Joe Barresi: King Of The Rock Age complimented the producer on working for the band, and “not for anyone When it comes to the production of volume-to-11 rock there’s else” – an apparent reference to record company pressures. And so, with no-one better than Joe Barresi – the latest offering from full creative control and a much larger budget to work with than before, Homme and Barresi set out to experiment more than ever and, said the Queens of the Stone Age, Lullabies to Paralyze, is latter, “create something unique.” testament to that. Paul Tingen finds out “The band rehearsed the songs at Rancho de la Luna studios [in Joshua Tree National Park in Southern California]” explained Barresi. how this complex, ear-invading metal “When they came back to LA, I sat in on a couple of rehearsals and it monster was assembled. was mainly a matter of me learning the music and seeing what worked, sonically, guitar- and tempo-wise, and so on. Then we loaded all the gear into Sound City studios and spent the first day sorting through it, plugging things in and deciding what would sound good for what parts. We had a massive array of amplifiers, guitars and drums, including some of my own stuff…” Vintage King When Barresi spoke about “some of [his] own stuff,” he was, perhaps momentarily, under the spell of the British art of understatement, for he’s the proud owner of a rather extravagant collection of assorted boxes, guitars and amplifiers. As he put it, “I have 250 guitar pedals, probably close to 45 guitars, 75 guitar amps (35 combos and 40 heads), and countless pieces of outboard gear. Altogether enough to fill a garage.” To be more specific, Barresi’s gear includes over 30 microphones (from the likes of Royer, Neumann, Shure, Sennheiser), almost 40 compressors (TubeTech, Focusrite, EMI, Neve, Trident, Urei, etc), 30 mic pre’s (Studer, Sontec, Pultec, API, Urei, Joe Meek, Quad Eight, etc), and some more esoteric stuff he’d rather not see in print. The sheer number as well as the nature of these boxes reveals much about Barresi’s approach to engineering, for many affect the front end of recording, and most are analogue, valve, and/or vintage. “I like to focus on things like: how a part is played, what guitar is played, where you position amplifiers, the drums, and the vocalist, what console you track on, the kind of mics and mic preamps you use, and so on,” stressed Barresi. “A few nights ago I spent hours A/B-ing Neve and Quad Eight mic preamps. Stuff like that matters to me. Gear with personality is mandatory and every little bit helps. Analogue gear allows me to experiment and not sound like everybody else. If I was lazy, I’d just put a plug-in on something, but instead I prefer to pick the right compressor or microphone, or get the mic placement right. All this is about the art of making records, which I think is getting lost at the moment.” Photos: Nigel Copp School of Rock As a keen student of the art of recording, Barresi is an avid reader of recording books, magazines, and enjoys watching any kind of making-of documentary. “What really blew my mind,” he explained, “was watching this documentary recently about the making of Who’s Next and seeing Glyn Johns push up just four faders and hearing what I’ve been listening ack in the 1960s, Phil Spector’s influential approach the paracetamol is a matter of taste, but Barresi is undoubtedly Queens of the Stone Age Producer, Joe Barresi, in the to for three quarters of my life! Amazing. These days everything seems live room at Sound City studios, LA, with Josh Homme to mega-sized production was described by the now setting new sonic standards for the production of turbo-charged, to be about musical ‘perfection’, optimum recording levels, complete on guitar. “We had a massive array of amplifiers, guitars Blegendary term ‘wall of sound’. Forty years later, volume-to-11 rock. and drums”, said Joe, something this picture makes fairly isolation on each microphone, and so on. It’s just ridiculous. I like Californian producer and engineer Joe Barresi is attempting The best-known example of Barresi’s sonic barrage is Queens evident. recording straight to analogue tape without click-tracks and without to inch ahead of Spector with a sound that’s so massive, hard- of the Stone Age. He engineered, mixed and co-produced the listening to whether this particular beat is ahead or behind. And that’s hitting, and in-your-face that it can perhaps best be described as band’s eponymous debut album (1998), as well as their recently what we did with Lullabies to Paralyze.” a ‘wall of rock’. released fourth offering, Lullabies to Paralyze. Co-producer on Further prodding for details of the recording of the latest QotSA A sustained listening to music produced, engineered, and/or both albums was bandleader, guitarist, singer, and songwriter album was met with occasional resistance on Barresi’s part, apparently mixed by Barresi is like surfing a Tsunami and being crushed Josh Homme. Lullabies to Paralyze has been well received out of respect for Homme, who likes to shroud the recording process in by a quarry-load of boulders at the same time. Whether this and in interviews, Homme has described the relationship secrecy. Luckily Barresi was happy to spill the beans on the tricks and leads to an exhilarating adrenaline rush or a desperate lunge for between himself and Barresi as “bordering on telepathy”, and working methods that were his own territory. AT|34 35|AT Barresi’s Guide to Miking up the Volume Vocals “I never go in knowing what vocal mic I’m going to use. While cutting tracks I’ll put a couple of mics out and see what the singer sounds like. On vocal days I’ll then put up a couple of mics again and listen and do a shoot-out. Sometimes you have the same microphone for the whole record, but on the Queens album we used different mics on different songs. I rented a Brauner VM1 and that worked really well on pristine vocals. It’s a beautiful, very clear sounding mic. I also used the [Neumann] M49 on a couple of tracks, the SM57 on some others, tried the [Blue] Ball, and used the Shure KSM44, which is really good. “I tend to compress when I go to tape. The [Urei] 1176 is my favourite on vocals, but sometimes the [Teletronix] LA2A works really well. If you’re looking for more dirt you can turn a tube compressor up a little more. I’m not opposed to dirtying the signal up and Joe at the Helm of the Vintage Neve console. Almost all of Lullabies to Paralyze was According to Joe, “There [was] nothing on the album that didn’t touch the Neve at some stage.” blending that in with the original. I’m not a recorded through Sound City’s Neve 8028 desk. transparent compressor guy. I may send one compressor into the other as well. That works well if you need a very upfront vocal. “I try not to use the same thing twice. If I used an Echoplex on the first Queens whole song like that, “ it comes from a different When I’m mixing I’ll compress the vocal record, I wouldn’t bring that the second time round. The making of Lullabies was also with a lot of bleed.” we tried to get a different sound for each musical universe. further, perhaps using a [ELI] Distressor and experimental in the sense that we tried to get a different sound for each song, and One song that saw a “We wanted a circus feel,” something that’s a little cleaner and more song, and even for sections of songs, accurate, like an 1176 or the SSL console even for sections of songs, trying out different microphones than the ones I would lot of experimentation stated Barresi, “and you can’t compressor.” normally use. It was like a recording dream, because not only were the songs good, was the album’s trying out different microphones than the have a big rock circus feel. the guys amazing players, and the record fun to make… it was also like going back to lengthy centrepiece, ones I would normally use” So we made it like merry- Guitars recording school.” Someone’s In The go-round type music, with a “I’ll split the guitar signal, using the PCP For each track the group and Barresi would experiment until they were happy Wolf. With its long, swirling feeling. The ‘circus Instrument Distro or more often my System- with a combination of certain instruments, amplifiers, pedals, microphones, and their impressionistic middle section it almost comes across as a guitar’ is a hollow-body through a weird little combo amp and a atic Systems guitar splitter, which can split placements. Then, continued Barresi, “We went for it and tracked the song. We cut slice of 1970s prog rock. “The band laid the song down live bizarre microphone. There was also a mic in the middle of the the signal to six amps. I don’t tend to use them all at the same time, sometimes it’s drums, bass, and two guitars completely live on all the songs. Medication, Little Sister, with the middle section in there,” revealed Barresi, “and we group. I think that intro had only three or four mics.