No Knife - Riot For Romance Record!

[Derrick]

Wow, this has been out since 2002, but I keep getting more and more into this recording (sound wise). Anybody know anything about who recorded it or the session it self?? It has become one of my reference CDs and the music is great too.

[xonlocust]

i just got this for the first time a couple months ago - totally under my radar when it came out but some friends turned me on to the band over the summer.

no idea re: recording, but it is a great record. i bought it on itunes, and the thing that sucks about that is the lack of artwork or liner notes.

oh - checkitout:

http://www.mymusic.com/product.asp?curr ... nbr=461358

"Recorded at Singing Serpent and at Red Rocket, San Diego, California."

http://www.skyscrapermagazine.com/features/noknife.html

So what was the impetus that got you guys back together? I heard it was that your producer, Greg Wales, just wanted to record.
BD: Yeah, it was all about Greg man, seriously.
MW: Greg and Japan. We had done a split CDEP with this band Nine Days Wonder from Tokyo and we kind of set up a tour as everything was falling apart. We took several months off and we had already set up this tour, so we figured we should just go through with it as kind of a last hurrah thing. We went over there and it kind of put a spark under us again. Japan is completely different. You can go across the States like 40,000 times and you?re only going to hit a few cities where it?s great. Not necessarily big cities, there are little pockets like Sioux City, you know these pockets where you can tell that people really care about music, but for the most part it just seemed like people didn?t really give a shit here. We went over there and it was such a fucking alive thing. It was regarded as something worthwhile.
BD: It reminded us of what was fun about it: when people like what you?re doing and you just play, you tour, you make friends and have a great time.
MW: And you hear other great bands. So yeah, we did come back after Japan. That was the big question then. People were like, ?We heard you broke up.? We were like, ?Where the hell did you hear that?? We didn?t even tell anybody.
BD: That was a good sign. We got to see that there was an interest in the band. We?re doing something that people like and we like doing what we?re doing so we didn?t want to just abandon it and give it up. MW: Greg called us in December and said, ?I?m gonna be in town. I have six days to record. I?ll bring my computer; let?s do a record.? We said, ?Well, we kind of broke up.? And he said, ?Well, I don?t care. That?s even better because that way we?ll just be making a record for us, just to see what we can do.? We went into it with that spirit. We tried things we normally wouldn?t have tried, just as far as songwriting and parameters. It was the best process of writing and recording that I?ve ever experienced.

[Derrick]

I cannot find any information on Greg Wales, Singing Serpent or at Red Rocket studios. I was hoping to see more about available equipment and physical recording space (room/s). I cannot imagine that this was recorded on some little computer!?!? I mean, the article says he just offered to grab his computer and swing by to record... I love anolog and am very open minded to digital. I've recorded digital and have no problems... just pref. Still, if this was recorded on a little computer, then you won't have to pry the tape machine from my hands the day you cannot get tape or heads anylonger! Geez.!! Must... know... more...

[Al_Huero]

It was mixed in Protools. Not sure if there was an analog front end and it was dumped in later.

[ataraxia]

i saw them open up for sunny day along time ago. they were fucking awesome, not as awesome as sunny day of course, but damn. it was good stuff.

[super skoda]

There was an article in TapeOp awhile back about Rafter Roberts. He owns Singing serpent. http://www.singingserpent.com/start.html

[Derrick]

i saw them open up for sunny day along time ago. they were fucking awesome, not as awesome as sunny day of course, but damn. it was good stuff.

I saw that tour w/Sunny Day too in DC. Great show. I remember really wishing that No Knife would play more from the 1st two albums as they were my faves at the time. But I wasn't really familiar with the 3rd which they were touring for, and the 4th (which we are talking about and I love as well) wasn't evan written yet... BTW, Chris Prescott (the drummer) was in Tanner who is one of my all time favorite bands ever and I didn't even know it was him.

So who is Rafter Roberts? Too bad Singing Serpent gives no photos of their room or info on gear. Riot For Romance has a GREAT sound period!!

[cprescott1972]

Hey there. My friend sent me the link about this album. I am the drummer from No Knife and this record was recorded on my Mac G4. It seems like some people had questions about the process and the room etc so here's a little about it.

We went in through UA preamps and an old Soundcraft board. Nothing too fancy. Then went straight to disc. The whole process was done this way. Most of the overdubs were the UA pres. All mixed in the box and mastered to tape back in Australia. That was a key thing actually. You can really notice a huge difference before and after mastering. More noticable than any project I've ever worked on. But it was pricey, like $1000. Especially considering that all the recording was like $2000.

The room used for drums was a big open room with very tall ceilings and cement floors. We set up the drums in the corner next to an adjoining control room. This door was opended and helped get taht crazy swirling, hugeness to the room sound. The room was a big part of the sound and Greg put a couple Neumans right on the concrete to pick up the ambience.

Oh and the vocals and guitar were done at our old practice space. Nothing too special. Carpet and cement and some carpet on the walls too (yikes) Mostly clsoe miced this stuff anyway. Not too much usable room sounds there.

Can't think of what else to add... drop me a note and I am glad to try to fill in the blanks.

Oh yeah, the thing was done in a Digi 001. Pretty bare bones. Tons of nice plugs though...

See ya, Chris Prescott.

[pedrohead]

Oh yeah, the thing was done in a Digi 001

hells yes!

so i'm not totally out of date yet

[Derrick]

Wow, strait from Chris! Hey thanks. BTW, I'm the one with the Tanner/Jehu tour video a few years back...

I'd love to know more about the drum micing (placement, how many) and the mics used if you have any of that kind of detail. I'd also love to know more about the use of UA preamps (how many were used and what kinds of tracs they were used on, etc.).

I cannot believe this was digital!! I swear, this changes everything for me!
Thanks for this information Chris. Happy holidays.

[cprescott1972]

Hey there. Cool! I have that video. It's a good one. Thanks. !!! What a fun tour that was. Jehu is great!!!

Re: Riot for Romance:
As for mic placement, Greg didn't do anything too out of the ordinary for close micing. The thing that made it noticable different was the way he set up the drums in the room and the use of the room mics placed right on the concrete floor (about 6 feet from the drums)

The UA pres were the 610 units (or M-610) It's just the single version of the 2-610. They sounded good. We put them against the Soundcraft pres and some API pres and a couple others like Joe Meek etc. Sorry I don't have more info about the other tracking, I was sort of only paying close attention on the drums since that's what I do and otherwise I was tryihg to stay out of Greg's way.

Greg's outdated and old homepage is this:
http://members.optushome.com.au/gwsh2/default.htm

There are some cool discographies there and maybe a current contact... ??

Take care and again sorry I couldn't fill too much more.

-Chris Prescott

[Derrick]

Thanks Chris, I'll check out Greg's site.

PS- Actually, you sent the Tanner/Jehu tape to me. Cannot thank you enough!!

Take care.

[Skipwave]

Just got this record. The bassist/guitarist that I play with has been trying to get me into No Knife for a while, and this thread got me started.

Riot for Romance does have a really cool sound, the drums in particular are nice and room-y. One thing that strikes me as unusual is the reverb on the vocals. Very echo-y and perhaps a bit over mixed. I wonder if that was a result of recording in a small untreated room or if that was a mixing choice.

Anyway, the record is great. Thanks to Derrick for bringing it up, and many thanks to Chris for taking the time to provide us with details.

[Derrick]

Yep, I just got my 3rd copy this Christmas as I've wore out the 1st 2. As a result of this thread, I'm looking into digital capture such as the 001 or 002 rack to couple with my analog gear to see how it does in place of my 8 track tape machine...