In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida - stereo imaging!

[mjbphotos]

The local classic rock station is doing an "A-to-Z" thing right now and played the classic Iron Butterfly song yesterday, I turned the radio on just before the drum solo.
What magical imaging! During the drum solo, it's like you are standing right in front of the drum set. Keyboards kick in (3 tracks of recording, maybe?), with the highest part slightly to the right, the next part a little more centered and finally the lower, fullest part almost centered. I had the radio in my truck cranked!

I'm going to have to load this song into Reaper and listen to it again!

 

[witzendoz]

Love this track, it came out here just as the first commercial FM station went to air, they would play it at midnight every night for months and we would wait up for it. I actually own a few albums by Iron butterfly including the live album with yet another version of In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida on it. I may need to dust off the old albums and have a listen, it has been a while.

Alan.

 

[grimtraveller]

I was really disappointed when I eventually heard "In-a-Gadda-da-vida". The story of how it got the name is far more interesting than the song itself !
I'd read about it for years. Apparently, the album it's from was the first ever platinum album. In the midst of the organ solo, you can hear snatches of hymns and carols {Doug Ingle's Dad was a church organist or something}. The whole album was a disappointment, actually. Except for one great moment on it, the song "Mirage". That's a weirdly wonderful piece.

 

[mjbphotos]

You must be too young, Grim!

 

[grimtraveller]

You must be too young, Grim!

Well, I'll be 50 on saturday ! How old do I have to be ?


By the way, I don't dislike the song or the album. But I was really disappointed when I eventually heard it. I still have it though !

 

[mjbphotos]

Well, I'll be 50 on saturday ! How old do I have to be ?


By the way, I don't dislike the song or the album. But I was really disappointed when I eventually heard it. I still have it though !

Early Happy Birthday!

Evidently, you need to be older than that! You were born in '63, so only 5 years old when this came out ...

From Wiki:

The track was recorded on May 27, 1968, at Ultrasonic Studios in Hempstead, Long Island, New York.

The recording that is heard on the album was meant to be a soundcheck for engineer Don Casale while the band waited for the arrival of producer Jim Hilton. However, Casale had rolled a recording tape, and when the rehearsal was completed it was agreed that the performance was of sufficient quality that another take was not needed. Hilton later remixed the recording at Gold Star Studios in Los Angeles. The single reached number 30 on the U.S. Billboard Hot 100

The first six minutes of the song is dominated by a memorable, "endless, droning minor key riff", a guitar and bass ostinato. It is used as the basis for extended organ and guitar solos, then silenced to make way for a drum solo, one of the first on a rock record and one of the most famous, because of its surreal tribal sound. Bushy removed the bottom heads of his tom-toms to give them less of a resonant tone, and during the recording process, the drum tracks were subjected to flanging, producing a slow, swirling sound. It is followed by an ethereal polyphonic organ solo (which resembles variations on "God rest you merry, gentlemen") to the accompaniment of drums (beginning around 9:20 into the piece). There are then interludes in cut time and a reprise of the original theme and vocals.