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Simon & Garfunkle Documentary on BBC


Mykesbass
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Nice "Imagine" documentary on BBC1 last night, based on the making of Bridge Over Troubled Water and the 1969 tour. Decent amount of interview time with Joe Osborn, but most interesting was some of the background information on the production techniques. Well worth catching on the IPlayer.

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This programme was excellent!! :) Some of my favourite music of all time.

Definitely cool to see Joe osborn, the genius behind the scenes.

Just when I was beginning to question the need for a telly, given all the crap that is broadcast, something great like this comes on :)

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Absolutely golden.

Loved it, love all the references to use of room acoustics and unconventional places to find interesting acoustic phenomena to use as the sound of the album. Especially the use of them actually singin in the echo chamber rather than piping a send from a aspeaker to it - the resultant bvs are completely ethereal.

Fascinating insight into the use of double tracking and the essence of the sound requiring them to perform together into a single mic to get the blend then double tracking them each once alone (note the 'perfectly in synch' comment - pretty spot on for sure!).

Fovourite quote from it:-

[i]"There's more than just the song going on"[/i]

Absolutely!

Amazing and informative, one of the best doc on a recordiong I've seen I think.

Edited by 51m0n
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I normally find anything Yentob is involved with to be turgid and dull, but this was really good. Really interesting recording techniques revealed and a reminder of just what a great voice AG had, the outro to Bridge still gives me shivers all over.

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[quote name='51m0n' timestamp='1320834459' post='1431933']

Amazing and informative, one of the best doc on a recordiong I've seen I think.
[/quote]

That's pretty much what I was thinking as a layman - nice to hear that someone with your reputation agrees Simon!

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[quote name='Mykesbass' timestamp='1320837840' post='1431995']
That's pretty much what I was thinking as a layman - nice to hear that someone with your reputation agrees Simon!
[/quote]

Well I love getting the inside gen on how records were made, there are some great insights into the Abba stuff out there (have a search on youtube for Michael Tretow) and Bruce Swedien has been amazingly forthcoming about his work recording Michael Jackson on Gearslutz.

Too often though docs about recordings just miss the actual process of the tracking, someone sits behind a desk and raises faders and says, "And here's the bit where JomBob played his guitar" but you never learn about the thought process behind that part, and the way/place/thinking behind the actual tracking of that part, I'm not really too bothered about the mic/pre blah blah blah, but the acoustic space choices, the reasoning behind them, that fascinated me.

It is the core of each individual track, which must be blended to make the final recording. You cant polish a turd (although you can chuck so much glitter on it that some people wont even noticce the smell), and that basically means the tracking on great records is so good that listeing to the people who made those records and their thinking can be incredibly illuminating, and just give you more ideas for your own work.

On top of that its a fascinating insight into who they thought they were at the time (from the flashbacks) and who they think they were now (or whenever it was made), which is really interesting....

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[quote name='ezbass' timestamp='1320835351' post='1431951']
I normally find anything Yentob is involved with to be turgid and dull[/quote]

+1

[quote name='51m0n' timestamp='1320834459' post='1431933']
Amazing and informative, one of the best doc on a recordiong I've seen I think.
[/quote]

+1

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[quote name='JTUK' timestamp='1320838886' post='1432016']
I missed it so will hope to catch a repeat on Sky Arts...but I did just catch the play-out of Bridge over troubled water at the end.
Piano by that much missed genius, Richard Tee.
[/quote]

Its up on iPlayer right now:-

http://www.bbc.co.uk/iplayer/episode/b0171r6x/Imagine_Winter_2011_Simon_and_Garfunkel_The_Harmony_Game/

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