Getting a Ringo sound...

  • Thread starter Thread starter Rickson Gracie
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The other thing about Ringo, is he played a right handed set, left handed. Most of his fills go low to high. It is needed to get his true sound.
 
You can sound like Ringo with just a single dynamic mike and a good pre.

Set up the gear in a smaller no more than 20 ft square room.

Set up a SM57 a little higher than shoulder height.

Put sound dampening on the opposite wall and leave the other ones without.

Get a little drunk.

Turn on the multitracker

Sing this:

In the town where I was born
Lived a man who sailed to sea
And he told us of his life
In the land of submarines

So we sailed up to the sun
Till we found the sea of green
And we lived beneath the waves
In our yellow submarine

We all live in our yellow submarine,
Yellow submarine, yellow submarine
We all live in our yellow submarine,
Yellow submarine, yellow submarine

And our friends are all on board
Many more of them live next door
And the band begins to play

We all live in our yellow submarine,
Yellow submarine, yellow submarine
We all live in our yellow submarine,
Yellow submarine, yellow submarine

As we live a life of ease
Everyone of us has all we need
Sky of blue and sea of green
In our yellow submarine.

We all live in our yellow submarine,
Yellow submarine, yellow submarine
We all live in our yellow submarine,
Yellow submarine, yellow submarine

We all live in our yellow submarine,
Yellow submarine, yellow submarine
We all live in our yellow submarine,
Yellow submarine, yellow submarine

Thats how you get the Ringo Sound.
 
I was also going to say about the Ludwig Kit


also remember that at one point there multi track facilities were very basic, so they ended up having to put one track to the left speaker channel so they could record another on the multitrack

this is why you hear quite a few tracks where they seem to only come through one speaker
 
what a aweosme and intresting thread this is!

i forgot about that book on the beatles recordings.. id love to have that, i remember hearing about it before it came out! does anyone know the name of it?
 
Wouldn't the media that everything was recorded on have a big impact on the sound as well? I mean think about it they were recording OLD school reel-to-reel and nowaday we are using DAWs that record digital 24bit blah blah blah...
 
juststartingout said:
The other thing about Ringo, is he played a right handed set, left handed. Most of his fills go low to high. It is needed to get his true sound.
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That´s right, Ringo played right handed, but he started his fills with the left. He also played double stroke rolls, when most drummers should agree that a single one could be enough. He said that´s how he feel more comfortable and natural, he didn´t even think about it, it just flows :eek:
In Abbey Road album Ringo covered his toms with towels to achieve the sound you can listen on that record. :)
 
The Beatles had many different configs on drum micing. The main thing is not real close. The common setup early was an AKG D20 on kick about 3/4 of the way of the from head, pointed down a bit. AKG D19 overhead. At times another D19 kicd of level with hi hat pointed up a bit. Sometimes Coles 4038 overhead, even U67 in front of kit capturing toms and kit together. The White album is an entire diffferent story, very tight sound. I think the sound you are trying for is a roomy sound without much close micing. The kit needs to be tunned the same. They also used towels/rags over the drums a lot. On the snare and toms. Many different drums sounds.
 
donkeystyle said:
i read an interview where george martin said that he put a condenser mic about 4 inches from the kick.......it might not have actually been for inches.......maybe a little further away, but i know for sure it was closer than a foot.......he said he got in a bit of trouble for it, but he told the higher ups that the band liked that sound. i don't remember if i just heard about the stereo ribbons, or if i read it in the same article.

i think martin was talking about the first time he recorded them. since tape op is about the only recording magazine i read, it was probably a tape op article if anyone is interested.
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That would have been Geoff Emerrick
 
Hi All,

You need to get a drum kit like this, Black Pearl Ludwig, I bought this kit 20 years ago and I am not even a drummer (bass player).

The photo was taken in my old studio (new studio photos soon nearly finished being built). The kit has been used on 100's of recordings and always sounds good.

The photo is a bit of a mock up for the photo as in the way it is miked would be if I was doing jazz, 2 overheads (sennheiser me40’s or me80’s) and kick (AKG D112 or D12), when recording rock add 421's on the toms, 57 on snare, and a small condenser on the hats, plus maybe a room mike or 2.

Cheers

Alan.
 

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Ringo almost always overdubbed an extra snare to couteract the signal degredation from bouncing down the drums multiple times.

Also, a KM56 was frequently used on the bottom of the snare (alsong with the overhead and kick mic), which could account for thinner sound produced by the snares themselves.
 
craigmorris74 said:
Ringo almost always overdubbed an extra snare to couteract the signal degredation from bouncing down the drums multiple times.

Where did you read/hear that?
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The new Recoding the Beatles Book. It lists what was committed to each track of the multitrack tapes of many of the songs.
His drum overdubs are obvious with a little critical listening. He would often just overdub on beats 2 and 4, while other snare hits would be left alone.
 
????? So you are saying that in the book( I have that book by the way), that it states that Ringo overdubed his snare hits? I have never read that. If it were to be true, of whcih I do not believe, it WOULD be on 2 and 4 as that is the back beat, the beat that the snare is typically hit on. Yes it does indeed list the tracks and their content but to say that Ringo overdubed his hits! Nah! Oh are you my son?
 
MadAudio said:
Bun E. Carlos is easily one of the world's greatest rock drummers, period.
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FUCK YEAH!!! Can anybody play "Anytime"??? No!! Just Bun E. !!!
 
jmorris said:
That would have been Geoff Emerrick
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really? I could have sworn it was martin. I'm sure you know better than I though.
 
If it were to be true, of whcih I do not believe
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Yes, is says so in the book in the production section, on multiple occasions, and you can hear it.
 
According to anything I've read.....


George Martin was more influencial over music and musical arrangement. Certainly a very important figure in the production.

However, it was Geoff Emerick who came up with alot of the tape loop manipulation, close mic techniques, leslie rotating speaker tricks, etc. etc. etc.


Geoff Emerick was a real pioneer in engineering.

(And he was able to put up with years of the Beatles' abuse - they were extremely demanding, and not too grateful )
 
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