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Cocaine Decisions

Started by Depressed Beyond Tables, May 04, 2018, 03:40:11 PM

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Depressed Beyond Tables

Exhibit A:

https://youtu.be/OBwS66EBUcY?t=158

While the introduction of drum fills adds to the tension, the decision to go full balls-out in verse 3 with a constant tom roll has to be down to a shedload of lines on the mixing desk. Even the next day, with a sober head, anyone would realise 'shit, we went a bit mental there. Better cut down on the powder'.

Of course there are examples where drugs have contributed to some great decisions in music, but what about the howlers.

PaulTMA


Head Gardener


Brundle-Fly

A summer Friday night on the terrace at Soho House . 1am

Justine: Let's cover this!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vZWya1F8gRY&frags=pl%2Cwn

buzby

Quote from: Depressed Beyond Tables on May 04, 2018, 03:40:11 PM
Exhibit A:

https://youtu.be/OBwS66EBUcY?t=158

While the introduction of drum fills adds to the tension, the decision to go full balls-out in verse 3 with a constant tom roll has to be down to a shedload of lines on the mixing desk. Even the next day, with a sober head, anyone would realise 'shit, we went a bit mental there. Better cut down on the powder'.

Of course there are examples where drugs have contributed to some great decisions in music, but what about the howlers.
That's just Jim Steinman's 'kitchen sink and the rest of the plumbers merchants for good measure' bombastic style, whether drugs were involved or not. Being able to use drum machines instead of live drummers allowed him to pursue his excesses to the maximum.

marquis_de_sad

"Let's make 'All Around the World' nine minutes long"

"Let's put it on the album twice"

"More guitars!"

momatt

Whoever mixed/mastered New Order's Blue Monday, must have been coked out of their mind to think it was a good idea to have no bass frequencies in the track (pretty much).

I'd love to hear it done properly.

marquis_de_sad

Quote from: momatt on August 03, 2018, 03:41:50 PM
Whoever mixed/mastered New Order's Blue Monday, must have been coked out of their mind to think it was a good idea to have no bass frequencies in the track (pretty much).

I'd love to hear it done properly.

I thought it might be Martin Hannett, but apparently they did it themselves.

Brundle-Fly

Quote from: marquis_de_sad on August 03, 2018, 02:55:03 PM
"Let's make 'All Around the World' nine minutes long"

"Let's put it on the album twice"

"More guitars!"

I was going to suggest that. The promo is excruciating. They must have been having methadone enemas as well as the coke.

alan nagsworth


buzby

Quote from: momatt on August 03, 2018, 03:41:50 PM
Whoever mixed/mastered New Order's Blue Monday, must have been coked out of their mind to think it was a good idea to have no bass frequencies in the track (pretty much).

I'd love to hear it done properly.
What version are yoo listening to? I've just slung my Polygram 90s issue of Substance in my PC and through my crappy old 90s Walkman in-ears it sounds fine - the DMX kick drum has a satisfying thud and the Moog Source octave bass part sits just below Hook's Shergold Marathon 6-string bass. As far as levels and frequencies go it's pretty similar to most other disco and electro records from around at that time.

It's not got any heavy, subsonic bass on it but there wasn't much of that around in club music in 1983. Even the 1995 Hardfloor remix/remake doesn't add that much more to the lower frequencies apart from an 808-style kick instead of the DMX one.

Blue Monday 88 on the other hand should be erased from existence. It was a slapdash remake (the original masters were missing for a long time) to keep Quincy Jones happy and to pay off a massive tax bill and has dated horribly. The only good thing to come out of it was the promo video.

Quote from: marquis_de_sad on August 03, 2018, 03:46:15 PM
I thought it might be Martin Hannett, but apparently they did it themselves.
Everything's Gone Green was the last track Hannett produced, having walked out of the mix session after an argument with Sumner and Hook over the drum levels. Blue Monday was recorded at Britannia Row during the sessions for Power Corruption & Lies in late 1982. It was mostly fuelled by dope & LSD rather than coke (they developed a taste for coke and MDMA later during their summer 1983 US tour).

purlieu

Quote from: marquis_de_sad on August 03, 2018, 02:55:03 PM
"Let's make 'All Around the World' nine minutes long"

"Let's put it on the album twice"

"More guitars!"
Be Here Now is pretty much the go-to cocaine excess album, but y'know I actually find it really works for 'All Around the World'. The rest of the album takes three minute songs and makes them six minutes long, but for 'All Around the World' they went the whole hog and just added more sections and key changes to the outro than anybody would ever need, to the extent that I find it actually becomes absurdly entertaining. The fact that there's only one song between it and its three minute reprise is just even better, the way the reprise fades back in in a kind of "hey, it's back!" kind of way, just brilliant. Best part of the album.

Twed

Quote from: buzby on August 03, 2018, 08:44:47 PM
What version are yoo listening to? I've just slung my Polygram 90s issue of Substance in my PC and through my crappy old 90s Walkman in-ears it sounds fine - the DMX kick drum has a satisfying thud and the Moog Source octave bass part sits just below Hook's Shergold Marathon 6-string bass.
That's the issue then. momatt was listening on their White Slimline Telephone With Last Number Redial.

Z

Station to Station is always the first one that pops into my mind. The title song in particular has a pretty ridiculous level of swagger to it all.


Just looking at the lyrics it looks a bit unnatural. https://genius.com/4676051

chveik

Cocaine, cocaine,
'Round my heart and runnin' 'round my brain,
Cocaine, aw, you ol' cocaine.
I woke up this mornin', Lord, I had a hunger pain.
And all I want for breakfast is my good cocaine

DrGreggles

I love Dodgy, but Free Peace Sweet surely belongs in this thread.

And the Worst Album Titles one.

a duncandisorderly

mate of mine has this idea that we kicked around for a bit, for a movie where a bloke's made a flick & wants vangelis to do the music, but vangelis' (real-life) itinerant lifestyle is making it had to track him down. we were going to call it "get the greek to me".

anyway, here he is with his old band-mate during a session for the 'blade runner' s/t, & some stuff in a bag they forgot to hide when the camera came out:


buzby

Quote from: Twed on August 03, 2018, 08:55:09 PM
That's the issue then. momatt was listening on their White Slimline Telephone With Last Number Redial.
It was meant to illustrate iI was using the vanilla CD (not an MP3  orthe Rhino remaster, which has loudness war issues) with flat EQ and bog standard earbuds..

a duncandisorderly

Quote from: buzby on August 03, 2018, 10:08:03 PM
It was meant to illustrate iI was using the vanilla CD (not an MP3  orthe Rhino remaster, which has loudness war issues) with flat EQ and bog standard earbuds..

roger lyons, on dealing with the 'blue monday' multitracks in preparation for live renditions:

"I strengthened some aspects of 'Blue Monday' a little bit. The Oberheim DMX drum machine is 12-bit so the sounds weren't very chunky. Don't get me wrong, 'Blue Monday' has a powerful bass drum sound but it's centred around 100Hz. If you listen to any Kraftwerk album from the '70s, it's exactly the same — no bass. Trends change, so, to get a little more oomph right at the bottom end of the kick drum, I used Waves Max Bass. Most of the editing I did on 'Blue Monday' was adding more bass to the gated bass line and the kick drum."

buzby

#19
Quote from: a duncandisorderly on August 03, 2018, 10:23:20 PM
roger lyons, on dealing with the 'blue monday' multitracks in preparation for live renditions:
That's exactly what you see on the spectrum analyser output - the kick peaks about 100hz (though it's still present below that) and the Moog bassline sits just above it. Like I said (and as Roger also points out) the trend for having earth-shaking bass on club tracks came along towards the end of the decade. Most decent clubs at the time it was recorded (like the Funhouse and Paradise Garage in NYC) had their systems set up for clarity and faithful reproduction rather than as much bass as they could muster.

Factory tried to replicate that in the Hacienda, spending tens of thousands on a studio quality PA system, only to find the sound shattered into a trebley-y hash once it was installed as the acoustics of the building (bare brick and girders and high ceilings) were terrible. They tried a few times over the years to improve things (Hook even had a go at rebuilding it at one point) but it never made much difference.

Tombola

Another shout out to 'Be Here Now'. Could have done with 2 minutes off each track, and 200 guitar tracks off each track.

And another obvious appreciation of coke gone right - 'Station to Station'. Tried to find the naff kids's show version of 'Golden Years' but couldn't.

Howj Begg

Quote from: a duncandisorderly on August 03, 2018, 09:27:57 PM
mate of mine has this idea that we kicked around for a bit, for a movie where a bloke's made a flick & wants vangelis to do the music, but vangelis' (real-life) itinerant lifestyle is making it had to track him down. we were going to call it "get the greek to me".

anyway, here he is with his old band-mate during a session for the 'blade runner' s/t, & some stuff in a bag they forgot to hide when the camera came out:



Ha! Fantastic pic of Demis and Vangelis. And it strikes me that 'blade runner' is a pertinent title for this thread topic


My answer to this question is: all of Lindsey Buckingham's songs on Tusk. Witness this up-all-night compressed to hell production:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DuQFnVKrHuY&index=2&list=PL1nYNK2p2we2gdb8Y-_YbhaMABoCmrrqm

McChesney Duntz

Not that you can necessarily tell from the end product, but I was a little surprised to hear from Sir Macca that blow was the sense-deranger of choice through much of the Sgt. Pepper sessions.

a duncandisorderly

Quote from: McChesney Duntz on August 04, 2018, 01:48:49 AM
Not that you can necessarily tell from the end product, but I was a little surprised to hear from Sir Macca that blow was the sense-deranger of choice through much of the Sgt. Pepper sessions.

I think, a bit like the BBC & broadcast technology, they sort of had to try a bit of everything just so that we didn't have to. I was under the impression that lennon was on the smack by this time & that only mccartney was actually bothered about the ongoing business of making albums; not surprised if he needed something the exact opposite of what his erstwhile writing partner was doing... DITL in its two distinct parts is probably the clearest illustration of this. I can't imagine either GH or RS doing lines, though. that would be surprising, unless they were just keeping him company.


greenman

#25
Quote from: Z on August 03, 2018, 08:58:27 PM
Station to Station is always the first one that pops into my mind. The title song in particular has a pretty ridiculous level of swagger to it all.

Just looking at the lyrics it looks a bit unnatural. https://genius.com/4676051

..that and Low perhaps the best advert for coke though? maybe Marquee Moon or Achilles Last Stand?

Generally though I'd say Page stayed fairly level headed in the studio whatever he was on.

McChesney Duntz

Quote from: a duncandisorderly on August 04, 2018, 03:23:24 AM
I think, a bit like the BBC & broadcast technology, they sort of had to try a bit of everything just so that we didn't have to. I was under the impression that lennon was on the smack by this time & that only mccartney was actually bothered about the ongoing business of making albums; not surprised if he needed something the exact opposite of what his erstwhile writing partner was doing... DITL in its two distinct parts is probably the clearest illustration of this. I can't imagine either GH or RS doing lines, though. that would be surprising, unless they were just keeping him company.

I think Lennon was half-catatonic on acid then (I don't think the smack came along until after Yoko did), but I suspect the dynamic was pretty close to what you posit. And no, I can't imagine George all manic and babbley on blow, and Ringo, well [NOSE JOKE REDACTED BY ORDER OF THE MINISTRY OF HACKNEYED HUMOUR]

a duncandisorderly

Quote from: McChesney Duntz on August 04, 2018, 05:13:14 AM
and Ringo, well [NOSE JOKE REDACTED BY ORDER OF THE MINISTRY OF HACKNEYED HUMOUR]

would've thrown him off his chess, anyway.

monolith

Quote from: purlieu on August 03, 2018, 08:50:02 PM
Be Here Now is pretty much the go-to cocaine excess album, but y'know I actually find it really works for 'All Around the World'. The rest of the album takes three minute songs and makes them six minutes long, but for 'All Around the World' they went the whole hog and just added more sections and key changes to the outro than anybody would ever need, to the extent that I find it actually becomes absurdly entertaining. The fact that there's only one song between it and its three minute reprise is just even better, the way the reprise fades back in in a kind of "hey, it's back!" kind of way, just brilliant. Best part of the album.
I'm one of the few people who love Be Here Now almost entirely for the reasons that most people hate it. I get lost in the bombastic pomposity of it all and tracks like the opener (all 7 and a half ludicrous minutes of it, helicopters and all) are immediately what comes to mind if I was asked to define Oasis' sound.

Totally understand why it puts people off but if I ever hear D'You Know What I Mean I can't help but break out in to a Manc swagger whilst smiling at the absurdity of it all.

purlieu

Helicopters are fine (nay, great), but the outro of DYKWIM really bores me. It's not really enough, just a minute of dull backwards guitars. On the opposite end, 'Magic Pie' is a shite song made worthwhile by its ridiculous outro. I wonder who it was who came up with a load of wibbly noises and some jazz organ for that.