Listen to "Songs About Comic Books & Mid-30s Malaise," the new album from the Roland High Life
When I'm not writing things here on BoingBoing and elsewhere, I also sing and play guitar for an indie rock called the Roland High Life. And today, we have a new album out called "Songs About Comic Books & Mid-30s Malaise!"
The subject matter is precisely as you would expect it to be. You can hear it now on Spotify, Bandcamp, iTunes / Apple Music, Google Play, Amazon Music, plus a bunch of music streaming services I haven't even heard of like Deezer and ClaroMusica and Saavn and Anghami and KKBox.
I'm particularly proud of this album - not just because I wrote half the songs on it, but because the audio quality is great. We wrote and recorded these songs over 2 weekends. First, we got together in the basement of the house where our drummer grew up in Middletown, Rhode Island, where we figured out which songs we wanted to record, and how we were going to arrange them. We recorded all the drums that weekend with these Shure DMK57-52 Microphones going through a Focusrite Scarlett OctoPre 8-Channel audio interface, then captured the bass parts directly through the Scarlet and with an SM7B on the cab.
Once that was all mixed and comp'd in Logic, we reconvened to record the guitars and vocals over another long weekend in my own childhood bedroom (thanks mom!). Some those parts were recorded on that same SM7B, but mostly they were done on a Bluebird by Blue Condenser Mic, the ever-reliable SM57, and the surprisingly-cheap-but-still-surprisingly-fantastic MXL 990 to compensate for the fact that the radio towers in the woods near my parents' house still interfere with audio electronics just like they did when I was growing up.
I mention all this audio geekery for two reasons. One, I find it amusing that we ended up recording this all in the places where we grew up strictly out of utility (we could be loud in a way you can't in city apartments), but it ended up being a fairly resonant decision that fits well with the theme of the album. And two, because I think it sounds fucking fantastic, and I'm really proud of what we pulled off with such a scrappy operation.
Plus I think the songs are pretty great. Thanks for listening!
"Songs About Comic Books and Mid-30s Malaise" by The Roland High Life
Spotify / Bandcamp / iTunes / Apple Music / Google Play / Amazon Music