The Waking Point is the doom rock project created by Sadie Belica and fronted by vocalists and guitarists Sadie Belica and Alex Springs. After the success of her solo album Rose Colored Violence, Sadie Belica expanded the band during the pandemic to include grunge nerd Alex Springs on lead guitar and Carl Jester Buena on bass.
Leaning in on the band’s lucid form of Rock meeting the theatrical prog essence, The Waking Point’s latest single “My Control,” is filled to the brim with dark undertones of an almost ethereal universe. Enlisting the talents of drummer and mix engineer Dan Konopka, the amplified setting of this record pairs a grunge-fueled intensification of the instrumentation with delicate vocals shimmering on the themes dispersed throughout the track.
You immediately pick up on The Waking Point’s musical influences of Nirvana, Sonic Youth, Alice in Chains, Deftones, Fleetwood Mac, and Led Zeppelin as the manner in which they approach the song’s structure is foreboding and thought-provoking at its finest. With the drum patterns sitting in the front of the mix with the euphonious vocal layers, you hear the distorted bassline peak through amongst the smoldering guitar riffs in a way that caters to the focus of each element.
Drizzling ominous lyrical motifs within the composition you hear the articulated emphasis take the back seat as the power is in the strung-out spirit of each word. Using an impeccable proportion of time and space, “My Control,” simmers in its bolstered appeal as you digest every moment that The Waking Point provides.
Hello The Waking Point, welcome to BuzzMusic, and congratulations on the release of your latest single, “My Control.” Working with such big names as drummer and mix engineer Dan Konopka and Grammy-winning mastering engineer Margaret Luthar, could you please share how these talents helped you bring the sound of this record to life?
Working with Dan was super fun, I was so excited when he said the song was awesome! I remember playing back his drum takes for Alex and we were so shaken, it was so alt-rock and brought the song to life. You’ve got to work with people who dig your sound and want to get locked into it. Margaret did an amazing job mastering the track, I still can’t get over how clear and smooth it sounds. A lot of musicians try to do it all, but it’s amazing when multiple talents can help bring the art to life and make it shine.
Being created in the midst of the pandemic, have you found any challenges in the process of producing quality content such as “My Control?"
At the beginning of the pandemic, the challenge was learning how to produce music since we were locked down and unable to form a band. It was a great learning experience for me, but now that the vaccine is available it is a huge relief to be able to rely on others and expand the project.
Could you please share the creative and recording process you embarked on when bringing “My Control” to life?
I wrote the song first on an acoustic guitar while I was recovering from covid. It was a simple riff but I started to add layers to it in Logic and the sound evolved. I used a combination of stacked chorus guitars with delay and retro synths run through different amps to get the sounds you hear in the verses, mixing heavy metal guitars into the chorus for an exaggerated transition. I want us to have a signature sound that you could make comparisons to but also be its own interpretation. When I played back the song to Carl he had a hard time describing it but definitely, Deftones came to mind in the kind of riff style and echoed production. I had a dummy drum track in place but we knew we needed a live drum track to bring it to life, and Dan really nailed it. I spent a while experimenting with different vocal effects and how to best combine our harmonies to bring out the emotions of the listener. You want them to feel what you felt when you wrote it, and I’m happy that this emotion resonated strongly through the final mix.
We’re hyped to hear that you have an EP coming out in the fall! What can you tell listeners about ‘The Enemy of Love?'
This is going to be a rock album that explores new mixtures of sounds. The songs will have heavy riffs since we are hard rock hearts but we are going to be experimenting with different effects chains you might hear in acid rock as well as a variety of synths and virtual instruments, to make it more dramatic. Each song has a distinct sonic atmosphere and you won’t be hearing the same thing twice.
What would you like new listers to know about you and your music?
The music we make is true to the artist, otherwise, it would not be worth doing. Art is a reflection of the soul and when you listen to something someone created you want to feel their pain, you want to know that you don’t suffer alone. Creating is how we move on, it’s how we grieve and express ourselves when normal words fail us.
