Category: Recordings

Berkeley, and Panda.

I decided during the Covidopalypse that I must find a new pair of kittens. After some research and tips from friends, I met a marvelous foster-kitten-fosterer who was herself pregnant with a hooman baby. She had two bonded pairs of catboys – a stripey tiger and a sleek noir panther, plus a rambunctious somersaulting holstein-kitten  and  a subtle grey silvery feline of mystery. Instantly I loved them all, of course, as one does. Sat myself down in their kitty-rumpus-room right on the floor to get amongst them, on their level.  The tiny panther, just six weeks old or so, saunters over, climbs onto my outstretched legs and.. falls asleep. I had been chosen, clearly, and I was about to ask – which of the others is in this bonded pair? The tiger answered by investigating and scrutinizing me, as his brother snoozed utterly unconcerned and blissful in the way kittens do.  Promptly I committed and signed adoption papers (these do exist for kittens). The lads were too young to take home yet, and they hadn’t been neutered yet, and I had travel plans, so off I went and four weeks later, gleefully collected the now larger and more bouncy felines.

Playful doesn’t begin to describe the ball of energy that is a happy young kitten or puppy. One is reminded of this when confronted by such a whirlwind of enthusiasm and curtain-climbing.  The lads roughhouse roughly in the house, occasionally to the point where we think they’re fighting – only to stop abruptly and groom each other and themselves ever so gracefully, and spontaneously nap intertwined in that kittenly way.

They needed names.  I as their hooman needed to name them, for their vet records and kitty-chips, as one does. I didn’t think long. Berkeley, and Panda. The tiger is Berkeley, the panther is Panda.  Berkeley being my hometown and Berkeley Cat Records being my record label, naturally the tiger is Berkeley.  Panda, this also came to me quickly, as I work for Pandora Radio and SiriusXM, and my esteemed Pandora music-head colleagues refer to themselves and each other as Pandas.  This nickname had been established well before I started at Pandora as a contractor in 2017, and when I was eventually hired full-time, I embraced my Panda-ness and of course, named Berkeley tiger’s panther-brother, Panda.  He’s also just sort of a panda.  I mean, he’s ridiculously cute and playful and cuddly as one hopes a kitten or a panda would be.

So it came to pass, Berkeley and Panda are the executive leadership team of Berkeley Cat Records.  Here’s an earlier photo of them in discussions about creative direction:

Note the antiquated 1980s stereo gear. We at Berkeley Cat Records kick it old school. There’s even a song in which we claim 1983 as our permanent residence. Cameo appearances here by Berkeley Cat himself and yours truly:

So many pieces converged here. I’d love to tell the story of how this one came about but it’s too soon for me to tell it well. I myself didn’t do any jumping off of things – that’s all metaphorical, save for some friends close to me who did some leaping indeed. Thanks Shannon for the awesome artwork on this. Thanks Damon for clueing me in about Logic Pro Mastering Assistant – wow. I have tried Ozone and a couple of other mastering thingies but couldn’t get anywhere useful. Now, lo and behold I can master my own records at home. Cycle complete. I can create drum tracks, all the way thru to mastering.. A victory of sorts, true solo record-making. But enough nerding. This one rocks and I hope y’all enjoy. Definitely a big nod to early Beserkley Records stuff here, especially Modern Lovers, and the underground velvety wonders they adored.

I have completed my Bandcamp collection.  Here’s a partial screenshot.

The collection contains 4 full albums, a few EPs and a bevy of singles.

The last song on the last album I published there, is Barf.  I improvised it in one pass, while recording it on an iPhone 4, in about 2015 I think. The production value matches the subject matter perfectly in that it is Barf.

One of the more finely produced numbers is I Can See It Now. Unlike Barf, this took a lot of work, trial and error, rewriting and reimagining, several recording and mixing sessions in 2018, with significant contributions from the brilliants Matt Jaffe (on 12-string Rickenbacker), Michael Rosen (at the controls) and Michael Urbano (on a Ludwig drum set that happened to be made the year I was born).

My journey toward producing my own records started on 4-Track cassette recorders in the mid ’80s. I could never get them to sound quite the way I wanted, but the banging away at it helped me hone some skills. Along comes digital and ProTools and all of the funtoys we have now, and I can actually create just about any kind of audio track that I can imagine, now.

A recent highlight was Rabbitus Maximus. This one I did entirely by myself,  in a pretty short stretch of time at the very beginning of 2024.  It was a case of following an idea from start to finish, and there was really no rewriting or rethinking of anything –  I tracked each instrument once and moved on, dialing in the mix as I went. The end result is delightful, a personal favorite. One dear old friend said it was my best yet, while another told me it was too silly and that I should lean in on my darker material. All of which reinforces what I have learned about my works or really any piece of art – IT AIN’T FOR EVERYONE!

It took me a while to gain the confidence, or perhaps the gall, to release some of my wilder material. A flashpoint for me was the track Content, Content, Content from (of course) my CONTENT album. That little outburst had been brewing in me since I first heard the word “content” in its Internet-era context, back in the early 2000s. Everything – your FB comments, your cat pics, my albums, news items, clickbait headlines, the greatest most beautiful art and the most irrelevant and insipid SPAM, is all CONTENT, now. The weird neutrality of it fascinates me.

In a spasm of nostalgia last year, I composed and recorded 1983, definitely in my power-pop zone, with an ample nod to Ska. Called in the big guns for that one – no less than three Michaels! Urbano, Rosen and Valladares (on ’80s synth-bliss) at East Bay Recorders, with Paul Jackson joining me on the vocal chorus – and then I mixed it at home. Soon afterward, I performed it live on just acoustic guitar at Down Home Music, in my first ever solo performance. That whole set is now my Caterwaul! album, and there’s an uncut video of it on archive.org.

Oh!  The video thing!

I started to get my toes wet in Premiere Pro about a year ago, and managed to create some pretty cool homespun vids for Charlotte in the Garden of the New Futility and a few other songs. Most recently I started a more elaborate one, for Rabbitus Maximus, but I put that project on hold simply because it was proving too time-consuming. Learnings: I CAN make my own records, it’s fun and sometimes actually pretty easy now that I know the ropes, AND! The same can not be said about making movies. Maybe someday!

The aforementioned “Charlotte” represents a lifelong epic within me, that started the first time the UpTones visited Los Angeles, in 1984. Coming from the Bay Area, where we had become something of a sensation, LA was a different world and I felt in every way an outsider there. The lines “No one talks anymore, no one walks in this town, hardly notice myself when I take a look ’round,” haunted me for decades, and on numerous occasions I tried to frame them in a completed song.  Finally, in mid-2023 the rest of it came to me in a rush, oddly spurred by the Barbie movie, of which I am an avid fan. I produced and released the song, along with an instrumental mix, and if my math is correct, that was 40 years in the making!

Through many of these endeavors, Shannon Wheeler‘s pen and imagination gave my records cover art which so often surprised and delighted me. The last one is a sort of magnum opus – I just couldn’t believe my eyes at first when he sent me this.  I had absolutely no idea what sort of image we should use for On Top Of The World. The song is a celebration of stardom, sort of narrated by an adoring fan, in an imagined world where there’s no downside, at least in the moment, and everything is grand.  I was clear that I didn’t want the artwork to be a picture of that. There had to be a twist. But what could it be? Shannon admitted at first that he too was stumped. A week later he sends me this.

!!!

More learnings –

Every song has its own rules, its own soul, if you will.  The production styles for mine vary greatly, as I’ve discovered. One that I wrestled with a bit was I Liked Their Early Stuff.  Like any great cliché it is born of truth. We’ve all said it, right? I can name a bunch, but one will do: The Police. I LOVED their early stuff! And I’ll leave the rest of that “as read.” So, I had that recording in pocket, for a couple of years, after blurting it one day, and I vaguely intended to re-record it until recently I listened again and laughed aloud and realized that’s it, that’s the only recording of that song that I need. It sounds like a “demo” and, as such, it’s like a prop in its own play.

Yesterday I enabled the purchase-all option for my Bandcamp collection, so if you like you can download the whole kaboodle at 50% off. That works out to $33.50 for 4 albums, my singles and EPs, Charles’s dub mixes, the works.

I hope you enjoy my (ahem..) CONTENT!!

I waffled for a week as to whether I’d invite Charles Stella to do one of his awesome dub mixes for this song.  It is, after all, not in any way Reggae or even Ska, this is a Rock song with a capital R.  Can we do dub mixes of Rock? Oh why yes, Catalonia, we can, as evidenced by the result. I like how the EP flows with the single, then the dub, then the instrumental version (which is simply my original mix with the vocals muted).

I similarly waffled about asking Shannon to draw a cover for this one. Because I had absolutely no idea what it might be.  And I had a bit of dread about what it could be, and I wouldn’t want to waste Mr. Wheeler’s time.  The song is about a rock star on top of the world having a grand time and their fans are happy and they are happy and everything is great. I didn’t want the cover to be a picture of that, exactly. There had to be a twist.

That was a few weeks ago, and Shannon was, at first, similarly stumped as to what to draw.  I made it clear – we don’t have to do this one – I have a perfectly good temporary cover and I can just keep that, but if you have an idea….

Well, I’m very glad I asked him, because a few days later, arrives in my inbox: a cat in a top hat smoking a bubble-pipe on top of an apparently flat-ish earth on the shoulders of charming elephants dancing on a mighty turtle. Whaaaat!? I cheered out loud.

On Top Of The World was done, boom.  Myles Boisen mastered the audio for my mixes, Charles mastered his mix, I put the pieces together here and voila.  A Berkeley Cat Record.

As of today it’s live in aaaaaaall of the streaming services; Here’s a widget with links to a few of the more popular ones:

https://distrokid.com/hyperfollow/ericdin/on-top-of-the-world-ep

And here it is in our beloved Bandcamp, long may they camp:

Turtles, turtles, all the way down.