What are you listening too right now....
- Thread starter kevy73
- Start date
RocketCowboy
Senior Member
Re: What are you listening to right now....
One of my favorites...
https://youtu.be/UNilsLf6eW4
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
One of my favorites...
https://youtu.be/UNilsLf6eW4
Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk
Classical guitar music is sooo calming. Here are two videos--since we can only hyperlink one video per post, I will hyperlink one and post the link to the other. Both are played by the same guy.
Hallelujah
Pachelbel Canon in D
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXC9tuumjiA
Hallelujah
Pachelbel Canon in D
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jXC9tuumjiA
I was glad to see a lot of mentions of Ann Wilson as a top voice in rock. I have worked and recorded many of the women cited in this thread plus some in more cross-over/R&B/Pop but doing 80s two albums for Heart that re-established them after years of so-so albums and lost audience. I would her pretty much at the top of the heap. I say based on her ability to sing anything, from hard rock to opera and make it believable. Most female ...most singers...have a limited range of expression but if they have a style that stands out and are coupled to the right songs, they can turn in great performances. Nancy, however, is an all-round better person to interact with, and fun, talented and approachable, traits not often coupled with Ann. They got me a number of platinum RIAA record awards sitting in storage back in California.
Pat Benatar was mentioned and she was in that latter group of a limited range but did some really enjoyable work
Stevie Nicks was the same, but the one album I recorded changed the band and changed the charts as the biggest selling in history, until Thriller. We did Rumors in '76 and although a true historic record recording during emotionally difficult times for the band, I never preferred the pop Fleetwood Mac over the old blues oriented original band.
Doing Whitney Houston's first album around the same general time frame as Heart, despite being blown away by the dynamics and control when first hearing Whitney...and her model good looks and stylishness as a young woman, Ann was a very expressive versatile singer.
The best popular signer I ever heard to this day was Barbara Streisand in her early and mid-career. There is one opera singer who I like more but for pop and standards, Streisand has no equal. I never worked with her but heard her live in small venues and large, flew across the country to hear her in a show and another time in a small concert. Yep, the best.
Mariah Carey in her beginning years when I worked with her, I thought she would be on of the all-time greats but fame got to her and no one told her "no" so generated a lot of trash and now can't sing at all.. She sure had the range that no other pop-R&B could touch.
Some I wanted to work with but didn't include Annie Lennox and many of the big band "girl singers" of the 30s and 40s who would have been rock stars if born 30-40 years later. Another singer I recorded who I admired is a jazz singer so out of my usual realm, Cleo Laine who came with only her husband John Dankworth
Other female singers I liked included Grace Slick who in her younger years was really a good singer far better than her material of band mates. She had mostly a supporting role in StarShip but was the best singer, although Marty Balin was a very good singer. Later, Mickey Thomas became the lead singer and felt he was very good also but lacked great songs. There was more talent in the band than their output showed.
Aretha Franklin was a dream job, one project called Freeway of Love, sold very well and put her back on the charts but felt she had seen her best days. The record label pulled a fast one, they contracted with us to do that album and just before the start, the owner Clive Davis called and asked if we could use the evenings for a new artist since Franklin wanted to be done by 5pm every day. I agreed assuming it was demo work and they already were paying lockout. So the first day of production with Franklin, at 5pm the "demo" project walks in the door, and we assumed she was a model for a music video, a tall black girl with impeccable grace, makeup, poise and style walks in...the demo for free at night, her name; Whitney Houston and that first free recording time was a monster hit debut album. She was very young but obviously well groomed for modeling and public appearance. Performers coming to work usually dress very casual and relaxed but she cut a stunning figure. She was sweet, a little shy and very appreciative of anything we helped with or did for her. The girls in the studio office started wearing nice clothes, and the guys became more gentlemanly just from her presence. It is really too bad he got too much fame too soon, she was not equipped for it. The day project was short days, Franklin wanted to not over stress her voice but the material was very easy on it, I got the impression she was more comfortable puttering around home instead of working, heck she had been doing it since the 1950s.
I worked briefly with Debra Harry, but she was the LA scene and not what we did, and I was not impressed with her voice but was VERY impressed with her as a person, smart passionate about her causes and personable.
Overall there were more iconic voices on the male side, more males were in rock. I found a young female singer just last month who impressed me here and she has in a very short performing career, measured in weeks instead of years, she put a video on Vimeo that was of high production quality before she even performed once live. The show was in a small club with about 100 capacity. One two guy showed up, me and her boyfriend but 98 girls came and 1/2 appeared to be in love with her and I got the impression they were lesbians. She lives 800 miles away so I won't work much with her but I would like to, she has style and charisma where everyone in the room was really taken with: her voice, her banter between song, and her appearance. I found out after the show that she only worked with the band for 2 days and had never performed in front of strangers before. She is a natural, and will be a factor in music I suspect.
The very first female singer I worked with Janis Joplin. She was a bit disorganized in thinking and life but when in front of an audience, even if just a free unplanned concert in the park there in San Francisco, something switched on in her brain and she tore it up. Her band was not as good as most in the area but who cared, it was her energy and drive that made every some work. The original girl with attitude on stage and just another slightly unhinged hippie chick from Texas when not on stage. Capturing her big voice at that era technology was a challenge. A little girl with a big voice.
My favorite band to see in concert was always the Grateful Dead, a band that had two reactions from the public, those who never saw them live and those who did. The latter probably share my view. No band ever has so many well crafted songs, none. If you ask fans for their favorite they will vary widely but a lot of people liked best any one of their 600 songs. Before any concert tour they would narrow down the possible set list to 200 but have no set list for the 3 day show. They had such an extensive high quality sound system, the best in the industry, with ample investment in research, like getting Meyer Sound going and inventing the Wall of Sound, a gigantic system that took so much work to set up they stayed in each venue 3 days for 2 performances always sold out, mostly to the same people all 3 nights. That gave the second system trucks and crew enough time to get the next destination assembled. DeadHeads trade tapes by the thousands daily years after their last performances. They encouraged taping by the audience because no song was done the same way twice. Their 2 drummer configuration was the best rhythm section in the industry. Next on my list of groups is Led Zeppelin, never worked with any of them or maybe would have placed them higher if I did know the members personally but had too short of active time. The Dead on the other hand were all personal friends and was able to hear them all individually when they played around town when on the 120 or so days of the year when they were not touring. When off the road, the members played every day with some band or some artist.
Individual artist I would have to say Hendrix. Saw him first at Monterey Pop and never heard or saw such a thing, a 3 piece with the guitarist playing lead and rhythm at the same time, upside down and backwards guitar while reimagining the blues in his unique style.
Favorite people in rock...John Fogerty, the nicest most down to earth musical genius one could find.
Best rock to dance to..lots of 69-73 British bands and equally good to cover now for club/bar bands. I was not into early Beatles or Stones but both matured into much better music later.
Easiest musician to record and work with...BB King no doubt.
Most fun band to work with in the studio or play(sports) with has to be Huey Lewis and the News.
Only artist I kicked out of the studio mid-album...Rick James.
Best guitar player? hard to pin one one but Carlos Santana and Hendrix but I never worked with Hendrix. My studio was designed for him but he died before it was completed.
Smartest guitar player I ever met was Brian May. Dumbest(but still musically gifted Neal Schon who could create great riffs and melodies without even knowing it), best bass player I worked with is without a doubt, Victor Wooten, and one of the nicest.
Best ensemble horn section; Tour of Power, whenever we needed horns, they got first call
Best remote recording project; Moving a ton of gear down to LA to Stevie Wonder's house to do Songs in the Key of Life. He gave me the Steinway Grand piano used on it so moved that up to my Studio B and the two Yamaha grands were moved between A and C as needed. One of big Yamaha's has shaved hammers which resulted in a great attack that recorded well on rock and R&B
All during these eras I was taking candid shot in the studio and some of those ended up on liner notes or album jackets. Mostly shooting Canon, my A1 was my last film camera, a great camera that I took all over the world. For digital I moved to Nikon and I have been very happy with all 3, D90, D7000 and D800 soon to be joined by a D850.
Pat Benatar was mentioned and she was in that latter group of a limited range but did some really enjoyable work
Stevie Nicks was the same, but the one album I recorded changed the band and changed the charts as the biggest selling in history, until Thriller. We did Rumors in '76 and although a true historic record recording during emotionally difficult times for the band, I never preferred the pop Fleetwood Mac over the old blues oriented original band.
Doing Whitney Houston's first album around the same general time frame as Heart, despite being blown away by the dynamics and control when first hearing Whitney...and her model good looks and stylishness as a young woman, Ann was a very expressive versatile singer.
The best popular signer I ever heard to this day was Barbara Streisand in her early and mid-career. There is one opera singer who I like more but for pop and standards, Streisand has no equal. I never worked with her but heard her live in small venues and large, flew across the country to hear her in a show and another time in a small concert. Yep, the best.
Mariah Carey in her beginning years when I worked with her, I thought she would be on of the all-time greats but fame got to her and no one told her "no" so generated a lot of trash and now can't sing at all.. She sure had the range that no other pop-R&B could touch.
Some I wanted to work with but didn't include Annie Lennox and many of the big band "girl singers" of the 30s and 40s who would have been rock stars if born 30-40 years later. Another singer I recorded who I admired is a jazz singer so out of my usual realm, Cleo Laine who came with only her husband John Dankworth
Other female singers I liked included Grace Slick who in her younger years was really a good singer far better than her material of band mates. She had mostly a supporting role in StarShip but was the best singer, although Marty Balin was a very good singer. Later, Mickey Thomas became the lead singer and felt he was very good also but lacked great songs. There was more talent in the band than their output showed.
Aretha Franklin was a dream job, one project called Freeway of Love, sold very well and put her back on the charts but felt she had seen her best days. The record label pulled a fast one, they contracted with us to do that album and just before the start, the owner Clive Davis called and asked if we could use the evenings for a new artist since Franklin wanted to be done by 5pm every day. I agreed assuming it was demo work and they already were paying lockout. So the first day of production with Franklin, at 5pm the "demo" project walks in the door, and we assumed she was a model for a music video, a tall black girl with impeccable grace, makeup, poise and style walks in...the demo for free at night, her name; Whitney Houston and that first free recording time was a monster hit debut album. She was very young but obviously well groomed for modeling and public appearance. Performers coming to work usually dress very casual and relaxed but she cut a stunning figure. She was sweet, a little shy and very appreciative of anything we helped with or did for her. The girls in the studio office started wearing nice clothes, and the guys became more gentlemanly just from her presence. It is really too bad he got too much fame too soon, she was not equipped for it. The day project was short days, Franklin wanted to not over stress her voice but the material was very easy on it, I got the impression she was more comfortable puttering around home instead of working, heck she had been doing it since the 1950s.
I worked briefly with Debra Harry, but she was the LA scene and not what we did, and I was not impressed with her voice but was VERY impressed with her as a person, smart passionate about her causes and personable.
Overall there were more iconic voices on the male side, more males were in rock. I found a young female singer just last month who impressed me here and she has in a very short performing career, measured in weeks instead of years, she put a video on Vimeo that was of high production quality before she even performed once live. The show was in a small club with about 100 capacity. One two guy showed up, me and her boyfriend but 98 girls came and 1/2 appeared to be in love with her and I got the impression they were lesbians. She lives 800 miles away so I won't work much with her but I would like to, she has style and charisma where everyone in the room was really taken with: her voice, her banter between song, and her appearance. I found out after the show that she only worked with the band for 2 days and had never performed in front of strangers before. She is a natural, and will be a factor in music I suspect.
The very first female singer I worked with Janis Joplin. She was a bit disorganized in thinking and life but when in front of an audience, even if just a free unplanned concert in the park there in San Francisco, something switched on in her brain and she tore it up. Her band was not as good as most in the area but who cared, it was her energy and drive that made every some work. The original girl with attitude on stage and just another slightly unhinged hippie chick from Texas when not on stage. Capturing her big voice at that era technology was a challenge. A little girl with a big voice.
My favorite band to see in concert was always the Grateful Dead, a band that had two reactions from the public, those who never saw them live and those who did. The latter probably share my view. No band ever has so many well crafted songs, none. If you ask fans for their favorite they will vary widely but a lot of people liked best any one of their 600 songs. Before any concert tour they would narrow down the possible set list to 200 but have no set list for the 3 day show. They had such an extensive high quality sound system, the best in the industry, with ample investment in research, like getting Meyer Sound going and inventing the Wall of Sound, a gigantic system that took so much work to set up they stayed in each venue 3 days for 2 performances always sold out, mostly to the same people all 3 nights. That gave the second system trucks and crew enough time to get the next destination assembled. DeadHeads trade tapes by the thousands daily years after their last performances. They encouraged taping by the audience because no song was done the same way twice. Their 2 drummer configuration was the best rhythm section in the industry. Next on my list of groups is Led Zeppelin, never worked with any of them or maybe would have placed them higher if I did know the members personally but had too short of active time. The Dead on the other hand were all personal friends and was able to hear them all individually when they played around town when on the 120 or so days of the year when they were not touring. When off the road, the members played every day with some band or some artist.
Individual artist I would have to say Hendrix. Saw him first at Monterey Pop and never heard or saw such a thing, a 3 piece with the guitarist playing lead and rhythm at the same time, upside down and backwards guitar while reimagining the blues in his unique style.
Favorite people in rock...John Fogerty, the nicest most down to earth musical genius one could find.
Best rock to dance to..lots of 69-73 British bands and equally good to cover now for club/bar bands. I was not into early Beatles or Stones but both matured into much better music later.
Easiest musician to record and work with...BB King no doubt.
Most fun band to work with in the studio or play(sports) with has to be Huey Lewis and the News.
Only artist I kicked out of the studio mid-album...Rick James.
Best guitar player? hard to pin one one but Carlos Santana and Hendrix but I never worked with Hendrix. My studio was designed for him but he died before it was completed.
Smartest guitar player I ever met was Brian May. Dumbest(but still musically gifted Neal Schon who could create great riffs and melodies without even knowing it), best bass player I worked with is without a doubt, Victor Wooten, and one of the nicest.
Best ensemble horn section; Tour of Power, whenever we needed horns, they got first call
Best remote recording project; Moving a ton of gear down to LA to Stevie Wonder's house to do Songs in the Key of Life. He gave me the Steinway Grand piano used on it so moved that up to my Studio B and the two Yamaha grands were moved between A and C as needed. One of big Yamaha's has shaved hammers which resulted in a great attack that recorded well on rock and R&B
All during these eras I was taking candid shot in the studio and some of those ended up on liner notes or album jackets. Mostly shooting Canon, my A1 was my last film camera, a great camera that I took all over the world. For digital I moved to Nikon and I have been very happy with all 3, D90, D7000 and D800 soon to be joined by a D850.