The Apples in Stereo

We caught the Apples at a strange Portland gig opening up for some shitty local bands. Many people who came to see the Apples play ended up seeing us interview them instead. They're a wonderful, pop-psychedelic combo from Denver, Colorado (although none of them really are from there) and they love to record their own music...as well as play live. Their latest album is called Fun Trick Noisemaker, and they also have a unique deal going with their record label, SpinArt, who not only encouraged them to record on their own...well, you'll see! Robert, who's sorta the main songwriter, singer and plays melodic leads on his guitar, did most of the talking. Hilarie, the drummer with the minimal kit, had a lot to say too, but John (rhythm guitar) and Eric (bass) were either running around or rather quiet.

How did you get into recording yourselves?

I guess that's the way that we've always done it. We've all been recording for a long time on 4 track and stuff. I started when I was 15. We recorded two EPs and some 7" records on a 4 track and we couldn't afford or want to go to a recording studio. Plus, it was a really distasteful sound to our ears.

Have any of you been in bands that used a "real" recording studio?

We'd never been in other bands. We didn't really know, when we first started recording on the 4 track[cassette], that you couldn't make something sound as good as a recording studio. We knew the Beatles recorded on a 4 track; therefore, why couldn't we? Then we found out you can't, so we got a reel-to-reel 4 track. Now we have an 8 track.

What kind of 8 track?

An Otari 5050. 1/2 inch. It sounds great. We've got good mics. I recorded a few albums, last year, after our own. I recorded the Neutral Milk Hotel album [on Merge recs]. We did that on our 4 track , reel-to-reel. Then I recorded the Olivia Tremor Control and the Felt Pilotes on 8 track. I've gotten a lot better engineering since then...we're almost Hi-Fi!

That's cool, you graduated from 4 track...

We told SpinArt that we'd been in recording studios and we knew how to record. They told us they'd buy us an 8 track if we got an engineer to help us with it. We didn't have either experience or an engineer!

So, how many reels of tape sound really bad?

No. With those good mics, you just set them up anywhere, never change the settings, and it sounds great. Even an SM 57 on the bass drum sounds really good. So, we just figured it out. It was good enough on the 4 track, we just wanted 8 tracks and with these better mics it's gonna be better, anyway. We didn't end up having an engineer. We went to a friends's house in California and recorded. We've become expert, technical engineers!

What kind of mics have worked really good for you guys?

The Audio-Technica 4033. It rules. It's so great. They took the analog EQ curve from a bunch of great '60s mics and then they averaged it out and copied it on that mic. It sounds real old fashioned and real warm. The 4050, the next model up, is too pristine. It's a bit too fat and bassy sounding too.

How much was the 4033 mic?

About $500 or $600. It works on anything.

Does everyone get into recording?

We all do.

How did you get SpinArt to offer the cash to set up the studio?

They offered. That was why we decided to do a record with them. They liked our stuff and they wanted to put one of our songs on a compilation. I told them how I really wanted to get an 8 track and they said, "Hey, we'll buy you an 8 track." They knew about the equipment and they suggested some stuff and my friend Kyle had a studio, and he suggested some more stuff. We ended up getting some high- end equipment.

A lot better than a regular advance!

Yeah! We can keep it forever. Not like we'll piddle it away. I've recorded three other albums, I'm getting to be a pretty good engineer. We got the money back and I got to live off that all year.

But these guys [the Apples] are the ones who helped you get the equipment and you get the money [from outside productions]??

[Laughs]

I'm sorry. What are some of your favorite records that sound cool to you?

I love the new Lilys album. It's not out yet. It's called Butter Can't Make Your Life Better. It's amazing. It sounds like the Kinks in 1966. It's totally mod and it's beautiful and it's great songwriting. I'm really jealous that he recorded such a great album. I love Pavement records.

What about the Beach Boys influence? On the album there's that one song with that total fuzz bass..

"Lucky Charm". Like "Good Vibrations". That little piece is exactly a rip. SpinArt were thinking about putting that song out as a single and we went and remixed it and it's really strange, they insisted that we take out the bridge. It's my favorite part of the whole song. They thought it was too weird for radio. That seems bizarre, 'cause it's a rip of "Good Vibrations" and that's what they told Brian [Wilson] in the old days, that it was too weird for radio, and it was a big hit.

So you guys will borrow a friends house, you'll take your 8 track, record your basic tracks, do some overdubs. When it comes to mixing do you take it somewhere else?

We might do that more in the future. Maybe the record after next. It's good to have all those compressors and stuff. It'd be good to have another set of ears for mixing, too. It'd be good to have somebody else so you could bounce ideas around. I'd still have to mix everything myself because I have a really strong idea of what it has to sound like. Everything is all connected musically. There's not a whole lot of room for this or that to be different. That's all sub-mixed, so it's all pre ordained.

So you do a lot of bouncing?

Yeah. We bounce everything. We recorded that album [Fun Trick Noisemaker] on eight tracks and then dumped it to a DAT machine, put it back on two tracks of the 8 track and then kept going. It works really well, a stereo mix and everything.

And you save your old tracks just in case..

Exactly. That works great. That's how we did most of the stuff. The new stuff, some of it will be submixed to stereo and some of it will be ping-ponged on the 8 track. It's better to ping-pong than sub mix 'cause you have more control in the end. If you submix, all the overdubs are real crisp and the submix is on 2 tracks. Those 2 tracks can sound awfully puny once you start overdubbing other tracks. I've gotten better EQ and stuff, so I think I can make them sound less puny.

Do you record guitar, bass and drums initially?

Track the drums first with a scratch guitar, overdub rhythm guitars and acoustic guitars, maybe overdub some keyboards and piano. Submix all that down to stereo. Go back to the tape, add all the harmonies, keyboards, slide guitars, everything. Sub mix all that stuff to a couple more tracks. Bass and the lead vocals are the last things to go down. So the bass can have it's own track; it always gets drowned out in the sub mix. The vocals have two tracks, one for each lead vocal.

[To Hilarie] You seem to sing a lot less live than on the record.

Yeah. Well, I'm kinda shy. I don't want to sing flat. It's hard with the PAs, we're all real soft singers. If I can't hear myself, I'm real self-conscious that I'm singing totally off. I can't hear myself over my cymbals. I wish I was really confident and knew I was gonna sing it right. Sometimes we'll record the parts, but we never practice them, so I'll forget what the part is.

It seems like you guys, as a band, enjoy recording and operating in this way.

It's fun to learn. It's a thrill on it's own. Plus we're never, "Oh shit, time's ticking away! It's $20 an hour!" We're just sitting there, smoking pot and having a really good time. Taking all night to do a guitar track if you have to. Like the guitars on "High Tide." All the lead guitars on that, I just stayed up all night with a pillow, on my back, with the remote for the 8 track next to me and just recorded all the lead guitars, there's three or four of them on there. It took all night. I was just baked, smoking pot, lying down on the floor. It was really fun.

Cool. So you're pretty adamant about doing the next few records yourselves?

We're gonna do them all. We're always gonna do our records on our own. We'll just get higher budgets and more great equipment. Someday we'll have a 16 track, maybe. Right now we're happy with 8 track; there's a long way to go with it, with the new mics and new board.

What kind of board is it?

A Mackie 8 buss, 24 channel. A really great board. It's got a lot of EQ options. The one we used to have was the Mackie 1604. That's what we did our album with, mixed it and everything. So our next album's gonna be a lot better. Even in the sub mixing, you can make it sound a lot better. It's really amazing.

How do you mic the drums?

We use a snare drum mic, a bass drum mic and an overhead. Even with other bands, when they have tom toms and stuff. Put it on three tracks and submix it to one track.

You don't do stereo drums?

We did on our album but not anymore. I realized after that album that every single album I love all have mono drums. Our album was different 'cause we really wanted it to sound like a band in a room; a roomy, real, right-there kinda sound. But you just get a better sound with mono drums, I think. The Beatles, The Zombies, The Beach Boys, Phil Spector. The best drum sounds are all mono.

Have you heard the Beatles Anthology 2? The drums sound so fat on that.

That's the drum sound we want. That perfect, flat, just slightly overdriven drum sound.

So do you use much reverb?

Just on the harmonies, some slide guitar, maybe. We have two [Roland] Space Echoes. That's all we use. We use tape delay and spring reverb. That's all we need. We used to have a digital delay and I traded it for my tube 4 track.

Any last words on recording?

We love it. It's part of the writing of songs for us. We're gonna keep doing it and get better and better. We're in control, like, "Let's make it sound better on the next record." Not, "I hope it sounds better." We're not just a rock band. We're producers and we want to be engineers. Someday we might not be a rock band, but we may still want to write songs and record them.