For the next week or so I’m dri­ving around the Mid­west with my friends in the Back­yard Com­mit­tee. It’s a great line­up of musi­cians and our first night was a blast — the music is a bit on the root­sy, Amer­i­cana side with a lot of room for impro­vi­sa­tion and try­ing out new ideas. Late­ly the shows I’ve been play­ing have been a lit­tle more strict, at least in the sense of learn­ing very spe­cif­ic parts and arrange­ments, so hav­ing some room to stretch out makes for fun nights.

Along with the drum­ming duties I’ve been assigned the role of record­ing engi­neer — the plan is to record every show and release a live album of the best mate­r­i­al. It makes the shows, for us at least, engag­ing on anoth­er lev­el as every night is essen­tial­ly a record­ing ses­sion, albeit one in front of peo­ple. For the record­ing geeks out there, we’re dou­ble-mic­ing every source, with one line going to the front of house and the oth­er line sent to my mobile record­ing rig, a Uni­ver­sal Audio Apol­lo with eight addi­tion­al pre­amps sup­plied by a Audi­ent ASP880 feed­ing into Pro Tools. It’s a quick set­up and on these small­er stages avoids any issues with split­ters or nego­ti­at­ing with house engi­neers. Knock­ing on wood here, but so far things are sound­ing great with no hiccups.

Check out the dates on the fab­u­lous old-school poster below, and hope to see you if we’re com­ing to your town!