Santiago in the studio

This weekend just gone, I was in the studio with my band Battle of Santiago, mixing what will be our first lp. I say “mixing”. It was actually our old friend Zqaty who was doing the mixing, we were there, generally getting pissed.

We returned to the woods of Värmland, to Silence Studio, to mix the songs we recorded last October. I don't why these things always take so fucking long but they do. Zqaty is a busy guy and he's also a complete flake, so the studio booking had actually been postponed around five times between December and this weekend. Anyway, we finally made it. The aim was to mix twelve songs in three days. Zqaty assured us that wouldn't be a problem...

I arrived on the Thursday morning. I worked all day and night on Wednesday and then got the train from Stockholm to Arvika, departing at 6.15. I didn't get a wink of sleep during the four hours I spent in my bed. So I was pretty fucking tired when I got to the studio since the train didn't offer me any sleep either. The other guys were all awake and chirpy when I got there, except Patrik, who as normal, was fast asleep in his bed. My good friend Paddan sure likes to sleep...

I jumped into bed with him, spooning him in the process, and bade him good morning. Without even opening his eyes, he just kinda mumbled “Hey Gaz...” No wonder we call him Mr. Haze. He can fucking play guitar better than most people I know though...

We hung out with Zqaty for a while in the morning, going through the plan, listening to Zqaty harp on about some new philosophy on life he has, or something to that extent. The man just rambles on in his charming, wasted way and I pretend to listen. So the plan is fours songs a day. Zqaty says he can mix at about three hours a song. He thinks it's best that we sort of stay out of the way whilst he's doing all the technical stuff and then we can join him when a mix is up and we can say what we want changed. That was the plan. It would change dramatically by the end of the day.

Zqaty spends that first day, locked away in the control room at the mixing desk, smoking weed and fiddling with faders. We're upstairs in the house section of the studio getting drunk. That first day turns into evening and still the first song's mix is waiting to be heard. We catch a few bits here and there but nothing is ready to work on yet. We carry on drinking upstairs...Evening quickly turns into night and we've made our way through a bottle of Scotch Single Malt, twenty four cans of Crocodile Beer and a box of red wine. We're all pretty fucking boats by this point. Zqaty is still downstairs twiddling away. Well, we're behind schedule it seems. It's around midnight and we're all rapidly crashing. I haven't slept in around thirty hours and I'm pissed as a fart. The guys all start drooling off towards their beds and I'm on my way too, but somehow me and Patrik end up in some deep, drunk conversation in the kitchen and I feel a second wind coming on. After chatting for the best part of an hour we decide to grab some more beer and head down to the studio to see what's happening. Time to get into studio mode.

We get down to the control room and check in on Zqaty. This man is a legend, he really is. He's never phased or worried by time. He has no idea what the word “stress” means. He's sitting there, happy as you like, smoking a joint, as if everything is perfectly fine. It turns out he now has a new plan.

He's getting a mix together for the entire record. When that's up, all that needs to be done is some detailed tweaking for each song. Zqaty is re-assuring us that this is a much more efficient way of doing things and that all is fine. He's got a mix of the first song up and he tells he's almost ready with it. He lets us hear it. By this time though, Patrik and I have fallen asleep, open beer cans in hand, sat upright. Snoozing.

I have a vague memory of coming around, heading back up to the kitchen, me and Patrik enthusiastically ranting on about Fugazi's album, Steady Diet of Nothing, and then falling asleep in my bed with that album playing on my Ipod.

I wake up the next day to the sound of the song that Zqaty had spent the entire day and night mixing. It's on the stereo on repeat and Patrik is sat upright in a chair, sleeping. I realise then that I've been hearing that song in my sleep all night...

Day Two begins with the determined decision that substantial progress will be made today. I get out of my bed around 11am. and am greeted by an ever cheerful Zqaty. “Ah, good morning! Great, everyone is up, so we can make an early start on things!” He seems genuine when he says this. I'm far from shocked though when he makes his way down to the studio for the first time that day at 4pm and starts working on that very same song again...

We head into the woods and climb this really impressive cliff that is hidden by them, right behind the studio. We get to the top, look out over the glorious scenery of the valley below and crack open a can. Day Two follows almost exactly the same path as Day One. Zqaty in the studio listening to a distorted bass drum, us either up the on the cliffs drinking beer, or playing pool, or hanging in the kitchen. When I wake up on Day Three Zqaty has gotten through four songs, although we haven' heard much of them yet and there is some contention between the band as to the mix details of each song.

Zqaty is an absolute genius when it comes to sound. No doubt. As is often the case with genius though, it brings an element of madness along with it. He gets so lost in the music and his work that he takes on, that he's sometimes hard to reach. He gets involved to the point that he acts almost as if he's part of the band and that it's his record. I have a problem with this and find myself suspicious of everything. I've always been the same when it comes to these situations. I'm always really guarded and defensive when it comes to my music. I don't want anyone fucking with it too much. The thing is, I do really like Zqaty and I want to trust him to get the job done. Johan Victims told me once that Zqaty was without doubt, Sweden's most talented sound engineer. Without doubt. He's also completely unemployable! Johan had Zqaty working for him at Debaser for a while, but it didn't work out...

So Day Three arrives and we're all hungover to fuck! And there are eight songs to mix in one day. Zqaty assures us it's no problem. His plan is to work through the night without sleep and get it done. The trouble with that plan though is that it leaves no time for us to listen to each individual mix and change the things we want changing. We all decide that morning that we're gonna stay sober and get the job done. I actually believe, for a short while, that that plan will be carried out. For a short while. Until Tompa starts mumbling suggestions about driving into town and picking up some beers for himself. This is quickly latched on to by Patrik who says he could probably have a few beers too. The rest of us play innocent and say that we're not drinking. Tompa and Patrik head off in to town whilst myself, Erik and Olle head off for a walk in the woods and grab some much needed air.

We all meet back at the studio an hour or so later. The fuckers have bought a twenty-four pack of beer and another box of red wine. We head up the cliff with a couple of cans each...

Zqaty actually does spend the next twenty-four hours mixing the record. Twenty-four hours straight, give or take some time for dinner and the odd joint. What an incredible individual he is. We spend the night getting drunker than any other night previously. It all starts when Erik suggests we play the game Quarter, which basically leads to the five of us getting through almost a whole twenty-four pack in the space of an hour. And then we have the wine and Erik has some of his Jelzin vodka left. He had brought two and half bottles of the cheap French piss with him.  Yes, French vodka!  He'd bought them from a friend who had found them on the street, having apparently fallen off the back of a truck...

I wake up Sunday feeling the hangover shame. Surely I'm getting too old old for this nonsense...

Zqaty, looking like the walking dead, hands us a cd with the mixed tracks on it. Although there are some minor details to be changed, that will need another half day or so in a studio, in Stockholm, he has for the most part, pulled it off. It sounds great and we're all really happy with how it's turned out. Quite what our presence was required for, I don't know.

We hug Zqaty goodbye, tell him to get some sleep, and head off in the car back to Stockholm, the mystery of Zqaty no closer to being resolved. I still can't work out if he's a genius, or just a complete and utter bullshit artist.

Either way, I love the man...

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