That Early Shadows Sound

[roger bayliss]

I had another good listen tonight at some of those early Shadows tunes and Abbey Road Reverb is all over them ! It is a big part of the sound on those recordings without doubt .. and the times its been said that there is too much reverb on a recording by one of the members here and that HBM did not use reverb... but it most definetly there and plenty of it but its a certain type of reverb that is quite special from that room with the pipes styanding in it at Abbey Road.

Not the sort of reverb you get in a pedal effect eh ! Anyone know how to get the Abbey Rd reverb ?

[AlanMcKillop]

It has been discussed many times as you say, the best way to hear the extremes of what was added in the studio, is listen to Midnight and Dance On (with headphones). There are others, but these two tracks for me, illustrate the effect the added 'effects' have on the respective tracks.

[Didier]

I had another good listen tonight at some of those early Shadows tunes and Abbey Road Reverb is all over them ! It is a big part of the sound on those recordings without doubt .. and the times its been said that there is too much reverb on a recording by one of the members here and that HBM did not use reverb...

Hank didn't use reverb, but Malcolm Addey did !

Didier

[dave robinson]

At the risk of taking some flak here, I personally think that the Shadows - or Drifters as they were then, had an aweful sound on their own records until we hear 'Saturday Dance'. Before that single I can only describe the sound as flat and lifeless, It's as through they were given new, better instruments to play from then on and that the recording people actually gave a thought to getting a good sound. It isn't just an opinion because it's there for all to hear chronologically on boxed set of the 'A's and B's' singles collection. From 'Saturday Dance' onwards everything sounds massively better, but the earlier Cliff records , particularly 'Move It' on which The Shadows don't appear, have the same magic. Any other thoughts on this ?

[asimmd]

Further to Rogers post above,I think the "Special" reverb would have been "Plate Reverb".

I saw a programme on tv a while ago which showed steel plates hanging
from the ceiling,different sizes produced different effects,although it is still reverb.

Probably the only way to replicate it today,except for hanging our own plates,
would be to try a Lexicon Reverb,something which I have always wanted to try
but never got round to it but I think they are regarded as the best.

Alan

[dave robinson]

Further to Rogers post above,I think the "Special" reverb would have been "Plate Reverb".

I saw a programme on tv a while ago which showed steel plates hanging
from the ceiling,different sizes produced different effects,although it is still reverb.

Probably the only way to replicate it today,except for hanging our own plates,
would be to try a Lexicon Reverb,something which I have always wanted to try
but never got round to it but I think they are regarded as the best.

Alan

Alan, it wasn't 'plate reverb' - it was and still is a designated tiled room with randomly placed concrete or ceramic cylinders which deflect and diffuse the sound at different time intervals, with a microphone at one end with a speaker at the other end - I've seen it . . . . . . .

[asimmd]

Hi Dave

I wasn't specifically referring to Abbey Road regarding the Plates.

I can't remember the programme but it had a long room with bare brick walls and
large steel plates of different sizes that were raised and lowered by a pulley system.

It may have been one of those techie programmes,but it was very interesting.

Alan

[almano]

The plate reverbs were generally the EMT Plate Reverb units which were enormous integrated ‘stand alone’ items. Many studios used them in the late fifties, sixties and seventies until the digital versions took over.

A famous one was the EMT model 140 – here’s a description :

(© http://studioelectronics.biz/recentproj ... icemt.html)

“In 1957, EMT introduced the 140 Reverberation Unit. The 140 consisted of a large piece of sheet metal, suspended from a heavy steel frame. An electrical transducer (similar to a miniature speaker) transmitted sound energy to the plate, which along with its drive and pickup amplifiers, was built into a heavy wooden enclosure. The 140 was about 4 feet tall and 8 feet long, and weighed about 600 pounds. A damping plate, controlled by a servo motor, allowed adjustment of the reverb time. Though it was much smaller than an echo chamber it was still sensitive to ambient noise, and had to be kept in an isolated space. Still, the “plate” was a great advance. Instead of building 8 echo chambers, a large facility could put 8 x 140’s in a small iso room. And it was the first cost effective answer for smaller studios, where actual chambers weren’t feasible. EMT 140’s didn’t sound exactly like a real room but they sounded very good, and remained the most popular studio reverb for many years. The early ones used tube electronics, but in the 70’s EMT began shipping them with transistor circuitry. EMT released a primitive digital reverb in 1972, the rack mount 144, but its capabilities were limited, and few survive.”

The major studios all had these reverb units (some still do!) and, I believe EMI used them as well (probably in tandem with a dedicated room for different tonal effects) – but I’ll check that out when I can find the old copy of Studio Sound which had a ten or twelve page article about the Abbey Road studios in the early sixties – it’s at the bottom of one of those tea chests somewhere!

Cheers,

Alan.

[Tone]

Hi

I've been following this discussion with interest because, before it started, I was involved in a similar debate with a friend. He maintains that it's possible to reproduce The Sound (after considerable perseverance) by using the correct guitar with heavy strings, a Vox amp, a good echo unit (e.g. a TVS3) and the correct fingering positions. I wasn't convinced as I felt that some, at least, of the early recordings had reverb, eq, compression etc, added in the studio.

By coincidence, while this debate was ongoing, I needed to correspond with Malcolm Addey so I took the opportunity to ask him about how the early tracks were recorded and I have Malcolm's permission to quote from his reply to me:

My answer to your question will be less than satisfying to you and you can imagine was the subject of many discussions with Roberto. This all happened more than 50 years ago! Even if I were to be provided with the exact same mixer, mics, studio etc I doubt that even I could duplicate "That Sound!" I cannot remember any actual details of the individual sessions. Day to day experiments with different studio techniques would make that impossible and we had not started to keep records of our settings and studio layouts until the mid 60s. I can tell you that recording the Shadows required absolute minimal electronic manipulation.

It is true that the engineer's contribution is a unique component in the sound of any record It was Roberto that pointed out to me the difference in the sound of Shadows' records when Peter Vince took over their sessions in 1966. And there is that one thing that apples to the uniqueness of all records and that is an indefinable "magic of the moment."

So there we have it from the horse's mouth. I wasn't expecting a detailed list of what was done to what tracks but Malcolm's comment about "absolute minimal electronic manipulation" is significant and would tend to confirm my friend's assertion. Also, due weight should be given to "the magic of the moment." I think we all agree that it certainly exists but, of course, it is totally indefinable!

Cheers.

Tony

[dave robinson]

Hi Dave

I wasn't specifically referring to Abbey Road regarding the Plates.



Alan

Yes you were Alan - that's what we were discussing and you referred to the 'special' reverb being plates.
Did the Sliders pickups and the TVS3 come through for you?