The easiest way to know if a record is overproduced is to look at the back and see if it says Mutt Lange.

Sheryl Crow's Tuesday Night Music Club. This album has great songs that IMHO are pretty rootsy. They squashed the hell out of everything, taking any "live band" sound out of it.

Def Leppard - Two steps behind.

There are like 1000 guitars overdubs on that?

Mmmm live. lol.

The lead guitarist needs to raise his action. buzzy.

Yeah, pop music is so gay man....
you sound like a 12 year old mate

I think the Jellyfish stuff was way overproduced, but I think if something is gonna be overproduced, thats the way to do it.......smart/clever/interesting arrangments is the key.
I havent read this whole thread but I hope the vibe of it isnt that "overproduced" equals "badly produced", because badly produced is just badly produced....

Well put Chymer. You sound like an Australian (nothing wrong with that though). Oh you are Australian too.

Great pick, I find that really frustrating too. It works on Solidify though for more (killer drums). Her self titled is where it's at for me, music and engineering.

I'm not sure I know if there is such a thing. It depends on the intent of the album.

Music as both a personal art and public entertainment. As a personal art, I don't see how anything can be overproduced, because until it reaches the artist's vision, it's not done, underproduced.

As public entertainment, it seems "overproduced" is what sells. Group vocals, overdubs galore, fake instruments. It's overproduced in that it can never be performed by a real band, and the singers would be lucky to nail 1 line, let alone the multi part autotuned passes, but it sounds nice to the average Joe.

Maybe overproduced is when there has been a lot of effort put into production, yet the music has no impact, so the artistic endevour is a failure from a musical standpoint... even if the artist is satisfied?

I like, even love, a lot of the albums that people consider overproduced. They sound to me like they must have met the artists' visions, or even exceeded them. Even something like AC/DC's Back in Black meets this criteria in my mind. People think of that album as raw, but I hear perfectly (over)produced rock and roll. That's not just a "hey, throw up a few mics and we'll print it no matter what" sound.

There are plenty of albums where I might call them overproduced simply because they are musical turds polished into something that attracts a certain number of listeners, but that's entertainment music, not art music. I look at it like a sci-fi movie with special effects or a horror movie. It's just part of the product. You can't make a real horror movie with real killing(who would act in it?), so you overproduce the visuals because the consumer want's to see blood. It's the same thing with music.

I'm more concerned about an album that's underperformed than overproduced. I actually get annoyed when lazy slips make the cut when seriously talented players are the reason I'm listening. Sure, I know they're human, but I want a little overproduced fantasy sometimes. I want my gods to be infallable.

And what exactly would that "indicator" be???


Best,


Jamzone

There's a story the Pet Shop Boys told about how they got Trevor horn to produce and mix ONE song, and it took him 6 months to record it and another 6 months to mix it. They thought it was extreme. I'm inclined to agree. If they're spending that much time making everything "perfect", then imo it's over-produced.

Yes, that is an unusually long time.... But I would propose that it is due to the fact that he is quite busy and not that he actually spent a whole year on one song. I would think that his album projects during the course of that year took precedence over a single. The Pet Shop Boys are a very well established name and can afford to wait for him to give it the "Horn treatment". Just a thought. What's the title of the single, BTW?

When you all speak of "over-production", just exactly what is it that you are referring to? Is it in the processing, editing, track count, etc? Perhaps this term is yet another audio misnomer.

If you were to get to the real crux of production, how could anyone definitively conclude what is over-produced?

It was "Left to My Own Devices", a good song but I didn't get the sense that there was 6 months put into it.

On the other hand, Seal's "Crazy", you can tell there was some insane production happening on that track. Though you know what? I heard a version where Seal did it live with a real drummer and band and imo it completely beat Trevor Horn's version. Let's face it, Trevor Horn or no Trevor Horn, "Crazy" was a killer song and would have been a bit even with less production.

Yeah, I own both versions. Both are great. But I remember when "Crazy" came on MTV back in the early ninties when they still played music videos, and I remember stopping what I was doing, shaving my head with a cheese grater in frustration over all the bad music or something of the sort, and my bloody head just started bouncing of its own accord to that insane groove, voice and "soundscape". That happened/happens rarely to me since the beginning of the '90's. And Trevor Horn's productions have been the cause of about 25% of those instances.

Hey, Kes, didn't I respond to you on this thread back in the '90's? What's that all aboot??? Haha! My family is from further north than you in Michigan, don't 'cha know...

Ozzy Osbourne..

Great production. Even better songs.
Blizzard of Oz
Diary of a Madman
Speak of the Devil(live), but it was great.)

Underproduction..
Bark at the moon (worst guitar sound ever.)


Anything he put out after that...
Pretty much Bad songs that good production couldnt even fix.

dfegad

To me it doesn't mean when the production has enhanced an already great tune, but when it has "made edible" a mediocre tune. Over production is the MSG of music. If that makes sense....

i have to agree...the only thing muttt doesn't have in there is the marching band fleetwood mac had on tusk..great album and production though

There are a couple of relevant points about over production being a misnomer. However, if I say something is overproduced, I simply mean for my tastes.

"Over produced" is a term that stale boring old fart rockers use

Here's an example of one

True. But then I'm 23, play jazz more than anything, and I use it (ok so you got me on the boring part ). Like I said before, nothing wrong with having a preference. On the other hand, Craigdouglas' quote is pushing preference as fact, which is when I have an issue. I think Dissolvas last post sums it up well for me.

Pink Floyd "DSOTM", "The Wall"
Bjork (All)
Radiohead "OK Computer", "Kid A", "Amnesiac"
Beck (All)
Beach Boys (Most)
Beatles (Some)
Steely Dan (Nearly everything)
Massive Attack (Most)
Any rock album using double-tracked guitars
U2 "Pop", "Achtung Baby",
Miles Davis "Bitches Brew"
Brian Eno (All)
NIN (All)
Muse (All)
Autechre (All)
Foo Fighters (Everything except the first one)
Any Daniel Lanois production
Most things out of Nashville
Boards of Canada (All)
Any Mitchell Froom/Tchad Blake production
Anything Phil Spektor
Anything produced by the Matrix
Anything produced by Timbaland
Anything on the radio...

And the point of this thread is what, exactly?

bdp

Anything not recorded by Steve Albini.

bdp

Anything with a Sansamp on the kick or snare.

bdp

Anything not recorded direct to two track 2" tape.

bdp

Anything with an orchestra overdubbed in post-production.

Especially when said orchestra was recorded at a different studio, and the brass section was close miked.

bdp

Damn, you're good!!!

Though, I would have to add (based upon the consensus defining the term 'over-produced) St Pepper's as the most over-produced record of all time.

I can't really understand how the "over-production" can be described as subjective.

"Left to my own devices" is a great track and horn production is astonishing. I think the purpose of the production here was to create something different.<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p>

TH pushed Pet Shop Boys to use orchestral arrangement rather than synthetic. Actually, one of the magic of the track is the total fusion between classical/orchestral and pop/electro arrangement. The dynamic is also very important (classical influences).<o:p></o:p><o:p></o:p>

For Horn, the sound is definitely different than the other TH's production: mids, mids, mids, … (while horn is well known for his warm/fatty sound).<o:p></o:p>
<o:p></o:p>
The day you feel your ears are particularly open, try the album version with good headphones or mono driver monitors (avantone, auratone, …): Great moment of music and production.<o:p></o:p>

Sure it took six month. The have done tons of different versions… they tried to create something new so that was part of the creative process.<o:p></o:p>

Overproduced??? Well it's pet shop boys (it's a bit like telling Nirvana is overnoisy) and the production is completely linked to the track. I know several tracks that Horn overproduced but this one is definitely no ( sorry but this track is important for me maann ).<o:p></o:p>

Same here. I remembered the first time I heard Krazy on the radio (the version with the K where Tim Simenon made a lot stuff actually), my head literally plunged into the speakers (dude, where this sound come from).<?xml:namespace prefix = o ns = "urn:schemas-microsoft-com:office:office" /><o:p></o:p>
At the same time, one of my friend called me on the phone screaming: "ARE YOU LISTENING TO THE RADIO?".
At the end of the song, verdict of the announcer: "new Trevor Horn production".
My friend and I screaming: "NOOOoooo, HE did it again"

Right! But "over" suggests "too much".

It should be called "Much produced" or "highly produced".

This thread is about the definition of a term. If we could agree on the meaning of the term "over produced" then we could begin to talk about it.

Kalli

sorry, it's early saturday here.

I don't really see the issue. It's simply a thread where people can list music that THEY think is overproduced. If you don't think music is or can be overproduced that's fine, but as this thread shows, plenty of people do.
While certain aspects of production can be quantified,whether or not it is too heavily produced is subjective.

Some people like rare steak, others like it tough. Of course we can tell how cooked the steak is in an objective way, but what is too well cooked for one person is perfect for another. Likewise Brendondp may think Bjork is overproduced, but I think it is produced just right. That aspect really is taste.

Not trying to have a go at anyone, I just find it an interesting point to debate.

Oh man...

That list (and it could easily be so much longer) was, for me at least, about albums, artists and producers who've become genre defying and defining because of the production methods they've used, rather than in spite of them.

I kinda hoped the following posts - y'know, the one's where I said close-miking a brass section is "over-producing" - would have indicated the use of sarcasm to illustrate the point, but I see next time I may have to resort to using emoticons to ensure the message is recieved in its intended form.

From where I stand, this thread is a really pretty redundant, except for the purposes of being a smart-arse, and allowing one to increase the number of posts under their username.

Which I think I achieved.

Cheers,

bdp