Snow Patrol-Final Straw???

[JonCraig]

anyone know the band Snow Patrol? i have no idea how their album, final straw got in my itunes library. the production seems VERY cool, sounds are good. i'm only about halfway through the album, and so far it's fairly musical, too.

anyone have any insight on these guys? (yes, i'm going to google them now).

perhaps more importantly... anyone know how the hell they got on my computer?!?

--jon

[JonCraig]

just saw that they were nominated for a freakin' grammy. what rock did i crawl out from under?

--jon

[Jules]

I co-produced a band with that albums producer Garret Lee (the band were from Croatia - they were called Stella Maris)

And I have had the engineer Dan Swift assist and engineer for me many times over the years. He is a very nice guy and a great engineer and an old chum.

In fact Final Straw was recorded in the studio where I have my feet up on the console in my avatar! (Fortress studio, London) Dan was the in house engineer and Garret had production suit upstairs from the main studio.

Garret Lee, when I worked with him, was very preoccupied with metronomic timing and 'pulsing' hypnotic repetition. Actually we clashed a little on the production about this, I was happy to allow some ragged timing on drum fills or slight diversion from the exact click track tempo, but he was adamant that everything be 'just so' / perfect in time. He won out on this production 'dispute' between us and the final result was all the better for it. (I think he was keen on rigid timing as he had plans to use drum loops and midi sequences over the live drums.)

Metronomic / pulsing timing can be a fantastic feature of rock music when used to good effect.

Jeff Lynn's production of Tom Petty has this pulsing quality
The velvet underground used it to good effect on songs like "Waiting for the man" and "White Light" (probably more due to the fact that their unorthodox drummer couldn't play syncopated beats)
U2's drummer Larry Carlton uses unusual repetitive rhythms to good effect.

Anyhow - It sure worked for Snow Patrol! Their stuff all seems to have a constant pulsing, repetitive hypnotic beat. And it was no surprise to me to hear that U2 asked Garret to work with them.

Garret was a guitarist in 80's Irish punk band, Compulsion - then moved over to having a career as remixer / artist "Jack Knife Lee" and with production work.

[GOD]

They have been opening for U2 for a while now and YES! they know their oinons.
They play extremely well and have some good and experienced people behind the scenes.
They are going a longgggggggggggggggg way

[JonCraig]

Originally Posted by Nu-tra

Wow a grammy? More proof this country is heading down the toilet! I remember they were being pimped on myspace for a while and I thought to myself... "What a studpid band name" It reminded me of some dumb disney movie.

to be fair... the grammys haven't meant anything for a while now. i just meant that i must have been way out of the loop to have never even heard of a grammy-nominated band.

--jon

[Jules]

Originally Posted by JonCraig

just saw that they were nominated for a freakin' grammy. what rock did i crawl out from under?

--jon

The band are a very big deal here in the UK. Constant, heavy radio play.

[JonCraig]

Originally Posted by Jules

I co-produced a band with Garret Lee.

And I have had the engineer Dan Swift assist and engineer for me many times over the years.

In fact Final Straw was recorded in the studio where I have my feet up on the console in my avatar!

well i'll be damned... it's a small world after all!

--jon

[Jax]

Originally Posted by JonCraig

perhaps more importantly... anyone know how the hell they got on my computer?!?

--jon

I'd guess that the track was included in your iTunes library upon installation of the OS.