you talkin bout 60s ?

 

Last edited: Jan 4, 2025

Early 70s.

 

Necessary thread. And this lack of attention goes for a lot of things, since the recording process to the processing choices made on a mixing/mastering enviroment. You guys already told that storage is not a issue right now, but apart from not storing tapes, you didn't had 100 fairchilds, 49 Neves 1073 or 30 LA-2A's. If you were 'standard' you would get a pair of 2A's and 1176, some pultecs and maybe a fairchild. And great records were made like this. Nowdays people don't even try to extract the max from a piece of gear and they are buying another one, and another one, thinking that the problem was the gear or plugin. I'm not saying that we should refuse better revisions of a software, but what works works, and we are already PLENTY of plugins. We don't need nothing else anymore to make great music. So if something is not sonding well, you can bet that the tools are not the fault.

 

The 660 had 10 tubes, a handful of transformers and an inductor thrown in for fun. It weighed about 30 pounds. About 800 in total were manufactured and many less so for the 670 which had double the electronics and weighed in at nearly 65 pounds in a six rack height. Abby Road had a 660 which was used on vocals and drums. Capitol Records used one or two I believe.

 

In these stories, I see folks who dedicated their lives to making sure the music was as alive as it could possibly be in reproduction...for us. I see sacrifice. The production quality of 30-50 year old records generate envy to many of us younger engineers. I on-purpose replicate unwanted distortion/imperfections/soft clipping as a production technique. I view 'Mix With The Masters' for production stories of yesterday wishing I was there while the storyteller wishes they were not there constantly fighting the noise floor as a career choice.

I am the child of parents who drilled the love of old school R&B into my head as early as I can remember. As I came into my own musical tastes, I appreciated the timeless music that came before me in terms of complexity, cohesion, and it's universal respect for arrangement, actual talented vocalists, and quality production values.

At 24 years old, I can enjoy the groove/pace/feeling of 'Hey Nineteen' by Steely Dan (1980) just as much I can enjoy 'Fukumean' by Gunna (2024). However, my mastering mentor can not, as he is forever stuck in 1972-83, bless his old, grumpy-ass heart.

Keep those stories coming!

 

There is another thing rarely touched on too.
The manufacturing of LP's was different as well as the packaging in some countries. There were also record import stores where you could get albums that were not released in every country like they are now. They cost more to import too. The American LP's were regularly made from less flimsy vinyl and more solid than some others that were made of the same album. Some came with plastic covers and some did not. Also live filming was not common of concerts. You'd have to go to the theatre to see it e.g. Song remains the same (Zeppelin) and others, before video VHS/BETA players.

 

Soundwise, you're correct. The only thing i don't think it's 'fair' it's to compare a neutral/no processing storage (digital/DAW) with a storage with built in processing (tape machine). The tape has 'musical' qualities that a DAW, by itself, doesn't have. And tape plugins just can't give the same processing feeling that the analog tape can give. On the other hand, you can process digital audio in a way you couldn't do with tape. But the reability is the key here. I trust Studer team more than i trust myself and my chains. Is this trust worth the price? Some people will say 'yes', other people just can't afford it or will not see any sense on the purchase because they rely more on their chains.

 

I asked and Jim Williams of ElectroMagnetic Radiation Recorders answered concerning how much a 670 originally cost and he said.."1950’s $s, in the $400-600 range. There were others that were more expensive. I haven’t seen the price of a Western Electric 1126, but everything WE was 5-6x more expensive than anything else for no reason other than they were WE".

At $600 apiece I'll take 10 please!

 

Harrison Mixbuss advertises their DAW as sounding like their hardware mixers though I believe that it's just hype. My guess is that when all knobs and faders are set at indent it would null with every other work station, otherwise CPU would burn down every computer running it.

 

Yep you are right. It ain't fair hehe. I just thought analog needed a bit of love mentioned. Consider the slander analog tape has endured over the years like noise and hiss, maintenance, "unwanted" saturation, very limited if any editing at all, etc., by makers and users of digital systems like Pro Tools. I mean i 'll be damned if i could ever notice hiss in a busy recording even when my ears could hit ~19 khz.
If there is anything, the DAW is not neutral but unmusical hehe. Because put 8 tracks there and it sounds bloody clean and pristine. Slam 48 tracks and it just doesn't sound as pristine as it did earlier, because the DAW's summing algorithm becomes apparent and no matter the high audio quality and highest possible internal algo resolution, your summed audio from the main buss will sound less defined. Alas, you gotta do more work on the individual channels for it to sound as good as possible.
I can also argue the best albums -at least to my ears- that were recorded digital, were still mixed and summed in top end analog consoles like Neve, SSL, Trident, Oram, Harrison etc. And it does make a significant positive difference especially when you have top notch ADDA.

I have been testing this daw for some time now (not the very latest version) and i gotta say "summing wise", it rivals the best "audio oriented" DAWs out there like PT, Pyramix, Sequoia, Sadie etc. Some neat inherent plugs there too. Very nice, and even more if your main thing is recording real instruments which in your situation i believe it is With the limitation of no vsti it's a strictly audio rec/mix app. If this covers you, try it out.
Oh and that Yello ad ? Man. If there is one thing forever imprinted in my mind, is that Yello have the best produced hybrid/electronic albums ever in the history of music. Their soundscapes, poly-rhythms, grooves, sound design and all are invincible. And as visionaries they were quite ahead of their time too. Yello @ 1980:

EDIT: Quite relevant i guess... A nice read for young and old alike. And i want one of those albums on tape please!
https://www.hifipig.com/yello-stella-15ips-studio-master-copy-edition-review-chat-with-boris-blank/
Cheers

 

Last edited: Jan 5, 2025

If it weren't for the Alive! album in 1975, this little band called KISS would have been totally forgotten by the end of the 70s. Likewise, Cheap Trick was on the same path until KISS took them to Japan in 1977 and they put out that 'Live At Budokan' album..

Some bands needed a live album before the mass market 'got it'..

 

Frampton, KISS, Cheap Trick, Bob Seger... definitely all broken big by live albums in the '70s...

 

Or a hit in the radio charts:

Cheap Trick - I Want You to Want Me

Kiss - I Was Made For Lovin' You

Not to forget that back then there were singles (45 RPM) with A and B sides, there were also record players where you could stack several singles on top of each other and play them. There were also jukeboxes in pubs that also played modern music. The radio was on almost everywhere and played the hits. There were also so-called summer hits...!

 

'The first live album is often considered to be "The Famous 1938 Carnegie Hall Jazz Concert" by Benny Goodman. This historic concert was recorded live at Carnegie Hall in New York on January 18, 1938, and was later released as a double album in 1950'

 

Last edited: Jan 6, 2025

I remember, back in my day, musicians used to come to the studio fully lubed up for their circle jerk fests...
One musician I worked with had rehearsed so much, his left arm was twice as big as his right arm...
And rehearsing was not an easy task too. You'd have to get black and white magazines from your local boy scout leader in exchange of reverse throat singing lessons...

Nowadays, kids with their computers and cellular phones are hooked on digital erotica 24/7, all they think about is rubbing one off as quick as possible, no work ethic on them young'uns...
And they can't even get it up because of their lack of taste, Xanax and cough medicine addictions, and their chemical hydro chronic marijuana...

Back in my day, we'd spend DAYS to get the seeds off of our marijuana just to have enough to roll one joint...

 

A lot of technical related claims here - remaining unsupported of course.

 

You are correct in one way especially.
This century, the fact that anyone lived through something in the past and witnessed it personally is no longer considered evidence that it happened, unfortunately.

I feel most sorry for Generation Beta coming in because it has got to the stage nobody knows what is the truth anymore in what they see, read or hear. Videos, speech, images and words can be faked, identities stolen and worse.

So people who actually have something worthwhile to pass on in the future, will simply say they cannot be bothered wasting their breath even though they experienced it.

 

The subjective part will always remain unsupported. You can't prove analog sounds better. And i don't care one bit to be frank hehe. Reason why i invited anyone who didn't have a past experience to check for themselves. The objective part discussed like software summing of multi-track recordings or the sound of a top end analog console (ie. noise to signal ratio etc etc) is all documented already.
I don't particularly like how some peeps praise the various procedures of old to make something worthwhile listening, rather than the final outcome of those efforts. Perhaps because half the times or more those efforts led to mediocre music after all? And all that remains was the trip getting there? Dunno. Not really sure.
I don't consider myself an analog evangelist. I do work in the digital domain 30+ yrs now since i first got a Roland DM80 in '92. With that said, every now and then i get the chance to do an album on 2" tape, so i am reminded that music, at least to me, can also be infectiously tactile. And i get to stand in awe at the marvel of some of the epitomes of analog sound. I don't expect anyone to agree. Writing about it cleanses my soul mate, so to speak.

 

Analogue becomes digital

If you go back to the time when electricity had not yet been invented, people were extremely happy when electricity was invented and then, as we know, technical development went very quickly.

Then came the time of analogue music devices and it was like a miracle, then came the digital age and there was progress again and a miracle, today we all sit at the PC and use technological progress, the people who lived without electricity and made music back then are long dead and some wrote down their experiences and experiences.

The older analogue generation also wrote down their experiences, this is the only way to explain and understand technological progress. This digital generation that is writing here today will pass on its knowledge to future generations.

The Internet is ultimately a collection of all of humanity's knowledge.
This forum is also a collection of knowledge, ideas and other images of musical life.

 

Q: Does analog sound good?
A: When it's good, imo, yes.

Q: Does digital sound good?
A: Done right, imo, yes.

Q: If I like the sound of analog, should I go analog?
A: If the hassle and expense is worth it to you, then yes, you will get that sound effortlessly without putting a lot of worry into it (beyond the constant maintenance).

Q: Can digital sound analog?
A: Yes, imo, if you're willing to put the effort into it.

Q: Can analog sound digital?
A: Not really, and what would be the point?

Q: Well, which should I get?
A: Dunno, up to you