lots going down in the ol’ home studio today.

mission accomplished on the bass parts! recorded bass for everything else that needed it, so i should be completely done with bass now in all the songs. one song i put on the list i decided didn’t need bass, and when i opened another one i realized i’d already done bass and just forgot, so those were nice surprises. also i mic’d the bass with the AKG mic this time instead of the 57, which, besides being more sensitive, seems to yield a better sound. i think i’ll try that with the electric too when it comes to that.

anyway, just for kicks, here’s the bass i’ve been using:

it’s a Squier Jazz Bass. it is the property of southwest christian church if i am not mistaken. it’s not exactly a high quality instrument, but it gets the job done surprisingly well. when i first brought it home the action was really bad, so i had to adjust the truss rod*, but now it actually plays pretty well.

then after two days of figuring out how to play the banjo part for ‘bethany’s song’ and practicing it multiple times, i took a first stab at recording the part today. when you don’t play the banjo and you don’t know the chords, it is not easy…to play the banjo**. and play it in such a way that fits the bluegrass style. but i hacked through it.

mics were another challenge. where do you mic a banjo? there isn’t a hole. so i fooled around with it for awhile. i mic’d it with the AKG also originally but then got paranoid because the mic is so small. so i ended up switching back to the large diaphragm Shure and that seemed to come out better.

so what we have at the end of the day is a banjo part made up of 5 takes that i will likely have to redo, at least in places, because it’s not quite there yet. but we’re making progress, people.

as promised, here is the banjo:

it is a fender. yes, that is a capo on the banjo. yes, i am aware that it is terribly unfashionable to capo a banjo***. no, i do not care.

*guitar 101, for anyone who cares: the truss rod is a metal rod that goes through the length of the neck of a guitar or bass. usually there is a hole at one end or another where you can see the end of the rod, and it’s adjustable with an allen wrench. most guitars seem to come with one such wrench. anyway the truss rod controls tension in the neck; so if your action is really bad (strings are really high off of the fretboard) one way to adjust that is to adjust the truss rod, because it’s likely that your neck is bowed like a valley from humidity or reckless tomfoolery or something of that nature. necks can also be bowed the other way like a hill and it can cause string buzzing. over-adjustment of the rod can snap the neck, so the first time you adjust it is a terrifying experience. but as with most things, once you do it, you realize it’s not so bad. you’d pretty much have to go to town on it to break it in that way. so there you go. guitar 101: the truss rod.

**my friend angie had a dog named Banjo. greatest dog name i’ve ever heard.

***i also have been known to capo an electric guitar, which i’m certain is equally unfashionable. i’m also certain that i don’t care in this case either.