An Album Update and Question about REAL Pianos

Here we sit, still a few hundred bucks shy of affording the extra time/talent for real guitars and bass, and I’m faced with an unexpected budgetary decision.

We’ve found a studio with a Disklavier— not only the finest pianos on planet Earth, but MIDI-controlled. For $50 per song, I could take the MIDI performances I’ve already made and have them recorded on a real piano. Same performance, much more authentic piano sound.

But this means, at minimum, another $150 for the three seriously piano-forward songs and potentially another $400 to record all of them. (Coyote All Night and This Band Does Not Suck really wouldn’t benefit from real piano parts.)

Given that we haven’t even approached mastering funds yet, I’m hesitant to pull the trigger on this… but the thought of adding that next level of authenticity to the album is hard to ignore.

What are your thoughts?