Paula: What was the biggest challenge of recording your album -- I understand you two did a lot of sending tapes back and forth to each other -- how exactly did that work?
Matt: We approached each song differently. Some were built up on digital multi-track. Some one track at a time on DAT. Some started as sequences on John's old MacIntosh or the K2000. All of them would up getting wacked in the computer by Alchemy, D-Sound, Pro Tools or Digital performer. We consistently start with elements we record ourselved rather than relying on some horrible CD-Rom sound library or ripped-off samples of other people's stuff. The biggest challenge was getting to the post office. The raw elements on a project like this are just too big to throw back and forth online. Even from an FTP site, the download would be a pain. John: The biggest challenge for me, actually, was the creation of the musical elements themselves. I'm a drummer, so when I was working on melodic lines I often found myself getting to a point where my memory of music theory classes from high school just couldn't support the concepts I was trying to pull off. That's where the particular nature or our collaboration really became a plus. I could get something half-finished and send it off to Matt and forget about it for a couple of months. He'd send it back and it would be headed in a totally different direction, and usually I found I could work with it again.
