From: owner-lucy-list-digest@smoe.org (lucy-list-digest) To: lucy-list-digest@smoe.org Subject: lucy-list-digest V5 #61 Reply-To: lucy-list@smoe.org Sender: owner-lucy-list-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-lucy-list-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk lucy-list-digest Monday, March 17 2003 Volume 05 : Number 061 In this issue: [lucy-list] Re: lucy-list-digest V5 #59 (producers) ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Sun, 16 Mar 2003 11:17:07 -0800 (PST) From: Libby Wiebel Subject: [lucy-list] Re: lucy-list-digest V5 #59 (producers) Hmmmm.... that's a tricky one.... > Can you speak a bit too why you think that? Anything a > layperson would understand? Like for instance which Lucy has > the best production? > > Just Curious, > > Lisa > Part of me is a little sad that I do think so much lately about the production of things... It's like once your ear has learned to pick apart tracks and listen to, for instance, the bass part on an album, you can't go back... Something that has wonderful production... hmmmm... I guess there are a lot of things I hear. Like when I listened to Alette Brooks album "Swim With Me" the thing that hit me most was how "warm" the piano sounded. Think about all the different pianos you've heard... like the one in a grade school classroom.... or the one in a concert hall... or the one you last heard Susan Werner play... Each one has a personality. Some are very "bright" and seem to say... HERE I AM! Others... they're more mellow and you can just envision a lounge singer resting a gin and tonic on it... Others... seem to cry... I need an orchestra to play with me! It's just noticing the personality for some things.... But then... think about that Cher song that came out about 5 years ago... "Believe"... remember all the weirdness they did with her voice that made her sound like a robot? The technology is there to "lock" a sound into a certain "range" of frequencies... and so a track can be, to a degree, automatically tuned... you listen for stuff that sounds unnatural. Not that you run into Cher-like stuff too often... but the idea is there... Like if you take the same exact drum beat for a few measures and then repeat it... It sounds mechanical. To me, over-production sounds "fake"... but they're trying to pull one over on you... make you think that it wasn't fake. I guess there's something slightly honorable in Cher... she made no bones about the fact that her vocals were heavily digitally altered! I love listening for textures in music. Textures... and layers. Like... have you ever heard someone sing and thought... wow... they seem to be talented, but they really needed more than just that single instrument up there... I remember seeing a singer-songwriter open for a band at Wolf Trap (Filene Center)... a BIG BIG outdoor venue in DC. She was just dwarfed by the venue and the crowd. She needed some more "layer" or "depth" to the sound. Well it goes that way in a recording, too. Listen to early Ani... some of it is just "girl & guitar"... and it's good... but then listen to something that comes just a year or two down the road... "girl & guitar & something else"... it has more "texture"... Kind of like seeing Lucy solo is very different than seeing her when she's with another guitarist. So... when I listen to things, I love thinking about the layers... Like how much a strings track can add. Or how much just a simple flute part can add... or little things that add a lot... like in "Edges"... the studio version has this wonderful little chime-like percussion instrument that comes in about halfway through. It's like... wow... that little thing that almost sounds like one of those melody-ball necklaces... it's just an extra layer of support for the sound... More "texture". I love the production on all of Lucy's albums... but I particularly love "Ten Year Night." Jennifer Kimball's harmony vocals throughout are so perfect... she has kind of an "airy" texture to her voice... and it just, to me, makes it feel like the songs are breating... very much alive. And then... the order of the songs on the CD... it's very effective, I feel. You travel very "naturally" through the course of the songs... like you aren't too worn out after too many fast songs... or you don't get "bored" by too many slower songs... it just flows very well. I feel like, when I listen to it, that I'm always "ready" for the next song coming up... it's always the perfect thing to be hearing next. I think the thing that strikes me about the Cosy Sheridan album that I mentioned ("Grand Design") is that there is such a continuity... the same instruments were used throughout, but in creative ways so you don't get the feeling that one drummer came in and played for 10 minutes and then they used that for the entire album. There's variation within similarity. You feel like all the songs are part of a family... they all belong together... the album is a WHOLE... I don't know... it's like I get very excited when I listen to a CD and I never want to skip a track. Sometimes I'll have something on in the car, and it'll be like... hmmmm... that's a nice song, but I'm not in the mood for it right now... so then I skip it. To me, one mark of good production is that you never want to skip a track... because if you do, it leaves a "hole" in the portrait... Anyway... I'm just babbling... hope maybe some of this is interesting or at least slightly less than confusing babble. :) Libby ===== - ----------- libbywiebel@yahoo.com http://www.libbywiebel.com "I took myself to The Wait-a-While Estates, down on Transition Boulevard, you'll make no mistake." Album available in May, but pre-order your copy of "The Wait-a-While Estates" today! (http://www.libbywiebel.com) Yahoo! Web Hosting - establish your business online http://webhosting.yahoo.com ------------------------------ End of lucy-list-digest V5 #61 ****************************** This has been a posting from the Lucy Kaplansky mail list digest To unsubscribe send mail to Majordomo@smoe.org with "unsubscribe lucy-list-digest" in the body of the message