Ralf Knoflook is a musician based in the Netherlands who makes half-pretty, half-noisy kind of sad sounding pop songs. I asked him how he recorded his latest album - Low Fidelity Record - and a few other things:
Where did you record your album?
In the attic of my home in Nijmegen (Netherlands).
There are some bad-ass guitar solos on there. who is your favourite guitar soloist?
For psychedelic guitar solos I took a lot of inspiration of the acid wah-wah guitar playing of Peter Green at the end of his Fleetwood Mac era. You can hear him play acid wah-wah on the 1970 live album 'Chalk Farm' and his first solo album 'The End of The Game' (1970). From what I understand he achieved this amazing sound playing a guitar with out of phase pick-ups through a classic spring reverb into an overdriven tube amp. Been trying to mimic this sound on my record.
How long did it take you to record the album and what was the hardest part?
I have been writing and recording these songs for more than a year. Whenever I had some time I tried working on it. I very much wanted to be a fun recording experience. Recording at home, playing all the instruments yourself, can be a bit of a hassle.
Since you have to record the instruments after each other, normally I would play over a click track, in order to keep the song rhythmically tight. However playing over a click track is hard! It's no fun at all when you hear yourself playing not according the click, and having to record again and again.
That's why I decided for this record (upcoming album 'Low Fidelity Record') not to use a click track at all. So I thought what is the most fun of playing your own songs? Well, just to sit on a chair playing guitar and sing simultaneously. This track of me playing guitar and singing live forms the heart of every song.
What did you record your album on? Computer/mics etc?
Condenser mic connected to an Focusrite Scarlett interface, getting the signal into my computer. So I guess a standard set-up. The condenser mic was nothing fancy, just the standard one which was packed with the Focusrite. The placement of the mic was like 2 meters away from the chair, so I could capture the guitar, vocals and a bit of the natural reverb of the attic.
For a few songs ('Beautiful' and 'Think it Over') I also tried recording in a “stereo” setting. Besides the condensor mic I placed a SM57 Beta very closely to the bridge of the guitar. This allowed me to have two signals, which I could pan, making a stereo image.
What guitars and other instruments did you use? Amps? Pedals?
When trying to write good songs, I found that playing on crappy instruments, forces me to write songs that are able to stand alone, not dependent on how perfect or cool my instruments sound. That's why I recorded on an insane crappy nylon string guitar. Bought for 10 euro's years ago in a second hand shop. It's propably better to throw it on a hearth and that's exactly the reason I played an entire album on it. If the guitar sounds bad, the song has got to make up for it!
On a couple of songs I played a hohnica accordeon, the idea was to create a kind of an organ sound. On Mr. Money I played a Frames guitar banjo. It's called a guitar banjo because it has 6 strings just like a normal guitar would. It is in standard guitar tuning as well, so any guitarist is able to play it.
In trying to mimick the Peter Green sound I recorded a Jaguar style electric guitar through a Dunlop Jimi Hendrix Wah-Wah pedal and Alesis Midiverb 2 effect processor. Normally I would run this through a tube amp. But this time I plugged the Voxamplug (a guitar amp simulator for playing guitar on headphones) in the output of the Midiverb2 before connecting it to the Focusrite. Furthermore you can hear some percussion and bass guitar.
Did you have any other albums in mind as sonic inspiration for your record?
Stripped down albums, which depend heavily on acoustic guitars, like
The Lost Days – In the Store
Sam Forrest – Lost in Flight
Dylan Rodrigue – The Birds are Still Singing
What process do you use to mix your records?
I work with a DAW called Reaper. Although I record digitally, I'm after an “analog” sound. That's why I put a lot of saturation/distortion on the seperate tracks before mixing or applying any other effects. Kind of like how the engineers in the 60s would put a hot signal with lots of gain trough their mixing consoles.
After that I just do the normal stuff: some eq, 60s style compressors, plate reverb, etc. This time I tried a different approach with using reverb. I noticed that in some songs of the 60s (Jimi Hendrix, Cuby + Blizzards) a more or less dry vocal signal in the centre of the mix and a very wet reverb signal panned hard left or right. On this album I panned the reverb channel of guitar/vocal track hard left. It gave a very wide sound, which is probably a good thing for when trying to fill the space with only guitar and vocals.
I have double tracked the vocals on every song. If you are a fan of Elliott Smith you really have no other choice!
In a few songs I've put the 'extra vocal track' through an artificial double track (ADT) plug-in. It sounds great and reminiscent to the 60s. It works on solo guitar tracks aswell, it'll give instantely that typical wobbly Beatles guitar sound.
Did you try any of these songs with your band You Should Get To Know Us?
No.
If you had to play these songs live with a band, which musicians from past or present would you hire?
Drum – Janet Weiss
Bass – Paul McCartney
Organ – Herman Brood
Guitar – Evan Dando
Which is the best venue to play in the Netherlands?
Been lately to a venue in Amsterdam called Cinetol. A great little venue with an alternative feel. Would love to play there!
Do you prefer to play live sober or totally fucked up?
I haven't played live in a loooong time. I would go for the full experience, so sober!
What next for Ralf Knoflook?
I'm not sure yet. It could be a more surfy sound. I might ditch the acoustic guitar and go for an electric one.