Digidesign Pro Tools Makes Life Easier For Donita Sparks
There was a time when Donita Sparks of L7 and more currently Donita Sparks + The Stellar Moments didn't know the sameness between an XLR Cable and a microphone cable, but that was the 90s, and heck, I spent most of it wearing a long sleeve flannel while trying to escape the bleak realities of a world where you can't get ahead without using shampoo. Times, though, they are a-changin', and thanks to time in studio as a member of L7 and technological advances that bring the mystique of recording to everyman (and woman) right in their own homes, Donita is a lot more recording savvy.
Here she talks about the pros and cons of Pro Tools, which, to be fair, could just as easily be called Con Tools.
DONITA SPARKS: Hi. I'm Donita Sparks.
[DONITA SPARKS PERFORMING WITH THE STELLAR MOMENTS]
We had a friend who was an engineer at Sound City, which is a studio that we used to record at a lot in Los Angeles, and he came down to our rehearsal room and showed us how to set up drum mics and mic the room, and so that we didn't know how to do. We didn't really -- Dee and I didn't know how to do anything. We didn't even know like what an XLR cable was or what kind of microphones we liked or anything like that, so he showed us how to do that, and we Pro Tools it's pretty easy, you know, and I like the immediacy of Pro Tools.
One thing I could never -- I never had much patience for was the dialing in the sounds at a recording studio. It's very time consuming and it's realy boring for me, so I like the immediacy of the Pro Tools stuff but sometimes it doesn't of course sound as good as when you've got a real engineer getting a great tone. You know what I mean? But I don't know.
PATRICK OGLE: Did you use the kind of plugin stuff that they have to like get the sounds all, you know, all through Pro Tools?
DONITA SPARKS: No. We recorded some of the guitars with real mics at our rehearsal studio, and we kind of turned that rehearsal studio into a recording studio.
This record has maybe a wider musical palette. There's a bit more pop and if there's darkness, it's not heavy. It's melodic dark pop.
[DONITA SPARKS PERFORMING WITH THE STELLAR MOMENTS]
This song is about a Jewish [INDISCERNIBLE] Barbara Bush, George [INDISCERNIBLE] Bush....
DONITA SPARKS: You know, like with L7, if there was like a dark subject, we'd hit it really heavy, you know, and just make a heavy tune, but with this I didn't want to go heavy with anything really. I tried to keep the music joyous. I tried, even with distortion and even on the rockers, I tried to keep it like danceable rock and joyous and not go to negative places, because I sometimes with L7, I got to the place where I was singing about negative things and I didn't really want to do that anymore. So if it's negative, I turn it into some pretty pop.
[DONITA SPARKS PERFORMING WITH THE STELLAR MOMENTS]
AN INERESTING SUBJEDT...
Hi,
Asit cpuld be for me. Being involved constant recordings various takes, without advanved info. on modern, or more polished recording technics'Perhaps someone could advise??
I'd much appreciate it...
Regards,
Louis
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