18.05.2003
We decided to deliver you some nearly daily news in "diary-style" written by our drummer. I hope you enjoy it ;-)

Here he goes...:

-----Drummer´s Diary (Part 1)-----

Well folks, welcome to the first day of our recording diary. We thought about having the "new bloke" (it's still ME, Stefan !) writing some things down that are going to happen in the forthcoming days and weeks. So, let's get started with the things, that are sure about to come.

14.05.2003

After rehearsing the new material on my own (we used about 4.005.666 CD-versions full of song-fragments and songs), drumming with headphones on for the last three months, it's finally good to get moving to a studio on Friday (can't believe I really wrote this - usually I hate recording-sessions). We will record the drums in Berlin's "underground-studios" under the eyes of Nikolai Wurk, who is going to become a well known sound-engineer in the local Berlin music-scene. After finishing the drum-recordings, we all moved to the "Klangwerk"-studio in Zehlendorf (a district of Berlin), where all the rest & the details are going to get recorded, mixed & done. So, part II of the recordings will be done by Martin Anding, who also is responsible for the monumental classical arrangements on the upcoming BOOK II......

Back to part I of the recordings: Back in december 2002 I ordered a new set of drums, which I hoped to use for the recordings. Today - about five months later - my local dealer called, and told me that the stuff has just been delivered, but one f'**** drum was missing - I just told him to f*** off & get the stuff delivered completely. So, we'll see if my old drums will work out fine, or if I'll have to hammer on Steven's belly for getting the bassdrum-sounds I like.

15.05.2003

Hi there! I moved the drumkit to the studio yesterday. A friend of mine wanted to help out with his big Volkswagen - but his car was stolen that night. GREAT! So I did all business alone with my small car, driving here and there several times. Anyway, everything is set up now and ready to go for the soundcheck tomorrow, which starts at about 1700 p.m. - stay tuned...

16.05.2003

Chaos, as usual. Before entering the studio today, I picked up the new drums, as the last one was delivered as well. I didn't had the chance to take a look at 'em, nor to play a tune and to hear what they sound like. Bollocks, but anyway... When I arrived at the studio, Niko had already set up the mics & cables. During the next hours half of the band and some friends appeared. Martin, our sound-engineer for everything but drums passed by and had some chitchat with Niko concerning technical details of harddiscrecordings. We finished at about 21.00 as all the settings were done.

17.05.2003

We met at high-noon today to get things started. First the playbacks & clicktracks had to be synchronized. BOOM - fullcrash! Martin using Prologic for the playbacks and Niko using Samplitude served us a well known "shit-how-are-we-gonna-fix-it"-cocktail as the clicks couldn't be synchronized as we suspected to, due to different datatypes. GREAT! ...I hate those techniques anyway, that's why I chose drumming - just start playing. No plugs, no sound probs and it's as loud as I like it. Felix and Niko fixed everything with Cubase in the end, I think... The results so far: Five hours delay!!! But finally we started recording at half past five, got two songs done, which was o.k. for the first day. That's rock'n roll - expect the unexpected!

18.05.2003

Same shit, different day. We huddled at about 12.00 am again to keep the train rollin'. I felt pretty well today, so I made Niko hurry up & and get the "tapes rollin'"... I did four songs today, even two of the real hard ones. Two of 'em we're gonna keep for sure, two of 'em we´ll probably get re-recorded the fothcoming days. Anyway - good day; the way I like things working... The only bad news of today: On two songs Niko had to rebuild the clicktracks, as data was lost for some reason. Maybe Logar's magic has found its way down into the cellars of Berlin... - and be sure: I'll kill the bastard, if any of the real drum-data gets lost.

19.05.2003

Busy monday I can tell you. As we are not yet a selling band, everybody has got to do his daily job. So do I, and as my boss is on holiday since Friday you can imagine that there is a hell of a lot to do. And today was just one of those Mondays you'd better stay in bed all day. But anyway the recordings went well again, although we "only" did one song (it's the time in the late hours that runs faster, as we only have about 4 hours time to record stuff on days during the week). We taped two fine versions of that song and we'll definitly get a final version mixing them up.

20.05.2003

Again a busy day at work, and a busy day at the studio. We nailed another one today in just one version that we thought was of course worth being heard on the album - the magic seemed to be there. So, this one makes it a total of eight songs right now - we are ahead of the schedule, which seems to be unbelievable being in LOGAR'S DIARY... *hehehehe*

21.05.2003

Nothing spectacular to let you know about today, as we're taking a day off from the studio.

22.05.2003

I felt pretty shitty entering the studio today, a bit uncomfortable. And things went wrong as far as they could. We started up one other up-tempo-cracker fully packed with doublebassdrum-attacks, and I fucked it up completely. Then I had a couple of rounds on the Japanese bonustrack (sorry for all you "non-Japanese" album-buyers!!!) which is a re-recording of "King´s Hall" in BOOK II, but it didn't work out as well. Meanwhile Felix & Steven were off on a mission, trying to get a copy of the album-opener with full classical orchestration from Martin, as the song was not yet finished (as well as one other song, that I didn't even had the chance to rehearse yet - it's going to be a funny thing to go on and record a song, that I just don't know yet!). They arrived at about 19.30 when Niko and I decided to stop recording for today. And even more so, we decided not to work tomorrow - what a bunch of lazy bastards...*hahahahaha*.....still being ahead of the time-schedule, we just thought: what the f***??? Just a creative break.

23.05.2003

Here we are: DAY OFF ! As Niko is heading towards a short holiday in sweden from the 28th of May, we decided to do two songs on this weekend and to keep the bonustrack and the "still-nobody-knows-what-it-fucking-sounds-like"-song for the weekend 7th/8th of June, when Niko will be back, so that I have another extra-time to go on rehearsing.

24.05.2003

SHIT. I overslept! Called Niko and told him to come by later so that I could have breakfast at least. I arrived at the studio at 1.00 pm to warm up, before mighty Niko arrives. Checked my pockets - BOOM. I forgot the damn keys! GREAT DAY. So, I hurried back to my girlfriend´s home, to get my "preciousssss". Arriving there I rang the bell and - you've guessed it: Elvis had left the building! So, last chance: A call on her mobile phone, which she never turns off (even during the night) - not so today. Finally I ran to the nearest shop, as I had in mind that she wanted to get some stuff - BINGO! Got her, got the keys to her flat, got the keys for the studio. Hurried back and arrvied at about the same time Niko did. GREAT AGAIN!!! Anyway - I had a roll today and we recorded the two songs we wanted to quite quickly, and after five or six rehearsals for "King´s Hall", I even got the bonustrack done, which we aimed for doing later. Un-fucking-believable!!! No business again on Sunday...!

Listening through the various tracks again we just came to the conclusion, that one of the tracks from last Sunday must definitely be re-recorded when Niko is back. I can do better than this. So, we are on a short break - STAY TUNED...!

-----More to follow soon-----