Manson/Dennis Story

[Stephen W. Desper]

Stephen-
What songs ended up sounding the best?

COMMENT:  I have no recollecting of the music. Only dealing with him. ~swd

Selective memories; yes , we all have those sometimes.
Perhaps you could do some hypnosis to recall more?

COMMENT:
No it's not selecive anything!  The man left more of an impression on me than his music.  I had to listen to him over and over. I heard his songs once or twice.

I don't want to recall more. If I was going to use hypnosis it would be to forget the entire incident.

~swd 

[zaval80]

I've read a Talking Heads book this week, and there's a story how Andy Kaufman (must be the man behind the LIE album) heard a commotion in the deep of the night in his yard. He had powerful lights there and switched them on. The yard was full of Mansonites dressed in black doing their "creepy-crawl" with knives between the teeth. Some other guy from the household blasteda warning shot  from a shotgun, and they scattered with the cries, "Charlie told us to get the music back!" - they came for the tapes.

[CosmicDancer]

I've read a Talking Heads book this week, and there's a story how Andy Kaufman (must be the man behind the LIE album) heard a commotion in the deep of the night in his yard. He had powerful lights there and switched them on. The yard was full of Mansonites dressed in black doing their "creepy-crawl" with knives between the teeth. Some other guy from the household blasteda warning shot  from a shotgun, and they scattered with the cries, "Charlie told us to get the music back!" - they came for the tapes.

That'd be Phil Kaufman. 

[Sam_BFC]

COMMENT: From my perspective, here was a single artist playing a single instrument, and I had eight tracks to capture whatever I wanted. So of course, record the guitar in stereo and the vocal with two mics. That's four tracks.   ~swd

That is interesting that you recorded the vocal with two mics.  Was this something that was often done for sessions with The Beach Boys as well?  I had never really considered that one might record a single vocal with more than one mic...for instance how is it ensured that both mics are sufficiently on axis with the singer?  And would there also be concerns of phasing issues when combining the two signals together?  I'd love to hear more about this Stephen.

[Stephen W. Desper]

COMMENT: From my perspective, here was a single artist playing a single instrument, and I had eight tracks to capture whatever I wanted. So of course, record the guitar in stereo and the vocal with two mics. That's four tracks.   ~swd

That is interesting that you recorded the vocal with two mics.  Was this something that was often done for sessions with The Beach Boys as well?  I had never really considered that one might record a single vocal with more than one mic...for instance how is it ensured that both mics are sufficiently on axis with the singer?  And would there also be concerns of phasing issues when combining the two signals together?  I'd love to hear more about this Stephen.

COMMENT: I've produced numerous demo sessions, of which this friend of Dennis' was one of many. I was given to believe that this session was mealy exploratory, to see if the man was artistic enough to sign, to see how good his songs were, to get an idea of his strengths and weakness’ with respect to the recording process. I could have easily put up two mics, vocal and guitar, done a quick session and gone home early. But that's not my nature and not what Dennis ask for. He wanted a good sounding demo that he could use to “sell” his friend to the BRI label. That is, he would need the OK of the other guys to plow money into any pending artist their label might consider signing. So a good demo was requested. After I started working with Charlie I can see why Dennis wanted me to produce the demo and not he himself.

In planning out the tracking, I did not know if this artist would be adding a bass line to his guitar, or even if he could play a decent bass. He said he could play any instrument, which means nothing. Maybe he would want to add some harmony line or double his vocal. So my thinking was to record the guitar in relative close stereo, then if in the future I needed to loose one of the stereo tracks of the primary guitar, I could. So I set up two condenser cardioid's about two-feet apart and two-feet or so from the sound hole. Not a great spread, but enough to give spatial separation between a mono-centered vocal and the stereo instrument. Since I did not know from the onset how far this demo might go, I did not know what type of vocal sound the voice might require as various sounds were added to the demo. As it turned out, Charlie was this guy who had no experience recording. He was just a good guitar player with a somewhat commercial voice. This was a guy who had sat around and played songs on his guitar as he sang and entertained girls with his talents. His songs were good and the lyrics were provocative. Dennis recognized this and sought to give it a go, but it all starts with a demo.

As I said in other posts, Charlie arrived with several girls in tow and he brought his own guitar. I confined the girls to the studio. I did not want them, their smoking and talking in the small control room of Brian's studio. As it turned out, Charles told the girls to keep quiet, no talking or whispering, and they did do just that. I think they were all stoned anyway as they just sat there on the floor of the studio leaning against the rear wall in a daze. I ask them not to smoke except on breaks that would be taken outside. Charlie smoked in the control room, but on the couple of breaks he and his girls went out into the back parking area, behind the house, to smoke. I don't know what they smoked out back, as I played with my Dalmatian in another part of the yard during these breaks. However, I only saw Charlie smoke tobacco in the studio -- no weed.  I don't know what this has to do with your question -- I'm just rambling . . .

Everything was setup when he and his girls arrived. Two Neumann KM-84 cardioid condenser microphones  (See in use at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugoS5gfOaCw where the KM184 is heard but same acoustics as KM84 without the bump at 9k. Picture about two feet apart) were ready to be positioned in front of his guitar, mounted on two small booms. These were inputted into two low-noise outboard vacuum tube mic-pres to get the phantom power needed by these microphones and the best sound. As usual, these were plugged directly into the 3M multi-track and not through the console for a cleaner sound. No need for EQ or limiting since the mics were a distance from the instrument and sound just fine without any tonal manipulation. Limiting is only necessary for close miking of percussive instruments. I put baffles (live reflectors) four feet behind the guitar for a little acoustic clue.

Charlie showed up with his rather beat up guitar. Rather than putts around trying to get a reasonably passable sound from this Sears quality six-string I went back into the storage room and brought back a Martin D-28 from the fifties (see demo of a Martin D-28 >>> http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FLD-tLW9w0M&feature=related).  I knew I could improve on his guitar’s sound and thought he might play better with the D-28 in his hands. He knew what I’d handed him and quickly took it.

It is not unusual to use two or three vocal microphones for first-time recording of a vocalist to determine what mic or combination of mics sounds best. As long as the mics are clustered close together – or even touching – and their diaphragms are on the same physical plane, there will be no phasing problems. This is because the wavelength of the human voice is much longer than any spacing between the microphones diaphragms. Both mics were positioned several inches behind the blast filter. The Neumann U67 tube condenser was set on figure-eight pattern and hung down from a large boom. This vocal mic’s figure-eight pattern allowed for more separation between the vocal and guitar because the guitar was propagating more into the dead lobs of the figure-eight while the singer was directly in front of the pattern. Under it was a Shure SM-58 dynamic mounted on a smaller boom. This mic has a cardioid pattern and also served to give better isolation from the guitar. Each microphone was sent to a separate track and each had its own limiter . . .  only used to prevent extreme peaks from overloading the tape, otherwise I prefer to manually ride gain. It sounds more natural to me. The Neumann gives a very clean and clear vocal sound that blends well into most mixes. The Shure gives a more commercial sound that cuts through excessive mid-range frequency buildup that comes from using many instruments in the vocal range. A combination of the two usually will solve any vocal problems. In Charlie’s case, I did not know what he was going to do or what he was going to add, so I did not blend the two mics but kept them on separate tracks that could be combined later onto a single track, if needed. As it turned out Charlie was not comfortable doubling his voice. He had never done it before and this was no time to learn. We never got around to adding much of anything other than the basic guitar and vocal.

So Charles was given every chance to make a good demo. He was in a proper studio, surrounded with the very best of microphones and recording equipment, run by a good engineer, and provided a first-rate instrument for as long as he wanted to take. His demo went OK and was waiting for the demo-tape-audition-listening-time to be arranged, as everyone’s schedule permitted.

As I wrote before, he just could not seem to wait, got impatient, then got angry. His own ignorance of the way the music business works was his own undoing leading on to the very tragic serious of events that followed. Had he just gone with the system, he might have sold some songs or had a go at a recording career.  Instead the bloody wake of terror he left has lead him to live out his life behind bars.

You can read and hear more about multiple vocal microphone recording at >>>
http://www.google.com/#hl=en&sclient=psy-ab&q=vocal+recording+using+two+mics&oq=vocal+recording+using+two+mics&aq=f&aqi=g-q1&aql=&gs_l=hp.12..0i22.3672.16807.0.20240.40.32.2.5.5.1.569.8504.2-9j12j3j1.25.0...0.0.5l1_VHtucxs&pbx=1&bav=on.2,or.r_gc.r_pw.r_qf.,cf.osb&fp=433f55e2a4872c5d&biw=1152&bih=574

~swd

[Sam_BFC]

Thank you so much for taking the time to write such a detailed reply Stephen...as many have said, I would really love to be able to get my hands on an updated copy of your book.

[18thofMay]

http://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/breaking-news/judge-stops-lapd-warrant-for-manson-tapes/story-e6freuz9-1226499178036

Manson tapes.. Had me slightly excited for a milli second..wrong tapes

[andy]

Stephen, can you explain what you mean by animal magnetism?

[halblaineisgood]

I'd love to see what he or Tosches could do with a Beach Boys book. f*ck! They'd scratch the  hell out of the surface and gouge big holes in it. Has Tosches said much about them? For some reason I'm getting the feeling he wouldn't care for them too much and express it etched in acid.

Possible titles for the Tosches book:

- Tainted Wilson Blood Ruined An Apple Juice Fast

- Tainted Wilson Blood   

 - Tainted Blood

anyone else?

[MBE]

I didn't like Tosches' book on Jerry Lee. It was all myth no man.

[Myk Luhv]

I thought his book on Emmett Miller and minstrelry more generally was excellent. I was a bit disappointed with his pre-Elvis rock'n'roll book, however, though but perhaps this was due to the paucity of information available for some of the figures; longer interviews would've been nice all the same. Like Joe Turner, he could also refer to Brian as a "big fat fuck"!

[runnersdialzero]

Stephen, can you explain what you mean by animal magnetism?

Animals flocked to him because he smelled so terrible.

[Juice Brohnston]

Does anyone know definitively, Dennis' relationship with Charlene Cafritz? Apparently they dated? Apparently he introduced her to Manson? Apparently she blew some of her inheritance on the Family? Apparently she made some home movies of the Family? Apparently she and the movies kinda disappeared?

Also did Grillo have any interaction with Manson?

[chaki]

Wow the SWD posts are so amazing. Mind blowing.

Interesting to note that during the recently revealed Brian interview with Stern from 88, Brian admits to knowing Beausoleie and that he was bummed his hairdresser Jay Sebring died in the Manson Murders.