• Techniques
  • The Technical Constraints That Made Abbey Road So Good (p.2)
2014/10/29 14:06:01
Larry Jones
I'd like to second the general tone of this thread, and I hope I (we) don't sound stuck in the past.
 
A well-known author who has published several "handbooks" for recording, mixing and mastering engineers has a habit of posting on his blog isolated tracks from old hit recordings, for example, the drum and bass track of The Beatles' "Hello Goodbye." With the rest of the mix stripped away, he always finds some little musical or technical anomaly, and goes on to say something like "...if this had happened today, we would have fixed it."*
 
The idea that you could "fix" something that was good enough for George Martin, Paul, and Ringo at the time, on a record that millions of people still love 50 years later, just seems wrong to me. I mean, doesn't the word "fix" kind of include the notion of "improve?" I think the musicians and technicians working at Abbey Road in those days must have understood that concept, too.
 
Even with all the tools I now have at my disposal to fix stuff, I believe that music should be organic, and as such a little hair growing off the side of it is acceptable, if not downright desirable.
 
*To be fair, after I repeatedly challenged this author he finally admitted that he doesn't mean it should be fixed, just that it would be fixed. Considering that there are a lot of budding engineers reading his books, I think he should make that disclaimer on every one of his "isolated tracks" posts.
2014/10/30 01:03:04
AT
One of the things this post made me think of was the notion that music is emotion channeled by the structure of math.  Which is one reason it is nice to know a little bit of the science of music and mathematical relationships (even if the guitarist can't count past 10 without taking off shoes).  But nobody dances to an open math book.
 
Fixing all the ... quirks, making a song mathematically perfect, provides only obvious expectations w/o any surprises.  which is the point of music.  I'll take an imperfect performance that captures the emotion of the song any day over a perfect take which you can already hear after the intro. 
2014/10/31 17:55:07
tlw
BenMMusTech
The Beatles vox amps, which were solid

 
Are you sure about that? The AC15s and AC30s the Beatles used in their earlier recordings were certainly not solid state, nor were Vox's early louder amps, the AC50 and AC100.
 
Brian May uses valve AC30s by the way. Not sure about David Gilmour. I associate him mostly with Selmer in his early years then Hiwatt DR103s, at least as his main amps.
 
2014/11/01 23:41:01
BenMMusTech
tlw
BenMMusTech
The Beatles vox amps, which were solid

 
Are you sure about that? The AC15s and AC30s the Beatles used in their earlier recordings were certainly not solid state, nor were Vox's early louder amps, the AC50 and AC100.
 
Brian May uses valve AC30s by the way. Not sure about David Gilmour. I associate him mostly with Selmer in his early years then Hiwatt DR103s, at least as his main amps.
 




Yes you are partially correct my bad...just had to look it up.  The early Beatles Vox amps were all tubes, then in mid-60's they were turned into transistors...Mays were always resistors.  I did not say Gilmour used Vox, you are correct he used Hi-Watt's.
http://www.voxshowroom.com/us/amp/beat.html
Ben
2014/11/02 16:17:19
tlw
There's a lot of confusion over 1969s Vox amps, probably because the Vox-badged amps made in the States by Thimas Organ had little in common with the (original) Vox amps built in the UK by Jennings Musical Instruments other than cosmetics. The (Thomas) Beatle and Super Beatle are pretty much unknown in the UK.

The JMI Voxes were mostly valve, including the AC50 and AC100 developed in the mid 60s when 30 watts was no longer enough to cope with the increasing size of audiences (not to mention the screaming that greeted the Beatles). A cranked AC30 is remarkably loud and bright, in the painful to stand in front of class. I can't imagine what the audience noise must have been like when it got so bad the Beatles gave up gigging. JMI did build some solid state and hybrid stuff but it was never a mainstay of their range or regarded in the same light as the class A(ish) EL84-powered AC15 and AC30, the bass amps perhaps being the exception, though Marshall pretty much had the UK bass amp market at the time. The Beatles would have had access to anything of course, Harrison and Lennon certainly used Fender and Marshall amps as well as Vox.

I'm not sure what you mean by May's amps being "resistor". His AC30s were and are definitely valve. He did some work with Derek Rocco of Watford Valves a few years ago to find a good modern valve set for the AC30. The result was gain-rated JJ made Harma STRs, often cryogenically treated. Very good valves on a par with old Mullard, Sulvania and Phillips. May did often use a little Deacy solid-state amp in the studio as well.

I think you're right about the combination of solid state and valve blended together creating a very musical sound. A transistor Fuzz Face running into a valve amp still takes some beating, and just about every distortion/overdrive pedal is solid state of course. Personally I prefer transistors after valves to be simple, clean amplifiers rather than adding clipping of their own. Valves can smooth out solid state clipping while solid state clipping on top of solid state clipping gets very harsh and tiring.
2014/11/02 16:26:47
BenMMusTech
Transistors, yes, Transistors and resistors I was getting my wires crossed.  Sorry, more  creative man and scholar (history, why?) hence I'm always happy to admit I am wrong.
 
Some of the best electric guitar sounds I ever got, was the Behringer 90 buck tube amp...horrible dirty sound fed into whatever card I was using and compression, for truly beautiful digital hybrid sustain and distortion.  In fact when I was using my Creamware DSP cards, which could be played "live" I was able to get great...I think you would call it digital feedback, using my Yorkville monitors.  I would call it digital feedback because it was coming from a digital source.  Maybe I am wrong.
 
Ben, sorry musing again.
2014/11/02 16:39:01
dstrenz
I remember someone telling me a long time ago that the Beatles Vox amps actually had Fender guts because they had a contract with Vox which obligated them to have Vox amps when they played live. Was that a myth?
2014/11/02 20:58:47
BenMMusTech
dstrenz
I remember someone telling me a long time ago that the Beatles Vox amps actually had Fender guts because they had a contract with Vox which obligated them to have Vox amps when they played live. Was that a myth?




I'm not sure I will do some research.
 
Ben
12
© 2025 APG vNext Commercial Version 5.1

Use My Existing Forum Account

Use My Social Media Account