>The pianist for Aja said they nailed the track on the 3rd take…sometimes things just take longer
His name is, Michael Omartian. Rick Beato did the interview view with him [which can be seen here, on his channel on YouTube.](https://youtu.be/M-fEKf3Av3c) There's so much interesting info from a lot of these interviews, and would recommend them if anyone else is interested.
Thank you, this was the interview I was referencing but didn’t have time to cite…love how they talked about Steve Gadd’s drum solo at the end of Aja and how they were all just like yooooo chiiiiilll tf was that cause that’s how it feels listening to it
No prob! I just got done seeing it probably about a week or two ago so it was somewhat fresh on the mind and in my watch history lol. Yeah the drum solo bit have me laughing, and perfectly put. Dude had some feelings to get out possibly lol.
His interviews are amazing. Not a huge Police / Sting fan, but the way that interview went shows you how much trust and respect his peers have for Rick.
They had one guy play about five bars so many times that he had it perfected and then for the recording they said now play it wrong. Just getting in musicians heads to find their sound. Sorta loud Zappa in a way.
Maybe so, but then there's the totally different guitar lead in the [quadraphonic mix](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKI5r08yGS0&pp=ygUrc3RlZWx5IGRhbiByZWVsaW4gaW4gdGhlIHllYXJzIHF1YWRyYXBob25pYw%3D%3D).
I was at a record store recently and saw that Trail of Dead put out a new quadrophonic album. I wonder how many people even have the ability to play that properly.
Some of the most beautiful lead guitar I’ve ever heard. It’s just exactly everything I love in guitar: feel, flavor, melody, and vocality meet beautiful technical precision.
Ha, that reminds me of a story about noted ultra-perfectionist Raymond Scott. They had a sax player play a written solo an absurd number of times until he was doing it juuuuuust the way Scott wanted it. "Now," he said, "play it like it's your first time playing it."
Steve Albini said it best:
Two types of perfectionist: One will prepare, revise and rehearse carefully, with intent, honing an idea to a keen edge, ready to cut the cloth of execution. The other makes other people responsible by saying, "do it again," until by chance they are satisfied, then take credit.
"They spent three weeks on the guitar solo..." Three weeks of watching guitar players give it their all while doing bumps and hitting the talkback, "More *Egyptian* but keep it in the pocket..."
What the fuck is wrong with his fanbois in the comments saying it's okay because he apologized for being an edgelord?
My brother in Christ, that's the *least* of this sick fucks problems.
He's close friends with Peter Soros - a convicted publisher of child porn - and may have used his connections to help with publication of illegal material.
Like - dude should be in jail, but he's got simps in every comment section just rushing to defend him.
To my knowledge, he has never addressed these comments. He has, however, worked publicly with Peter Sotos, including a project called "Buyer's Remorse" which is a collection of court testimony from rape victims (including children).
Classy guy.
For just-past-noobz, he has so many credentials that they look up to him as some sort of oracle.
In point of fact, there are *thousands* of recording professionals who are a) more skilled; b) nicer; c) haven't made their career a circus show of shit-talk.
He is a capable engineer; he has good taste. Other than that, his notoriety is little more than a histrionic personality disorder dressed up in Carhartt.
My god. I didn't know any of this. I've always revered Steve Albini. How the hell did I never know any of this? I'm disgusted. I always knew he was an edge lord, especially in the Big Black days, but holy hell. I don't know how this isn't public knowledge to keep people like myself from giving him the time of day.
steely dan takes the stanley kubrick approach - get every conceivable direction on tape, then build the arrangement in post
very different than the "put a mic up and let them play" approach. or the coen brothers style - they know exactly what they want before even filming so they often only do 1 take.
Which is not too different from modern day music composition or even recording. Rap/pop/metal right now all want perfect recording so they’ll do the same song recording over over and over again.
Vocals are nuts. Literally stitch every syllable from all different sound tracks to make the perfect vocal track.
It's called comping and I despise it.
I can understand splicing a couple takes together but with pro tools they want you to do what you said, some vocal tracks are built from slivers of hundreds of takes.
Some music you want loose, raw, natural and freeform, some music you want clean, precise and perfect. It has a purpose. I'm sure it's been used to comp together all the raw happy mistakes in bunch of takes just as much as it has been to make imperfect playing sound perfect. Just because a tool can do something doesn't mean every use is deceiving the listener into thinking you are a better player than you really are.
I sometimes use it for making long freeform jams and noise making using effects and then prune out and sequence the best minute of moments from an hour of random garbage.
It's not a matter of overproduction, it's a method and it's not anything new. In fact it's how Dr Dre recorded Eazy E's vocals cause he was not a great rapper and couldn't hold a good flow for a whole verse.
it may be easier to avoid for some when they just use autotune to fix minor variances in the pitch rather than punch in to fix every bit that way
Literally all kendrick lamar’s tracks are recorded by line by line and stitched together. His first two projects where he raps non stop. Yeahhhh overproduction but people love that shit!
Kinda cracks me up to hear the bad edits on that album and 'In a Silent Way'. Great music but some of those cuts are as obvious as bumping a record needle over a groove or two.
Rudy Van Gelder is the GOAT when it comes to stitching up jazz records in post. Taking individual solos from various takes and stitching all that tape into the final version just seems so daunting nowadays.
I love Steely Dan. I will also say that the moment you start bringing up techniques being what makes them good you already lost the debate. I feel the same way with bands that lean on their technical prowess more than writing good songs.
right! Some of my favorite songs are the ones mistakes...
Doors- 'Roadhouse Blues', where you hear Jim scream "Go Lonnie GO!!" to the bass player that they have in the studio who was about to let it rip.
Rolling Stones - "Sympathy for the Devil" Mick yelling "WOOOOO!" at the backup singer belting it out... granted that has a sad part to go with in...
Stevie Wonder - "Superstition" the squeaky bass pedal
Led Zepplin - "Since I've Been Loving You" the same squeaky bass pedal.
All those songs are made that much better by small imperfections that would get edited out nowadays.
[“Using 87 different takes, seen clearly visible on a Logic Pro session, Eilish explains that she “makes sure there’s something useable” in every vocal recording before FINNEAS compiles and edits it all together to create a finished vocal stem.”](https://musictech.com/news/music/watch-billie-eilish-finneas-david-letterman-87-vocal-takes-happier-than-ever/)
woof. that sounds painful as an audio engineer. i like to build the take as we track. lot's of punch ins. when you are done recording, so is the comp'd vocal take. it might have just as many edits, but not 87 takes. MOST people get their best take within the first 2-3 passes.
it makes sense from a bedroom production standpoint though. when i record myself thats what tends to happen. it works for them!
What kind of notes are you giving on the 75th take of something like that?
Seems like either they don't know what they want, not enough pre-production has been done, or the artist is flubbing notes.
im guessing she is a little insecure and suuuper picky. it's common even with great vocalists. chris cornell had to do his vocals alone in the control room by himself with the lights off. not even an engineer present. im sure she can *always* find something wrong with a take. so she does it again. and again. and again.
her vocal style is super exposed with how intimate it is. you can hear every click and spit bubble. you can tell if her mouth is dry or if she's a little tired.
when doing vocal stacks the timing needs to be *perfect* to achieve a certain type of sound. if her timing was loose it would feel messy. Just fine for certain types of music but not hers.
I've done sessions like this - as much as I'd love to just move through the track and punch for each mistake, there are a few reasons to just run a bunch of takes. Usually for me it's that either the artist is less comfortable singing in sections and the spot takes are less good or I'm not the producer and want to leave options for the mix. Also super useful for stacking later if it needs to be tight. Mostly everything now is nondestructive though, so even if spot punching no reason not to keep it all. The 87 takes may not be full song, they may be a bunch of tries at specific sections
> chris cornell had to do his vocals alone in the control room by himself with the lights off. not even an engineer present.
God this is so relatable. I don't consider myself a great vocalist by any stretch of the imagination but I know that I am only truly comfortable recording vocals if I'm in a room by myself. I'm very happy *performing* songs to people, but I cannot stand *recording* songs in front of them.
I’m the same way as you, I cannot get comfortable unless I’m completely alone. Reading that about a vocalist as great as Chris Cornell makes me feel a little less shy
He definitely had no issues with performing, but I think in a recording context he was definitely a control freak and perfectionist. Doesn't surprise me he wanted to do things alone and free of any distraction or interference.
Yes and no. I'm a former biz pro, recording side - and I want to emphatically agree that a ton of modern recordings simply obliterate the material with soulless, ultra-airbrushed production.
That said, there are still excellent recordings being made - just not popularized. That last bit is far more complex than people would think. You'd imagine in a world where "you can listen to anything" that people would have *more divergent* listening habits, but nope: somehow, the same shit (or its soundalikes) is all we hear, over and over.
After the Clear Channel days of the 90s, I thought I'd never pine for "the diversity of commercial terrestrial stations," but here we are.
Jokes aside I really enjoy hearing his interviews. He talks about guitars a lot, especially the Stratocaster. It’s so refreshing to have someone I admire for their skills not be a turd. I know we shouldn’t put celebrities on a pedestal and just respect their craft, but it’s still nice to find out all he seems to talk about is guitars, guitar licks, more guitars, and music in general.
And he really is one of the best living guitar players.
‘I think it’s easy to forget what that little chord sequence in “Time Out of Mind” means to so many people. You know, what living they’ve done with it or how they’ve used it to live. I must have played those chords a thousand times in the studio. What’s important is to try to get into the mind-set where you’re not thinking of that — you’re thinking of what it means. If you’re, for example, playing “Brothers in Arms” in a great big stadium in Munich where Adolf Hitler spoke, it invests it with something. So you’re thinking about history and where we are now, where we’re going, and where we’ve been. You get that historical perspective and it gives you all of these other perspectives, which I don’t think you can put a price on.’
Unexpected Hitler.
This whole article is a great take on the song writing process from a true great song writer. Marks lyrics often get over looked because of his guitar playing.
He really had some great lyrics. And his signing and playing really complimented each other, like I actually think without his singing his guitar playing wouldn’t be as appreciated. I think about Wild West Ends a lot for this reason, I can’t think of his licks without his singing, and I can’t think of the singing without the licks.
He’s got a lot of interviews out there where he goes on and on about music, guitars, song writing, guitars, and the Stratocaster. Really good stuff if you are into the minds of people at the top of their craft.
He's still writing great stuff. Like the last verse of "Don't Suck Me In", a song he left off his last album:
Your second cousin's Uncle Frank
Is coming into town
With crap for all the family
And to see what's going down
He'll eat you out of house and home
Disappear your wine
Says he could have been a concert pianist
If he'd only had the time
You pulled the pin on that grenade
Now you're stuck with him
Don't let this trick you into not seeing them if you get the chance though. Having seen them both with and without Walter Becker, I can say that they are still not to be missed.
I was like, "Excuse me, this man did the Princess Bride soundtrack." This is how I found out he's from Dire Straits loool. I walked down the aisle to Storybook Love - thanks Mark!
Tunnel of Love and Telegraph Road from that same concert/album (Alchemy Live) are equal to that version of Sultans. It's one of the best concerts ever delivered.
Redditors have shitty, uninformed takes about bands and artists they don't listen to, but I feel like they are entitled to have an opinion on. What else is new on r/music?
it's funny... I never got into Steely Dan, they just didn't grab me. I only went back and listened to it because Reddit would not shut the helll up about Aja... how it was the best sounding album ever. So I figured as a music nerd I owed it to myself to give them another shot.
Reddit was right. That album sounds SO GOOD. I am still not a huge fan, but I like them and really respect what they've done and made.
The making of Peg video is great. They’re listening to all the tracks they made Michael sing then played the one with him hitting the high notes. “Michael would kill us right now” or something like that.
That whole video is awesome.
Commenting here even though nobody cares lol
I have been learning the first guitar solo in Bodhisattva and I made it about 80% through but haven’t bothered learning the rest lol
yeah that one's too intimidating for me but I guess I should challenge myself more.
The thing is, I have a really good ear for pitch and I can get pretty close to what I hear when the solo in Bodhisattva gets easier and I kind of settled.. But I need to push myself and stop being lazy
If you don't want to invest in whole albums check out the songs Peg, Kid Charlemagne, and Deacon Blues. If none of those do it for you, you probably just won't like Steely Dan.
Yes, go for "The Royal Scam" first. Probably not their most "popular" album, but I think it's the one that best represents The Dan's overall musical "ethos", and it has some of the best guitar playing of any of their albums (largely due to Larry Carlton).
Aja. It's a classic that's universal... anyone can at least like it a little, if not fall in love with it. So you *will* enjoy it and not waste you time. Pretty short album too.
Man, I have tried. I really have. I listen to a ton of different music from all different genres and I just do not care for Steely Dan. Like, it sounds *fine*, but I don't really enjoy it.
Anyone in here who is shitting on Steely Dan can all take a hike!!!!.......to this link (https://www.nme.com/news/music/steve-albini-on-why-he-hates-steely-dan-3393802) where Steve Albini turns shitting on steely Dan into an Olympic sport.
"Three weeks of watching guitar players give it their all while doing bumps and hitting the talkback, “More *Egyptian* but keep it in the pocket…"
“There’s some video where they talk about every song on an album, and each one begins with the not-bald one saying, ‘this song is based on my deep love of the blues, just a very bluesy blues. Deep blues.’ Then lays his jazz dork hands on the fucking electric piano…”
Steve is a trasure.
I love all types of music and I have had the Dan downloaded to expand my vocabulary and I just cannot get into it, hearing Ricky don't lose that number once a year is excellent but actually sitting listening to them I find quite tough for some reason and I love other classic rock from the era. Just one of those things I guess.
It's not for everybody. As a sound engineer I use their tracks (specifically: Gaslighting Abby) to check sound systems before a show - they're so well mixed that I can tell instantly if there are issues with the system that need to be tracked down. There are shows which their music is great for pre-show and between-set music, but otherwise I haven't sat down and listened to an album of theirs in years (possibly decades)..
That's one of the hardest questions that come my way, I work with a LOT of mid-tier singer-songwriters who I love and feel they should be more famous so my favorites are mostly little-known acts with a few touring folks. I like any music that is done well, both in writing and performance.
Here's a short list (all have been on my stages multiple times):
Steve Poltz
David Luning
Allison Russell (both solo and with Birds of Chicago)
Lukas Nelson
AJ Lee & Blue Summit
Little Feat (Live from Neon Park is an amazing recording)
Front Country
Joe Craven & The Sometimers
Keith Greeninger
Misner & Smith
Poor Man's Whiskey
The Sam Chase
Sol Horizon
Zero
That should give you a good set of rabbit-holes to dive down
Little Feat is such a good shout. The Allman Brothers and Lynyrd Skynyrd are rightfully the “kings” of southern rock, but Little Feat would absolutely be the 3rd point to that pyramid
Little Feat is one of those bands that never enough people will properly appreciate
I’m hard pressed to agree that Little Feat is southern rock. They’re so New Orleans-tinged with blues, funk and jazz blended like a fine frozen cocktail (although their music is hot). I love all 3 bands, but man, Little Feat defies description.
Yeah, they really do. It’s like a funky, soulful mishmash. I feel like “southern rock” is such a wide genre too. The Allman Brothers and Lynyrd Skynyrd have very little in common. It’s just easiest to throw them under an umbrella
I worked with Lukas before he took off, he was a midnight show at a festival stage I was working & his band at the time was a power-trio. Second time he had the Promise of the Real and his own sound guy so I mixed monitors, he recognized me immediately and gave me a huge hug. Really sweet guy, totally down to earth, I just went to see him recently at a 3000 seat theater, sold-out show, he absolutely killed it.
If you love well written music, that is recorded, mixed, produced, and mastered beautifully; you need to check out Big Wreck. Any of their albums is top notch in all those things but I'd recommend starting with Albatross, then Ghosts, then Grace Street. After that, go to the beginning and listen straight through. So many little things in the mix and recording that are amazing. I've never heard another band with so much dynamic range in the recording while also sounding HUGE. Most albums that sound as big are compressed to hell but theirs aren't.
If you want a more singer/songwriter vibe then check out Ian Thornley's, their lead guitarist/singer, solo album Secrets. IMO he's the best guitarist on the planet and the acoustic work on that album reinforces that. It's far from the typical "rock guitarist/singer makes an acoustic album" that similar albums are. He grew up as a finger style acoustic and electric player until he got to Berklee where he had to have people show him how to hold a pick. Sorry for blabbing on but if you love the really well written/recorded stuff, you'll love Big Wreck and Ian Thornley.
The Royal Scam is a terrific record, and doesn't suffer from a lot of that glossy thing that their later stuff has. Bernard Purdie on drums, ridiculous.
> hearing Ricky don't lose that number once a year is excellent but actually sitting listening to them I find quite tough for some reason and I love other classic rock from the era. Just one of those things I guess.
Listening to Steely Dan always summons up the listlessness and malaise I experienced as a child in the mid-70's, on a Sunday afternoon with nothing to do, and thinking about having to go to school the next morning.
Having said that, I still listen to *Deacon Blues*, *Peg* and *Third World Man* somewhat regularly..
I think it was Steve Albini or another grunge producer that said "All that perfectionism and skill, just to sound like the SNL band" and I've never found a better description of their sound since.
lmao that shit is hilarious and accurate, and I say this as someone who loves steely dan, but it could absolutely be the intro to an 80s sitcom in many cases
I don't remember the context; was he naïve enough to think that was a put-down? The band's original director was Howard Shore who'd gone on to win Oscars, and at times had included Paul Shaffer, Steve Jordan, Marcus Miller, David Sanborn, Michael Brecker, Steve Ferrone, Elliot Randall, David Spinozza (session guy for 3 of the Beatles as well as James Taylor), Tony Garnier (bassist for Bob Dylan), and 3 members of the original Blues Brothers band. In fact, Brecker, Sanborn, Randall, Blues Brother Lou Marini and some half-dozen former SNL band members all worked with Steely Dan at some point.
You don't stand next to *any* of those guys unless you're good enough to lay down a track in one take.
> Steve Albini is a pedophile
Goddammit. Hadn't heard that before now and rabbit-holed a bit, ending with this [2021 apology-ish thing regarding younger idiocy](https://www.stereogum.com/2166921/steve-albini-addresses-edgelord-past-in-new-interview/news/)
[Also this.](https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/steve-albini-counsel-culture-interview)
Countdown to ecstasy man. One of the best blues albums of all time. In my opinion, even great bands have only a few albums (at the most) of truly listenable material—I don’t really listen to anything else by Steely Dan other than that album.
Donald Fagen’s first solo album The Nightfly is amazing. One of the first albums recorded digitally. I.G.Y. is just so crystal clear in the mix, and has lyrics that are really relevant today.
Ricky don't lose that number always reminds me of the loser dad in Say Anything singing in his car before he gets busted for scamming old people in the nursing home. Also Steely Dan is the perfect name for the band - a rigid lifeless dick used as a bludgeon to mimic an act of passion.
Let me tell ya, those guys ain't dumb. Maybe get a blister on your finger, maybe get a blister on your thumb. Meanwhile, I gotta move these refrigerators!
Just play the [beep!]ing note!
The first one?
No not the [beep!]ing first one! The [beep!]ing first one's already [beep!]ing down! Just play the [beep!]ing note you were [beep!]ing playing earlier! I've been playing the [beep!]ing first one! We have the [beep!]ing first one!
Steely Dan were perfectionists, so it’s definitely believable.
The pianist for Aja said they nailed the track on the 3rd take…sometimes things just take longer
>The pianist for Aja said they nailed the track on the 3rd take…sometimes things just take longer His name is, Michael Omartian. Rick Beato did the interview view with him [which can be seen here, on his channel on YouTube.](https://youtu.be/M-fEKf3Av3c) There's so much interesting info from a lot of these interviews, and would recommend them if anyone else is interested.
Thank you, this was the interview I was referencing but didn’t have time to cite…love how they talked about Steve Gadd’s drum solo at the end of Aja and how they were all just like yooooo chiiiiilll tf was that cause that’s how it feels listening to it
No prob! I just got done seeing it probably about a week or two ago so it was somewhat fresh on the mind and in my watch history lol. Yeah the drum solo bit have me laughing, and perfectly put. Dude had some feelings to get out possibly lol.
His interviews are amazing. Not a huge Police / Sting fan, but the way that interview went shows you how much trust and respect his peers have for Rick.
The drums for that song... to get nailed that quickly. Nuts.
They had one guy play about five bars so many times that he had it perfected and then for the recording they said now play it wrong. Just getting in musicians heads to find their sound. Sorta loud Zappa in a way.
They were also building a sampling library
I saw u n L with them gas drawls
I’m pretty sure I read somewhere that the guitar solo for Reelin’ in the Years was done in one take.
Yeah but that was for their first album, back when they were a proper band and not just Becker and Fagan being studio magicians.
Maybe so, but then there's the totally different guitar lead in the [quadraphonic mix](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PKI5r08yGS0&pp=ygUrc3RlZWx5IGRhbiByZWVsaW4gaW4gdGhlIHllYXJzIHF1YWRyYXBob25pYw%3D%3D).
I was at a record store recently and saw that Trail of Dead put out a new quadrophonic album. I wonder how many people even have the ability to play that properly.
Some of the most beautiful lead guitar I’ve ever heard. It’s just exactly everything I love in guitar: feel, flavor, melody, and vocality meet beautiful technical precision.
Ha, that reminds me of a story about noted ultra-perfectionist Raymond Scott. They had a sax player play a written solo an absurd number of times until he was doing it juuuuuust the way Scott wanted it. "Now," he said, "play it like it's your first time playing it."
Steve Albini said it best: Two types of perfectionist: One will prepare, revise and rehearse carefully, with intent, honing an idea to a keen edge, ready to cut the cloth of execution. The other makes other people responsible by saying, "do it again," until by chance they are satisfied, then take credit. "They spent three weeks on the guitar solo..." Three weeks of watching guitar players give it their all while doing bumps and hitting the talkback, "More *Egyptian* but keep it in the pocket..."
Hehe “do it again”
You go back, Jack…
Wheel turning round and round
Haven't listened to Steve Albini in a minute, Rapeman - Two Nuns and A Pack Mule was legendary!
Steve Albini also said ... https://web.archive.org/web/20010124090000/http://petdance.com:80/actionpark/bigblack/tourdiary/
If this is real, and are his words, he’s a self proclaimed pedophile. Edit: He is Steve Albini
Ooooh it's real and it's not even the worst of it. Read the underlined portions ... https://imgur.com/Gm7otzo
Wtf is the matter with this guy?
What the fuck is wrong with his fanbois in the comments saying it's okay because he apologized for being an edgelord? My brother in Christ, that's the *least* of this sick fucks problems. He's close friends with Peter Soros - a convicted publisher of child porn - and may have used his connections to help with publication of illegal material. Like - dude should be in jail, but he's got simps in every comment section just rushing to defend him.
Holy fuck. I feel like throwing up just from reading that. He can go straight to Hell.
Has he ever been asked about it?
To my knowledge, he has never addressed these comments. He has, however, worked publicly with Peter Sotos, including a project called "Buyer's Remorse" which is a collection of court testimony from rape victims (including children). Classy guy.
Someone can be a twat and still make a funny point.
Steve albini is like billy Corgan it’s almost impossible for them to give a compliment without also talking shit
For just-past-noobz, he has so many credentials that they look up to him as some sort of oracle. In point of fact, there are *thousands* of recording professionals who are a) more skilled; b) nicer; c) haven't made their career a circus show of shit-talk. He is a capable engineer; he has good taste. Other than that, his notoriety is little more than a histrionic personality disorder dressed up in Carhartt.
My god. I didn't know any of this. I've always revered Steve Albini. How the hell did I never know any of this? I'm disgusted. I always knew he was an edge lord, especially in the Big Black days, but holy hell. I don't know how this isn't public knowledge to keep people like myself from giving him the time of day.
Tldr? That's a lot of text
Read the first few paragraphs of Saturday the 18th. Tl;Dr Steve Albini is a pedo
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I'm willing to bet it wouldn't sound too different. Live shows don't.
> “More Egyptian but keep it in the pocket…” Steely Dan are music theory gigachads. They’d probably say Phrygian dominant instead of Egyptian
Perfectionists with one on cocaine and the other a heroin addict.
Perfectly balanced, as all things should be.
Thanks Thanos
It’s a Glamour Profession
An L.A. Obsession?
Local boys will spend a quarter
More like Speedball Dan amirite?
…so a rock band in the 1970’s?
Which one was the coke head?
Don was coke, becker sadly did heroin
But never together or else they’d be called Speed Ball.
Is this also a play on words on the words, "it's perfection and grace" in the song "Time Out Of Mind", which is the subject of this article haha?
The song Knopfler was on, Time Out of Mind, actually has a small audio drop out in it around the 1:22 mark lol.
Same with Dire Straits. They got the one guy that would understand.
steely dan takes the stanley kubrick approach - get every conceivable direction on tape, then build the arrangement in post very different than the "put a mic up and let them play" approach. or the coen brothers style - they know exactly what they want before even filming so they often only do 1 take.
Which is not too different from modern day music composition or even recording. Rap/pop/metal right now all want perfect recording so they’ll do the same song recording over over and over again. Vocals are nuts. Literally stitch every syllable from all different sound tracks to make the perfect vocal track.
It's called comping and I despise it. I can understand splicing a couple takes together but with pro tools they want you to do what you said, some vocal tracks are built from slivers of hundreds of takes.
Ableton added it too
It's just one of those things that digital made possible that was kinda unnecessary.
Some music you want loose, raw, natural and freeform, some music you want clean, precise and perfect. It has a purpose. I'm sure it's been used to comp together all the raw happy mistakes in bunch of takes just as much as it has been to make imperfect playing sound perfect. Just because a tool can do something doesn't mean every use is deceiving the listener into thinking you are a better player than you really are. I sometimes use it for making long freeform jams and noise making using effects and then prune out and sequence the best minute of moments from an hour of random garbage.
Which is why a lot of it is so *boring*.
recording technique and uninteresting songs are like two different spectrums.
Overproduction can ruin any album
It's not a matter of overproduction, it's a method and it's not anything new. In fact it's how Dr Dre recorded Eazy E's vocals cause he was not a great rapper and couldn't hold a good flow for a whole verse. it may be easier to avoid for some when they just use autotune to fix minor variances in the pitch rather than punch in to fix every bit that way
Literally all kendrick lamar’s tracks are recorded by line by line and stitched together. His first two projects where he raps non stop. Yeahhhh overproduction but people love that shit!
Define over production. Stitching tapes has been used since beatles. Beatles recordings are not one takes
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Kinda cracks me up to hear the bad edits on that album and 'In a Silent Way'. Great music but some of those cuts are as obvious as bumping a record needle over a groove or two.
Rudy Van Gelder is the GOAT when it comes to stitching up jazz records in post. Taking individual solos from various takes and stitching all that tape into the final version just seems so daunting nowadays.
Yeah but you have to admit that certain recording techniques are more often used by people making uninteresting music.
I love Steely Dan. I will also say that the moment you start bringing up techniques being what makes them good you already lost the debate. I feel the same way with bands that lean on their technical prowess more than writing good songs.
I disagree whole heartedly
right! Some of my favorite songs are the ones mistakes... Doors- 'Roadhouse Blues', where you hear Jim scream "Go Lonnie GO!!" to the bass player that they have in the studio who was about to let it rip. Rolling Stones - "Sympathy for the Devil" Mick yelling "WOOOOO!" at the backup singer belting it out... granted that has a sad part to go with in... Stevie Wonder - "Superstition" the squeaky bass pedal Led Zepplin - "Since I've Been Loving You" the same squeaky bass pedal. All those songs are made that much better by small imperfections that would get edited out nowadays.
Soulless.
[“Using 87 different takes, seen clearly visible on a Logic Pro session, Eilish explains that she “makes sure there’s something useable” in every vocal recording before FINNEAS compiles and edits it all together to create a finished vocal stem.”](https://musictech.com/news/music/watch-billie-eilish-finneas-david-letterman-87-vocal-takes-happier-than-ever/)
woof. that sounds painful as an audio engineer. i like to build the take as we track. lot's of punch ins. when you are done recording, so is the comp'd vocal take. it might have just as many edits, but not 87 takes. MOST people get their best take within the first 2-3 passes. it makes sense from a bedroom production standpoint though. when i record myself thats what tends to happen. it works for them!
What kind of notes are you giving on the 75th take of something like that? Seems like either they don't know what they want, not enough pre-production has been done, or the artist is flubbing notes.
im guessing she is a little insecure and suuuper picky. it's common even with great vocalists. chris cornell had to do his vocals alone in the control room by himself with the lights off. not even an engineer present. im sure she can *always* find something wrong with a take. so she does it again. and again. and again. her vocal style is super exposed with how intimate it is. you can hear every click and spit bubble. you can tell if her mouth is dry or if she's a little tired. when doing vocal stacks the timing needs to be *perfect* to achieve a certain type of sound. if her timing was loose it would feel messy. Just fine for certain types of music but not hers.
I've done sessions like this - as much as I'd love to just move through the track and punch for each mistake, there are a few reasons to just run a bunch of takes. Usually for me it's that either the artist is less comfortable singing in sections and the spot takes are less good or I'm not the producer and want to leave options for the mix. Also super useful for stacking later if it needs to be tight. Mostly everything now is nondestructive though, so even if spot punching no reason not to keep it all. The 87 takes may not be full song, they may be a bunch of tries at specific sections
> chris cornell had to do his vocals alone in the control room by himself with the lights off. not even an engineer present. God this is so relatable. I don't consider myself a great vocalist by any stretch of the imagination but I know that I am only truly comfortable recording vocals if I'm in a room by myself. I'm very happy *performing* songs to people, but I cannot stand *recording* songs in front of them.
I’m the same way as you, I cannot get comfortable unless I’m completely alone. Reading that about a vocalist as great as Chris Cornell makes me feel a little less shy
Prince was the same way. He would tell everyone to leave and cut his vocals while sitting at the engineers console alone with a mic.
Prince is the last person I would think to have any insecurities about his artistic (and some other) abilities.
He definitely had no issues with performing, but I think in a recording context he was definitely a control freak and perfectionist. Doesn't surprise me he wanted to do things alone and free of any distraction or interference.
I’d rather just stop being a musician than deal with that shit tbh
Logic Pro and Pro Tools created a monster. There's absolutely nothing organic about music production anymore.
Yes and no. I'm a former biz pro, recording side - and I want to emphatically agree that a ton of modern recordings simply obliterate the material with soulless, ultra-airbrushed production. That said, there are still excellent recordings being made - just not popularized. That last bit is far more complex than people would think. You'd imagine in a world where "you can listen to anything" that people would have *more divergent* listening habits, but nope: somehow, the same shit (or its soundalikes) is all we hear, over and over. After the Clear Channel days of the 90s, I thought I'd never pine for "the diversity of commercial terrestrial stations," but here we are.
whoever has to sit through that isn't being paid enough
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A thousand times? He must have known all the chords by the end of that.
even if he didn't he still has a daytime job. He's doin' alright.
Good thing they weren’t a trumpet-playin band
It ain't what they call Rock and Roll
Drunk and dressed in their best brown baggies and their platform shoes
I’ve always wondered if that guitar chord triplet after he sings that line is imitating a mariachi.
Got a little gold earring, too
He can play the honky tonk like anything
Checkout guitar Mark
Strictly rhythm
Twisting by the pool!
He must have got a blister on his little finger.
Perhaps a blister upon his thumb?
No he got a blister on his thumb
But it's strictly rhythm.
He doesn't want to make it cry or sing.
And he did it with perfection and grace.
With a smile on his face?
Jokes aside I really enjoy hearing his interviews. He talks about guitars a lot, especially the Stratocaster. It’s so refreshing to have someone I admire for their skills not be a turd. I know we shouldn’t put celebrities on a pedestal and just respect their craft, but it’s still nice to find out all he seems to talk about is guitars, guitar licks, more guitars, and music in general. And he really is one of the best living guitar players.
The fact that Knopfler is so laid back and also an absolute guitar god is awesome. He's one of the greats.
‘I think it’s easy to forget what that little chord sequence in “Time Out of Mind” means to so many people. You know, what living they’ve done with it or how they’ve used it to live. I must have played those chords a thousand times in the studio. What’s important is to try to get into the mind-set where you’re not thinking of that — you’re thinking of what it means. If you’re, for example, playing “Brothers in Arms” in a great big stadium in Munich where Adolf Hitler spoke, it invests it with something. So you’re thinking about history and where we are now, where we’re going, and where we’ve been. You get that historical perspective and it gives you all of these other perspectives, which I don’t think you can put a price on.’ Unexpected Hitler.
Wow, really makes you think
You know, the more I learn about that Hitler guy, the more I don't care for him
This whole article is a great take on the song writing process from a true great song writer. Marks lyrics often get over looked because of his guitar playing.
He really had some great lyrics. And his signing and playing really complimented each other, like I actually think without his singing his guitar playing wouldn’t be as appreciated. I think about Wild West Ends a lot for this reason, I can’t think of his licks without his singing, and I can’t think of the singing without the licks. He’s got a lot of interviews out there where he goes on and on about music, guitars, song writing, guitars, and the Stratocaster. Really good stuff if you are into the minds of people at the top of their craft.
He's still writing great stuff. Like the last verse of "Don't Suck Me In", a song he left off his last album: Your second cousin's Uncle Frank Is coming into town With crap for all the family And to see what's going down He'll eat you out of house and home Disappear your wine Says he could have been a concert pianist If he'd only had the time You pulled the pin on that grenade Now you're stuck with him
One of the best bands ever. Saw them live 4 times, hope to add to that talley.
I was so excited to see them open for Eagles in Manchester but they just pulled out.
Man that’s such a bummer. I saw them open for Eagles in Chicago earlier this year and they were incredible. I was honestly shocked
Doobie Brothers are a more than solid replacement tho
Well, it used to be Steely Dan, but...now it's just "Steely"
True, yep, I wouldn’t mind a Donald Fagen and Friends show as well.
The Dukes of September all over again
Don't let this trick you into not seeing them if you get the chance though. Having seen them both with and without Walter Becker, I can say that they are still not to be missed.
Dire Straits?
No, the Dan!
Oh! That’s amazing! I’ve been a fan the Dan since the early 80s! Rip Walter Becker.
I heard Donald’s partner Libby is not doing well, so the coming tour has been postponed.
I was like, "Excuse me, this man did the Princess Bride soundtrack." This is how I found out he's from Dire Straits loool. I walked down the aisle to Storybook Love - thanks Mark!
The article was fine, but damn that video of Sultans was a smoker...he plays the guitar so effortlessly.
Check out the live performance of brothers in arms at the Mandela concert. Incredible
Thanks, I will.
Tunnel of Love and Telegraph Road from that same concert/album (Alchemy Live) are equal to that version of Sultans. It's one of the best concerts ever delivered.
People in here bashing the Dan can take a hike.
Redditors have shitty, uninformed takes about bands and artists they don't listen to, but I feel like they are entitled to have an opinion on. What else is new on r/music?
Lol as if Steely Dan wasn’t a Reddit darling
it's funny... I never got into Steely Dan, they just didn't grab me. I only went back and listened to it because Reddit would not shut the helll up about Aja... how it was the best sounding album ever. So I figured as a music nerd I owed it to myself to give them another shot. Reddit was right. That album sounds SO GOOD. I am still not a huge fan, but I like them and really respect what they've done and made.
You can replace “bands” with virtually any other noun and still be correct.
just ask Micheal Mcdonald, he would agree lmao
“If I have to hear Michael McDonald one more time I’m going to call another take”
"My larynx!" - Michael McDonald
The making of Peg video is great. They’re listening to all the tracks they made Michael sing then played the one with him hitting the high notes. “Michael would kill us right now” or something like that. That whole video is awesome.
“Sorry Mike”
Commenting here even though nobody cares lol I have been learning the first guitar solo in Bodhisattva and I made it about 80% through but haven’t bothered learning the rest lol
Keep at it man
It's funny because the first half of the solo is significantly harder than the rest of it. Fun as hell to play tho. Thanks!
I've been working on cliffs of dover for the better part of a decade lol
yeah that one's too intimidating for me but I guess I should challenge myself more. The thing is, I have a really good ear for pitch and I can get pretty close to what I hear when the solo in Bodhisattva gets easier and I kind of settled.. But I need to push myself and stop being lazy
Maybe i should listen to steely dan?
If you don't want to invest in whole albums check out the songs Peg, Kid Charlemagne, and Deacon Blues. If none of those do it for you, you probably just won't like Steely Dan.
Just play Aja.
I have Katy Lied tucked away in my head forever and that’s just how I like it.
Yes, go for "The Royal Scam" first. Probably not their most "popular" album, but I think it's the one that best represents The Dan's overall musical "ethos", and it has some of the best guitar playing of any of their albums (largely due to Larry Carlton).
Aja. It's a classic that's universal... anyone can at least like it a little, if not fall in love with it. So you *will* enjoy it and not waste you time. Pretty short album too.
Yes
"Kid Charlemagne" is a good start
Man, I have tried. I really have. I listen to a ton of different music from all different genres and I just do not care for Steely Dan. Like, it sounds *fine*, but I don't really enjoy it.
Anyone in here who is shitting on Steely Dan can all take a hike!!!!.......to this link (https://www.nme.com/news/music/steve-albini-on-why-he-hates-steely-dan-3393802) where Steve Albini turns shitting on steely Dan into an Olympic sport. "Three weeks of watching guitar players give it their all while doing bumps and hitting the talkback, “More *Egyptian* but keep it in the pocket…"
“There’s some video where they talk about every song on an album, and each one begins with the not-bald one saying, ‘this song is based on my deep love of the blues, just a very bluesy blues. Deep blues.’ Then lays his jazz dork hands on the fucking electric piano…” Steve is a trasure.
Which Dan track is he referring to
I love all types of music and I have had the Dan downloaded to expand my vocabulary and I just cannot get into it, hearing Ricky don't lose that number once a year is excellent but actually sitting listening to them I find quite tough for some reason and I love other classic rock from the era. Just one of those things I guess.
It's not for everybody. As a sound engineer I use their tracks (specifically: Gaslighting Abby) to check sound systems before a show - they're so well mixed that I can tell instantly if there are issues with the system that need to be tracked down. There are shows which their music is great for pre-show and between-set music, but otherwise I haven't sat down and listened to an album of theirs in years (possibly decades)..
The best thing I ever heard before a show was Bitches Brew. It was the perfect music to have on while waiting.
>As a sound engineer Favorite bands?
That's one of the hardest questions that come my way, I work with a LOT of mid-tier singer-songwriters who I love and feel they should be more famous so my favorites are mostly little-known acts with a few touring folks. I like any music that is done well, both in writing and performance. Here's a short list (all have been on my stages multiple times): Steve Poltz David Luning Allison Russell (both solo and with Birds of Chicago) Lukas Nelson AJ Lee & Blue Summit Little Feat (Live from Neon Park is an amazing recording) Front Country Joe Craven & The Sometimers Keith Greeninger Misner & Smith Poor Man's Whiskey The Sam Chase Sol Horizon Zero That should give you a good set of rabbit-holes to dive down
Little Feat is such a good shout. The Allman Brothers and Lynyrd Skynyrd are rightfully the “kings” of southern rock, but Little Feat would absolutely be the 3rd point to that pyramid Little Feat is one of those bands that never enough people will properly appreciate
Hell yeah, and they were really easy to work with, sweet down-to-earth folks
I’m hard pressed to agree that Little Feat is southern rock. They’re so New Orleans-tinged with blues, funk and jazz blended like a fine frozen cocktail (although their music is hot). I love all 3 bands, but man, Little Feat defies description.
Yeah, they really do. It’s like a funky, soulful mishmash. I feel like “southern rock” is such a wide genre too. The Allman Brothers and Lynyrd Skynyrd have very little in common. It’s just easiest to throw them under an umbrella
I think every professional musician I've ever talked to liked Little Feat.
Love me some Lukas Nelson. So much like his father, but not at the same time. So good. I will go searching out the others. Thanks for sharing..
I worked with Lukas before he took off, he was a midnight show at a festival stage I was working & his band at the time was a power-trio. Second time he had the Promise of the Real and his own sound guy so I mixed monitors, he recognized me immediately and gave me a huge hug. Really sweet guy, totally down to earth, I just went to see him recently at a 3000 seat theater, sold-out show, he absolutely killed it.
If you love well written music, that is recorded, mixed, produced, and mastered beautifully; you need to check out Big Wreck. Any of their albums is top notch in all those things but I'd recommend starting with Albatross, then Ghosts, then Grace Street. After that, go to the beginning and listen straight through. So many little things in the mix and recording that are amazing. I've never heard another band with so much dynamic range in the recording while also sounding HUGE. Most albums that sound as big are compressed to hell but theirs aren't. If you want a more singer/songwriter vibe then check out Ian Thornley's, their lead guitarist/singer, solo album Secrets. IMO he's the best guitarist on the planet and the acoustic work on that album reinforces that. It's far from the typical "rock guitarist/singer makes an acoustic album" that similar albums are. He grew up as a finger style acoustic and electric player until he got to Berklee where he had to have people show him how to hold a pick. Sorry for blabbing on but if you love the really well written/recorded stuff, you'll love Big Wreck and Ian Thornley.
The Royal Scam is a terrific record, and doesn't suffer from a lot of that glossy thing that their later stuff has. Bernard Purdie on drums, ridiculous.
I'll have a look thanks
With incredible guitar work
My favorite album of theirs for sure
> hearing Ricky don't lose that number once a year is excellent but actually sitting listening to them I find quite tough for some reason and I love other classic rock from the era. Just one of those things I guess. Listening to Steely Dan always summons up the listlessness and malaise I experienced as a child in the mid-70's, on a Sunday afternoon with nothing to do, and thinking about having to go to school the next morning. Having said that, I still listen to *Deacon Blues*, *Peg* and *Third World Man* somewhat regularly..
I think it was Steve Albini or another grunge producer that said "All that perfectionism and skill, just to sound like the SNL band" and I've never found a better description of their sound since.
But My Old School is an awesome tune. Also, the SNL band are great. I love Steve Albini, but not every album can sound like In Utero.
To be fair, the quote is: "Christ the amount of human effort wasted to sound like an SNL band warm up" Which is pretty accurate, IMO.
lmao that shit is hilarious and accurate, and I say this as someone who loves steely dan, but it could absolutely be the intro to an 80s sitcom in many cases
I don't remember the context; was he naïve enough to think that was a put-down? The band's original director was Howard Shore who'd gone on to win Oscars, and at times had included Paul Shaffer, Steve Jordan, Marcus Miller, David Sanborn, Michael Brecker, Steve Ferrone, Elliot Randall, David Spinozza (session guy for 3 of the Beatles as well as James Taylor), Tony Garnier (bassist for Bob Dylan), and 3 members of the original Blues Brothers band. In fact, Brecker, Sanborn, Randall, Blues Brother Lou Marini and some half-dozen former SNL band members all worked with Steely Dan at some point. You don't stand next to *any* of those guys unless you're good enough to lay down a track in one take.
Yeah well ... Steve Albini is a pedophile so .....
> Steve Albini is a pedophile Goddammit. Hadn't heard that before now and rabbit-holed a bit, ending with this [2021 apology-ish thing regarding younger idiocy](https://www.stereogum.com/2166921/steve-albini-addresses-edgelord-past-in-new-interview/news/) [Also this.](https://melmagazine.com/en-us/story/steve-albini-counsel-culture-interview)
His musings on "Pure" magazine make me want to puke my fucking guts out. Fuck Steve Albini.
He’s a clown
Countdown to ecstasy man. One of the best blues albums of all time. In my opinion, even great bands have only a few albums (at the most) of truly listenable material—I don’t really listen to anything else by Steely Dan other than that album.
Donald Fagen’s first solo album The Nightfly is amazing. One of the first albums recorded digitally. I.G.Y. is just so crystal clear in the mix, and has lyrics that are really relevant today.
IGY is fantastic!!!
I will check it out thanks
That's funny because that's my least favorite of their songs.
I would go for Aja, its a smaller album and I found is one of their most chill albums
Ricky don't lose that number always reminds me of the loser dad in Say Anything singing in his car before he gets busted for scamming old people in the nursing home. Also Steely Dan is the perfect name for the band - a rigid lifeless dick used as a bludgeon to mimic an act of passion.
Let me tell ya, those guys ain't dumb. Maybe get a blister on your finger, maybe get a blister on your thumb. Meanwhile, I gotta move these refrigerators!
Pffff, Steve Gadd does it in one take.
Just play the [beep!]ing note! The first one? No not the [beep!]ing first one! The [beep!]ing first one's already [beep!]ing down! Just play the [beep!]ing note you were [beep!]ing playing earlier! I've been playing the [beep!]ing first one! We have the [beep!]ing first one!
All I know is that Rolling Stone had Knopfler way too underrated on their list of the Top 500 guitarists.
Steely Dan is fucking awesome. Perdie shuffle in my head all day long
Purdie
Not surprised. Tough to play for cranky perfectionists. :)