I think when this series of updates on the recording of Orange Goblin‘s yet-untitled new album is over, I might have to ask frontman Ben Ward to continue filling us in on both his drunken misadventures and the English football league. In this second (and massively entertaining) installment of the studio diary, Mr. Ward details his preferred hangover-curing breakfast, progress on the guitar and bass tracks, and several well-celebrated victories.

Last week’s update is here. Orange Goblin is Ward, bassist Martyn Millard, guitarist Joe Hoare and drummer Chris Turner. More to come, and in the meantime, dig it:

Orange Goblin – Album Recording – Week 2

After a very successful first three days in the studio we all went away and had four whole days off to listen to what we had recorded and decide if any changes to the drum tracks needed to be made, but I think we were all 100 percent happy with the work that Chris had done and by Friday when we arrived back at the studio, Martyn continued laying down his bass tracks, quickly adding to the good stuff he’d done last weekend as well. The break in recording also gave me a good chance to go away and listen to the songs and make sure that the lyrics and vocal melodies are going to work when it finally comes to laying them down. I’ve now got finished lyrics for seven of the 10 tracks, which leaves me with two full weeks to write words and melodies for three songs! Even by my standards, this should be easy enough! Martyn concentrated long enough Friday to get all his parts done despite the rest of us trying to put him off with the temptation of beer, cider and pizza! We all left there Friday night confident that we were well ahead of schedule so Chris and I went back to mine and celebrated this with more beer and whiskey!

Saturday morning, I was up early (and hungover!) and went for a breakfast fit for a king (steak, poached eggs, fried potatoes, onions, mushrooms and tomatoes – Thanks Tom!). This was the perfect stomach lining for a day on the ale! I didn’t actually attend the studio on Saturday as the English football season has started now and I had a ticket to see Liverpool play at Arsenal at the Emirates stadium in London and Liverpool won 2-0!! I honestly had intended to go to the studio after the game but because Liverpool won, there was much celebrating to do and the rest of the band accepted that I wouldn’t drop by! Whilst I was away Joe began laying down his guitar tracks (I’m amazed he managed this, as Martyn was running around the studio celebrating the fact that his team, QPR, had also won that afternoon!) After a while of working on different tones and sounds Joe cracked on and made some very good progress. By the time I got to the studio on Sunday he was well over half way through his basic rhythm tracks and everything was sounding awesome!!

Martyn and I spent the whole day listening to Joe plough through his rhythm tracks and deciding where we needed to multi-layer the guitars and where to keep it simple. I think Joe has a very good sense of where he needs to do stuff and where to drop out and I feel it adds a lot to the overall sound of Orange Goblin albums. Chris never made it to the studio on Sunday as he had family business to attend to but he made a point of sending us messages that his team, Wolves, had won again and were in fact top of the league!! Before we left the studio we had to load all our drums and bass gear out of the studio as they are now done with! We’ll be back again next weekend for Joe to add his leads and for me to start doing vocals on all the songs that have finished lyrics, if this all goes to plan then the following weekend should be spent finishing vocals and guitars and adding the finishing touches (keyboards, percussion and any other little bits and pieces that may need doing!). Once that is done we start the mixing!!! All in all another very productive weekend and three much-needed points for Liverpool, QPR and Wolves. I don’t think all our teams have ever won on the same weekend before………..must be a good sign!!!

Ben Ward, 23rd August 2011

Tags: Candlelight, London, Orange Goblin, UK

This entry was posted on Tuesday, August 23rd, 2011 at 11:14 am and is filed under Features. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed.