go back and erase it. I’d record over it
and keep on doing it. The decision was
made then and there: “Yes, that’s the
take, we’ll keep it.” That’s why I would
love engineers and producers to spend
some time working on 4-track because
obviously you have to make decisions.
Are you committing to compression
and EQ as it goes down?
Oh yeah, do it right. I like to hear the
record as we’re putting it together, the
final thing.
When it comes time to mix, you’re basi-
cally able to push the faders up and then
just be creative with what you want to
do with the mix. You don’t have to worry
about making the tracks work.
Yes, absolutely. You already know it
works to 75-percent certainty, and it’s
just zeroing in on the other 25 percent
to make it magic.
Do you have a specific approach to
recording acoustic guitar?
My normal way of doing it would prob-
ably be an AKG C414. I do it really
close, it’s angled at the hole or it’s angled
more toward the bridge end. I’ve found
that acoustic guitars are a little touchy.
You have to do more with the mic and
the mic placement with an acoustic gui-
tar. So I will experiment more with an
acoustic guitar, trying things.
Upgrade your reverb to Infinite Definition
Have you found any modern microphones that are useful to you?
No—but there are always exceptions to
the rule. When I did Missing Persons,
the first set of recordings that I did with
them—which were originally supposed
to be demos, and they finished up being
amongst their most popular songs—we
went into Frank Zappa’s studio to record.
Frank had just had that studio built. He
was on the road and he wanted to come
straight back in and start working in the
studio. He knew my reputation for finding every possible fault that there is in
a studio, so he allowed us to have it for
free knowing that I would find all the
faults and get them fixed before he came
back off the road. The problem was
that all of his best mics, which were the
ones that I would normally use, he had
on the road because he recorded every
Why Settle For Less? VanAmps.com/demos
