Bounce to Disk

Tim Midgett was a founding member of Silkworm, a legendary and influential Chicago-via-Seattle rock band with an uncompromising aesthetic. His new band, Bottomless Pit, is about to release a 45 RPM double LP. He is an electrical engineer, home recordist and true high fidelity enthusiast. Also included - a song download from the forthcoming Bottomless Pit album. Photo by Heather Whinna.

Could you describe your home recording setup?

Midgett: I have a newer MacBook Pro and a MOTU 896. I use Digital Performer. I have a number of decent mics, from Shure KSM141s to a Coles 4038.

I used to have an MCI 1″ 8-track–made a couple of records on that. It sounded great, but I couldn’t justify the space, maintenance, and tape costs, given the convenience, flexibility, and acceptable sound quality of my digital setup.

Now that you are an electrical engineer by trade, do you do most of your own gear repairs and maintenance? What kind of mods and/or builds are you doing?

Midgett: I do basic repair work and maintenance on my amps and stuff. I don’t work as a circuit designer by trade any more, so I don’t do much tweaking. I just fix what breaks.

Have you ever built a microphone? What design did you use?

Midgett: I used to do circuits for a living, at Shure. I adapted a (very, very good) companding wireless preamp for use in Shure’s top-of-the-line UHF-R wireless mic and bodypack, but David Cerra designed that circuit.

I also adapted the basic KSM preamp for use in the KSM9 vocal mic and wireless mic head. It’s a nice preamp–very low noise, neutral. Gene Nemirovsky is the guy who designed it, though.

The only thing I don’t like about the KSM preamp is that it is not a balanced output–pseudobalanced only (one side grounded). The rationale was that it would have the same output into balanced and unbalanced inputs alike. I didn’t think that was a good enough reason to throw away 6dB of output from a professional microphone, but it wasn’t my decision (or Gene’s!). It is very low noise anyway, so no big deal. I can’t say it really changed the mic all that much.

Where do you source parts from?

Midgett: Solid state stuff, I get from Mouser most of the time. Tubes, various places. Triode here in Chicago, Antique Electronic Supply and the Tube Store online.

Which records did you make on the 8 track? I like the raw sound of Blueblood, but the solo record had an amazing detail and depth of sound. How did you achieve that? What did you do differently from the Blueblood sessions?

Midgett: Blueblood, You are Dignified, and It Goes Like This were all recorded on the MCI.

Blueblood was done in a tiny basement. The room was maybe 14′ by 10′, with 6 1/2′ ceilings. Most of the songs were tracked live, as well. That environment was the constraining element of the sound.

I like the music on Blueblood, and I don’t mind the quality of the recording. A few songs sound quite good–”Redeye”, “Beyond Repair”, “Cleaned Me Out”. There are a couple of songs that would have benefited from a more expansive recording–”Said it Too Late” in particular.

The other two records were done in a larger basement, with slightly higher ceilings. All that tracking was easier since there was very little drumming to contend with.

Recording acoustic guitar is extremely easy for me. I have an old Guild F50 that sounds incredible and does most of the work on its own, if it is played halfway competently.

On It Goes Like This, I borrowed a Royer stereo ribbon mic from Steve Albini. It’s a great mic; you can place it almost randomly if you are recording a single source. I used that mic on almost everything.

That EP was recorded with expediency in mind–I wanted it to be as spontaneous as possible, since we’d rework at least a couple of the songs with Silkworm anyway.

On You are Dignified, we tracked the mandolin and guitar together for most things, so it was a little more strategic. The mandolin had a Coles 4038 on it, the guitar had a Royer, and I used some kind of stereo or omni mic for the room (can’t remember what it was).

Could you tell us a little bit about the dynamic of your “new” band, Bottomless Pit? How do you arrange songs? Do you have a process of making demos?

Midgett: Bottomless Pit is more ‘just so’ than Silkworm. The sound of the band is something I had in my head, and we’ve worked hard to get that sound out in the room.

My demos are detailed, and we work off them to a certain degree–at least I do, in guiding things. I have started taking more care in recording them, since I have ended up with usable recordings in a couple of cases. Always a nice surprise.

Andy’s stuff is more collaborative, and we still arrange as a group. Everyone’s input is important.

Do you play all the instruments on your demos? Do you lay down drums? I’d like to hear these.

Midgett: I play all the instruments. I can play bass and rhythm guitar to the level of my desires. OK lead guitar player. Poor keyboard player, and a poor drummer. I play the trumpet, but I don’t really use it on anything.

I rarely play drums on demos. I use my old Alesis HR16 drum machine a lot. I have considered buying a new drum box, but I am fond of this one, after twenty-some years of using it.

MP3: Bottomless Pit - Sevens Sing
Recorded in Tim Midgett’s basement, mixed with Greg Norman @ Electrical Audio

Most of the Silkworm records were made with Steve Albini. With Bottomless Pit’s Hammer of the Gods, you took a different approach, but the results are still amazing. What was the process of making this record?

Midgett: Thank you, first off.

We made Hammer of the Gods with Greg Norman rather than Steve. I wanted to pay ‘full rate’ to Electrical rather than sponge off Steve’s goodwill (which we did shamelessly on the last few Silkworm records). As good a deal as Steve is, we could better afford Greg, and Greg is a very good engineer, so it wasn’t like we were compromising.

We needed a little more time in the studio to get things lined up. Being a new group, we had to figure out how to achieve our desired results. It was easier to book time with Greg on short notice, although that is changing now that more people find out about him.

The album was recorded in roughly equal parts at Studio Greg Studios II (at Greg’s house) and Electrical Audio. I did some tracking at my house–overdubs and most of “Sevens Sing.” Everything was mixed at Electrical.

We took a long time to make the record. Everything was demoed extensively. These songs are important to me, and I wanted to be sure they were in good shape when we documented them. It’s hard to know, sometimes, when things are properly but not overly cooked.

I am very pleased with the sound of the 2×12″ format–I’m not sure we’ll be able to make a 33RPM LP again!

You keep returning to Abbey Road for mastering…what do you like most about their work?

Midgett: We’ve used John Golden Mastering several times to good effect, and we will probably use Chicago Mastering Service, which is Bob Weston’s new place. But I like direct metal mastering for LPs, and Abbey Road is the only place I trust that does it.

They do very good work, and the engineers we’ve worked with there–Steve Rooke and Nick Webb–understand high-fidelity recordings and how they differ from typical pop recordings. They have great equipment and a long history of knowing what to do with it, but they’re not afraid of new technology, either. Just a great, albeit pretty expensive studio.

Have you ever considered a career as a recording engineer?

Midgett: No. I could never do it. I’d go insane dealing with bands and especially all the bad music one has to record to stay in business.

Thanks a lot Tim. Readers should go check out 4 songs from the new record at bottomlesspit.us.