Behind the Scenes of Velvet Vandals' First Album
- RPMG Recordings
- Mar 11
- 7 min read
Updated: Apr 3
RPMG Recordings sat down with Steve Vandal for a chat out AI, being Hybrid and ADHD..
RPMG - So how was it creating the album?
Steve Vandal -
Creating an album isn’t clean. It’s not exactly polished. It’s not some perfect studio performance where everything just falls into place. Fuck I am punching in lines to make the magic happen 2am and then up for work on my day job for 6am. I mean Axle Rose once said if you want to be a rock star you need a job. Some shit like that but its facts.
RPMG - So it did not come easy?
Steve Vandal -
It’s chaos. It’s late nights. It’s doubt, its ADHD obsession, and chasing something you can hear in your head but can’t quite touch yet. But being ADHD and in control, I use ADHD as a super power and direct it into my obsession. Music is so huge I cant ever conquer it as I am always learning and that's the thing with ADHD, once we master the obsession, we move on and forget it. This fucker called music as haunted me since I was kid haha. But one thing I dont want to say is stop telling kids that have ADHD, dyslexia and so on that they have a problem, they dont, they just fear your fucking super brain, harness that power, become the next creator of phone or some shit just make sure you have a good secretary to keep ya on track.
RPMG - So, your not a traditional band. You are a studio band, you dont gig, you dont want to get signed to a label. Tell us about that?
Steve Vandal -
This isn’t a traditional band built in a rehearsal room. It’s a modern rock project built from the ground up — driven by my raw ideas, my real vocals, and whatever tools it takes to bring a song to life exactly how it’s meant to sound.
Don't get us wrong, we have done years of bands, touring, practices and the issue with a band is that we have group of artists who all think in colours and paint different pictures. When one of us does not paint the same picture it gets a bit mad, bass players throw a Newcastle Brown Ale bottle of drummers head. The guitarist wants to play death metal also has ADHD and today he identifies as a goth, meanwhile the keys player is always pissed and can never afford band practice rooms. We have done it all, the sex, drugs and rock n roll and all the shit in-between, playing gigs for beer. Like we have opened up for L.A. Guns in Newcastle, Dear Superstar, Alice Cooper, Wednesday 13 to name a few..
I mean, we got signed. like we had meetings, we did everything we should, we had a manager, we gigged like fuck, then nothing. GHOST. Literally, we got ghosted. 24 months of band practice, recordings, arguments, lies, bullshit then we split up and our poor fucking guitarist died, poor fucker passed from cancer. Fuck knows what happened to the rest, I think they play fucking Indi pop or something. Me and the drummer are still cool, hence why he is in this band haha. But yeah the label sadly got taken out with the death of the CD, Myspace and for bands on a distribution deal, well it fell apart quick.
I gave up, got fat bloated, drinking all the time, I stopped caring as much and I had joined a motorcycle club and the drugs, drink, bikes took over. So it was also me, I was lying to the band in the end as I was fucked up quite a bit.
But this album was written in 2007 to 2013, Its the material that I recorded before I blew out my voice. From all of the years of forcing my vocals I damaged it, but its now possible to bring it to life using modern studio techniques. Before anyone fucking starts, yeah we use AI. We dont hide it, its the modern way. Fuck plug-ins and pissed band members. Bass player does not turn up. Fine, we play bass or we AI the fucker. Test our music, some are like 50% AI some are 90% some are 20% and zero fucks are given because the music fucking slaps harder than 70s pimp. Mind I did a track and it only had AI guitars and the stupid AI detector said it was 98% AI so they are bullshit anyway at this point. I mean thing is, is that if you do 100% AI I think the online world will eventually burry your shit, it will get less views and drop off. So Its important to use it sparingly and if you can use it as a base, then replace the instruments with real instruments by real people.
BUILDING THE SOUND
I mean do play instruments, me, I play bass, rhythm, some lead, keys but I also write the songs work the production, Proudy plays the drums, so I will create a song, see what AI will churn out, if it slaps I then throw it into a "short" production, then test it on our Bandlad, friends, fans etc. If it works, people vote by likes on the Bandlab. I will then farm out the stems of each instrument. Eddy will do lead guitar but he is based in California, Proudy is in Newcastle, I am in Cornwall, then we have Howie also in Cornwall who will do bass and rhythm also if I cant get it done. I have Anita that can do keys, piano etc.
I send them the stems online, they recreate them, turning it from AI into human made music, send it back to me, I put it into production. then do the vocals. I actually studied for months, reading old articles on bands that we love like Def Leppard, RATT, Cinderella, Skid Row etc. I wanted to know how that music was created, how the vocals were layered, the vocal chains used to get the sounds and it helped. If you listen to some of the songs you can hear hints of them bands in the songs as I wanted to capture what I grew up with.
When it comes to backing vocals, sometimes I will AI the fuck out of it or what we term "hybrid", its a human voices layered with other AI generated voices to round out the sound. Like I dont have access to gospel singers but I do have access to AI in modern hybrid production. But I am strict on my vocals. I am old school that way, I still attend vocal coaching with coach Nadine Finny, she has some pipes, good woman, she has taught me allot. Nadine has trained in AMEB Singing, Musical Theatre at the National Institute of Dramatic Arts. Australia's very accomplished and world renowned Theatre Education Centre so she knows her stuff.
To me there are No rules, if there were I just fucking brake them. No limits to what we can do and no fucker can hold the fact we are hybrid over us like its a dirty secret, we are open and identify as fucking hybrid. Just enjoy the music, good times and ROCK ON! Yeeewwwww.
BUILDING THE SOUND
Velvet Vandals was never about copying the past — it was about bringing it back with a new edge. Inspired, researched, learning how Def Leppard built a wall of vocal sound. I mean none of us really sound like we do on a song when we live because a real track will have a clean vocal, under that a high vocal in head voice falsetto, then a raspy bad boy with a bit of grit, I sing the same lines and use the best takes, punch in on the notes I cant hit and use studio magic when needed but I always take my song to my coach and I am like "Nadine help sing this" and she does her witchcraft and I eventually learn to hit the notes or as she says "place myself on them". By the time you pan left the raps, pan right the head voice, leaving the main vocal centre it creates a wall of sound once you add the right vocal chain like compression, EQ, echo, reverb etc it builds a sound that once mixed with the instruments sounds amazing. Joe Elliot does not sound exactly as he does on the mastered track when he sings live, none of them apart from fucking Axel Rose.
Our music is big riffs. Big hooks. Big emotion.
Inspired by the golden era of glam and sleaze, but built with a hybrid mindset, the sound sits somewhere between classic rock attitude and cinematic storytelling. Think Skid Row, 18 and Life. its a story from the streets.
Every track starts the same way — a feeling, a inspiration, a life event, an emotion.
Sometimes it’s a riff. Sometimes it’s a lyric. Sometimes it’s just a moment that won’t leave you alone.
From there, it gets built piece by piece. Layer by layer.
Some parts are played live. Some are shaped in the studio or as I already explained. All of it is intentional.
THE PROCESS (REAL, NOT ROMANTIC)
There’s no “band in a room writing songs” cliché here.
This is a hybrid process — part performance, part production, part experimentation.
Ideas get tested, scrapped, rebuilt. Vocals get pushed until they feel real. Guitars get layered until they hit right in the chest.
Some days everything clicks. Some days nothing works.
That’s the process, it keeps my ADHD brain occupied.
WHAT IT’S REALLY ABOUT
Every song carries something underneath it.
Not surface-level lyrics. Not throwaway lines.
Real themes:
addiction
loss
street life
consequence
temptation
survival
Songs like Cold Cold Night and Black Widow aren’t just tracks — they’re stories. Moments. Lives. Outcomes.
That’s the difference.
FROM MUSIC TO VISUALS
The music doesn’t stop at sound.
Every track is built with a visual world in mind — dark streets, neon glow, snow falling, chaos in the background.
Music videos aren’t just performance clips. They’re extensions of the story.
Cinematic. Gritty. Real.
WHERE THIS GOES NEXT
This is just the beginning.
Velvet Vandals isn’t here for one release or one moment. It’s a growing body of work — songs, visuals, behind-the-scenes, and everything in between.
You’re not just listening. You’re watching it being built.
Velvet Vandals is about turning it loud, living in the moment, and keeping the spirit of rock ‘n’ roll alive.
Welcome to the ride.
Comments