ed sullivan show - great drum sound from 1 mic!! which one??

[joninc]

i was watching an old tape with a friend of the cowsills on ed sullivan and the drums sounded wicked - it looked like 1 mic about 4 ft high in front of the kick pointing straight horizontal at the drums right in front of them. it wasn't lip synched so i know the drum sound was live.

the mic looked like a 58 "bulb" style head - might have been a beyer or some tyoe of ribbon.

ANYWAYS - it sounded AMAZING - obviously a great drummer for sure but the sound was like off a motown record and i am curious if anyone knows anything about how these shows were recorded and what type of mic was used etc....

[AlexLakis]

Originally Posted by joninc

it wasn't lip synched so i know the drum sound was live.

Oh yeah? Maybe they were just reeeally good lip synchers?

[jindrich]

that reminds me of the film "that thing you do"

near the end, when the drummer is alone in the studio, he's *jamming wiht himself* and there's only one big mic above the kit, about 3 feet high over the overheads. It looks a lot like the AEA R88 long-gun stereo ribbon -don't know if it existed at the time, or the producers just didn't care, as it certainly looks old enough.

well, it sounds just SOOO TIGHT that it couldn't have been overdubbed.

it sounded simply AWESOME!

take a look if you can

[Bob Olhsson]

Most rock on TV was lip-synced or else just live vocals sung to TV tracks

[joninc]

is there anyone who believes it may possibly be NOT lip synched?

[bob katz]

Originally Posted by joninc

i was watching an old tape with a friend of the cowsills on ed sullivan and the drums sounded wicked - it looked like 1 mic about 4 ft high in front of the kick pointing straight horizontal at the drums right in front of them. it wasn't lip synched so i know the drum sound was live.

the mic looked like a 58 "bulb" style head - might have been a beyer or some tyoe of ribbon.

ANYWAYS - it sounded AMAZING - obviously a great drummer for sure but the sound was like off a motown record and i am curious if anyone knows anything about how these shows were recorded and what type of mic was used etc....

Was it grey? Could you see any slots or was it smooth and slotless?

I saw them using an Electrovoice 635A on drums on the Sullivan, which is an OMNI with a presence peak. None of those old dynamic mikes was particularly flat, but pull it away from the drumset and in a live room, presto---magic.

[max cooper]

O/T that set ^ is absolutely incredible.

We're really not getting better at any aspect of this, are we?

[kats]

Ahh Max - the corporates smelled blood, all those hormone enriched baby boomers ready to spend their lemonade stand money

The demographic and the money just isn't there anymore to justify those kind of bubblegum spectacles.

[Bassmec]

If it was live and it sounded any good at all back then.

[Betamax]

....more pics from Sullivan.

[Betamax]

..Has anybody ever noticed the drums getting louder as the camera zoomed in on ringo? I think maybe they had a mic on the camera boom.

[max cooper]

Originally Posted by kats

Ahh Max - the corporates smelled blood, all those hormone enriched baby boomers ready to spend their lemonade stand money

The demographic and the money just isn't there anymore to justify those kind of bubblegum spectacles.

When you see that set during the TV show it's cool but not as cool as it looks in the photo above. The tungsten to daylight color and the far perspective kinda make it cooler than it was meant to be.

[blastula]

Originally Posted by max cooper

We're really not getting better at any aspect of this, are we?

Shhhhhh......