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Garbage's Billy Bush Talks INA-GRM
by Randy Alberts
Top: Billy Bush
Bottom: The Garbage studio |
Band's engineer on using all the right GRM Tools "The GRM Tools package is so hardcore, it's unreal, the coolest thing ever." Coming from lead Garbage engineer and programmer Billy Bush, that about sums up the rest of this GRM user story to follow. Oh, he goes on to talk about his Shuffling, Pitch Accum, and Band Pass filter tools, something interesting about the way they recorded and mangled parts of "Push It," and a bit about getting weird sounds with Doppler, but the first quote about GRM Tools there could just about sum it all up for Billy. "When we've exhausted all of our avenues to make a sound be cool, different, or weird, that is when the GRM stuff truly shines," says Billy, who has engineered and programmed for Garbage since the band's Version 2.0 in 1998. "It's like, 'Hmm, what do you think Shuffling would do to that part?' or 'what would happen if we ran that through Pitch Accum or put a really narrow Band Pass filter on it?'" How did it work out? "Anything it takes to make a sound be unique. Often you need something to inspire a part that's not happening and it ends up being just the thing the track needed. The GRM stuff to me is kind of like that, which is a good thing. It makes whatever you put through it a little bit stranger and a little more special, you know?" Only Happy When It Shuffles We know, Billy. Bush, who shares console time with producer and Garbage drummer Butch Vig (Nevermind, Smashing Pumpkins, Sonic Youth, L7) for every Garbage Pro Tools session, has also done the same with Korn, Limp Bizkit, Ash, Alanis Morrisette, The Offspring, and Beck. Bush, Vig and band mates Steve Marker, Duke Erikson, and Shirley Manson are also currently recording their much-anticipated fourth album. Following the infectious and wildly successful Garbage, Version 2.0, and Beautiful Garbage and songs like "Only Happy When It Rains", "Push It", and "Androgyny" won't be easy, but that's where GRM Tools continues to help them out. A band as technologically adaptive as Garbage is always at the vanguard of just what we can do these days with a plug-in, and Billy is no exception on this side of the Garbage board. He's seen early Akai samplers and Studer 24-tracks and Studio Vision and Pro Tools III come and go since Garbage was recorded in 1995. Perhaps some day he'll include his new Pro Tools|HD rig loaded with GRM Tools in that historic list, but for now he's too busy carving up, shuffling, accumulating, doppler-ing, and band filtering various Garbage tracks to come up with something completely unheard of and entirely new. "The Band Pass Plug-in was easily automated where the breakdown in 'Push It' filters away to nothing," Bush continues. "That's all GRM stuff there. When we do our B-sides we have free reign and don't have to make it sound pop. For one B-side called 'Tornado' we ran all the vocals into the Shuffling plug-in, printed the results of three passes onto a couple of new tracks, took individual pieces from it that were all screwed up then just dropped them in randomly to give it a Euro remix vibe." Billy says Garbage also uses GRM Tools to develop textural backdrops, add motion to parts, subtly shift something or to dramatically alter and affect entire tracks at a time. He uses Band Pass, Pitch Accum, Doppler, and the entire GRM Tools set on fast, furious techno songs like "Hammering In My Head" and special effects of "Push It" from Version 2.0. "We wanted a cement mixer caught in a tornado sort of a sound. So, obviously, you start thinking about a tornado and you think, 'I've got to use Doppler.' Using it with the SuperSlider is very cool because I like how handy it is to get something to go from point A to point B with just one touch of a slider. We often use the GRM stuff like that as a sound design tool." The Sound of Garbage This Garbage engineer/programmer goes on to explain that there's nothing that sounds quite like GRM's Band Pass filter plug-in. He struggles trying to think of another software filter plug-in that compares to Band Pass before arriving at a better comparison. Considering it's one of the most respected and coveted hardware equalizers in the world he's arrived at, the GRM plug-ins' coders couldn't be more happy to hear Billy's comparison. "Band Pass is unlike anything else out there, " says Bush. "The only thing I can think of is the Manley Massive Passive EQ's I have. It's a big heavy piece of outboard gear with a lot of knobs on it. It doesn't sound like any other EQ on the planet. If you really want to filter something you can do it with that, but the sound of the Manley is what the GRM filters remind of. Something that's completely not like anything else that's out there, it's truly one-of-a-kind stuff." Before you dip back into the new Garbage sessions, any last comment you'd like to add, Billy Bush? "Yeah, the cool thing about the GRM stuff is it doesn't necessarily come from a musical place, it comes from more of a sonic place." www.garbage.com ||| |