Road Stories, Recording Secrets, and the Perfect Pop Song – with Rand Lempert from The Broken Rings

About this episode

Dave Hamilton and guest Rand Lempert discuss recording techniques, tour stories, and the art of the perfect pop song.

This week on Gig Gab, Dave Hamilton sits down with guest co-host Rand Lempert of the Broken Rings, a two-piece recording project built on 15 years of musical kinship between Rand and guitarist Gio da Silva. You’ll hear how these two have crafted an intentional, travel-fueled recording process across cities, cutting live instruments and vocals together, passing files between New Orleans, Tampa, and now Denver, and why that friction and urgency is exactly the point. Rand makes a compelling case for keeping things analog as long as possible: real amps, minimal pedals, old-school mic placements like a modified Glyn Johns setup, and the conviction that nothing replaces the feeling of having a human being in the room when the tape (or hard drive) is rolling. The conversation ranges wide, from Rand’s vivid 9/11 tour story, stranded in St. John’s Newfoundland on one of the last planes to land before U.S. airspace shut down, to a deep dive into the art of the perfect pop song, with nominations for Tempted by Squeeze, Big Star’s Thirteen, Bryan Adams’ Cuts Like a Knife, and Fastball’s Out of My Head. Whether you’re a working drummer obsessing over…

People in this episode

Host: Dave Hamilton

Guest: Rand Lempert

Topics covered

• recording process
• music production
• pop song analysis
• tour stories
• analog recording

Keywords

• recording secrets
• analog music
• pop songs
• tour experiences
• music production

Mentioned in this episode

Organizations: The Broken Rings

Books & works: Tempted, Thirteen, Cuts Like a Knife, Out of My Head

Places: New Orleans, Tampa, Denver

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