
SouthSIDE Glen
independentrecording.net
Why?well, reference material for a certain type of song, should be something sonically similar, right?
Does your band employ the same guitarist playing through the same guitar through the same amp through the same microphone and preamp in the same room, and mixing those same tracks of the same song with the exact same arrangement that accompanies the same vocalist, backed by the same drummer playing the same size and brand drums also through the same mics and preamps in the same room?
If not, there's no reason to expect sonic similarity.
And if so, you might as well just hang it up and let the band you're trying to clone do it themselves, because the last thing the world needs is another band that sounds identical to the first with half the talent.
Staying within one's genre for reference and inspiration is the musical equivalent of mating with your sisters. It doesn't take long before everybody looks like the banjo player from Deliverance...except without the musical skills.
Ya gotta figure out what sounds right for your band playing your song, and grab fresh DNA fron anywhere and everywhere.
Might it wind up in a similar class of sound to your favorite band? Sure, that's what makes genres genres. But unless you're in a tribute band, trying to sound like "them" is a dead end road.
Slash uses his own flavor of jazz improv, he doesn't try copying Jeff Beck. Joe Satriani's favorite album is "So!" by Peter Gabrial, not anything by his buddy Steve Vai or even his hero, Jimmi Hendrix. Charlie Watts recharges by playing with acoustic jazz trios. Neil Sedaka steals bubble gum piano breaks from Venezuelan classical composers. There are a million such examples and stories out there - in fact I think we should hear some of them from you guys; it's entirely relevant to this thread, I think.
When was the last time you heard a brand name audio engineer or producer say, "I wanted this album to sound like Album X", and Album X was by a band whose sound was actually anything even close to the band he was engineering/producing?
G.