New York, NY (Top40 Charts) Approaching completion: New instrumental experimental progressive rock music by
Lucas Lee, with mastering by Ronan Chris Murphy
Guitars, Bass, Keyboards/Piano:
Lucas Lee
Drums:
Marco Minnemann
Mix Engineer:
Lucas Lee
Mastering Engineer: Ronan Chris Murphy
Sept 3, 2018:
Orange County, CA: California-based, Canadian multi-instrumentalist
Lucas Lee wraps up new progressive rock fusion project with master engineer Ronan Chris Murphy (King Crimson, Gwar, Terry Bozzio). The mastering session was done at Murphy's studio, Veneto West, located in picturesque Kern Valley, California. The new set of songs once again feature drumming icon
Marco Minnemann (Joe Satriani, Steven Wilson, The Aristocrats, Mike Keneally, Paul Gilbert). This will be a 6-track, 42-minute album, entitled, "Lowered Expectations".
Similar to Lee's previous release from 2017,
Marco Minnemann tracked his drum parts remotely from his home studio. Tracking and performances of all other instruments were done by Lee. Acoustic piano was recorded in Vancouver, Canada, while all other instruments were recorded in
Orange County, CA, where the project was also mixed. As with all of his previous projects, the current is once again mastered by engineer Ronan Chris Murphy.
Lucas: "For this project, I spent a bit of time revising my mixing approach by self-studying other records academically. While I was going for a 'wall-of-sound' aesthetic in my last one, this one is more focused on separation, definition and power of the midrange instruments. Panning, equalization, arrangement and placements decisions have been slightly bolder than what I was used to. The results may only be noticeable by very few, and getting the technique right will certainly remain a work in progress for years to come, but I felt that it was necessary for me to progress in the area of sonics.
Ronan, of course, is known for his work on a number of King Crimson records. I first met Ronan about 9 years ago in his Recording Boot Camp class, where I learnt about audio engineering. Although this is my fifth record, all my projects had been mastered by him since the beginning. During mastering, the task at hand, for Ronan, of course was to put in the finishing touches with the goal of making the record sound as good and as it could be, given the source material, and to also make the album sound cohesive. But it has also always been educational for me to self-reflect throughout the mastering process with him and learning what to focus and improve on in subsequent projects. My album projects have always being quite labor intensive, produced on weekends and odd hours outside of the 'day job', so any bit of improvement in approach is always something I look out for.
Ronan's studio was previously located in
Santa Monica and has since been relocated to Kern Valley, California, which is about an hour outside of Northern Los Angeles. The mastering session was at a beautiful setting, within a nice distance drive out from the city. It was a nice excuse to spend the day for work that doubled as a mini getaway.
The mastering process consisted of some corrective equalization tweaks, with some to help to make the guitars sounding a little more present. Ronan enhanced things with analog outboard gear on the 2-bus to warm things up, to add a little more excitement via compression and to open up the mixes via EQ. Hopefully listeners of the album would pick up on the sonics and will naturally gravitate towards turning up that volume knob."
"Lowered Expectations" is scheduled to be released towards the middle/end of Fall 2018.
For more general and contact information, please visit www.LucasLeeMusic.com
Instrumental Experimental Progressive Rock Fusion, Featuring Drumming Virtuosos
