Striving for vintage sound! Tips?

[Mr Clean]

It's not an incredibly large studio space. It MIGHT be possible for the drums and guitar to track in the same room. Everything else is in another relatively small space. I'm hoping to record all three horns into one mic, but that will be done separately. I think drums, bass and guitar will be tracked at the same time. Horns and keys separate. Vocals separate.

Could you put the guitar and bass amps (mic'd up) in the same room as the drums with the players in another room? That would help you get the mic bleed sound across the instruments.

 

[TASCAM MAN]

If you want vintage sounds you need to use the same methodology as much as you can

Have the musicians vey well rehearsed and play the songs all the way through
Minimal overdubs
close mic back then was considered 18". (Jeff Emerick got in trouble with EMI for bringing the mics closer than that to the drums when recording the Beatles)
Large spaces
Playing as a band rather than a bunch of solo parts
minimal track counts
real instruments
no pitch correction
Living with limitations and some mistakes in the performance
small number of very high quality signal processing effects in the mix placed where they would have the most impact (so not three compressors, four EQs, filters etc on every single track)

If you do all of that then tape (or tape emulation) is the last tiny piece of the puzzle

Awsome info and advice !!!

 

[TASCAM MAN]

if you've not seen them, have a look for the "classic album" documentary series. There's some wonderful stuff on there. I think it was on deep purple's "machine head", where they were recording in an hotel that was closed for the season. They'd do a take as a band and, at first, they'd go and listen to it in the portable recording van outside. The problem was, to get outside involved some climbing, jumping, and essentially parkour, and then they'd have to go through it all again to get back inside. After a few trips they decided just to let the engineer and producer decide if it was a good take or not. Now, what constituted a good take wasn't necessarily playing the tracks note-for-note perfect, it was about the overall feel and vibe of each performance. And that's the point; each take was very much a performance!. As someone said earlier, treat each take as if you were performing the songs to a crowd and don't nitpick too much over duff notes, so long as the performance as a whole is good and has a cool vibe to it.

that is it man !!!:d

 

[GONZO-X]

just roll everything off above 11khz, below 50hz, instant vintage

 

[grimtraveller]

If you've not seen them, have a look for the "Classic Album" documentary series. There's some wonderful stuff on there. I think it was on Deep Purple's "Machine Head", where they were recording in an hotel that was closed for the season.

I've seen it a few times but I watched it today on Sky arts 1. It's one of the best because they talk to everyone involved.
I was particularly interested in what Richie Blackmore said because unlike Gillan, Glover, Lord & Paice, he's not said much for 20 years.

I just wish they weren't so focused on the 60s. It wasn't my era, so even though I have an appreciation for bands like Cream, I'd rather see more on bands I actually listen to.

I know where you're coming from. Because I'm not interested in Iron Maiden or Metallica, I wouldn't even bother to watch the ones on them. But it should be remembered that it's called "Classic albums". From about 1965 to the start of the 21st century, there tended to be more of a universal consensus as to what constituted a classic album. I'm out of touch with the modern scene so I don't know that still is the case.
That said, there are lots of books around on the making of albums. I just wonder whether or not studio technique and production is as fascinating in the digital era as it was when alot of the "classic albums" bands made albums under the kind of limitations that many today simply couldn't cope with.

 

[Raymeous]

One thing you might try...

... if you want the "all at once in a room" thing, but the space isn't big enough to do it, you could always record some guide tracks for the drummer, then record only the drums in the room. Once that's done, take the kit out, and put guitar guy to one side of the room as if he/she was to the drummers left. Mic their amp and go. Then pull the guitar rig out and put the bass rig in the room to what would have been the drummers right.

Essential, the idea is to emulate that the band was all in the same room (because they were in a way) and by positioning the equipment to the sides, you're also getting how the amp actually sounds from that particular point in the room. Is it going to make a huge difference? Not really, but if you are capturing the room, it might add to that "all at once" vibe if the audio is bouncing around in the same space, and pan accordingly.

The other thing is don't cut and paste too much. Play through the whole thing as if it were a gig. Say only 2 or 3 runs for each musician. While you can take snippets of each performance to make a composite track, do not copy the "perfect verse" for every verse. Let a few oddities get through, just so it still "feels" human.

I hope this helps in some weird way