Music Production and acoustics

^^
I agree about Motown. It had a sound of it's own which was encurabent on the inhouse musicians AND the production. Even though it was primitive by todays standard, it was distinctive and purposeful which says to me that production is a factor.

As you are a Northern Soul fan- was the production any different to it's counterparts or was it just a more slightly aggressive way of playing? I am not enough of an expert to compare but maybe the production was approached slightly different?
 
It depended on the label.
Some of them were subsidiary labels of larger ones, so the production was good for the time.
Of course some of the smaller independent labels put out their music on a shoestring.
Most of the soul adopted by the Northern Soul scene was taken mostly from the smaller labels.
 
Although Dead Kennedys were not second wave punk, I think production had a bearing on the 2nd wave and was instrumental in adding texture and tone to offer a differentiating sound. Take Killing Joke. They ceratinly had great production on a lot of their albums and it's no accident that Youth has become a prolific producer.
 
Yeah i'm looking forward to that. Radio Times promises MC5 & Funkadelic as well in that.

And I think I may have to delay my review of Whats Going On another 24 hours :D
 
DepenRAB a lot on the album i'm listening to.

If i'm listening to something thats intricate , multi layered & detailed then obviously I want decent production to heighten those things.
A good example of this would be something like Radiohead's Kid A.

However if i'm listening to something thats more simple and is obviously based more on the songwriting rather than the music I prefer it done as raw as possible , such as something like You're Living All Over Me by Dinosaur Jr.
 
My opinion is basically Urban's. Something that always bugs me about the Smiths debut is how low quality the production is especially compared to the Queen is Dead but something that annoyed the crap out of about Bright Eyes's last album was how how quality and sleek it sounded, it just didn't work no matter how orchestrated they've become.
 
I'm glad someone agrees with me about this. Steve Albini made In Utero noteable too, not to mention he made great albums for Bush and Chevelle. Despite the fact you can find Razorblade Suitcase at every music store used for 4 bucks it's great from beginning to end.
 
I've never been able to understand why the production on Albini's own banRAB sound so bad compared to his other stuff.
Every Big Black & Shellac album i've heard sound like the treble switch was jammed on maximum.
 
I imagine it's easier to take other people's ideas and mold them than your own. I've never had a problem with Shellac or Big Black's production but his work for others is better.
 
I think there's a distinction that neeRAB to be made between an album being well produced and overproduced. I'm a huge fan of quality music production. I want to hear as much detail, balance, and musical presence as possible. A well produced album compliments the music and the artists and the level of production should be the last thing one notices when listening to a well produced album. An overproduced album usually wreaks of Record co. debauchery. Mastering engineers augment recordings with obnoxious levels of compression (in anticipation of commercial radio airplay) and generally polish the sound through a stupifying nuraber of takes which sterilizes the spontanaiety of the music, and subsequently apply gratuitous degrees of audio processing to compensate for overall lack of talent in many cases.
 
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