Did technology peak 30 years ago ?

[kevinc]

I`ve probably had my head stuck on music gear too long but I found myself thinking about this at length the other day.

Why can`t we come up with anything better than the Neves, Neumanns, API`s and other old gear out there.
It seems like everything good coming out these days is a recreation of the past. But the funny thing is none of these companies can get an exact recreation because they don`t have the parts anymore.
The other thing is there all very expensive (Probably because of hard to get epensive parts.)
Shouldn`t it be cheaper to recreate something that was made 30-50 years ago.
If not it should definately be cheaper to come up with a new design with modern parts

With the exception of a few companies like Cranesong it seems like everybody on these forums are mostly getting exited about old gear or recreations. (Myself Included).

How about something new and cheap (and good)instead of expensive and old.


Kevin

[Oldone]

I would say that once the Stradivarius was constructed, most everything else has paled since. Same with audio, humans hit their peak stride in an endeavor and emulation comes after that. Thus we see things like the Focusrite Liquid channel which is trying to emulate the analog sounds that people like. I don't think the human ear has that many sounds that are pleasing from a sound capture perspective. Unless another Bill Putnam comes along with a specific idea about how to capture sound, and many others agree that their idea sounds good, we are probably going to continue to utilize the tonality sounds of the devices which first and best captured sound for recording purposes.

That said, I think there will always be a place for high end audio that creates a new musicality which is different than the old musicality. In between others will try to make that sound at a cheaper cost.

[David Herbert]

These devices are tools. How much has the shovel changed in the last 100 years? Lighter, cheaper, more durable, still pretty much the same. Then again, what about the snow-blower or the shop-vac? Man, now I'm confused...
OK, so I think that there are lulls and swells, and everything that was old will be new again. Competition and Gear Sluttery will ensure that designers will continue to make new preamps, and new favs will become classics in their own right. I think... David

i think the thing about this old gear is it has a sound that people are used to and have grown to like/love. this eqipment played such a huge part in many people's lives (whether they actually used the gear or just grew up on its sound).

it often takes people a long time to warm up to new ideas(sounds). especially when those ideas or sounds are what they grew up on. then those people's enthusiasm for the sound gets passed on to younger generations.

rock and roll was built upon this older equipment. and most people are going to associate very strongly to the sound they grew up listening to.

or something like that. im not very concise or even very able to write out the things i think into words... usually

[Nathanael]

Isn't it interesting how many people say that popular music peaked about 30-50 years ago, and here comes the comment that technology did the same. This is not a logical linkage. Having a preference for those recordings is not the same as saying the technology was better or even equal then.

Gear is better in every objective measure: quieter, less distortion, cheaper (by a huge amount), etc.

How can you discount the as-yet almost untapped work of greats like Michael Gerzon, etc.? His work has not yet even started to make the difference it might. Cognitive research into sound, perception, and surround systems is expanding rapidly. Compared to what we knew 30 years ago, we are well ahead, at least for what I do. Not everyone is a basement/bedroom studio "engineer" - AES has published a lot of papers in the last 30 years.

I don't know of any genre that demands more accurate results than classical music. (See the accuracy thread to debate what that means). There may be some niche label still pressing records, but look at the high end Chesky stuff now - SACD and 96Khz PCM surround sound. In every technical way, these recordings are better than what was possible 30 years ago.

Want proof points? Microphones: look at what Stephen Paul has done for mic technology; Mic Pre's: how about the new Gordon Audio unit; Processing: How about Cranesong, Monitoring: Halcro and Pass amps, Speakers - dunlavy, Wilson, etc. All represent incremental, if not exponential, improvements on what was available before.

There are enough threads here to explain why the musicians were better, etc. The bottom line is that the tools are better than they ever have been. The only difference is the education, care, and concern of those that use them. Was better sound available in a custom console than the latest Digi box now? Better parts exist today - get a custom console built now and it will be cheaper in real dollars and sound better. Apples to apples, compare what's possible in either the money is no object, or the "home" studio, and dollar for dollar, you will see real improvment.

Too many people have been working hard for there to be no improvement.

[Brad Lunde]

Originally posted by Nathanael
<SNIP>
Gear is better in every objective measure: quieter, less distortion, cheaper (by a huge amount), etc.

I'm with you. Gear is way better. Back when Neve was new, or the telefunken 251 was new, people didn't care a whole lot for what came in over 15Khz.

How can you discount the as-yet almost untapped work of greats like Michael Gerzon, etc.? His work has not yet even started to make the difference it might.

Right on the money. The last frontier in audio is imaging. As one who is involved trying to get Gerzon's work in use (SoundField), I can tell you its slow going, but anyone that hears it knows its the future (audio with all three dimensions accounted for).

<SNIP> look at the high end Chesky stuff now - SACD and 96Khz PCM surround sound. In every technical way, these recordings are better than what was possible 30 years ago.

It may cheer you to know that Cheske is using Gerzon's work....I set him up with a SoundField several years ago and David Cheske uses it for everything now.

Brad

[Nathanael]

Originally posted by kevinc
With the exception of a few companies like Cranesong it seems like everybody on these forums are mostly getting exited about old gear or recreations. (Myself Included).

How about something new and cheap (and good)instead of expensive and old.


Kevin

Personally, I don't have anything but a passing historical interest in old gear or recreations thereof. I do not understand the "vintage" mistique. At the time, these were just the tools of the job, not items of worship.

I am not very interested in something whose stated value is "new and cheap." I am interested pretty exclusively in gear that is "over the top excellent". Price is a more distant consideration, and as Bob O points out, the best gear today is cheap compared to what it used to cost. Color me grateful.

Maybe I don't "get it", not being a pop music kind of guy, but I really don't understand these "old gear" posts. Unless you are trying to make a "historically accurate" recording somehow, why does old gear matter? You guys crack me up with all the comments about how creativity is gone, everything sounds the same, there's no more artistry, etc. So instead of of someone figuring out how to play right and then find their own artistic voice with an instrument, it becomes the gear of the week party to get that elusive sound.

Why not use the best gear you can afford and capture the best sounds you can personally produce? That at least has the possibility of being original. You can't just keep copying people's signal chains, playing style, chord changes, etc. and come up with "original" stuff. Sure you have to study your instrument and its performance history- the best musicians I know have also mastered a lot of historical repetoire. But it's never struck me as a particularly musical goal to become a human record player of other people's work. Beethoven didn't play Mozart. He studied with him, and then put the principles to work in his own music. Because he mastered everything related to known keyboard technique, and still didn't reach the end of his curiosity, he was able to add considerably to keyboard technique and it's repetoire. But how many musicians have the basic integrity to master known technique before needing "their own voice"?

Even in the classical realm, there are few players who have mastered their instruments to the point of being able to transcend them. But look at what's happened with someone like Yo Yo Ma - his early records are just "historical" in nature: here's Yo Yo playing Bach, etc. Then look at his most recent output: experimental stuff with the Silk Road Ensemble, Appalachian folk music, even a strange little album with Bobby McFerrin. What's happened? Real creativity and musical expression - new music, music that isn't necessarily notated in traditional ways. Music that some people like, some don't, and some just don't understand.

But it hasn't come from new gear, etc. It's come from someone who has mastered his instrument, is well grounded in the past masterworks in his genre, and is now pursuing his own interests and voice. Sadly, for purposes of this thread, gear has little to do with his new sounds. I'm sure the guitarists on the board could make the same comments about the few guitarists who have truly mastered their instruments at a world-class level - they have a voice that is gear independant.

- Nathanael
"Excellence is, by definition, rare.

[CV7]

Yes, I also think we are in the emulation period.

[Bob Olhsson]

I think the decline in the quality of average recording gear began 50 years ago!

I define quality as the ability to simply plug it in and get on with making a recording knowing that if the performance is good, the recording can be counted on to sound great. I only witnessed the very last part of that era but was dumbstruck 4 or 5 years ago when I heard some 3-track safety masters from the '50s at the AES in LA.

The reason quality declined was pure economics. Prior to the late '40s, you couldn't just go out and buy recording or broadcast gear. There were still enough patents in effect that your only choice was leasing the gear from the patent-owners and paying them a royalty on every record manufactured. Gear was built to last as long as possible because that was to the economic advantage of the manufacturers. With reliability defining construction quality, decent sound was only a matter of design skill rather than expense. Most gear was designed by either Bell Labs or the RCA labs and both had the most expensive engineers and scientists money could buy, a budget for design talent that has been unthinkable for audio gear since the late '50s.

During the '60s and '70s, commercial audio gear still needed to compete with the old lease gear and with the creative skills of every studio and broadcast station's shop to build their own gear to the standards that had been set by the lease gear. By the late '70s, recording gear had become a retail product and most of the people buying it didn't know anything about quality so everything became feature and "hipness" driven much as it still sadly is.

[Fletcher]

Originally posted by kevinc
Why can`t we come up with anything better than the Neves, Neumanns, API`s and other old gear out there.
It seems like everything good coming out these days is a recreation of the past. But the funny thing is none of these companies can get an exact recreation because they don`t have the parts anymore.

Well, yeah... the practicioners of hardware necrophilia are kinda ****ed on old parts... but the people who have taken an "old" concept and brought it to a modern context are fine... like Great River's MP-2NV and EQ-2NV.

You can also look at Pendulum Audio. The equalizer in the Quartet II for example... it's based on the work of Eugene Shank's "Pulse Technologies" company [you may know them as Pultec]... but it took it to another level [i.e., the "aggressive" section of the 'passive/aggressive equalizer']... not to mention the "delta MU" compressors from Pendulum... how that has taken an estabilshed technology to the next level.

AEA, Chandler LTD., D.W. Fearn, E.A.R., John Hardy, Martech, Smart Research, Soundelux, Speck Electronics [etc] have taken principles of the past into the realm of extremely good sounding, flexible and unique units.

While companies like Crane Song LTD., Empirical Labs, iZ Technology, GML, ... and even FMR Audio have stretched the possibilites in a remarkably musical manner... this is a great ****in' time to be an engineer.... at least in my mind it's a great time to be an engineer.

Bill Putnam had his time and place... frankly, in my opinion, his kids should have left the ****ing shovel in the garage and left Bill's legacy alone instead of trying to cash in on it. There isn't a single time when I haven't used and preferred a Purple Audio MC-77 over the 1176LN's second coming. It's just a better sounding unit at playing the same game. Granted, the brothers at Purple Audio didn't reinvent the wheel... but frankly it didn't need reinventing. The premise was good... but with the implementation of some more 'modern technology', the unit's a way better piece than it had ever been in history.

Neumann started some very interesting research back in their day... but let's face it, since the Sennheiser take over [hell, since before the Sennheiser take over... probably since the early 70's] Neumann didn't really contribute much to the advancement of microphone technology, at least not from the perspective of making a more musical item... in terms of cost saving mass manufacture, Neumann and AKG are indeed the kinds... but in terms of developing product that has a more musical nature... no.

Klaus Heyne, and before he lost his mind, Stephen Paul, really pushed the envelop in microphone development. Today, many of the Stephen Paul modified microphones that exist are highly coveted items... and the Brauner "KHE" is perhaps the pinnacle of modern microphone design... which doesn't leave the work of guys like David Bock to go unnoticed... though I think it does by much of the general public because the products are made to look like revered classics. David's work in the realm of understanding proximity effect and quantifying a measurement technique that can anticipate the quantity and nature of the proximity effect is really highly innovative... but it's not necessarily shit that most people will notice on the pages of a catalog.

The Microtech Gefell company, while holding on to some very viable capsule designs from years past, have created some highly musical and innovative products... like the UM-900 for example. Using a tube that was originally developed for hearing aids, they made a most excellent sounding tube amplifier for a microphone... that runs on phantom power and has the headroom, as well as depth of tone and texture that very few products have been able to achieve over the years. Personally, I would put it in the realm of old U-47's and M-49's in a heartbeat... but it hasn't withstood the test of time to become a "legend" as the other 40 year old microphones have done.

The work that David Josephson and Kelly have done with capsule design, the stuff Rick Perotta and David Royer have done with consistency in ribbon mics and magnetics... the technologies that guys like George Massenburg have developed... first in the analog domain, and now in the digital domain... it's just staggering.

In 40 years, I would think that KHE's and UM-900's and E-47's and I'm sure a bunch of other stuff will be held in as high regard as the units from our past... as may be the GML units, the D.W. Fearn units, the Martech mic pre's the Crane Song equalizers and compressors, the Pendulum
Audio hardware, and a whole host of other, highly innovative products that live in the realm of the small "boutique" manufacturers... rather than the 'mass marketers'.

The problem may be that the modern engineer has more choices of remarkably excellent hardware than ever before, but the same or more limited attention span... which makes it harder for the true innovators' products to fight their way to the surface through the spew of the "more established" manufacturers.

[kevinc]

Now that I think about it there is a lot of modern stuff out there that is really good and ground breaking. Like GMLs Pro Tools eq which is supposed to sound as good as $5000.00 analog eqs. Plus converters had to take a huge jump in the past ten year or we`d all probably still be recording to 2 inch. Emperical Labs stuff is in every decent low budget project studio out there. I already mentioned the Cranesong stuff.

But it just seems funny how the top 5 Mic pres talked about on these forums are neve clones.

As far as mics go Neumann/Telefunkin stuff or their copies are the mics every ones lusting after.

It`s definately true that most of these companies improved on the design of the orignals in some way making them more reliable and usually more flexible. But there still marketed as "Something that sounds like neve".

I actually bought a Soundelux U99 and I plan on picking up a MP2-NV , some API and maybe a TG2 at some point in the near future.
All old gear knock-offs.
I had/have no real desire to look at any of the newer designs because these seem like some of the tools I need in order to make great sounding recordings.
I bought a Fatso which is new but I got it to emulate tape which isnt new at all.

I`m not saying there isn`t a lot of great new gear out there but it seems like the go to equipment is definately based on the older stuff if not a modified version of the original.


Kevin

[dtobocman]

Originally posted by Fletcher
Bill Putnam had his time and place... frankly, in my opinion, his kids should have left the ****ing shovel in the garage.....

Hilarious!

[ttauri]

Originally posted by Nathanael
Maybe I don't "get it", not being a pop music kind of guy, but I really don't understand these "old gear" posts. Unless you are trying to make a "historically accurate" recording somehow, why does old gear matter? You guys crack me up with all the comments about how creativity is gone, everything sounds the same, there's no more artistry, etc. So instead of of someone figuring out how to play right and then find their own artistic voice with an instrument, it becomes the gear of the week party to get that elusive sound.

I remember a discussion I had with a friend once talking about the way TV syndication--seeing old shows right next to new ones--shaped our aesthetics. I think recordings have functioned similarly. Having an archive of reference brings out the differences between recording eras, makes the personality of their techniques palpable.

In particular, for me, sampling in hip-hop made the differences quite vivid, and the way the different sounds of various recordings were combined really emphasized for me the importance of what engineers and recording studios imparted to a record. After that, I really couldn't dissociate the timbre imparted by this or that recording technique from the performance. The character of a record for me is as much a product of the studios and engineers as it is of the performers. And the whole mental process of how I reach for this or that sound has been deeply shaped by that view, and by that archive of records I refer to and draw inspiration from (and in my case, sample from).

For me, I don't think there's been as many records that have taken digital studio equipment (at least in terms of the traditional mixing techniques) and really used it in an excitingly different way; that make me think, ooh I want to do something that sounds like that (there's a few tho).

Peece,
T. Tauri

[Bob Olhsson]

Originally posted by ttauri
...For me, I don't think there's been as many records that have taken digital studio equipment (at least in terms of the traditional mixing techniques) and really used it in an excitingly different way; that make me think, ooh I want to do something that sounds like that (there's a few tho).
...

Nobody in 1965 was using analog equipment in an excitingly different way. They/we were using musicians and their instruments in an excitingly different way out in front of the microphones. People COULD easily be doing this with digital gear but many don't seem willing to take on that kind of a creative challenge. They'd rather buy another $5000 box or, lacking the means to do that, a $500 plug-in that claims to model the box.

[Ted Nightshade]

I don't know of any genre that demands more accurate results than classical music. (See the accuracy thread to debate what that means). There may be some niche label still pressing records, but look at the high end Chesky stuff now - SACD and 96Khz PCM surround sound. In every technical way, these recordings are better than what was possible 30 years ago.

Accuracy again... I must say, I need to hear the Chesky stuff. I've heard it's quite exceptional. I am remiss!

Technically, I'm sure it's far superior... but artistically? I have a CD of Bartok recorded back in the late 50's that is just *so* gorgeous, moving, stunningly vivid... like you're there! Provided with sufficient playback gear.

It would be great if that were anything like the norm now...


And I do think the place for wonderful new advances is in front of the mics. We have the technology to make things happen in front of the mics that never happened before too, not just to manipulate the usual things in front of the mics in new ways after they are recorded.

[Fletcher]

Originally posted by kevinc
I actually bought a Soundelux U99 and I plan on picking up a MP2-NV , some API and maybe a TG2 at some point in the near future.
All old gear knock-offs.
I had/have no real desire to look at any of the newer designs because these seem like some of the tools I need in order to make great sounding recordings.

A Soundelux U-99 is it's own microphone. Sonically comparable to a U-67? Sure... but the design is very much a David Bock design, not a Georg Neumann design... the U-67 reference is more a matter of convenience as a reference point for us pimps than anything else.

The MP-2NV? Call it an "old gear knockoff" in front of me... and I'll knock your block clear across the bar. The similarity to anything old, started and ended with the drawing from a 1073. The drawing. None of the implementation, damn few if any similar parts. The transformers in the mother****er were the product of a year of trial and error [and patience and science] to make then not sound like the iron in the original Neve modules... "old gear knockoff"? **** you.

As for API stuff... well... I guess you kinda got me there... except that it's API knocking off API stuff... and the 550b is 4 bands instead of 3 bands like the 550A... but the 560 is pretty much the same... and while the 225 is a world of different [as in way more advanced, more like a 2500] than a 525... damn if a 525 ain't pretty much the same as it was in days long past.

Even the TG-2... which Wade will tell you in a heartbeat he went out of his way to be as faithful to the original TG series modules as humanly possible is an amalgam of several different TG series modules. That most people have never heard an actual "TG series" modules certainly makes it a 'new sound' to those that have never experienced the original... sorta like why people often say that certain other 'knockoffs' that claim to actually pull of the hardware necrophilia thing, pull it off. If you'd really heard the originals, lived with the originals for an extended period of time, you'd know that for the most part these people are full of shit and are trading on a myth... but most people that are buying that crap have never spent the requisite time with the old shit to know any better.

Sorry for the rant... this kinda hit a nerve.

[Bob Olhsson]

I almost jumped on that comment about the MP-2NV myself. It sounds way more open than any Neve I've ever encountered. In fact I'm not all that big a fan of Neves. If you want to knock off a British input module, a Helios is the one to go after, not a Neve.

I really like the first Great River too. It reminded me somewhat of my encounter with the Jensen twin servo prototype, big, open, transparent and effortless.

[makoto]

Bob FYI,

http://cgi.ebay.com/ws/eBayISAPI.dll...category=23785

Makoto

[tommyd]

I'm not Bob, but I saw those and I want em' !!
TommyD

[RobMacki]

Originally posted by tommyd
I'm not Bob, but I saw those and I want em' !!
TommyD

Make that both of us!

Or This

[Bob Olhsson]

The Helios I fell in love with had mostly styrene caps. Kind of amazing this person is touting 'lytics. I haven't seen one in 20 years so maybe there were some 'lytics that I overlooked while I was drooling at all of those styrenes.

[ttauri]

Originally posted by Bob Olhsson
Nobody in 1965 was using analog equipment in an excitingly different way. They/we were using musicians and their instruments in an excitingly different way out in front of the microphones.

Well, there was Lee Scratch Perry, Tubby, Jammy and them guys a little later on... Absolutely thrilling.

Anyway, I was wondering in another thread if the "archive effect" is more a product of a "postmodern" attitude. Regardless, I hear a lot of interesting breadth in the analog history, where I don't know that it can be placed so squarely on the performances in front of the mics.... be it soupy Bollywood strings, waaaay overdriven R&B 45s, the bongos from Martin Denny records (I can't even imagine how one could duplicate that sound today)....

Peece,
T. Tauri

[kevinc]

[i]The MP-2NV? Call it an "old gear knockoff" in front of me... and I'll knock your block clear across the bar. The similarity to anything old, started and ended with the drawing from a 1073. The drawing. None of the implementation, damn few if any similar parts. The transformers in the mother****er were the product of a year of trial and error [and patience and science] to make then not sound like the iron in the original Neve modules... "old gear knockoff"? **** you.
[/b]

I wasn`t trying to piss anybody off with the gear knockoff statement. I havent personally even heard the thing.
I just saw the NV at the end of it and jumped to conclusions I guess. I know the pres and mics I mentioned are supposed to be great whether or not there true to the original or not. I`ve been hearing a ton of great things about them and thats why I want to try them out.
I guess in these cases there definately not trying to be true to the original (even close maybe) so I`m sorry if I offended you guys.


Kevin

[OzNimbus]

Originally posted by Bob Olhsson
Nobody in 1965 was using analog equipment in an excitingly different way. They/we were using musicians and their instruments in an excitingly different way out in front of the microphones. People COULD easily be doing this with digital gear but many don't seem willing to take on that kind of a creative challenge. They'd rather buy another $5000 box or, lacking the means to do that, a $500 plug-in that claims to model the box.

Amen brother! Instead of spending 5 grand on a box, spend $50 on a cattle prod and use it on the drummer !


-0z-

[OzNimbus]

As for new mic technology... I'm really surprised nobody mentioned Taylor's THE mics so far.