Blumpy: A Logical Way to Musical Freedom
Comping Vocals
Another production feature unique to Logic is comping vocals. Blumpy explains: “After we record three or four takes of the lead vocal track, I compile the best lines together — maybe grabbing the first verse from one take and the second verse from another.” Those takes go in a folder. “So when I’m in my main Arrange window, I’m not cluttered up with 40 tracks of vocals — and I don’t have a bunch of hidden vocal tracks in playlists.”
The playlists in other DAWs, says Blumpy, are basically a drag. “You can have multiple playlists for a track, but you can’t see them all,” he notes. “So what you see is not necessarily what you have. And if you want to find a particular vocal take, you have to dig through tracks and playlists to find it. Whereas with Logic, you put it all in a folder, double-click on the folder, and there are your vocal takes.”
Complex Tasks Are Simple
“With Logic, simple tasks are simple,” says Blumpy. “But if you want to do something complex, you can also do it in a very simple manner. That’s because Logic has an abstraction to its editing that’s not there on any other DAW. DAWs like ProTools are designed only to do very simple editing tasks. In order to do one complicated thing, you have to group a bunch of small tasks together and do them manually, one by one, to achieve your effect. But in Logic, you can do the same complicated task with one key command or mouse swipe.”
Convenient Sound Effects
Blumpy likes the effects he can obtain with Logic. “Lots of times you want to throw an element in a song — say, an ethereal pad, this kind of muted choir sound. And Logic has these great built-in soft synths. So instead of fussing with filters and all that, you just play your keyboard to get the synth sound you want from Logic.”
Logic gives Blumpy a 24/7 pass to the library. “Every producer keeps a library of his favorite sounds,” he says. “Over the years I’ve transferred mine from the E3 to the K2000 to the Korg, from one sampler to the next. But now I’ve universalized them all by putting them in the ESX-24, the Logic sampler. So I don’t have to dig up old synths to get my samples — they’re always available on my PowerBook. It’s so much more convenient.
A Music-Centric DAW
Blumpy laughs at the diehards who aren’t yet convinced. “You start talking to the old-time rock-and-roll sound guys about mixing in the digital domain and all these issues come up,” he says. “Some people say that DAWs don’t sound as good as the old million-dollar consoles. But with Logic, I don’t believe that.”
“Logic is music-centric, based on beats-per-minute, as opposed to timeline-centric. That’s why it’s so much more inviting to make music in Logic.”
Of course, not all DAWs are created equal. “Logic is music-centric, based on beats-per-minute, as opposed to timeline-centric,” says Blumpy. “That’s why it’s so much more inviting to make music in Logic. Logic is more robust. And a lot of my pro colleagues are switching. But some of the rock guys are dinosaurs — they’re still using two-inch tape!”
Where to From Here?
Blumpy is passionate about the possibilities. “I love the creative aspect of making music,” he says. “I love sound design. It’s the tiny subtle things you put in a record. That’s the stuff I like to do — the pads, the drone sounds, the background stuff. You’re making a landscape, and it’s not immediately noticeable in the song, but it creates a feeling. And if you mute it, people notice it’s gone.”
He reflects on the trajectory of his career. “Originally, I got into this biz because I loved music,” he says. “I wanted to work with experimental bands like Ministry, Skinny Puppy and Depeche Mode — all these weird bands that didn’t sell well! Then slowly, over time, the questions became, ‘Will this get radio play?’ And, ‘How do we get more interest in the third chorus, so people don’t change the station?’
“I don’t want to think like that any more,” says Blumpy. “The old formula of intro, first verse, chorus, second verse has been beaten to death. It doesn’t work any more. I just want to make good music. And now I have the tools and the know-how, so I can make records the way I wanted to when I was 15.
