Robert Johnson did it this way,and he influenced every great guitarist,He never got one red cent for it either.24/7/365 your hear someone copping his influence,somewhere in the world.The is a sweetness,an honesty and a purity with an acoustic guitar.I love the studio and it's tecnology yet to me the essence of recording art is to capture a heartfelt Human performance,the majority of commercial sessions,this is not the case.It is a series of digitally created composite recordings edited and assembled together by the producer.It is not anything human it is a computer.That is not to say it doesn't sound good simply to say it is not real,a group did not sit down and play that.They did little bits and pieces of it seperately.My personal illustration of this would be the only New York sessions I did with the band for "(oo)(oo) I've Been Calling."This session was completely styled to us recording as a major label act would,with a top-notch producer being hired who did not care one whim for any of our ideas nor input.We just delivered the goods the way he wanted to hear it.And that is what I was paying for too.I wanted to know if I could cut it that way.The band was totally blindsided by this and very upset about it.We had written and been performing this song onstage successfully for 6 months.Yet in New York we did not at anytime play anything together nor play the whole song at any time in succession.And we played and sang what we were told to play and sing.Not any of our input nor credence was accepted.We came back to Florida without any idea of what the song sounded like.We laid down NO drum tracks at all.The only stipulation was that our parts would not be cut and overdubbed by him although it was accepted that my good friend and radio promoter, Gary Lefkowith was going to do some sweet guitar on it too.In fact he wrote the guitar solo for the middle eight bridge but I was the one that played it.So when the song was finished and mastered at Sterling Sound it was stunning and beautiful,radio airplay as slick as they come...perfection in audio fidelity.Within' two weeks it went to number one in New music Weekly's top 40 up and coming charts edging out the fantastic Maroon Five's "This Love Is Breaking My Heart."For the number one spot.Of course we were stopped right there, we did not have the major label promotional muscle to go on any further.Nontheless for an indie from nowhere that is a pretty impressive showing.Now back to my point,that recording is not genuinely us,it is a computer model of us,albeit,an excellent one yet the drums are totally fake.We had to re-learn it to do it live,in fact we did both versions.But it is a breakdown of an illusion for us to listen to it.We did not create it we performed the elements to it yes but when they were recorded they were irrevalent to anything but the click track,it was the vision of the producer that became the creation.And I am accustomed to being in charge of every tiny detail of a session.To do a couple of albums like this would be kind of creatively gut wrenching.Because when you listened to it you would know it was not really you.Yet I could do it that way if someone was paying me to do it that way,it was a tremendous learning expierence.I came back to NYC apart from the band to observe the production of it.And this is a topnotch producer,He pulled our finest skills out of us and if you are going to NYC my friend,you had better be going with your best!The same is true of doing a direct to disc,your skills must be impeccable.and the recording is a much more honest thing.I mean so what really if somone can hear your watch rattle or your slide hitting the fingerboard.I am very much looking forward to the upcoming sessions.They are not being done to produce hit records,it is just for the pure joy of playing and singing music.perhaps out of it you may even be given cause to REALLY feel something for once in your life.And I am still alive and well you see so you are going to be forced to endure me yet a little bit longer before I fly away.Peace and love to all!/Ren