Abbey Road Echo Chamber

[zyabo]

Hi guys, I'm new to the forum.

I have a question

Did anybody try to emulate the reverberation of abbey road's echo chamber on the reverb unit (TC, Lexico etc.)?

What the perameters?

The room dimensions were: 12 by 21 feet, the walls were covered with gloss paint. Spread around the room to diffuse reflections were glazed sewer pipes of two sizes—18" diameter and six feet tall with paving stones at the top and 12" diameter less than three feet tall.

That's the info availible from the Recording The Beatles book.

The chamber was rebuilt for the Anthology project but it is different now.

Anyway if someone has any experiments with it and got any result, please share your expireance.

Thank you.

[zyabo]

anyone???

Any ideas?

[vernier]

A recording with a fair amount of chamber on the vocal or solo instrument is probably your best bet.

[davioh]

hey vernier, is that avatar pic or whatever they call it of an ampex tape machine???

[vernier]

Yep, but its not mine ..I have a newer one, unfortunately. Hey, is there a song, like a Beatles one that has reverb? ..I don't recall hearing reverb on their tunes.

[zyabo]

Originally Posted by vernier

Hey, is there a song, like a Beatles one that has reverb? ..I don't recall hearing reverb on their tunes.

What do you mean?

[gregohb]

Originally Posted by vernier

Yep, but its not mine ..I have a newer one, unfortunately. Hey, is there a song, like a Beatles one that has reverb? ..I don't recall hearing reverb on their tunes.

On the 3rd anthology CD set, there are some of the songs from Abbey Road played without all the tracks on the commericial release. I forgot the name, but I think its "Because" where there are these lush vox harmonies and you can hear the reverb really well. Maybe on the strings for Eleanor Rigby too - which are isolated on one of the other anthology tracks.

A lot of the reverb was probably pretty subtle - as it should be. None of the Beatles recording have that "in your face" dry hiphop sound. They sound very natural, and that means there was some element of room verb if not fx verb. Of course John was famous for the slapback tape echo which doesn't use any echo chamber at all.

And its possible that the echo room was not used that much. The Beatles are so great, that like Jesus, even their garments become holy, but in this case any thing in the studio they recorded in - from the desk to the brand of mic or instruments becomes a holy relic.

[davioh]

Originally Posted by gregohb

The Beatles are so great, that like Jesus, even their garments become holy, but in this case any thing in the studio they recorded in - from the desk to the brand of mic or instruments becomes a holy relic.

Hey maybe on should go on ebay and start selling "official beatles 60's dust" scraped from the top of one of thier consoles??? I bet I could afford lots of new gear then j/k.

[zyabo]

They were using Echo chamber for mixing down. Voclas and instruments wre sent to the speacker that was placed in the chamber and than the Neumann mic picked the sound in the chamber with reflections and they got the "wet" sound to the desk. Both than was mixed and put into tape.

That's right Because is a great example, eventhough it was mixed using a rebuilt Studio Two's Echo Chamber, it was not like the original, but still quite grate!

[vernier]

Forget reissues, remasters, and remixes ..the only true examples are on original vinyl ...mastering guys are adding verb and other digital tricks to almost everything these days.

[r0ck1r0ck2]

yep....
please get the mono releases...

those stereo release are a travesty..

that said..

i seem to recall that 'recording the beatles' states that the echo chambers were decomissioned (sp?) in the 80's(?)

they were rebuilt when sir george wanted to do a remix..but the results weren't exact..

i have no idea if some of those lexicons had abbeyroad chambers as a model..

i do hope someone could answer that..

good question that i look forward to an answer thereof.
(yep, another drunk reply from yours truly)

[zyabo]

So shall we carry on on this???

[Cujo]

It would be cool if Chandler put out an Abbey Road chamber plug. If it wokred in my system that would be a bonus.

[zyabo]

Originally Posted by Cujo

It would be cool if Chandler put out an Abbey Road chamber plug. If it wokred in my system that would be a bonus.

At least we could see the parameters of the chamber and could emulate it with other reverb units...

[Cujo]

I think the RTB book has pretty detailed info about it.

[vernier]

Just listened to Revolver and didn't detect any chamber.

[Cujo]

Seems like some times they liked dry, other time they dug the chamber, depending on the mood of the day.

[zyabo]

Yes, but I'm talking about reverb parameters like predelay, decay time and others...

[vernier]

I don't know anything about that studio other than listening to Beatles ..theres a little natural room ambience in there but I'm not hearing delay, plate, or chambers. If any, it's miniscule. What isn't miniscule is the Fairchild ..they really cranked that up on Revolver.

For rad chamber, listen to David Crosby's CD, If I Could Only Remember My Name, ..you'll hear obvious tape delay going to Heiders/San Fransico chambers. Those might be the best chambers of all. Too bad theres office furniture in there now.

[zyabo]

Just listen to their first album (Plese, Please Me!), tack A Taste Of Honey for instance...

[Ironklad Audio]

...this sounds like a new altiverb preset

[zyabo]

Originally Posted by Ironklad Audio

...this sounds like a new altiverb preset

Have you got it?

[vernier]

Taste of Honey, verb sounds generic ..maybe EMT 140.

[zyabo]

Originally Posted by vernier

Taste of Honey, verb sounds generic ..maybe EMT 140.

No it was Abbey Road's echo chamber that they used to create reverbs....

My goal i to emulate it's sound (I don't mean 100%) on a FX processor like TC or Lexicon...

[Empty Planet]

Hey, great to have you here, Brownsound.

Maybe you could shed some light on the (solo'd) track of Paul doing the vocal of (the song) "Sgt. Pepper's Lonely etc." There's quite a bit of reverb on that and I always thought it was the natural ambience of Studio Two, but now I'm not so sure. Any thought?

And btw, it would actually be a pretty great opportunity to hear your thoughts and impressions about working on that project and with those tapes. I'm sure many of us here would be quite grateful. Not to mention having quite a few questions!

Cheers!

[zyabo]

Originally Posted by Brownsound

The chamber has a much shorter reverb time, and can sound "bathroomy" if overused.
The beauty of the chamber is that it gives an ambience that you don't notice unless it's taken away, and is used on a lot of the Anthology mixes.

Wow wow wow!!!!! Thanks a lot for the information. That's a lot.

Is it possible to emulate the sound of the chamber (aproximately) usinf a TC Reverb 4000 for example (Konwing the parameters of the chamber reverb)?

Thanks

[vernier]

Is it possible to emulate the sound of the chamber (aproximately) usinf a TC Reverb 4000 for example (Konwing the parameters of the chamber reverb)?

You do it by ear ...on a 4000 or any kind.

[zyabo]

Yep... But to start with you need some parameters, I guess.....

I tried with a "bright chamber" preset, I turned the knobs a little and got a nice sound... that I thought was ok. Didn't have a chance to compare it.

I just think that knowing the parameters would let you a good starting point... I don't know... what do you think???

[vernier]

A preset should do it ..dark chamber, bright chamber, whatever is in the unit you have.

[zyabo]

thank you