I sit at the table in the studio, absolutely stuffed to bursting. This is the first time I’ve been to residential studio, and I have to say that we’re being looked after pretty damn well. Home cooked food every day is a luxury that is rare for me. And cheesecake? Man oh man. Time to work on a slow one.

Day 1 was spent with the tedious but necessary business of setting everything up and getting sounds. Because we’re trying to record as much live as we can, that meant setting everything up at once. Alex and his assistant Dean beavered away with microphones, while I discovered, rather to my displeasure, that I fucking suck at table football. I’m well acquainted with the fact that I’m terrible at sport generally, but discovering that I’m also rubbish at a pub game was… gutting. It was even worse to discover that, for some unfathomable reason, Tarrant is really good at it. What?

Day 2, we started tracking. We have 5 days here, so we’re pretty up against it time-wise, if we want to get all 12 of the songs I want on the album nailed. Thankfully a month of rehearsals, plus the fact that we’re all totally boss musicians (haha), has paid off, and we motored through 5 songs in one day. This morning we got back into the fray and thusfar we’ve polished off another 3. Good going. We’re recording to tape, which is new for me. It’s quite scary when, every once in a while, Alex starts editing, which basically involves cutting the tape up with a de-magnetized razor blade. I get slightly edgy when I see him slashing through our recordings. Needless to say he know what he’s doing.

It’s all sounding great so far. I’m really pleased with the general vibe – this won’t be the most precise of records, playing wise, but it has soul, which is something I feel a lot of records lack these days. It feels like we’re making a worthwhile album. And I have been ever so slightly improving at table football. Victory will be mine.