Okay-- time to resurrect this thread once again.
Reasons-- I've resumed work on a Beatley project now that PLAY and FabFour are 64-bit, now that I have a computer that can handle it, and now that the past year as allowed me to acquire things such as IK Amplitube2/Ampeg/Hendrix as well as a few gems in the way of instruments--- such as an Epiphone Casino, and Rickenbacker 360-6, and as of yesterday a Gretsch 6119-1963HT (George's "Help!" guitar) For bass guitar I now have a Hofner and a Ric 4003.
I now have no excuses whatsoever.
That said, I found this fascinating DVD set which should arrive in a couple of days:
Volume 1 (QT)
http://to-a-tee.tv/products/beatles1/clips.html
Volume 2 (flash YouTube- style)
http://to-a-tee.tv/products/beatles2/clips.html
Volume 3 (flash YouTube- style)
http://to-a-tee.tv/products/beatles3/clips.html
Each clip is quite short, just a few seconds, but it's very well done, I think. I'm looking forward to working with these because:
1. They will provide great audio references for matching instrument and amp tones in DP for numerous sounds of the 60's. Only the guitar parts are played without drums and vocals, so the integrity of the parts are easier to distinguish than they are from using the original recordings.
2. Seeing the fingerings will facilitate creating other guitar parts to fill in the gaps. For example, I do not have a 12-string of any kind at the moment, so observing the fingering techniques and picking styles, open and stopped strings can be more easily and more convincingly emulated in FabFour or Real Guitar or some other guitar VI.
This is a very sticky challenge for me when recreating guitar parts with VIs. If I had all the instruments (and were as accomplished a player as I'd like to be) I'd play them myself as audio, but that day is yet to come.
For those who play guitar, it's no secret that there are numerous ways of playing the exact same notes on different parts of the neck. If one really considers the unique intro to "I Feel Fine", for example, it becomes clear that this is played on the lower strings starting on the 10th fret and working downwards. It's a very different tone that can't be duplicated faithfully on higher strings. Also, further research reveals that Lennon played these parts (not George). Lennon also used his acoustic Gibson J-160E for this.
Also, important details such as hearing hammer-ons (hammers-on?) and slides are concerned on specific strings have huge impacts on how picking styles and techniques are recreated with a VI in a DAW. Slides are clearly on one string, and that can make all the difference between a boring track and a musical one. Even where VIs have clear limitations, understanding the same facts edifies one's understanding of how such parts would be played on a real instrument anyway. As I see it, such a study has few down sides no matter how one chooses to represent the parts ultimately.
Having such facts serves as an imortant "missing link" of sorts with narrowing the gap between reality and virtual reality. I truly believe that many virtual guitar tracks suffer because a more considerate study of this performance gray area often gets overlooked for the lack of time or even the lack of patience.
For real Beatle fans looking at the clips, you will notice that the host humorously chooses to wear clothing akin to what the Beatles wore in various phases of their career. Less obvious, perhaps, is the fact that he also has gone through the trouble of taping the Candlestick Park setlist on the upper cutaway of his Rickenbacker 325 in the same manner the John had done.
Such things may seem superfluous, but for me it's an additional testament to this guy's deep level of attention to detail. The mere sound of his playing catches the ear as being (imho) a most respectable, if not faithful, representation.
Guitar players may scoff at some of this, but I'm not a guitar player. I'm first and foremost a keyboard player who also happens to play the guitar. Big difference. I believe many DAW users fall into this category, and such issues all too often remain unaddressed. My love for the guitar has inspired a commitment to pursue virtual and real approaches in greater detail concurrently. Keyboard players tend to think differently from guitarists, and where many similarities in what each can offer to a track, the unique differences must be addressed independently, imho.
Mind, the purpose of all this is not to create another Beatle album. For me it's a wonderful study in musical balance. Any good band will have a multi-faceted sense of balance with their choices of instruments, the tones they choose, as well as what parts those instruments play together as a whole. I believe this study can be done with any band, and such studies can only serve to enhance how virtual tracks are produced in a DAW.
I choose the Beatles' music because I find their output a great resource for a diversity of musical styles which influenced them and morphed into styles that influenced others later. Most importantly, it's the blues that serves as the foundation. Sure, there's a long history before the Beatles of what one might call "authentic" blues, but my current explorations go much further than just studying the blues.
It's easy to look at "Honey Don't", "Boys", "Dizzy Miss Lizzy", "Bad Boy", "Rock and Roll Music", or "She's A Woman", but the Beatles offered a wide variety of 12-, 16-, and 20-bar blues. "I'll Cry Instead" is one example. "I Fell Fine" is another. Clever departures include "Taxman", "Ballad of John and Yoko", "The Word", and "Another Girl" among others.
It was in their later years that such tunes as "I Want You, She's So Heavy" brought less "blues" per se and more of a "blusey" approach to their style vocabulary. I dare say that "While My Guitar Gently Weeps" falls into this category where Clapton's influence cannot be easily ignored. Getting into "Helter Skelter" and the jam session near the end of Abbey Road, it seems to me that rock and roll had grown into something that would later be referred to simply as ROCK.
It's taken a long time-- a lifetime-- and an embarrassingly long thread to get to the point where the tools and ideas have begun to congeal at last.
"What's past is prologue". What follows is how all of this relates specifically to DP.
This is my story. This is my song. Thanks for reading.
more to come...
number 9k
number 9k
number 9k...
