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Post by mobeach on Dec 3, 2015 17:30:44 GMT -6
Quite often we discuss how great the production was in bands like The Beatles, Led Zeppelin, The Doors, Pink Floyd, Tom Petty etc.. and how disappointed we are in modern recordings/production, due to new technology like Autotune etc..
Do any of the modern emulation plugins come close at all? Or would one have to purchase nothing but vintage hardware? Or, is that era and how things were done simply gone forever?
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ericn
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Post by ericn on Dec 3, 2015 18:31:51 GMT -6
The 4 most important pieces to puzzle are still Song, talent, instrument and room. Bob O's thing about the Motown Sing a long test holds water. The thing is the above are all about time and expense, Today it's cut it quick in somebody's bedroom most of it being played on a workstation keyboard as quickly as possible . The gear is just the icing on the cake.
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Post by formatcyes on Dec 3, 2015 19:03:34 GMT -6
I am sure it wasent the equipment in fact if you could send some of our gear back to those guys I am fairly sure they would have used it. It's was big budgets and money to keep everyone together long enough for the magic to happen plus the music wasent smashed and squashed to death.
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Post by mobeach on Dec 3, 2015 20:59:01 GMT -6
The Doors and Zeppelin just seemed so warm, realistic and natural, except for a few solo jazz vocalists you just don't see or hear it any more.
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Post by tonycamphd on Dec 3, 2015 23:47:34 GMT -6
the production techniques of today are astoundingly advanced/and comically easy to implement as compared to yesteryear, but those easily accessed abilities have led to giving way to gimmickry and actual talent has taken a seat in the back of the bus, i mean seriously, at least 90% of the mouthbreathers sitting at the top of the charts today would be laughed out of a career in music if all they had in front of them was a mic, all the bands that mo mentioned were just insanely talented, an attribute thats all but scoffed at today.
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Post by rocinante on Dec 4, 2015 3:17:50 GMT -6
I hate 90% of the music on the radio nowadays. Back in the day popular music was mostly made up of talented musicians, who worked hard, had some good luck, knew how to smootch a little, and after years of building a loyal fanbase through touring and promotion got rewarded by being played on the radio. Those days are for the most part gone. Nowadays its money. You pay to play. I played and toured with some acts that had openers that paid them in the thousands just so they could be the opening band for 2-3 weeks. It was jaw dropping. And that was in the metal scene. But make no mistake there are some incredibly talented bands recording some amazing albums out there. And yeah they're using top of the line modern gear to achieve incredible results. They just arent played on stations that play Miley Cyrus. I was listening to Opeth's Deliverence yesterday. Ahh its just beautiful. Its 3 dimensional. The engineering skills on the drums alone (IMO) are a showcase of drum mic'ing and mixing mastery. Its very much top notch metal album production at its finest without the jejune quality of the nu metal mid swoop cookie cutter junk that infiltrated the metal scene in the early 2000s. And theres thousands of other albums out there that also integrate such masterful production. Gogol Bordello's "Gypsy Punks" is another that comes to mind. Its highly produced but not so much that its plastic or too generic yet still has that almost commercial quality. Also Between the Buried and Me comes out with some very produced sounding albums yet they're really well written pieces by some really talented musicians. Tom Waits is also still dishing out masterpieces every few years using a plethora of recording and production techniques to achieve his goals. I could go on literally forever. Point is these days (and for the last ten years) good modern music isnt played on the radio or on TV. Its played in a house or on a stage at a club and the only way you get to hear it is by sifting through the riff raff while sipping on a cocktail or reading posts like this one I'm throwing down right now.
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Post by Bob Olhsson on Dec 5, 2015 10:58:15 GMT -6
To me it was all about arranging and stage experience from an early age. What's ironic to me is that recording mostly live with session musicians is cheaper unless people are not getting paid for a lot of the work. Using signal processing to disguise bad musicianship and arranging has become very common to the point that a lot of recordings are cartoons compared to the past. It's comparing Ansel Adams to Marvel Comics. Adams chose striking moments of light much like older records chose striking moments in a recording session.
I worked at Motown with very little idea of how good the musicians were. Then I got a pretty rude awakening in San Francisco even working with bands who had been signed and made their first successful major label records 4 and 8 track. When I moved to Nashville in 2001 I had the opportunity to do my first digital recordings with some legendary session musicians again. I quickly discovered that all but the lightest signal processing made them sound worse!
At some point in the early '70s the majors were able to extract an agreement from the American Federation of Musicians to pay performers who were eligible to receive royalty payments for just one session per song as opposed to the regular hourly session rate for record dates. At that point studio time rather than wages became the biggest recording expense to labels.
Around the same time a loophole in the Federal Income Tax law allowed wealthy doctors and lawyers to take a tax credit for all expenses related to shooting a movie or recording a band. That loophole was what gave us Spielberg, Lucas and Coppola. It also gave us a lot of new studio owners who created the pro audio gear business as we know it. When that loophole closed, many of these investors liquidated and the older studios found themselves in competition with their own chief engineer who had just bought a high-end studio for pennies on the dollar. Meanwhile the labels discovered that a lot of bands had been running up their bill while getting kickbacks from the studio. As a result the "all-in" deal was born which was a flat payment to deliver an album with the artist getting to keep whatever was left over. The studio business has never been reasonably profitable to my knowledge since.
Cheap recording had become king. Producer/songwriters were expected to record major label artists on spec. and only getting paid if their recording eventually made the album. Cheap recordings are what I think we really are complaining about and this economic race to the bottom is probably a lot of why most young people aren't nearly as engaged with music as many of us were.
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Post by tonycamphd on Dec 5, 2015 11:09:32 GMT -6
To me it was all about arranging and stage experience from an early age. What's ironic to me is that recording mostly live with session musicians is cheaper unless people are not getting paid for a lot of the work. Using signal processing to disguise bad musicianship and arranging has become very common to the point that a lot of recordings are cartoons compared to the past. It's comparing Ansel Adams to Marvel Comics. Adams chose striking moments of light much like older records chose striking moments in a recording session. I worked at Motown with very little idea of how good the musicians were. Then I got a pretty rude awakening in San Francisco even working with bands who had been signed and made their first successful major label records 4 and 8 track. When I moved to Nashville in 2001 I had the opportunity to do my first digital recordings with some legendary session musicians again. I quickly discovered that all but the lightest signal processing made them sound worse! At some point in the early '70s the majors were able to extract an agreement from the American Federation of Musicians to pay performers who were eligible to receive royalty payments for just one session per song as opposed to the regular hourly session rate for record dates. At that point studio time rather than wages became the biggest recording expense to labels. Around the same time a loophole in the Federal Income Tax law allowed wealthy doctors and lawyers to take a tax credit for all expenses related to shooting a movie or recording a band. That loophole was what gave us Spielberg, Lucas and Coppola. It also gave us a lot of new studio owners who created the pro audio gear business as we know it. When that loophole closed, many of these investors liquidated and the older studios found themselves in competition with their own chief engineer who had just bought a high-end studio for pennies on the dollar. Meanwhile the labels discovered that a lot of bands had been running up their bill while getting kickbacks from the studio. As a result the "all-in" deal was born which was a flat payment to deliver an album with the artist getting to keep whatever was left over. The studio business has never been reasonably profitable to my knowledge since. Cheap recording had become king. Producer/songwriters were expected to record major label artists on spec. and only getting paid if their recording eventually made the album. Cheap recordings are what I think we really are complaining about and this economic race to the bottom is probably a lot of why most young people aren't nearly as engaged with music as many of us were. Hammer meet nail! Bob O for president! 8)
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Post by Deleted on Dec 5, 2015 11:38:35 GMT -6
couple of approaches I seem to hear. Minimalism (adele, lorde) and vocal everywhere, the vocal is the hook, the solo, the verse it's everywhere all the time. Rock bands aren't on the radio much and four on the floor still dominates the day. The pitch correct/quanitze argument is no longer applicable because that stuff has been in use for over a decade. If I were to limit my scope to just the stuff I do, the more punk/metal/hardcore stuff what I am noticing is that the tones are much less metallic, the bands aren't afraid to use more natural tones and the records aren't as bright. Off the floor is really coming back for a lot of these bands who are liking their records translating to their live show.
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Post by Johnkenn on Dec 5, 2015 11:41:21 GMT -6
I think Time is something we don't spend on recordings anymore either. These guys would spend a year making a record - months in the studio. Now it might be a week.
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Post by Bob Olhsson on Dec 5, 2015 12:01:46 GMT -6
The technical revolution today is inexpensive live recording. An Ethernet connection from an Avid, Digico or Yamaha digital live console plugged into a laptop or even an iPad can record 32 microphones.
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Post by Bob Olhsson on Dec 5, 2015 12:06:26 GMT -6
The vocal IS ALWAYS the hook. Imagine if Al Schmitt had recorded "Hello" with an orchestra!
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Post by jazznoise on Dec 5, 2015 12:09:51 GMT -6
The problem with wanting big open drum sounds is people want big bassy guitars and vocals, they want to hear sub. It's very time consuming to manage all those sources with all that spectra and still get natural sounding ambience. That's why the HPF + heavy compression thing is so readily used and so quickly recommended.
There is less skill required, there's no tape biasing, no head bump. Flip side is that there's also not that many great engineers out here. There's no one around here I'd be rushing bands off to (barr myself) because it's going to be another 1980's overdub everything in a dead room, add reverb later job. Horrible workflow.
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Post by swurveman on Dec 5, 2015 12:21:02 GMT -6
The biggest difference to me as I write for the Pop genre, and listening to Pop hits, is the lack of a drummer. All the songs seem to be using the same samples and there are very few fills, mostly kick and snare. And even with the ease of using a DAW with samples to change tempo's during the song, it rarely happens. Thirdly, the instrument riffs are simpler than anything Led Zeppelin or the Doors did. Listen to their instrumental intros. Nothing that complex or musically challenging is happening.
The overall production today is tighter time wise, but musically it's dull. No plugin or technology is going to fix that. In fact, the more technological control we've gotten, the worse the music has become imo.If there's going to be change, an anti technology movement is the answer, not more technology. Given our cultural identification with technology, with the premise that all technological advances are good, I doubt it will happen.
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Post by Bob Olhsson on Dec 5, 2015 12:25:06 GMT -6
I call those "Les Paul Memorial overdub parties." Why does anybody want to sound like a Les Paul record?
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Post by swurveman on Dec 5, 2015 12:27:37 GMT -6
couple of approaches I seem to hear. Minimalism (adele, lorde) and vocal everywhere, the vocal is the hook, the solo, the verse it's everywhere all the time. Rock bands aren't on the radio much and four on the floor still dominates the day. The pitch correct/quanitze argument is no longer applicable because that stuff has been in use for over a decade. I would say this is one of the few area where technology has enhanced music. Because auto tune can correct pitch, singers are writing melodies with wider range knowing that their pitch failures will be fixed. Very few singers naturally have a large range where they consistently sound in tune, but auto tune has helped average singers stretch their range and the melodies are better for it imo.
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Post by Bob Olhsson on Dec 5, 2015 12:38:05 GMT -6
"The overall production today is tighter time wise, but musically it's dull." It's dull because it isn't as tight! Time in music is about tension against a steady mantra-like beat that every performer is aware of while they perform live. Everybody breathes together. This gets completely lost when everything is overdubbed. The right tempo is crucial yet few bother figuring out what the right tempo actually is. Another problem is that few metronomes run at the same speed just like two tuners often don't agree.
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Post by drbill on Dec 5, 2015 14:46:32 GMT -6
The technology today is amazing. Completely off the hook great. The problem is that much of it is so cheap that it can easily get into the hands of inexperienced and untalented individuals.
That results in confusion, abuse, mis-use, and the actual music taking a back seat to "technology"- in the mistaken guise of "better" music as people who 30 years ago wouldn't have "made it" are now in the producers seat guiding productions - trying to make the music "better" by the wrong means.
Technology used in the hands of experienced pro's with a vision is a beautiful thing.
I have ZERO doubt that if available, the aforementioned acts would all be using current technology to it's fullest. Hopefully with someone talented and "in tune with the music" at the helm. How many of them said :
"16 tracks? No way, the only legitimate way to record is with 8!!!!"? Answer? None of them. You'd be hard pressed to find an act that didn't take full advantage of the tech they had at the time. The difference being that now, because of GC and cheap tools, we have inexpensive tech to make untalented people sound capable. And THAT was (for the most part) the death of great music - the democratization and cheapening of recording technology. Allowing ANYone to participate.
It's a double edged sword. (i.e.: it's a Good AND Bad thing)
How many of us would be here if the only way to record was in a $100-200 per hour studio that was funded by a record company who only wanted talented people? Be careful answering that.....
Technogy = Good AND Bad. It's our responsibility to use it to it's best potential. There's nothing stopping us from tracking live all together in one room, working arrangements out till they pop, with glorious bleed in the room, minimal track counts, great mics, and talented musicians instead of wannabe's. (They are still out there). At that point technology becomes your friend.
But unfortunately, even talented guys are more about chasing the right mic, pre or compressor when in reality, chasing the right paradigm for making the music is where the gold is....
Blinded by technology.
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Post by Bob Olhsson on Dec 5, 2015 16:44:07 GMT -6
Looking back, I think the peak was 16 track in the early '70s. Consoles weren't mass produced yet and the labels had incredible live acts to choose from.
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Post by wiz on Dec 5, 2015 16:59:35 GMT -6
My brother and I were painting the outside of my studio a couple of weeks back.. he is 66 years old. I had put a little transistor radio on the ground for us to have some music playing on whilst we painted and chatted.. it was a beautiful sunny day, and it was just a lovely afternoon, two brothers doing some work together and just generally enjoying each others company. Anyways, the radio is tuned to a local AM station.. its playing a mix of old and new stuff... "You're No Good" by Linda Rondstat comes on.. it sounds incredible.. now I like the song, and think she is just the most beautiful creature to walk the earth, so there is that bias...8) but it sounded just amazing. Full, rich, incredible. coming out of this little tiny shitty radio. Next song, some new piece of garbage, sounded like utter crap. My brother turns to me and says "why does new music sound so bad compared to that old song we just heard?" He is just a consumer when it comes to music...no engineering or playing experience. I said to him "thats really a PHD question right there" I then told him about Bob Olhsson and his thoughts on the matter, and my brother thought that made sense.... I was floored though, how great that song, You're no good, sounded coming out of that radio... for a minute I was a kid again, hanging with my brother, in the sun, listening to a great tune on a little radio... great day cheers Wiz
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Post by M57 on Dec 5, 2015 18:40:04 GMT -6
The biggest difference to me as I write for the Pop genre, and listening to Pop hits, is the lack of a drummer. All the songs seem to be using the same samples and there are very few fills, mostly kick and snare. And even with the ease of using a DAW with samples to change tempo's during the song, it rarely happens. Thirdly, the instrument riffs are simpler than anything Led Zeppelin or the Doors did. Listen to their instrumental intros. Nothing that complex or musically challenging is happening. OK, I'll play devil's advocate.. 1-2. If a drummer is lacking, it's because the genre doesn't require it. Remember when the first synths and samplers came out and bands started using cheesy string sounds on their tracks? String players were complaining because they were loosing gigs to a machine. And the evolution continued from there. Synths and samplers became preferable to and eventually eclipsed them in most pop music because of real strings relative limited palette of sounds. 2-3. So you just mentioned 2 bands with amazing musicians that used complex and challenging instrumental riffs.. Could you name 10 more from that era? I'll bet you could find 10 current bands that satisfy that criteria in just the metal genre alone on youtube in less than 1 hour. When it comes to pop music.. touché you win. But that is a commentary about the broken industry and what satisfies the masses, not what is out there. The 'broken' industry is a misnomer. The 70's and 80's were a golden age for a lucky few - and let's not forget, "cutting edge technology" created that era. Now anyone with an iPad or can record/create music, and of course most of it is bad. What would you expect? But, I would contend there is more good music - proportionally speaking. We can argue about the quality of the recordings, but that's apples and oranges - the music itself was no better than today's. From Billboard's top 100 from 1975 - the first and only year I picked - and holy shit did I nail it! It's filled with crap. I was a teenager in the 70's - so this music is part of my DNA, but I'd rather listen to today's top 40 any day of the week. 1 Captain and Tennille Love Will Keep Us Together 2 Glen Campbell Rhinestone Cowboy 3 Elton John Philadelphia Freedom 4 Freddy Fender Before The Next Teardrop Falls 5 Frankie Valli My Eyes Adored You 6 Earth, Wind and Fire Shining Star 7 David Bowie Fame 8 Neil Sedaka Laughter In The Rain 9 Eagles One Of These Nights 10 John Denver Thank God I'm A Country Boy 11 Bee Gees Jive Talkin' 12 Eagles Best Of My Love 13 Minnie Riperton Lovin' You 14 Carl Douglas Kung Fu Fighting 15 Doobie Brothers Black Water 16 Sweet Ballroom Blitz 17 B.J. Thomas (Hey Wont You Play) Another Somebody Done Somebody Wrong Song 18 Tony Orlando and Dawn He Don't Love You (Like I Love You) 19 Janis Ian At Seventeen 20 Average White Band Pick Up The Pieces 21 Van McCoy and The Soul City Symphony The Hustle 22 Labelle Lady Marmalade 23 War Why Can't We Be Friends? 24 Major Harris Love Won't Let Me Wait 25 Stevie Wonder Boogie On Reggae Woman 26 Freddy Fender Wasted Days And Wasted Nights 27 Isley Brothers Fight The Power, Pt. 1 28 Helen Reddy Angie Baby 29 Ozark Mountain Daredevil Jackie Blue 30 Ohio Players Fire 31 Pilot Magic 32 Carpenters Please Mr. Postman 33 America Sister Golden Hair 34 Elton John Lucy In The Sky With Diamonds 35 Barry Manilow Mandy 36 Olivia Newton-John Have You Never Been Mellow 37 Barry Manilow Could It Be Magic 38 Harry Chapin Cat's In The Cradle 39 Michael Murphy Wildfire 40 Jessi Colter I'm Not Lisa
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Post by Guitar on Dec 5, 2015 20:09:06 GMT -6
Well now there's a more powerful machine which requires a less skillful driver. So you end up with Splenda (TM) instead of pure maple syrup some of the time. You end up with Drake (TM) instead of Led Zeppelin.
I think Bob O's post about economics is the most powerful reality. Why does money seem to dominate every discussion? I guess because it's how things actually work.
Certainly people have become lazy and short-sighted about their goals with music. The days of over budget six month long sessions are pretty much gone. Along with that sort of album. Things happen more quickly and people listen more quickly.
But there's also a certain freedom in unlimited choices that eclipses even some of the more specific top accomplishments of the past eras. If I had to measure the music I listen to the most, I think the top bracket is still for me stuff that's been made in the last 10 to 20 years. So I don't really think too much has been lost along the way.
For example, I think FM radio is pretty much a wasteland, along with YouTube hits and television. The world is still your oyster if you still have the taste for oysters.
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Post by Bob Olhsson on Dec 5, 2015 20:42:25 GMT -6
The great sound of the '70s had great arrangements and little or no signal processing. At Wally Heider in San Francisco there was an API 550 on each console channel and three or possibly four 1176s in the rack. You needed to pay extra for anything additional and people typically rented no more than an LA2a and maybe a Pultec. There were several EMT 140s and a couple live chambers. It's real easy to set up processing that only sounds good on the monitor system where it was set up.
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Post by Bob Olhsson on Dec 5, 2015 21:46:56 GMT -6
Let me add, don't judge older recordings by CD reissues.
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Post by Deleted on Dec 6, 2015 0:52:08 GMT -6
"The overall production today is tighter time wise, but musically it's dull." It's dull because it isn't as tight! Time in music is about tension against a steady mantra-like beat that every performer is aware of while they perform live. Everybody breathes together. This gets completely lost when everything is overdubbed. The right tempo is crucial yet few bother figuring out what the right tempo actually is. Another problem is that few metronomes run at the same speed just like two tuners often don't agree. So true. In the early 90s i played bass in rock bands always with the same drummer and we recorded a few times in the studio, where he refuses to play to a click. We were much into the classic rock aesthetics, the band was ok with this and we recorded everything live with the band aiming for zero overdub except for vocals where we only recorded an orientation track. The second time we recorded in the same studio unfortunately the bass track was unusable what became obvious after the recordings, and to cut studio time i agreed to just overdub my track - and it was a catastrophy for me, i had a really hard time to meet the feel of the recording, i was totally alienated by the overdubbing process itself, never did it before... I was not really ok with the outcome, although it turned out to be not half as bad as it felt to me while i had to play in again. I never got more aware of the fact, that playing live and getting exactly this tension, variate speeds to give the performance something special, and groove with a drummer and not with a click is something that can not be substituted with anything. I have not the slightest thing against rehearsing with click to get train consistency, but when i see that many, many rockbands play live with the drummer playing to the click in the earplugs and whole sample tracks play along i always think that this is a huge loss for the music. Many songs could sound so much better if the bands would be aware that handmade music offers a kind of magic you can never achieve otherwise if you concentrate on bandmates and not on clicks and capture the moment. But nowadays i know bands that sometimes not rehearse as a band in one room together AT ALL. They send tracks around and that's it.
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