"Eclipse" - 30 Years in the Making

I remember writing "Eclipse." It was 30 years ago (give or take a year). It was an all bass piece with 3 tracks. Not very impressive by today's standards, but back in the day, it was still fairly uncommon. It was also pretty uncommon to record a multi-track tune out of your house. Luckily, we had the "DAW" of the day, a Tascam Porta One.

High tech at the time, the Tascam Porta One was a 4-track tape recorder. You could bounce tracks, apply very simple EQ, adjust levels, do a little panning, and...that's about it.

The '80s DAW of Choice!

I remember having a time of it getting the bass lines perfectly in sync. There's a high bass, a mid bass, and a low bass, all in octaves. If you're off even a hair, it's noticeable. The Tascam didn't have a built-in metronome or click and I didn't think of recording a metronome to an empty track. Soon after I started, I gave up; vanquishing the concept to some distant corner of my mind. And so it stayed there until about 4 years ago.

I was listening to some of my old cassette recordings while cleaning around the house when the piece came on. I turned and looked at my boom box (yes, I still call it a boom box!). There was a moment or two of uncertainty to what was playing. Then it hit me. After a few more seconds, everything came back.

Fast forward to now. A couple of weeks ago I decided to record the piece using a modern DAW. The final recording didn't change much from the initial concept. There are a few minor arrangement changes and a new string section, but, overall, it's the same.

A nice, blurry picture of a modern DAW

Better late then never, I guess.

Listen to it on YouTube | Radius80

- DD Bass