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Subject: Why is digital less warm than....
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Original Message Date: 28-Feb-02 @ 09:02 PM - Why is digital less warm than....
We all hear things like, digital isn't as warm as analog, and while I'm not here to argue that specifically, did you ever think about why that is? Outside of some of the basic physical properties, you'd think the two mediums wouldn't be that divergent.... and in some sense, maybe they're not. Now I'm gonna try a little heresy...
Maybe the reason mixes from analog sounds warmer, more musical, whatever, is: our techniques for recording, mixing, etc., are mostly built and modeled on analog experience. We've learned techniques for, say mic placement, that were establised in the analog realm... maybe we should be evaluating new ways of doing things....?
I mean think about one of the most basic differences between the two mediums, the level meter... Many of us that came from the analog world were sorely surprised to find out we couldn't push the LEDs "past the red" on a digital board... Now once I learned how to use digital LEDs, mt life, and my mixes, sounded better...
I'm not really trying to lay out new "rules" of digital recording/mixing, but just bouncing the idea off you all. If you have any experience with what I'm on about here, by all means share it. If you got a "warm sound" from all digital equipment, what was your methodology? Why do you think it worked that way? If you captured a digital take of a vocalist that just simply shimmers, did you do it the "traditional" (i.e., basically as it's always been done on analog equipment) way, or did you find a technique that is exclusive to digital?
Anyhoos, just some thoughts....
Peace All
Message 111/157 03-Apr-02 @ 09:51 PM - RE: Why is digital less warm than....
Message 112/157 04-Apr-02 @ 12:08 AM - RE: Why is digital less warm than....
Peace
Message 113/157 04-Apr-02 @ 12:06 PM - RE: Why is digital less warm than....
Ape
Message 114/157 04-Apr-02 @ 03:47 PM - RE: Why is digital less warm than....
http://www.larkinam.com/MenComNet/Business/Retail/Larknet/Percussion
Peace
Message 115/157 05-Apr-02 @ 11:18 PM - RE: Why is digital less warm than....
Ape
Message 116/157 06-Apr-02 @ 04:36 PM - RE: Why is digital less warm than....
What I _do_ remember decades before that, though, was back when I was listening to music in my parents' house, as a teenager, and had put on a recording (it was LP in those times) of Scriabin's "Poem de L'Extase" (sp) and then Miles Davis' "Kind of Blue" while my parents were hanging around with an old family friend (my godfather, actually). I remember the family friend commenting on how much better "Kind of Blue" was recorded than the Scriabin, and him posing me the question as to why. At the time we chatted about it, it boiled down to a couple of things, that also became an issue in the recording of classical symphonic music at the time:
a) "Kind of Blue" is recorded comparatively simply, with not that many mics. The orchestral recording was being done with the standard of the time (early '70s), lots of mics for the different sections. Later on, recording technique changed and fewer, better mics were used, it was felt you got a clearer, less "busy" mix that way, despite some loss of the detail that the 100-mics approach was trying to buy (all of this in the area of trying to capture orchestras more "realistically").
b) and more important, and lining up with what Pongoid's been hinting at a couple of times in the thread: it ain't the meat, it's the motion, to borrow an old blues line that Bonnie Raitt borrowed once upon a time. What makes "Kind of Blue" such a crack recording is the _experience of the engineers working with the musicians_. They all knew they had a special thing, they were all listening to each other, and working together with a kind of intimacy and understanding that's not often found.
I would say it's not a question of analog vs. digital, really, but the attitude towards both music-making and music-recording reflected in the approach of different generations.
The "analogue" generation treated the art of music, of recording, and the interaction of all the elements with incredible respect and attention to detail. They also brought a range of experience, not just in music, but in culture, a breadth of knowledge of human experience, and history, a passion for a few small, important things, to the process.
The "digital" generation lives in a sea awash with 60 million versions of the same thing, all being simultaneously hyped as new and improved every other week. There's a general levelling towards sub-mediocrity that's induced as a result, since what's being hyped grows out of people with about as much knowledge about the world as the average high school sophomore left off with (and I'm talking _knowledge_ not _information_ -- _knowledge_ means _passion_ for finding something out, say, why a musician in Kenya is doing what they're doing, going there, spending time with them, learning about their lives, not just watching an MTV video with a guy playing "that really cool instrument in the background").
I'm not saying everyone back in the '50s, '60s, '70s were geniuses (though a few were), nor that everyone these days are idiots.
I just think that because there's so "much" around now, and access is so easy and instantaneous, that we're easily distracted, have a difficult time paying deeeeep attention to one thing for a sustained period of time, think we have to do 90 things well at the same time, etc. etc. Generalized ADD, basically. The results are inevitable.
So, when it comes to "analogue" vs. "digital," my main opinion for you there, Mindspawn, is that there's no special equipment or technique you can hand out in a flyer at the workshop to get from "digital" to "analogue" except the one that simply states, "Pay Attention to Details." The commercial pressures to "work quickly," the cost of studio time, the cost of education, etc. all leads to trying to do too much, too fast. You can get that "analogue magic" with any equipment, even digital, if you only give it "analogue attention." And, it's only worth giving the music "analogue attention" if the music itself has been composed and performed with the same kind of attention.
Find a group that's worked closely and lovingly for years with their mixing and studio engineers, who have a real, sustained relationship around what they're doing, who feel they're on a mission with what they're doing, who feel they've got something truly valuable to contribute with what they're doing, who take the necessary time and attention to accomplish what they're doing in a decisive fashion, and you'll get "that sound."
Just my opinion.
rt
Message 117/157 06-Apr-02 @ 08:44 PM - RE: Why is digital less warm than....
"all being simultaneously hyped as new and improved every other week. sub-mediocrity average high school sophomore watching an MTV video."
yes
Message 119/157 06-Apr-02 @ 10:54 PM - RE: Why is digital less warm than....
Sitar, I owe any truth justice and clarity to what I just said all to you, man... I don't know how... I'm just sure of it....
rt
Message 120/157 07-Apr-02 @ 05:21 AM - RE: Why is digital less warm than....
Kinda like dealing with folk thinking I'm a DJ when I play live... lots of times folks will come up and say, "wow, you're a great DJ..." seems no matter how I tried to explain it, they just didn't get it... I finally gave up and just say "Thanks" these days...
Anyhoos, good words...
Peace
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