Well, it’s been “all go” here in Orlando for the past few weeks! First, I have been involved in the recording of Orleans’ first studio album in 8 years: both as a drummer and engineer. We cut the initial tracks while the rest of the band were in Florida for a week of gigs. We played Sunfest in West Palm first of all, then we did 4 nights at Epcot, followed by a gig in Sanford, Fl, for the opening of the new Riverwalk there (larry Hoppen is a resident of Sanford, so this was a good thing to be doing). In the mornings, we gathered at my place, and recorded a tune. By the end of the week, we had 7 great backtracks.

Then, earlier in June, we gathered once again for 11 days of overdubbing. I was employed as engineer on this occasion, and only ended up playing a bit of percussion at the end of the period. So that was an interesting departure from my ‘norm’!

The job of mixing the tracks was given to John Marsden, producer and writer for Plan 9. Speaking of which, we released our 3rd album this month. “Rearview” is a collection of re-arrangements of hits that have influenced us over the years. Our first single, a treatment of Pablo Cruise’s “Wathca Gonna Do” (featuring the vocal talents of Pablo Cruise’s Dave Jenkins) has been climbing the AC charts. We are currently at 96, and climbing. Very exciting! More updates to come…
Charlie