Crystal Palace

Jun 1, 2009 12:00 PM, By Mike Levine

THE CRYSTAL METHOD DITCH THE BOMB SHELTER FOR A GLEAMING NEW RECORDING SPACE

So you haven't missed the vibe of The Bomb Shelter?

Jordan: I've never felt that.

Kirkland: Yeah, I never missed the vibe of the last six odd years at the place, but [I did miss the way it was] early on, when everything was kind of hard wired without a computer. You could just run a DAT and you could get an idea without having to bring up a sequence and figure out the tempo; that kind of stuff that just sort of happened spontaneously. Obviously, we made some great music in that studio so there are those memories. But as far as what we've been able to create here, and our work environment now, it doesn't compare.

Was it challenging to produce so many different singers on Divided By Night?

Jordan: Working with different vocalists, overall it's just fun. On this album, it was half, or less than half, that cut the vocals here, though. We wanted everyone to come here, but due to where people lived, or because people were more comfortable in their own studio, we ended up talking with them or meeting with them, and sending them tracks. And they would cut the vocal either in their studio or at a studio near them.

So you didn't get to actually produce them when they were singing.

Jordan: We did with Sign Language.

Kirkland: And with LMFAO, and Meiko.

Jordan: Also, Meiko's track, “Falling Hard.” With Matisyahu [“Drown in the Now”], there was a lot of going back and forth. But with “Kling to the Wreckage,” Justin Warfield recorded at a [different] studio, but we were talking with him and working with him.

Kirkland: On the Matisyahu track, Matis was working with David Kahn at the time on Matis' album. And both of them made time in their schedule to fit in this track, to do the vocals for us. David did a really great job of producing the vocals and some really great things on the mix side of the vocals.

Do you typically write a song with a certain artist in mind, or do you find someone who will fit after you've written the music?

Jordan: Yeah, it's more the song develops along, and then we start thinking of who it might work for.

Kirkland: On “Falling Hard,” we had this really, really beautiful track that we were very happy with as an instrumental, but we felt it could be that much better if we could get the right vocalist on it. And we found Meiko and she just had this really beautiful voice, and the things she had done, the things that we had heard, didn't sound anything like the stuff that we were doing, or even the track that we had sitting there. And she came by and we had a really great conversation. And we played her a few things, and she was really comfortable with that track, and she came in and gave it a really beautiful vocal that sort of has the feeling that everything was created at once.

What would you say has been the biggest challenge of doing the album?

Jordan: I don't know. Everything always is sort of a natural development. Certainly involving so many different vocalists and still maintaining a band identity on the record.

Kirkland: The hardest thing is not to get wrapped up by looking at the clock. We sort of wear both hats when we're in the studio. The producer side of us wants us to get the songs done and get an album out and move forward, and the artistic side of us wants to take the time and let songs develop and get the most out of our album or out of each song.

Did you use live drums at all on this record?

Kirkland: We did on two tracks.

Jordan: Samantha Maloney played.

Kirkland: We used lots of live bass and a little bit of live guitar.

What about drum loops?

Kirkland: There are still some loops. We've got a vast loop library that we've collected over the years that we manipulate before they go into [a track]. There are very few perfect loops out there that haven't been overused to the point that the next time you hear them, you just want to turn the radio off.