Recording Oldies

[afire]

I'm an oldies buff, and bought a Fostex VF08 to record early rock songs, mostly from the Beatles first four albums, one track at a time just for fun. I've had Cakewalk for years (which I rever got used to, my fault, no doubt), and in high school was always putzing around with a cassette 4-track. So, I've now got my digital 8-track, and a modest amount of gear: Marshall MXL V69ME tube condenser, a very cheap condenser, and a Beta58, an ART Dual MP tube preamp, a Presonus Comp16 (since I've never used a compressor before) and a Yamaha REV500 reverb unit. I'm currently just running my mics into the tube preamp, then into the reverb, then the compressor, and into the Fostex (staying in balanced xlr all the way-is that correct?). Does anybody have suggestions for doing this sort of recording where I'm looking for a very simple but good sound? I'm looking to keep life simple but still capture that early Beatles sound, nothing fancy. For example, I've seen threads on micing drums, but from looking at old pictures, I can see that the Beatles were using just one overhead, and one mic in front. So, can anybody make any suggestions about how I can best use the equipment that I currently have?

 

[Chibi Nappa]

Well, if you are trying to replicate the Beatles sound the first thing you have to do is get that compressor and reverb unit out of the chain.

I really think that is going to be a hard sound to re-create a track at a time. You'd have much better luck with a full band playing live. Mic bleed and all that....

 

[afire]

Chibi Nappa - I would rather be recording with a band, but it's not easy finding like-minded local musicians who share my obsession with the Beatles and the earlier artists who influenced them. So, as an outlet I do this one track at a time for kicks. So, take out the compressor and reverb? Then all I'm doing is a mic into a preamp straight to the hard disk. The VF08 doesn't have a way to loop effects that I can see (if anybody knows otherwise, please let me know) and I don't care for the ones onboard. So, for a Beatley sound, record everything dry, and add a single level of reverb to the whole thing once it's complete? Compression too? Or knowing that I can't loop effects, would you keep them in the chain?

 

[Chibi Nappa]

Well, you can always find some way to add effects later.... Solo a channel, run the output with the soloed channel to an effects unit and then record the output of the effects unit to a new track...

You might be better off recording in a huge room with some natural reverb if you can get it.

And here's a crazy idea that may or may not work if you can't get a band:
Record guitars and bases going directly into the board dry. No eq, no effects, nothing. When you go to record drums, run direct outputs from the two guitar tracks to two guitar amps and the bass track to a bass amp. Set the amps with whatever distortion/eq/effects you need and mic them. Presto! Instant full band setup with just one musician. Play the drums with all three amps at regular performance volume to simulate the sound of a full live band.

 

[afire]

Well, I think I would lose quite a bit of quality doing the live through amps method, although it would be fun for giggles. As for running one recorded dry track though reverb and into another track, how does that gain me anything over just putting reverb into my chain? I guess I'm thinking that when the Beatles were doing songs like I Saw Her Standing There live in the studio, how were they doing it? You can hear reverb, but I don't hear anyhing else-on any of their first few albums for that matter. Did they record with a little reverb and that's it? Compress the final mix?

 

[Chibi Nappa]

I'm no expert on the early Beatles recording, but if I had to guess I'd say that all of that reverb is "real". No effect boxes or anything like that, but real physical rooms and chambers or maybe even big ass plates actually physically reverberating the sound. Again, I have absolutly no way of knowing that for sure, but it sounds real to me.

And as far as running dry sounds back through an amp and re-micing it: The recorded sound coming out of the amps should sound exactly like regular guitar sounds coming out of the amps unless the dry recording was really messed up. It's called "re-amping", and it's actually pretty common to use it on one track that needs a little life. I've just never heard of it being used to simulate a full band where there is none....

The more I think of it, the more I want to try that myself actually.

 

[Benreturns]

As far as i can tell Abbey Road studi 2 had a wooden floor and large open spaces, lots of room for sound to reverberate. Have you noticed how Johns guitar is miked in those early years? You can hardley hear his little Rickenbacker at all. Its a faint jangly background noise. There is alot of reverb on the voices, for example 'Misery' and 'Do you want to know a secret'. Im not too sure if that is natural or not. Ive been informed they used AKG dynamic mics early on. Ringo's early drum fills are mainly on the snare and he plays it like a lead weight. By the way if your recording 'I saw her standing there' most the guitar arrangments you find on the net are wrong. They get John and George confused and dont transcribe Johns rhythm part at all.

yes, i am a Beatles nut.

 

[MartyMcFly]

Hey,
Afire...
Where in Wis Are ya From. Im From Clintonville... I share your obsession with beatles songs too.