Weezer - Pinkerton (cmon...)

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theemasquerade
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Weezer - Pinkerton (cmon...)

Post by theemasquerade » Sun Oct 22, 2006 12:13 pm

How great does this record sound? The drums on Tired of Sex! The vocals! Does ANYONE know ANYTHING about the recording process (i.e. mics, equipment, rumors, lies, scandals) of this album???

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Post by chris harris » Mon Oct 23, 2006 8:58 am

they wanted to sound like the Flaming Lips.

great record! best weezer songs by far.

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Post by Johnny B » Mon Oct 23, 2006 11:38 am

All I know is that it's the first one they self-produced, it was recorded in a bunch of studios while they were on tour and, of course, it flopped, only to become considered a cult classic while the band took a year or two off. That, and apparently, Rivers Cuomo took the response so hard that he's never written anything that personal again, and until recently they didn't play anything from it live.

Oh, and it f-ing rocks! AFAIC, they haven't touched it since. Maladroit has its moments, but even at its best, it isn't nearly as good as Pinkerton. I think if you look at the first two albums versus the last three (and the two Rentals albums), you can easily see Matt Sharp's contribution to the band. No matter what the credits say, you can see his hand all over this record. I do wonder, though, what the general public's reaction is to the production. This is a pretty raw sounding record. It's loud, dry, in your face. But I think it complements the raw, soul-bearing lyrics. I don't think the songs would be well-served by slick production.

Damn, now I want to listen to it and I don't have a copy here in Florida.

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Post by theemasquerade » Mon Oct 23, 2006 12:13 pm

I want to get that drum sound. I can't stop listening to the drums on Tired of Sex and Across the Sea. It could also be the fact that Pat was a severely underappreciated drummer (when he played like he did on this album...what happened to this band??)....oh well. Where in Florida are you?

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Post by RoyMatthews » Mon Oct 23, 2006 12:27 pm

Weezer has a DVD out called 'Video Capture Device' (i think). It has some in studio home movie of both the Blue album and Pinkerton. Not that much to see but you might be able discern a mic or 2.

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Post by runrunrun » Mon Oct 23, 2006 1:58 pm

this has been one of my favourites for years...
i have the dvd, i can have a look to see what the micing setup is. some of the tunes are recorded by dave fridmann (reinforcing the flaming lips comment from earlier) sounds like tired of sex is his kinda drum sound...

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curtiswyant
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Post by curtiswyant » Mon Oct 23, 2006 5:34 pm

I posted a thread like this earlier...guitars were mostly LP's into Marshalls, with some crazy daisy-chained distortion pedals for some of the buzzsaw solos.

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dr.ona
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Post by dr.ona » Mon Oct 23, 2006 6:34 pm

A little off topic BUT...didn't they record an album with just POD's or sansamp?If so...which one?
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curtiswyant
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Post by curtiswyant » Mon Oct 23, 2006 7:02 pm

dr.ona wrote:A little off topic BUT...didn't they record an album with just POD's or sansamp?If so...which one?
I think their Green Album tour was the POD phase :roll:

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Post by Johnny B » Mon Oct 23, 2006 8:09 pm

theemasquerade wrote:I want to get that drum sound. I can't stop listening to the drums on Tired of Sex and Across the Sea. It could also be the fact that Pat was a severely underappreciated drummer (when he played like he did on this album...what happened to this band??)....oh well. Where in Florida are you?
They were a killer rhythm section. I wish I could have seen them. My wife (well, she wasn't at the time) caught them twice on that tour. The stuff on the first Rentals album is pretty good, too, although it's a little more polished than Pinkerton.

Where I am is Miami-ish. Right now, I'm in a hotel in Tamarac, but next week I'm moving to Hollywood. I should probably get to changing my location from Syracuse...

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Post by jonathan » Tue Oct 24, 2006 12:41 am

this record is so awesome.....

i got a lot of similar tones with a project i just did
.....

step number one is using tape,
if you're using tape, slam everything in pretty hard
and also dont worry about clipping at all, it will only help you

if you're not using tape then get ready to distress or use some ampex pre's set to clip.

set up 2 large diaphram condensers to the left and right of the kick drum close to the floor but about 1 foot away from the kick, make sure these are getting slammed.
preferrably u47s

it will maximize the out come if your drummer doesnt give a shit about anything and slams hard as hell

set up a mono room or stereo if you can slammed through a distressor or urei 76 or 78

i dont know, good luck, those tones are so awesome.

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Post by JMorken » Wed Oct 25, 2006 7:52 pm

My first post on this board after poking around for awhile. Couldn't resist talking about what is easily one of my favorite records.

I watched the DVD a while back and it looked like they tracked everything at once (minus overdubs and vocals I assume). They used a huge room. I watched it a while ago and I wasn't nearly as into recording back then (still a noob). The sonic energy they were able to squeeze onto that album makes me wanna... I dunno... freak out!

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Krumly
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Post by Krumly » Thu Oct 26, 2006 9:58 am

There's a decent book about Weezer called Rivers' Edge that doesn't really go into recording specifics (no mentions of mics, gear, etc) but it does go into what was going on with the band when they were recording the different albums and how that affected the music.

Two things I remember from the book:

Rivers fired their original second guitarist (Jason Cropper) during the recording of the first Weezer album. Ric Ocasek was amazed when Rivers played and re-recorded all of Cropper's parts for the entire album in one day with no mistakes.

As far as I remember, Cropper's replacement Brian Bell isn't on the album at all or just barely.

Also, "Hash Pipe" is about a transsexual and not pot. Still trying to get my head around that one. :?
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Post by thekeepsake » Sat Oct 28, 2006 1:42 am

I don't know much about the drum sound. I had a band come in that wanted a similar sound recently. What I am fairly certain about is the guitar sound. I don't think we would enjoy that drum mix nearly as much without the space left by the guitars. My theory is that they are jcm 900s with the mids floored, but, and this is really important - with big muffs. If you listen, a lot of the time you can kind of tell the guitar is there but not really hear it specifically.

And the weird effect this has is really puzzling. When I thought about this album before I tried to break it down, I thought of it as a big guitar record. But it's really not. It's the space they left for the drums by lowering the guitar (and using something like a big muff with enough hi freq. information to still be present) that makes it heavy.

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Post by drumsound » Mon Oct 30, 2006 6:53 pm

Pinkerton is one of my all-time favorites. I used to sit in with a friend's band and play drums on a Tired of Sex cover. The key to that tune is really laying into the drums. The recording seems to have no regard for "proper gain structure!" :lol: The drums are played hard, the pres are hit hard, the compressors are hit hard, the tape decks are hit hard...

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