Studio Recording Techniques

[newvillefan]

I came across an article today about the 10cc song I'm Not In Love and how they created the sound for that song. I read in absolute amazement how it was done and it got me to thinking about the Carpenters and some of the tricks they must have employed in creating the sound that we eventually all came to know and love. Does anyone have any quotes by Richard, the group or anyone else associated with the band about their studio techniques that they'd care to share and discuss?

For anyone interested, here's the article about the 10cc song and a link to the video if you'd like to listen while reading. Amazing!



In a BBC interview, Eric Stewart told how the song began as a bossa nova version, but was ditched by the band after Kevin Godley and Lol Creme dismissed it as "crap". Although the band moved on to record "One Night in Paris", they noticed that studio staff were still walking around singing "I'm Not in Love". Stewart recalled: "I looked at Graham (Gouldman), and I said that song's a hit, you know. I don't know what's going on here, but I think we got to try it again. And blow me down, Kevin came up with the idea. He said, 'Let's do something very different. Now let's do a whole track and the whole backing track is voices.'"

The ethereal sound was created by laboriously building up multiple overdubs of the voices of Stewart, Graham Gouldman, Godley and Creme singing a single note in unison. This multi-track was then mixed and dubbed down onto 16-track tape. This process was repeated across all 16 tracks to create a lush 256-voice "virtual" choir that could "sing" chromatic chords. A number of these prepared multi-tracks were then cut into several endless loops, each of which contained the basic notes of the main chords used in the song. The chorus loops could then be played by using the mixing desk rather like a keyboard—each chord could be sounded by bringing up the fader for that loop. The instrumental break featured the repeated spoken phrase, "Be quiet, Big boys don't cry...", spoken by Kathy Redfern, the receptionist at the band's own Strawberry Studios, where the track was recorded.

The song, once complete, became instrumental in 10cc's launch to international fame. According to Stewart, the band was already being courted by Phonogram to leave Jonathan King's UK Records label and sign a new deal. He said: "I rang them. I said come and have a listen to what we've done, come and have a listen to this track. And they came up and they freaked, and they said, 'This is a masterpiece. How much money, what do you want? What sort of a contract do you want? We'll do anything.' On the strength of that one song, we did a five-year deal with them for five albums and they paid us a serious amount of money."

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/I'm_Not_in_Love

 

[Harry]

The instrumental break featured the repeated spoken phrase, "Be quiet, Big boys don't cry...", spoken by Kathy Redfern, the receptionist at the band's own Strawberry Studios, where the track was recorded.

What a surprise THAT was, the first time I heard the song.

By the summer of 1975, I was working at my first job in radio. The pop station I started at the year before was migrating to a rock sound that would be freeform AOR by 1976 when I left. But, loyal guy that I am, I listened to it all, expanding my horizons as I went about life.

Still living in my parents' house, I had a small bedroom and for reasons I've forgotten, had my stereo speakers hooked up on the floor on either side of my bed. I used to set an alarm clock to turn on the FM stereo radio so I could awaken gently, and on the morning that this song was debuting on our station, it played.

Half awake and listening to the ethereal harmonies of the record, I was jolted awake when Ms. Redfern began whispering from under one side of my bed! It's a memory I'll always associate with that record.

Harry

 

[Rudy]

Mix (the pro audio magazine) has a lot of "making of" features of popular hit tracks, which are fascinating to read. Look for "Classic Tracks."

One thing I never knew was that the Bee Gees hit "Stayin' Alive" was one of the first to ever use a drum loop. It is actually the drum track from the bridge of "Night Fever." They wanted the same clock-like steady rhythm for "Stayin' Alive," and the engineer dubbed it to another tape, looped it, and played it back through the deck, and I think a few extra hands were needed in the studio with ball point pens to guide the long tape loop so it did not drop to the floor.

 

[newvillefan]

Mix (the pro audio magazine) has a lot of "making of" features of popular hit tracks, which are fascinating to read. Look for "Classic Tracks."

One thing I never knew was that the Bee Gees hit "Stayin' Alive" was one of the first to ever use a drum loop. It is actually the drum track from the bridge of "Night Fever." They wanted the same clock-like steady rhythm for "Stayin' Alive," and the engineer dubbed it to another tape, looped it, and played it back through the deck, and I think a few extra hands were needed in the studio with ball point pens to guide the long tape loop so it did not drop to the floor.

Thanks Rudy, I'll definitely look that magazine up! I just love stories like this. I wish there were more from Richard about their techniques. I looked up his "Fans Ask" section on the official site today and one fan complimented him as a producer and actually asked him if he'd consider writing a book about their production techniques. His answer was "thanks, but no". Shame.

In the meantime, here's a bit of magic behind Queen's Bohemian Rhapsody. I marvel at all of this stuff.

 

[Rudy]

I'm sure you've seen them by now, @newvillefan, but there are quite a few Classic Albums DVDs out there that go into detail about the making of the featured album. I've found the quality to be variable (some seem to ramble on about the type of music or society, without really getting into the actual music on the album or any in-depth info), while others are at the console breaking apart different tracks so we can hear how a mix was built. I'll knock off a few I remember here.

Watching Hugh Padgham and Phil Collins dissect Face Value is one of my favorites. Phil did some of the work at home in his studio, and hearing how they fleshed it out into a proper recording is very interesting. As one example, the idea for his remake of the Genesis song (from Duke) "Behind The Lines" came from some housecleaning they were doing at their studio--they were going through old tapes and playing them at double-speed just to see what was on them. The sped-up playback of "Behind The Lines" sounded like a whole different arrangement, so Phil ran with it, adding the Phenix Horns (Earth Wind & Fire's horn section) to bring part of that sound to life. On the video he also performs live, solo, a version of "Please Don't Ask" that he wrote with the Face Value songs, but it was the only one used on the Duke album beside the hit "Misunderstanding."

The Steely Dan Aja DVD is sometimes as obtuse as you'd expect. But they do break down how the music was created, featuring some of the musicians who played on it, and also play back a sampling of those legendary rejected guitar solos for "Peg." And there is a performance of one of the album's songs done live in the studio for that video.

One I didn't like was the disc for Who's Next, as it babbled on about music in the 60s and early 70s, and IIRC it had minimal input from the band members, certainly not as in-depth as the others in the series. I seem to recall the Metallica "Black Album" video was pretty good (it has a couple of A&M connections, including producer Bob Rock, who was a member of the early 80s band Payola$ on the A&M subsidiary IRS Records), and the Stevie Wonder Songs In The Key Of Life is like a big reunion party (Michael Sembello is quite a kick). U2's Joshua Tree was well done also, as was the Nirvana Nevermind edition (and who knew Dave Grohl would have stepped out from behind Cobain's shadow and become who he is today).

The most recent I watched was the Rush 2112/Moving Pictures edition, which is a great companion to their "Beyond The Lighted Stage" biography video. I haven't yet watched the Simply Red Stars edition yet but it's next on my list. And I think I have Queen's A Night At The Opera edition but may not have watched it all the way through. A classic!

 

[newvillefan]

Watching Hugh Padgham and Phil Collins dissect Face Value is one of my favorites. Phil did some of the work at home in his studio, and hearing how they fleshed it out into a proper recording is very interesting. As one example, the idea for his remake of the Genesis song (from Duke) "Behind The Lines" came from some housecleaning they were doing at their studio--they were going through old tapes and playing them at double-speed just to see what was on them. The sped-up playback of "Behind The Lines" sounded like a whole different arrangement, so Phil ran with it, adding the Phenix Horns (Earth Wind & Fire's horn section) to bring part of that sound to life. On the video he also performs live, solo, a version of "Please Don't Ask" that he wrote with the Face Value songs, but it was the only one used on the Duke album beside the hit "Misunderstanding."

Rudy, this is my absolute favourite of all the Classic Albums series! Listening to Phil recount the change in pace for Behind The Lines and the addition of the horns also had me spellbound. I loved the song Please Don't Ask, and the story he told about it's conception, I wish it had made the Face Value album. My favourite part of the whole episode was seeing him sat at the mixing desk playing the multi-tracks for In The Air Tonight. He plays the electronic drum track and explains that a real drummer would get bored playing to that and add fills, whereas the electronic version adds a sense of bleakness and relentlessness that he was looking for on that song. Just amazing. I watch stuff like that over and over again and the Simply Red one you mention is now next on my list as I'm a big Mick Hucknall fan too!

Fleetwood Mac's Rumours Classic Albums is another killer...to see Lindsay Buckingham explaining the guitar riff over the top of Go Your Own Way that almost didn't make the cut is another favourite moment.

 

[Chris May]

This is a great thread! I'd suggested to Richard some time back that he engage in this - or at least a book or some kind of text outlining certain techniques, etc. He and I have had a lot of discussion on this, as I've shared on other threads here I'm pretty sure. Most of the songs from Offering thru Now & Then were done 4-parts, sometimes 5,6,7 or 8 parts (like with anything a cappella). They would go in and hit the "outer parts" of any chord, Karen singing up top, Richard on the bottom. They'd sing them simultaneously, then listen back until they got it perfect. Then they would re-sing the part two more times following the same process, WITHOUT listening back to the first take. They didn't match unisons on playbacks like most of the bands did mentioned above. It threw K & R off generally when they did that. Once the "outer" parts of the chord were sung three times each perfectly, they would go and hit the "inner" parts of the chord, where most of the "close" harmonics were created until that was perfect. What you would have at the end would be a 4-part, 12-voice chord (or occasional 5 or 6 part where there were embellishments, passing tones, etc).

When Horizon came into the picture, the studios had been renovated, the machines were upgraded to 24 from 16 and they changed their technique. At this stage, and from here on, everything was "double tracked" instead of "tripled", and Richard would sit in the control room and listen to Karen sing ALL of her parts, then Richard would go out and do his. There's other documentation on this regarding this album as a matter of fact on the Reader's Digest set.

Most of the tunes that were done a cappella (Without a Song, When Time Was All We Had, It Came Upon a Midnight Clear) were done 8-parts, double tracked. Richard mentioned that to me several times, creating 16-voice chords. There were very few effects added other than the multi-harmony overdubbing technique along with some reverb, occasional chorus effect to open it up a little, but beyond that mostly what we heard were Karen and Richard and a lot of natural tones.

 

[Guitarmutt]

I'm sure you've seen them by now, @newvillefan, but there are quite a few Classic Albums DVDs out there that go into detail about the making of the featured album. I've found the quality to be variable (some seem to ramble on about the type of music or society, without really getting into the actual music on the album or any in-depth info), while others are at the console breaking apart different tracks so we can hear how a mix was built. I'll knock off a few I remember here.

Watching Hugh Padgham and Phil Collins dissect Face Value is one of my favorites. Phil did some of the work at home in his studio, and hearing how they fleshed it out into a proper recording is very interesting. As one example, the idea for his remake of the Genesis song (from Duke) "Behind The Lines" came from some housecleaning they were doing at their studio--they were going through old tapes and playing them at double-speed just to see what was on them. The sped-up playback of "Behind The Lines" sounded like a whole different arrangement, so Phil ran with it, adding the Phenix Horns (Earth Wind & Fire's horn section) to bring part of that sound to life. On the video he also performs live, solo, a version of "Please Don't Ask" that he wrote with the Face Value songs, but it was the only one used on the Duke album beside the hit "Misunderstanding."

The Steely Dan Aja DVD is sometimes as obtuse as you'd expect. But they do break down how the music was created, featuring some of the musicians who played on it, and also play back a sampling of those legendary rejected guitar solos for "Peg." And there is a performance of one of the album's songs done live in the studio for that video.

One I didn't like was the disc for Who's Next, as it babbled on about music in the 60s and early 70s, and IIRC it had minimal input from the band members, certainly not as in-depth as the others in the series. I seem to recall the Metallica "Black Album" video was pretty good (it has a couple of A&M connections, including producer Bob Rock, who was a member of the early 80s band Payola$ on the A&M subsidiary IRS Records), and the Stevie Wonder Songs In The Key Of Life is like a big reunion party (Michael Sembello is quite a kick). U2's Joshua Tree was well done also, as was the Nirvana Nevermind edition (and who knew Dave Grohl would have stepped out from behind Cobain's shadow and become who he is today).

The most recent I watched was the Rush 2112/Moving Pictures edition, which is a great companion to their "Beyond The Lighted Stage" biography video. I haven't yet watched the Simply Red Stars edition yet but it's next on my list. And I think I have Queen's A Night At The Opera edition but may not have watched it all the way through. A classic!

The Fleetwood Mac "Rumours" one is good too. They still have strong associations with that time and those emotions.

 

[Guitarmutt]

Oh, another fun glimpse into the vocal harmony process is on the 1972 Live in Australia concert footage. Richard takes time to explain a little about how a chord is formed with Doug and Danny doing those inner voices Chris May mentioned. It's funny and insightful. Then they go into a great version of Ticket.

 

[Rudy]

The Fleetwood Mac "Rumours" one is good too. They still have strong associations with that time and those emotions.

I am pretty sure I have that one, but the DVD-Audio version of the album also had a "making of" feature, audio only, that I've listened to which had pretty much the same information. I'm so burned out on the album, though, that I can't sit through the music anymore. (That's sad when radio plays songs to death, to the point of where you never want to hear them again.)

 

[ullalume]

This is a great thread! I'd suggested to Richard some time back that he engage in this - or at least a book or some kind of text outlining certain techniques, etc. He and I have had a lot of discussion on this, as I've shared on other threads here I'm pretty sure. Most of the songs from Offering thru Now & Then were done 4-parts, sometimes 5,6,7 or 8 parts (like with anything a cappella). They would go in and hit the "outer parts" of any chord, Karen singing up top, Richard on the bottom. They'd sing them simultaneously, then listen back until they got it perfect. Then they would re-sing the part two more times following the same process, WITHOUT listening back to the first take. They didn't match unisons on playbacks like most of the bands did mentioned above. It threw K & R off generally when they did that. Once the "outer" parts of the chord were sung three times each perfectly, they would go and hit the "inner" parts of the chord, where most of the "close" harmonics were created until that was perfect. What you would have at the end would be a 4-part, 12-voice chord (or occasional 5 or 6 part where there were embellishments, passing tones, etc).

When Horizon came into the picture, the studios had been renovated, the machines were upgraded to 24 from 16 and they changed their technique. At this stage, and from here on, everything was "double tracked" instead of "tripled", and Richard would sit in the control room and listen to Karen sing ALL of her parts, then Richard would go out and do his. There's other documentation on this regarding this album as a matter of fact on the Reader's Digest set.

Most of the tunes that were done a cappella (Without a Song, When Time Was All We Had, It Came Upon a Midnight Clear) were done 8-parts, double tracked. Richard mentioned that to me several times, creating 16-voice chords. There were very few effects added other than the multi-harmony overdubbing technique along with some reverb, occasional chorus effect to open it up a little, but beyond that mostly what we heard were Karen and Richard and a lot of natural tones.

You know, in the UK, we have BBC4 and Sky Arts. I could easily see a 1 or 2 hour program with Richard sitting behind a mixing desk talking about their technique. Literally, it would cost peanuts to make, and Richard would be done in a day. In fact I know someone who makes shows for Sky Arts. Chris, have your people call my people. . . we'll do lunch.

 

[Rudy]

A "Classic Albums" edition for A Song For You would be neat, actually.

 

[newvillefan]

A "Classic Albums" edition for A Song For You would be neat, actually.

Superb suggestion! It's a pity the Carpenters have never been given the "Classic Albums" treatment. This would be the album to feature for sure.

 

[Chris May]

Only issue is if most of the masters were destroyed, they wouldn't be able to do the same kind of treatment they've down with Fleetwood Mac and Queen. Such a bummer!

 

[ullalume]

That blinkin' fire.

 

[Chris May]

And honestly I would bet that sort of request would just remind Richard of the pain of loss.

 

[newvillefan]

Only issue is if most of the masters were destroyed, they wouldn't be able to do the same kind of treatment they've down with Fleetwood Mac and Queen. Such a bummer!

Not sure if this question has been asked before but weren't any of the multitracks transferred to digital before the fire? It's digital transfers they use on the Bohemian Rhapsody segment.

 

[Chris May]

Not sure if this question has been asked before but weren't any of the multitracks transferred to digital before the fire? It's digital transfers they use on the Bohemian Rhapsody segment.

Actually yes, when David [Alley] was managing Richard, he often required that the 2" stuff be transferred over to ProTools as a backup. David is a friend of mine and recently mentioned how this was never a request made by Universal - which basically means that unless there was a request for transfer, it wasn't standard to have it done.

But yes, it's likely that a lot of the 'standards' at least got a full digital transfer. I know that Richard and David had everything transferred over to 48-track tape and worked from there for As Time Goes By.

 

[newvillefan]

For any ABBA fans (and even those who aren't), here are a couple of treats! I could watch stuff like this all day! The last 50 seconds of each of these clips are amazing...

 

[Chris May]

If you really want a treat, listen to the center channel of much of the Carpenters' Singles, 1969-1981 [SACD]. Richard had Al place many of the backing vocal stacks thru the center and dry. Some of the rears have these as well but it will definitely help give you an education in Carpenters with regards to the vocal overdubbing for sure!

 

[newvillefan]

If you really want a treat, listen to the center channel of much of the Carpenters' Singles, 1969-1981 [SACD]. Richard had Al place many of the backing vocal stacks thru the center and dry. Some of the rears have these as well but it will definitely help give you an education in Carpenters with regards to the vocal overdubbing for sure!

Chris, can that be done without an SACD player at all?

 

[Chris May]

Chris, can that be done without an SACD player at all?

Oh sure...many of the clips can be found on YouTube. Just search Carpenters a cappella etc. and you'll start finding stuff. Probably most educative or fascinating are This Masquerade, Touch Me and Sing to name a few.

 

[ullalume]

Actually yes, when David [Alley] was managing Richard, he often required that the 2" stuff be transferred over to ProTools as a backup. David is a friend of mine and recently mentioned how this was never a request made by Universal - which basically means that unless there was a request for transfer, it wasn't standard to have it done.

But yes, it's likely that a lot of the 'standards' at least got a full digital transfer. I know that Richard and David had everything transferred over to 48-track tape and worked from there for As Time Goes By.

So in effect, with the digital transfers, he could be capable of deconstructing their sound on film. Seriously, this would bring his talent serious Kudos to be featured on the above channels. . . .the masses simply follow what they're told. Perhaps for the 50th. 40's- Bing, 50's -Elvis. 60's - Beatles. 70's - Carpenters. 80's - Prince. 90's - Carey. They NEED more spotlight. Might be worth throwing the idea in his direction.

Neil

 

[Chris May]

So in effect, with the digital transfers, he could be capable of deconstructing their sound on film. Seriously, this would bring his talent serious Kudos to be featured on the above channels. . . .the masses simply follow what they're told. Perhaps for the 50th. 40's- Bing, 50's -Elvis. 60's - Beatles. 70's - Carpenters. 80's - Prince. 90's - Carey. They NEED more spotlight. Might be worth throwing the idea in his direction.

Neil

Oh sure! It's a track for track copy. I honestly don't know for sure which titles/masters got transferred. I'm happy to look into it a little.

 

[ullalume]

if ya don't mind, Chris. . . that'd be swell