the return of lo-fi

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dr.colossus

dr.colossus

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i just bought the white stripes album....there is more hiss on this thing than some of my old four track tapes.... i love it.....

this whole lo-fi thing is great, it allows us all to really compare our songs with those of bands such as the white stripes and the strokes and never use the excuse that the pro tunes sound better because of recording quality....

its funny, because i'm starting to find crisp clean million dollar studio recordings to be really pretentious....whereas i suppose alot of you guys all feel the same way about this whole lo-fi fad going on at the moment......

something else which i like about all this, is it seems to have dropped the term "industry standard recording" down a notch....

hmmmmmm.... food for thought :)
 
I'm not against low-fi as a recording style, but I disagree with the tendency to call it a musical style as well. This tends to lend legitimacy to sloppy recordings by marginally talented bands, given credit because they're "lo-fi".

If you happen to be making your music on low-budget equipment, so be it, but make the best music you know how to make. Belle & Sebastian are a great example of doing good recording using what's available.

I too am tired of major label overproduction, and I hope successful underproduced albums such as the "O Brother Where Art Thou?" soundtrack will help curb the Ultra-Compression theory. I mean, we got rid of Mutt Lange, didn't we?
 
god this whole low fi thing sucks. and unfortunatly it seems as though its going to be the "next big thing" in music.
spacy cardboard drums, distorted vox, harsh guitars, root note bass. feh...

I could write and record an entire low fi punk rock album in 2 weeks. Its waaaay more pretentious than well produced rock. "Vintage" is "in" and they're just taking advantage of that.

And its not just the recording, its the talent of the bands thats going down the drain too. Ever heard that song "understanding in a car crash" by thursday? It sounds like they grabbed some regular guy off the street and said here, sing into this cylindrical thing.

I guess crappy songs and recordings are the new rage.
I cant wait for A Perfect Circle's next release though. Now THAT is some well produced rock.
 
O Brother was produced by TBone Burnett and all of his stuff is awesome. He did the first Counting Crows album and has done all of the albums for female singer Sam Phillips. He generally has a very simple but high quality sound. His solo albums are great production wise but a little too country for my taste.
 
No. Only people who only like "hifi" think about "lofi".

And no, you couldn't put together a lofi punk record in two weeks. If you can, then do it.

It's also not "the next big thing", it's always been here...it certainly predates anything hifi. Perhaps you can attribute hearing more of it today to simply having more exposure to the world.

I agree that there is sort of a middle ground....and I think that it's the middle ground that dr.colossus is talking about. Much of the Beatles work would fall into that category. I think it's funny to think that if the Beatles were a group of homerecorders today, and they posted something from the White Album to the cave, most people around here would bash it to death. "That guitar solo was too loud." "You accidentally panned the snare drum far left." "The vocals are distorted."

Personally I like recordings from the 70's....before people thought that radio stations require ultracompressed mixes (who made that crap up?)....before the invention of the acoustic pickup. There's a lot of that style still around too, you just won't find it in the Top 40 rack at Sam Goody. I'll take Surfer Rosa any day.

Slackmaster 2000
 
WEBCYAN said:

spacy cardboard drums, distorted vox, harsh guitars, root note bass. feh...
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this is why i think lo-fi works so well, it sounds so much like when one of your mates hands you a shitty four track tape of his band and says "have a listen".... it lends itself to familiarity, like you know the band on a personal level

and Sir Matthew, i definatly agree with what you say about it being a "music" style...however, i don't think great bands like the white stripes would recieve anywhere near the acclaim the recieved if it wasn't for the recording, so does that make them a lo-fi band?
 
Slackmaster2K said:


I agree that there is sort of a middle ground....and I think that it's the middle ground that dr.colossus is talking about. Much of the Beatles work would fall into that category. I think it's funny to think that if the Beatles were a group of homerecorders today, and they posted something from the White Album to the cave, most people around here would bash it to death. "That guitar solo was too loud." "You accidentally panned the snare drum far left." "The vocals are distorted."


Slackmaster 2000
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snuck in just ahead of me slack! i think you hit the nail right on the head there....... quite often its these sorts of recording "obscenities" which helps make albums interesting... i mean this was voted the most important album of last century (somewhere, rolling stone i think) and yet some of the recording techniques are now far beyond logical comprehension..... rather than just using the recording medium to replicate, i think its pretty important we use it as a definite artistic tool....
 
Ditto on T-Bone Burnett. That first Counting Crows album has a great, personal sound to it. High quality, but not overproduced.

Have you heard "Poses" by Rufus Wainwright? Pierre Marchand does a similar thing, using quality sounds without compressing the shit out of it and taking away dynamics.

Though I agree the studio can be used as an instrument as well (Floyd fan that I am), I think it's just like any other instrument in that there can be too much of a good thing. I love listening to David Gilmour's guitar solos, but if he played one for 45 minutes straight, I'd get bored out of my mind.

And Slackmaster, you've hit upon one of the primary causes: radio. People use the recording techniques they think will get them radio play, which is every-song-is-exactly-the-same-volume-all-the-way-through-yaddah-yaddah-powerchord-feel-my-pain-no-fade-out-because-the-commercial's-gotta-start-right-NOW!!!!!!!!!!!

The TCU campus radio station down here is my only refuge from that format. There's actually space between the fucking songs. It's surprising how much better they sound that way.

Sorry, dr colossus, wish I'd heard enough White Stripes to give an opinion. I'll try & find some.
 
This Low Phi topic has been poppin up a lot lately around here. And I've been trying to figure out where I stand on it. To me it seems like some homewreckers like the lo fi stuff because it lowers the bar and subsequently they can lower their expectations as to the sound they can get out of their studios. I have yet to make a recording I thought was as good as the overcompressed, over polished crap on the radio, but I have made many crappy Strokes-ish recordings. Should I quit learning the techniques that have been passed on through the decades from engineer to engineer because radio's standards seem to have been lowered to a level I passed when I stopped recording on a karoake machine?

I think this lo fi shit has a way of making frustrated homewreckers feel good about their four track recordings.

just my opinion.
 
its not just about radio....

well produced bands like tool, apc, nin, etc... recieve minimal airplay yet their sound is of high quality.

i seriously think its just a bunch of idiots who want to be rich without working to achieve good music so they make bad music "in".
 
WEBCYAN said:
well produced bands like tool, apc, nin, etc... recieve minimal airplay yet their sound is of high quality.
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Yes, but their songs suck. At any rate, I wouldn't describe their rotation as minimal. Many bands with infinitely more creativity manage to exist with a small fraction of such airplay.

No matter your opinions of lo-fi, I don't think it's coming back. Most of the "good" lo-fi from the 80's and 90's was done out of necessity (no real gear or money), as mentioned, but today every every other asshole in the world has a computer.
 
Is this debate really about lo-fi v. hi-fi or is it a debate about what style of music people prefer?

I personally love a lot of lo-fi recordings because the bands that are making these records are the ones I prefer to hear. Bands like Sebadoh, Slint, Pavement...they all have a really raw, personal sound to them. Part of this has to do with the production style and part of it has to do with the music itself. It's sloppy, to the point and honest...just like the lo-fi production that is on most of these albums. Lo-fi is an art form too...

I find that I don't like many hi-fi recordings because I can't stand the bands that are recordings like this. For me, it's no so much about the production as it is the lack of soul that most of these hi-fi production bands have. I would never listen to Nickelback, Creed, Kid Rock, Puddle of Mud, Nsync...or anything like that crap. This has something to do with the production style but it mostly has something to do with the bands. It just so happens that all of these type bands have a hi-fi production style to them and it doesn't seem to gloss over the fact that these bands do not rock in any way.

So, if lo-fi is bad, what to you guys think about someone like Albini who makes a living by making true, raw sounding recordings of bands? He produces very high quality recordings that would fall more closely to lo-fi than hi-fi, yet his recordings are solid. Bands like the Rye Coalition, The Jesus Lizard, Shellac, June of 44...where do they fit in this little debate?
 
Albini did Pavement's last record, and I love it. The band was pretty sick of each other at the time and as a result some of the songs are just kind of tired, but the overall sound is very good.

Another good example of lo-fi gone mid-fi is the Grifters record 'Aint My Lookout', recording by Easley. Wonderful.
 
The new Rye Coalition album, On Top sounds amazing. You should check it out, Vurt. It's balls-out rocknroll.
 
Vurt said:


Yes, but their songs suck. At any rate, I wouldn't describe their rotation as minimal. Many bands with infinitely more creativity manage to exist with a small fraction of such airplay.
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you don't deserve to be called a musician. end of story.
 
Interesting story... You should write for Readers Digest or something.

I just might do that, Blackburn - I've been in the mood for something like that for months. I've been really lazy :(
 
Hi-fi Lo-f

Its a cheap term
some fucking great bands sound awsome as is!!!!!!

I dig punk bands, rock n roll bands, and i can give a list of shit that sounds great, but the second any kind of production that "enhances" the band I tune out. (new bomb turks)

I want to hear the FUCKING BAND not the studio......

The only debate is those who dig it and those that dont..

Not everyone needs tons of production to get the vibe accross.

rod
 
I don't usually do the flame thing....

...but right now, Slack is my fucking hero for the post way above.

Cyan, you sure come off like a total fucking snob and it seems unlike your usual intelligent posts. I mean where do you get the authority to dish out on who deserves to be called what?!?! And just cuz you don't like "lo Fi" doesnt mean it shouldnt exist. I HATE bands like A perfect Circle and so forth but I would NEVER come down on anyone who likes it because Im not a fucking music Nazi!

Also....you know nothing about fi of any kind if you have to distinguish between the two. Lo fi isnt shitty sounding....shitty sounding is shitty sounding.


Listen to anything by Spoon. All early stuff was done on 8 tracks...I challenge you to beat the album Telephono.

Listen to Beulah's When Your Heartstings Break. I mean it!!! Look it up on cdnow or whatever. That record was done with nothing but a 16 track 1/2 inch tascam MSR recorder through the pres of a Fostex 450 16 channel board. 1 DBX 166 compressor, 1CAD E100, 1 4033, and some 57s and 58s are all they had, recorded at their jam spot and when one of you anti lofi clowns makes a record HALF this good at your crib, we'll talk.

Look up Jack Drag. Album...Aviating. Done with a tascam porta2 and a tascam DA38 along with a sampler and some horrible mics no one here would even admit to owning. Same thing....make arecord this good at YOUR house and I'll eat your shit.

YOu could not make a lofi record in two weeks that was any good because you dont understand the genre or the aesthetic so fuck off on that one.

Lastly, the day you got something over the Stooges "Funhouse" record, I'll quit fucking your mom.


I encourage everyone here to search out and listen to the records I outlined just for the sake of it. Home recording at it's best, fellas! Also check out www.jeffereysimmons.com for some wonderful stuff. Email him and he'll send you a copy of his record for free. It's INCREDIBLE! Here....beat this one:


I was thinking once how if my favorite records were done by me and I asked for criticism here, they would be nitpicked to death.

Oh well, fvck me...whatta I know anyway.



heylow
Rock Jedi/Indie Snob
www.heylowsoundsystem.net
 
Slack said:

"I'll take Surfer Rosa any day."

I'll second that! What is it about the Pixies that keeps their recordings sounding so "new" even ten years after the fact.

As for your comment about the production on '70s music, I'll have to agree with you there too. I've never heard production that I would put up against any Steely Dan record from the mid '70s.

I've never heard the White Stripes, but the Strokes come of to me as some producer's project band. I'd be surprised if they write their own songs.

-Glenn
 
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