good 80's/90's analog consoles/mixers.

RFR said:
Getting an "analog " sound has as much to do with workflow, approach, method of thinking as it does gear.

For one example; My exoerience working with bands only 30 to 40 % of people I've worked with have used a click track. The drummer IS the clicktrack (if he's good)
Youll have the tempo groove with the flow of the song. It may not be a clock perfect tempo, but it flows and sounds like 'real' music.
I'm not opposed to clicks, but have gotten more organic, 'natural' sounding stuff easier that way.

With virtual drums and going all ITB, going 'click less' is almost unheard of..
Sure theres different 'humanizing' editing that can be done, but what a pain in the ass! :)

With taking a band and doing it in a more old school approach, a more convincing 'analog' sound can be achieved.

Good gear helps too. :)


Eh, just my thoughts. Not gospel
:D
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I hinted at this earlier at the thread revival. Didn't want to stamp a foot down because I don't have the facts or massive experience,
but I'm pretty sure you could take any old band with a distinctive retro sound, their instruments, their amps, all their equipment, and bang it into Protools without anyone noticing.
That's not to say that the medium imparts nothing on the product but the 'sound' of a band is usually the sound of the band.
 
bouldersoundguy said:
Making an artificial drummer artificially sloppy is not the same as the natural variations you get from real musicians playing together.
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I think the sound you're looking for is more for some blues rock or something even older music style than what i'm looking for. I found out from another forum that click track was used in the 80's and 90's to get a really tight sound, it was a machined Time indeed.

styles - What's the theory behind the "80s" sound of a song? - Music: Practice & Theory Stack Exchange
 
Kurkkumopo said:
I think the sound you're looking for is more for some blues rock or something even older music style than what i'm looking for. I found out from another forum that click track was used in the 80's and 90's to get a really tight sound, it was a machined Time indeed.
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The sound I'm looking for is humans playing together. I lived through the hair band era. It was fun but vapid. Things got way out of hand, people lost touch with reality. The drum machine aesthetic was more of a dance music (disco, new wave) thing but it did influence the more polished pop styles of rock. There was a time when machine-like sound was new and different. Kraftwerk was original. Devo was fresh. By the time Trevor Rabin fronted Yes it was hitting the big time. Once it became the normal way to make music it got boring to me. Music became about production values and money instead of about people.
 
I was also into that "machine" thing for a few years from about '89 -'93...and then one day it was like, "WTF am I doing?"...:D...and that's when I put away the heavy MIDI stuff and the samples, and went back to old-school basics.

The last few years I've been using samples again, but the quality is better, and of course, it's more about ear candy and occasional necessity, rather than adopting that as "the sound" like it was back in the '80s/'90s.
I know sims are the big thing these days, since just about everyone is working ITB for the most part...but I'm still miking almost everything that I can in my studio setup, and then I can bring those track into the DAW.
 
Same here about the miking, the only thing that i'm not satisfied with (yet) in the virtual and modelling world is the digital guitar amp models and profiles, it just doesn't do it for me so i'll probably stick with my mesa boogie for a while and mic it.
 
I have yet to you a guitar amp sim...honestly.
The last time I used anything resembling one was back in the mid-90s when I used a SansAmp for a bunch of things, but since then, it's always been amp/cab/mic....and the funny thing is, I have a bunch of guitar sim plugs.
I've got the Scuffham Amps S-Gear sims, which are really good...I have some of the amp sims from Plugin Alliance...and I also have some Amplitube stuff...and I've auditioned them and think they are pretty decent...but I still always end up miking my amps instead. :)
 
miroslav said:
I have yet to you a guitar amp sim...honestly.
The last time I used anything resembling one was back in the mid-90s when I used a SansAmp for a bunch of things, but since then, it's always been amp/cab/mic....and the funny thing is, I have a bunch of guitar sim plugs.
I've got the Scuffham Amps S-Gear sims, which are really good...I have some of the amp sims from Plugin Alliance...and I also have some Amplitube stuff...and I've auditioned them and think they are pretty decent...but I still always end up miking my amps instead. :)
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If i would go for amp sim stuff i would just sell my mesa and get the kemper, that's absolutely the best from all the modelling/profiling stuff. Anyways i've yet to find a clip that really has so minor difference that i would get it. I will probably audition one of those in a one store in helsinki and see what it can do. :D
 
Kurkkumopo said:
If i would go for amp sim stuff i would just sell my mesa and get the kemper, that's absolutely the best from all the modelling/profiling stuff. Anyways i've yet to find a clip that really has so minor difference that i would get it. I will probably audition one of those in a one store in helsinki and see what it can do. :D
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Yep, and make it something like an older style Vox or Marshall, don't get me wrong, I have great respect for Mesa, but like my Rivera, they can be a bit clinical in their sound.

:cool:
 
What kind of bands are you trying to emulate and what amps did they use?
Can't state it enough. If you want to sound like someone, use their instruments/amps and play like them.

The rest really is icing.
 
I don't know if i need another amp, Mark III is just so good. :D

And my mesa atleast really has an 80's esque sound in it. Some of the artists in the 80's actually switched to Boogies because they couldn't get enough distortion from Marshalls without Overdrive pedals in front of them.

And i'm emulating bands like this:

 
Steenamaroo said:
Fair enough, man. :)
Just making sure you'd considered it.
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Absolutely, of course i'm going to get almost all the guitar stuff from that era, but probably not specifically a certain artist in mind as i want to add my own taste into it too. :D I think after i got some money again i will probably get a jackson custom shop select soloist. Seymour Duncan JB pickups are actually the pickups that really give that 80's sound and alder body ofc.
 
So now that you've decided what path you're going to take, when you gonna get started?

The way this thread is going, it could easily end up at 124 pages before you record your first song.

Get to work, buddy.
:D :D :D :D

Ps. Analog, tape in particular, rolls off the highs. A converter doesn't, and virtual instruments have a lot of high end content. Add up a lot of tracks in your daw with that high end build up, and you end up with an overly bright harsh mix. That's one reason the current hair metal mixes don't sound analog to you.

Just food for thought.

So get on it, you got songs to record.

:D
 
RFR said:
Add up a lot of tracks in your daw with that high end build up, and you end up with an overly bright harsh mix. That's one reason the current hair metal mixes don't sound analog to you.
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Right...and it's an easy problem to deal with in the DAW, plus...you have an Undo option. :D
 
miroslav said:
Right...and it's an easy problem to deal with in the DAW, plus...you have an Undo option. :D
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How do you deal with this problem? Also Wagener used to record digitally and he never had way too bright mixes back then.

Also i'm on it, just gotta get the equipment first. :p
 
Simple. Roll off highs in the daw. Some think a tape saturation plug in will do it on it's own. Not the case.

Whenever mixing have a reference track of stuff you like and compare.

Our ears will get used to the highs, so it will slip by you. So a reference track helps give you something to compare to.

Wagener also had a console, and racks of fat analog outboard gear. Not to mention good ears.
 
RFR said:
Simple. Roll off highs in the daw. Some think a tape saturation plug in will do it on it's own. Not the case.

Whenever mixing have a reference track of stuff you like and compare.

Our ears will get used to the highs, so it will slip by you. So a reference track helps give you something to compare to.

Wagener also had a console, and racks of fat analog outboard gear. Not to mention good ears.
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Yes he had and he still has them, he also had UAD plugins and he said that they're amazing.

I think even the tape plugins come really close to the real thing, atleast i didn't hear the difference almost at all.

If you would compare a semi pro gear like ghost, tascam msr24 and some semipro hardware stuff versus UAD plugins made of high end hardware would the semi-pro stuff sound more fatter and roll the highs off better than the UAD tape and outboard plugins?
 
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