Three of the tracks in my influences playlist, Drain You by Nirvana and Quiet and Cherub Rock by the Smashing Pumpkins, were produced by Butch Vig, widely regarded as one of the most influential rock producers of all time. Nirvana’s legendary ‘Nevermind’ album is highly regarded both musically and in terms of production. Both Nevermind and ‘Siamese Dream’, which features the two Smashing Pumpkins tracks mentioned will be key to the choices I make when recording and mixing this EP.

Firstly, it seems clear the Butch Vig is not especially partial to using ambient microphone techniques. In an interview with izotope.com (link at the bottom of this entry), Vig states that when working on Siamese Dream, which features Quiet and Cherub Rock, ‘Billy Corgan and I wanted to put the sound right in your face—we didn’t want anything to sound three feet away, or five feet or ten feet. With the drums, we did have some extra room mics, and we may have used a few extra with the guitars, but in general, I really found that if you get one mic, put it right in front of the amp, and get the right sound, you simply don’t need six microphones placed, y’know, behind the cabinet, around the cabinet, across the room, and all that.’ Grunge, which arguably isn’t what the Smashing Pumpkins would be categorised as, is certainly a genre I was considering when approaching how to record and mix YCIALM. This information shows a clear way of getting an ‘in your face’ sound which I want to get from the band. Vig concludes that ‘that simple close-miking technique is the sound of that record.’ While I’m not focusing on guitars, rather drums and vocals, these techniques will be translated onto drums.

On mixing Nevermind, Vig says ‘I kept the mixes pretty au naturel. But at the time, I think the label thought that the mixes could have a little bit more sheen to them, or they wanted to pump them up a bit more.’  ‘In the end, my mixes are just a little more primal sounding than the album version, but they’re exactly the same performances: guitars panned left and right, Kurt singing with some doubling here and there, Dave singing some harmonies, and bass and drums. That’s it.’ A primal sound is something like what I aim to achieve from this recording and therefore this information is useful. The doubling of the vocals is something that I am keen to replicate on this project, should time constraints allow it.

One particular aspect of Drain You and, by extension, Nevermind that I find particularly fascinating is the drum sound. It is incredibly famous due to the power and dynamism of Dave Grohl’s drumming and the way it was recorded and mixed. In an article on Consequenceofsound.net, Vig claims that ‘people always say, ‘how’d you get that sound on Nevermind?’ and 90 percent of it is Dave Grohl… it’s just how Dave plays and he’s just so, so powerful.’ To MusicRadar.com, Butch Vig said of the drums on Nevermind, “It was recorded in Sound City, California, which is basically a big open room. We used a drum tunnel on the kick, where you take another bass drum, extend out the regular bass drum and put the mic further away, which I often do to get more boom. But the set-up was really nothing fancy. It was the player and the room that made that record sound so special.”

This may make it difficult to replicate the drum sound on Nevermind due to a differing drummer and room, but nonetheless, I will take key pieces of information and impliment them wherever I can.

On Siamese Dream, Vig says that he used condenser mics on the snare drum and toms because Jimmy Chamberlain, Smashing Pumpkins drummer, “has unbelievable dynamics, so I was able to use really good condenser mics on the snare and toms. Sometimes he’d explode into rock, and sometimes he’d be playing little grace notes on the snare, often all in the same performance, so I had to make sure the mics were able to capture all that” (MusicRadar.com).

For mixing drums, Vig speaks of the importance of the room mics and which frequencies can be problematic in a mix. ‘It’s a balancing act. Hearing the room mics is important. To me, the mid-range frequencies define what the room mics sound like, though these frequencies are also what can clog up a mix, particularly in the 300Hz-500Hz range. So you have to determine what’s important, be it the room or other sounds in the track. Sometimes I will push up the room mics in calm sections of a song, like breakdowns, and then pull them back when things get dense in the chorus’ (Speakhertz.com).

In terms of mixing vocals, I have actually found a Waves Plug-In, created in unison with Butch Vig that allows you to replicate the vocal sound synonymous with his work. The creatively named ‘Butch Vig Vocals’ is available to download as a plug in and is described on the website as ‘designed for those looking for a creative approach to shaping vocals, Butch Vig Vocals features intuitive EQ controls, a compressor and a de-esser, and several tools for coloring your sound in numerous shades, including Tube and Solid State saturation, a unique Focus knob, and other inspiring features, all carefully crafted by Butch himself to help you realize your vocal vision. With instantly hyped vocals that cut through the mix and a sound that is dripping with character, Butch Vig Vocals now gives everyone the opportunity to work with the sound of a true rock innovator.’ A link can be found at the bottom of this page.

In terms of artist management, Butch Vig has always maintained that is important as a producer to let the artists dictate how they want the tracks to sound. While the producer does have an input, Vig understands that the songwriters and performing musicians know the meaning of the song better than the producer ever could. Regarding Smashing Pumpkins’ Siamese Dream, Vig discloses that ‘we were having trouble recording “Disarm” and kept putting it off. With all the other songs completed and our backs to the wall, we attempted to record the song with the full band. We tried various arrangements with the traditional Pumpkins sound: ringing guitars, pulsating bass and pounding drums. But it just wasn’t working. Out of frustration, Billy Corgan walked into the control room with his acoustic guitar, closed his eyes and sang the song. It was so simple and emotionally direct, it made the hair rise on the back of my neck. And we both realized it was exactly the kind of feel the song needed. So Billy went back into the studio and quickly recorded an intensely emotional “Disarm”‘ (from Rolling Stone).

All in all, Butch Vig has played a pivotal role in influencing the production methods I will use on this EP.

https://www.izotope.com/en/community/artists/recording-artists/butch-vig.html

http://consequenceofsound.net/2016/08/producer-butch-vig-credits-dave-grohls-drumming-for-90-percent-of-nirvanas-nevermind/

http://www.waves.com/plugins/butch-vig-vocals#butch-vig-vocals-audio-demonstration

http://www.rollingstone.com/music/news/butch-vig-my-favorite-moments-in-the-studio-19961017

The vocals in 1979 are one of the most distinctive aspects of the track, and the recording process used on them, as well as the vocals on the rest of the album that features it will be influential in choosing how I record vocals on this EP.

In terms of capturing the vocals, Flood, one of the producers of 1979 along with Alan Moulder, discovered that “Corgan was a much better singer pitch-wise when he didn’t use headphones, so he switched Corgan up to a Shure SM58 and had him sing in front of open speakers” (emusician.com)

An SM58 is a highly accessible microphone that is regularly used for performing vocals live however isn’t as orthodox in a studio. They are popular microphones for live performance due to their ruggedness and ability to cut plosives from the sound, delivering a clean tone. However in a studio environment, most producers will prefer to use a condenser mic, with a pop-shield to remove plosives. This is because condenser microphones are more adept at capturing nuance and a range of differing tones from the human voice than a dynamic mic.

I will consider using an SM58 when recording vocals, particularly during group vocal sections or in tracks with an aggressive singing style.

As you can hear in the ‘vocals only’ video at the bottom of this entry, there are certain sections in 1979, mainly in choruses where there are two (more in places) backing vocal takes panned hard left and right to create space. This is a common technique for the mixing of backing vocals and allows the lead vocals to remain dominant. The central lead vocals in the track are without any noticeable form of distortion but they are compressed. I will use these techniques when recording and mixing vocals on the EP.

http://www.emusician.com/gear/1332/signal-to-noise-the-sonic-diary-of-the-smashing-pumpkins/40242

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HbDKRbVrz-c

In terms of how the drums were captured on this track, it is difficult to know fully, but articles on how the album it belongs to (Mellon Collie and the Infinite Sadness) do share some techniques used.

Flood, one of the producers of the album along with Alan Moulder, said in an article for emusician.co.uk that Jimmy Chamberlain (drummer of The Smashing Pumpkins) “used to love having the kick drum and a bit of snare going through his wedges, which were directly behind him. So if you’ve got a kit that’s lacking a bit of bottom end, you pump the kick and the snare through the wedges and you start to tweak them to get extra weight.” This is an interesting technique to add lower frequencies to the drum sound, but is not entirely practical given that I will be recording in the university Multi-track studio.

Chamberlain then notes that “from there I go to microphones as far as how I want the drums to sit dimensionally in the track. If I want the drums up front and aggressive, I’ll use a lot of AKG C 414s so they sit in front of things dimensionally. If I want the drums to sit in a rhythm section configuration, I’ll lean back towards the 414s and maybe some Shure SM98s. Then maybe go for Shure 12As on the bigger drums.” These microphone choices will be hugely useful in influencing my own choices in mics. His fondness for AKG C414s is something that I will try to take into account when choosing mics. I have always traditionally used these mics to record overheads and as room mics but have never tried them on individual drums or cymbals.

http://www.emusician.com/gear/1332/signal-to-noise-the-sonic-diary-of-the-smashing-pumpkins/40242

When I was deciding which tracks to add to the artist influences playlist, I immediately knew I wanted to add 1979 and Cherub Rock by the Smashing Pumpkins. The initial reason for this was that upon examining Your Cat is a Landmine’s (YCIALM), I noticed a strong influence on their music, both tonally and technically.

Aside from this, I find the drums in both tracks, particularly 1979 to be extremely recognisably and creatively produced. The audio clip at the bottom of this entry demonstrates that 1979 features a mixture of both electronic and acoustic drums which are blended and altered as the track progresses.

While I am not intending to use anything other than acoustic drums for this project, due to the nature of the band and their personal preferences, it is interesting to learn how such a distinctive tone was created, and I take influence from the acoustic drum sounds featured on the record.

In terms of mixing and effects, Recordingology notes that “the drum samples and drum loops from the Alesis HR-16 are selectively treated to strong doses of distortion. It’s always restrained, focusing on timbre and texture, not rebellious intensity.” They also note that “the expressive time feel is strongly defined by the tension between human and machine. We are offered a drum machine, the Alesis HR-16, at the intro. Add to that Pumpkins Drummer Jimmy Chamberlin playing actual drums, entering in the B section of Verse 1, after “…you and I should meet.” It’s so clearly real, acoustic and human, yet it is pulled back from total freedom by way of loops, layered over a drum machine pattern, plus added samples (the Hi Hat?) triggered with hypnotic regularity. It all adds up to a seductive real vs. machine debate that draws in so many listeners. The human expressiveness of the live performance within this groove is itself further constrained, as we get to hear only 4 bar and 2 bar snippets of Jimmy’s human effort”. In short, the drums in this track are heavily shaped by the drum machine that the drum section begins on. The distortion mentioned increases and decreases in certain sections of the track such as the choruses in order to help build the sound. Distortion is an effect I have used on drums previously and something I aim to use when mixing the YCIALM EP.

“We hear gated snare come and go throughout the tune. Often, it’s a distorted snare sound, cropped unnaturally short by a gate. The snare sample in the opening loop is itself already gated, and distorted.” (Recordingology) This is something that I will take into account while mixing the EP, and gating is not something I would naturally think to do while mixing a snare drum, other than to remove unwanted noise. There is the potential there to use it creatively as shown by Smashing Pumpkins.

In terms of dynamics on the drums, Recordingology notes that “the drums, the drum samples, and the drum loops offer impossibly controlled dynamics, thanks in part to compression. Machine meets compressed human expressiveness for a steady drive.” Again, this adds to the impression of the electronic vs. acoustic blend that is so clear on the drums. Compression is generally used on acoustic drums for practical purposes, to get a balanced mix, rather than as a creative choice, but here it works as both, making even the acoustic drum parts sound robotic. I will personally only be using compression in the traditional sense when mixing the acoustic drums on the YCIALM EP.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LGvZEhR4Vww