DeadBeat Boulevard

Well ladies & gentlemen, the time has come for us to release unto the world our first E.P., cunningly entitled "Maximum dB" for your aural delight.  Made in our homes in Blackwood, Hamburg, Birmingham & Bristol, these 4 tracks have taken us hours of blood, sweat & tears.  We are mighty happy with the way they have turned out, & we hope you like them to.

By way of background history, this project started when Jan Buchholz, who mixed the King & Queen Of Sorry E.P. started chatting to me about the music he loved.  Having agreed that there ain't too much wrong with Motley Crue's Shout At The Devil, I sent him some scraps of riffs to see what he thought.  Pretty much immediately we started filling the gaps to make these ideas into fully fledged songs.

Freedom To Rock was first on the slab.  This track was originally labeled as Kiss Of Life, but once the track was fleshed out into a song & the melody sussed, words were written & it became apparent that this should be a song about the joys of rocking out when your alone or somewhere new.  A guide vocal was sent to the wonderfully talented Kathryn Mash, my musical partner in crime in King & Queen Of Sorry, which she sang fantastically as always.  She manages to convey the power required for a rock song like this, without losing out on the melody.  She really is an awesome singer & we are blessed to have her in this band.  There was a spot for a solo which Jan or I could not realistically fill, so I called out to the finest virtuoso I have ever met, my old pal Andy Gregory.  Andy can play faster than Einstein can think, but he knows when to slow it down & strip it back.  The boy is a star & he absolutely crushes the solo in this song.

The second song we worked on was the opener for the E.P., Fourth Of July.  This is a typical boy meets girl, shenanigans ensue type song, with a big riff running through it.  We ahem "borrowed" the church bell in the riff: bonus points for telling me from which song it is taken...

We thought we should slow it down for the third offering, so we went with First Light.  This is a song I've had hanging around in my head for a few years now, & I'm glad it has finally been recorded.  I played the clean guitars here & Jan played the distorted ones: this is the only track we divided in this way & I think it works well.  Coming home from a road trip is a well worn path for a rock band, & that's where the inspiration for that one came from. 2 fine solos from Andy on this one, & a brilliant bluesy vocal from Lady K.  Couldn't be happier with it.

We decided the final track on the E.P. should be just a blasting rocker, & I think we certainly achieved that with (I Won't Be Your) Carnival Queen.  This is a straight 80's riff - I wanted it to be Crue meets ZZ Top meets Debbie Harry - & we got that in spades.  It was probably the hardest for me to write vocals on as it's very much from a female perspective. It ends the E.P. as I wanted it to: big bombastic & uncompromising.  I like it a lot.

We came up with the idea of Maximum dB as an E.P. title as it has a few connotations, decibel or DeadBeat Boulevard. The decibel wave was also agreed upon as part of the logo, which Kathryn's husband James designed for us (thanks James!).  We added the wave To a 1970's picture of Brooklyn & made a logo which is meant to look like a neon sign.  The concept was faded glamour, & I think the image conveys that.

So, what more is there to say?  We had an absolute blast making it, & we all love it to death.  I received 3 messages from the guys the day before the release: Kathryn "I feel like I'm 21 when I'm singing this stuff": Andy "this is my dream band": Jan "I love this band".  Ditto to all of the above guys.  I thank you all individually for making this happen.  Please give it a try - you can download it for free from:

http://deadbeatboulevard.bandcamp.com/

Progress Update On Deadbeat Boulevard

I thought it was about time I posted on another band I'm involved with.  This one is very different to King & Queen Of Sorry, so if you're expecting more of the same, you may need to broaden your horizons a little...

Ok, so here's the background to the project.  Kathryn Marsh & I have been working on our acoustic band King & Queen Of Sorry since January/ February this year.  We did a rough mix of our first track, but were clueless how to make it sound more professional. Jan Buchholz, a friend I've met through the excellent Six String Bliss forum, offered to have a go at mixing it, & we were delighted with the quality of his work.

When going through the producing/mixing process, I got to know Jan a lot better.  We both love 70's / 80's hard rock, so we agreed to have a go at collaborating on a few tunes.  Now I love and am very proud of the acoustic stuff I'm doing with Kathryn, but I'm a frustrated rocker too.  I'd written a bunch of riffs which were being played regularly in the house, but nowhere else. So I sent off a batch of riffs with provisional song titles to Jan to see if there was anything he liked that could be fleshed out into a song. We used dropbox to exchange ideas & IM on Facebook to discuss the tracks.

The normal way we work is thus: Once we agree on a particular track to tackle I send off my guitar track - usually with a video too of me explaining the chords & being stupid in front of the camera.  Jan will start by sampling different drum tracks, & we agree on which one works best.  He then adds bass & his guitar parts - again sending samples all the way so we are in agreement.  Once our parts are finalised we send the track off to my friend Andy Gregory to add one (or 2) of his mighty guitar solos.  The man is a genius. Again the solos are dropboxed to Jan for mixing.


Once all the instrumentation is done, the track is then dropboxed off to Kathryn - usually with a guide vocal by me & lyric sheet.  I say guide - that is a bit of an overstatement - vocal - stretching the bounds of credibility even further! Somehow from hearing my howling, she deciphers what its actually meant to sound like & sings it in her usual spectacular fashion, & we pinch ourselves for being so lucky to work with her.  Then back it goes to Jan for final mix.


We're almost done on 3 tracks & track 4 is in the drum editing stage.  No one is rushing, & there's no need to.  We all have families & commitments so the emphasis here is on fun - as it always should be in music.  We all get along well too.  Once the 4 tracks are approved by everyone involved (& we get some artwork sorted) we'll release them as an E.P.  The title of said E.P. has yet to be agreed so your suggestions would be most welcome.  I favour "Maximum db" at the moment (do you see what I did there?)


After that - who knows?  I'm hoping that at some point we'll add more tracks to our cannon & release an L.P. eventually.  I'm loving it! 

The Making Of The "Step Off The Ledge" E.P.

Perhaps I should start off with a little history lesson.  I'm from a small town in South Wales called Abergavenny. It's a friendly little place where, when you walk down the High Street, you'll probably find yourself saying "hello" many, many times.  My wife (when she first visited) found it hilarious that I knew everyone.  So what's a teenager from a small town to do? The answer, my friends, is to join a rock & roll band.

I'm aware that in most places, there's a rivalry between different bands, but things work a little differently in Abergavenny.  People who played instruments got together as friends, & often had jams with people in other bands.  This is largely how I came to know Kathryn - she always had a fantastic voice & we became good friends. However, people move away & times change, & as such, we lost touch for many years. We got back in touch (as most people do with old friends) through social media networks.

So a few years back, I turned 40.  To celebrate this, I decided to hire a recording studio for the day & invite 8 of my old musician buddies to come along & record some tracks.  I figured that if it went well we'd have some music to remember the day by, & if it didn't - well I would have met up with some old pals & had a laugh.  I asked Kathryn if she would like to come & sing on one of the 2 songs we were going to tackle.  I think she was a little reticent at the idea initially, as she hadn't sung for a few years, but agreed to come & give it a whirl.  She sang brilliantly from the first take & I was delighted (as was everybody there) with the results.

http://soundcloud.com/rhod-williams/twilight

After that, we kept in touch & occasionally I'd send her songs I'd written with the intention of doing another studio day as before. With so many people involved however, it was nigh on impossible to get everyone together, & several planned studio days fell through.  Kathryn & her lovely family were coming down to stay for a weekend, so I thought what the heck, I'll record some acoustic song sketches to work on while she was with me.  The result of this initial get together was Open Door, track 3 on the E.P.

http://soundcloud.com/rhod-williams/open-door

I'll admit to being a complete Luddite when it comes to technology, so when it came to mixing & production, frankly I was dumbfounded.  I put the initial unmixed track on facebook to see what reaction we'd get. Jan Buchholz, who I'd met via the Six String Bliss guitar forum, kindly offered to have a go at mixing the track. With the addition of piano by my great friend Giz Davies, we were overjoyed with the results and asked Jan if he'd lend his skills to producing a few more tracks for us.  We were very grateful that he said yes.

The initial success of that first recording process spurred us on to want to record more tracks, so we arranged another weekend stay for Kathryn & her family at my house.  This time we recorded 3 tracks - enough for an E.P.  Again, on one track we utilised the multi-faceted talents of Giz Davies to add some strings & piano, but the rest is my guitar & K's beautiful voice only.

http://soundcloud.com/rhod-williams/traffic-lights

http://soundcloud.com/rhod-williams/33-to-45

http://soundcloud.com/rhod-williams/sighs

Would you like to know the worst thing about being in a band?  It's not money squabbles or "musical direction", its agreeing on a sodding band name! We would agree we both liked a name, only to find it already taken by another band.  Both Kathryn & I apologise way too much and too often - hence her commenting once that we were the "king & queen of sorry".  We though that was a cool name which aptly described us! The artwork was done by Josh Greeves - a very talented young artist who has done an excellent job.

So, in signing off, I'd like to thank a few people.  Kathryn, thank you for lending your wonderful voice to my half-arsed songs, & making them sound better than they have any right to.  Giz - your help on those 2 tracks has really made them sound ace.  Cheers mate. Jan, thank you for your infinite patience with us - you have really done a very high quality job & we count ourselves very lucky that you agreed to work with us.  Josh - thank you for your time & effort too.  It does not go unappreciated.

If you want to listen to the tracks & get more information, go to

http://www.reverbnation.com/kingqueenofsorry

For downloads, free or paid (its up to you!) visit

http://kingandqueenofsorry.bandcamp.com/album/step-off-the-ledge

I've started work on the next batch of tracks - so - as they say in all the best thrillers - to be continued...