KEN SCOTT’S TOP
RECORDING TIPS
Here’s a short list of Scott’s own tried-and-true guidelines for making better recordings:
1Make decisions as you record. Don’t wait until mixdown. According to Scott, “No one likes
to make a decision, and
it’s not just in music—it’s
in life it seems. Everyone is second-guessing
themselves. How many
times have you been to
the supermarket and you’ll
walk past a guy with a
cell phone to his ear: ‘yes,
honey, I know, but there
are 10 different kinds of
baked beans. Which kind
is it I’m supposed to get?’
It’s just baked beans,
come on. So you make a
mistake, she’s not going
to kill you for it. Make a
bloody decision!”
2Listen to many different musi- cal genres and try to learn as
much as possible from
each. Don’t be afraid
to experiment. It’s nice
to have a total picture of
where you are headed, but
leave the final destination open to improv and
creative discretion.
Legendary record- ing engineer and producer Ken Scott recently put pen to paper for the biography, Abbey Road to Ziggy Stardust.
from being exposed to
other perspectives.
3Your idea of sound should be constantly changing.
“That’s how you grow,”
Scott says. “A band like
The Beatles, they were
changing constantly. As
they learned more and
more, they would make
things change. They would
take the audience with
them, and that’s how they
managed to come up with
such incredible stuff—they
were always learning and
they always wanted something to be different.”
4Make record- ings with the gear you have. Great recordings
can be made with any level
of equipment if the sources
and performances are great.
5Invest in good monitors and learn how they sound. Everything starts with being
able to hear your tracks
accurately.
7Pare down performances to the essen- tials. Focus on
making the best song,
don’t fixate on the individual parts to the point
of losing the forest for
the trees.
6Play out live as much as possible and learn from the
audiences’ response
to your performance.
you’re bound to benefit
8Go into record- ing sessions with an end in mind. Don’t worry
about having every detail
mapped out, but a good
arrangement and a vision
for the final result will make
for a much more productive
and successful session.
should be this kind of sound, this part
should be this kind of sound.” We’d zero
in on the sound, he’d play those parts,
we’d double them or whatever, then we’d
get the sound for the next part, and just
patch it together like that. So, exactly what
should the sounds be? I didn’t know up
front. We had to find them.
It sounds like you need a well-developed
sense of psychology to work as a producer. How do you read the musicians
and know how to handle them?
I have no idea! Take my history with Jeff
Beck. The first time I worked with Jeff,
it was to record the first Jeff Beck album,
Truth. It was a bunch of guys who weren’t
really known. Jeff had a bit of a reputation
from the Yardbirds, but certainly nowhere
near as big as Clapton was coming out of
that band. Little-known, generally regular
guys—they were a blast. They were really
fun to work with and they were really
good, obviously.
Then we complete the project. Album
comes out, they tour the States, they come
back to start on the next album. And the
egos were through the roof! We couldn’t
work together, it was obvious. I think we
did one day and that was it—sessions got
canceled because it just wasn’t working.
I don’t see Jeff for a while until I start
to work with Stanley Clarke. Jeff comes
in and plays on a couple of tracks on
Stan’s albums, and he’s back to normal
again—he’s a regular guy. It was really nice
working with him again. No sign of that
ego. Then I get to work with him again
later on There and Back. It was the exact
opposite of everything! He didn’t feel he
was good enough to be playing with those
musicians. On this occasion, I had to try
and draw his performances out of him.
I was sort of stroking his ego the whole
time, “Jeff, you can do it, come on mate,
this is easy for you.” That was very hard. I
hadn’t had to deal with that before. That
was a learning experience for me, trying to
pull something out of an artist they didn’t
think they were capable of. Generally, they
go over the top. It’s easier to pare it down
than it is to get it out of them.
You’ve done pop, glam, fusion, blues,
rock, new wave—all sorts of different
things. What drives you to work in new
musical styles?
