Lizzy's Retrograde Commentary

by Lizzy Daymont

The idea of recording this EP was specifically to show off the band as a live unit. The four of us (Yogi, bassist Brian Timpe, me and Pete) voted on which 5 "old" songs to record, and this would be our demo to send out to clubs for getting gigs. Yogi already wanted to drop the "Yogi &" from "Yogi & Half Zaftig" and was not totally comfortable sending out his solo albums as a representation of the band's music, even if we were performing that material live.

The voting was in consideration of the best material that was exciting in a live setting, and what would make a good 4-5 track listing with some variety. The original idea was for the recording to be quick and dirty. As in, get some decent sounds, throw the tunes down all playing in a room together, then overdub vocals and redo guitars. Quick and easy, right? We also made plans to get good drum tracks for two new songs that we wanted to put out as a single, and have a head start on a new album for Half Zaftig.

When it was time to set up for the weekend in the studio, in March of 2004, Pete celebrated the occasion by having strep throat. Rather than canceling the sessions we were so much looking forward to, he soldiered on through and turned in some impressive tracks. I happen to know he was really not feeling well at all and was probably feverish much of the time. Maybe being a bit delirious made him lose some anxiety he might have had about recording and just let his natural abilities shine through. He pulled off some cool stuff, and we had a set of drum tracks by the end of it. Not only did we get drums for “Firefly”, “Throw Me A Bone”, “Sleeping”, “You Fell”, and “Freedom” recorded, but the whole band did two rather long live takes of “The Ending” and he also did another song which will end up on the next Half Zaftig album (though he did re-cut the drums for that this year during album sessions).

On Sunday night of the first weekend, after Pete headed home having given his all, bassist Brian Timpe fixed a few bass parts. I fixed a few guitar parts such as all my rhythm parts on “You Fell” and an E-Bow part on “The Ending.” Over the course of several evening and weekend sessions, Brian fixed more bass tracks and I came in to do all of my guitars, of which there are many. Apparently Yogi was really enjoying NOT having to play all these parts (since he'd already done these songs in the studio) and letting someone else handle them.

My guitar skills aren't what I would call hugely impressive… in fact, back when Yogi asked if I might be interested in joining the band on guitar I was doubtful that I could even handle it, being a little rusty as a guitarist. Much of my playing centers around more acoustic strumming and finger picking type stuff. I'm more of a Nancy Wilson than an Eddie Van Halen. However, after listening to the material, and knowing that he would be able to show me exactly how to play certain parts, I figured I could at least do something "as long as it wasn't Yngwie licks or anything."

I began to get into shape, and ended up finding ways to cover some keyboard parts from the albums. On some songs Yogi was happy to have me do the main parts while he concentrated more on singing. These new band arrangements are what we wanted to capture on the "demo" recording. Although once we were past a certain point with the overdubbing, we decided to go all out and just make the best recording we could whether it sounded "live" or not. Since we were revisiting previously released material, why not add a few new ideas that Yogi hadn't thought of the first time around?

As I said, I was a little rusty. But after several months of working with the band I became a bit more comfortable in the role. Even so, playing live, loud and raw is one thing… going under the studio microscope was another matter and I was a bit nervous. After all, most of my real studio experience is as a bassist, so I don't know all the little secrets and techniques to recording guitars. I was at the mercy of Darin's and Yogi's coaching, and they did admirably. I couldn't have done my guitar work on this without their help. They helped get amp sounds and gave me playing pointers when my light-attack technique or inexperience with certain playing styles wasn't quite cutting it. Of course, the studio is also where we discover all kinds of interesting things like how this part I'd been playing for months is actually not quite the right part, either rhythmically or the notes. So there was some re-learning on the fly. Luckily, Yogi knows what it should sound like and when it's going to work with everything else and when it isn't. I feel kinda bad for putting him through the necessary tortures of intently listening to everything while keeping in mind what the "big picture" was going to sound like. He also was responsible for making final decisions on when a take is a keeper and when to do it again.

Darin of course lent his ears and creativity as always. Darin is a guy who doesn't sugar coat things. Well, maybe he does a little…when a take isn't happening he will find a way to say so without being mean, that is until he knows a person well enough where he can straight up say something sucked (and yet colorfully, in a good way) and know he won't send someone home in tears (or get smacked.) After many takes on the same things, we get to this point. Usually though, I know it sucked and that I can do better. I guess it's nice to have someone agree and push me in the right direction.

So recording all my guitar parts was a lot of work for me, and in the end there are bits I wish I played better. Yogi ended up replacing some of my parts on “Firefly” because Darin wasn't really happy with the tone of my tracks there, but even so, he plays that part with so much more authority that it sounds much better just for that reason. He also had to re-do some of my rhythm tracks on “Freedom” because…well, I was out of tune (it's the main open string riff). But since I did my parts first it wasn't clear that I was off until Yogi was doubling the rhythm parts with his IN TUNE guitar, then it became quite evident. Somehow Yogi and Darin were able to cut him in there using a completely different guitar and amp and make it seamless (Note: we actually used the same amp that Lizzy used for “Freedom” when we fixed the out-of-tune bits. –Ed.).

Before I had finished recording all my tracks, and it was taking longer than anticipated due to everyone's busy schedules and the budget, Yogi began revisiting the whole finance situation he was facing for the remaining year. He made the decision to put all recording and the band in general on hiatus for several months so he could pay off some debts in preparation for an upcoming period of unemployment. However, he had me finish my tracks at least, so all that would be left were his guitar parts and all the vocals.

Shortly after this, there was a parting of ways with Brian Timpe as well. During this hiatus period, we began to think about the situation we were faced with, and decided to give the trio idea a try with me switching over to bass. Unfortunately this meant Yogi would lose his comfort zone he was enjoying by having the extra guitar player. But it was that way before I was involved, and he figured he could do it again and we would just have to get creative with arrangements. Or drop certain songs that were now sort of impossible to do. It would also be easier to pare down than to start auditioning people, which can be grueling, depressing and extremely time consuming. I just hoped I could do the music justice as a bassist.

When it came time to get things going again a few months later (about November 2004), there was the question of what to do with all these recordings we started and didn't finish. Yogi wasn't real excited about not finishing what we started, and yet it didn't really make sense to finish them as they were if this was to be a proper representation of the band (now an overdub laden one at that). So he had me re-record the bass tracks. Admittedly, this felt a little weird to me, replacing Brian's tracks. But such is life, and I feel pretty good about my performance on them, and all that work that Pete and I had already done (not to mention Yogi and Darin) wasn't wasted.

My approach, rather than recreate exactly what Brian had been playing, was to go back to the original studio tracks and scrutinize the parts originally played by Bryan Beller. Yeah, I copped a bunch of his licks, and who wouldn't? I added a few of my own, and also did a slight variation on the new line Mr. Timpe came up with for the verses of “You Fell.” Obviously the drums are played much differently by Pete than Chris G's parts on the album, so there was a bit of flexibility required to make it all fit together and sound natural, and like me.

Since the original idea of recording two completely new songs and releasing them as a single had been dropped (these were to be the King's X cover “Freedom” and a brand-new song), we opted to put “Freedom” on the demo EP as a hidden track, and save the other new song for the next album. The live recording of “The Ending” is shelved for the moment, until there is opportunity to mix it. We were left with the four "old" songs for the demo, and all that was left now was Yogi's guitars and vocals, and my backup vocals. Naturally, this took longer than expected as these things tend to.

I'm not sure how long Yogi took for his guitars, but I think it was pretty fast (by our terms) since there wasn't a ton for him to do. A couple solos, some rhythm stuff, new things he wanted to try that would be different than the old recordings he's probably tired of. He also had some new ideas for the vocals, and those familiar with the albums will hear those (as well as his edgier voice after a couple years singing with the band raging behind him).

Vocals took longer but after most of his were done, it was time for my backups. I think I did one full Sunday session and a couple evening sessions before I was all done. I was pretty apprehensive about it but it turned out to be lots of fun. Yogi had me try all kinds of different harmonies he was thinking of, and we also did some singing together around the mic to get a great group vocal sound. You can hear it on the choruses of “Freedom” and “You Fell.” That was really fun…and Yogi has now learned to not get me started with the fart jokes or it will never end. I'm sure Darin got some good outtakes from those sessions! We even got Pete to come in and sing a bit. You can hear him do some harmonies on the "day by day" section of “Throw Me A Bone.”

The last big thing to do was mixing, which Darin did without any interference from us. Once he had a preliminary mix for each song we gave approval or not and made suggestions for any changes to make. “You Fell” was particularly chock full of little sounds and layers, and he did a fantastic job getting all those little things to come out the way we were hoping they would.

After everything was mixed to our satisfaction, Darin did the mastering and Yogi had a copy ready to send off for pressing. He had already prepared the artwork with the wonderful Paul Tury and logo by Katy Towell, and we decided on a final design so it would be all ready to send off as soon as the master was done. Except that Yogi found these cool little mini vinyl record CDs that he fell in love with and wanted to have for this EP. The title of the EP is Retrograde, after all, in keeping with theme of re-recording old music. So it was only fitting that the CD should look like a little vinyl LP and remind us of the good old days (without the smell). However this meant the artwork for the CD needed to change to accommodate the tiny label, and Paul was on vacation at the time so it took some time to get that sorted out.

Once that was all done, the final master was sent away for pressing and several weeks later the CDs arrived. Finally, a year and a half after starting our little quick demo, we had boxfuls of a finished EP in hand that we could all be quite proud of. At last, an actual product, the result of our hard work.

More random thoughts while listening…

“Firefly”:
I think this was the first song we worked on when I came in to do more guitars. I had trouble getting the right feel with the chicka-chickas on the main chorus riff "Oh…like a Firefly, shine my love to you…" I got them, mostly, but they were still sloppy (I have a rough mix to prove it). Yogi ended up replacing it himself anyway, so all better!

The bass melodies in the intro, as well as some other licks, are completely ripped off of Bryan Beller's part on the original album. So don't nobody be givin' me credit for that. They were just too cool to change. Yogi had asked Brian Timpe to restate the opening piano riff on the bass right before the bridge section for the live arrangement, so I did the same.

“Throw Me A Bone”:
Lots of intricate guitar parts on this one. This was the last song I did guitars on before our hiatus. My favorite thing here is from the solo on out. Right when you hear the acoustic guitars strum, the whole thing just opens up sonically. I loved doing the acoustic tracks on this, I'm a huge fan of layering big strummy and sparkly guitars like that. The vocal layering here is also killer.

“Sleeping”:
This song really gets me lyrically. The thought of lost, wasted time…the older I get the more I feel it. The line "Listen…can't you hear your mother sigh…" of course makes me think of my mom, who passed away almost 3 years ago now. When I was young she would say things like, "Why don't you get up and do something constructive today?" on a Saturday morning when I would rather be… “Sleeping.” Yogi's vocals are particularly good on the track, as is the solo he does.

The groove is in 7, which can be weird, but once we fell into it I think it works pretty well. It has a lilt to it that's lazily hypnotic. I also love how it builds up from a laid back groove thing to all out rocking.

“You Fell”:
This track was recorded without a click, unlike the others. We did it this way because of the "quote" in the middle, which is completely out of time. But not having a click made overdubbing the guitar on the bridge a little difficult, all I had to go on was Pete's quarter notes on the ride cymbal, and my scratch track.

There are noises you will never hear during the verses of “You Fell”, unless you know they are there. At one point I took the trem bar off the guitar and plinked it on the strings behind the nut. I also screamed into the pickups but it's barely audible (at about 2:44). Most of these things were Darin's ideas. I also had a helluva time getting the swelled notes to come out right, the first time I attempted them having forgotten my volume pedal. At one point we had Yogi sitting on the floor operating the guitar's volume knob for me, while I had a paper towel stuffed under the strings to keep them from ringing when I didn't want them to. This ended up not working, and in the end I had to do it on another day using my trusty Ernie Ball volume pedal.

The Satanic Turkey, at the very end under the screaming vocal: This is one of my favorite things ever… not just because it sounds so cool, but because I remember the fun in the studio when I recorded the part. It helps that Yogi had the camcorder rolling and made a nicely edited video clip of the event. On the original version of the song, there is a sort of noise guitar happening there that I was trying to recreate. I made a horrible patch on my Boss GT-6 multi-effects that had chorus, flanger, and some awful fuzz all turned up all the way. This made a lovely cacophony that I thought was appropriate. When finished, Yogi commented that it sounded like a Satanic Turkey, taking revenge for all those Thanksgiving dinners. Glad I don't eat meat anymore…

“Freedom”:
During the bridge ("…credit card number and press my luck"), there is a gnarly bass slide, which may have been Darin's idea altogether, but I'm not sure now. Whoever thought of it, it was just crying out for a Big Muff to make it even more gnarly. Darin pulled it out from the toy bin and plugged it up. Getting it just so took an extra half hour, but it was time well spent. Do I go up, then down? Or just down? Which note should the slide start on? Should I pick the first note AND the note coming down, or just slide up/down? My fretting finger got pretty sore from all that sliding around…but man it's cool. The Big Muff returns on the very last note of the song.

When doing the backups on “Freedom”, I had a laughing fit due to a lyric Yogi sings in the first verse. Let's just say I mistook the word "fetus" for another word beginning with "p". And uh….well each take I'd hear that line and it just cracked me right up, even more each try. So I suggested we mute his vocal there and then I was able to concentrate on my singing.

***

For the record (and the curious), the following guitar parts are played by me (as far as I know!):

“Firefly”: All clean arpeggiated rhythm guitars (intro, verses, under the solo). Dirty guitars on right channel throughout except choruses. All played on my Carvin Bolt.

“Throw Me A Bone”: Main rhythm guitar throughout, right channel, using a Carvin TL60. Acoustic guitars starting at bridge, played on my Taylor 714ce acoustic.

“Sleeping”: Clean and dirty rhythm guitars throughout, all right channel, Carvin Bolt.

“You Fell”: Rhythm guitar throughout, right channel. Lead melody at intro, and near end. Warbly clean guitars in bridge. "Satanic Turkey" noise guitars under vocal at end (and after end). All this played on my Carvin AE185. Volume swells and subtle noises during verses, on the Carvin TL60.

“Freedom”: Rhythm guitars throughout, right channel (except main chorus riff). Warbly guitar on bridge. "Oh Say Can You See" lead guitars at end. For this tune I used Pete's MusicMan Axis Super Sport.

My basses were as follows: Pedulla Rapture 5 string (on “Firefly” and “Bone”), Fender Geddy Lee Jazz, tuned Db, Ab, Db, Gb (on “Sleeping” and “Freedom”), Roscoe LG3005 5 string (on “You Fell”).