He lost the guitar track files. Terry Carleton rebuilt them with AI.

Happy Friday!

What do you do when a collaborator records a perfect guitar part for your album and then loses the files Terry Carleton found an answer in a Rick Beato video about the Beatles.

Terry is a drummer, producer, and studio owner based in San Jose. He first joined me for a podcast episode in January 2024 to talk about his work remixing over 150 original Vince Guaraldi recordings from the Charlie Brown TV specials. He’s back because he just finished something he’d been building for seven years — his own album, Ric Shah and the Sandcrabs (From Jupiter) — and the process of making it turned up a few things worth talking about.

Terry Carleton playing drums at a show for The Reunion, Beatles tribute band. — Terry Carleton Performing with Beatles tribute band The Reunion

Insights from our conversation

AI Audio Separation as a Production Tool
Camel’s Andy Latimer recorded guitar tracks for one of the album’s songs — then lost the original files. Terry had seen Rick Beato’s video on how the Beatles’ “Now and Then” was restored from a cassette demo using AI audio separation software called Lalal. He ran Latimer’s mp3 through Lalal.ai and extracted eight separate audio tracks from it. He then took those reconstructed tracks to another studio to sync them with the updated version of the song, using time compression to match Latimer’s original tempo to the newer recording. The tracks appear on the finished album.

How a DAWless Workflow Actually Works
Terry’s studio has no computers, no DAW, no automation. He mixes by hand, end of signal chain is a hard disk recorder, playback stays analog throughout. The constraint he values most isn’t the sound — it’s the attention. Without a screen between him and the session, he says he’s more present as a producer and arranger. The practical limitation (no undo, no session recall) also means clients arrive more prepared. He’s planning to add some hybrid automation, not to replace the approach, but to extend it. He told me that he would have adopted Pro Tools years ago if anyone had told him they couldn’t work with him. But they haven’t.

On Collaborating with High-Caliber Musicians
Andy Latimer plays on three tracks. Bassist Michael Manring plays on one. Grammy-winning Disney composer Michael Silversher plays piano on another. Terry's observation is that in the past decade, working musicians at this level are more accessible for collaboration than they used to be — they're home more, touring less, and able to send tracks without leaving their studio. The relationships themselves aren't new; what's changed is the logistics. Terry also calls on high-caliber players to record on his client's sessions.

🎧 Listen to Episode 240 (plus show notes and links to things we talked about)

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Peace, love and more cowbell,
Robonzo

P.S. – A memorable moment in this conversation: Andy Latimer contributed guitar to multiple tracks on the album. On one, Latimer sent his part, then later sent back an eight-minute version where he played everything, slowed it down, and sang it. He liked it enough to release his own version on Bandcamp — and Terry applauds this. That's what decades of the right relationships looks like.

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