The last time I set foot in a studio it was a place in Hoboken called Water Music to make the Yakub record, probably around January or February 1999. It took over an hour to get the drum sound. That’s over an hour of hearing an engineer instruct you: Hit the snare drum — snare — snare — snare — snare — snare — ok, the kick — kick — kick… And I’m sure we did it much faster than is normally considered professional.

Today The Surge drove to a fellow’s house in Rockville to record my drum tracks under the wise care of producer Charles Gray. Set up time took less than half an hour total. I was dubious of recording in a guy’s apartment, nestled in a Montgomery County cul-de-sac, but his cathedral ceilings made me a believer. Immediately we hit a snag: he couldn’t load his ProTools. Day a waste? Nonsense. We got out the two-track and some quarter inch tape, mic’d my kick drum and backed a room mic about ten feet away from the kit and recorded like it was Studio One. Should we just use the room microphone? We wondered at one point. Sure, I responded. Like Nas, all I need is one mic.

I ended up keeping a Twitterdiary of the session. (The "two inch tape" is a mistype. That’d be some massive tape.)