In early Janurary, Yoav Goren called me to propose a concept for us to work on. He had been compiling tracks and songs for nearly a year to be slated for the follow up CD to the highly successful Globus-Epicon. When he asked me to produce the project I was elated. Producing a project of this scale was admittedly somewhat daunting. The pieces were structured, however in a very raw stage. But the scope and depth of a project such as this was a very exciting prospect.
In early pre-production meetings we chose 12 of 20 or so tracks he had in mind. What was the genre? It didn’t really concern us, we were simply going to produce the music that came out of us. At times orchestral, at times hard core rock, at times gentle and ambient.
Once all the raw tracks arrived at my studio I started formulating a plan. What tracks need what new elements and so on. We started calling players to be involved. First up was my long time friend and incredible drummer Fritz Lewak to put some groove and power into the foundation of some of the tracks. Then, Dave Sutton, the baddest bass player I know and the amazing Satnam Ramgotra to pocket Tablas and ethnic drums. Next we enjoyed the creative talents of guitar player Bruce Watson who contributed enormous texture and grit to the pieces. We recorded some live strings and brass to supplement the pre existing orchestra and brass as well as a very special cello soloist Tina Guo. And lastly premier vocalists Lisbeth Scott, Ryan Hanifil, Jane Runnalls, Alex Brown and of course the Waters Singers.
The record sounds huge and as big as we could get, utilizing a 90 piece orchestra, 60 voice choir and hard core rock elements firing on all cylinders at times and then will drop you off a bridge to being virtually inside one single acoustic instrument. After two months of mixing, Doug Sachs at the Mastering Lab in Ojai put the finishing touches on it for us.
Great sonic dimension in this record if I do say so myself. Having a creative stake in the music I work on is incredibly fulfilling.
Fritz Lewak
Satnam
Tina Guo
