"Double Exposure" Tape Technique?

[ithoughticouldrelate]

OK, to preface, this might just be me pronouncing my ignorance on basic physics. BUT, it was a weird idea I couldn't seem to figure out.

Say you're bouncing tracks 1, 2, and 3 to a blank track #4 on a 4-track to give you more room. When you record over 1, 2, and 3 with new stuff, you're going to be completely erasing what was on there and replacing it. Track #4 is like the "electronically summed" signal (running through whatever fader and EQ settings you had on 1, 2, and 3).

Is there any such thing as a "non-electronically-summed" signal, or one that's not added together in the circuitry before it hits tape? In other words, can you write over tape that has something else on it and send (ok, here's the ignorance) a "weaker" signal over the record head so that things kind of "blend" rather than be completely overwritten or erased? I mean, since print-through happens, it seems like it'd work, right? Just a really controlled and intentional sort of print-through instead, except you're doing it directly through the tape head, rather than it coming from another part of the tape.

This might be completely impossible. I'm trying to work out whether those little individual iron filings behave just like 0's and 1's in a computer, where there's only information from this signal, or that signal, and nothing else ? so the only way to add two signals is to have them summed before it hits tape at all. Or whether it's like, you can nudge them a bit more, so there's more resolution, and kind of organically sum two signals (like how you can still see what was there originally and the "ghost" image when you take a photograph on film that's already been exposed once).

Again, not really practical probably, and perhaps just stupid, but I was curious if anybody'd ever tried it, or whether or not it would even work. Even if you couldn't record directly, maybe you could record your two tracks separately, snip the tape, lay them on top of one another, and let them sit a little while. Kind of like planting something in the garden...let the sound "grow" and then see what you get!

If it doesn't sound any different than just electronically summing the signals together it doesn't matter or make a difference. But it seemed like it might be cool for some things. I dunno!

[Nick Sevilla]

Hi,

It's not completely impossible.

Try to recording the FIRST signal very hot, and the second signal over the first a lot lower.

Depending on your machine, you may have enough ghost signal from the previous recording, to keep some of it through the second recording process. It won't be much, so you'll need to experiment at all stages to get something usable.

Cheers

[chris harris]

The erase head is going to be the problem. I guess you could disable it, or adjust it so that it doesn't erase completely.

[A.David.MacKinnon]

Google Les Paul (the guy, not the guitar) and "sound on sound" (the technique not the magazine). He invented what your talking about in the 1940's. Basically you're recording a new layer of audio over top of the original track without erasing what's already there. With each pass the previous parts get a little quieter and degrades a bit.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lw8GXrISOS0

[ithoughticouldrelate]

Google Les Paul (the guy, not the guitar) and "sound on sound" (the technique not the magazine). He invented what your talking about in the 1940's. Basically you're recording a new layer of audio over top of the original track without erasing what's already there. With each pass the previous parts get a little quieter and degrades a bit.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lw8GXrISOS0

Oh, cool! Awesome video. It's funny, I've read Sound on Sound for years and always just thought it referred to bouncing. I feel dumb I never realized this, though I guess it was quickly surpassed in favor of more hi-fi stuff. This is more like using a guitar looping pedal without the undo button on one track of tape. Very cool stuff. It's amazing that there's so much resolution there that that sort of thing is possible. I wonder if having the tracks literally "glued" together like that gave things a more cohesive sound without having to use mix-buss compression. Probably sort of a wash though when you consider degradation in sound quality. Hey, still sounds pretty amazing to my ears though.

[A.David.MacKinnon]

The technical achievement is really impressive but the playing is some kind of unbelievable, superhero type thing. Even more so once you know that any mistake on any of the parts means you have to start over from scratch. It helps if you're a brilliant player and as well as a genius.

[Nathangrn]

Les Paul used two record cutting lathes for his first set up, much like multitracking by bouncing one tape deck into another while playing along. If he messed up he was out his most recent take not the entire song.

I have the bracket on my WEM Copicat erase head loosened up so I can push it back and build up a big smeary mess on the tape. I even spliced small chunks of tape and leader tape together in a loop so the echo cuts in and out.

[ithoughticouldrelate]

I have the bracket on my WEM Copicat erase head loosened up so I can push it back and build up a big smeary mess on the tape. I even spliced small chunks of tape and leader tape together in a loop so the echo cuts in and out.

Nice! I do a bit of film photography on the side for fun, and it's really neat to see the parallels between some of those techniques and working with analog tae. Plus, it's really tactile! You don't have to know how to program a driver to fiddle with something mechanical.

[A.David.MacKinnon]

Les Paul used two record cutting lathes for his first set up, much like multitracking by bouncing one tape deck into another while playing along. If he messed up he was out his most recent take not the entire song.

True, and he also had a similar set-up with two tape machines but most of big hits were recorded with a later, single sound on sound machine. He added an extra play head before the erase head. That play head fed a simple mix circuit and combined the existing recorded material with the new part. Every time you add a new part you wipe out the take before it.

[A.David.MacKinnon]

I have the bracket on my WEM Copicat erase head loosened up so I can push it back and build up a big smeary mess on the tape. I even spliced small chunks of tape and leader tape together in a loop so the echo cuts in and out.

Awesome! I've done the same thing for years with a reel to reel and layers of masking tape over the erase head.