Episode 22: Joe Cardamone of The Icarus Line

I have mentioned on several episodes and posts that I am metal head. I love Metal, and especially bands like Dillinger Escape plan and Periphery. Before I was a metal head, though my parents and grandparents made sure I had a very wide exposure to music. Growing up I listened to classic rock, big band jazz, 50's and 60's pop and rock. I enjoy the arrangements that went into some of the early pop music. Some songs were very sparse and some were quite elaborate. Some required some amazingly creative thinking on the part of the recording engineers to achieve a certain sound. But then I discovered Metal, in particular Metallica. Metallica had a symphonic quality about them and their longer song structure was like listening to a mini-symphony. But then the "Black Album" happened, and a lot of my metal heroes stopped being metal for a while. So I discovered the Post punk and hardcore scene of the late 70's and early 80's and what ended up being called alternative rock in the 90's. There was a raw quality to the music, and the arrangement was there once again. Of course that scene also dried up and distilled itself into watered down pop leaving me with a craving for something new or perhaps old. It seems while the music that I had enjoyed in my youth was thought to be dead, it was really just a Phoenix getting ready to rise from the ashes. And it turns out so was the post punk hardcore that I enjoyed. And today there is a thriving scene that allows us to not draw lines in the sand and just focus on making great music. And that is What Joe Carmadone does, he makes great music. Listening to the latest Album by the Icarus line is like listening to the audio equivalent of watching someone paint by throwing gobs of it from their brushes. At first it seems like chaos, then a melody emerges. That melody is nurtured and built into a song, and then it all starts again. Talking with Joe, I learned that he a modern guy with old-school sensibility. He knows when something calls for a high tech solution, or when a time tested 50 year recording technique will suffice. How does he know this? Because he is an artist. And artist knows what his tools, respects his tools, and more importantly, knows which tool is best for the job. Joe might have a huge mountain of gear and effects at his disposal, but he uses what is best for the song, for the creation. And that.... is what we discuss in Episode 22. Gear, creating music, and capturing a performance.