# 11STEPS Debut CD !!!!!



## faracaster (Mar 9, 2006)

Hi All Forumites

I saw on the front pages of the Forum a thread regarding myself and my former band Rockit Science. So I thought I better get this out there to update our status.
Rockit Science officially morphed into 11STEPS about a year ago. (if you google Rockit Science.....there are about 20 bands in North America with that name and we didn't want confusion between us and anyone else). 
This has been what turned into a three year project. We did a CD as Rockit Science of covers (to get work mostly) about four years ago. I had a phone conversation with Craig, our B3 player wondering aloud if we had it in us to do a CD of our own songs. 
In that conversation we talked about a time line (of about a year) to write, arrange, and record about 10 tunes. Well, you know life gets in the way doesn't it? Between very busy work schedules, life changes like marriages, deaths and vacations, it took us about 3 years from starting to write to having a finished CD in our hands.
I picked up the finished CD on Dec 23rd. I have to say it was a bit of an emotional moment. This CD resulted in two departures from the original band because of the commitment required to actually finish a project like this to it's fullest potential. Both these two guys are dear, old friends that are great musicians. But the project really took on a life of it's own and while we thought we knew what it would take, we really had no idea.

I can say however that I am very proud of this debut effort from the band.

We wrote about 40 songs, recorded 17, mixed and mastered 12. The CD has 11 tracks on it with a bonus track at the end. 
The reason there is a "bonus track" is that we wanted to arrange a group of the songs as a journey. I took the songs and arranged them in what I thought was a logical progression. The idea was to be able to listen to this CD from beginning to end as a complete piece of work. The band agreed. We even have some songs overlapping from one to the other. I know that in this age of iPods, and downloads where everyone has their own playlist, this idea of making a CD a statement is archaic. But ultimately rewarding for us as artists and for those who choose do listen to the CD the way it was intended. 11 tracks make up that statement. The 12th was an add on because we just like it.

The CD was produced by myself and Craig MacDonald, our keyboard player.
We recorded and mixed it a North Of Seven Studios in Almont Ont. The CD was engineered by Robin Short, who tireless in getting the sounds we were creating in the studio to transfer to Pro tools as accurately as possible. We gave him a Technical Producer credit for his above and beyond contribution.
Steve Stepanic (SSdeluxe here on the forum) mastered the CD for us at Joao Carvalho Mastering in Toronto. Steve absolutely ROCKED this CD. We brought him what we felt was a pretty damn good sounding CD and he just made it JUMP !!!!!!

From the guitar/ amp side (this is a guitar forum after all). I used whatever I thought was appropriate for the track. From vintage guitars and amps to modern production, boutique, cheap and not so cheap instruments. Mandolins and other stringed instruments were also used. I didn't want to double track anything so the performance would remain loose and vital so we would often track several different amps at the same time. So with close, medium distance and room micing, there would sometimes be as many as 12 tracks of guitar per one performance. We would then mix the different tracks to achieve the sound I was hearing in my head, sometimes eliminating many of the previously recorded tracks. 
(I do have a detailed list if anyone has any interest at all in what took place on what track )

So we have started playing out again with as much verve as we can muster and these gigs have been VERY successful. 
We have just gotten all the prerequisite Internet sites up and running this week and the CD has been available on CD baby for just few days. We have already been added to rotation on 12 stations in France !!!

We have a MySpace page http://www.myspace.com/11stepsband please visit. there you can listen to some selected tracks from the CD and there is notices of upcoming gigs.

We have a Face Book page http://www.facebook.com/pages/11STEPS/426159675407?v=wall please visit and become a fan of the band. This is also the place that you can talk to 11STEPS directly and leave feedback (no pun intended). Gigs and performances will be posted there also.

and MOST IMPORTANTLY our CD is available for download or purchase at CD Baby http://www.cdbaby.com/cd/11STEPS

We have also reached a distribution deal with *HMV*. We are hoping it will be available by next week at their stores. I will post when it is a reality.

We do have a 11STEPS.ca site coming soon. That is under construction as we speak.

We will be having *TWO* CD release parties coming up very shortly. One for us 416ers and one for the 905 and 705ers. I will keep you all apprised of their info.

Thanks All for looking here and visiting any of our internet sites.

cheers
pete


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## LowWatt (Jun 27, 2007)

Great news Pete and AWESOME COVER!!! Great design.


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## GuitarsCanada (Dec 30, 2005)

Made those corrections on the Front Page for you Pete. All the best with this CD, from what I heard it is a winner. Just a note to all members of the board that have bands, if you would like to have your band listed on the Front Page either send me a web link so I can pull the data or send me what you would like put up. Make use of GC's power for your bands. This site gets hit about 10,000 a day by all the major search engine bots.


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## axestronomer (Mar 1, 2007)

Hey Pete.
I just had a listen to the tracks on the Myspace page and the one word I would use to describe them is fantastic!
The sound quality and the mixdown of the tracks is superb and the guitar tone is full and to die for.
Congratulations on the release!


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## Guest (Jan 22, 2010)

Awesome Pete! Can't wait to get home and check it out!


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## hollowbody (Jan 15, 2008)

Congrats Pete! I'll check out the disc for sure!


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## faracaster (Mar 9, 2006)

faracaster said:


> We have also reached a distribution deal with *HMV*. We are hoping it will be available by next week at their stores. I will post when it is a reality.
> 
> 
> 
> ...





Thanks to all for the kind comments. It's all very exciting at this point.

I said I'd let you know when we are doing our CD release parties and *our 905 area CD release party is this coming Saturday Feb 20th *(416 still TBD, but I will ). Please come out if you are in the area. Info for the show is in this thread.........http://www.guitarscanada.com/showth...S-905-area-CD-release-party-Saturday-Feb-20th

*ALSO*......... Our CD is now available at HMV stores across the GTA and can be ordered in any HMV store across Canada.

We are also on iTunes as of last week.

So things are moving along. I'll update with any news as it happens.
Thanks for your support and if you are in the Markham, Pickering are on Saturday come on out !!!

cheers
pete


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