The Smiley Smile Message Board

Perhaps this is better suited for one of the threads with Stephen Desper or Mark Linnett...but on tracks like "Heroes and Villains" (the "In the Cantina" version, in particular) and "Break Away" the lead's are extremely distorted and shrill, with virtually no bottom end at all.  It almost makes some "finished" versions of these songs sound like demos.  It's easiest to hear what I'm talking about in the stereo a capella mixes of "Break Away" -- the backgrounds are very lush and full, but the lead sounds completely different, thin and overdriven.  Obviously, it helps the voice "pop" in the mix -- separating it from the rest of the vocals.  But it's also very difficult to listen to in some ways.

I don't feel like Brian always recorded vocals this way -- why were these? 

Has anyone else noticed this, btw?  With H&V, I'd always thought it was just a "we mixed this quickly for the box" thing (sorry, Mark -- no offense intended), only to find out it was actually tracked that way.

i thought H&V on the box was sourced from an acetate of some kind, although am probably wrong... as for the other vocals, it might be something to do with the fact they were using a live pa system (and not a very high quality one) for the home studio, i think i read that on here. Of course, some people think that Brian underproduced stuff in the late 60's. Which i personally think is bogus, but i suppose vocals could come under that. Brian stopped double-tracking leads around this time, maybe it's that?

I wouldn't say there's any distortion on the lead vocals at all. They are a bit thinner sounding than the earlier pre-Pet Sounds stuff, but I think it's a combination of the basic mixing desk, less reverb, less double tracking, probably different mics, changes in BW's voice and maybe a purposeful decision to change the sound.

Probably the greatest difference would be the obvious switch to the home studio exactly in that time period. Before that, they were using professional studios with hired engineers.

Why did they switch to the home studio? Was that voluntarily, or out of necessity?

Wasnt it an attempt to get Brian involved with recording again?

Brian and the boys still worked in outside studios during the era. Brian hadn't missed a Beach Boys session yet when it was installed. He had cancelled a few but that wasn't a problem until later. He was there more then not through 1971. He really was only gone from 1967-69 for about half of 20/20. All their voices got a little deeper because they weren't teenagers anymore. I like the sound of their late sixties stuff especally vocally, but it was different. I wouldn't say distorted.

The H&V Cantina mix comes from a protection master (or safety copy - pick ur term :)). The mix was done on January 27th, 1967 (my eight birthday - no kidding!). The protection master was made on Feb 10th. The master went missing so this protection master is all we have. If Mark reads this, can you tell us of the problems at the begining of the tape are from actual physical tape issues or just a bad copy job. I can't believe a recording engineer would make such a bad sounding copy.

When did they switch from Scotch to Ampex tape?  (Even if it's not related)

Yeah, there I just have to disagree with you.  They're distorted -- particularly when Brian or Al do their *loud* singing.  Plus, compare H&V to 1965-vintage BB's and...well, there's just no comparison.  And I thought it was an acetate, too -- but the a cappella versions of Break Away I've heard have kind of convinced me otherwise.  I think it was an engineering technique...and kind of a strange one, honestly.

The Home Studio used pro gear, rented, but quality, and they still hired top engineers.  I also am not quite sure what you mean by distortion.  There are some mixes, certainly, like the Cantina mix, that certainly are not the cleanest masters.  But I can't detect any distortion on leads at all.  Break Away is squeaky clean to my ears.  Of course, you're talking about a bootleg, which may not be pristine.  I hear more compression on some of the vocals in the period you're talking about, based on changing recording practices.

There were also more effects being used on vocals as time goes on, although more in Sunflower and Surf's Up than late 60s. Perhaps you're calling what you hear on those as distortion? (They're more often things like filters,though.) Background vocals on This Whole World, for example.

Funnily I was about to mention This Whole World...it does have a certain shrillnesss akin to what is being described.

It sounds more like high end presence and heavy limiting than distortion...and on certain speaker systems that's a distinction without a difference.  I haven't listened to these tracks myself but I know that was one issue that led me to remix half of my upcoming album.  It's easy to get carried away with making the lead vocals too bright....sounds great on some speaker systems, kills your ear on others.

That bootleg Break Away Acapella mix you're talking about is about a half-step too fast.  That probably explains a lot of what you're hearing.

...except for the fact that I thought as much when I first heard it on the GV box.

My ears aren't playing tricks here -- around that time, he was tracking and EQ-ing lead vocals differently...for whatever reason.  And frankly, it's a crummy sound.

i think the 67-71 stuff sounds better than their stuff that came before.  i also do not hear any distortion specifically on lead vocals more than anything else ... maybe it just jumps out more on the leads.  i would agree you may be talking about a certain kind of mid-rangey, tube-y sound from this era, but i personally think it sounds good.  are you listening on vinyl or CD?  the CDs may potentially have additional compression/limiting and some of them will have a certain kind of noise reduction that may affect the sound as well.  if you are listening to bootleg mp3s, etc, then there is no telling.  I will say that the group during this period set a standard for sound quality and you are possibly just expressing a distaste for some of the creative decisions that they made.  Even so-called "murky" records like WILD HONEY have a brilliant sound in terms of production.

Thank you, I thought I was crazy this whole time. Everyone talks about how beautiful and lush the vocals are on Sunflower, and they are in a sense, but they always sounded overly processed to me, a little metallic.  The Beach Boys did not need that, at least back then, it took away from the warmth of the vocals. I think the best sounding BB vocals were on Smiley Smile, and those are very dry (the "Vegetables" vocal tag, the ending of "Wind Chimes", before the 'whispering winds' part).

I prefer it. So there.

I just listened to about five different versions of "Break Away" -- a cappella versions, the alternate with Brian singing, etc.  And the lead vocal on every one has virtually no high end and no bottom.  In the a cappella mixes, you really notice it b/c the rest of the voices (mixed in stereo in the versions I heard) cover the frequency spectrum and are very full.   

I should add, btw, that while the vocal arrangement, brass arrangement and melody of "Break Away" are amazing, the final mix is does that song no favors.  The instrumental mix of the track I've heard sounds leagues better and fuller -- but for some reason when it was all mixed together, the snare was almost completely dry and thin (like on the opening hits), giving it a kind of demo-y quality.  I'm not sure whether Brian just kind of left it to someone else or became disinterested or what, but the song and arrangements are brilliant and deserve a MUCH better mix than what we got.

Actually around that time they - they probaby being Desper and whoever from the group was helping to mix a given song - started mixing some vocals out of phase.  The lead vocal on "Break Away" is a great example, and it does sound tinny and processed compared to the backing vocals.  Bruce became the worst offender of doing this; both of his tracks on SUNFLOWER use it as well as "Disney Girls."  But other group members did it too (IIRC "Long Promised Road," for one).  By contrast "Lookin' At Tomorrow" has phasing applied to the vocal, which is a related though very different animal than simply mixing vocals out of phase.  In fact, they seemed to stop mixing stuff out of phase to any significant extent after Desper stopped working with the group.

When Bruce came back in 1978/79 there was a temporary resurgence of it (some of "Good Timin'"s vocals and some of the KTSA stuff).  And it still sounded shitty, tinny, and processed. :)

i like the desper-ized vocals and i also like what you referred to as a demo-y quality.  some of us call that "home-spun" or incidental recording.

Pardon my ignorance, but how does out of phase-mixing work and what characterizes it?

I also quite like that aspect of late 60's beach boys - I get a nice picture of them crackin' on making these highly realised pop tunes chilling at brian's house with a beer/$5000 worth of hash, pausing for the occasional steak dinner. Maybe not quite the truth, but it's a nice thought.


Beats me. can someone explain it?

Beats me. can someone explain it?
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I won't go into the real technical aspects, because it requires knowledge of wave mechanics, but essentially what you're doing is splitting whatever track you want to mix out of phase into two separate but equal mono signals.  One is run through with no processing, but the other the phase/polairity is altered electronically by anything up to 90 degrees.  The two signals are thn recombined to one signal which is now out of phase relative to how it started out.  The signal is then mixed with the other tracks normally.

The best way to describe the sound is to say that rather than giving that voice (or whatever was on the track) a discrete location in the mix it's now has a bit of an indistinct, slightly spread out location in the mix and sounds processed.  Listen to Mike Love's lead on "Don't Go Near The Water" through headphones for a good example.

Thanks, Jeff, I'll do that!

what was done to the vox on "Transcendental Meditation"?
The sound is so harsh to my ears, causing the opposite of the desired effect of meditating.