

I have worked on various little project with King Lizard since I accidentally ran in to Niro Knox (guitar) at the Big Red pub in London somewhere in November/December of 2007! I recorded and mixed two live shows for the band with the Underworld 2009 Live N’ RED Raw show released on DVD. But I was a lot more interested in getting the band into the studio for a proper album recording.

I was commissioned to engineer the band’s new album – A Nightmare Livin’ The Dream – which was going to be produced by Pedro Ferreira (The Darkness, Tank, Shikari, Therapy). Working with Pedro was an experience in itself. He is a very skilled rock/metal producer and I learned a lot from him.

The actual recording of the album started before Pedro came on board. We recorded two songs on the 11-12th of August 2011 at Snap Studios as a test and pitch to the band’s record label. We recorded If It’s a Sin and Down. I mixed the initial versions, but these were not the ones that ended up on the album as they had to be remixed to be consistent with the rest of the mixes.

I’d like to shout out to Shure UK who were very kindly had lent us a goody kit of lovely drum microphones to play with. They were absolutely brilliant and I was very sad to part with them at the end of the session! If any engineers – studio or live – are reading this, I urge you to give the Shure microphones (beyond the usual SM57, SM58 and SM7B) a shot. I feel that they are unjustly ignored in the UK.

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Fortunately, the label liked what they heard and the album recording was scheduled for early February with Pedro producing the album and myself engineering.

We spend 3rd till 9th of February recording the drums, bass, rhythm guitars, some solo guitars and overdubs, and some vocals for the remaining 10 songs on the album. Additional recordings of solo guitars, vocals and even horns were done at Pedro’s studio in the following weeks.

All drums were tracked to sync’ed 24-track tape and bounced back to Pro Tools. All tracks were recorded live with the whole band playing live! This makes a huge difference to the feel of a recording and isn’t always the preferred modern way of recording. We were lucky to use a studio that can accommodate this space-wise and more importantly the band were professional enough as musicians and were well rehearsed to be able to play all the songs live top to bottom. Respect!

As you will see from the photos below, February 2012 was an especially cold month, but the studio was kept very warm by the music, gear and excitement. For me, this album was a fantastic thing to be a part of and I am very proud of the result. Working with the band, Pedro and being at the brilliant Snap Studios with Ben Mclusky assisting was just a joy. I think the band’s rockumentary explains it better that I can though:

[youtube=”http://youtu.be/McKxHbt65Eg&w=500″]

The album was released in November 2012 and has received dozens of smashing reviews from around the world by rock and metal magazines and punters who got to hear the band for the first time following this release. The band is booked for major tours around Europe in 2013. I highly recommend catching them live as they put on a hell of a show!

The album was mixed by Pedro Ferreira, mastered by Ade Emsley at Table of Tone, and released by Bad Reputation Records.

Recorded at Snap Studios and assisted by the brilliant Ben Mclusky.

You can buy the album on iTunes or the band’s website at http://www.kinglizard.co.uk/collections/shop

Also, please follow King Lizard on their Facebook page and Twitter feed.

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Denise – Camden Town

Adam Crowe — Sat, 22 Dec 2012 17:50:14 +0000

Over the past year or so, I’ve been involved in an amazing production called Camden Town by Denise. The 14-track album is a explosion of styles ranging from jazz to soul to instrumental to rap all written by the talented Denise Jahnigen. Featuring 44 musicians from four continents, I have been very fortunate to record many elements from this album, play guitar on two tracks and mix 7 tracks!

Camden Town was composed by Denise Jahnigen who not only wrote the music and lyrics, but also wrote and orchestrated all the string parts which were recorded in New Orleans with a proper New-Orleans-style rhythm section. The album is full of gorgeous melodies and jazzy, yet poppy, chord progressions. Denise has a great ability of taking complex chord progressions from the world of jazz and making them very accessible and natural to even an untrained ear.

I had the great fortune of being able to play electric guitar on two tracks – Amy and Crazy Magnolia – which I recorded in my studio, and also engineered/recorded various elements like drums, piano, bass, French horn, percussion and BVs in Snap Studios and Alice’s Loft Music (see below). More importantly for me, was the chance to mix 7 tracks which I am very proud of. The album was skilfully mastered by the great Ray Staff of Air Studios and is now available on CD and Vinyl (my first vinyl release!).

“…Adam Crowe for his incredible patience, support, and advice throughout this entire project…”

Credits

[ultimatetables 1 /]

This album has been in the works for a long time and I know how hard Denise worked on it, and I believe the result reflects that. I’m very proud and honoured to take part in it. I encourage everybody to have a listen to the album below and moreover, buy a copy!

[soundcloud url=”http://api.soundcloud.com/playlists/2694849″ params=”” width=” 100%” height=”350″ iframe=”true” /]

Buy Album

Arhai – Eastern Road

Adam Crowe — Sat, 08 Dec 2012 21:40:48 +0000

Earlier this year I have been commissioned to mix an album for an interesting electronic/folk fusion duo called Arhai. The album ‘Eastern Roads’ a very tasteful mix between traditional folk instruments with electronics grooves and beats. The folk part is heavily inspired by traditional Irish, English and especially Balkan music.

Although I am less used to electronic music, I found that the beautiful combination and the gorgeous playing was just too nice to resist. I am very proud of this work as it was not only a challenge for me to work with a new style but also because I got to meet two very talented musicians. I’ve never before met someone so immersed in a specific type of music so much as Jovana Backovic and Adrian Lever are. They manoeuvre with ease between between a standard 4/4 rhythm through 7/8 to a finger-breaking 11/8 that I am still trying to learn how to count!

Have a listen to the album preview below (I especially recommend the excellent guitar work on track 10 – Ismail)

[soundcloud url=”https://api.soundcloud.com/playlists/2503507″ params=”auto_play=false&hide_related=false&show_comments=true&show_user=true&show_reposts=false&visual=true” width=”100%” height=”450″ iframe=”true” /]

CLICK HERE TO BUY THE ALBUM!

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I highly recommend catching Arhai live because seeing their music come to life on stage is something special. Have a look on the band’s Facebook page and website for tour dates, and of course don’t forget to buy the album!!!

Arhai website

Arhai on Facebook

Why I Do This (a.k.a. Feedback from Murray Creagh)

Adam Crowe — Tue, 13 Nov 2012 00:49:56 +0000

With major labels dropping like flies, records not selling, studios closing and musicians starving, one has to ask himself every once in a while (more often than not actually) ‘why do I do this?!’

Well, there is no good empirical answer to this. It’s an urge, a feeling, a calling from within… It’s often difficult to justify, vague to understand, and very hard to quantify. But every so often I do a session or write a song or play a part and do a mix and get some feedback that will really strike a chord with me.

This past Saturday, I spent the day engineering and recording drums for Murray Creagh, a London-based singer/songwriter/producer. It was a long session with various different drum sounds, all tracked to 24-track tape. Joe Ryan was absolutely brilliant on the drums. I had never before seen someone playing with such consistency for 12 hours!

I got the following email today from Murray:

Hey Adam, just wanted to say thank you again for your engineering genius on Saturday and organising the session! I’ve had a listen through the takes and it sounds fucking great to me, it’s exactly the sound I wanted to get…. though having said that when listening back I’m still like “whoa, those mics + that Neve desk + that outboard + that kit + whatever else is going on” really is the full catastrophe! But of course it’s knowing how to put all that together – so thanks dude, you really nailed it!

Your place in heaven is assured!

– M

I think this explains better than anything I can write or say why I do what I do.

Adam

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