Tandem Voice Booth

Hi anyone out there - this is my first blog. Ever. So be gentle. My name’s Jonny, and I’m flukey/fortunate enough to be in the position of engineer, recording local musicians here at Tandem. I’ll use this blog as a way of letting anyone who may be interested what is going on here musically, and maybe even endulge in a bit of “mixerman” gossip mongering along the way. So…Lately we’ve been busy, which is great. I’ll upload samples of these recordings soon so you can have a listen.

Recently:
We recorded, mixed and mastered Hera playing live at Al’s Bar last month and the CD has just come back from being pressed! ‘Hera Live at Al’s’.
Recorded the soundtrack to The Court Theatre’s production of ‘Skin Tight’ written by Luke Di Somma - String Quartet and Percussion.
Recorded theme music and performed the audio post mix to the short film ‘Ronnie Grimble’ which will be part of the NZ Film Festival.

We had a great open day and were lucky to have Hera along to be our recording guinea pig… Thanks! I might even post some of the recordings we made that day.

In Progress:
Neverdead - 3 piece local rock group - 5 songs still in the mixing process but layed down a killer version of ‘Horse with no Name’ - hard to imagine I know…but really!
Stinging Loco - a local bluegrass band have been in and recorded 7 songs quickfire for plenty of knee slapping fun. Think ‘Oh Brother Where Art Thou’ and you’ll get the idea.
I’m currently mastering a Live CD for The Jamesons Irish Band who play every Tuesday at The Bog - you should be able to pick it up at their upcoming gigs.

Coming Up:
Bang Bang Eche with their long awaited ’single’ recording sesh that we gave them for winning the RounDUp comp last year. All going to plan they’ll be in this weekend.
Echoic - the boys will be coming in later in August to turn it up to 11.
More fun with Luke Di Somma.
Fresh on the scene local singer songwriter Tom Batchelor.

So its busy times on the music front - which is awesome. If anyone has any questions about recording or whatever, feel free to harangue me on this blog…or use the phone… or email.

Here at Tandem Voice Booth we pride ourselves on offering a wide range of audio services. This range includes one of my favourite branches: Audio post production. This involves editing and mixing the soundtrack to a motion picture, be it a TV ad, TV show, short film or a full length movie.

We’ve been asked to complete audio post production on a locally produced feature length film produced by Silverback Films and Gorilla Pictures

It’s called “Last Of The Living” (see website) 

The film has been produced over the last year or two by local film maker Logan McMillan. It is a Zombie comedy film, and is shot in Christchurch, Wellington and various locations around Canterbury and the South Island of New Zealand. A draft cut of the film was recently screened at Cannes and picked up international distribution, so we’ve been brought in to master the audio in the film.

It is a very exciting process, as audio adds another 50% to the picture in terms of realism and believability, and probably

another 75% in terms of emotion and atmosphere.

Because the film is set in a post apocalyptic world where a virus has killed most of humankind, some scenes we are having to recreate entirely as the location audio contained background noise such as city noises, cars, horns and aeroplanes.

We are mixing the existing audio, adding ADR and foley effects, and then mixing to stereo and then mxing in 5.1 for DVD release.

The films first screening will be in the official selection in the Christchurch International Film Festival running  from the 31st July to the 17th August.

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