Recording

I can still hear the mellow sound of the piano ring through my ears, then the words "Looking down the memory lane" slowly makes its way into my ears, giving me the goosebumps. Then the sound of the thumping bass starts beating away into my heart. The drum beats keep me in check as I slowly make out a harmonic on my guitar and before you know it, we're already starting to play some of our most inspired music. And all that still makes the hair on my back stand like it never has before. And dare I say, a little misty inside. That, was how we were for our very first recording session. And in case you're wondering, I am absolutely smiling even though it has been almost a day since it was over and I've been playing the song over and over because there are just so many good memories and emotions that go through my head every time I listen to it.

We had so much fun while practicing and during the actual recording itself. We cracked so may jokes and it was made even more fun by our little Darryl "Shaun Lai in the making" who is only 13 but he walks, talks and behaves like our Shaun.

The rehearsals itself was amazing. Yee Leong dropped by on our final rehearsal and gave us some very helpful tips which resulted in 3 guitar solo's and a much better song. But there was one problem though, I hardly remembered the notes to my guitar solo's!

Then the recording session was a rather mixed one. At first, we thought that Meng, the guy operating the studio had completely forgotten about our slot because we tried to call him so many times but we never got through. To make things worse, the studio was closed. All of us were extremely worried, more so was Christina because she really had to get the record out before the next day. Or else, she couldn't go for the audition. But thankfully, about half an hour before we were due, the studio opened. You should have seen the look on Chris's face. She started to jump for joy. We then quickly gathered our instruments and made a dash for the studio.

Upon reaching the studio, we got in and ran through the song twice. We made sure that we knew our parts perfectly which was important because if it wasn't, we would have to re-record the song over and over again until we got it right. Thankfully we were able to. After running through the song, we formed a circle, held each other's hand and started to pray right in the middle of the studio.

After saying our prayers, we proceeded to record our song. Being the lead pianist, Christina recorded her part first. Before she went in we gave her some words of encouragement. And we all hugged her for a while. Then she walked into the studio and started to get ready. The rest of us made our way to the other studio but we could see her through the glass. Then, before we knew it, she started to play and personally, I was rather mesmerized by it. But honestly, I couldn't help bu feel nervous and extremely worried because I know how much this means to her and I really would love to see her play her best and have her music take her places. But as fate would have it, she made a few mistakes and we had to rerecord her piano part which made me even more nervous than I already was. The next effort was much better and I think she nailed it.

Once the piano parts were recorded, Darryl's turn was up. He was to play the drum parts. His first run was rather alright but he made a mistake no one had anticipated which was he hit the microphone twice. We made a big joke out of it. On his second run, he made a mistake and we had to restart. On the third run he played really well but was a little too aggressive with the cymbals so we had to do a fourth run. The fourth run was by far the best. It was in beat and I thought that it was extremely mellow coming from someone as aggressive as Darryl.

After Darryl, it was Ping Fuan, our bassist's, turn to record. He managed to get through the first run without any mistake, or so we thought. Fortunately, Meng spotted a tiny error and got Ping Fuan to rerecord his part. But it took a few more recordings to get his bass part right. And by that time we only had about 40 minutes left to record the vocals and the guitar parts. The first three parts had taken almost an hour and fifteen minutes to record. Initially, it was planned that I would record my guitar parts after the bass only then would we record the vocals but Meng decided to have the vocals recorded first and I upon hindsight, I figured that it was a good decision because of certain problems which I am glad that we were able to solve.

After the vocals, it was my turn to record. But unfortunately, intead of recording in the studio like the rest of them, I had no choice but to record in the mixing room. This was because someone else had already booked the studio and our recording time was up. But the good thing was his programme had a distortion function which I could use. And due to the lack of time, I had no choice but to nail it the first time around. But there was one problem. I couldn't remember the notes to my solo's. I had to improvise 3 solo's . Immediately, I started to panic because I was a real bummer at improvising and I would most likely screw it up and have to record it over and over again. But as fate would have it, or somehow the realisation of how imprtant it was, I managed to nail it in one go. But there was a slight error on Meng's part. He forgot to turn on the distortion for my last solo and as a result I had to rerecord my second last and last solo again. But unfortunately, they weren't as good as the first time around. So what we did is that we took whatever I played the first time around and just redid the last solo. Fortunately we got it right. Upon doing that, I was so happy that I went up and gave Chris a hug.

Meng then asked us to give him about 45 minutes to master our record. While waiting we decided to grab some supper at Asia Cafe. By that time it was already late. I think it was 11.30 P.M. After some waiting, we were about to go back to the studio and as we were about to go, we bumped into Jian Pang and gang. Which was great because we haven't seen him in a while and he had just returned from Australia.

Then we went back to the studio to get our record. When Meng played it for us we were captivated. It was a whole lot better than we had expected. Even the vocals were good and the solo's were amazing. There was chemistry between us band mates.

After that we all said our goodbyes and headed home. But the day wasn't over for me yet. When I reached home, I came to a conclusion that my parents had locked me out of the house because I came home late. I figured that I had to spend the night sleeping in the porch. But thankfully, Christina and her dad insisted that I spend the night at their home. It was an offer too good to resist. So we went there. Chris and I stayed up until 2.30 in the morning, surfing the net and chatting. Then at around 2.40, I went to bed. And I must say that she has a very comfortable bed and the air conditioning was mighty cold. I slept real tight.

But before I end this post, I would like to thank Christina's parents for making me feel welcome at their home and for the wonderful breakfast. And I would also want to thank my band mates for the amazing effort. Lastly, this goes out to you Christina, you were amazing. Keep up the good work.!