ALBUMS OR ARTISTS YOU WISH YOU CAN PRODUCE DIFFERENTLY

Was just listening to a 80s graham parker album the realmccaw and i thought that many guys were teamed up with producers and had some good songs that were slightly ruined by slick production . this lead me to wonder what albums would i have produced differently.

1. graham parker a few cds from his mid period would have toughened up the sound a bit.
2. black 47- their first ep had a raw sound and ric oceasek produced them but i think it was a little too clean .
3. warren zevons bad luck streak in dancing school- it has about 5 kick ass songs.- title song, jeannie needs a shooter,play it all night long but it has string arrangements which dont lend to the songs very well and from hearing them live it sounds much better.
4.the alarm- similar to black 47 in the respect they had a really cool ep and their first lp was preety good but they somehow ventured into a 80s bland imitation of u2 instead of a aucostic version of the clash.

5.u2 - would try to bring them back to being a 4 piece rock n roll band with less ambience more guitar oriented feel yet not nostalgic or them doing a u2 trademark sound like the stones do now.

x - ain't love grand
beatles - the stereo separated stuff; yechhh
blondie - Autoamerican, etc. This band needed some edge
bongwater - when the vox are muffled, it loses the point
bowie - let's dance
church - priest=aura ; a better LP once you get past a bland production
dead kennedys
dino jr - yr living all over me (typically sreeechy SPOT)
Led ZEP - in through out door (trendy production just about ruined this one)
NiN - if he went out of his comfort zone we might listen again
Nevermind - If it was a Fisk instead of a Vig, it'd be more than one song and a buncha filler*
Rush's live albums (remember that friend you had in high school who carted them under his arms and got perplexic when you explained they weren't actually live?)
Social D - they got wayyy too slick

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Saved by a sketchy production:

Apples - 1st EP
Big Black - Atomizer
Slint - Spiderland
Butthole Surfers - Psychic Powerless
Clash - 1st; remember the 1st time u heard this??
Ramones - 1st
J&MC - psychocandy
Damned - DDD (this has really bad production)
Pavement - S&E ; bad produce part of charm
PIL - Metal Box; when this came out, it was the production that wigged us

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The ones on both lists:
Never Mind the Bollocks
Sleater - woods
Stooges - Raw Power (solely by default)


*Though it doesn't look like it, I realize that continuing to blame Nirvana for all the ills and lost innocence of the indie world is akin to "Blame Bush" thinking. Sure it happened, we couldn't stop it, and it's sickening, and we can't go back, the effects are still compounding, and it ended in a high price-tag disaster, but it doesn't push things forward. On the other hand, there'll always be a generation who doesn't know what it was like before and a population segment that continues to buy into the myth as long as there's somebody to sell it. Like reno w/his OMD.



Post Edited (09-15-07 17:55)

I don't know who is to blame for where The Alarm ended up, but I don't think it was on the producer/engineer side of the glass (and I love The Alarm).

Generally speaking, I would like to hear someone else produce the last few releases from Prince and World Party (Karl Wallinger).

Having spent some time on both sides of the glass, I'm a strong believer that a good producer (more or less) accentuates the positive.

And that's how I'll leave it.

husker du

there's no reason grant's drums have to sound that bad.

Satch,

I agree with you about Husker Du's drums. On the album where they sold out to the majors (Candy Apple Gray), they claimed they finally had enough money to get the drum sound they always wanted, and yet the drums sound worse than ever on that album. Songs #2-4 begin with the EXACT SAME tinny drum fill. I actually think Grant was an exceptional punk drummer and his tinny drum sound was effective on Zen Arcade. His sound was so tinny, with almost no audible cymbalcs, and yet when he played a million miles an hour on a song like Newest Industry, it sounded thrilling...almost "liquid". It was kind of fun listening to the live album where he had this big booming John Boham, reverb-saturated drum sound. I only wish they could have captured a bit of that on the last two studio records.


Craig

My Morning Jacket - It Still Moves.

I dunno...I realize Grant's drums sound like shit in a technical sense, but I think of that drum tone as an integral part of the Huskers' sound. I can't imagine their records without it, not even the Warners stuff.

Similarly, I don't find the reverb and echo-drenched sound of AMC's Everclear distracting. Nearly all their records have weird production, and, again, I've always associated that as part of their sound. I think it was especially advantageous on Everclear, as it helped Vudi and Bruce Kaphan create those otherworldly, atmospheric tones, which helped AMC stand out from the college rock/indie rock pack at the time. (Well, as noted, it was and still is the songwriting that really sets AMC apart, but you know what I mean.)

It's just a matter of aesthetic taste on my part, since one could make the same argument as I just made for AMC above, but I'd've loved for Prefab Sprout's 80s albums to have been produced by someone not as synth-obsessed as Thomas Dolby. I was listening to the two-disk best-of a while back, and while I marveled once again at what a remarkable writer Paddy McAloon is, I kept thinking, "My god, these recordings sound twinkly and dated."

Perhaps I'm too forgiving Dolby, but I've always found the Prefab Sprout "sound" to be part of the charm. For this listener, the fact they failed to reach a Steely Dan or The Beautiful South level of ornamentation worked as part of the whole package...

That is a tough one.

I'm not sure if some of us are conflating "bad production" with "bad sound engineering". I mean, it's pretty clear that the MBV sound was supposed to be that way; it's less clear if the crummy drums on a lot of 1980s indie and punk were.... There was a lot of bad production (yes, the gated drum sound), but I put that in a different class than just not being able to HEAR the instruments....

American Music Club - Everclear. I can't think of another album drowned in this much echo. The songwriting is pretty strong, but the overall sound is distracting.

The Church - Seance. This album has the reputation of having one of the worst drum sounds ever. This may or may not be the case, but there's certainly room for improvement.

There are plenty of albums that got saddled with the 80s booming electronic percussion and slick synthesizer treatment, and it was completely out of place. Most notably John Hiatt's ALL OF A SUDDEN and Bruce Cockburn's INNER CITY FRONT and THE TROUBLE WITH NORMAL.

And heck, Springsteen's BORN IN THE USA could probably do with a less bombastic production, also. And that Dylan album whose name I can't remember right now. EMPIRE BURLESQUE?

i would like to produce sprignsteens nebraska with a full band {not that i think the aucostic version was bad or a bad choice}. give it a country pedal steel type of sound.
a couple of steve foberts albums i would have given a little bit of a harder edge. louder guitars
a couple of bruce cockburn albums in the 1980s had a 80s kind of sound and sounded dated which is too bad cause he is a great guitarist/lyricist.
more emphasis on the guitar playing and a more intimite sound.

I often wonder what would have happened if somebody other than Ray Davies produced the Kinks post-1970. I think that he was a little too much involved, especially during the RCA "concept album" era, & it would have been interesting to see what would have happened if he allowed outside producers to work on the Kinks.

Much as I love Prince, I've often felt he could use a good producer, for just the purpose Jermoe stated: to ac-cen-tu-ate the positive. Or at least, to persuade him (assuming anyone can) that not every musical or lyrical idea he gets is necessarily a great one.

Still, what Ira said about ten years ago still holds true: Prince earns his egotism every day. And he's been on a good roll for the past three or four years. Musicology was a good comeback, even if it did start to run thin about halfway through. 3121 and Planet Earth are really strong. I just hope he tours soon.

Pretty much the whole SST catalogue.

I'll throw this out and then I'll run and hide

Joy Division

I think someone should remove all that nasty noise from My Bloody Valentine albums.

The Only Ones studio work just sounds so sterile, it always killed me.

I can listen to it of course because the songs are so tremendous - but the Peel Sessions versions are just so much more punchy.

I agree on the Only Ones and Husker Du.

Being a fan of Johnny Thunders I think everything he did from the Dolls on out could be re-done, with the exception of the re-mixed LAMF.