The United/Western/Ocean way/Cello/East West maze...

[Andrew G. Doe]

Reading the latest and excellent ESQ, I paused to smile, somewhat wryly, at Alan's observation that Ocean Way was Brian's "home". For his solo career, maybe, but Alan has joined many, equally well-qualified, folks in believing that Ocean Way and Western are one and the same. They're not: prior to his flying solo, there are only three documented instances of Brian using United, the studio that became - eventually - Ocean Way. Allow me to illustrate.

In 1957, moving to Hollywood from Chicago, legendary engineer Bill Putnam bought the United Recording Corp. facility at 6050 Sunset and four years later purchased Western Studio at 6000, just across the parking lot. Although often referred to as United Western, they were in fact two entirely separate facilities. United's larger rooms appealed to the likes of Sinatra, Crosby and the "older" crowd as they could accommodate a full orchestra, while the emerging rock scene favoured the more intimate rooms at Western (the legendary Western Three measured 34 feet by 14, as opposed to the 66 x 45 of United A - which was also 22 feet high). That's how it stayed until 1984, when Putnam sold the whole United Western complex, which was duly renamed Ocean Way. Now it gets a bit tricky.

In 1999, Ocean Way's owner, Allen Sides, sold off the old Western half: this was renamed Cello, while the former United remained, and remains, Ocean Way to this day. Cello closed in 2002 and remained so until 2006, when it was bought and reopened as EastWest in 2009. Thus, while the former Western was indeed Ocean Way for the fifteen years from 1984 to 1999, since then it's been sucessively Cello and EastWest. To my knowledge, Brian's never used either studio.

The only documented instances of Brian using what is now Ocean Way but back in the sixties was United are in May 1963, for the Bob & Vicki session for the "Summer Moon" track (the vocals were cut at Western), in October 1965 for the "Stella By Starlight"/"How Deep Is The Ocean"/"Three Blind Mice" orchestral experiments, the December 1968 session for The Honeys "Goodnight My Love"/"Tonight You Belong To Me".

[mikeddonn]

Thank you for that Andrew. 

Did they use EastWest to film the studio scenes in Love and Mercy?

Also, you'd think someone would notice it was a different studio Brian uses nowadays versus the hit-making years.  Unless the interior has changed dramatically.  Wouldn't happen with Abbey Road, Studio 2!

[c-man]

<<while the former United remained, and remains, Ocean Way to this day.>>

News flash: Ocean Way Hollywood was recently purchased by new owners, and is being renamed: United Recording.
http://www.unitedrecordingstudios.com/

Prior to the EasWest rechristening, the former Cello Studios was going to be renamed: Western Recording. Pity that didn't happen!

[c-man]

<<The only documented instances of Brian using what is now Ocean Way but back in the sixties was United are in May 1963, for the Bob & Vicki session for the "Summer Moon" track (the vocals were cut at Western), in October 1965 for the "Stella By Starlight"/"How Deep Is The Ocean"/"Three Blind Mice" orchestral experiments, the December 1968 session for The Honeys "Goodnight My Love"/"Tonight You Belong To Me".>>

We can add a couple of others to this list:

* - The orchestral tracks on the Christmas album (engineered by Bill Putnam himself, June 1964) - even though the AFM sheets say Capitol, other evidence proves it to be United (and some of the group's vocals, as well - on "We Three Kings", part of "Santa Claus Is Coming To Town", and maybe the others - for which they sang live with the orchestra).

* - A June 1967 attempt at "With Me Tonight"

Interestingly, all of the '60s sessions at United were held in Studio A, but Studio B became Brian's "home" starting in the 2000's. Studio A was locked out for use several years in a row by then red-hot engineer/producer Jack Joseph Puig; when it became available again to other clients, Brian (and The Beach Boys in 2012) began using it extensively, while also continuing to occasionally utilize Studios B and D.

Oh, and Brian apparently did use the "Western" side of Ocean Way a bit during the Imagination sessions, for a percussion overdub session, after which they would ship tracks from St. Charles out to Ocean Way just to have them run through the legendary echo chambers, with the echo returns printed to open tracks, which could then be incorporated in the mixdown. Joe Thomas is quoted in that year's EQ cover story: "Brian walked into the room where they recorded "California Girls" and he said, 'I remember we put Carl's Rickenbacker directly into the console. And he stood right here and played.' And then Brian got kinda misty. Tears kind of came to his eyes and he said, 'You know, this is a little bit heavy for me.'"

[Wirestone]

Thanks for bringing this up, Andrew. This has been a pet peeve of mine for a few years, ever since I figured it out with some Google maps and online research. The big question is whether Brian himself knows -- I have to assume he does, right?

[Andrew G. Doe]

<<The only documented instances of Brian using what is now Ocean Way but back in the sixties was United are in May 1963, for the Bob & Vicki session for the "Summer Moon" track (the vocals were cut at Western), in October 1965 for the "Stella By Starlight"/"How Deep Is The Ocean"/"Three Blind Mice" orchestral experiments, the December 1968 session for The Honeys "Goodnight My Love"/"Tonight You Belong To Me".>>

We can add a couple of others to this list...

No. Not we... you.  

Amended info gratefully appreciated, as ever. Would the 6/67 "WMT" session be the one on the 30th ?

[Custom Machine]

Thank you, Andrew, for this info.

And thanks to Craig for the addendum specifics, especially on We Three Kings, which I consider to be one of the BBs finest vocal group performances.

[Sam_BFC]

Great thread.

Studio 1 at 'Western' is also a rather large room is it not?  Not sure how it compares in size to the large 'United' rooms mind.

I think it was Studio 1 at 'Western' that they used for the aborted session scene in Love & Mercy (where is my DVD Amazon?)

[Alan Smith]

Thank you for that Andrew. 

Did they use EastWest to film the studio scenes in Love and Mercy?

Also, you'd think someone would notice it was a different studio Brian uses nowadays versus the hit-making years.  Unless the interior has changed dramatically.  Wouldn't happen with Abbey Road, Studio 2!

Yeah, big thanks, Andrew, for bringing up the topic - when I was reading Al's recollection in ESQ I was unsure about that bit & thought better double check that on Smiley!

Thanks, c-man for sharing your knowledge as well.

Mike, I recall these notes from the Mark L thread, which may help re your questions about L&M:
http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,201.msg526591.html#msg526591

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,201.msg524015.html#msg524015

[c-man]

<<The only documented instances of Brian using what is now Ocean Way but back in the sixties was United are in May 1963, for the Bob & Vicki session for the "Summer Moon" track (the vocals were cut at Western), in October 1965 for the "Stella By Starlight"/"How Deep Is The Ocean"/"Three Blind Mice" orchestral experiments, the December 1968 session for The Honeys "Goodnight My Love"/"Tonight You Belong To Me".>>

We can add a couple of others to this list...

No. Not we... you.  

Amended info gratefully appreciated, as ever. Would the 6/67 "WMT" session be the one on the 30th ?

No, actually, it was the 5th of June - two sessions that day, one at Western and one at United - both for attempts at "WMT". The June 30th "WMT" session was at Bellagio.

And, I almost forgot - Brian also used Cello for a GIOMH album session - I believe it was for Paul McCartney's acoustic guitar on "A Friend Like You" - or maybe his lead vocal. Some part on that album (possibly that song) was done at Sunset Sound, and one part at Cello. Meanwhile, the entire track "Desert Drive" was done at Ocean Way "United" Studio B - possibly the first time Brian ever cut in that room. My research data on that album is saved to an old floppy disk, which can't be accessed by my current computer config, so I'm going entirely on memory here. Need to go to FedEx and get that transferred to a flash drive one of these days!

Interesting that Brian has mostly shied away from his old Western haunt in his solo career - perhaps he associates that place too much with the BBs. But even in the mid-'90s, when he was recording with Don Was, as well as Joe Thomas for "Everything I Need", he used the old United side - despite the fact that Don Was apparently used both (and Was definitely utilized all rooms of the Western side for the Rolling Stones Bridges To Babylon sessions in '97).

[HeyJude]

Awesomely interesting stuff guys. I don't really get caught up on the semantics of what the BB's call these studios in modern times. They've fallen victim to all of the issues that accompany passage of time, age, conflation of stories, etc.

But all of the underlying info being unearthed here is what is interesting!

[guitarfool2002]

It was interesting when I posted it here a year ago.

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,18510.0.html

[Jim Murphy]

Great stuff! 

Thanks Andrew, Craig, and gf for sleuthing and shedding light on one of the more confusing aspects of Beach Boys history . . .

[guitarfool2002]

A year ago when I posted much of the same info Andrew posted in this thread, I got a "beating the dead horse" icon as a reply which closed that thread (click on the link, it's all there). Just recently I got a PM saying my posts were too long. The search function works well on this board, it's been said in the past.

Interesting how the same info goes from kicking a dead horse to interesting after a year's timeout. Either that or Bill Putnam's echo chambers at United/Western had a longer delay time than anyone realized, in this case a year.

[SMiLE Brian]

Yeah something is fishy here for sure.

[Wirestone]

It was interesting when I posted it here a year ago.

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,18510.0.html

IIRC, GF, I made that distinction earlier than anyone else on the board. But so what? Facts are facts, and it's nice to bring them to light, especially when someone who should know better (Alan) spreads misinformation.

[HeyJude]

As I mentioned earlier, I think this is awesome information, and I love when myths are debunked. I probably enjoy that *too* much sometimes.

If Al being wrong was the impetus for clarifying this issue (again), then that’s ultimately a good thing.

But I also don’t see Al (or Brian, or anyone) messing this up as particularly shocking, and relative to every other thing the BBs have gotten wrong over the years, this mistake is not near the top of the list, and is actually in some ways an understandable mix-up. I went back and read that old thread that GF linked (which, as far as I can tell, I didn’t read a year ago), and even though GF and I disagree sometimes (autotune, etc.), I actually think his post on that old thread made some really interesting points as far as why it would make sense for these guys to mix up the two studios. As others suggested, I “Google Mapped” the street view, and they’re arguably *literally* a stone’s throw away from each other. Also, as GF mentioned, it was all under the same management back then. Considering someone like Al especially didn’t do a ton of studio work in LA in the 80s and 90s for instance and wasn’t constantly at this complex after the 60s, I could easily see Al or Brian messing this up.

Do I find it plausible, as Wirestone asked in the old thread, that Brian literally thinks his current Ocean Way/United haunt is his hold Western haunt? Totally. I'm not saying he does think that, but it's plausible to me. The way these guys (or anyone’s) memory can slowly change over time, and things can be seemingly vividly recalled yet be totally re-molded over time (didn’t someone post that Al tells some old story that is actually an old David Marks story, where he presumably was told the story back then and re-remembers that he was there when he wasn’t?), I totally buy that the mistake about the studios was made decades ago, and the whole time some or all of these guys think they’ve been working in the same studio. Or, maybe they feel like Western and United were kind of the same studio "complex" back then, so Ocean Way/United is “Western” enough for them. Or maybe because they did do a bit of work here and there at United years ago, and maybe also wandered into other people’s sessions over the years, and certainly passed right by the building a million times back then, they still feel Ocean Way/United is one of the “old haunts.”

If Western and United had been across town from each other, or in different cities or states or countries, the mistake would be less understandable (though still not implausible).

[Wirestone]

Thing is, though, I'm pretty sure that Brian went back to the *actual* Pet Sounds studio for documentaries / photographs / etc. And they used it for Love & Mercy too, right? At some point he has to realize that the sites are different.

[HeyJude]

Thing is, though, I'm pretty sure that Brian went back to the *actual* Pet Sounds studio for documentaries / photographs / etc. And they used it for Love & Mercy too, right? At some point he has to realize that the sites are different.

Very true. I would have to guess that, if there had previously been some confusion, once they went back to the original Western location, especially for something like "Love & Mercy", that confusion would be cleared up.

I think the cases of saying "this is the same studio" can be explained (theoretically) by the idea that Brian saw the whole complex as one studio. However, if there are cases where they have been at Ocean Way/United and asserted they are in the very room that a bunch of classic BB sessions took place, then that would be much more difficult to explain/understand, especially once they've been back to that little room back at the old Western building.

[Wirestone]

And if we're fishing for firsties here, let me link to these posts --

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,12323.msg249598.html#msg249598

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,12323.msg249677.html#msg249677

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,12323.msg249679.html#msg249679

-- in which I established this back in February of 2012. So no need to get crabby about who went first, because IT WAS ME.

 

[mikeddonn]

Thank you for that Andrew. 

Did they use EastWest to film the studio scenes in Love and Mercy?

Also, you'd think someone would notice it was a different studio Brian uses nowadays versus the hit-making years.  Unless the interior has changed dramatically.  Wouldn't happen with Abbey Road, Studio 2!

Yeah, big thanks, Andrew, for bringing up the topic - when I was reading Al's recollection in ESQ I was unsure about that bit & thought better double check that on Smiley!

Thanks, c-man for sharing your knowledge as well.

Mike, I recall these notes from the Mark L thread, which may help re your questions about L&M:
http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,201.msg526591.html#msg526591

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,201.msg524015.html#msg524015

Cheers Alan!   

[guitarfool2002]

The details through the decades get a little more complex, but from the time Bill Putnam bought the neighboring Western (which was separated from United by an empty lot), it not only became one complex but it also became one company as well. If you were an employee on the staff, your paychecks were signed by the same person. There was no separation in a corporate sense, it was Western United or United Western along with Putnam's electronics company called UREI that became Universal Audio. Putnam outfitted his studios with his own UREI equipment, and in the mid 60's the only studio rooms that were not fully outfitted with Putnam's current designs were two United rooms that still had console designs Putnam had in his studio before he moved to LA and bought the United facility (backed in part by Frank Sinatra and Bing Crosby who remained some of Bill's highest-profile clients into the late 60's, also explaining why Sinatra's Rat Pack friends who were on hie Reprise label recorded there so often).

If you see any old track sheets or other literature, the United rooms are labeled with letters and the Western rooms are numbered, hence Brian's personal favorite of the time Western 3. But all of the staff worked together under the same corporate umbrella and name, there was no separation between United engineers and Western engineers, they'd work whichever room they were booked to work. All the United Western studios shared the same echo chambers, the engineers working a session at United room A would tap into the same echo chambers as Western 3. In the 60's they also got a closed-circuit TV monitor system to link certain studios together which helped bring in more film and film scoring clients.

So if someone was a Putnam employee, they'd be working at United Western and getting the paychecks from the same place no matter where physically they actually worked day-to-day.

When Allen Sides bought the facilities, he bought United Western's studios. He renamed it Ocean Way. So for a time, what Allen Sides owned and ran as Ocean Way was all of the rooms, both United and Western together. When he sold off the Western part of it, that's what got renamed Cello and that's what went bankrupt in the mid 2000's. Ocean Way remained the "United" rooms.

Further on that, there are interviews with Sides himself who perhaps cleared it up better than all. In the decades leading up to him owning Ocean Way, several of the individual rooms were renovated to change with the times. This included, according to Sides, an attempt to "deaden" the room itself...and again according to Sides, it was that kind of renovation which stripped the room of all the characteristics that made it a great live room in the first place. But there was a time where that "dead" studio sound was what clients wanted, and that's what studios had to offer to bring in business. The "dead" room is almost a polar opposite of how producers like Brian and Spector cut their records and made these studios legendary in the first place.

But - some of the rooms were left more intact and true to what they had been in the 60's, down to the acoustic tiling on the walls and other details that helped create the sound of those rooms that everyone began to want again in the business. Plug in those variables, and it might help explain why artists looking for those legendary room sounds and characteristics associated with Putnam's studios of the 60's might book the rooms that were closer to how they were back in the day versus ones which had been renovated through the years and whose sound had changed with the designs.

Bottom line, though, for decades after Putnam first grabbed Western and created the complex United Western, and up until Sides sold the Western rooms to the Cello people, the facility was thought of as one location more often than I think might be considered by those looking back on the history of it. The everyday business of this studio since the Beach Boys first booked time while rooms were still being built up in their earlier days was far less separate than i think has been reported, in terms of the people who worked there and who recorded there. It was United Western, then it was Ocean Way. All the rooms under one complex, sharing facilities and staff, separated by the distance of a lot in between the actual buildings, but part of the same complex.

[guitarfool2002]

And if we're fishing for firsties here, let me link to these posts --

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,12323.msg249598.html#msg249598

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,12323.msg249677.html#msg249677

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,12323.msg249679.html#msg249679

-- in which I established this back in February of 2012. So no need to get crabby about who went first, because IT WAS ME.

 

Did you get the beating the dead horse icon? Nope.

[guitarfool2002]

The issue comes down to people who worked and recorded there for decades, up into the Ocean Way era prior to the sale to Cello, knew it as the complex of studios on that street owned by Bill Putnam and later Allen Sides where all kinds of great records were made and where Putnam's designs and equipment were installed. The parsing and detailing of what was where and what it was called was not as much a consideration when they were fully operational versus when outsiders looked back on it through history. It was the same company, same complex, same people working there when you went to those facilities for a session.

[mikeddonn]

And if we're fishing for firsties here, let me link to these posts --

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,12323.msg249598.html#msg249598

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,12323.msg249677.html#msg249677

http://smileysmile.net/board/index.php/topic,12323.msg249679.html#msg249679

-- in which I established this back in February of 2012. So no need to get crabby about who went first, because IT WAS ME.

 

Did you get the beating the dead horse icon? Nope.

The point is GF, they may be in the same complex but the room Brian uses now is not where he cut the hits.  It's romantic storytelling to have this said whenever Brian is back in a studio.  It's misleading and not true, like a lot of stories in Beach Boys world.  Imagine McCartney was recording in studio 1 at Abbey Road and writers/group members said "He's back where he recorded with the Beatles" would that be ok?  It's in the same building after all.  

The point being made is that the rooms Brian used in the 60s and has used througout his solo career are not the same.  No agendas, no-one being critical of Brian.  Just people trying to get the historically accurate facts.

I can see this thread going downhill like so many of the others lately. Shame.