Backbone (The Making Of) - Sound On Sound

[andyb]

There’s a 6 page article in this month’s (Jan edition) of Sound On Sound that covers the recording, mixing and mastering processes involved in making Backbone. for those interested in that sort of thing.

Available in all good newsagents and online here for those interested in that sort of thing:

www.soundonsound.com/techniques/session-notes-recording-status-quo

Enjoy!

[mortified]

Love the pic on the link 

There's something atypical about it with Francis in a body-warmer and goodness knows how much more clothing and Andy in a floral shirt and tank top. One man's winter is another man's spring   

Ta for sharing. I'll very likely be grabbing this 

[mortified]

Tried to get the mag today but struck out. However, I did find this while I was browsing.

It's effectively an interview with Alan Lancaster about the recording of On The Level. Interesting there should be 2 similar articles about albums nearly 45 years apart. 

www.rockcandymag.com/

[frozenhero]

Hi Andy! I think I'm not the only one who's glad about how Backbone has turned out, sonically (with the sole exception of the snare drum on some tracks). I wonder how deep the discussion went, as far as compression/limiting goes? "We Talk Too Much" was still a lot louder than Backbone (thanx to Mr Pax...). Do you think there's any chance Francis might be interested in remastering (especially) ISOTFC and QPQ for CDs?

Anyway, sterling work from you there!

I noticed a little error: Thirsty Work was also produced solely by Francis, unless the credits are incorrect...

[sqcollector]

Jan 30, 2020 16:08:24 GMT frozenhero said:

Hi Andy! I think I'm not the only one who's glad about how Backbone has turned out, sonically (with the sole exception of the snare drum on some tracks). I wonder how deep the discussion went, as far as compression/limiting goes? "We Talk Too Much" was still a lot louder than Backbone (thanx to Mr Pax...). Do you think there's any chance Francis might be interested in remastering (especially) ISOTFC and QPQ for CDs?

Anyway, sterling work from you there!

I noticed a little error: Thirsty Work was also produced solely by Francis, unless the credits are incorrect...

I still think it was too compressed on some songs. The compression was applied after the fade outs were made, so you can see how the peaks (mostly from the drums) expand, when the songs start to fade-out.
In terms of EQ, it's not bad. I think I'd remove a bit of low mids and would open it up a bit.
The snare and the hats don't sound very good, in most songs, unfortunately. All in all, I like the sound. I'm just nitpicking. If it were me, I'd mixed/mastered it slightly different.

I had also pointed that fact, regarding TW production, in some other thread about this article. Francis also produced some songs for QPQ and Bula, but that's different, I guess, since more people are involved in the production of the album as a whole.

[frozenhero]

I think rock music does need *some* compression to give it that "oomph". Otherwise Status Quo would sound like Steely Dan... in the 70s, rock music was often simply compressed by saturating the tapes a bit, which gave it that "analogue warmth" that people still rave about. Digital clipping is a much harsher sound and should be avoided at all costs.

Could Backbone be a bit less compressed? I guess so, but considering how loud the current chart standard is, it's nothing short of spectacular soundwise. To reiterate the comparison with the Rossi/Rickard record, "Falling off the World" is effectively TWICE as dynamic as "I'll Take You Home". That's quite a change.

[sqcollector]

I understand what you mean and I agree, to an extent. For instance, I think bands like Green Day (and other alternative rock bands) benefit from having some compression (but even their CDs are too compressed). But Quo have a more traditional sound. They are still heavy, but they are not noisy, if I'm making myself clear. Still, each case is a case.

For instance, on Waiting for a Woman, it's a softer song. That snare and bass drum could have had a bit more space to breath. Just like some parts of the Backbone song, especially during the "whoo-oos". In some parts, the punch of the snare disappears a bit.

That being said, yeah, it's far better from the nowadays' standard. And it's still better than the Deluxes. This one seems more like limiting, whereas the Deluxes seem to lose more macro dynamics, in addition.

[snakelady]

I don't understand much of the technical talk, but the article is an enjoyable read and the sound of Backbone is great IMVHO, so thanks, andyb

[mortified]

I read this article the other day and pretty much didn't understand a single word!    Other than the reference (already pointed out by frozenhero ) that the last album Francis produced before Backbone was Rock 'til You Drop. 
So basically the only bit I did comprehend was wrong 

[andyb]

Jan 30, 2020 16:08:24 GMT frozenhero said:

Hi Andy! I think I'm not the only one who's glad about how Backbone has turned out, sonically (with the sole exception of the snare drum on some tracks). I wonder how deep the discussion went, as far as compression/limiting goes? "We Talk Too Much" was still a lot louder than Backbone (thanx to Mr Pax...). Do you think there's any chance Francis might be interested in remastering (especially) ISOTFC and QPQ for CDs?

Anyway, sterling work from you there!

I noticed a little error: Thirsty Work was also produced solely by Francis, unless the credits are incorrect...

Hello - I'm very happy to hear that, for the most of it, all you hardcore fans have really enjoyed Backbone. It was a pleasure and an honour to have worked on it.

There is a fair amount of discussion in the article in regard to dynamic processing - both in terms of individual tracks and also in regard to the overall level of the album and yes you are 100% correct in saying that WTTM is a much much louder product.

I'm sorry to say that I couldn't begin to comment as to what the plans for ISOTFC and QPQ would be but you can never rule these ideas out.

[sqcollector]

Feb 18, 2020 15:43:42 GMT andyb said:

Hello - I'm very happy to hear that, for the most of it, all you hardcore fans have really enjoyed Backbone. It was a pleasure and an honour to have worked on it.

There is a fair amount of discussion in the article in regard to dynamic processing - both in terms of individual tracks and also in regard to the overall level of the album and yes you are 100% correct in saying that WTTM is a much much louder product.

I'm sorry to say that I couldn't begin to comment as to what the plans for ISOTFC and QPQ would be but you can never rule these ideas out.

Thanks for the insight.
It you don't mind me asking, similar to what Frozenhero mentioned, how are the decisions taken in terms of loudness level of the album and for each individual song? For instance, how did you (or someone) decide that Waiting for a Woman would be compressed in, if I had to guess, 3 or 4 db?

[andyb]

Hi all

Some of you may have seen the link for the Backbone article in Sound on Sound when it first came out but not had an opportunity to read it as it was pay per view/subscription. They’ve now released the article in full for free so you can see the whole thing. There’s a lot of tech stuff there but it maybe if interest to some,

bit.ly/SQSOS

[andyb]

Feb 18, 2020 16:06:51 GMT sqcollector said:

Feb 18, 2020 15:43:42 GMT andyb said:

Hello - I'm very happy to hear that, for the most of it, all you hardcore fans have really enjoyed Backbone. It was a pleasure and an honour to have worked on it.

There is a fair amount of discussion in the article in regard to dynamic processing - both in terms of individual tracks and also in regard to the overall level of the album and yes you are 100% correct in saying that WTTM is a much much louder product.

I'm sorry to say that I couldn't begin to comment as to what the plans for ISOTFC and QPQ would be but you can never rule these ideas out.

Thanks for the insight.
It you don't mind me asking, similar to what Frozenhero mentioned, how are the decisions taken in terms of loudness level of the album and for each individual song? For instance, how did you (or someone) decide that Waiting for a Woman would be compressed in, if I had to guess, 3 or 4 db?

Hi SQ - this is a very good question. Thankfully we are all stepping away from a time where everyone is trying to make records that are competitively louder and louder. With the rise of streaming services (who monitor and aggregate their own output levels irrespective of how loud the source material is) the only necessity for making a record impressively loud these days is for physical units (CD/Vinyl) and even then there is a resurgence of trying to maintain the dynamics of the music rather than crush and make it super loud.

I tend to make sure that when mixing I’m never pushing the master output into the red. This means that you get a nice punchy mix that is loud in the heavy parts and suitably contrasts that in the softer passages. It also means that when it comes to the mastering stage you have plenty of headroom to crank up the level should you do wish. However, in the case of Backbone, it was important to make sure that the dynamics were not skewed by over compressing the sonics in the mastering.

So in answer to your specific question it was a matter of aiming for a target level (somewhere between -10 and -8 LUFS I think) and making sure that, after multiband compression, EQ, and a little width and harmonic treatment, the final limiter was sitting around that target without SOUNDING like it was too overcooked. If it was over compressed then it was simple case of easing back a touch on the level. And, if that meant the song wasn’t as loud as it could technically be that was OK too - the onus was always about keeping the musicality of the song.

[sqcollector]

Jun 7, 2020 23:28:37 GMT andyb said:

Hi SQ - this is a very good question. Thankfully we are all stepping away from a time where everyone is trying to make records that are competitively louder and louder. With the rise of streaming services (who monitor and aggregate their own output levels irrespective of how loud the source material is) the only necessity for making a record impressively loud these days is for physical units (CD/Vinyl) and even then there is a resurgence of trying to maintain the dynamics of the music rather than crush and make it super loud.

I tend to make sure that when mixing I’m never pushing the master output into the red. This means that you get a nice punchy mix that is loud in the heavy parts and suitably contrasts that in the softer passages. It also means that when it comes to the mastering stage you have plenty of headroom to crank up the level should you do wish. However, in the case of Backbone, it was important to make sure that the dynamics were not skewed by over compressing the sonics in the mastering.

So in answer to your specific question it was a matter of aiming for a target level (somewhere between -10 and -8 LUFS I think) and making sure that, after multiband compression, EQ, and a little width and harmonic treatment, the final limiter was sitting around that target without SOUNDING like it was too overcooked. If it was over compressed then it was simple case of easing back a touch on the level. And, if that meant the song wasn’t as loud as it could technically be that was OK too - the onus was always about keeping the musicality of the song.

Thank you very much for the reply. Very interesting information!
I never understood why people/labels would like their records so compressed. The only reason I see would be to make it louder in comparison with other artists' songs. But that would only happen on streaming platforms (I know some level match the songs, but, for instance, I don't let my Spotify do that). Which would mean that in CDs/vinyls, where the context is all about music of the same band (multi-artist compilations would (or should) always have the songs level matched, so no big differences there, and radio applies their own compression), would be pointless to have songs compressed to -6 and -5 LUFS. I do understand some amount of compression allows to shape the sound and that's fine. But compression was used and abused. I also read that since the user is listening to a less varying RMS, you'll be prone to like (or interiorize) the song more (because you're listening more of the same thing). I don't know if this is true, though. Doesn't work like that for me; that, I'm sure.

It's was very cool of you to share that info! I'm also into mixing, mastering and production in general. Only as a hobby. So I find it very interesting to peek at the reasoning and the decision taking behind music albums creation, including these technical parts.

Cheers!