Ivy Window

05.17.2007- CST

Hey. Andy Chase here again. So, the update since my last entry:

I finished producing and mixing the Juliana Hatfield album. I ended up mixing it with John Holbrook. He was last in mixing for Fountains Of Wayne's new album, but he's also been in Stratosphere Sound for three or four different projects this past year, so he's become part of the furniture at this point. A very excellent couch he is, with great ears too. And now that so much stuff just stays "in the box" from start to finish in Pro Tools, you can actually mix together with someone, taking turns tweaking until you both agree that it's done. So that's how I mixed the Juliana record - two guys taking turns at the computer - and I have to say it was a hell of a lot of fun, and turned out amazing. Once and a while fights can occur from this process, since it's possible to mess-up what the other guy just spent hours doing. But since I'm agile and trained in hand-to-hand combat, I was able to quickly subdue him the few times he tried to attack me. We also had one of my favorite voices come in to Stratosphere to sing a duet with Juliana on one of her songs - Richard Butler from The Psychedelic Furs. Juliana and I made him sing about 50 takes more than we needed...just to hear that unmistakable voice. He was awesome. While Richard Butler was in Studio A, Yoko Ono was in Studio B singing a guest vocal for Basement Jaxx. Yo Majesty came in too as a guest for Basement Jaxx.

In fact, it was a pretty cool couple of months for Stratosphere. The Gibson/Baldwin piano (which sounds amazing...but would anyone expect less from an instrument with that name on it?) got a lot of attention - the Yeah Yeah Yeahs were in recording an EP and used the Baldwin piano. We also had Morning Wood, HEM, Midnight Movies, Moby, and even Fuse On Demand was in filming a documentary on Stratosphere and it's three slacker partners...um, OK, two slacker partners.

As far as a Postmarks update - they made it to #7 in the CMJ Top 200 and stayed in the Top 20 for 5 weeks straight. They just finished their first US tour, so their story is just growing and building nicely. I finished mixes for a Brooklyn band called The Grey Race who I signed to my label. Their EP and full length will be coming out later this year.

Well, thanks for reading! Until next time...