The Making of "Milkshake": Ollie Moltaji & Sarah Nienaber

Less than one month before heading off to New York City for the CAMS New Media Roadtrip, the band Sarah and I are in, Gospel Gossip, started taking off in Northfield and Minneapolis. We started playing in basements, next The Contented Cow pub, and eventually we were invited to play gigs at the Fineline and the Turf Club in the Twin Cities. Although we occasionally recorded earlier this year, we decided to settle down and focus on recording songs we played live at the end of August.

We were fortunate because recording equipment is cheap – especially if you have a good computer. We used a decent Pro Tools setup, which included Pro Tools 7.1, a 14/18 M-Audio firewire interface, and mid-range microphones. Also, because we had more experience in engineering than producing, the process was as much about discovery as about fun. The sessions were recorded in a large basement room at Carleton’s Concert Hall. It took a little more than a day to set the mics and levels, and then a couple more days to record the songs.

We’re currently mixing down a 4-song EP here on the Roadtrip. Because our set-up is highly portable, we’re going to take the master tracks to London and finish printing there. We produced a few demo EP’s to give to Bob George at the ARChive for Contemporary Music [image above] and to friends and family until the project is complete.

The cover art is of a poster paint-printed milkshake with typewritten information on the back. Because each CD will be unique-but-similar in the same vein as Warhol’s printed work, our plan is to fashion a CD realease party in which we will display a handful of finished discs on a wall to be taken down by the audience.

Here's our first cut on the record: Shadows Are Bent

-Ollie Moltaji & Sarah Nienaber

Comments

[Terin Mayer]

This makes me really happy.

[air yeezy]

No matter how gluttonous devouring all the time, we need to breathe at this time, and strive to win our reputation, the sickle of time can not hurt us. - William Shakespeare