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Classic Tracks: X and “The New World
when they sing, ‘It was better before before they voted for what’s-his-name,’” he says. “It could almost be a John Philip Sousa march. There’s a hint of that.”
Bonebrake also recalls that his drum part on the song posed some challenges. “I’m pretty sure the song was always in 12/8 time,” he says. “But the thing about rehearsing with X is, we rehearse relatively quietly—not a whisper, but, because we were in an office space and we didn’t even have a great sound system in there, we played lighter.
“The beat I do on that song is all eighth-notes and it’s fast on the hi-hat, but when we started to really play it, I realized that may have been a mistake because it’s really hard to play that way and play loud. But I decided it doesn’t sound right any other way, so that’s the way I’ll always play it.”
REMEMBERING RAY Partway through rehearsals for the album sessions, the band was joined in their rehearsal space by their producer, Ray Manzarek. The former Doors keyboardist produced the first three X albums, and More Fun in the New World would be his fourth and last time in the studio with them.
“We met Ray in 1979 at the Whisky a Go Go,” Bonebrake says. “We were opening a show and Ray was there with his wife, Dorothy, to see the headliner. At that time we were playing a really fast version of ‘Soul Kitchen’ by the Doors. When we started playing ‘Soul Kitchen,’ Dorothy recognized it and she looked over at Ray, like, ‘Hey, do you hear that?’ Apparently he had a blank look; he didn’t recognize it at first. But they came backstage and he said, ‘I really like your stuff—the poetry and the music, and your sound. I’d love to produce you if I could.’”
On Los Angeles, the band’s debut, Manzarek played keyboards on a few songs, but on subsequent albums he served solely as producer.
“He was well aware of what it was like to be a musician, and he knew what it was like to be the oddball,” Bonebrake says. “We were part of the punk scene, but we weren’t exactly punk. The Doors were like that, too. They came out of the ‘60s, but they would do a Kurt Weill song, or some poetry. Even though they had hits like ‘Light My Fire,’ I remember listening to their records as a kid and going, ‘Wow, this is dark and wonderful.’ So there was that commonality.”
THE SESSIONS AT CHEROKEE After the band fine-tuned their arrangements with Manzarek, they all headed to Cherokee Studios to begin tracking in Studio 1. The live recording sessions—with Bonebrake and Zoom in the big room, and Doe and Cervenka in iso booths—were engineered by the band’s live mixer, Clay Rose, who was assisted by Cherokee staffer Brian Scheuble. Mix was unable to track down Rose for this story, but Scheuble offers a unique perspective on the sessions, as this was literally the first studio session he ever worked on.
“Before that, I had been a runner for four to six months,” Scheuble says. “I was thrown into that session and I really was pretty green, but they were the coolest, nicest people and everybody was supportive. I don’t think they ever knew that this was my first session.”
The band played live with Doe and Cervenka singing guide vocals. Bonebrake’s drums were set up in the middle of the room. Though Zoom played his Gretsch Silver Jet guitar in the live room as well, his amp—a 1960 Fender Concert—was isolated. Scheuble recalls that Rose’s experience as a live engineer informed the microphone choices.
“There were a lot of 57s,” Scheuble says. “They were on the drum kit, the guitar amps, the snare, the tom-toms. But there was also a pair of Neumann U87s being used as room mics, and John and Exene sang into U67s.”
Songs were captured to one of the studio’s MCI JH24 tape machines via the mic pre’s in one of Cherokee’s four Trident A-Range consoles.
“It was a well-equipped studio, and we also used 1176s and LA2As and Fairchilds—pretty much all the great old gear that everybody drools over today. I also remember Clay using an old Eventide delay for guitars and vocals, which was pretty standard back in those days.”
“We would do about two songs a day,” Bonebrake recalls. “I think the basic tracking took five or six days, after the first day, which was just getting sounds. We would get there every day and work on a song, and if we didn’t get it we would have dinner and then we’d probably get it on the first take after dinner. Then we’d work on the second song, and if we didn’t get it, we would come in fresh in the morning and get that on the first or second take.
“That’s one of the consistent things about X: If we’re not getting the groove on a song, we don’t beat it to death. We take a break. We’ll come back tomorrow. We’ll make suggestions, but we don’t get microscopic. We let it happen organically until it starts to work.”
When the basics were complete, the project moved to Studio 3 to overdub any replacement parts, solos and final vocals.
“John and Exene would sing together on separate mics with a gobo between them,” Scheuble recalls. “There was never too much analyzing or overthinking on this album. The vibe was pretty light and fun.
“From there, we went right into mixing,” the engineer continues. “Everything was mixed to an Ampex ATR 102 quarter-inch machine. We had no automation; everything was by hand, which was awesome for me because they had me doing moves and I was able to learn how to use the A-Range console very quickly. Everybody had their little part of the board. Ray was down on the far left, Clay was in the middle, John had a couple of faders, and I was on the far right doing some on-and-off for the backgrounds and some percussion. I also remember we used Cherokee’s EMT 140 plates on vocals. It was an amazing trial-by-fire experience, and the first of many sessions I worked on as an assistant and as an engineer for the next six years.”
Ten years after working on More Fun in the New World, Scheuble coincidentally ended up serving as one of the engineers on X’s 1993 album Hey Zeus. Today he is an independent engineer and mixer.
X stopped working with Ray Manzarek after New World, and sadly the great Doors keyboardist and producer passed away in 2013. DJ Bonebrake and his bandmates have gone through different incarnations and side projects over the years, including a five-year hiatus, but X survives. The band have been touring in their original lineup on and off since 1998, and 2020 saw the release of Alphabetland, their first studio album in 27 years.
More Fun in the New World went to Number 86 on Billboard’s album chart and remained on the chart for 23 weeks—a notable feat for a punk band at that time. Track one, “The New World,” might as well have been written in 2020. n
