Ava Luna are no strangers to experimentation. Smashing punk and soul together, they arrived at Miner St with a wild mix of ingredients and one small problem—an unfinished song.
When we asked Shaking Through Alum Twin Sister to curate an Episode, they hailed their most recent tour mates and friends, Ava Luna, citing confidence in their ability to perform under pressure. This makes sense of course, historically the band has a “no overdubs” policy which would make recording a song in a day a simple matter. But they were eager to push the boundaries of what was possible in a session...and boy did they.
The 6-piece band came to Miner Street at the end of a rainy week in May with only a chorus and a couple chords in mind, leaving the rest up to their own creative instincts. This was a gutsy move and—we’ll be honest—had us reaching for the Tums. But “Water Duct” proved to be a departure from their previous songs in the best possible way. As their Curators will confirm, the band’s real prowess lies in their ability to write layers of sounds that transcend the space of a studio.
If the band feels like a wild science experiment, well, it is. It’s not only an amalgam of styles, shapes and textures, it was also an experiment in how to create a sustainable project. “It came down to money in the end,” says lead singer Carlos Hernandez. “I was thinking ‘How can you make a band that’s sustainable given that you’ll never have money, you know? And I decided that it was simple: you create a whole music process by which you can always record on your own.”
For Ava Luna, the past few years have been a testament to their dogged pursuit of that process. Formed by Hernandez, Ava Luna is comprised of long-time friends Ethan Bassford (bass) , Julian Fader (drums),
Felicia Douglass (vocals, synth), NathanTompkins (synth), and Becca Kauffman (vocals, guitar), who all met in New York City. Pulling from years of music theory, training, and personal history, each bandmate contributes their own personal style. “There's not many bands that you can push a lot of music into tiny sections” says Dev Gupta from Twin Sister. “I think Ava Luna’s songs are really structurally complex. In terms of lots of parts and of changes from moving one
“If the band feels like a wild science experiment, well, it is.”
feeling to another, those tiny moments are amazing.” Hernandez formed the band years ago with the intention of making music that he could produce at his own pace and integrate with his own style. Eventually, the band grew and evolved, but the band’s progression never strayed from the initial principle. “The idea would be there would be no studio stuff at all; almost like a punk band, just these raw elements, and this energy with a lot of space to write and perform music”, says Hernandez, who also happens to be the son of a well-known soul DJ in New York. With that influence, Ava Luna has carved out a niche of soul-punk in New York City and beyond.
“Their songs are structurally complex. Few bands can push a lot of music into tiny sections like Ava Luna can. They change quickly from one feeling to another; those tiny moments are amazing.”
Ava Luna have always been the kind of band that depended on their live show as a platform for their albums—most recently, 2012's Ice Level. So coming into Miner Street to record Shaking Through was an opportunity, but it was also pushed the band to envision their process new and different ways. Hernandez, for the amount of experience he’s had as a musician, has always greeted studios reluctantly. With the endless options and potential feedback that Miner Street offered, it can be as overwhelming as it is exciting.
The song not being done didn't help either. But with the help of Producer/Engineer Jon
Low, the band leaped at the chance to create something they couldn’t necessarily re-create live. “Some people get hung up on the ideas of right and wrong especially when it comes to music.” notes Hernandez. “But I'm more interested in experimenting with the whole idea of not using overdubs was an experiment, and so is this… we had one day to make a song, and the result was based on those restrictions.”
As Hernandez points out, “I feel very passionate about being open to new things: when you decide on something, then you do it all the way. What's the point of experimenting if you don't do it all the way?”
“In the end, “Water Duct” is a highlight for Ava Luna, not only creatively, but also as a group who in the past has declined the resources Shaking Through offers.”
In the end, “Water Duct” is a highlight for Ava Luna, not only creatively, but also as a group who in the past has declined the resources Shaking Through offers. As Twin Sister puts it: “The thing that Shaking Through does for bands is like trying on clothes, you get to live this dream for a day. You get to take these lessons back to your normal process and really focus your craft. It's a great opportunity."
And as we learned throughout the session, opportunity is not something that Ava Luna passes up. While still harnessing their soul/R&B finesse, they used the two-day session to their advantage, bringing to the table aspects of writing and recording that
should be admired by any emerging band. Their approach to creating music that can be made and re-created without the nuances of a studio album has proved to be recognized by the music community, including their biggest fans, Twin Sister. “I really think my favorite part about Ava Luna is the combined energy that comes out of a group of people interacting with each other.” The energy can be felt all the way through “Water Duct”, a song which solidifies Ava Luna’s past and present influences.
Tracking a song in a day is a challenge even under the best of circumstances. But when Ava Luna presented us with just fragments of “Water Duct” we knew we were going to have to act fast.
A band like Ava Luna, one that has only ever played as a whole six-piece group, offers some unique challenges in the studio. For one thing, they seemed uncomfortable having their songs stripped down to the core rhythm section—it was as though they might not know their way through a song without cues from the whole group. On top of that, they really only had a chorus and some ideas for parts, but no sense of how many repetitions part to part. The day started in their comfort zone: Carlos, Ethan, Julian, Felicia, Becca and Nathan, at their instruments arranging parts. But from there, we pushed them to explore new territory.
Surprisingly, they were ready to lay down the basic pretty quickly, all things considered.
Julian played a stripped back set, including kick, snare, floor tom, a hi-hat and a ride cymbal. The miking included the three mic overhead system that we’ve developed and used in most episodes over the past year and a half: a pair of small diaphragm condensers (Telefunken Ela M260s) in a modified “Recorderman” configuration, and a Coles 4038 measured out like the Ela M’s up the middle for a fat mono center. A pair of Samar figure 8 ribbons—beautiful custom microphones running through our perennial favorite, Rob Roy Campbell’s Electronaut M63 dual tube preamp—were placed a few feet out in the room, spread apart and positioned so that the nulls faced the set.
Ethan’s bass was a four string Ibanez, strung with the low strings of a 5 string bass. It was thick and low, and could have been too far separated from the rest of the instruments, but the line itself maintained it’s composure. Nathan laid in a few synth bursts in the basic and Carlos joined the two with his Gibson Les Paul “Firebrand” guitar for a scratch.
Carlos and Becca initially set out to lay the first guitar overdubs down as a duo. However the amps were emitting a high pitched whine
and no amount of work by Jon or Brian seemed to fix it. The solution was a bizarre one. The problem was with the car wash across the street; their poorly grounded electric buffer was coming through Becca’s amp. We had to go over there with a three-prong to two prong “ground lift” adapter. Eventually the two split off from playing together and the problem worked itself out. Once finished, Carlos and Becca headed over to the coffee shop to write lyrics!
“The solution was a bizarre one. The problem was with the car wash across the street; their poorly grounded electric buffer was coming through Becca’s amp. We had to go over there with a ‘ground lift’ adapter.”
While they were gone, Nathan laid down some synth parts. He played a Dave Smith module with an Alesis controller. Felicia then quickly put down a part on the vibes, captured with those beautiful Samar mics combined again with the Electronauts. Carlos and Becca still weren’t back, so Nathan jumped in a little more, this time with the studio’s Roland Juno 6.
After the sunset, Carlos sang his lead into our friend Joel at Ecstatic Electric’s Geffel UM75, a beatifully smooth reproduction of a vintage UM57 by the very people who made it in the first place. The mic passed through
“After a quick and successful run of their harmonies, we tried Roy Thomas Baker’s (Queen, The Cars) trick of having both singers then sing each other’s parts. The results were ‘over the top.’ Don’t dis it until you try it!”
Rob Roy’s Electronaut, the Massive Passive and a vintage Gates SA-39.
When Felicia and Becca’s turn to sing, the two were set up together, each to her own Samar ribbon mic. Man, oh man, did that work! The two were smooth enough to spare the mics of any plosive bursts of air, but loud enough for ribbons which are often too low in the output for vocals. After a quick and successful run of their harmonies, we tried Roy Thomas Baker’s (Queen, The Cars) trick of having both singers then sing each other’s parts. The results were “over the top”—but don’t dis it until you try it! I was awesome.
In mixing, Producer Jonathan Low set up what has also become a staple of Shaking Through recordings over the past couple of years—guitar amps for reverbs. In this instance we had a Z-Vex Tremorama, a vintage Memory Man and Polychorus, in line to an Ampeg Gemini and Fender Deluxe Reverb. This reverb chain, as complex as it is, was applied to several sounds in the mix, and was later topped of with some good-old, genuine tape flanging between the Otari MX5050 and a Tascam BR-20. Think Led Zeppelin, Tears for Fears, or… Strand of Oaks, perhaps?
Director
Peter English
Executive Producer
Andy Williams
Producers
Brian McTear
Peter English
Engineers
Jonathan Low
Band
Carlos Hernandez
Becca Kaufman
Ethan Bassford
Julian Fader
Felicia Douglass
Nathan Thompkins
Julian Fader
Director of Photography
Ian Markiewicz
Editors
Sean Huber
Larry DeMark
Audio
Joe Bisirri
Still Photography
Peter English
