Happy Tuesday!
As promised/threatened, here is another email with usage ideas, inside information, and whatnot on our plug-ins.
El Juan Limiter
The El Juan is the first of our plug-ins using our proprietary licensing system. From now on, all our plug-ins will be using it and we’ll upgrade the original 5 too. Soon.
The El Juan started as a joke. A certain plug-in company changed their business model, switching over to subscription, which pissed a lot of people off. Dan was on Social Media, listening to the complaints, and posted something along the lines of “I’ll make a version of XXX and give it out for free if 1000 people like this post."
A few days later, Dan got to building the El Juan. The origin of the name you should be able to figure out.
The El Juan definitely excels at making things louder, and it does this by limiting and makeup gain. But it also has waveshaping.
Waveshaping
When you change the shape of a waveform, it adds additional complexity, in the form of additional harmonics. A simple sine wave goes in, waveshaping can add an octave to it, or thirds, or whatever you want, really. Waveshaping can add a bunch of sweetness or a bunch of garbage.
The “traditional” analog way to waveshape was to clip the waveform by overloading a component in a circuit or an entire device. Yes, saturation and distortion are forms of waveshaping. Digitally, one can apply math to replicate analog saturation and distortion, and that is waveshaping. Or, unlike the analog world, one can use math to add a very specific, controlled series of harmonics to a waveform.
A simple way to think of this: when I refer to waveshaping, I’m referring to math that adds a limited, very controlled set of harmonics. Saturation uses math to add more than one or two harmonics, and distortion adds tons more harmonics. Waveshaping - simple and a little. Saturation/Distortion - complex and a lot. The El Juan’s waveshaper adds some harmonics, which result in a richer, fuller sound. It doesn’t add saturation per se, it’s waveshaping, it’s adding some of the elements of saturation - the nice ones!
The El Juan has two different waveshaping options, which change the harmonic structure of the signal feeding through it, much the same as feeding the signal through a different console brand will affect the structure of the signal. And this gives you a hint as to how we use the El Juan. Like the PSC and the AIP, we almost always start the El Juan by flipping it around to the back and playing with waveshaping and input eq.
Here’s a video which shows a lot of the power of the El Juan.
The available settings are clearly marked and the effect will be obvious to your ear. Start back here, getting something that you like that fits your mix. Then, switch around to the front and use the limiter section to further process your sound.
Goofy Goofy Secret: the original marketing for El Juan was supposed to be like a Clint Eastwood Spaghetti Western comic book. The Tale of El Juan was narrated by a robotic turtle named “Old Pedro.” However, when I was typing things out, I made a typo and wrote "Old Pedo.” I thought it was hilarious, so there was a running gag of Old Pedro and various other characters mispronouncing his name and Old Pedo, I mean Old Pedro, having to constantly correct it.
Again, I thought it was funny. But a few people found it less so... and somewhat insensitive, childish, stupid, tone-deaf, etc. So Old Pedro the Turtle got shelved and thus died one of the great marketing ideas in North American history.
Puff Puff mixPass
The Puff makes things apparently louder by using... waveshaping! The Puff Puff is basically a dedicated waveshaper. If something is already compressed and still not sitting there correctly, the Puff will make it a bit louder (and actually undo a bit of the compression by popping out the peaks a little bit).
How does waveshaping make things sound louder? It adds harmonics, and typically, when you add things in audio, there’s a power and loudness, unless things are out of phase. That’s a very simple way of explaining it. Try this: think of additional harmonics as adding density — the signal becomes thicker, richer, and our ears perceive it as louder. Note that the Puff makes things PERCEPTUALLY louder, but there isn’t much of a change on the meters. You don’t get a different LUF reading typically.
Quick Tip: Dan’s basic trick is if something sounds good, do the same thing again. Put a Puff Puff on a channel or a bus, and then add another one, Most of the time the result is a delight.
Both El Juan and Puff are designed as bus processors. That doesn’t mean they won’t work on a single channel, but our development thinking was that these are things you slap on a bus or across a mix. Both do similar things but in very different ways, and there’s also some redundancy. The El Juan also has waveshaping and the Puff also has a clipper on it.
Here’s a thing: You’ve slapped the El Juan across your mix bus, you’re doing some mighty fine limiting and things are sounding good, and you think, “Let’s add the Puff Puff to this and see if we can’t end the loudness wars once and for all.”
Where do you put the Puff? Before the El Juan or after? That’s a good question.
I’ve tried both, and I usually wind up with it after. So, once I limit things with El Juan, then I put the Puff on after it and play around with it a little more. I almost always swap the positions of the two, but generally, the Puff goes after.
Here’s a video where I’m using Puff and El Juan together. Some good ideas here.
Quick Safety Tip: Even though the Puff doesn’t typically change the meters, it doesn’t mean that putting it on last won’t clip your mix bus. One thing I do is have a True Peak meter on the bus after the Puff, and I make sure I’m keeping the true peak value at -1 or even -2, depending. We could have a whole ridiculous discussion of all this stuff and I assure you, we will, and soon.
The WOW Thing
The original WOW thing was a cheap plastic box you could slap on your computer speakers to get things a little wider sounding for, I don’t know, more drama when playing Legend of Zelda. Eventually, the WOW thing found its way onto the guitar tracks of a number of famous albums in the 90s and suddenly it’s a must have guitar secret. And to be honest, it’s great for that. But at its heart, it’s a psychoacoustic processor that uses delay and phase shift to fool your ears into thinking things are outside of the geometry of your speakers.
The WOW gently gets rid of everything below about 1kHz - the more you turn up WOW, the more this frequency cut happens. Hence, the WOW thing by default makes things brighter. And this is where the misnamed TrueBass control comes in, it adds back bass. Actually, it invents bass. It’s not TrueBass at all. All the real bass on the track died in a horrible filtering accident earlier in the signal flow. And this is what I love about the WOW Thing: it’s a great bass/low end enhancer.
I use the True Bass on kicks, bass — anything where I want something kind of big, low and pillowy, rather than something super tight down there. It works great for this. Also, you can’t go wrong putting the WOW thing on reverb returns.
Here’s a video I did a few months back in which I stem mixed a song using only The WOW Thing. There’s a ton of ideas in this video on how to use it to get more bass, more motion, overload it for additional harmonics...!
Pumpkin Spice Latte
This is a surprisingly complex little plug-in disguised as a seasonal beverage.
Pumpkin Spice was designed to be an all-in-one, a mini-channel strip that could get something rough and chewy out of a vocal track. Of course, people are using it all over the place, not just on vocals. I like it especially, a friend of mine swears by it on brass, and it does work.
There are limiters and compressors all over the place on the Pumpkin Spice, and they’re all interactive with the rest of the controls so that you don’t really know they’re there. You can slap this sucker on a raw vocal track and you’d be surprised by how much things will get under control without touching a knob.
Pumpkin Spice is a quick idea tool. Throw it on a track, play around and get some ideas. Perhaps execute the ideas using more adjustable plug-ins, like swapping out the reverb for something with more adjustments, but often it sounds so good as it is, we just leave it on the track.
Fun Usage: Set the delay time to under 5ms or so. Crank up the feedback and you’ll get crazy comb filtering, a “stuck flanger” effect. Change the delay time to shift the resonance up and down. Then, automate that delay time every now and then to wake everyone up. Fun stuff!
That’s it for this Tuesday. See you next week... on Monday.
Warm regards,
Luke
Happy Monday!
We started our Black Friday Sale today. And we added plug-in bundles, which people have been asking for. SO... 40% off plug-ins and up to 60% off on bundles!
Kim Deal
A few weeks ago I wrote about albums by older guys. I was in some sort of search for meaning, I suppose.
On November 22nd, former Pixie and Breeder Kim Deal, at age 63, released her first "real" solo album, 'Nobody Loves You More'. It's simply wonderful. Might be the best album of the year.
Kim had released a few things on her own in the past decade, things she recorded on eight-track tape — she's an analog kinda gal, but finally hunkered down in Florida, learned Pro-Tools (by bugging her friend, engineer/producer Steve Albini for lessons over the phone) and got to it.
Most of 'Nobody Loves You More' was recorded by Steve Albini, with Kim producing, along with a crackerjack bunch of players ranging from rock musicians to jazzers, to string players, and more. The record is lush, quirky, and ever-interesting. Songs evolve from sparse, punky Americana into a cha cha, or there's a pedal steel, or strings. It's all over the map, but it's held together by melody and Ms Deal's fascinating voice. It takes a bit to get used to — she sounds like an animated cartoon character played by a chain-smoking alcoholic, but it's the perfect voice to deliver the pain and magic of this album.
The record is full of pain. She lost her mom to Alzheimer's, and then, following in quick succession, her dad, her aunt, and her uncle — within one year. And then she lost Steve Albini — he died after 'A Good Time Pushed', the last thing he ever recorded.
But while it's a painful record, it's not sad. There's something gorgeous and content about it, triumphant and wise. And Ms. Deal has a great sense of humor, which comes out in the lyrics and the scatological arrangements. It's such a good record, and so worth a listen. In a fair and decent world, it would sweep the Grammy's.
But it won't. Because it's not something built to fit an algorithm and tweaked to within an inch of its life — there's not even autotune on it. It doesn't have guest rappers, songs written by fourteen people, or Max Martin anywhere near it. Kim has about 7,000 subscribers on YouTube. This music wasn't written with data science and AI pitching in on the lyrics. It's not statistically constructed to increase engagement. It ain't fucking "content."
It's a record by someone doubling down on the one thing all of us can double down on: being one's self. Unapologetically screwed up, vulnerable, perhaps a bit pissed-off, but playing your own damn game.
'Nobody Loves You More'
Some things on YouTube:
A short one this week. Have a lovely time - the holidays are upon us. Love love love.
Warm regards,
Luke
Happy Monday!
I am guessing most of you don’t know Hawksley Workman. He’s Canada’s answer to the question, “What if Prince and Bowie had a baby?”. He plays everything, sings, composes, engineers, sometimes records entire songs in a single day, veering all over the map musically. Is it cabaret? Is it alternative? Is it noise? Only Ryan Corrigan (his real name) knows for sure.
Two Hawksley videos, and both are so worth a watch.
The first... early in his career, shot in one take and a Juno Award winner: Jealous of Your Cigarette. This is the best use of two and a half minutes ever.
And this, from a few years ago: Young and Wasted. Another simple idea, beautifully executed. What a melody, and what a voice to sing it.
Just one more - live mayhem in a studio. Teenage Cats. When I grow up I want to not care what anyone thinks as much as this guy.
After that 'Young and Wasted' song I feel like crying and missing my past. Oh well, onward...
Puff Puff Fun and Tips
We usually have a few specific use cases in mind when we design plugins. Like the Amplified Instrument Processor: it’s designed to go on electric guitar buses. But then it winds up on vocals, reverb returns, the master, all sorts of applications beyond its original scope.
Of course, this is exactly what’s supposed to happen. Plugins should add to your creativity and spark ideas. It’s never a bad thing to think, “How would this sound if I did this with it?"
We get a lot of new uses from you all, and here are two that I think are especially useful applications of the Puff Puff mixPass.
#1 Puff to Even Out Levels
Frase is a producer, composer, singer, engineer, bassist, multi-instrumentalist. A Canadian, like Hawksley.
Frase performs live and it’s a blend of DJ’ing and live singers, dancers, and players, with backing tracks served up by Ableton.
What’s been a problem for Frase is that he’s using material recorded across several years, mixed and mastered in different studios, and loudness is inconsistent because of different amounts of limiting and compression. Adjusting level doesn’t really work, and adding additional compression is a non-starter.
Frase’s solution: he runs the individual tracks through individual instances of the Puff Puff mixPass and then matches loudness by ear. Because the Puff Puff isn’t a compressor or limiter, the actual meter levels don’t really change, but the apparent loudness does. Once he tweaks the loudness, he bounces the tracks and he’s set.
This is the critical thing about the Puff Puff MixPass: it makes things LOUDER without really affecting amplitude.
#2 Puff to Undo Limiting
Another tip/application courtesy of Jason Soudah. Jason is another one of those guys that can play everything, sings, engineers, produces, composes, but the bulk of his work is in film and TV scoring. And he’s not Canadian.
Jason has been working on a major film soundtrack, and he’s riding herd over hours worth of music with thousands of tracks and an ungodly plugin count.
One of the critical things he has to do is make alternate mixes for different uses — with vocals, without, for live use, as a backing track, mixes for different languages, etc. But depending on the type of mix, there can be lots of minor alterations throughout. For instance, the horns might be pulled down a bit during vocal sections, but when it’s an instrumental only mix, then the horns are going up and down all over the place, so the automation needs to be re-written. And then that track is feeding through a limiter on the mix bus, but because the mix might be missing things, the way the limiter is responding can be weird, like it pushing down swells and sucking the excitement out of things.
So, Jason’s been running mixes through the Puff Puff AFTER the limiter, using it to restore loudness and match levels with other mixes. As a side benefit, the Puff tends to increase dynamic range because of the way it affects transients, resulting in bigger and brighter mixes without losing headroom, and in some cases gaining headroom.
Vault of Marco
Oh, that Marco... you never know what comes out of his vault... wonderful song by Big Star.
Lovely recording of acoustic guitars - small diaphragm Neumanns through a Spectrasonics console into an LA-176.
Something upbeat and gorgeous to one through the work of the week calls. Y’all be cool.
Luke
Happy Monday,
So much to write about...
We’re in a Podcast
Our friends Benedikt and Malcom from The Self Recording Band recently had a conversation with Dan and I about recording, Korneff Audio, plug-ins, the industry, etc.
Benedikt and Malcom are great guys who know their stuff. Their website has lots of resources on it, including the Podcast with the guys from Korneff. Audio.
Double, x2, Twice as Much
Double double toil and trouble... Today we’re looking at doing things x2. And there are double the number of production ideas and tips in here today, including Dan Korneff’s Secret Secret. Read on...
Production tip from Shakespeare
Here’s the beginning of a monologue from William Shakespeare's Hamlet:
O, what a rogue and peasant slave am I!
Is it not monstrous that this player here,
But in a fiction, in a dream of passion,
Could force his soul so to his own conceit
This monologue from Hamlet goes on for like another 65 lines and then at the end, you get this:
More relative than this. The play’s the thing
Wherein I’ll catch the conscience of the King.
71 lines of blank verse (that’s what they call this stuff) that do not rhyme, and then 2 lines that do.
I studied Shakespeare at Oxford in the early 80’s, this monologue in particular, and the question was always: Why do the last two lines rhyme?
Shakespeare did it to make them stand out. To catch your ear. To add EMPHASIS. To make you remember that particular moment as important.
I started to hear examples of this sort of thinking on records. Echos that would pop on for only a few words. A moment of strange EQ or distortion. Some little thing to grab your ear for a moment, like someone highlighting a line of text in a book.
The Beatles were masters of this, and they did it very often with doubling. Or, in some cases, not doubling.
And I Love Her, the sort of ballad ANYONE would be lucky to write (notice the all caps... emphasis...). Have a listen, and note how the doubling of the vocal works.
Only two lines out of the whole song are un-doubled! All the rest is doubled. And they don’t even seem to be very consequential lyrics, but they do force you to pay attention to the hook line that follows.
So, next time you’re mixing and making, think about what little moment can be made special, and how you might do that.
There’s another thing to learn from this particular song: if you write something with a killer melody and have a great singer sing it, you don’t need to do much production-wise to make magic.
Dan Korneff’s Secret Secret
I was surprised to learn that Dan’s mix bus has two iterations of the Puff Puff mixPass on it (along with a bunch of other things). I asked him about it, and he said this:
“If something sounds good, I do it again, figuring that it will sound even better. With the Puff Puff on the mix bus, I added one with the default settings, and it sounded great. So I added another one, same thing, default settings, and that sounded even better. I tried a third one, but that didn’t work. So two it is."
GAH!!! This is SO simple and SO obvious and I wish I'd thought of it, but I didn’t. Dan further confessed that he does this ALL THE TIME. He’s always adding another iteration of the same thing and listening.
This is a great trick. If it sounds good with one on it, try adding another.
Double Compression
A friend showed me a trick using two compressors when tracking vocals, and it became my standard operating procedure for recording vocals, bass, acoustic guitars, or anything that had too much dynamic range to fit comfortably on tape. I still track things this way 30 years later.
Here's an extended blog post on this, complete with settings, a few diagrams and usage ideas. This is a game changer for your engineering. Perhaps many of you already do this. If you don’t, you should.
AI is Still Here
Watch this good video in which a guy in our industry, Cameron from Venus Theory, discusses AI and its impact on audio careers, and how one might survive. His conclusion, by the way, is the same idea that I came up with a few months back, which is:
Double down on being yourself.
Again for emphasis: Double down on being yourself.
Happy Monday all. We always enjoy it when you write to us. Thanks for reading.
Two Times the Love,
The Guys at Korneff Audio
Recently, I had the incredible opportunity to record a cover of "Karma Police" with the band Pierce the Veil at Signature Sound Studio in San Diego.
As an audio engineer, capturing the perfect drum sound is not only a pivotal part of creating a track that resonates, but it was also one of the highlights of the original song that influenced the overall vibe of the song. Here's a behind-the-scenes look at the recording techniques we used to achieve this dynamic and impactful drum sound.
Our session took place in Studio A, renowned for its fully loaded 32-channel API 1608 console and a spacious live room measuring 31′ x 27′ with a 17′ ceiling. The old '80s recording studio aesthetic of faux brick walls and an old parquet floor not only set the mood but also provided the perfect room acoustic properties for this track. Navigating a new room can be a challenge, but with the assistance of award-winning engineer and mixer, Christian Cummings, we were up and running in no time. His knowledge of the room was invaluable, guiding me on the best placement for the drum kit in the live room to exploit its natural reverb and warm characteristics.
The essence of "Karma Police" demanded a layered approach to capturing drum sounds, targeting three types of ambiance: close, mid, and far. I wanted to make sure each part of the drum kit could shine through in the mix, not only providing depth but also a sense of space. A basic assortment of microphones was used for close miking positions. Carefully placed gobos and an area rug helped keep the close mics dry. Instead of close miking the cymbals, I opted for an "overall" drum sound using a pair of Bock 251 overheads. They were placed slightly higher than usual to take advantage of Lonnie's consistent drumming, which practically pre-mixed the drum sound with his performance. For the mid ambiance, Coles 4038 ribbon mics were positioned about six feet in front of the kit in a spaced pair configuration. These microphones offer a smooth, warm sound and have the ability to capture high-frequency detail without harshness. This is what I built the entire drum sound around. All of the close mics needed to reinforce the room mics, especially the Coles. For the expansive room sound needed for the song's explosive ending, Beyer M88 mics were placed about 15 feet back in an XY configuration.
The API console did a wonderful job of making the drums punchy and full, but the overall vibe was missing a little bit of that "magic." I knew exactly what it needed; a little love from the El Juan Limiter. Giving the Coles a healthy dose of limiting, along with input shape set to Punchy, really brought them to life. A nice lift in the bottom end from the Tone Shaping finished it off nicely by adding a satisfying heft to the entire kit. Everyone was like "damn, these drums sound sick". The prototype for Puff Puff mixPass also made an appearance on guitars and bass, but that's for another story.
A lesson I've learned early in my career is to commit your sounds to 'tape' during the recording stage. Why wait until the mixing phase? We printed the room sounds through the El Juan Limiter, ensuring that the drum sound we fell in love with was captured exactly as we wanted, forever.
Recording at Signature Sound with Pierce the Veil was not just about utilizing the studio's top-tier equipment; it was about creating an environment where technology meets creativity to capture a sound that truly stands out. This session was a testament to the power of experience, technique, and a little bit of studio magic.
Dan recently worked on Pierce the Veil’s latest release Karma Police, their cover of a modern classic. We have an article about that here.
We thought it would be interesting to take a quick look at the original Karma Police.
Radiohead has always managed to combine a penchant for noise and experimentation with a surprising pop sensibility. Thom Yorke and Co. make interesting and catchy weird records. When The Bends came out in 1995, it was being played in every control room that was setting up for a rock session. A great record, and to my mind a better offering than OK Computer, which followed in 1997.
OK Computer was amazing sonically. More experimental than The Bends, OK Computer was a prickly, challenging listen. The big single on it was Karma Police, and it’s one of the more restrained recordings on OK Computer. It’s “Beatle-esque,” with harmony vocals, a bass drum combo that sounds and feels like Paul and Ringo, and a piano part in the chorus that’s a sweet bite of Sexie Sadie off The White Album.
The vocal performance... this too is a Beatle thing. John Lennon often used to record vocals very close to the mic and sing very quietly. The same thing is happening on Karma Police — the chorus is practically whispered, and it’s not until the vamp out at the end that Mr Yorke opens up and sings with a bit more power.
Quick idea to steal: The vocal on the vamp out has reverb on it, and the ‘verb itself has some additional effects on it. Love this idea - don’t effect the vocal, keep it clean and effect the effect.
I found two demo versions of Karma Police... and of course I ran them through the Puff Puff mixPass and the El Juan!
This first cut sounds like vocals, a guitar, and drums working in a rehearsal space. The song has a different structure and lyrics and it sounds like a very early workout of the tune.
This version is Thom Yorke singing with an acoustic guitar, and the song is basically all there — he’s even figured out the ending vamp.
Enough demos, let’s talk about the drums on the original recording.
Three Overheads = HUGE
Producer/engineer Nigel Godrich worked with Radiohead on Karma Police, and he tended to mic them using a spaced pair of overheads with a third mic right in the middle of the kit as well. Three Overheads.
Here’s a picture of drummer Phil Selway during Ok Computer sessions. They recorded in a mansion in England (actress Jane Seymour’s house), with big rooms, high ceilings and lots of stone and glass. Very reflective spaces.
The kit is mic’d with a spaced pair of what look to be vintage AKG C-12s and a Neumann M-49 in the middle. There are also some close mics on the toms.
Throw some compression on it and there you are: insta huge. Of course, there will be phase issues galore, but oh man! Crush that center mic with a limiter and you’ll get a heck of a huge drum sound.
The overheads to the left and right provide a little bit of left-right movement, and the mic and center pins the whole thing down. And that is the sound of Karma Police 1997. A simple, clever set-up.
What are the sheets or drapes around the kit doing? Not a whole hell of a lot. Probably just getting some of the high-end shizz off of things, but mid to lows is going through them like a rhino through a petunia patch.
VERY IMPORTANT: notice how they took pieces off the kit. One crash cymbal. No ride cymbal. One rack tom. This is a SUPER TIP.
Remember, toms and all drums resonate, and cymbals are highly reflective — they’re big metal plates. Want to clean up a drum set for a good sound? Take all the extraneous stuff off of it. If it’s not getting hit during that session, it shouldn’t be on the drum set.
This mic setup is similar to late 1960s early 70s drum setups, like the "Glynn Johns setup."
Glynn Johns = super influential engineer/producer.
His setup = A mic on the kick, another mic sort of low to the floor tom, and then a third mic somewhat higher and over the snare, but, and this is a BIG BUT, those last two mics have to be equidistant from the snare to keep the snare in phase.
This is the basic sound of Led Zeppelin, the Stones, the Who, etc.
People like to experiment with the Glyn Johns setup but it is hard to get a modern sound from it. First of all, Glyn was typically recording with great players in great spaces, and everything is easier when you have someone like John Bonham on the drum and you’re in the great hall of a mansion. Also, there wasn’t the fastidiousness that modern audio recording seems to wallow in. There was a time when being slightly flat was ok. Ahhh... the good old days.
Often, the Glyn Johns setup has to be augmented with more mics, because the hi-hat and snare are out of balance, the rack tom sounds thin, etc. Eventually, this method becomes basically multi-micing the drum set.
If you try this and you’re using two different mics for the overheads, remember to measure from where the diaphragm is and not from where the grill cover is, so you’ll cheat that measurement a bit. The times I tried (and then subsequently abandoned the Glyn Johns setup) I used a piece of string to get the distances right. You can also use a mic cable. I’ve seen people use tape measures and I think that’s ridiculous. Dude, it’s a drum set with gaffer tape all over it: we’re hitting it with sticks. We’re not trying to calculate the radar return of a stealth fighter.
Back to the Radiohead track, this is a lovely, huge drum sound and the technique used to get it would translate to virtually any room—even a cruddy sounding space in a basement.
As always, we love hearing from you all, we love hearing your thoughts and ideas.
Happy Monday - got your coffee? Evidently I've had too much of mine because this week's New Monday is manic and all over the place.
Sick of I vi IV V or John Barry’s Secret Chord Progression
There is entirely too much I-vi-IV-V happening in pop music today, in pop music in general.
Yes, it is the chord progression of hits like this, and this, but it and its variations are overused. Here’s an article on how often Taylor Swift has used it. And here’s a video on how often she uses a slight variation on it (I V ii IV).
If you’re looking for a different progression to base your stuff on, try this: IV - V. You can also call it V - IV or I - bVII or bVII - I.
Call it what you want, the idea is moving between two major chords a whole step apart. It’s easy, very handy (especially if you’re a guitarist), and has a TON of great songs written using it.
On Broadway - original Drifters version sort of hides it a bit, but the George Benson version makes it more obvious.
My Generation - V - IV with a bass solo.
LA Woman - this song is almost one chord, the IV - V only happens on the chorus.
And there’s still more... Reelin’ in the Years.
IV - V or V - IV has a modal quality to it —Mixolydian to be exact. It also doesn’t have a strong sense of resolve. Songs written with it can seem like they’ll go on forever.
More Allman Brothers???
I promise I’ll stop with the Brothers next week, but for now:...
The song "Dreams", on their first album, is a IV - V for almost the entire song, including a fabulous extended solo by Duane Allman. Very modal and vibey recording. Great vox by Gregg.
I couldn’t resist running "Dreams" through my instant-this-sounds-better workflow of the Puff Puff mixPass into the El Juan Limiter. And I made a short video of that too.
John Barry, the God of V - IV
Film composer John Barry was a top film composer. He won a bunch of Academy awards, scored the James Bond films, etc., etc. Huge name and a great musician.
He deployed IV - V often. It’s the cornerstone of the soundtrack to the James Bond film “You Only Live Twice.”
Nancy Sinatra sang the original version for the film. The distinctive opening riff is V - IV.
Bjork did a breathy, moody remake.
John Barry, though, outdid himself, on the soundtrack for "The Midnight Cowboy". His "Theme from the Midnight Cowboy" is one of the most gorgeous things ever written. It features the most lonely sad harmonica on the planet. If there’s only one thing you listen to today, it’s this.
John Barry plays Theme from Midnight Cowboy.
That song makes me cry. And here’s something else you can cry over!
Music has a tremendous effect or Fun with the BBC
Several months ago I wrote an article on the Johnny Nash hit “I Can See Clearly Now.” A producer from the BBC, Mair Bosworth, read it, contacted me, and I was honored to play a small part in a podcast about the song. The podcast is less about the music or recording and more about the almost supernatural effect the song has on people’s lives. The podcast is incredibly moving and worth a listen.
The podcast, on BBC’s Soul Music, is here.
Shout out to Mair Bosworth at the BBC. Soul Music rules!
And... I couldn’t resist running I Can See Clearly through the Puff Puff. That plug-in is amazing.
Probably too many links and ideas this week, but I got excited. There’s so much to listen to and to learn.
Have a great week.
Warm regards,
The guys at Korneff
We love to hear from you all. Send us your V - IV progression songs. Write some!
Happy Monday!
Two things this week: we released a new plug-in, the Puff Puff mixPass, and Dickey Betts, the guitarist from the Allman Brothers Band, died at age 80.
The Puff Puff mixPass
Our latest is a dynamics processor. Using waveshaping, the Puff Puff adds harmonic content to "puff up" the apparent volume of a signal. It's not a compressor or a limiter, rather the opposite, but it has a similar effect: it makes things LOUD.
It also has controls to add character to things—distortion, overdrive and all sorts of fun sonic garbage.
I also made a video using it to enhance an Allman Brothers Band live recording. More on that below...
Dickey Betts and the Original Band
Forrest Richard Betts... a great player and a great songwriter—he wrote a lot of the best-known Allman Brothers Band songs, including their biggest hit, Rambling Man.
80 years is a pretty good run for anyone, but especially for a rock star who has had... adventures.
The original Allman Brothers Band line-up, brothers Duane and Gregg, drummers Butch Trucks and Jai Johnny Johanson, bassist Berry Oakley, and Dickey Betts, are generally considered about the best rock band the US ever produced.
The evidence is a bunch of live recordings from The Fillmore East, which was a concert hall in NY city that was open for a scant four years but is still remembered for the quality of the performers it attracted, and especially for the Allman Brothers performances. Their 1971 album Live At Fillmore East made the band's career, and the album is one the best live rock albums recorded.
The original lineup of ABB was a spectacular band. They had the power of Marshall amps and the listening skills of a top-tier jazz group. They had two fantastic guitarists, a killer rhythm section, and the most authentic-sounding white blues singer imaginable.
The Allmans played The Fillmore East a number of times, including the two nights that were recorded for the live album. They also headlined the closing, last show at The Fillmore East on June 27th, 1971.
The Allman Brothers Live - a bootleg
Duane Allman died young and left a huge legacy that, while well deserved, has somewhat overshadowed Dickey Betts. Dickey was a great player, perhaps not as adventurous as Duane, but technically probably better. Duane actually remarked a number of times in interviews that he thought Betts was the better player of the two. We hear about Duane Duane Duane, but what about Dickey?
We have this: I found a bootleg from that last performance at the Fillmore, and pulled out a bit that features both Duane and Dickey rocking out with the band and also in solo segments. It's amazing playing, to my ear better than anything on the great live album.
The guitar sounds are phenomenal as well: both are using Les Pauls through cranked-up Marshalls, and it's the damn voice of rock 'n' roll. Dickey is over towards the left, Duane is on the right.
Duane is amazing, but Dickey SCREAMS on this recording.
Fixing with the Puff Puff and friends
I ran the recording through a couple of our plug-ins. The guitars sound great, but the drums are lost, so I did what I could. I made a video of how I enhanced it, and also I put the finished recording up for the world.
I used the AIP, the El Juan, and the Puff Puff. It’s a deep dive.
Duane died about four months after that last Fillmore gig, Berry Oakley a year after that. The band persevered, with Dickey Betts assuming the mantle of leadership for a decade. Butch Trucks and Gregg Allman died in 2017. The last living member of the original powerhouse that was this fantastic group is Jai Johnny "Jaimoe" Johanson, age 79.
The original members remain family, naming their kids after each other.
RIP Mr. Forrest Richard “Dickey” Betts.
Have a great week. Celebrate your friends.
Warm regards,
The guys at Korneff
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