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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If you love the retro sound, why not try a wire recorder or a wax cylinder?
Truth is, digital has democratized music recording. No longer is it necessary to spend hundreds of dollars per hour in a studio to put down tracks. It's possible to get an old-style sound with mic placement, real-time recording and no overdubs or tweaking of the bits. The software for the "tube sound" isn't as expensive as a Studer or studio time, if you can find a studio.
It's garbage in, garbage out, whether on a 2" Studer or a Mac.
A lousy carpenter blames his tools.
Ms. Lynne wasn't arguing that digital is not easier or cheaper or more accessible. She was arguing it didn't sound better and it wasn't inspiring. You, and inordinately sarcastically, are making the analogous case for the drum machine, less expensive and easier to maintain. But is it capable of getting in a room with a combo and swinging it? Not really, and in that way it may impede the creation of capital-M music.
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So true.
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Music industry committed suicide when it went to digital media.
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NICE TO HEAR YOU ARE STILL OUT THERE MAKING MUSIC SHELBY. I'VE GOT A FEW OF YOUR OLDER ALBUMS AND PUT THEM ON WHEN I'M FEELING BLUE. KEEP CRANKING THEM OUT.
Shelby, There are quite a few bands and record labels putting out new and classic records on vinyl.
http://www
thought-provoking post, for sure!
i was an engineer for several years, starting in 1990. i was there when pro tools came out. i learned how to calibrate a deck, run tones, etc... and then watched it mostly go bye-bye.
the problem is that analog gear is EXPENSIVE. 2-inch magnetic tape is nasty stuff to make. it doesn't store well. analog gear requires sensitive maintenance - and know-how. blah blah blah - waaaah.
the other problem is that 2-inch tape SOUNDS GREAT. there's nothing like it.
for now - recording to tape and mixing with digital gear is the best of both worlds. eventually, they will figure out ways of 'warming up' the digital realm.
my tip: invest in great mic preamps.
Thank God - I thought this was going to be another column using some pained explanation of why we should vote for Hillary Clinton. ("It's 3am...the phone rings in your little white house...yo
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Shelby, I've loved your music since I saw you do a duet with Lee Roy Parnell about 15 years ago on "the Marty Party" on the old Nashville Network.
However, as a musician and a recording engineer for a small weekend warrior in the Bay Area, I have to disagree with you.
While it might be true, that 2" tape makes "better" sound, I know many who have done both and also disagree. I know a studio owner in Mt. Juliet, TN, who never uses his Studers any more (he has two), because "when you get it to 24 bit, there's no difference
Furthermore, how many bands can afford to buy a 2" Studer (much less maintain it or afford the tape, which isn't even manufactured any more?)
We recorded our record in our drummer's upstairs room, I suppose you might call it a "den." We recorded as low-tech as computer recording would allow, four mics on the drums, DI for keys and Bass, and a 57 on the guitar amp. It's fairly raw.
But recording this way allows us to finance our record ourselves, without help from a major investor or worse yet, a label, not that any label would be interested in a bunch of geezers like us.
Another positive aspect of digital recording is it's wresting control of the music being created from the labels. I applaud you for your steadfast devotion to great sound (though how many folks record to 2" and then *import it* into Pro Tools? Many I know, in both Nashville and LA).
I'll grant you digital recording enables every half-assed schlock artist and terrible band of 16-year-olds as well, but I believe, the aforementioned schlockery notwithstanding, digital recording, when done with respect for the old ways (the Glyn Johns drum-miking technique, for example) can enable GOOD artists to make their music while also allowing them to have their day jobs and not spend every dime they have in a studio. Like Photoshop, Pro Tools and similar applications can indeed, be used for great evil. Mutt Lange's practices are a good example of that. But not everyone recording digital is Mutt Lange. That is good and bad.
I offer http://ray
Basics were recorded live to eight-track (Digi-001). Overdubs were recorded in several places, my hallway, a small studio in Los Angeles, with a couple more to arrive from Tennessee sometime this weekend.
I've played slide guitar for a singer in New Zealand. I could not have done that using the old ways.
Again, I love your music, but in this day and age, one size does not fit all. I hope you'll consider that.
where do i begin? how about - i love you, shelby lynne! i love your many incarnations in music - i bought "restless" way back when and felt it worked just fine. but then several years later hearing "love, shelby" for the first time i realized THIS was so much better, so much more of whom i thought the "real" shelby was. if one can wear out a CD, i've certainly worn out "love, shelby." i played it again only last month. there isn't a single song on that CD that doesn't resonate with me, including "jesus on a greyhound.
i appreciate your take here in this column on tape and vinyl. i am 60 years old - sounds ancient, i know - but i was there when vinyl took off in the mid-1960s. i have about 2,000 albums or so; a friend has thousands more - collected as they were being produced. some will never be found on CD. and yes, i still have a turntable and my vinyl collection can feed my every whim and walk down memory lane at a moment's notice.
while vinyl always gave me a case of the crazies with the scratches and the warps - and i've returned many a vinyl to a record store for a better replacement (always a gutsy thing to do at the time) - i still love the sound, the feel, the touch of holding an album in my hand, looking at cover designs, reading who's in the band, liner notes, song attributions, checking to see if there are any "secret" notations etched into the hot vinyl before it went to press. just the size of a vinyl is more friendly than the size of a CD - at my age, i have to get out the bifocals to read ANYTHING on a CD.
however, i do give cred to CDs for the convenience of moving a collection from point a to point b. there is nothing more discouraging than having to pack up and move 2,000-plus albums. they in bulk are heavy and cumbersome and each time i do it, i do pay homage to the compact disk.
for this reason, i had to stop rummaging through garage sales, library book sales, goodwill, and second hand stores looking for vinyl these past several years. it seems that pretty near everyone has divested themselves of their vinyl and the deals one can find are sometimes too hard to pass up. in the mid-90s, i once found someone's entire bob dylan vinyl collection in a dumpster.
i look forward to your new release, and i appreciate the time and effort and insistence it took to produce it on tape, just the way you wanted it.
anytime you want to kick back with a beer and listen to Django, give me a call - i'll bring the three or four vinyls i have of the legendary guitar player. i even have the hot club recordings.
good column, shelby! glad to see you at huffpost!
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Very interesting. I polled my (college) students on this the other day and found that nearly all of them download their music, and that most haven't purchased a CD in well over a year. (at least they told me they are downloading legally!) They are more interested in getting the songs they like, as opposed to enjoying the whole experience that comes with a CD. Most of them, of course, never experienced Vinyl; therefore buying CDs is at least a step back in the right direction.
Since you brought this up, may I vent a bit about the high cost of concert tickets! I hope we reach the point, when the audience demands much, much more from the artists, who are now charging us $60-$100 (or more)/ticket. They - the older acts - are no longer 30-ish. We - the audience - are no longer 18-years olds, willing to accept anything we see at their shows. A lot of older acts are putting on shows that just aren't worth the absurd prices that they are charging. These days I would rather go to a club.
Thanks for the post. Cheers!
Shelby, keep producing your music as you see fit. I have absolutely no problem with that at all. That's called artistic integrity.
For me as the listener, though, it's another story. I grew up on vinyl, and for all the "warm" benefits, they were more than offset by the scratches, pops and skips of the predominantly cheaply pressed records. And I took consummate care of my collection. It was just inevitable that the LPs would sound crappy after a while.
Bottom line, as a consumer, the digital age has been good to me, even if I do acknowledge the slight compromise in fidelity.
Great post. I couldn't agree more. Long Live Dinosaurs!
I don't know jack about music, but "Dream Some" sounds good on an Ipod.
You will become a relic, and soon. Those who do not embrace change will be left behind.
Shelby, you've got a point. It must be easier to roll a doobie on a record cover than on an iPod. But I'm not totally sure it's easier to share music using records. I'd probably have to call 20 friends to find one who even has records any more -- or have a record player that works
And as someone who was collecting records before you were born, I have to tell you that your nostalgia is making you a bit fuzzy brained. Records were never a high end musical experience. Records have a ridiculously narrow dynamic range, they usually end up getting scratched after about 10 plays and back in the day most people's systems either sounded tinny or you could hear the motor rumble.
And remember what it was like if you had a party? As soon as anyone started dancing, the record would skip. And someone had to feed the stereo every fifteen minutes and make sure that the records were put away otherwise Rubber Soul would be unplayable afterwards. But maybe you were too stoned to remember that part.
And try playing all your records when you're in your car. Kinda tough huh? Oh, yeah and lets remember how much fun it was to move those ten boxes of vinyl. Not quite the same as having an iPod with 500 CDs worth of music in your pocket or car . But you're right, you can't roll your doobie on the iPod.
So I guess I disagree with you about the good old days. I was there back then and except for a few audiophiles, the music you heard on those old record players was as clean as mud.
I grant you it was easy to bring over a few records to share with friends. But in about 10 minutes I can cut a friend several CDs worth of tunes and give those to him. Or if I really want to share some music, I can bring my iPod, plug it into a friend's system and spin through a hundred different playlists.
So I prefer to have the best of both worlds. I will hold onto a few of the old psychedelic records in case I ever want to roll me a doobie. And I will share tunes by burning CDs or bringing an iPod with me.
That was pretty funny and true TimT. It's always amusing to see the inevitable backlash that young people put on technology. Funnier still is the cherry picking of what technology is cool (or not) from week to week. Look for rotary dial cell phones soon.
Zappa said... "It is not necessary to imagine the world ending in fire or ice. There are two other possibilities: one is paper work, and the other is nostalgia.
Yes... But what about the doobie rolling?
In many ways, I agree with you. Music has been turned into a commodity and is just too damn predictable these days. I fondly remember going to dusty old record shops when I was in college and sifting through stacks and stacks of vinyl.
It was, of course, a far better experience than listening to 30 second samples on Amazon, clicking on links suggesting similar artists. etc. etc. The feeling of coming home and listening to what I just bought, deciding whether it was even any good and ultimately coming to know the songs and to place them within a certain space of my memory is far superior to building a music collection through digital collection (which I have also done to the tune of about 24,000 legally obtained tracks).
On the flip side however, I am a huge proponent of the netlabel model which allows artists to free themselves completely from commercial concerns (if they want to be liberated in such a way) and allows them to distribute their music to anyone who want it. So I don't think it's all bad.
But yeah, in general, I'll take the organic feel of vinyl over digital when push comes to shove.
Oh and random play is the work of the devil.
(BTW, when I read the title I thought this was going to be yet another piece about how Obama is the flavor of the month or whatever. Instead, it was about one of my favorite subjects. Thanks.)
You are right about analog. Working on analog also doesn't cause the same kind of ear fatigue as digital. But you have to give digital its due in terms of new artists. It's cheaper, by far. And with the internet, this newer and cheaper medium is allowing all kinds of artists into the musical culture that wouldn't have had a chance even five years ago.
I miss tape. It's hard to find someone who actually knows how to splice it.
The answer is to get recording engineers to really work at making their digital sound more analog. And, when someone can afford analog like you --well, go for it.
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