Old School Panning

mentalattica

mentalattica

Just a Home Recorder
Thanks for the info BK, I found something out that I always wondered...

When would I listen to some oldies (mostly 60's), I'd hear the beat (instruments) panned hard left and vocals panned hard right, or vice versa. I always wondered "WHY THE HELL WOULD SOMEONE DO THAT!?!?" Come to find out that's when stereo took off when the norm was mono and there were no mixing guidelines. Most consoles didn't have faders for panning, instead a knob with "Left", "Right" and "Center".

I found that interesting but have always found the songs irritating. It makes things good for sampling though, I've sampled catch phrases from the channel the vocals were on and it was almost accapella. I've also sampled loops from the channel the instruments were on.

Thought I'd share that, and get at BK he has some good articles on hand.
 
What I've heard also is they mixed like that cause they didn't have that many tracks to work with. Sometimes just 8 tracks or so. That's what I heard... And like said the mixing boards weren't that great for panning.

And back in the 40'a to 60's they used to do just one takes. No multitracking. If you didn't get one part right you had to do the whole song again. :o
 
Now a big question here. Since multitracking came to be... Do you think artists are better now or back 30 or 40 years ago where they couldn't overdub, auto-tune and have all that digital editing. I look back at oldies and think how it must have been to make a song. wow.
 
I don't think they're any better or worse, just the recording process is different.

I remember when I got my first CD burner in like 98 it had 2 decks and a mic jack, I would put my beats on one CD and record onto a blank CD... There was no punching in and if I messed up a verse I had to start the whole thing over... it used to kill me when verse 1 and 2 were perfect and I f*cked up the last word of verse 3. It was also expensive, CD's cost more back then so I really couldn't afford to mess up...lol
 
i think my favorite stuff recorded like that was probably hendrix. It really seemed like they did it this way because it was "new" you know....like "look at what we can do now!" Like mentalattica said tho, it makes it easy for sampling. A lot of that stuff had the drums panned hard one way, which is handy.

As far as musicians being better or worse now....hmm....not too many better than hendrix, but today, it's easier to get a good recording if you aren't that good; and if you are, it's quicker!
 
I was just thinking about that today... The Doors first album had the entire drumkit panned hard left - it does get quite irritating when listening on headphones but as said above, it was at the start of stereo and it was done SIMPLY to show off that they CAN pan things :)
 
real nice topic..glad i can make people think when i post something..LOL
 
How far back are we looking?? Our Neve console is over 25. Thankfully I live in this day and age. My first recordings were done on tape of course... When I was like 13-14... Editing for me was cutting tapes with razors. Not to the extent of how they did it back in the day though.
 
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