The Whitehalls

the life & times of San Franciso rock band The Whitehalls

Bonsai

if you are not a member of The Whitehalls you will not understand this post…yet…but soon all will become clear!

Pics from latest studio mixing session (Feb 2011)

The Whitehalls are busy putting the finishing touches on our upcoming release!

Here are a few pics from our most recent mixing session in the studio:

Who says making music is easy?

 

 

 

 

Listening to the mixes

 

 

Music looks as good as it sounds!

 

 

We added some killer keyboards on this record!

 

 

Producer B working his magic on these tracks

 

 



















































Looking forward to your feedback on the new songs and we’ll be previewing some of them at our show Friday March 11 in SF!

See you soon…

- Drew, Neil, Bill, PJ

 

Breaking out of the studio

As we get close to finishing our second album, we’re getting itchy feet for the ol’ stage again, and judging by all the people who have asking us when we’re going to play again, we’re not the only ones. And now, everyone will be pleased to hear that we’re playing a show on March 11th.

It’s at San Francisco’s Abbey Tavern at 4100 Geary Blvd., and we’ll be playing with friends of ours, Against Leo.

The Whitehalls play at 8pm sharp.

The Holidays, The Whitehalls, and a worthy cause!



If there is one thing that The Whitehalls know -- it’s that the Holidays are a great time for celebrating with family and friends!

But alas, in a moment of eggnog induced act of selflessness, we’ve decided that the Holidays are also a great time for helping out others.

With that in mind The Whitehalls are proud to announce that “Hurricanes”, a track from our soon to be released CD (coming in early 2011!), has been included in a very special compilation called “Still Standing”.

“Still Standing”, brings together the talents of several San Francisco-Bay Area artists to benefit the Berkeley-East Bay Humane Society (BEBHS) who are focused on rebuilding after a devastating fire on May 20, 2010 that destroyed their shelter.

Many animals were rescued, but many were not so lucky, and this accident has left them ‘in dire’ financial need.

Proceeds from “Still Standing” will go toward helping BEBHS to rebuild so they can continue to live up to their mission of ensuring “no healthy or treatable shelter animals will be euthanized in the Society’s care”.

The Whitehalls have partnered with music technology startup MusixShare to offer this digital Cause Compilation for the benefit of the Berkeley-East Bay Humane Society.

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Purchase “Still Standing”, at www.musixshare.com and help support the Berkeley-East Bay Humane Society, The Whitehalls, and Bay Area Music!

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And we’re not just asking you to do this for nothing!

“Still Standing” features some truly amazing Bay Area artists including

We ask you all to lend a bit of a helping hand -- and in return you will receive some fantastic music while supporting a worthy cause!

And oh yeah -- “Still Standing” makes a great present for any music fans on your holiday shopping list!

Cross that one off!

Thanks for the support and Happy Holidays!

Cheers,

Drew, Neil, Bill, & PJ
The Whitehalls

Who says you can’t make $ in the Music Biz?

As indie artists we are always looking for opportunities to make a living anyway that we can.  But who knew that the tactics for domain squatting that worked so well on the net would work so well for band names?

Exit Through The Gift Shop -- the name of a band and also the name of famous UK Graffti Artist Banksy’s new film project.

(was Banksy recently tagging in the San Francisco Mission? Read this post from Mission Mission)

The band agreed to rename themselves “Brace Yourselves” and in return received via van a Banksy original appraised at $300K!

Check out the full story on Hypebot.

Anyone working on a film entitled “The Whitehalls” should contact us immediately!!

Karmacoda show

Drew and I went to see our producer B play with his electronica band Karmacoda last night at Harlot in San Francisco. It was a terrific show -- great crowd, great venue, great visuals and great music.

I don’t really have any ground-breaking comment to make except that you should check them out: www.karmacoda.com

More vox

I was out at the studio on Tuesday night to do more work on the backing vocals, now that Drew has finished lead vocals. B and I were able to get through five songs, to add to the two I’ve already done. Four to go, then we’ll all take a listen to what we have so far, decide what else needs to be recorded and push to get it all done.

One thing that was really interesting was to listen to the work that B had done on Drew’s vocals. It is no secret that everyone corrects pitch on pro recordings these days, and we’re no different. Usually you can’t hear the results, but what I heard on Tuesday sounded a bit… odd. After talking it through for a while, it turned out that the cause of the unusual nature of the edited vocals was in fact some extra heavy compression. Things sounded fine with either the compression or the pitch correction, but both together made for an unnatural effect. They are after all doing the same thing, smoothing out the track. Compression smooths the dynamics (volume) whilst auto-tune smooths the pitch. When it sounds too smooth, it sounds unnatural. The solution was to dial back the compression, and now it sounded terrific.

It was really enjoyable to work with B on the problem-solving process -- I always learn such a huge amount whenever I’m working with him, and we’re incredibly lucky to have him at the helm of this project.

Listen (or download) songs from The Whitehalls debut CD!

Here’s few songs from our debut CD, “Say It Like You Mean It”

(we’re in the studio recording the follow up CD right now!)

Click the big arrow on the left to play the song -- click the download button on the tracks if you like them!

Drew gets a new toy

Drew and I spent an afternoon last week playing with his new Christmas present, a Line6 audio interface. After years of recording his song ideas on a Walkman with a built-in mic, it was time to move into the 21st century, and the Line6 allows him to connect a mic, guitar or other electronic music device to his shiny new HP laptop.

I’d bought one last month and found it to be awesome, so I knew Drew would benefit from it. He’ll now be able to develop his songs much more than just having a rough vocal and acoustic guitar part recorded on a crappy Walkman.

Here’s a pic of how my dining room table looked whilst he was getting his training on digital audio recording. My wife was momentarily stunned to see four laptops there at one point…

The Whitehalls & SVR Rocks raise over $27K for Music in Schools Today!

Earlier this month The Whitehalls were asked to participate in a benefit at GAMH doing a little to give back to Music and Music Education.

I’m pleased to report that the Silicon Valley Rocks Benefit raised more than $27,000 for Music In Schools Today!

We had a great time playing this show and it’s fantastic to see that the effort of all the bands, sponsors, and people involved in pulling this off had a nice result.

Drew in his Dylan pose...

Drew in his Dylan pose...

More pictures from that night are available here

- Drew, Neil, PJ, Bill