New Monday #28
Happy Monday
First of all, thank you to everyone who submitted a survey. We’ve only managed to read a few so far but the suggestions have been really helpful. If you’re sitting on your survey, remember you have til the end of the month! We do want to hear from you!
Do you steal ideas when working on your music? I do. I’m working on some acoustic guitar stuff that has a swampy kind of sound, so I went poking around in the past and of course turned up this nugget.
Black Water
Tons to hear—what a mood and vibe assembled in such a deceptively simple manner. Lots of little changes to the mix in every new section of the song. Listen and follow along.
0:00 Chimes at the top for a water feel, and then listen for an autoharp strummed (it sounds like someone strumming guitar strings above the nut) just in the back, alternating left and right.
0:07 Two slightly different acoustic guitar parts panned hard left and right. This really tricky, syncopated playing. Kudos for songwriter/lead singer Pat Simmons for overdubbing the second part (I think it’s the one to the right) so tightly. Also a viola comes in, a right center, played to sound like a bluegrass fiddle.
0:18 Lead vocals centered and pretty dry.
0:41 Harmony vocals—sounds like three guys around one mic, panned back and right center.
1:00 More reverb added to the lead vocal for this section.
1:10 Lead vocal pans left and... it sounds like they added a delay and panned that hard right. Could it be a 30ms Cooper Time Cube delay? It’s got a strange frequency response. Or it could be a really really tight double. What do you think?
All those moves in on the vocals in less than a minute, and that’s not counting whoever is riding the gain.
1:31 Drums panned 3/4 left, sounds mono. Very flat, dry sounds—typical dead 70s drums. That kick.... that sounds like an AKG D12. They sort of sound like a “boing” rather than a slap.
Bass comes in, played very tight on top of the acoustic guitar’s low note and weaving around the guitar part. Maybe slightly to the left of center?
1:55 Viola again, but now two tracks and one doing a harmony. They “breathe" and it sounds a bit like an accordion.
2:15 The viola swells in, doing what sounds like a horn part, but I think it’s the viola still.
2:24 A great little tom fill. I love drum parts like this that come out of nowhere and seem almost to be a mistake. Charlie Watts is the master of this.
2:35 A solo acoustic guitar, played with a pick, comes in opposite the viola and the two trade off.
2:57 This is such a cool moment. The bass takes the attention, the lead guitar drops back a bit. There’s a cymbal splash off to the left... I think it might be someone making a “pish” noise with their mouth.
3:08 This is a glorious moment in recorded music history: the acapella break on Black Water. Three tracks, one part right, then one center, then one left. They’re all running through Amigo’s reverb chamber, but I think the right side part, with the bass voice on it, has a complementary really long reverb on it panned left. SO... maybe they printed the reverb to tape and then panned it and then fed it back into the reverb again? The center part is doubled lead singer, the left and right parts are the same guys but singing in different registers and balanced differently around the mics.
3:25 The music fades back in, there’s yet another improvised lead vocal. This might be Tom Johnson instead of Pat Simmons but I can’t tell for sure.
And the song rambles out, back down the river.
Brilliant production by Ted Templeman, wonderful engineering by Don Landee. These are the same guys that did a bunch of Van Halen records.
Black Water was tracked and mixed on an API console, cut to a 3M 24 track 2”, and all this fun happened at the now defunct Warner Brothers Studio in North Hollywood. Note that this studio is often credited as Amigo Studios on records - same place, different name after a buyout.
Black Water became an unlikely single in 1974, the Doobie Brothers’ first #1, and was an instant classic. I remember hearing it as a kid and being amazed at the mood and vibe... 1974... 5th grade??? A bunch of us trying to do the acapella part and totally sucking at it because we were all still sopranos. Sounded like The Brady Six.
Speaking of the brilliant acapella part, and speaking of stealing ideas, Ted Templeman nicked it from here.
I listen to this and I’m amazed by the clarity and depth, and how they pulled this all off with comparatively simple equipment. We’re basically talking API console EQs, a few 1176’s and a reverb chamber.
But what is really going on here is excellent microphones put in exactly the right spot on excellent instruments played by excellent musicians. And the whole event happens in a room specifically designed for recording. And the guy picking and putting the mic in the exact right spot has a closet full of different mics to pick from and years of experience putting different mics on different instruments, and figuring out through the osmosis of experience what works with what.
Daunting. Let's cheat.
The Frequency Chart
Frequency coincides with pitch. Every note played or sung has a specific frequency to it.
A useful idea. So useful that in my early engineering days I had to search around audio textbooks (it was a pre-internet world) to turn up a chart like this:
This was a super handy thing to have. It’s not needed as much anymore because there are EQs with built-in Real Time Analyzers, but I find knowing the numbers and the math very useful.
Here’s a bunch of EQ ideas based around the chart and the math. I’ll be adding to it, and if anyone has an idea to add, send it to me and it’ll go on the chart.
For those of you who wanted something more technical, there ya go.
The Vault of Marco
My buddy Marco sends me things he’s listening to, and Marco tends to listen to obscure stuff that is always sorta cool. The first entry into the Vault of Marco, made all the more timely by the impending elections in the US, is...
You’re the Man - Marvin Gaye
Recorded in 1972, You’re the Man expresses Gaye’s disappointment with leadership in the US and his hopes for better policies for the people. This nice message must be tempered by the fact that Gaye was in huge trouble with the IRS for not paying back taxes and he eventually fled the country.
Motown Records thought the song was too controversial (meaning that there might be financial backlash and boycotts against the label) and didn’t promote it, so it vanished off the charts and out of the cultural consciousness quickly. The album "You’re the Man" was supposed to be released to follow up Gaye’s groundbreaking “What’s Going On” album back in 1972. That didn’t happen either. The album was finally released in 2019, on Marvin Gaye’s 80th birthday, after he had been dead for 36 years.
That’s all for now. Remember to get those surveys in. And of course, feel free to write anytime. It is always a pleasure to chat with you all.
Luke
Korneff Audio
