I convinced myself that I had to do everything from writting to mastering and there I suffered the time and spirit consuming consequences x )
But well here it is, in a state I consider tolerable to share:
The recording stage had me tracking DI guitars then reamping them through a little Peavey Rage 158 and some Orange for the final solo. For the bass just the DI set through Guitarrix. Drums were played by a good friend of mine and recorded in a rehearsal room with 4 microphones in what I intended to set as an ORTF + snare and kick mics (which came out as lets say 65% of what I expected it to be). I had my vocals recorded in different rooms I have been living in the last year, with just a dynamic mic, an antipop and mic placement as my weapons against the outrageous noise we live surrounded by in our daily lives.
Writting and recording took me something around 4 months, then I spent about a year working out the editing and mixing. It wasn’t an everyday thing, I picked it up from time to time trying to give my ears some rest. Somewhere in the middle of the process I asked here about drum replacement as I felt my original sounds were kind of weak, at that time I couldn’t get lsp plugins to work but some months passed and despite having commited to the original snare sound I finally could use lsp trigger in my system and blended some samples in, both for snare and kick.
Then mastering was the least enjoyable part of the process, I will definitively be delegating that part on someone else for the next song xD. The thing is all that limiting brought up little noises and glitches I had in my tracks due to the poor isolation that some of the material was recorded in. So going back and forth to the mix session took another good chunk of time and life from me.
Plugins I recall using:
A lot of Calf Suite, after the first money I ever get with this goes to Ardour the next bag should be going to those guys, but they take none so I will just drink it xD
So Calf: compressor thrown at pretty much everything, multiband compresor for bass and mastering, multiband gate for cleaning drum hits, limiter for mastering, bass enhancer for kick, transient designer for some guitar, saturator and vintage delay for vocals.
The most used eqs have to be the ones from Pere RĂ fols Soler, highly recommended, I also used a couple of times the x42eq due to its nicely band listening feature, which by the way is something Calf multiband plugins have as well and that is just perfect.
Guitarrix tremolo and vibrato pedals for intro and ending, MOD’s C* Scape Stereo delay for that little solo in the middle of the song. The already mentioned lsp trigger plugin (awesome), and finally the (I have to admit it) AT1 autotune, mostly in vocal harmonies as I needed them to be as clean and clear as possible. Although that plugin doesn’t pull a vocal track off on its own so I have to think that I have some singing by my side xD but all the props to the devs (Robin Gareus?) because it is indeed a really helpful tool, even more in those times when you just can’t find the strength to set your room up again to sing against the horns, helicopters and ~€#$$*% crickets.
That’s it, I have still a long way ahead but with a feeling that this is a good start, I like the song but I have to admit I got sick more than once from listening to it so, many, many, freaking, times… so having it done now is definitively liberating for planning new things. I nonetheless don’t rule out the idea of remastering it in the future, I just had to do everything this time : )
Mental notes for the next trip:
- track drums with at least 6 mics next time, or 8 even better.
- vocals have to be recorded in an isolated space
- buy a battery for my laptop
If you happen to have any question about the process I’d be glad to share ; )
Thanks for reading and listening.
. Keep it up; I’ll patiently await your next full-length release 
