"Not to dismiss how valuable Bo Rhap was, but it seems that the whole 'everybody collectivelly begged them not to release it' might've been blown out of proportion to contribute to the myth, same as the 180 voices, being the first video, three solid weeks of recording, 16-track ... all of which have been all but debunked and all of which still stem from a fact which was initially true.
'I'm Not in Love' had been No 1 earlier that year and it was also long and with plenty of overdubs (though that one they did edit for the single version)."
Hi Seb, you reference "I'm Not in Love", and you often state that the 180 voices is debunked. Here is what 10cc had to say on the making of "I'm Not in Love":
"It worked, but the loop itself — and this is where it gets interesting — had to be made up from multiple voices we'd done on the 16-track machine. Each note of a chromatic scale was sung 16 times, so we got 16 tracks of three people singing for each note. That was Kevin, Lol and GiGi standing around a valve Neumann U67 in the studio, singing 'Aahhh' for around three weeks. I'm telling you; three bloody weeks. We eventually had 48 voices for each note of the chromatic scale, and since there are 13 notes in the chromatic scale, this made a total of 624 voices. My next problem was how to get all that into the track.
"I mixed down 48 voices of each note of the chromatic scale from the 16-track to the Studer stereo machine to make a loop of each separate note, and then I bounced back these loops one at a time to a new piece of 16-track tape, and just kept them running for about seven minutes. Because we had people singing 'Aahhh' for a long time, there were slight tuning discrepancies that added a lovely flavour, like you get with a whole string section, with a lot of people playing. Some are not quite in time, some have slightly different tuning, but musically a lovely thing happens to that. It's a gorgeous sound. A very human sound, very warm and moving all the time. Anyway, after putting the 13 chromatic scale notes back onto the 16-track, it meant there were only three open tracks left!
So is what Graham Gouldman saying something that can be debunked, or is part of the magic of studio production in pre-digital days how you did things? I recall Brian jerry-rigged with duct tape a couple of Echoplexes for Brighton Rock. That could be a legend debunked, much as the disappearing tape on BR. I see 180 voices being easy to do. Remember, each member sang each line in unison. So one harmony line is 3 voices. They double tracked for size. 6 voices. One section of BR has 8 or 9 harmony lines. So that's 48 or 54 "voices" on that section alone. If it's semantics and individual voices, no way it's 180. Recorded vocal lines? I can see it pretty easily.
Sheer Brass Neck · Member since
For those interested in production stuff, here's the full read, and lots of great stories on how things got made:
RE the bass drum: I think in QP's mind - as they've discussed bonus material before - it's very simplistic. For example the KYA 'long lost retake' note on the Hollywood reissue of Q1 was quite naïve to a point. Like they are giving us a little peek which is special and while not like we are honoured to hear it, very much how a parent would describe something to a child to make them appreciate it. When someone questions it as in 'why / how / etc' they lose their shit and can't understand how the child is now not totally taken in by the explanation.
The Real Wizard · Member since
[QUOTE] [b]PrimeJiveUSA wrote:[/b]
I have never read anywhere about Roger using drugs. The only interview I have seen him address the issue is one where he said he was "never one for drugs" and that he tried marijuana ONCE and it made him sick.
[/QUOTE]
It's definitely no secret that Freddie and Roger enjoyed their Colombian marching powder on the road.
Queen wisely never wanted to be seen as a drug band, as it certainly never got in the way of their shows - but there are plenty of stories from road crew (and even the band members) saying how the excess got out of control by a certain point.
There's a 2005ish magazine (I wish I remembered which one) where an anonymous crew member speaks out about all this. He said it hit a point where the show wouldn't start until the goods showed up.
dysan · Member since
#lads
Sebastian · Member since
[QUOTE] [b]Sheer Brass Neck wrote:[/b]
Remember, each member sang each line in unison.[/QUOTE]
But that wouldn't happen for every single line, as the multi-tracks clearly show. The lowest ones would be just Frederick, and from around the f" onwards it would be just Roger. The high bb" on 'for me' is just Roger and he's not double- or triple-tracked at all.
[QUOTE] [b]Sheer Brass Neck wrote:[/b]
One section of BR has 8 or 9 harmony lines.[/QUOTE]
Which one? The song's got a few tetrachords and perhaps a couple of pentachords but they rarely went beyond that, perhaps one or two parts were done in octaves but that wasn't by any means the norm. 'Scaramouche ... Fandango' is clearly just three parts, expanded to five for 'very, very frightening me'. Most of those big choir parts are usually four- or five-part, a few of them are six.
Not eight or nine and that difference does matter for the final calculation since that means 12 less voices ... subtract the very low parts which had only Frederick (not the three of them, therefore one or two voices instead of six) and the top line which was usually just Roger (and usually not double-tracked) and you get probably 30 voices tops.
[QUOTE] [b]Sheer Brass Neck wrote:[/b]
So that's 48 or 54 "voices" on that section alone.[/QUOTE]
And even if they added up to that, it would be 54, not 180. That's my point.
[QUOTE] [b]Sheer Brass Neck wrote:[/b]
If it's semantics and individual voices, no way it's 180.[/QUOTE]
And that's my point exactly.
[QUOTE] [b]Sheer Brass Neck wrote:[/b]
Recorded vocal lines? I can see it pretty easily. [/QUOTE]
Sure, if we count each line as a separate recording and so on, it can be thousands ... but that's like religious apologists defending the scriptures by saying 'well, yeah, of course the earth's not 6,000 years old, but it's a metaphor - you need to read it in context!'
There are at least four identifiable variables when it comes to this particular legend:
1. Was it physically possible to have 180 simultaneous vocal overdubs?
2. Would it make sense for what they were trying to do?
3. Did they do it?
4. Did they say they did it?
And of course, they all result in different, often mixed-up, conclusions:
1. Yes, it is.
2. No, not for this particular case. On 'I'm Not in Love' the idea was to deliberately build up a harmonic background which would sound ethereal, and multi-tracking was a good way of achieving that effect.
'Bo Rhap' was a matter of emulating a large choir ... in the sense of making it sound 'as if' there were over a hundred people. It's not the same case: getting the three of them to sing a single part (which, again, did not happen for every single one of them) made sense as they blended and gave it a nice rich sound. Double-tracking that sound also made sense in order to make it sound bigger. Triple-tracking it would be just about right. Any more than that would be merely wasting time and reducing the sound quality because of all the bouncing ... and it wouldn't have sounded any bigger.
3. Everything points at 'no.' Most bits (such as 'very very frightening me' and 'Beelzebub' and so on) would barely have more than twenty, some bits would have far less (the 'Galileo' bit is just three voices), others would probably peak around 50 or 60. Not even close to 138 (which was the figure given once by either Brian or Roger), or 160 (taken out of context from what Fred said), or 180 (the usual figure, again taken out of context from what Fred said) or 200 (taken out of context from what Fred said). It was merely a hyperbole.
4. No, that didn't happen either: Fred stated they were *recreating* a 160- to 200- choir *effect*. That's where the legend was born: 180 is the arithmetic mean between 160 and 200 (160 + 200 = 360, which divided by two equals 180). But what Fred said (and that audio interview's been officially released a number of times, so it's not a matter of broken telephone or a misquote) is, again, that they were making it sound *as it* it had that amount of voices.
Brian made his guitar sound *as if* it were a clarinet, or a trumpet, or a tuba, etc., yet it does not mean he physically blew on his guitar and played it as a brass or woodwind instrument.
Of course, the powers that be soon found out the '180 voices' legend was great publicity, so even they started repeating it. Repeat a lie enough times and, for many people, it becomes the truth ... or it becomes politics ... or religion ... or misguided and misleading journalism.
dysan · Member since
Maybe I should post this in CMI's Fan mix Jazz thread, but here goes. I remember by phone earphone socket broke when I was walking along listening to Jazz maybe 5 years ago. It's was crackling and dropping out but I persevered and it did the most weird thing - actually isolated some instruments and stems. I skipped back and forth through tracks and yep it was filtering the music and breaking down into random part. The most notable thing was the vocal intro to FBG. It picked out a totally new harmony line that a) I'd never heard before b) couldn't possibly have imagine existed in that melody. I listened to it over and over and REALLY wish I'd somehow recorded to preserve it. Really weird. Been meaning to mention that on here since.
That's all.
mooghead · Member since
If you pull out the headphone socket a little bit it can create out of phase stereo, which means you hear the stereo parts and nothing coming down the middle. It was a revelation to me too. Long Away lost the complete vocal track.
dysan · Member since
I was trying to work it out but couldn't recreate it on protools.
Sheer Brass Neck · Member since
^^^
Seb, without getting into truth of the 180 voices, or actual number of tracks I stated I believe it's in the realm of possibility. Certainly could be overstated, but is the 10cc "INIL" 6000+ voices thing absurd too, or does the way they did it make sense to get to that total? My point is BR could be more than 300 voices, no one was counting, could be 24 voices but the 180 is plausible. Sweet Lady had at least 10 "guitars" or tracks with harmonies and rhythm and lead and BR was far more intricate in vocals, although Sweet Lady is genius. It's math and I'm not smart enough to count to 180 :)
Sebastian · Member since
Of course it's in the realm of possibility that you can make them add up to 180 depending on how you count... but, as stated many, many, many times, there's no solid evidence pointing at that figure. It was taken out of context from a quote by Fred and then a legend was born. Other than wishful thinking, there's absolutely no evidence for it and, as explained above, it's a completely different case to 'I'm Not in Love' since they were going after a different effect.
Two possibilities are not necessarily equally probable. It's, theoretically, within the realms of possibility that New Zealand win the next World Cup by beating each team exactly 22 - 0 with each player scoring exactly two goals, including the keeper ... but it's far, far, far, far, far more probable that that won't be the case.
PrimeJiveUSA · Member since
[QUOTE] [b]The Real Wizard wrote:[/b]
[QUOTE] [b]PrimeJiveUSA wrote:[/b]
I have never read anywhere about Roger using drugs. The only interview I have seen him address the issue is one where he said he was "never one for drugs" and that he tried marijuana ONCE and it made him sick.
[/QUOTE]
It's definitely no secret that Freddie and Roger enjoyed their Colombian marching powder on the road.
Queen wisely never wanted to be seen as a drug band, as it certainly never got in the way of their shows - but there are plenty of stories from road crew (and even the band members) saying how the excess got out of control by a certain point.
There's a 2005ish magazine (I wish I remembered which one) where an anonymous crew member speaks out about all this. He said it hit a point where the show wouldn't start until the goods showed up.
[/QUOTE]
Ahhh...obviously I was unaware of all of this. I knew Roger liked to party and have a good time but had never heard or read(that I can remember) of him using drugs. LOL...Freddie was a different story entirely, of course! I thought it was just booze and women...and then there is that interview where he said he was never one for drugs and even marijuana made him sick. He seems like the kind of guy who would readily own up to his past excesses and even laugh about them.
tomchristie22 · Member since
[QUOTE] [b]dysan wrote:[/b]
Maybe I should post this in CMI's Fan mix Jazz thread, but here goes. I remember by phone earphone socket broke when I was walking along listening to Jazz maybe 5 years ago. It's was crackling and dropping out but I persevered and it did the most weird thing - actually isolated some instruments and stems. I skipped back and forth through tracks and yep it was filtering the music and breaking down into random part. The most notable thing was the vocal intro to FBG. It picked out a totally new harmony line that a) I'd never heard before b) couldn't possibly have imagine existed in that melody. I listened to it over and over and REALLY wish I'd somehow recorded to preserve it. Really weird. Been meaning to mention that on here since.
That's all.[/QUOTE]
I had similar moments while listening to c_matt's altered mixes of '39 - there's a really unusual harmony on "write your letters..." which jumps all over the place, sung by Brian. It's pretty cool - effectively inaudible on the Roy Thomas Baker mix.
The Real Wizard · Member since
[QUOTE] [b]tomchristie22 wrote:[/b]
[QUOTE] [b]dysan wrote:[/b]
Maybe I should post this in CMI's Fan mix Jazz thread, but here goes. I remember by phone earphone socket broke when I was walking along listening to Jazz maybe 5 years ago. It's was crackling and dropping out but I persevered and it did the most weird thing - actually isolated some instruments and stems. I skipped back and forth through tracks and yep it was filtering the music and breaking down into random part. The most notable thing was the vocal intro to FBG. It picked out a totally new harmony line that a) I'd never heard before b) couldn't possibly have imagine existed in that melody. I listened to it over and over and REALLY wish I'd somehow recorded to preserve it. Really weird. Been meaning to mention that on here since.
That's all.[/QUOTE]
I had similar moments while listening to c_matt's altered mixes of '39 - there's a really unusual harmony on "write your letters..." which jumps all over the place, sung by Brian. It's pretty cool - effectively inaudible on the Roy Thomas Baker mix. [/QUOTE]
Pretty sure you can hear that in the 5.1 mix, too.
