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Posted by BananaHead on March 30, 2000 at 18:57:42:

In Reply to: Am I in the minority here??? (ALBUMS) posted by 7wielder on March 30, 2000 at 10:31:51:

Oh ya, you just said a mouthful. A band usually starts out indie and makes a few raw albums that get them noticed. As they grow eventually a major label wants to make some money on them and expand their market so that more people than just their core audience can like them. So that’s where you get a record like Metallica “Black” by Bob Rock. It is always a turning point for the band and a huge budget is usually established. AKA Soundgarden "SuperUnknown", REM "Out of Time", U2 "Joshua Tree".

Actually I’ve never been much into Metallica but I know what you’re talking about. “Black” sounds amazing… sonically… but it’s also filled with drum samples and bullshit. Nirvana “Nevermind” is a classic example of this also. The mix is filled with drum samples, tons of fake reverb, eq, compression and a multitude of quite sickening production techniques that come on like a twinkie and then leave you sick later. It’s as if they used Phil Collins’ recording setup to record a punk band (basically they did). That said it friggin rocks and I love it. But it’s simultaneously glossed over shit. Now “Bleach” was just a lo-fi lo-budget production. Yes it was raw but it wasn’t even recorded that well. Now “InUtero” wasn’t lo-budget, it was just purposely made to sound that raw way it sounds… no fake vocal reverb, no glossy guitars, drums that go thud… the essence of a punk record. Nirvana was pissed about “Nevermind” (I would have been also) but I think they really got a gem out of Steve Albini’s “InUtereo”. Personally I like the U2 “War” vs U2 “Joshua Tree” comparison. Both are excellent albums. But the first is a very real, raw, "true" sounding image of the band by Steve Lillywhite… and the second is a VERY huge production by about 100 friggin producers who spent a friggin month on one song.

And that gets us into naturalist vs pop productions. I think the best way to record a new band is to capture their true sound, even if it’s not all that flattering, as a way to put down a root. Like “here we are, here is what we really sound like”. Simple naturalism without getting too fancy pants. That gives a good solid foundation for the band to do more “pop production” type works later on. And if they catch on eventually they WILL do some of these glossy pop works. That part is always about marketing and trying to sell the band to a wider audience. As always, the labels rarely think about long term and only about short time profits. So like you said, a cheesy record gets made that can often hurt the band in the long-term. That was obviously the label’s goal with Nevermind but something went wacko and that cheesy pop album actually immortalized them. Freak fucking luck. But the real fans of a band (as well as the band themselves) are always fairly disgusted by that sort of direction. That's life. Personally it rather makes me puke, but oh well. I try to make very true recordings that truly represent the band… and are aimed at a small market that “gets it”.

At least there has never been a "bubblegum-pop" Tom Waits album that got played on MTV every day. We can ALL be thankful for that!

-BananaHead

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