West Valley Recording Studios

In 1997 @lessthanjake’s cover of “I Think I Love You” appeared on the Scream 2 Soundtrack. Producer: Me My manager at the time was Ed Gerrard, who worked for the legendary @supermenschshep. He supervised music for the film. Off to Gainesville Fla. to Mirror Image Studios. We recorded quickly. Speeding it up and adding the raucous horns and vocals made the track a burner…just what director @therealwescraven wanted. I bonded with the band and especially @lessthanchrisd, who loved late 1980’s hair bands, a good part of my discography. LTJ got signed to @capitolrecords by Craig Aaronson (RIP), who later signed @mychemicalromance, @theused, etc. “Losing Streak” did real well for them and poised for the next level. I had just made the switch to @avid.protools. LTJ was OK with me using the computer as long as we recorded the drums/bass/guitars on tape and transferred to the computer. Vocals, horns, keys all done to the DAW. Back to Mirror Image Studios… spending like a month in Gainesville when university was out was bizarre. It was LTJ, me, @stevenbradleyofficial (engineer) and alligators! I was grappling with Protools 3.0 running on a PowerMac 9600 crashing constantly! Back then you could call Digidesign for help and they answered the phone! The first contender was Big Crash, and then Boring Town and Metalheads raised their hands. Chris and @lessthanraj are super expressive singers and blend amazingly well! The horns on singles were a discussion between the band and Capitol… the suits at Capitol had this thing about horns and prospective radio play. But I thought we got what we needed and everyone seemed happy. This may have been one of the first albums mixed out of the “box” and onto an SSL (@solidstatelogic). @chrislordalge was perplexed seeing a computer instead of reels of tape. We figured out how to interface the 2 disparate systems. Boring Town was one of the first tracks where I personally achieved what I had in my head… a big song with an epic finale! All the songs were strong and the band played and sang their hearts out! And I loved Vinnie’s lyrical story telling. It’s their biggest selling album! Clipped from Chris DeMakes A Podcast #lessthanjake #hellorockview #historyofboringtown #musicproducer #behindtherecord

I vaguely remember producing this with @theused and @mychemicalromance... it was in the middle of a lot of chaos and projects. What I do remember is when we recorded it the Used were more well known. @BertMckraken came in, introduced himself to me in a very interesting way 🤷🤘, and proceeded to destroy one of our vintage mics during the vocals I was producing. He was just into it.. the studio was not amused. But it came out great and credit to Craig Aaronson (RIP) for making it happen (he signed both artists to @WarnerBrothers). Bert played the keyboards. #theused #mychemicalromance #underpressure #musicproducer #behindtherecord