Vinyl vs. iPod
A Studer 2-inch tape machine is a huge cumbersome beast that takes up a lot of space and might need pampering and attention when you make records. It requires that you use big, heavy rolls of 2-inch tape that need changing when you record two or three songs on them. And hardly anyone produces or manufactures vinyl records anymore. And nobody has a turntable. But it's making a trendy comeback.
Just because something is easier doesn't make it better. It certainly doesn't make it sound better. I had a digital recording rig in my home studio for a month or two and got so depressed. I quit writing songs, my guitar collected dust and I thought my creative life had ended. So I jerked it all out of the wall and threw it in the garage and that's where it will stay.
My new album, "Just A Little Lovin'" was made on a 2-inch tape machine. I demanded it. I like working with engineers and producers who love and appreciate tape. I love the sound, smell, and feel of tape. That's why I enlisted legendary record producer, Phil Ramone, and the brilliant recording engineer, Al Schmitt. They didn't mind my insistence. They put up with my hardheadedness. Hardly anyone uses tape anymore because they claim it's so expensive and it's just easier to use a computer. Most engineers can operate any computer rig in studios these days. But if you ask them to run a Studer and put on a reel of tape, they run down the hallway screaming for Mommy. I'm sorry, but I can't get turned on looking at a computer screen. First of all, it's not more expensive. By the time digital users spend the time and money to buy the software needed to put that "tape sound" on their digital record, they have spent more time and money than I have. While their downloading "tape sound" software, I'm kicking back on the houseboat drinking beer with a fishing pole in my hand listening to Django.
It's not for everybody. Tapes are not perfect like digital. If you want to sing the word "love" 40 different times and 40 different ways, then digital's for you. Tape requires attention. You can't just push the space bar and go to lunch. For example: When I put on my vinyl (yes vinyl) of Led Zeppelin's "Whole Lotta Love," my favorite part is towards the end when you hear the "print through" of Robert's vocals. You know the part when he sings "Yeah, Yeah, Yeah, Yeah"? For years, before I made records I thought that what I was hearing was on there on purpose, for effect. But while making my new record the same thing happened. There is no reason, it's just a tape thing. Sometimes that happens. It's not as noticeable or as cool as Zeppelin but if you listen to my first track, "Just A Little Lovin'," towards the end you will hear my voice. I made a record with print through. Wow. Everybody wanted to fix it but I insisted on keeping it. This is a true testament to using tape. The "real" comes through. It makes me proud to be such a hard head.
I was born in '68. Mama and Daddy had albums. I grew up listening to their vinyl. I have discovered that having a vinyl collection is so much cooler than having an iPod. Now, I have an iPod and I admit they are genius especially for travel and convenience. But they aren't really any fun. I don't call up my friends and say "Hey why don't y'all come over and bring your computers and let's have a party"? Hell no! I say bring pot, wine and vinyl. That's sexy. It's really a great excuse to get together and listen to music. Everybody takes a turn looking through the collection and it's interesting to see what each person plays. The vinyl way is just me. I think if if we all listen to more music together, it really doesn't matter how we do it. Music will save us all just like it always has. We feed our souls with it. Vinyl just creates a little more discussion for us. You get to look at the covers, the liner notes, sometimes the lyrics are included. Plus you can roll a doobie on it. That's hard on an Ipod.
Times are tough. Concert tickets are high and records are, too. Hell, everything is high and nobody has any dough. With our economy and the way it's headed, my guess is that we'll all be staying home drinking bottles of Two Buck Chuck listening to music, however we choose to do it. Cheers, music lovin' fools!
Keeping the dinosaur way alive y'all..........
Rockingly yours,
Shelby Lynne
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Great post!
I'm a dinosaur musician from the analog age who has spent the last ten years struggling to get something digital that sounds as good to my dinosaur ears as tape. Recently, in frustration, I enrolled in the local junior college for courses to bring myself up to date with technology. To my surprise I found that the great majority of the young musicians taking the class were all looking to get the sounds that we took for granted back in the primitive tape days.
I've come to the conclusion that digital is neither worse nor better than analog, only different. However, to lose the ability to use tape is like destroying all the grand pianos because there are synths. Great musicians will always use what's avaialable and make their choices according to what they're trying to achieve. Shelby, you sound like a lady who knows what she wants to sound like. Good for you for not going with the flow for the sake of convenience.
I have a whole new respect for you,ma'am.
This post said a lot about your integrity as an artist.
And I could fall in love with a won=man who would say "Bring pot wine and vinyl.
Cool!
Rock on Man... Rock on Man... Rock on Man... Rock on Man... ZZZZZzzzzr
heh...
Rock on, my sister...h
Ms. Lynne,
I'm an amateur composer -- also born in 1968, as it happens. I don't make my living from music. Nevertheless, I've done my share of recording -- from rock music to string quartets.
The primary advantage of digital recording technology is at the LOWER end of the economic scale. There's something to be said for the fact that, using digital recording technology, a modern garage band can produce a recording that sounds as clear as anything produced by the Beatles.
Most of us don't have your kind of money to throw around for an analog recording session. A two-inch reel-to-reel machine costs a bundle! And you have access to renowned producers and engineers to help you make it all work? That's not true for most of us.
You should of course work with whatever tools help you to realize the sounds you hear in your head. Twenty years ago I met an engineer who sang the praises of Dolby SR analog recordings over anything digital. That may well be true.
CHEAP analog recording technology is not nearly so satisfying. Quarter-inch, four-track cassettes moving at 3 3/4 inches per second, shutting endlessly over the recording heads, resulting in tape drop-outs. Ugh! Tape print-through, double ugh! Even if I don't bounce tracks (and I avoid it at all costs), when I get to the master recording, a lot of high-frequency information has been lost. I've had perfect takes ruined more than once -- by the tape.
If that digital recording rig is cluttering up your garage, send it to me. :^)
clear as anything produced by the beatles??? i think you're smoking what the beatles were...
The 'print through' that you hear on analog-recorded tracks (Reel-To-Reel tape) is how the sine wave seems to 'splash' against the tape. Admittedly, you don't achieve this effect with digital as the their is no no 'track bleeding', as the signal has a more controlled reception and disribution in digital.
I've heard this argument many times, and I being a musician, I have recorded both. Being born in '70 I get the vinyl passion. Was absolutely raised on it. I heard Pink Floyd for the first time on a turn table at my cousins house while they 'blazed a whole sack to the head' in 1979.
When I first was in the market for recording equipment, I enlisted the advice of a fellow engineer friend of mine to allow me to hear a track both on 2 inch analog, and on digital equipment in a controlled environment. Since I have an audio engineering background as well, I made sure that levels were equal, and that the effects were identical between the two.
The result? They sounded EXACTLY the same. In fact, I found that the digital equipment allowed for more control in processing and EQ/effects placement than the analog allowed. And while the 'print through' dynamic wasn't happening, I did notice that the digital held it's own. I bought it..and I love it
...But vinyl is more fun...and more interactive. I've noticed alot of what people refer to as 'warmth' in the recording really leans to being nastalgic, rather than something of substance in the recording itself
that's fine in the studio, but once you bounce the sound to a 44.1 khz, 16 bit aiff file for cd mastering you lose all the fidelity you had. and mp3's? puke...
Agreed. That portion of it is absolutely atrocious. Its comparable to listening to tin cans dance. Thats why I choose to do my mastering straight from original source, and not transfer to other mediums such as aiff or mp3 through programs like ProTools, which I do NOT use.
you rock...
I am sitting here listening to your new "album". I heard it first on WXPN and fell in love with your voice. What a combinatio
My 17 year old daughter, is of the ipod generation. But last Chanukah I bought her an analog turntable and she went into the garage and brought in the crates of all my old albums. She too loves the rawness and realness of vinyl. Her favorite???
In the court of the crimson king
nothing quite like listening to "21st century schzoid man" when things/and people are just crawling up your butt. blare that sucker. let the neighbors know who truly is the crimson king.
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Another great thing you could do with vinyl records was to s l o w t h e m d o w n, so you could hear all the notes in a fast guitar lick.
Shelby, if you want your own big honkin' tape machine, you should check out the LA Craigslist musical instruments for sale section. A lot of the studios in town are going digital, and selling off their old analog gear. There's a 24-track 2" Studer A80 for sale on there now for $2,500. Pretty amazing, if you know how much one of those things cost new. I also recently saw a 32-track 1" Otari with Apogee converters going for $1,000.
New vinyl, without the cracks and pops, does sound better than digital, particularly bass. And this is noticeable using a cheap record player and cheap stereo. Of course, the call of compact mediums does call more frequently.
Shelby,
Your post made me cry with joy and hope for this cold, cold world. I'm sitting here looking at my vinyl album collection that my wife has told me many times I should sell because "It's just taking up room and gathering dust". Maybe I'll dust off a few, pull out the turntable and crack open a brew. Thank you.
pobrecito
Lovely thought and nicely written. Mostly when we choose the easy way just because it's the easy way, we lose something. There ain't no such thing as a free lunch, so, in some way, I think we often sell out on something we should value just because we want things to be easy. Nice to see that not everyone will make that sale. Brava!
Wow, I'm an instant fan!
What are you gonna do next - sign a new recording deal with Edison records and release it on 78 rpm?
Amen, Shelby.
I too own an ipod but have never gotten around to using it. I own LPs CDs and cassettes and like you, I don't make any apologies for them. A real music lover would never trash anything vital for a little rinky dink piece of overrated crap.
Thanks for telling the truth.
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