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Volume #0399 March 28, 2000
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Dedicated to the betterment of recorded music and literature
Subject: Checkmates, Ltd
Received: 03/28/00 1:55 am
From: Paul Urbahns
To: Spectropop!
Phil wrote:
<< Although there is no credit, I can't see why it
wouldn't have been recorded & mixed at Gold Star. As far
as I can ascertain, the leading studios went 8-track
around 1967 and progressed thru 16-track to 24-track by
around 1973. >>
Phil, there is a credit on the Checkmates, Ltd album to
Larry Levine as engineer. At that time he was head engineer
at A&M studios so it was probably recorded at A&M studios
along with the Ronettes single of the time You Came You
Saw You Conquered which is credited to A&M in the Ronettes
Best Of comp, also credited to Larry Levine.
Paul Urbahns
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
Subject: BOUNCE: Non-member submission
Received: 03/28/00 2:09 am
From: Spectropop: Archive | Bulletin Board
To: Spectropop!
========= Start of forwarded message =========
[Main Spectropop Bulletin Board | Post Followup | FAQ ]
The Men Behind the Wall of Sound
Posted by Alan Ackerman
on Sun, 26 Mar 2000 09:07:44
----------------------------------------------------------
I have in my possession a copy of Modern Recording
magazine Vol.1 No. 3 published Feb/Mar 1976. In it, there
was an interview with Larry Levine in an article entitled
The Men Behind the Wall of Sound.
The following are some excerpts and summary of key items
from that interview.
Enjoy!
3-track or 4-track?
"Those days with Phil it was only 3-track...All except the
Righteous Brothers and Ike & Tina--we must have been 4-
track by then."
Gold Star Studios, Los Angeles Studio size: 22' x 30'
Control room: 10' x 15'
About the control room and playbacks:
"The sound came back at you from almost everywhere. It was
all pegboard. There was no acoustical design to the room.
We had Altec 604D's and Phil listened back at incredibly
loud levels. Maybe at about 120 dB--we never measured it.
It was the greatest, most exciting room to work in,
though."
The equipment?
"We had an Ampex mono 350, 02 -track was 351, I don't
remember what Ampex model the 3-track was. The board was a
United Audio board built by Bill Putnam. It was strictly a
3-track board, with 12 inputs--all of them were on rotary
pots."
Equalizers?
"We hardly ever used them. They were at the bottom of the
console. They could be for minus 3 or 6 on the low end and
5 or 10 kHz on the high end."
Spector's core musicians:
"The band was made up of three guitars (Tom Tedesco, Bill
Pitman and Irv Rubins; then Barney Kessel later on), two
basses (Ray Pohlman and Jimmy Bond), drums (Hal Blaine),
two pianos (Al De Lory and Leon Russell or Don Randi and
Nino Tempo), a horn section of five or six, two bones, two
saxes, two trumpets, usually, and anyone who was available
as percussionists (Sonny Bono, Cher, Jack Nitzsche, Frank
Kay, Brian Wilson, to name a few)."
Spector's standard recording procedure:
"What he'd do was to start with the guitars. They might
play for an hour, two or four bars, over and over. He'd
listen, then change it. They'd play, he'd listen and
change it until he was satisfied with the rhythm figures
they were playing. Then he would add the pianos and repeat
the process until the pianos would actually meld with the
guitars. This was the 'Wall of Sound'."
"Phil's whole concept was to have nothing really stand out
and say,'Look at me.' It was the movement of the whole. The
horns and strings were used usually for 'padding.' The
whole sound had to meld as a wall. A lot of people thought
it was echo, but it wasn't."
"...so, anyway, after the guitars and pianos were melded,
then it was the bass's turn to fit inside--all as a total
sound! This was standard operating procedure, always."
"...the drums came last! The horns and percussion came
before. Because of this procedure I don't ever remember
putting anything on tape before 2-1/2 hours into the
session."
The famous Spector drum sound:
"That's funny. Phil was never that pleased with the drum
sound. He would have liked the drum sound to always be the
same. Something he could count on when the drums came on.
But it never was. There was so much leakage in the room--
with a small room and a 12-foot ceiling and all those
people. Sometimes 18 to 23 in that room all going at the
same time--percussion, horns, full rhythm section. There
was no way to prevent leakage."
"...you were leaking into the rhythm guitar mic with the
drums, you brought up the drums so that it didn't sound
like all drum leakage. When you turned one thing up, you
generally had to turn something else up along with it,
because you change the sound of that 'other' thing when
you turn 'this thing' up. Therefore, leakage itself became
an instrument. That's why when people thought it was echo
that created the sound, it wasn't entirely true. We used
echo, of course, but the sound was created by the leakage
in the room itself."
"It was a lot of work: re-positioning, feeding more signal
to different instruments, playing with the guitar and bass
amp settings, rearranging the locations of the mics and
the players in the studio, mixing and remixing until it
was right."
Microphone placement:
"Miking was very basic. We used two mics on the drums (one
on the kick drum and one overhead), a mic for each guitar
and bass, a mic for each piano, one mic for the entire
percussion crew and, I think, we used two mics for the
horns. Remember, we only had 12 mic inputs on the board.
We used mostly ribbon mics (RCA 44's and 77's) on the
vocals and horns, and Electro-Voice 667's on the rhythm
instruments."
Track placement:
"Everything went on one track."
Weren't the percussion, horns and strings put on a
separate track?
"The string and vocals were. But everything else,
including horns and percussion, was cut "live" onto one
track of the 3-track. That's why there was so much leakage.
That's the way Phil wanted it. He didn't want to work
multi-track. He felt that 'the sound I have today I want
tomorrow.' The only way it could be that way was if it's
all on one track. Either it happened for us or it didn't.
It was a total sound."
How were the voices doubled?
"We rarely doubled the voices, but sometimes we did double
the strings. You see, because the Ampex sel-sync, in those
days, had no top end at all, I didn't want to 'ping-pong'
or 'bounce' tracks. So we'd go from the 3-track (which,
had the entire band on one track and the first set of
strings on another) to a 2-track. I'd transfer the band to
one track, and the strings, while I was doubling them, to
the second track. Then I would transfer the 'doubled'
strings from the 2-track back to the 3-track. This way
I've still got the original band on one track of the three
and a double set of strings on another. If I wanted to
double the voices it would be the same thing."
Echo?
"Well, we had two 'live' chambers at Gold Star that were
extremely bottom-heavy, so we couldn't put echo on the
overall track. It would rumble forever. So we had to add
it while we were recording. We did have selective echo,
and what I liked about it was that it was a 'splitter.'
When you turned the echo up it would send more sound to
the echo and less to the direct. So as you'd increase the
echo, you'd decrease the direct. The sound was great. You
see, the concept of echo in those days was that echo was
supposed to give you a feeling of 'distance.' Therefore,
bringing the echo up would automatically pull the direct
sound back. Today, as you know, the direct sound remains
and the echo is added. In order to get that 'distance' you
have to decrease the direct and increase the echo. Anyway,
on most of Spector's sessions we echoed the guitars,
sometimes the pianos and strings. On a few sessions, like
'Be My Baby,' we put echo on the drums."
I hope these interview excerpts helped shed some light on
what was really going on behind the wall of sound.
So much for now,
Alan
========== End of forwarded message ==========
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
Subject: I&TT and Checkmates, Ltd.
Received: 03/28/00 1:55 am
From: Jamie LePage
To: Spectropop!
Phil Chapman wrote:
> The 1966 UK album "River Deep - Mountan High" was issued
> in stereo(SHU 8298)and contains more or less the same
> mixes as the later A&M release.
Thanks for that, Phil. I hadn't thought about the
earlier UK release or considered there might have been a
stereo edition in '66. That does seem to indicate that
the stereo mixes were done at Gold Star. I wondered
about this because the stereo mixes are so much clearer
than the mono ones.
I asked:
>> Was A&M a 24 track facility when Spector cut the Checkmates?
Phil replied:
> The Checkmates Ltd album however sounds 8 track to me...
> Although there is no credit, I can't see why it wouldn't
> have been recorded & mixed at Gold Star.
I guess I jumped to a conclusion there! I don't know for
certain that Checkmates Ltd. album was recorded at A&M, I
guessed it was because it sounds so much different than
the latter day Ronettes, I&TT and Righteous Brothers
tracks. You Came You Saw You Conquered also has that
"different" aural quality, so I always assumed it too was
recorded at A&M. It seemed Phil was reaching for a "new"
wall of sound on those tracks. Leaving aside the Apple
period for the moment, the progression of this 2nd
generation wall of sound can be heard through the Dion,
Leonard Cohen, Nilsson/Cher, Darlene Love and Lennon
R&R sides cut through the mid-70s. It's still a wall, but
the texture of its surface has more definition.
I also notice that Spector tended to record at
progressively slower and slower tempos during this
period. Dion's Born To Be With You is an extreme example
of this. Talk about laid back!
Michael wrote:
> There were a couple of Ronettes songs that were not
> recorded at Gold Star-"When I Saw You" and "So Young".
> According to the Phil Spector box set, these cuts were
> recorded at United Studios, also in Hollywood-possibly on
> four tracks.
Good one, Michael! Now that you mention it, these two
tracks do have a bit less "room" or mic leakage than do the
Gold Star Ronettes tracks.
What about I Can Hear Music? I always guessed Jeff Barry
cut this in New York, at least the rhythm tracks. Sounds
more like a Dixie Cups track than most other sides by the
Ronettes. Anyone know?
Jimmy C wrote:
> describe for me your ONE defining girl-group musical
> moment.
One? Impossible. Here are a few that immediately come to
mind:
"Walking in the Rain," especially at the fade "I've been
wishing, and hoping, where can he be." God, I love that
fade. The poignant longing in Ronnie's voice is intensely
sad. If you listen only to the left channel of the
vocal-only version ("We Got Someone Watching The Door"
#2 track 9), what you hear is Ronnie's lead a cappella.
This version doesn't fade and runs six measures longer
than the final mix. You don't have to turn up the volume
at the end to hear that final phrase, and then Ronnie
sings even beyond that: "Please tell me where". One of
Barry & Cyn's best. Truly awesome.
The Raindrops' "The Kind of Boy You Can't Forget" when the
record stops dead in its tracks only to re-enter for the
fade with that super compressed drum/percussion track. What
a sound! Jeff & Ellie may have written better songs, but
this Raindrops record may be their most irrepressible
production ever.
The Goodies' Dum Dum Ditty. The whole record actually but
particularly when the track is pulled back, the singer
says in a low voice "yeh, yeh, yeh," then the track comes
surging back in. Like so many Shadow Morton records, it's
very strange, but fascinating.
I look forward to reading other listers' fave GG moments.
Best to all,
Jamie
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
Subject: perfection
Received: 03/28/00 1:55 am
From: Ron Bierma
To: Spectropop!
In a message dated 3/26/00 8:35:24 AM, spectropop writes:
<< here's your Spring Challenge: describe for me your ONE
defining girl-group musical moment. >>
when Ronnie opens her mouth and sings "I want him..." on
Walking in the Rain, I melt. Pure Bliss opening to a
perfect song. Still gives goose bumps after...oh...a
million listens.
Elron
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
Subject: My Grrrrl Group Moment(s)
Received: 03/28/00 1:55 am
From: DJ JimmyB
To: Spectropop!
In a message dated 3/26/0 9:35:03 AM, you wrote:
>Challenge: describe for me your ONE defining girl-group
>musical moment.
The whispered opening to Patti Lace & The Petticoats
"Sneaky Sue" seconded by "When I say I'm in love you best
believe I'm in love L-U-V" "Is he tall?" "Well, I gotta
look up!" "Yeah? Well I hear he's bad." "Mmmm, he's
good-bad, but he's not evil."
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
Subject: doo lang doo lang doo lang
Received: 03/28/00 1:55 am
From: Frank Youngwerth
To: Spectropop!
<>
Chiffons' "He's So Fine": "If I were a queen/and he asked
me to leave my throne/I'd do anything that he asked/
Anything to make him my own" Not just the lyrics, but how
they're delivered against the music.
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
Subject: Favourite Girl Group Moment
Received: 03/28/00 1:55 am
From: Stos, William
To: Spectropop!
Okay, here we go.
When I first heard the Cookies' "I Never Dreamed," I knew
I was in love. From the opening pouncing piano, to the
fade at the end, it just might be one of the best records
ever made (I don't care what Russ Titleman says). But what
really gets me every time is just before the last chorus
when the lead (whoever she may be) Margie or Dorothy(?)
starts up with her "no, no, no, nos." Second only to the
"baby please come home" lyric right after the interchanging
please, pLEASe, in Darlene Love's "Baby Please Come Home."
Wow! Tears every time!
BTW, did Ellie Greenwich and the Popsicles only ever make
one 45?
Will
--------------------[ archived by Spectropop ]--------------------
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