Track 1 - Catalina Come Up

Even though it's the first track on the album "Catalina Come Up" was actually the last song written and produced. It came about when I thought I needed a song between "Catalina Promise (Reprise)" and "Catalina Lord" so I went to my riff archive for the project and found what would become the opening mandolin riff. I was originally playing around with some Keith Richards' type chords and phrasing to see how they worked on the electric piano. Well, they didn't and the idea went into my idea folder.

Towards the midway point of the project I found Spitfire Audio's LABS. I originally discovered LABS while looking for string sounds but found it had a lot more to offer. Looking to rework the Keith Richards' riff I tried it with the Mandolin in LABS and had my opening. I went with a dueling Mandolin concept with one picked and the other plucked.

At this point the "band" concept was already established and I guess now is as good a time as any to get into it. After I came up with the concept I came up with some rules. Rules are made to be broken, and on this project they were, but it's still good to have them. As I put songs together I approached them with the idea that 4 musicians could perform them live. A drummer, a bass player and 2 keyboard players who would act as utility players. As you listen to the album you'll find the 4 person lineup is pretty consistent (with the exception being the string pieces).

"Catalina Come Up" had the benefit of being last so I was very comfortable with the instruments I'd use as my default ones going in. As mentioned in my earlier post all of the drum sounds were created in the LMMS Beat Editor using samples I acquired several years ago from Drum Werks. These are real sounds generated from a real person hitting real drums. I had hundreds of sounds at my disposal and narrowed them down to a few dozen for use on the album. Sequencing drum parts is time consuming but it's an aspect of making music that I really enjoy.    

Just about all of the bass sounds on the album were created using the Ample Sound Bass P Lite. The P Lite is a very convincing bass and allowed me to work very quickly. My approach to composing bass parts was simple: If I could play it on my bass that's what would go in the song. You'll hear some other bass sounds on the album and those were generated using the Martinic Kee Bass. 

The two keyboards you hear on the album are the HaNon B70 mentioned in my last post and the ZoomChak pro II. I'll talk about the ZoomChak in  a minute but wanted to spend some more time expressing how important the HaNon B was to this project. If "Catalina Lord" hadn't come together as quickly as it did I'm not sure how this project would have proceeded. I can say with confidence though that without the HaNon it would have sounded much different. The HaNon really acted as substitute for my guitar. I'll explain more when we get to the songs where you really hear it.

After I had the HaNon picked out I went looking for a synth to compliment it. I'd always been fascinated by Moog synths and a Google search lead me to the ZoomChak pro II from K Brown Synth Plugins.The ZoomChak pro II is a take on the Moog Sonic Six. After choosing it I discovered the Sonic Six was the least Moog sounding off all of Moog's offerings. I was committed though and liked what I heard.

The two keyboard concept is introduced right out of the gate here with the HaNon and ZoomChak taking turns playing fills. I wrote this entire song on the guitar including all of the fills. At one point I was tempted to just track the guitar and drop it in the song but that was a rule I didn't want to break.

As it developed I realized instead of a bridge track between the last two songs on the album it actually worked much better as an opener. This surprised me as the adrenaline charged "Catalina Rush" seemed obvious as the opener. Now I can't imagine the album without "Catalina Come Up".