David Myhr - Soundshine

Brad Jones to produce David Myhr’s second solo album! Recordings have begun in Nashville!

Posted: October 11th, 2016 | Author: | Filed under: post | Tags: , , , , , , | Comments Off on Brad Jones to produce David Myhr’s second solo album! Recordings have begun in Nashville!

Only two days ago I wrote about my co-writing research trip to Los Angeles, Nashville, New York that took place in February last year. The great news is that from these fruitful sessions a bunch of NEW songs for my FUTURE SECOND ALBUM was written!!! And what’s even better – the recordings have begun!!! In Nashville! With the one and only Brad Jones as producer! In one of the eight video blogs I linked to in my last post I talked about what he has meant to me over the years. Below you can enjoy eleven more video blogs that I put on my artist Facebook page from the Nashville sessions. As well as some photos from the studio, with co-writer Bill DeMain, from social activities with old and new friends including Javier Piñol, Wyatt Funderburk, and The Wellingtons.

skarmavbild-2016-10-10-kl-13-09-59

Here’s a video from the flight between Stockholm and Chicago on Aug 28 with me and famous Swedish reputable drummer Andreas Dahlbäck who I was fortunate enough to have with me on the first part of the trip. (He also played drums on my solo debut album Soundshine).

Once we got the Brad Jones’ studio Alex the Great Recording we started to fool around with the various instruments that were lying around:

Once we had slept off our jet-lag we had the first producer’s meeting with Brad at his home kitchen table:

Time for tuning up the instruments. Here I’m singing ”Nobody’s child” (once recorded by the Traveling Wilburys):

While setting up in the studio we put on a kettle of coffe and I was warming up the voice and getting in the the country vibe of Nasvhille by singing ”Country Dreamer” by Wings:

Later the same day we had laid our first track down. A song co-written with Linus of Hollywood called ”Lovebug”. Producer Brad Jones’ evaluation of the take is ”time for lunch”:

A little later into the recordings I finally got to pick up Brad Jones’ wonderful 1970 Gibson Les Paul Deluxe Gold Top with mini humbuckers. I was in jingle-jangle guitar power pop heaven!!!

Between takes there’s always time for more goofing around. Here with hired gun, and famous Nasvhille session musician, Pat Buchanan. Too much fun!

Here’s from one of many so called ”playbacks” in the studio. Here of a song I’ve co-written with my hero from the area of academic research within songwriting, and my assistant supervisor as well, Professor Joe Bennett. The song is called ”Egyptian Blue”.

During the weekend when Brad had to go on a tour to Colorado. As Brad put it: ”Zookeeper’s away, Monkeys will play…..”. Here’s Andreas trying out an idea on his Theremin on the iPad. With us during the weekend was my good friend Javier Piñol:

After Andreas had gone back to Sweden I was sometimes left all alone in the studio at night-time. So I took the opportuinty to try out some background vocals. Here with my new TG2 pre-amp that I had bought from Vintage King Audio:

I’m really excited with the result from these recordings and I look forward to finishing everything off during the next days, weeks, months, years…?  Time will tell! Stay tuned!

img_0981

img_0982 img_0676 img_1199 img_1130 img_1066img_1006 img_0878 img_0859 img_0717img_0872 img_0718 img_0516 skarmavbild-2016-10-10-kl-13-09-59


Three hour mix video and interview in Swedish music magazine “Studio” (4-2013)

Posted: March 26th, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: post | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on Three hour mix video and interview in Swedish music magazine “Studio” (4-2013)

Newsflash! It seems that Swedish media finally have “discovered” Soundshine! In the new issue of  “Studio” (4-2013) which is a music magazine specializing in recording and music production (and that I’m an avid reader of myself) you will find a three hour(!) long “mix video” featuring myself talking about the writing, recording, and production of my song “Never Mine” which as many of you know is the opening track of my solo debut album Soundshine. (Feel free to have a listen on the Spotify player to the right!).

The magazine says (kindly) that Soundshine is a “fantastic solo debut” and that it’s “sprängfyllt med gnistrande poppärlor” which would be something like “filled to the brim with glimmering pop pearls”. Don’t know if that works in English though… Should anyone (except for me) be on the look for nice praise over the album in “real” English  you can also check out Hooks and Harmony who named Soundshine the album of the year (followed by interview here).

Studio

In the STUDIO interview I talk about how the idea for the verse melody came to me already back in 2006 and how I reworked it over a two year to period until I finally was happy with it and how the song was put on hold while The Merrymakers were still active (or should we say inactive?) as a band but became an obvious choice for me to include on my album once I was a solo artist. By then it was up to no one but me to decide whether my songs were good enough or not – and guess if they were! (Insert laughter here…)

I also discuss at length about the choice of co-producer (and drummer) Andreas Dahlbäck, session musicians Anders Petterson, Rikard Lidhamn and more, and you will see unique video clips from the recording, how the drums were miked etc. Above all the mix video contains a detailed run-through on-screen insight into my Logic (recording software) project. There you will see which instruments are part of the arrangement and how they were recorded and treated from a production perspective.

Also, in the last part of video you get to meet Marcus Black who mixed the whole album where he discusses his approach to mixing in general and to the mix of “Never Mine” in detail (with an on-screen run-through of his Pro Tools project). At the very end we talk a little bit about the mastering at Abbey Road and you will be invited to see the mastering room of senior engineer Steve Rooke who apart from my album has worked with among many, many other artists Paul McCartney and George Harrison. Not to mention the recent re-mastering of The Beatles themselves.

The magazine also features an article about myself and the recording of Soundshine. So if you are in Sweden (or know Swedish) and you are interested in the above I hope you find your way to the magazine store this month. Or if you’re living the modern digital life you can buy it as a pdf here.

UPDATE: As en Easter egg STUDIO magazine is offering the video link for free! Just click the picture below to get access to the three hour video (in eight parts). Remember to click the HD symbol so it becomes grey (not white) in order to get high quality.

 

Skärmavbild 2013-03-28 kl. 16.07.31

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

A million big humble thanks to chief editor Mats Stålbröst and business manager Andreas Hedberg at STUDIO for showing an interest in my music and sharing it with their readers.

Please let me know what you think about the article in the comment section below or at my Facebook Page.

 


“Never Mine (Abbey Road Version)” – Video premiere!

Posted: January 2nd, 2013 | Author: | Filed under: post | Tags: , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Comments Off on “Never Mine (Abbey Road Version)” – Video premiere!

What “a day in the life”! Recording at ABBEY ROAD STUDIOS!!!

I have always loved the Beatles. And I will surely do ’til the day I die. One of the biggest highlights in my “Beatles career” (update: THIS was bigger!!!!) was to be able to spend a day in legendary Studio 2 at Abbey Road to record an alternate version of my song “Never Mine” which is the opening track of my debut album Soundshine. Check out the video and continue reading below for full background story.

Since my first visit to London back in 1990 I have never missed the opportunity while in town to visit the famous crossing at Abbey Road. But until 2011 I had never been able to actually enter the building. It was in May when I did it for the first time since I (in a strike of megalomania) had chosen this legendary place for the mastering of Soundshine. Read more about this occasion in this blog post.

Little did I know then that the doors would open for me again only six months later, and this time to RECORD in frickin’ Studio 2!!! Yes, THAT studio…!

How that came about  – from out of the blue – is something you are more than welcome to read about in this blog post from Nov 2011.

I wrote then; “today we’re not here to try to change music history but more to study the process of how music history was made from within the actual room were a big part of it was created. I hope to be able to share the result with you sometime in a not too distant future”. That distant future is NOW! Almost fourteen months later…! The reasons for the delay are many. One being that Thomas Juth who took the initiative (which I will be forever grateful for!) is a highly demanded sound engineer in London and therefore hasn’t been able to find the time to work on the mix from this little “hobby project” (although very close to his heart). Thomas is a really sweet (and also cool) guy who has worked with many great names and I mean GREAT(!). Read more about his impressive track record on his own home page.

Also I have been quite busy myself with the activities surrounding the release of Soundshine as well as the post production of my live show at PDOL And like so many others, I also happen to have a “real job” to take care of. (What I do for a living is something I talk about in this interview from Hooks and Harmony).

However, when I was asked to be part of a free download sampler (yes that’s where you’ll find the song I’m talking about here!) released by the music blog Real Gone  (who by the way made a really nice review of Soundshine here) I decided it was time to have a proper mix made. The mix is a combination of Thomas Juths ground work and Soundshine engineer Marcus Black’s fine adjustments.

I really wanted to be able to offer a video clip as well but there was no time and no money (as always…). But then Christmas came I and went to Spain with my wife to spend time with her family. And in between tapas, dinners, family life, and a gig at Festival Alta Fidelidad in Madrid, I finally found some time to take my first, stumbling steps as a video editor using Final Cut Pro X. And with the very little rough material I had from my iPhone standing on a tripod (and a couple of other cell phones in the room) I’ve tried to make a little video documenting this very special moment.

It was really a day in paradise for us Beatle geeks and we spent more than half of the precious ten hours staring at Beatles microphones and Beatles compressor and that kind of stuff. The recording became kind of secondary and something we really did “just for fun”. Considering all this I’m really happy with the final result. It’s obvious that we do not hide our love for the Beatles in the way it’s produced and played. And that’s also my reason for not releasing it on Spotify or iTunes or on CD. As much as I love the Beatles, and to play their songs, I don’t want my own stuff to be TOO Beatlesque and end up being categorized next to The Rutles.

To put even more weight into this occasion I decided to write a little piece of lyrics for this world premiere:

It was fourteen months ago today

Thomas Juth invited me to play

To try to recreate the Beatles style

was guaranteed to raise a smile

So may I introduce to you

The song you’ve known for just a year

David Myhr’s “Never Mine” in Abbey Roooooooooooaddd….

Hope you enjoy the video and the free download of the song! I look very much forward to your comments both here on the blog, on my YouTube Channel, and on my Facebook Page.

A splendid time is guaranteed for all!

Abbey Road photo

Special thanks to Thomas Juth and his brother Fredrik Juth (who played bass and drums) for inviting me to this very special occasion. Thanks also to Michael Bianco, Dyre Gormensen who were part of the recording process. And to Andrew Campbell at Lojinx who co-ordinated the Real Gone release. To Amy Campbell for shooting some nice photos (including the one above) at Abbey Road. And to Henrik Irgens and my wife Paula who also made the day even more pleasant through their sheer presence.