Blood Sugar Sex Magic and your F you indie spirit

[thefauves1]

It's ALL about the song but the RHCP still suck.

[xSALx]

Cheap Gear + Technique = Interesting, potentially Classic
Nice Gear + Technique = Classic

Of course, it helps that the musicians are worth recording... just a minor detail

I think you can make classic albums even with gear that's not neccessarily worthy to be in the same sentence as Neve, Neumann, etc. We can all think of recordings that have been made on cheap gear that are classics. Right of the top of my head I think of the Operation Ivy or early Elliot Smith records. Sonically their crap, but the performances are once in a lifetime.

To those of you who are in the Walter Sear camp and prefer sonically masterfull and hi-fi "studio" recordings over performance (which I think are few in the tape op crowd) here you go...

Listen to this and enjoy:
download for an mp3 from a post on gearslutz.com

Here is the gear list as posted:

The Drums are recorded location, in a 250 sq.meter hall with 8 meters up to the ceeling.
I used D112 on the kick, 57 on the snare, 451 on hat, 184 for oh and a soundelux iFet7 for amb. API 212 for all mics, exept a V72 for amb.

Bass: Little Lab red Eye - API 212 - 1176.

Guitars: Engl Powerball - 57 - API 212

All voc: Soundelux iFet7 - V72 - 1176

Perc: Josephson 42 - my Neotek ?lite

I mixed it on My Neotek, swissonic convertors (4 pc.- 32 tracks).
No plug-in used, Just hardware reverbs/dealys.
1176`s, DBX160, Expressor and RNC compressors.
A 2-1176 was hooked up on the master during the mix, ratio 1:1, just to get the grid of it- I love this box!

[soundguy]

with that list of gear in the above post, anyone that knows what they are doing should be able to make a recording that can stand next to brendan obrien or tchad blake if you dont have a recording studio to work in. The fact that gear of that integrity is located in your bedroom and not walter sear's studio should have pretty much zero impact on the quality of the recording you are making if you are good, and this is really what hit me over the head the other night.

Look at it this way, now that more and more and more people can afford a cheap clone of api or a cheap clone of neve or the real thing, the trend for the future is going to be blaming the environment for a poor recording. "Well, I have api but I dont have a russ berger designed space, so no wonder it still sounds like shit" and Im calling that shit out right now.

Want a real good reality check to continue this train of thought? Go put on Live At Pompeii, you can see all the gear that was used and that was most certainly tracked through their FOH console. What does that sound bad? Most people have a setup that is at least that good. You may not have pink floyd to record, but thats a good barometer for what can sound fantastic with mostly, if not entirely dynamic mics. Does that sound better than your last recording?

Why am I angry in my original post? Because Im absolutely sick and tired of this "lo-fi" trend as if to suggest all these people got together and made shitty records because they didnt have decent enough equipment. Its not lo-fi because you dont have the right gear and its not lo-fi because you recorded at home, its lo-fi because you didnt bother not to make it lo-fi. Lets raise the bar a little, you know?

Im not trying to take a cheap shot here at people new to recording or people who havent tracked bands for national television broadcasts. Im simply trying to draw some attention to the fact that for the amount of energy that is spent trying to save $23 on a mic from china or trying to see how many times in a week you can talk about glyn johns, if you took that and focused it on the real problems you are having with your recordings and making headway towards real solutions, you can really improve what you are doing. You can try all day long to emulate something glyn johns did, if you instead analyzed why your previous drum tracking session went wrong and fix your own approach you'll likely get much more out of that exercise than just copying a picture you saw on the internet. You know, teach the guy to fish.

And for all the people who still insist that expensive gear in a house somehow sets the situation apart from where they are at, please save me the exercise of naming a list of horrid sounding recordings made in acoustically designed spaces with even MORE expensive shit. Just because there is gear doesnt mean you get a good recording and just because you dont have an 8068 in your house doesnt mean you cant kick ass.

dave

[cgarges]

Its not lo-fi because you dont have the right gear and its not lo-fi because you recorded at home, its lo-fi because you didnt bother not to make it lo-fi. Lets raise the bar a little, you know?

Dave, I agree with that statement 100%. I'm also gonna post this little ditty from last year's TapeOp Conference because it makes a similar point and it's one I've thought about an AWFUL LOT since then. I know someone will object because Albini said it and there's always someone ready to pounce on whatever he says, but please read this and think about it a little bit.

"As engineers, we can fuck things up more easily than we can improve them. I believe we should spend our energy trying to improve our not-fucking-up skills rather than coming up with wacky new ways to influence the sound of the records." - Steve Albini

Chris Garges
Charlotte, NC

[joelpatterson]

Amen.

[soundguy]

"As engineers, we can fuck things up more easily than we can improve them. I believe we should spend our energy trying to improve our not-fucking-up skills rather than coming up with wacky new ways to influence the sound of the records." - Steve Albini

oh jesus, put that in a time capsule and deliver it to the Axis:Bold as Love mix sessions please. please?

dave

[thereminman]

Hello Soundguy,
and while I think I understand your point,
I figured that was one of the generally agreed upon ideas in this tapeop world--that we can get some quality work done outside of the 'typical major studio scene'----I thought that was what sort of drove the DIY folk in the first place.
I know that my recordings have gotten better as I go, mostly cuz I've been trying to learn how to record---I do this by experimenting, listening, trying, and figuring out why the last thing I did was crummy and how I can make it a bit better---
---but understanding a bit more how equipment works and such has also been a part of it, and that's where the endless 'gear' discussions have been a part of my learning too.

---it all works together, I hope, to improve my own recordings.

re:this comment:
"Its easy to kick back and say, oh someday I'll record in a real studio and get it right then. "

I really didn't think this was a greatly held belief in these quarters, or else why keep trying?

and maybe that's a big part of your point---you gotta KNOW it can be done, and has BEEN done so that you can shoot for that goal.

It just seemed a bit like you were ...not "preaching to the choir"...but "yelling at the choir"

b.

____________________________
http://www.blakejonesmusic.com

[thereminman]

and like many on this board,

I think my 'indie spirit' is doing fine,

just trying to give that indie spirit a little more Hi to its Fi.

____________________________
http://www.blakejonesmusic.com

[tommypiper]

Just because there is gear doesnt mean you get a good recording and just because you dont have an 8068 in your house doesnt mean you cant kick ass.

dave

Hi Dave. Totally agree. However, listen to my story. Ten years ago I was producing my first project. Tracking to 2" things went fine. When we began mixing I could tell I wasn't hearing the whole story. It wasn't sonics, or fidelity. It was something intangible. It was like suddenly the house was made of styrofoam bricks instead of fire-baked bricks. I hired a friend who is a Grammy-nominated mixing engineer. He mixed three songs for me, instead of me working through the house engineer. That was an interesting lesson and eye opener and a separate story (I liked my mixes better, but I still don't have a Grammy nomination.) I decided not to go with my Grammy friend's mixes either, and talking with him he suggested it was VCA automation on the board robbing the sound of its full density or whatever adjective he used...

So I called a stop to the production. What I thought would be a couple days discussion turned into a protracted 18 month battle. I eventually took control of the project and took it out of the original studio and went across town to a place I'd never been -- with an 8068. The difference was night and day. We mixed a lot. ALL the mixes sounded fabulous, even when they were wrong, even with whacko balances. Any mix sounded right. The sloppiest mix sounded gorgeous.

I was flabbergasted. Where EQ was needed originally, we ran most things flat. He had the same reverbs and the same compressors. The difference was the board and the lack of VCA automation, and a clean signal path. There is a place for these tools.

Back to your point, I totally agree. I record most projects in houses, often to ADAT, have even mixed on budget $1000 boards. It can be done. It is done. The music is the thing. The tools are extensions and mere tools. But even with budget gear, be aware of your signal path and don't get lazy or sloppy.

cheers all.