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Recording Fanning Dempsey National Park ‘The Deluge’

Recording Fanning Dempsey National Park ‘The Deluge’

Something For Kate’s Paul Dempsey and Powderfinger’s Bernard Fanning find a shared love for synth-driven rock/pop music. Fanning Dempsey National Park is the result.

5 August 2024

Artist: Fanning Dempsey National Park
Album: The Deluge

Gotta love this quote: “It’s not the two of us with acoustic guitars singing campfire songs”. And let’s face it, many would jump to that conclusion. This album could have been lazy, self-indulgent… phoned in from the respective hammocks of the protagonists. Instead the opening bar of the first track of the album, The Deluge, instantly stakes the claim for this album being one of the most unexpected and interesting of the year. Gary Numan-esque synths, ‘80s-style live drums, just-enough guitars… there’s a discipline; a spare quality that’s involving and provides a suitable platform for the Fanning/Dempsey vocals.

“Craig Silvey has to take a lot of credit for what you’re describing,” offers Paul Dempsey.

When Producer/mixer Craig Silvey (Arctic Monkeys, The National, Florence and The Machine et al) heard the demo of the album he knew he wasn’t being approached so much for any studio recording chops – the demo sounded amazing, thanks to (primarily) Paul Dempsey’s production skills – it was to provide a compass and some guard rails: “I used LCD Soundsystem as an example about the choices you make around what you leave out of a mix.”

According to Craig Silvey, the other key consideration was the role of the synth parts:

“There was lots of synth work on the demo but I think Bernard and Paul were still considering the synths as the sauce applied to the mix while I was making a strong case for the synths to be at the core of the songs.”

GETTING VOCALS TO STICK

Craig Silvey explains how he got Bernard and Paul’s vocals to blend successfully:

“It was really complicated and eye-opening to properly combine two completely different singers with unbelievable power and grit, but in completely different ways. Sonically, and in terms of their vocal strength, it was initially quite a conundrum. The challenge was to make them both sound strong without betraying their own voices or sacrificing the essence of each.

“A lot of it was about finding the right mic combination. It wasn’t necessarily about finding the right mic individually for each of them, but the right combination that worked best together. We used two different mics: Bernard on an AKG C12 and Paul on a Neumann U67. Both of those mics are mine, and they’ve travelled the world with me. Even then, I had to ask Paul to back off from his mic more than Bernard – Paul was activating the proximity effect in a more pronounced way.

“In the mix it was a real conundrum to ensure a smooth transition between the two vocals without losing comparative energy or power. For example, Bernard’s voice sounded great solo but sometimes sounded thin or nasal following Paul’s.

“I figured out that I needed to automate some EQ to blend those transitions. The crossovers were crucial, but when everything blended, it was great. They naturally stayed out of each other’s range.”

FROM BOWIE TO BAY

Paul Dempsey and Bernard Fanning were both involved in a Bowie tribute which incorporated some gun musicians from San Francisco, including drummer Michael Urbano and bassist Craig McFarland. Turns out Craig Silvey, although a long-term London resident, learnt his trade in San Francisco and was a friend and collaborator of the crew Paul and Bernard were hoping to get involved. It all coalesced at the site of the legendary (and defunct) Record Plant studios in the Bay Area, now rebirthed as 2200 Studios. “Michael Urbano manages 2200 Studios,” explains Paul Dempsey. “The old Record Plant had sat empty for 10 years and they were going through the process of relaunching it as a functioning studio. When we arrived, there was plenty of amazing outboard they’d acquired from another studio firesale, but nothing was wired in yet. It was a guerrilla setup with tons of vintage outboard gear, microphones, and synthesisers. We lost a few days to patching everything in, but it was worth it for the incredible live rooms.”

The two live rooms had played host to some amazing sessions over its storied career. One of the rooms has a larger volume thanks to Metallica’s Lars Ulrich famously bankrolling a 10-foot ceiling extension to chase an even larger drum sound.

Some of the outboard at Craig Silvey’s disposal during the 2200 Studios sessions in San Francisco. Preamps include the vintage strips of Neve 1073s. EQ options include H2 Audio Helios 5011 500 Series EQ, API 550 and 554 modules, Aurora Audio GT4-8 modules and a Millennia Media NSEQ2.

UPROOTED TO RECORD PLANT

With producer Craig Silvey entrusted with the role of the project’s aesthetic gatekeeper, one of his guard rails was to insist they record as a band. Synth player Adam MacDougall (Circles Around the Sun, Black Crows) completed the line-up to ensure the pivotal keys parts didn’t sound ‘drawn in’. After the aforementioned false start, where a few days were spent plumbing in the outboard, the rest of the 2200 Studios sessions were relentless, as Craig Silvey committed ‘now or never’ parts to Pro Tools. The pace was frenetic but it was clear that not everything was going be tracked in time.

“We felt uncertain after those sessions because we hadn’t tracked much guitar and had focused on synths,” recalls Paul Dempsey. “When we got back home we felt the album needed more work and at that point Craig Silvey’s vision wasn’t clear to us.”

For Craig’s part he wasn’t spending any spare moments crafting reassuring temporary mixes, it was all about tracking: “That’s really scary for a producer – trusting yourself when others aren’t seeing it. We didn’t take many breaks, which exhausted everyone. It became clear we weren’t going to finish on time, and that stressed everyone out, including me. However, deep down, I knew we were on the right track. I knew we had most of what we needed and just needed to find a few more elements to complete it.”

That’s really scary for a producer – trusting yourself when others aren’t seeing it

GUITARS QUIETLY WEEP

With Craig Silvey cracking the whip and insisting Paul played guitar with the band during the San Francisco sessions, it tamped down any urges to over-embellish.

Paul Dempsey: It was fun to take a different approach with guitars. Instead of focusing on the perfect valve amplifier and vintage guitars, I used a Roland JC-120 with a Shure SM57. It was all about playing parts that fit the mix. In previous projects you could be lost for days chasing the perfect tone, but the guerrilla-style approach made things way more pragmatic.”

Craig Silvey: “We kept it in the ’80s zone using a Roland Jazz Chorus. Paul is an accomplished producer and engineer, so it was about mixing it up a bit. Bernard wasn’t interested in playing much guitar, but we involved everyone in the recording sessions to make the takes more organic. Some of Bernard’s acoustics and Paul’s electrics from the demos were used in the final tracks as well.”

BYRON VIBES

With more work to do, Bernard and Paul decamped to the far more blissed out environs of Brooklet Recording Studio, a studio Bernard established in Bryon Bay with engineer/producer Nick Didia.

“Brooklet has the advantage of being a functioning studio!” notes Paul Dempsey. “We worked on vocals, guitars, percussion, and additional synths. It was perfect for final touches and having Nick Didia join us was a bonus.”

“Coming to Australia to finish the record was perfect,” concurs Craig Silvey. “In San Francisco, I pushed for a band-like dynamic where everyone had an equal say. In Australia, it was Paul and Bernard applying their personal touches. This approach created a core that was neither fully theirs nor mine, allowing their DNA to shine through in the second half. Both are incredibly talented but in very different ways, and my role was to create a neutral space where neither could dominate. This balance worked out well.”

Adam MacDougall’s synth playground included a Sequential Prophet 10, Mellotron, Yamaha DX7, a Roland SH101, vintage MiniMoog, a Crumar String Synth, a Roland Juno-X, a Rhodes and a Hammond B3.

SYNTH RABBIT HOLE

From the moment Bernard and Paul embarked on a collaboration, synths were high on the agenda. Paul has since become a card-carrying synth geek. His personal collection now includes a Moog Matriarch and a Black Corporation Deckard’s Dream CS-80 replica, along with a metastasising modular synth problem.

Paul Dempsey: “For all of my Something For Kate days of recording and touring we’d have a Nord keyboard and my interaction with synths was limited to finding a preset and maybe tweaking it slightly. I’ve since fallen down the synth rabbit hole and I love it. I started with the Sequential Prophet and gone from there.”

Craig Silvey: “Paul has really embraced the synth world, which is great. My love of music came from bands like New Order and Depeche Mode, so I’m a fan as well. We wanted the synths to be organic and performed live rather than static. We brought in Adam to play synths during the initial recordings, which might have surprised them. The idea was to make the synths the core, the pulse of the song, rather than just a sauce on top. Once they embraced it, they took it to another level.”

Keys player, Adam MacDougall, brought some of his own synth collection to the San Francisco sessions including a vintage MiniMoog, a Crumar string synth, while Sequential was good enough to lend out a Prophet for the duration.

Once back in Byron Bay to complete the record, Paul added more of his own synth lines.

“For sequences, we relied on a Roland Juno-X, which sounds great. I mean, we had access to an original Juno 106 and a Juno 6 but the Juno-X was in no way inferior and obviously much easier to work with than a 40-year-old instrument. We also used the Moog Matriarch for sequences on ‘Eyes Wide Open’. The Moog gear has a unique tone.

“I think I was dismissive of electronic instruments for so many years but some of these analogue synths are living and breathing instruments when you perform with them.”

The idea was to make the synths the core, the pulse of the song, rather than just a sauce on top. Once they embraced it, they took it to another level

Bassist Craig McFarland at the tools.

ON TOUR

The good news is Paul and Bernard are taking the album out on tour around the country. Fans of Powderfinger and Something For Kate will need to ‘readjust their sets’!

Paul Dempsey: “We’ve been working on the parts for the tour and looking forward to bring that to fans. Response to the Fanning Dempsey National Park album has been great.

“It’s been such a unique and rewarding experience, blending electronic and live elements, and working with such talented people. Craig Silvey’s vision and approach brought everything together beautifully, making this album a standout project for us. Shout out to Simon Struthers at Forensic Audio out of Perth for doing a great job with the mastering as well.”

As for Craig Silvey, sounds like he’ll be the No.1 VIP ticket holder when the tour kicks off in Brisbane on October 11. “I’m desperate to see the live show, I think it should be great.”

DRUMS

The Record Plant live rooms hosted many of the classic album recordings of the ‘80s, so Bernard, Paul, Craig and co. were in the perfect location to capture the type of drums sound you might hear on a Fleetwood Mac or Prince recording from that period. I asked Craig what the secret is to capturing that ’80s sound:

Craig Silvey: “One key is having an unbelievably killer drummer, like Michael Urbano. Having access to both rooms at The Record Plant and Michael’s ability to tune drums was next level. There’s obviously a significant amount of gating going on. In both rooms, there were two or three room mics. In the small room I had a close, medium and far room mic and a close/far combo in the big room. There’s a significant amount of compression going on each of those sets of room mics. I’ll have a gate triggered by the kick and snare, or maybe just the snare, or maybe the snare and the toms, each time working with the gate to try and get what I call ‘truncate time’ where you’re fine-tuning the attack and release setting to get a result sympathetic with the tempo of the song. In the smaller live room I might also set up a SM57 feeding into a Fender Champ guitar amp. Using the gain and delay setting on the guitar cab provided some extra mayhem which was also feeding back into the room mics. Again, I’m doing my level best for all of that to be in time with the song. Michael Urbano and the band would respond to this in real time. It impacted the way Michael would play especially.”