The rhythm guitar was the next obstacle we had to face. We seemed to have no problem getting a decent guitar sound in the basement or on stage, but for whatever reason as soon as we went into a studio it became a major challenge. As with "Manic" this time was no exception. One problem was due to the fact that we tuned extremely low, which always presented intonation and tuning problems. After struggling through most of the original tracks we actually went back and completely re-recorded all of the guitar parts. The bass tracks went the smoothest with John feeling much less rushed than the albums before. On "Manic" Kevin and John were constantly teasing each other about who would finish their parts the in the shorter amount of time. John had always suffered from "red-light" syndrome. This is a common condition in which a musician can play a song flawlessly, fifty times in a row, and then as soon as the record light comes on, he suddenly and completely forgets how to play his instrument. This time Kevin was ordered to remain outside the control room while John was tracking. Another difference this time was that we were ably to commit more time to guitar solos. We put a little less emphasis on speed and a little more on melody and phrasing. We all particularly liked how Kevin's solo turned out on "Driven", as I usually did the more melodic solos. Another nice thing about having so much time was when I came to doing vocals. I was used to recording demos at home, where I am controlling the recorder and can quickly shuttle back and forth between sections in order to listen to or re-do parts that aren't quite right. In a studio situation you are usually stuck in a booth outside the control room with the engineer working the control. This makes communication difficult and if you are off-key you have to wait for the tape to roll back to the right part and instead of jumping right back in and fixing it, you often stand there for a minute or two waiting for the song to come back to the right part. This was another big problem on "Manic", with each line usually taking approximately five million takes. This time I usually went into the studio alone and with a microphone set up right in front of the mixing console, I could record just as I usually did at home. It made things much easier for me and boring enough for anyone else who happened to be there that they would usually go away before too long. People love to make fun of the vocalist in the studio because the is nothing that sounds worse than your dry, unprocessed voice when they can't hear the music you are singing to. This is of course known as "walkman-sing-along" syndrome. I think we spent about five weeks recording everything and the last few mixing. We had been concerned about the fact that the studio had no automation for mixing (this allows you to "write" volume changes or mute and un-mute channels or effects and then "save" those changes to a computer which them performs those tasks each time you play back the tape). Where the board at Royal Recorders was fully automated, this time we had a dozen arms reaching in each direction trying to remember when to turn things up or down or when to mute something, etc. This is always a big restriction in mixing, mainly because if one person forgets to do something at the right time, you have to go back and do the whole thing over again or live with the mistake, depending on whether it's the third or four-hundredth time you have tried to get it right. Needless to say, with the amount of different guitar layers, and especially on the songs containing "orchestration", the final result was less than fabulous. After we had completed mixing everything with less-than-satisfying results, we were convinced that the biggest problem was that we didn't have the right equipment to get the most out of what we considered our best recordings. After a couple of weeks we convinced the record label that we should go back to Royal Recorders and remix everything. They suggested that we hire Bill Metoyer to help out. Bill was well known for his work with SLAYER, TROUBLE, and C.O.C. to name just a few. What we ended up with was an album that we were very happy with. No recording is without its flaws, but I think we were finally able to present our music as we had imagined it to sound. This is still the only one of our four albums that I personally like the sound of. For the most part it was very well received by those who were familiar with ANACRUSIS. Some said the keyboard parts were a little pretentious, but this was to be expected. If there had been a fifth album I can almost guarantee it would have been in the vein of the more "orchestral" songs. There will always be those who prefer the raw speed of "Suffering Hour", the dark moodiness of "Reason" or the technical iciness of "Manic Impressions". It is always a matter of taste. I think as our swan song I am very proud of "Screams and Whispers" as I think it succeeded in summing up all aspects of what we were trying to say both lyrically and musically up to that time. It contains some of my favorite ANACRUSIS songs ("Driven", "Sound The Alarm", and "Release") and, I feel, was a natural progression from where "Manic" left off. And with the number of bands in recent years who have incorporated "orchestral" elements in their recordings and performances (METALLICA's "S & M" to name a very recent one), I'd like to think that, though we were certainly not the first, we were nonetheless at least a little ahead of the pack.