Again , like for that vocal , I just wanted it to kind of have that air like where you picture that dark studio vocal booth in the 80s . You know , like that was really . The approach was like a visual first and then , you know , trying to get the sound that matches the vibe You're listening to the Inside the Mix podcast with your host , mark Matthews .
Welcome to Inside the Mix , your go-to podcast for music creation and production . Whether you're crafting your first track or refining your mixing skills , join me each week for expert interviews , practical tutorials and insights to help you level up your music and smash it in the music industry . Let's dive in . Hey folks , welcome to Inside the Mix .
Today , we're diving into how to transform a classic rock song into a synthwave masterpiece , and who better to guide us than Davey Oberlin , the mastermind behind all the damn vampires ? Davey , how are you , buddy ? Thank you for joining me . Great Thanks for having me . Fantastic .
So I've been looking forward to this , and I should have said this off air , but I'm on the other side of a sore throat , so my voice might break slightly at times , so my apologies .
You and me both , I've been fighting a cold .
Have you . Yeah , same man , same Every time . I think I'm getting over it . Then I try and do something , some sort of content like this , and my voice just gives out . But hopefully , fingers crossed , we're on the same page . So by the end of this there would just be no audio whatsoever and either of us , they wouldn't talk . Fantastic .
So for the audience listening who might not be familiar with davey and all the damn vampires , he's had a quite impressive career , from playing keyboard for five finger death punch and corn to I love that straight away to crafting cinematic synth-heavy music that's captivated fans worldwide .
He's no stranger to reinterpreting iconic sounds and today he's going to share his process for covering classic rock songs in a synthwave style .
Now , before we went live with this , I was just saying that I've always been a listener of your , your work and whatnot , but then I heard the the white snake cover of is this love , which , for anyone who knows me , it's probably one of my favorite songs , and I was like man , gotta get this guy on the podcast to chat about this , because it's uh , it's a
belt or of a tune , um , to begin with . And and the synth wave cover to boot as well . So really excited for this man , really excited . Thank you , this is awesome , yeah , so in this episode you'll learn step by step how to approach covering a classic rock song . Where to start sound design , some vocal instrumentation and some production and mixing techniques .
So I think the straight away I think to to begin with , uh , breaking down the process you covered , is this love , what drew you to want to do a sort of synth wave with guitar-esque sort of cover of this song ?
it actually started um I . I covered the song toy soldiers by martika and uh and I what I wanted to do was take , like you know that , just the vibe and the , the synths and the melodies , and I wanted to add , you know things that I like like heavier guitar .
So in that song I'm using a guitar that's tuned to like drop a , so it's like super heavy but it's still palatable . The vocals are still true to the original . Um , I kind of wanted to like take the classic and have it meet modern . I'm a big typo negative fan .
That's one of my favorite bands , so there's a little bit of Typo Negative in everything I do with all the damn vampires and some people either know or they don't . But that was kind of where it kicked off and I'm like I want to keep introducing the heavier guitar to this stuff and still pay homage to music from a time that fits visuals so well .
Like some of the Miami Vice stuff . I love all that blood sport , like how the music accompanies the visuals . So I was like how do I take that , produce it modern and then add , like these heavier guitars so that when I do it live it's like even more exciting ?
Um , and we could , you know , do shows with like corn or five finger , some of the bands that I played with . Like I want to fit within the same world and still honor , like my synth wave , you know , roots with all that typo negative as soon as you say I'm a massive , massive typo fan and it's .
I'm so good I never got to see them live . Uh and yeah , I , I would have loved to , man , and there's , there's that , there's a performance of typo . I'm going off on a tangent here that I watch probably once a week I think I do too . Yeah , there's one shot with anesthesia as it pans across the crowd at like dusk and I'm like this is incredible .
So Drop A as well . I mean , I was in a band and we played in Drop B yeah , but Drop A . What sort of strings are you using for Drop ?
A man , I don't know , they're like just shy of bass strings . Is this love ? Is drop f ? So ?
But I'm actually using a , uh , a pedal that tunes it down , because during the clean guitar parts I'm playing in standard and then , uh , the guitar itself is that I've got right here is tuned to drop a , and then I hit that pedal and bring it down to drop f , so it's like super heavy .
I mean by all standards it should be like a hardcore song , you know , but it doesn't . It doesn't come off like that . It still comes off like is this love ? But you know it's easy to miss , like nobody's , like sitting there going oh dang , like you know . Yeah , so that's one of my favorite songs and , uh , maybe I shouldn't spill the beans too .
I'll save it for later on why I got around to what that's going into for the body of work .
But yeah , yeah , so of course , so is that are you . You say you go , you've got the pedal , then go to drop f . Is that happening in the chorus ? Is that right ? Yeah ?
exactly as soon as that didn't , didn't , didn't ? That's all like coming into drop f , which is it's a little bit of a mental uh mix up , because you know , you got to reposition yourself on the neck for drop f so differently so if I forgot to hit that pedal or something it would just sound so off , you know .
And then I got to kick that off again for , like , even the guitar solo . Before I had andy james on it , I was doing the guitar solo , just playing basically the original solo and , um , the clean parts . You know , it's all like back to standard .
That's impressive . That's that's . That is a low tuning , Really low . I can kind of see why , though , because when you say that you want it to be able to sort of share the stage with the bands that you've mentioned , you kind of you need that , don't you ? You need that sort of sound .
Yeah , Compliment each other other you want to feel it in your chest .
You know , like I I love like the midnight and time cop , but I mean I can't imagine going to their shows and feeling a sub kicking me in the chest with that heavy guitar and like so you get like the sense of , like you know , the great synth wave acts and then you'll get that like just heavy rock and metal guitar that like just sits so well in the mix ,
like with that big fat bass guitar , like I feel like that's going to be a really cool live show once we get that all you know kicked off yeah , you mentioned that .
The midnight and time cop . Have you ever considered ? This is total tangent here . Have you ever considered like covering any of their synth wave body of work , but with that heavier sort of sound that you've got ?
that that would actually be really cool . I have , and I did a like a reimagining of uh river of darkness by the midnight and uh , people seem to love that one . Like . I just slowed it down and made it a lot dreamier , a little more like nine inch nails , but um , nice , nice , I haven't really reimagined anything .
I talked to uh royce , the guitar player for the Midnight , a lot and he writes some heavy stuff too . We'll send each other demos we're working on and he's super into it . He sent me something that was heavy guitars . I was like this is so sick and so I could see a future where something like that occurs , but nothing officially yet .
That would be cool , man . This is um . This is a second interview of 2025 , so the first one was actually tyler from the midnight , which is going to be recording . This is dropping the next week , which is the 24th or something of march , and um , I , when I first started the podcast , I interviewed a fair amount of artists and it was quite I .
I noticed the pattern . There were so many , and I'm one of them like metalheads who came over to synthwave and like synth music , this just seems to be a this , this , um , no , I don't want to say calling , but I don't know some gravitational pull . So , like the synthwave and synth based music , uh , what a tangent .
Again , what drew you to sort of move into and start dabbling in and in this realm with all the damn vampires ?
so a long time ago I had this little project that I was dabbling with um called black zenith , and it was like dark wave , like um depeche mode , you know , maybe even darker , but my production skills were just not there . I was just like just making these little little songs I'd share with friends and maybe upload here and there .
Um , and then I I started dating a girl who was really into , uh like FM 84 time cop , uh Calix , what else ? Uh the Kavinsky , so like once I heard that I was like wait , people are like fully just grabbing onto this sound and like really leading into it . I was like I've always wanted to do that .
I just didn't know there was like a , you know , there was like a bed position for it . So I started kind of messing with it on my own . I'd be on tour with Korn , I'd have a day off in the hotel and I'd start messing with music or you know .
And then , uh , once I had some , some tracks done , I'd show the other guys , thinking like they're going to be like this is the goofy , you know , it's like female-fronted pop music . Like they're not going to be into it .
Everybody loved it , like even to this day , like if I run into , like Jacoby from Poppa Roach , he'll love synth wave , um , and it seems to just like translate so well .
I have a friend that I grew up with out here , um , and we used to go to like all these hardcore shows and our bands would play in them , and he's in a band it's called like dance with the dead and they do yeah , yeah , yeah , tony Um , and he , you know he comes from the same background . It's like I don't know it .
Just it seems to be like another logical step . Like a lot of people went from hardcore to like dubstep and like DJing . I think there's like a similar like energy behind all that , with that like kind of tempo and you know the stomp .
So Synthwave kind of harkens into like metal a little bit , with those like kind of sad minor melodies that are still like it can be melodic yeah , that makes perfect sense and it's what I've experienced myself and what I've chatted to other people about .
Like the sounds , because the great thing with synthesizers is you're not I suppose you're not limited anyway with any genre of music really but you can create what you want like sound wise . Yeah , make it as heavy or as light as you want . But the bands you mentioned then papa roach , man , that's a throwback for me .
I remember listening to papa roach by the naughties man , I grew up listening to that sort of new metal sound and then you got under oath as well and I know you did a song . There's a song you released recently which was uh , I forget that . I forget the name of it now , but the singer on it .
I was like I recognize that singer's voice and it took me an age to work out , but it's like 18 visions and it played with me yeah , and it played with me for so long and I was like I recognize that voice , I totally do .
And then I dig a bit deeper and then I was like wow , and it just took me back because I hands in the air , I hadn't listened to 18 visions for quite a while , yeah , but it made me dig back in and go back to that again .
So it's really cool , though , like say it's , it's interesting that you mentioned all those acts as well and they're listening to , uh , to synthwave . It'd be uh interesting to to dig into them as well man and great shout out to 18 visions .
I mean , that was like one of my favorite hardcore bands . And then keith , the guitar player , for 18v , he , he actually put me onto programming drums , which is how I got started like breaking away from , you know , doing rehearsals where drummers are flaking and we can't write songs because we don't have a drummer there .
And then I just started doing everything in the box programming my drums , sending them to people , other drummers , you know . So Keith really like helped me out there . James is a good friend and I was like it'd be so cool to do a song together . And he came out with Runaway Dreams .
He sounds kind of like a mix between Sebastian Bach and Ozzy Osbourne on that track . You know , it's like it's . It's really I was like I want to end the album with like a little bit of a hint towards some of the future stuff I'm doing . So then , you know , fast forward to today .
We have , um , you know , the white snake cover , no-transcript , put it in my session and I find the the best way for me to work is to get the drums knocked out . So I'll recreate the drums , I'll follow along with the track .
Um , I'll put my own sounds in , of course , but like I just want to have that backbone so that I can mute that track and then start working on my own .
What really like kind of propelled me towards like focusing on some covers is I was asked to do like remixes , like Sumerian Records hit me up for a bunch of remixes , but what and what I ended up doing was barely listening to the original . I just took the vocal stem and make my own song around it , you know .
And so I realized like I'm not doing remixes , I'm doing like full reimaginings . And then you know , that ended up becoming like the Avenged Sevenfold collaboration I did , where they were just like let's make a synthwave song , and so we did that track .
And then I started kind of hitting these covers a little bit harder and I found the process of starting with the drums really gets you there , and then behind that , you know , you can recreate the melody any way you want .
So I could have done it with a synth , I could have done it with a guitar , you know , but for for this particular cover , the bass and the drums really like drive the whole song , you know , and the bass that do , do , do , do , do , do , do you know it really drives it .
So I got this , this nice LTD bass , and I slapped on some parallax uh from neural dsp . That's a great plug-in , it just makes it fat . I have a kemper , uh powered guitar head that I use with like a really clean channel . Put the bass in through that , slap parallax on it and then , uh , yeah , I mean it just gives you this massive bass sound .
I barely had to adjust it in the mix , like I was . I was pretty happy with it right away .
I'm also like really into low end and bass , probably more than a lot of people like , uh , I had andy james and uh charlie from five finger in in my uh truck and they were here in town , uh , and I was driving them and I was showing them all these these new tracks , you know , um , and they were just getting blown away by all the bass in the back you
know it was . It was so brutal . I was like I'm sorry , guys , like I can't help it . I don't even realize it till I get in you know , and do the car mix like that . The base is so cranked , but I just love it that way . I always have .
What , what , what is it you think that drives you to to have that ? What about LA ?
I think there's multiple answers to that . A big part of it is growing up . I was a big West Coast hip-hop fan . I grew up in LA . I was listening to Doggy Style and all the Dre stuff so I love . And then when I heard Korn and they had 808s I was like okay , that's sick .
And so I've always kind of gravitated towards bands that have a little bit more low end in their guitar mix and their drum mix . You know , then the other side of that is like I think all the years of live music I've lost some low frequency in my hearing . So I think I'm cranking it more to like compensate .
And so it's like this unholy marriage of like wanting too much low end , so I kind of have to dial it back . But yeah , I do lean heavier into the low end . So I I kind of have to dial it back , but but yeah , I do lean heavier into the low end than most people you've kind of gone against .
What is the natural tendency as we get older is the other the high frequencies tail off . You've kind of like it's gone the other way . They're like the lows , loads of total . But I didn't realize that corn used 808s . I didn't know that .
Well yeah in the beginning of uh I think it's blind boom , boom , boom , boom . Yeah , yeah , you know . So , like ray , uh the drummer , now he had a little sample pad with an 808 on it .
That was that kind of iconic that and you'll hear it in like the older recordings now that I've mentioned it , like if you listen , like you're like , oh there , it is like it's just this one 808 sound and uh , right , yeah , so he's got that set up .
Yeah , it's pretty cool . Yeah , nice , nice . Is there anything in particular ? That , when it comes to cover songs , let's say we're sticking with the rock genre here . That is more challenging than what . What is the most challenging part of it , do you think ?
let's say , well for me , I , I do everything by ear . I can't read music , like you know , so I'm . If I'm recreating something and there's like a small little nuance and I miss it , I'll .
I like to send my music to a handful of friends that I trust for like their mix , uh , input , or you know , and then they'll be like , oh , something's off right here , and then I I can't hear it . They'll , they'll it out enough , and then all of a sudden it'll clear up in my head and I'll hear it .
So some of those smaller nuances are a little bit more difficult . A while ago I would have told you it would be like comping the vocals or mixing the vocals , but now I feel like I have a pretty good handle on that .
But just being overcritical of the mix and just sitting there and just trying to rerun it until I can't even hear the difference anymore , I have to step away for a week . I think the biggest part is just going . I'm doing this by ear . I have to trust that I don't have anything in front of me on paper that's saying this is right or this is wrong .
That's kind of been the biggest struggle . Some of these songs that Whitesnake are doing are like very technical . You know those guys were like masterclass musicians .
So there's there's all kinds of little nuances that you might miss if you , you know , aren't paying attention , that you don't think are important , but they actually are , I suppose , devil's advocate in a way , and I remember when reading sort of interviews with other musicians throughout throughout the decades and whatnot , when they say they haven't got that ability to
to read music or the necessarily the musical theory in a way . It kind of not that you have limitations anyway , but it means you can be a bit more creative . I'm not more creative or opens up creative possibilities by accident , let's say , I guess yeah , happy accidents yeah yeah , that's the one .
That's the one I was looking for yeah , yeah , that's very true .
Uh , so basically , um , is this love is like part of a bigger thing I'm doing . It's called we're coining it vice core and it's going to be like like la vice , miami vice , you know , and there's some like yacht rock covers on there , like oh , wow , and so it's going to be cool .
But one of the one of the tracks like um , that's going gonna come out , it's kind of like that . Like I started listening to it I was like man , I don't know like if I even want to recreate this , and then I ended up bringing it into this like lo-fi kind of synthy thing for the verses and then the chorus comes in all big .
So that was like a one of those you know happy accidents where it just kind of settled into it without having that you know the sheet music or whatever . Like just just by ear it just felt right , you know . So that'll , I'm looking forward to putting that one out too . That'd be really cool .
Yeah , man , yacht yacht rock sounds interesting . It reminds me of a uh , remember his name , so a friend of mine sent it to me , but he does . York rock covers of various um musical genres , and the first one I saw was pantera , five minutes alone like a york rock cover and I was just like I was blown away .
I was like this is absolutely incredible just hearing a york rock version of that . You'll have to find it it's so good and it's , it's just the vocal on , it is just , it's fantastic . Um , yeah , it might be ai generate , but even so , okay , that's possible yeah , yeah , it just I was just like this this is actually I would listen to this .
I genuinely would listen to that .
It just sounded so good yeah , I mean , like I wish I could list off all the like . It's a , it's a cross between like covers and originals . I wish I could list off more of the covers because it would illustrate it better .
But basically , like you know , if you were to picture like a um , that white snake cover , this like modern universe of like la vice with like the you know the , the uh linen suits , you know the pastels and stuff , like in the mac machine guns , like it's kind of like we're leaning into um , there's even a track on there with uh sunglasses kid and oh nice ,
yeah , yeah yeah , I love edward . He , I , I'm the uh , I don't know if anybody knows this , but he just put out an album and there's like an intro with a guy talking like a radio host yeah , uh , johnny thunder and then there's like a helicopter dude who's like illustrating every all the action that's going on .
That's , that's all me , like I did all the voiceovers on that , yeah , yeah . So we do a lot of like cool collaborations together . He's like one of my you know top five friends that are like production wizards that I bounce things off of .
So , like you know , everything I finish I send to him on like whatsapp I'm like , hey , let me know if this mix sounds good . Yeah , he's one of the best he's always been so yeah , yeah , ed's great man .
I've had him on the podcast a couple times , I think . Uh , I'm overdue . Actually , I think we said we're going to catch up in a year's time , so I should probably reach out to him , but yeah , oh yeah he's great , isn't he ? He's a great bloke and like what he's doing on social media as well , with his , with his captions and his and his pov .
It's so good it's crazy like there's so many copycats that have sponsored that .
You know indeed , indeed , a new one crop up every day . But no , that's cool , it's . It's really interesting because , um , obviously , speaking to yourself today , and then , uh , you mentioned ed sunglasses kid , and just how this sort of circle , this network , has sort of grown from all these people from different sort of uh walks of musical life , if you will .
Uh , yeah , it's really really , really interesting yeah , it is .
I I think it's a cool place to be in a really cool time .
I mean , I I feel like , with the resources we have now , with digital streaming and that whole , like the financial structure behind that , it's kind of holding back this like incredible moment in time where we could all be in the same space and , you know , putting on these giant festivals and there's just so many cool opportunities .
But , um , you know , there's little bits , like if people follow really close , um , where we're like helping each other out and we're doing cool little things like those voiceovers .
And you know , obviously there's a lot of a track or two coming out with ed like um for this vice core stuff , so that'll be really cool to show people I look forward to listening to that .
Um , yeah , excellent man , but once again I've gone off on a tangent , steering back to the to the cover side of things . Um , so there was one thing I wanted to touch on , and that was it's actually a couple things actually before we sort of wrap things up , and that was the the vocal on is this love ?
Now , obviously , david coverdale's voice is , uh , is an impressive voice , as as we , as we , well know . How did you approach handling the vocals and sort of the vocal production on that ?
well . So , uh , ryan rose is the singer . He's singing on pretty much all the new stuff . I have a track that is a popular older track called Breaking Up , that Ryan sings on . So a lot of people that are following my music will know him from that and he's just an incredible vocalist through and through .
He's almost too powerful to where , if he's tracking , we really have to be careful with the vocal stems , because there's so much in there , um , so I really just wanted to . I wanted it to be very clear and present .
But also , you know , I needed that , that reverb and that delay to kind of tail in there a little bit , and especially if you want to get that kind of iconic sound .
So what I did was I actually side chained all of the effects , so I have the , the main vocal , and then I'm sending , sending it to another bus with , like you know , delay reverb just cranked up , and then I turned that down very low .
So then you don't lose any of the volume on the vocal and you're not getting too muddy and crowded , but you still have that . You know those effects and I think I used a lot of like Valhalla vintage verb , cause they have some of the gated stuff and that that's , uh , has been working really well with this um .
And then , uh , sometimes I'll use , like FabFilter Pro R , you know , I like , I like the FabFilter plug-in suites and the visuals of them , um , and then I just I work in Cubase so I just slapped on a Cubase stock like ping pong delay and just , you know , put that at like 15 mix , uh , 15 mix , you know , just keep it like nice and low .
So I , I really tried to just keep the vocals out front and , uh , I I definitely did a lot , a little bit less effects processing on than I normally would . Sometimes I'll really saturate them . But I felt , like um with ryan , like his voice is just so , so powerful and distinct , like it doesn't need much .
You know , like a lot of vocals I'll comp and I'll get I'll have to like you can tune them up melody and like all that you know , just to clean things up . But really , once I get stems from Ryan , it's it's always just a matter of like taming those those really powerful moments , you know , because it's so , so brutal .
But , um , again , like for that vocal , I just wanted it to kind of have that air like where you you picture that dark studio vocal booth in the 80s . You know like that was really the approach , was like a visual first and then , you know , trying to get the sound that matches the vibe nice if I had a reverb vintage .
There's my voice going there . Uh , it's a fantastic reverb . I'll be using that for years as well , and it's it's great to hear as well that , um I think this would be really good for the audience listening that you're also using stock , like delays and and stock plugins , because they're often overlooked .
I find , I mean , you're a cubase user , um , but regardless of what sort of daw so daw , sort of um agnostic like using just stock plugins it's great to hear that as well , you know , because sometimes they're overlooked .
As I say , yeah , there's a lot of good stuff in there , like cubase does a really good job . I started on pro tools , then I would rewire with reason to do synth stuff and now I'm all in on cubase . Um , I have a good friend , he's , he goes by dj zed and uh , he uses cubase and I loved his production .
So I was like man , just teach me , and so it was a really easy transition . You know , just very similar to pro tools and and it's just a lot better for midi and everything . So , um , I I go in there and then what I can't get out of the stock stuff I'll you know I'll do , like external plugins .
Oh , another , another plugin I like with vocals that people might dig is , uh , it's called x folks , x vo , x , um , and it's a great starting point . Like if you just need you know a little bit more in your vocal , you need a little push , you need some effects , like it kind of has everything . You can almost just put it on their default .
Like I like to carve out the low end , you know frequencies and like really just get , get all the frequencies clean . But , um , x folks is awesome , like I sometimes will just slap that on right away and and uh and just go from there is .
Is that native plug-in for cubase or is that a third party plug-in ?
that's a third party . I wish I could tell you what company makes it , but that's got .
I'll put a link in the episode notes . I'll do a bit of research afterwards and chuck it in the audience as well , but now that's really cool man . So moving on , um , in the interest of time here to the actual guitar . So you've got andy james , phenomenal guitarist . Um , I followed his work for quite some time .
Um , so we touched on earlier that you're using quite low tunings , uh , to say really so , when it comes to sort of the , the lead guitar elements , it . Have you got any tips for making ? Actually , let's start first with how you approached and why you approached Andy James . Let's start with that story first .
Okay , so Andy is on one of my favorite All the Damn Vampire songs I've ever written , called Carolina Lies , so he plays the solo on that song . We were actually out on tour together and he was . I hadn't been tracking guitar or anything on cubase , like I just wasn't confident . And then I saw him working with it .
He'd bring his kemper in and he'd be tracking on cubase and I'm like dude , like what's your process ? And so he , he helped me , you know , get myself set up to , uh , basically track instruments again in a way I hadn't been doing for years . I came home home I wrote like nine super heavy songs like very typo , negative catatonia , just like moody stuff .
I'll send you . I have a private link for that , I'll send you . Yeah , yeah , please do man it was like the first thing I did when I got home . So I was like , all right , this is killer . And Andy also loves synth waves . So we'd be in the dressing room getting ready . You know we were doing all those Metallica shows .
So we'd be at the stadiums and we'd have like the midnight playing , you know , as our warm-up music , while we're getting ready just doing push-ups , whatever . Like Charlie and Andy love Synthwave , we all listen to a little bit of everything . You know Sleep , token , whatever . So that's always kind of there .
And I think once Andy did carolina lies that the track did really well . It got received really well . Um , toy soldiers , andy plays a solo on that one . So I was like this is another great song for andy . Like I played I've originally recorded myself playing the solo on it and I was like this is cool , but it's basically just the original solo .
I want to hear andy james take on this because , to be honest , he's one of my favorite guitar players . I think he's maybe one of the best guitar players right now . Like , uh , modern technicality feel he does everything looks so well . It's like the best of dime bag and the best of like yngwie malmsteen all in one person , you know so yeah , I don't .
I hope he doesn't listen to this because this one played his ego , but uh , but anyway . So I was like let me throw this to andy if he's got time , if he's interested , you know . And he got right back to me , you know , with his take on the solo .
It was awesome and it was one of those moments where he pointed out one of those things that I was missing . So like there's that dun dun dun , dun , dun , dun , dun , dun dun . I wasn't stepping up like soon enough , so there's a step up that goes a little bit like one sooner than I was doing . Andy was like something's wrong , mate .
He's like , you know , there's just something that's off on this part and I was like I can't hear it . Man , it's driving me crazy . He's like listen . And then he did it . I was like ah , so you know , he helped me sort that , got the solo on it . It was cool , I'm , the other guitars are me .
So I'm like oh man , if andy doesn't like these guitars , you know I gotta listen to what he says because he's like the ultimate . so yeah , but it , but it all worked out and I'm I'm always hoping I can get andy on something . You know I in a perfect world he'd be in the all the damn vampires live band when I start doing that , you know .
But uh , that just depends on his schedule and like what he's interested in yeah , interesting , interesting stuff .
I have to reach out to andy once again . This is an eye opener for me because you mentioned these artists that I had no idea . Obviously I know andy's recorded on and you've you've worked with andy on your stuff , um , but a lot of them I had no idea they were sort of like these , these , these synth fans .
So it'd be interesting to um , I'll aim high and and start approaching them randomly and it would be great .
He's yeah , he's also a Cubase user , like I said , and so you know he's a great producer . He does all of his own solo stuff , he produces all of that and the production's awesome . I think we use the same drum kits .
Amazing , amazing .
So with regards to that and recording guitar for Synthwave because I know it happens a lot because the the sort of core listeners for this podcast started out , it really did start out with , like , synthwave artists and it's sort of grown organically and ballooned from that into various sort of sectors and whatnot , but then it's sort of steering its way back to
synth now and I know there are a lot out there who do use guitar . In particular , what was your sort of top tip for incorporating guitar let's say , both rhythm and lead into synth wave or synth music ?
that's a tough one , like I mean , there's a lot of ways you can incorporate it . Obviously leads are easy , like you can . Just you can play cool little leads over most synth wave music . It fits it really well .
But when you're doing the , the heavier guitars or like anything distorted or rhythmic , if you're not doing that kind of clean sender , like kind of bouncy picking which you can hear in like bad dreamers stuff , you know the 1975 , like that stuff's all great .
But like if stuff , like what I'm doing with the heavier stuff , I feel like the drums really have to match it . So like whether that's a pure electronic sub kick like a like that would work really well with some heavier guitar , something like I use which is like a really punchy . You know kicking and snare um work really well .
So I think that's a big part of it is . Is that percussive element element like it really needs to match ? If not , like you need to mix it low or just like have it sit nicely in the mix . Um , I like to quad track my rhythms so I do like two , two left , two right . Um , my uh leads are usually stereo right down the center .
Uh , bass guitar I'll do like a mono down the center and I have a stereo delay in cubase that I've modified to kind of put on that and it widens it out . But yeah , there's a lot of different tricks . I think guitar is a little bit touchy just because you can't just slap distorted guitar over anything .
If you're doing those kind of lean drum sounds like some of those classic smaller synth drums that distorted guitar is going to sound really messy . You kind of got to tuck that far back in the mix at that point .
So I would just be mindful of the entire composition if you're going to lean into guitars on your stuff , like absolutely , yeah , what you mentioned there about the percussive element of it , sort of .
My final question is and I was listening to a podcast and uh , they mentioned I think it was warren hurt was on it when our podcasting he was talking about it which was regards to sort of quantizing and to the grid . Um , with regards to production , how , how do you find your sort of approach to quantization ? Is that , say , with like bass and guitar ?
And then , because you mentioned there about drums and tying that all in together , is it quite sort of to the grid or is there a bit of flex there ? Is it a bit looser in terms of timing or I guess does it depend on the song ?
it depends on the song . But I'll be honest with you , I never touch quantize like I . I just try to play in time . Like I , my drums are usually locked in the grid and then my guitar and bass I'm just like I mean , I've been doing it for so long that I I lock in pretty quick . I've played with a lot of really great drummers .
Before I was with uh corn . I played guitar for a band whose drummer was gil chiron and he's like a master class drummer and he's playing for manson right now . But he was in like dillinger escape plan and you know .
So he he puts out a lot of drum clinics and stuff and I learned a lot playing with him because I had to lock in , you you know , and I thought I was great . And then I went to rehearsal and I left and they were just like dude , it's not good enough . I was like what ?
So I'm like really locking in with those kicks and so now when I track I'm like pretty much in the pocket . But if I want that little bit of swing , you know , like I , I just again , I don't touch quantize unless it's like synth stuff that I'm drawing in , you know , vsts or like MIDI . I stay away from that .
I like to just like that just a slight bit of push or a slight bit of lag like can add a lot of feel to things . You know that the baseline is is a great example , like it's really . You know , there's a little bit of push and pull on it .
Yeah on it . Yeah , yeah , it makes perfect sense . Makes perfect sense . Uh , davey , it's been an absolute pleasure . This is flown by and , as I said , I generally don't get through all the questions there's a lot more here but it's been a pleasure talking to you today and it's been quite eye opening as well .
Some of the stuff you've dropped , uh , that I wasn't aware of . Just the interest in synthwave and your production techniques and whatnot , and I know the all the audience is going to get a lot from this . Uh , with regards to covering , um , not just rock songs , but cover songs in general . So a huge thank you .
And before we wrap things up , uh , is there anything you'd like to share with the audience ? And also , where is the best place for them to find you online if they want to know more and listen to more ?
if you , uh , if you need like kind of a central hub to just find all my stuff , I would just go to my instagram , which is just davy oberlin d-a-v-e-y oberlin , um , and uh , I have a new track I just finished with mint simon that's going to be set to release soon , uh , called leaving los angeles , and it's a very , very twin peaks kind of romantic ballad
and uh . And then I've got a lot of vice core lined up , so there'll be , uh , there'll be an announcement on that , and then we'll have an entire album coming out , uh . So , yeah , I got a lot of new music coming out , but all the damn vampires in particular , and a couple other projects .
So just , uh , follow me on instagram and all my links are through there .
I share everything I do in real time on that fantastic man , vice core , that I'm not gonna lie , that was a new one on me today , but I'm uh that , that that term in particular . So I'm excited to yeah , to listen to more david . It's been an absolute pleasure and I will leave you to enjoy the rest of your day and I'll catch up with you soon .