EQ Magazine - January 2008 - (Page 6)

SOUNDING BOARD FIRST HAND NEWS I was rather surprised to read in the [11/07] “First Hand News” story what Richard Dashut had to say about using safety copies of Fleetwood Mac’s Rumours album. It’s true they wore out the original masters, such that the high end on them was pretty well trashed. But, from there, what actually happened is only remotely close to what he described. I’m the one who explained the technique of simultaneously running the master and backup, and syncing them manually with a VSO. This was done by placing grease pencil markers on both reels, using these markers to precisely align the reel positions, and starting both tape machines at the same time. The position of one is adjusted via its marker such that tracks on both are in sync at the top of a song. The person controlling the VSO then listens to, say, the snare track of each tape, on headphones, with one track in each ear (this makes it very easy to hear the direction of drift) and adjusts the VSO as necessary while playing through a song to achieve precise sync. It takes several attempts for each song, as the VSO operator has to learn the drift(s) before a successful complete pass can be accomplished. SMPTE timecode was recorded on an open track of each tape at this time, so that they could later be easily synced together, and this is how the final mixes were done. I offered to do this for them, but as it turned out a gentleman whose name I can no longer recall actually did the job at a studio I believe was named Lions Gate, in Los Angeles. My involvement was as an electronic maintenance guy for Wally Heider Recording, where Fleetwood Mac was working at the time (Ken Caillat had also been a staff guy there). Cheers, SAFF IT IS I found the Grails article [8/07] quite by accident the other day, and noticed that I am credited with mastering in the article, but that my name is misspelled. My name is “Carl Saff” not “Carl Saph. ” Thanks! IN ABSENTIA The Tiger Army article was pretty rad. I have one question though: Why isn’t Jerry Finn quoted in the article? McGrath has a lot of cool things to say but Finn did produce the album. on Music from Regions THE RIGHT WAY I just finished re-reading your interview with Phil Ramone [4/07]. You really captured his perspective on recording techniques as it relates to his history in the studio. What comes shining through [in the article] is the man’s simple philosophy of working Sincerely, with whatever technology is at hand to record the most natural feel of the artist. He doesn’t seem to be hung up on any one particular method but, rather, is always curious to try another approach—even if it flies in the face of “proper” recording, such as bringing a live PA into the studio to enhance the singer’s performance. Leakage be damned! This is great news for us home studio buffs who are always seeking ways to measure up to these great “performance recordings” by Beyond, I think it’s the best album of their career. And it sounds fantastic. The story was very thorough and I learned a lot about how they record. Great job guys! Greg the G (via email) Anonymous (via email) Matt Harper responds: Finn doesn’t do press, I was told. This is unfortunate as it would have been cool to hear what he had to say about the making of the album. I didn’t want to nuke the piece just because he wasn’t willing to participate, so I refocused it to cover just the tracking of the album, which is what Joe was responsible for. The story is complete, in my eyes—we got all the engineering info down, we just didn’t touch on Finn’s mixing techniques. trying to do things by the book. You need to know the rules before you can break them . . . but you need to break them to create something really unique. Inspired by Phil, I went into my modest home studio and re-did a vocal track using the PA whilst tracking. And you know what? It worked like a charm. It added a whole new “live vibe in the studio”—the mic bleed added more punch and presence. So thanks for the great article on a true studio pioneer, and the encouragement to your readers to continue to use technology creatively. Kris Baldwin (via email) Got something to say? Questions, comments, concerns? Head on over to www.eqmag.com and drop us a line on our Letters to the Editor forum, send us an email at eqeditor@ musicplayer.com or snail mail c/o EQ Magazine, 1111 Bayhill Dr., Suite 125, San Bruno, CA 94066 for inclusion on the Sounding Board. Note: Letters may be edited for length and/or clarity. Direct correspondence by EQ editorial is not guaranteed. All submissions become the property of EQ magazine and can be published in Carl Saff (via email) WUNDERFUL . . . BUT WRONG Small point, but Garrett Haines wrote that Wunder Audio makes preamps based on the Billy Youdelman (via email) SPRING FORWARD [I] just read the Tiger Army story [10/07] and I had to email you guys and congratulate you on another issue well done. The magazine just keeps getting better and better. I’ve been a fan of theirs since their seveninch on Chapter Eleven. Where some fans have written them off for getting more poppy custom Helios modules made for John Paul Jones [8/07]. The “John Paul Jones console” was actually an Allotrope rather than a Helios. I don’t know if Dick Swettenham was involved with the Allotrope, but I thought I’d mention it. Cheers, Creston Funk (via email) any medium. 6 EQ JANUARY 2008 www.eqmag.com http://www.eqmag.com http://www.eqmag.com

Table of Contents Feed for the Digital Edition of EQ Magazine - January 2008

EQ Magazine - January 2008 Contents Talk Box Sounding Board Robbers On High Street Rafter RTX Sharon Jones and the Dap-Kings Toolbox Rahim Dimmu Borgir Wu-Tang Clan Special Feature! Mastering for Musicians Guitar Trax Bass Management Key Issues Drumheads Vocal Cords Mix Bus Cheat Sheet Cakewalk Sonar 7 IK Multimedia Virtual Instruments Yamaha MSP7 Shure KSM137/SL K+H O 300 & O 800 Sonica Livetracker Apple Logic Studio Novation XioSynth 25, Audio-Technica ATH-M50, Samson G-Track

EQ Magazine - January 2008

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