Steve Smith, who originally became well-known as the drummer with Journey, grew up playing jazz. Since 1983 he has led Vital Information, one of the world’s top fusion-oriented groups. The latest iteration of the group features Smith in a trio with keyboardist Manuel Valera and electric bassist Janek Gwizdala.
Smith rarely looks backwards, but he was so inspired by Valera’s transformation of Journey’s classic “Don’t Stop Believin’“ into an up-tempo jazz-rock piece that he decided to record new versions of several songs from his illustrious past. New Perspective consists of revivals of three songs apiece from Journey and earlier versions of Vital Information, plus a Michael Brecker composition he previously recorded by Steps Ahead. All these new recordings are greatly changed from the original versions.
In addition to the standard two-channel stereo version, New Perspective–along with the group’s prior two releases, Time Flies and A Prayer For The Generations–is also available in Dolby Atmos. The immersive mixes were created by Kostadin Kamcev at his Mozart Studio in New Jersey, transporting the listener into the studio with the band. Immersive streaming on Apple Music and Tidal is a great way to sample these albums, but the new lossless Dolby TrueHD/Atmos MKV files from IAA’s shop provide an infinitely more rewarding experience for audiophiles.
I recently had the chance to chat with Smith and Kamcev about their years-long collaboration, thoughts on the new immersive format, and where they think the industry is headed.
In as much detail as you want to go into, it’d be great to hear about both your backgrounds and how you first began collaborating.
Steve: I grew up in the Boston area and was immediately drawn to playing the drums. I started studying privately at nine years old, then went on to attend the Berklee College of Music after graduating from high school in 1972.
I was on the path to be a jazz musician at the time–and the interesting thing about the early-70s was that there weren’t such hard boundaries between jazz and rock. A lot of popular rock bands from that era had jazz influences.
I assume you’re referring to bands like the Mahavishnu Orchestra or Weather Report?
Steve: Yeah, that was the beginning of jazz and rock coming together. But if you listen to Jimi Hendrix, you hear a lot of jazz influence in Mitch Mitchell's drumming or in Ginger Baker’s drumming for Cream.
After Berklee, my first big touring and recording gig was for Jean-Luc Ponty–who had come out of the second incarnation of The Mahavishnu Orchestra. That led to me doing a lot of touring, and eventually the guys in Journey heard me play. They asked me to join their band in 1978, which seemed like a very interesting proposition. I’d never really played with a great singer before–I had mainly played instrumental music up to that point.
When I joined Journey, the band was still up-and-coming. We were playing some of the same 2500 seat theaters I’d played with Jean-Luc Ponty. In those days, fusion music was popular enough to fill a 2500 seat venue. Immediately after leaving Journey in 1985, I started recording and touring with Steps Ahead–with Mike Mainieri and Michael Brecker. That put me right back where I wanted to be, focusing more on jazz than rock music.
I started my own group, Vital Information, in 1983–a little over four decades ago now–and we’ve managed to keep that going in various incarnations over the years. That brings us to one of the last iterations of the group before this latest one, when Vinny Valentino was the guitarist. He introduced me to Kosta, who we first recorded with at a studio in Teaneck, New Jersey.
Kosta: It was the former drummer from Blood, Sweat & Tears’ place, Andrea Valentini.
Steve: That’s it. We did some work there. Neal Schon came to that studio to have me record drums on one of his projects in 2014 and Kosta recorded the drums. Vital Information recorded our album Heart Of The City at Andrea Valentini’s studio. Then we moved over to Kosta’s Studio Mozart with the current incarnation of Vital Information.
In the videos that come with the New Perspective album, I assume that’s Kosta’s studio we’re seeing?
Steve: Yes. He’s got the cameras built-in, which is wonderful. It makes it really easy to document things as we’re recording.
Kosta: So, I’m coming from Macedonia, which was the former Republic of Yugoslavia. I’ve been into music since I was a kid, and I played in bands all throughout high school. I started recording with a small reel-to-reel deck and eventually ADATs before opening my own studio in a small town called Kavadarci.
That studio was originally in my house, but later I found out there was an abandoned bomb shelter nearby. I asked the town if I could use it as a studio, which they probably thought was crazy. It was a huge space and really well-insulated, so we were able to do a lot of great work there. We recorded all kinds of music–folk, jazz, rock, anything you could imagine–with famous people from all around the country.
After that, I ended up relocating one more time–to Skopje, the capital of Macedonia. This time I was renting an old studio from the national television network, which was a great sounding room built by the Germans in the old days when no expense was spared. We did a lot of recordings there too. Then, In March of 2000–coming up on 25 years now–I moved to the United States with my family. I was able to take my console at the time, D&R Triton, and some of the equipment I had at that last studio, and I didn’t speak the language or know anyone here. It was a crazy decision at the time, but looking back now I’m glad I did it.
My first job was at a local studio in Wayne New Jersey, called Granite Alps. I saw in the paper they were looking for an engineer, so I decided to apply even though I didn’t speak English at the time. The owners gave me a chance to mix something–they had a nicer two-inch Studer machine–and were impressed with the results, so they hired me. While I was working there, I took classes at a community college to learn English. I understood everything written, which helped me a lot from the beginning–because I translated all these manuals for Pro Tools and other gear. I still have that whole translation of the full manual from ‘95 or ‘96.
Wow, so you probably know all the keyboard shortcuts. [laughs]
Kosta: Not off the top of my head, but a lot of that stuff is kind of muscle memory now.
After that first studio closed, I started putting my own space together. I found an old house with a three or four-car garage, which I converted into a studio, and bought a Trident console. That console had some issues and there were no technicians around to fix it, so I started to learn about repairing old gear. I rebuilt the power supply and recapped it myself.
Like Steve was saying before, later on I ended up getting connected with Andrea Valentini, who was the former drummer for Blood, Sweat, and Tears, and he had connections with a lot of musicians in the area, like Lenny White, Vinny Valentino, and Steve himself. So that was how we first got introduced.
I read online that you did a vocal session for one of the new Dune movies at your studio. How did that project come about?
Kosta: Yeah. It was actually for both films, though I think they used more of what we recorded in the second one. That was the gig that saved us during COVID, because it was 8-10 hours of recording at least four days a week. I was working with Loire Cotler, who’s a featured vocalist in those movies. A lot of people think all eerie vocals throughout the film are some kind of digital effect, but they’re actually all her.
I’ve known Loire for almost 18 years now. My understanding is that Michael Lehmann Boddicker, a session player for a couple of Michael Jackson’s albums as a keyboard player, discovered her on YouTube and told his wife Edie Lehman Boddicker – who’s a big vocal contractor, she’s worked on lots of big-name films as well as with a lot of big artists like Beyonce, Billie Eilish, Alicia Keys... So, they were the ones who showed her to Hans [Zimmer], who called her up for a test session in L.A.
I think she didn’t feel comfortable flying out there to record, so she asked if they could do it from New Jersey–which is how I came into the picture. They loved the sounds we were getting–in fact I remember being on Zoom with Hans, and he gave me free reign to experiment. It was a lot of fun, but the organization of the sessions and having to constantly exchange files with them was hard work.
Like I was saying before, the whole project happened during COVID–so we didn’t have any contact. She stayed in the booth, I stayed in the control room. We didn’t even shake hands.
Going back to Steve for a minute–during the ‘70s and ‘80s, was it strange to be simultaneously playing in Journey and Vital Information? The styles are so different.
Steve: Not at all. In fact, it was grounding. I’d been playing with the guys from the original Vital Information line-up–Tim Landers on bass and Dave Wilczewski on sax–since high school, when we met playing in a local big band. A few years later, I met [guitarists] Mike Stern and Dean Brown while studying at Berklee. That was the first incarnation of Vital Information.
It was great to keep my contact with jazz during that time, because playing coliseums and stadiums with Journey was unfamiliar territory. During those seven years I was in Journey, we went from theaters all the way to arenas–with maybe 15,000 people–and then to coliseums that had 60-100,000 seats. It was always exciting, though also a bit daunting. Ultimately, I feel a lot more comfortable in the theater and jazz clubs.
On this latest record, you’ve actually done a few re-arranged jazz versions of classic Journey songs–which I understand is something you've never done before with Vital Information.
Steve: That’s right. I've always resisted the idea of playing jazz versions of Journey songs. It just didn’t seem like the music was conducive to that kind of treatment, even though I’ve heard of jazz musicians coming up with versions of classic songs by bands like Nirvana or Led Zeppelin.
I also just haven’t had any desire to play those songs again, though the idea has come up a few times with the other guys in the band. There’s a big age difference in this iteration of Vital Information: I’m 70 years old now, and the other guys–Janek Gwizdala on bass and Manuel Valera on keys–are in their mid-40s. They were the ones really pushing for it, and the arrangements they came up with were so good that I couldn’t say no. They really work as jazz pieces.
We played Manuel’s version of “Don’t Stop Believin’” on tour and it got a great reaction. Then he came up with a beautiful version of “Open Arms,” and people really enjoyed that as well. Janek arranged “Who’s Crying Now,” which is a very complex and challenging arrangement–but it was great, and all enjoyed playing it.
So that idea of revisiting some music that I had recorded before became the concept for this new album which we ended up calling New Perspective. We also re-recorded some older Vital Information songs, and a tune I used to play with Steps Head called “Sumo”–which is a Michael Brecker composition. These arrangements are all quite different from the original versions.
When you’re recording with the group, do you typically play a piece all the way through and then choose one take in its entirety? Or are the final versions on the album edited together from multiple takes?
Steve: We strive to play it once and have that be the take. By the time we went into the studio to record, we’d already been playing this material on tour for weeks. I remember “Open Arms” was one take, but “Don’t Stop Believin’” does have an edit somewhere. For the most part it really is live in the studio, with little-to-no overdubs. The only one I can think of is on “The Perfect Date,” there are some extra keyboard parts we added to enhance the bridge.
In the Atmos mix, I remember there’s one track where you can hear a keyboard part moving around the height speakers. Other than that one instance, I assumed it was basically ‘live-in-the-studio’.
Steve: The other thing that's overdubbed is my voice on “Charukeshi Express”, when I’m doing that Indian vocal percussion called Konnakol. I do it live with a headset, but in the studio those parts sound great doubled.
All three of these records–Time Flies, A Prayer For The Generations, and New Perspective–sound incredible. So, I’m curious if either of you could speak to what kind of microphones and other gear were used during the tracking process.
Kosta: For the toms, we used Steve’s DPA set. The rest on the drums were my microphones. Steve uses 3 snares, so top was Neuman KM4s on all, and the bottom was AKG 414 B-ULS, the Bass drum was DPA and FETU47 combination, as well as regular Room Mics. For New Perspective, since I knew we were going to mix it in Atmos, I added two more overheads and an additional stereo room mic as well.
So, you’re already thinking about Atmos implementation during the recording stage?
Kosta: Yes. It’s nice to have more options in order to give the drums more depth.
For the other instruments–bass and guitar–it was all direct input, the big tube REDDI to the VR Neve board. Janek was using an amp too, but that was more for him to hear himself out in the room. There may have been one or two songs where he was in the booth for that reason instead of in the room with the other guys.
Steve: Time Flies and A Prayer For The Generations were the first albums I did with this new version of Vital Information. They were both recorded from November 29 - December 4, 2022. I was in the main room versus the drum booth in order to get a big sound. Janek was in a booth, and Manuel was in another booth playing acoustic piano or Fender Rhodes. For the third album, New Perspective, we decided to record with everyone in the main room.
We went into the studio for an afternoon on June 29, 2023. We were on tour and that was our one day off and we were in the area. We recorded the first four songs that are on New Perspective, I thought of as “side one” of a record. That’s when I decided to continue with the idea of new arrangements of songs I had previously recorded. We returned to Studio Mozart on April 10 & 11, 2024 to finish the album.
I remember that A Prayer For The Generations also had George Garzone on sax.
Steve: That’s right. We asked George to play a couple of songs on Time Flies. He played in the drum booth so we could get a great sax sound. Once we finished those songs, George wanted to keep playing! The first additional song we played was a John Coltrane composition called “One Down, One Up.” George brought in the piece and asked if we could record it. That went so well, he said, “Let’s keep improvising as if we are offering a prayer.”
We came up with one idea after another and the album unfolded in real time. That entire record was made in about three hours. The album is sequenced exactly as the improvised pieces were recorded. Each performance was captured on video and you can watch them all on YouTube. They are simply titled “A Prayer For The Generations Part 1” and so on to Part 7. The next day Manuel, Janek and I improvised two additional pieces that are on the album.
Kosta: As far as gear goes, like we were saying before the bass was all direct. We didn’t use the amp at all. Manuel’s Rhodes was direct as well, with some pedal inserts that Manuel uses. For the Piano, with Manuel, I’m usually using two U67s and a little DPA clip-on inside the piano.
On the Piano, as a preamps, I used a Merging Horus interface, which has very high-quality preamps. Sax was captured with a Sanken CU-41 going thru my “Musgraved” NEVE VR console. Everything else also went through the console, though there were also a few outboard inserts too–the bass went through either an 1176 or LA-2A compressor.
Steve: As you can see in the videos, I don’t have a hole in the front head of the bass drum. On Time Flies and the first half of New Perspective, I was using a 20-inch Sonor bass drum with no muffling–which was very resonant. Then, for the second half of New Perspective, I switched to an 18-inch bass drum, which was even smaller, though we still got a huge sound out of it.
The last thing is that I always have a Zildjian Gong set up behind, which resonates as I play. You can occasionally see me playing like a giant ride cymbal, which can be a challenge for the engineer to capture. Fortunately, Kosta really knows how to capture every nuance and it sounds beautiful.
When I was in school, DPA came in to do a clinic where they showed off those clip-on condenser mics. I remember they sounded amazing on acoustic guitar, or really any stringed instruments.
Kosta: Yeah, I’ve used them on violins and sax too.
How did you get into mixing in Dolby Atmos? For a small studio like yours, it must have been a big investment to install a 7.1.4 array.
Kosta: I heard a demonstration of it at the AES convention and loved it. It seemed like how I always imagined music should be heard, because it’s never coming from just two places.
So, I started to build my system, using two pairs of ProAc monitors that I had already. Now I got seven of those on the ground, and then I stole the idea from Bob Clearmountain to use those small passive Sony speakers for the heights. They’re inexpensive and they sound great. Once I tuned the system, they matched perfectly with the ProAcs.
Everything is controlled by my Grace Design M908 controller, which has a matrix of 32-by-24–more than enough for any size of Atmos. It turned out to be a great system and I love working on it. I’ve done some R&B records and even some rock records in Atmos.
As I’m sure you’ve heard from listening to the wide breadth of material in Atmos on streaming services, there are a variety of different approaches to mixing music in the immersive format. Some records really put you in the middle of the performance, with instruments all around, while others take a more conservative approach. What’s your philosophy for mixing music in Atmos?
Kosta: It’s a great question, and it really depends on the artist’s intentions. Do they want it to sound like you’re a concert? Or maybe it should be like listener is in the middle of the rehearsal room? I talked to Steve a bit about this before we started mixing, and he said he wanted it to sound like the listener is sitting behind the drums.
Steve: Typically, I’m present while Kosta is doing the stereo mixers. When it later comes time to do the Atmos, he’ll do those himself and then send me binaural renders to listen to on headphones. Then, to finalize the mixes, I’ll come back to the studio and listen to the full speaker setup.
Usually, it’s not too far away from the stereo mix. He’s not going crazy with it, but occasionally my vocals or Manuel’s keyboards will move around a bit. As for the drums, I like to hear it from my perspective–with the hi-hat on the left and ride cymbal on the right, with the high toms up on the left going down to the low toms on the right. Hearing that in Atmos, everything sounds so much more open, bigger, and spacious.
Kosta: There was a lot more movement in Prayer For The Generations, but for New Perspective I approached it in more of a traditional manner. It was about getting that big soundstage and listening with the band.
Typically, I find that the most effective Atmos productions tend to be more layered records–for instance, the classic Journey albums would probably sound great in the immersive format–but in this case, there’s only three musicians and it still sounds massive. I love how the drums are mixed all around you, and you can hear the tom fills wrapping around the room.
Steve: I know Steve Perry has his own studio and he loves Atmos. It would probably be a huge undertaking to re-mix those older records, because you have to get the original multi-tracks. So, I’m not sure if he’s up for that, but he has mixed some of his more-recent recordings in Atmos.
You talked a bit about comparing the binaural experience on headphones with 7.1.4 on speakers. Do you find that it’s difficult to achieve satisfactory results on both mediums? Are there certain mixing decisions that translate better to one format versus the others?
Steve: Yeah, there were some things that didn’t quite work in the headphones. Typically, it was when something would move around, it would get too loud when it crossed the middle of the sound field. So, we had to address that.
Kosta: In the studio, I can toggle between stereo and Atmos at the click of a button–which is great for showing it off to clients. I also have separate presets on the Grace Design for binaural, both the Dolby and Apple codecs.
Steve: The other thing I want to mention is that we filmed every song on New Perspective. My editor, Christian Grassart, who lives in the south of France, has been editing the videos and then I’ll forward them to you, Anthony. You’ve been able to sync the Atmos mixes to the videos, so people who buy the album from your site get the full experience.
That’s right! The delivery format we use, MKV, supports HD video in addition to hi-res audio.
Steve: I think what you’re doing is great, because there’s no other way to market the Atmos mixes other than putting them up on streaming. I actually did another interview recently, where I was talking about the old days of being signed by a record label–where they’d actually give you a budget to produce an album.
I used to get something like $35,000 to make a record. So I’d go into the studio, and use that budget to pay for the musicians and other expenses–like flights, cartage, hotel rooms, studio time, engineers, mastering, etc. By the very end of the process, hopefully I’d be able to pay myself something like $2,500–which was close to what the other musicians were earning. Then, the record company would handle promotion and manufacturing of the LPs or CDs. Today, all of that is on me.
The early Vital Information records were on Columbia Records, right?
Steve: They were. The first four were on Columbia. In those days, I had a $50,000 budget to work with. Years later, I moved to another label called Intuition–which was based in Germany–and the budget shrunk to around $35,000, though I still managed to walk away with some profit. Today, it’s impossible to get any of the investment back from physical sales–but it keeps the band working. It keeps me interested in playing music, and I’m fortunate to have the resources in order to keep doing so.
Purchase Time Flies, A Prayer For The Generations, and New Perspective in the IAA Shop!
