Happy Monday!
Rubber Soul was released in December of 1965. It was re-released, yet again, on October 2nd, 2026, featuring remixes by Giles Martin, the son of the Beatles producer George Martin.
There’s no reason for me to go on and on about Rubber Soul. Y’all know it, y’all have heard it. If you’ve not listened to it in a while, you should. With Rubber Soul, and then Revolver half a year later, the Beatles effectively flipped recording on its head and changed the world. I can’t begin to write about the cultural impact these records, and then Sgt. Pepper’s, had on music, recording, art, clothing, etc. The impact of these recordings still vibrates through the world.
Rubber Soul was a four-track recording. There’s such a different thinking to building a record with minimal tracks. I’ve done a ton of eight-track recording, and there was something to mix at the end. The drums might be on one or two tracks, but they were by themselves usually. You could solo something out, and with the exception of perhaps the backing vocals, hear just that instrument.
Four-track recording, Beatle-style, seems to me totally different. It wasn’t about separation and then mixing. It was about MORE. There’s hardly ever a time when there’s just one thing on a track. Often, most of the band is on one track, all the vocals—lead and harmonies—are on another. Then overdubs are multiple things crammed onto one track. And then another track with overdubs all over it. Essentially, every track was its own mix, and the final mix was a mix of mixes. I find it hard to wrap my brain around it. Whaddaya mean if I bring up the guitar the piano gets louder, too?
Drive My Car
The opening track on Rubber Soul was “Drive My Car”. First of all, in 1965 even the title is a bit “What??” And then the song itself is a beat-heavy sort of Motown thing. What would it have been like to have heard that on the radio for the first time? The closest for me was maybe hearing “With or Without You” by U2 or “When Doves Cry” by Prince. Your ears did perk up.
Here’s a great video of Giles Martin breaking down “Drive My Car”. He starts with a single measly track and then shows you how the Beatles built the record. He also details his track splitting and remixing process.
https://youtu.be/zlHN92RLxnI?si=h0euE94Pldgdnv-V
Giles, and this whole remixing the Beatles, gets the piss taken out of it (we’re being veddy English today) online. I have to admit, I didn’t like the Sgt. Pepper’s remixes. I tried not to like the Rubber Soul remixes, but I do. Oh SNAP! There are so many things to hear that got lost.
Norwegian Wood
I first heard this at summer camp when I was fourteen, and I thought it was about the most beautiful thing I’d ever heard. I still do. If there was one song that I was stuck hearing for the rest of my days, I’d take the 2 minutes and 5 seconds of “Norwegian Wood”.
2:05. Isn’t that ridiculous?? The whole thing unwinds in two minutes. A guy goes home with a girl, tries to get her in bed, fails. She makes him sleep in the tub. In the morning she splits, and according to Paul McCartney, the guy lights the apartment on fire. Or perhaps he smokes a joint. And somewhere in there, India happens, and for most of the world, it’s the first time they hear a sitar on the radio. Two freakin’ minutes.
John’s lovely acoustic guitar part, and his lead vocal, were cut at the same time to one track. It’s one of his best vocals, and the guitar part is not easy. The guy could play and the guy could sing. Paul’s harmony vocal is on that same track as well.
Then George and Paul played a 12-string guitar and bass respectively. It’s a GREAT bass line. The remix really lets you hear it. George’s part is almost a drone, but for fills he pops in now and again.
Another track: Ringo on kick, maybe tambourine, there are some finger snaps or perhaps finger cymbals. And then the last track is George on sitar.
https://youtu.be/hqDgdRrh9Pk?si=W4TnC0MabOQycwCG
The recording is much better on Apple Music: https://music.apple.com/us/album/norwegian-wood-this-bird-has-flown/1441164359?i=1441164370
“Norwegian Wood” made me fall in love with music. Giles Martin has the best job.
Decisiveness
We’ve gotten to the point where people cut 100 vocal tracks and then assemble “the vocal” word by word. Meanwhile, John gets it in one pass with an acoustic guitar. Paul’s bass is mixed in with a piano or an acoustic guitar. I was given a song with five different tracks of the exact same bass part—a DI, a signal from the preamp, a signal from an amp through a power soak, a signal from a mic in the room. Do we really need that much choice for a bass part? Wouldn’t one track do fine? And you can process it with 10,000 different plugins. It is not a surprise that people hand a mix off to someone else to figure the mess out. Music production can be cooking with 20 different types of salt. Yes they are all different, but they’re still just salt.
Let’s get better at making decisions.
Try this: pull up a mix and group some things together. Do it logically. Think Beatles and think, “Who played on that first track?” and then group those instruments together. Get a good mix on that “track.” Then set up another group, the next thing the band would have done. The Beatles would often get the vocal down next, so do that, and throw something else in there, a keyboard part or some percussion. Balance this “track” against the first “track.”
Do this until you’ve got four groups—four tracks. And then mix that. Resist the temptation to do any rebalancing of any group. Make it even more fun: put an Alpha Channel across each of the four and now you’ve got a very simple EQ and a compressor, and some saturation. What can you do? Can you get a mix out of it?
A Lesson
Speaking of the Sound Techniques Alpha Range Channel, here’s a lesson on its compressor, the ElektraComp. I love this thing. I’ve been disengaging everything on the channel and just using the ElektraComp as an SSL bus compressor knock-off. Anyone else want to see it as a separate product? Let me know.
https://korneffaudio.com/lesson-the-elektracomp/
A short New Monday this week. I’m a bit written out. Oh good lord… “Nowhere Man” is playing in the background. The vocals are heaven. Listen to the Rubber Soul remix. Go here: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=OLAK5uy_kIcTOeOJlu4-1FxqvP25Qka2SkXxt9Gwc&si=uaOWcVuA0R2FK-TB.
It makes me cry like a baby, it’s so good.
Warm regards,
Luke