Recording and Production Styles Through the Ages

[nobby]

Starting with Edison's Talking Machine to the present.

Examples: Sun Records (I think) tape slap on Rockabilly; '80s gated snare, etc.

Not necessarily in chronological order, but as it comes to you.

[malice]

This goind to be a great thread ;)

I'm trying to recall what was the song and artist in question, but I have heard a blues recording where the sond recordist miked the foot tap of the artist on the wood floor.

This is to my knowledge the beguining of modern production.

I will have more to post about some recordings that just floored me as I'm listening to Miles Davis columbia records in the 60'.

Those wich took place in the mythical 30th street studio in New York.

It struck me how incredibly good sounding they were and how modern was the approach of the sound.

more later

malice

[otek]

It strikes me as funny how sometimes we think recent technology is all new and has no historical precedent.

Take the Pod for instance.

Most of the older patrons around here probably remember the dreaded Rockman products.

Something that is slightly less known is that many of the old blues records on the Chess label actually had DI'd guitars - an early version of the dreaded Palmer Load Box summarily executed by Slipperman in his Distorted Guitar explorations.

The Chess version essentially consisted of a couple of crocodile clamps attached to a transformer. The ambience was the leakage coming from other mics in the room.


- otek

[Mixerpuppet]

Most of the older patrons around here probably remember the dreaded Rockman products.

- otek

Older patrons?


I think people are just afraid to think about the past and the implications.

Me.... I never left the past and continue to live somewhere in the late 80's and early 90's...

I believe some of the newer folks have kinda missed some of the mechanics of audio.

For the first time in 18 years I have a mixer without VU meters...

So I cheated... I printed out some SSL VU meters and taped them to a peice of wood...

Many of the older production and recording styles also involved maintainence plans too...

People would design and build some pretty cool and some pretty aweful devices...

[FajitaTone]

flipping a tape over and pressing record after you heard the "end" of a word or phrase to get that pre-echo effect, then turning the tape back over and printing that to the 8 track. (I did a lot of radio spot production)

[Tim Halligan]

Most of the older patrons around here probably remember the dreaded Rockman products.


Hey!

I resemble that remark! :D

Somebody did me a great favour and stole my Rockman X100.

If I ever find that guy, I must thank him.


Cheers,
Tim

[Mixerpuppet]

Hey!

I resemble that remark! :D

Somebody did me a great favour and stole my Rockman X100.

If I ever find that guy, I must thank him.


Cheers,
Tim

LOL.... you actually paid money for one?


Ok so I still have the Stereo Chorus 1/2 rack space thing...

I gave away the sustainor and distortion generator... Redface

heh heh...

I will never listen to friends ever again....

[nobby]

flipping a tape over and pressing record after you heard the "end" of a word or phrase to get that pre-echo effect, then turning the tape back over and printing that to the 8 track. (I did a lot of radio spot production)

Jimmy Page claims to have come up with that at a session he played for a commercial, and then introduced the concept to Glynn Johns circa 10/68.

[Bob Olhsson]

Mickey Most was using it on in '66.

[malice]

As I told you guys, I was into listening to Miles Davis Columbia recordings lately.

I was a bit surprised by some pictures of the Gil Evans Sessions and some unreleased material.

1) looking at the pictures: no couple in front of the orchestra (sometimes as big as 19 pieces). Every group of intrument is picked with one microphone (like a M49 for all the trombones)

2) the orchestra is not positioned as they appeared on the record.
I was looking at one picture showing the Horns facing the trombones on the right hand of Gil Evans. In the record, you can hear them slightly on his left, with the reeds. This must be for technical recording reasons first ( the sound of the horns coming from the rear of the players) but must as well be for aesthetical matters, as they balance well with the rest of the brass that way. Still, the size of the Studio (Studio C in 30th street columbia studios) should have allowed to put everyone in their respective position.

3) You can distinctively hear additional artificial reverb. I doubt it was a plate (it was the very beggining of EMT140). I would rather think it was an echo chamber, with a 15ips predelay before. There is quite a fair amont of it, and it seems to be mono.

4) they were using Ampex three tracks recorders, and the third tracks was used to record Miles Davis on overdubs.
What was quite amazing is that they recorded his tracks with the afforementioned plate/tapedelay effect on the track.


So far for the supposely dry "natural" Jazz recordings of the 60'.

You can listen to "Kind of Blue" as well, it is rather "treated". At least more than a lot of nowadays Jazz album.

In other word, it was rather "produced".

malice

[otek]

So far for the supposely dry "natural" Jazz recordings of the 60'.

I think Miles (and Evans) probably had a very different aesthetic sense from someone like, say, Coltrane: His Atlantic Sessions are pretty dry.

[malice]

I think Miles (and Evans) probably had a very different aesthetic sense from someone like, say, Coltrane: His Atlantic Sessions are pretty dry.

Yes I agree, it must have been quite exceptional, and different from other recording. Hence my post in the "recording style" thread.

All the label were trying to "have a sound" on their own.

There is a distinctive "Blue note sound" . It goes the same for columbia

malice

[otek]

Yes I agree, it must have been quite exceptional, and different from other recording. Hence my post in the "recording style" thread.

All the label were trying to "have a sound" on their own.

There is a distinctive "Blue note sound" . It goes the same for columbia

malice


I've heard that the early demand for dryer recordings were because of jukeboxes and radio. The earliest recordings were often done in large halls and churches. When the jukebox companies started complaining that the large, ambient spaces didn't sound good with the jukeboxes, the record industry changed their methods and started to record dryer. So from the Swing Era up to the early 50's, everything was pretty dry.

Then Hi-fi started becoming important, and the perception at the time was that "Hifi" meant reverb. The first echo chambers were built in chicago (Universal) and LA (Capitol), and some labels started going for a bigger sound again. Decca used The American Legion Hall in NYC to record "Rock Around The Clock" in 1954, and Columbia, too, were using large, ambient studio rooms.

Though I am sure some labels were revolting against this trend, as well.

[malice]

This is totaly true as far as I know.

Later, the use of reverb had less to do with "hi-fi" sounding quest.

Reverb was use to get louder records.

Bob could tell you about this better than I am

malice

[dwoz]

I'll chime in with a little nugget.


This is in part a remembrance of a dear friend, on the first anniversary of his death.


Steve Gursky (loudist) told me this story once, during a short 2 1/2 hour phone call.

He was a 2nd, working I think at Criteria in Miami. The BeeGees were in, and they were working on a "disco" album. they were trying something new, taking 8 bars of a drum track, and splicing the beginning of the tape to the end of the tape, forming a "loop".

To my personal knowledge, this was the first time this was done on a commercial release of any significance.

So, this was a 1/4 inch, 15 IPS loop of tape, for 8 bars at 120bpm. So, we're talking about 2 seconds per bar, for 8 bars, or 16 seconds, at 15 inches per second. So that physical loop was "more or less" 240 inches long. That's 20 feet of tape.

Anyway, the story is, that for the entire mixdown process, (because they wanted to be first-generation on the drum loop), Steve was holding a broom handle somewhere out about 10 feet from the tape machine, being a puck.

The tune went on to about 25 billion spins.

Thanks, Steve....or not.

dwoz

[Brendo]

they were trying something new, taking 8 bars of a drum track, and splicing the beginning of the tape to the end of the tape, forming a "loop".

To my personal knowledge, this was the first time this was done on a commercial release of any significance.

So this was pre-DSOTM then?

[nobby]

Quote:
Originally Posted by dwoz
they were trying something new, taking 8 bars of a drum track, and splicing the beginning of the tape to the end of the tape, forming a "loop".

To my personal knowledge, this was the first time this was done on a commercial release of any significance


So this was pre-DSOTM then?

I don't know who or what DSOTM means, but I'm pretty sure Dwoz means drum loops, not tape loops in general which the Beatles and Pink floyd went crazy with years before Disco was ushered in.

[dwoz]

I don't know who or what DSOTM means, but I'm pretty sure Dwoz means drum loops, not tape loops in general which the Beatles and Pink floyd went crazy with years before Disco was ushered in.


"Dark Side Of The Moon".

(and I'm not sure).


dwoz

[nobby]

So this was pre-DSOTM then?

"Dark Side Of The Moon".

(and I'm not sure).


dwoz

If you've never seen The Compleat Beatles vid, you should. It's a real treat.

George Martin explained with delight at how he'd made a recording of a steam caliope, then took the tape and cut it into little pieces. He then threw the pile of pieces of tape into the air and they collected them from the studio floor and spliced the now random pieces of tape.

IIRC they show video of the loop going past the tape heads. This was for "Mr. Kite" on the Sargeant Pepper album.

"Revolution Number Nine" on the White album of course had a lot of loops on it.

[nobby]

Somehow, the broomstick incident and Mr. Kite caliope reminded me of another, uh, "far out" stunt.

My next door neighbor who used to be an AE worked with another AE who had worked on the Simon & Garfunkle "Bridge Over Troubled Water".

He said that they put a speaker at the bottom of an elevator shaft and a mic on one of the upper floors of a high rise (Columbia Studio Building?) which yielded the huge drum sound you hear at the end of the song.