My friend Jolene Willis recommended me to Brian Dunn to play bass for his album. Cool. I had no idea who Brian was but love recording - so of course I said yes.
Usually when I do a recording project I ... well... like to know what I'm recording. The Andrew Melzer project is one thing ( mostly swing tunes...read the chords..swing.. done ) ... but when you're doing someone's original alt-country/pop music album you want to hear the songs beforehand to get to the know them and figure out the forms and what makes the tunes tick.
So for a few weeks before the project, I shoot off an email saying "hey guys .. are there demos or charts for the tunes?" ... well... short story I didn't get any charts and got some iPhone demos the night before we were set to record but had no time to listen to them. I was cranky. :P
On the drive out I had myself a bit worked up thinking "well...THIS is gonna suck... no idea what the tunes are... no charts... nothing.. not gonna be MY fault if the result is sucky suckyness... " ( wow... dramatic eh? what a princess this Deryl guy is eh? ) ... I ( hopefully ) wasn't reallllly visably cranky.. just honestly nervous that it wasn't going to be as good as it could be.
Anyway... not knowing what to expect I brought all of my main basses ( Upright, Fender Pbass, Fretless Jazz bass ) ... Kirk White and I get there... meet Brian.. say hey to Jon.. get set up... and... then some really cool studio magic happened...
Brian just picked one of his tunes to start with... no one said "this is the style we're going for... this is the type of rhythm section feel or groove we want.. " .. Brian just started playing his tune... and Kirk and I instantly fell into place and just seemed to know what to play.
With each tune it was the same... here's the tune.. play along... get the form... press record..and away we go. Brian's tunes have so much familiarity to them that everything I played just seemed to make sense like I had played the tunes before.
turns out I was really wrong... didn't need charts or Demos at all... just needed great tunes and great people.
it was one of the most enjoyable recording projects I've ever done.. and to hear the final product ...well.. I was almost as excited as if it was my own CD.