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Home , Jack White, Love Interruption, Olivia Jean, Over and Over and Over, Ruby Amanfu, Sea of Cowards

On Blunderbuss, his solo debut, the analog purist makes spur-of-the-moment choices and proves that you don't have to buy into the loudness wars to make a Number One record BY KYLEE SWENSON GORDON

MAKTNG A gut decision has never been hard for . "If somebody asked rne, 'We're going to record a guitar part in a hotel room: What do you want in the room?' I'd say,'I want a lS-watt amp with a reverb, that Supro guitar, a ribbon rnicrophone, and a reel-to-reel,"'he reveals. "somebody else would say, 'Why don't you bring down ten of my Les Pauls, three Stratocasters, a Tele, four of the Silvertones, the Marshall, a TWin Reverb, six other amps, and we'll record 45 guitar tracks. And then I'n.r going to go on vacation and you engineers pick the best one."' While n-rany famous guitar players like to surround themselves witl-r nearly endless optior.rs, that's not a process that appeals to White. He's most comfortable making resolute selections made in the blink of an eye. "I make my decisions early on and eliminate right from the get-go so I don't have to make those choices down the road, because that just makes it harder on you," he says. The youngest of ten siblings, White took on a love for rock, , and country and started out as a drummer in local bands in . The singer and multi-instrumentalist has since paid his dues leading , , and , and he's col- laborated andfor produced artists ranging from and to O'Brien, , , and even In- sane Clown Posse. His latest project is his first solo effort, Blunderbuss, which debuted in April and was his first to hit Number One on the chart.

OB.2OI2 EIVIUSIC AN.COIVl 19 \ '\s\

la Et\4ustc AN coM 08.20t2 He also heads up a and store, Third Mar.r Records, as well as his owr.r studio, Third Man Studio, ir.r Nashville. He loves vir.ryl, ancl he likes to prodllce expensively made nov_ elties such as liquid-filled and triple_decker t'ecords. "I want to make those thir-rgs exist,', he says. "I want to put vir.ryl in kids, hands.,' White is also an analog_tape loyalist, nos_ talgic for- the days before the aclver.rt of DAWs. "Yoi-r just didn't have any choices to labor upon ,,When back then," he laments. people say, I like this guy's record, but it,s overproduced,, ,What irs a producer I think, does that mean, overproduced?' I wouldn't want someone to say' 1ln1 about my music, and I don,t ever-r knor,r, what that word means. All I cnn think of ,opportunity., irs a synonym of that word is And that can be a bad thing for some people.,, The forn.rer chief engineer for Blackbircl Studio in Nashville, Vance powell_who en_ gineerecl and rnixed Blunderbuss at Third \{ar.r-is a bit r.nore outspoken on the subject of "opportur.rity.,' "To me, the biggest thing destroying modern rnusic is that no one will make a f,**king deci_ sion," Powell says with a laugh. ,,,I,ve gotta have irll rhese tracks and all these playlists ,cause ol cliffelent takes we might want to changc it later.' No! Don,t do that. Just say, '\-es! I bolclly go forward with this.,And thrt's tl.re great thing with Jack is that he nrakes bold decisions.,, To Powell, the lack of commitment in record_ ,.That,s ing'these days stems from fear. what putting ,,I offthose decisions is,,' he says. have tliis niotto, and that is, Just because you can do it tloesn't mean you should.,Just because you can irligl and tweak and tune and make a perfor_ rrirnce perfec! that doesn't mean you should do it. Humans are humans. The world I live in and machine that works ludicrously slow, and .lcfinitel1, it,s tell you: Just go with your gut. you're going tl.re world Jack lives in, sometimes tl.re just really to hard to punch in and out on. Some_ be \\'itrts are tl-re diamonds, wrong sometimes, but in the end so to speak.,' times you get vou,ll at it, sometirnes you clon,t. There least know Por.r.ell also believes the that you went with what you felt old tools to be tried have been times when we didn't and I,rn like, was the right thing to :nd rlue: "Egyptians built pyramids, and they do at the time.,, 'Well, we really liked that part, but now it,s .ii.ln't have ar-ry laser saws or huge trucks or gone. I'm sorry., And he'll just go, ,It,s okay. In the Live Room B lunderbuss :iirr thing'. And those things are pretty cool. We'lljust was largely -Z,rri3is.l do it again better."' tracked Let,s put it this live at White's Third Man Studio, way: We sure haven,t While White goes with his gut, he,s also apt with few overdubs. The lriit ;rnvrhing cooler that will still be standing studio includes two to change his mind about things like arrar.rge_ :t: 5.t)00 r.ears.,' 2-inch 8-track Studer.AB00 tape machines ments. And when and that happens in an ar-ralog a stereo-modified R!.cording in an analog studio, it l.relps that Neve desk originally from studio, it's nothing like a quick pro Tools Shuffie. \\ nir.. is I confidentp;uitar a broadcast studio in Johannesburg player and It takes hours. South And when he doesn,t change l.ris .,::J loe.sn't r.r-rind losing ,,Many Africa. The Studers run at the superslow good takes. times mind, he'll occasionally ,.There,s rate of regret it later. 7-1/2 ips. 'You get I r:n c' rrctualh' recorded over something we an hour and six minutes on a a consequence to making quick decisions,,, . .:c.1." Porr'c.ll ,,We're he reel of tape, and it has a clense, says. working on a tape effected sound,,, says. "But it's like any mentor or parent will ,,What Powell asserts. goes in isn't exactlv what ?o .. . ,.r a:2012 CHALLENGING STEREOTYPES

On tour tor Blunderbuss, White brings two bands: one with all-female and one with all-male musicians. "l said, .What if I had two bands, and neither of them knows if they're going to play that night?"' he explains. "The idea behind the experiment is that it's really shaking things up. lt's been a really funny, strange learning experience for everybody in the camp. The novelty of it competing with the reality makes you think. You have people vocalizing stereotypes, like,'l saw both bands, and lthought the girls were gentler and warmer.'And l'm like, Are you craiy? The girls are kicking ass. They're playing twice as loud as the guys last night.' lt's funny' Sometimes people's preconceptions overpower what they're seeing and hearing with their eyes and ears.,'

comes back, but what goes in is enjoyable. It tapes of outtakes. There's not an abundance doing, all these cats would have gone and allorvs you to be able to make a great-sounding of extra material, though. "If you take a White learned 'Jezebel'offof YouTube, would have rock record that can be played really loud if Stripes album like Elephcnt: There's only one come with a preconception of what it would vou want because there's none ofthat digital take of every song," White says. "That's it. If it have been, and they wouldn't have brought the harshness. We listened to 15 ips, and we were didn't sound good, we just erased it." urgency or excitement to that scenario." like, 'Wow, that sounds great.' Then we listened In the past few years, White streamlined That sense ofurgency played out repeatedly to7-l/2, and we were like, 'Wow, that sounds his decision-making process even more by through the course of recordingBlunderbuss. really. . . interesting."' producing 45s for other artists. "I started The album's first single-a quiet, drum-less Although only four of the 13 songs on this thing called the Blue Series where an ballad called ""-was record- Blunderbuss went to more than eight tracks artist-say, Tom Jones-would come into the ed live, in a2ox24-foot room, in one take. The (maxing out at l4), the track limitations still studio in Nashville, and I would ask, 'What full band recorded it once, but they ended up left plenty of decisions to be made.'you have do you want to work on?'And he would say, using the pared-down version with White on to make hundreds and hundreds oftaste 'I would like to do "Jezebel,"'this Frankie vocals and acoustic guitar, singer choices all day longwhile you're working,' Laine song. I'd be like, 'Okay, what if I got singingbackups, and Brooke Waggoner playing White says. "If you're recording one song, and a harp player in here, pedal steel, a drum- Wurlitzer. Clarinet/bass clarinet player Emily 'r'ou have a few musicians with you and a four- mer, maybe I'11 play acoustic guitar?'And Bowland overdubbed her parts later. track, you have to decide the tone of the bass, I'll start making some calls and see who's For "I'm Shakin'," a cover of the 1960 hit the tightness ofthe snare drum, how long the in town and available. song written by Rudolph Toombs for Detroit- decay on the ride cymbal is, what compression 'An hour or so later that day, a handful of based R&B singer Little Willie John, White and vou're using on your vocal microphone, musicians walked in the door to work on a few other musicians rehearsed it, and the sec- and if you're using real reverb compared Tezebel.' None of those musicians knew ond run-through ended up on the record. "We to digital reverb. You have to make those they were going to be work on 'Jezebel' or had a talkback mic out in the room so that while choices again.,' Tom Jones' record that morning. If I told they were rehearsing, Jack could shout out At , there,s a vault with them two weeks ago this is what they were chord changes or talk to people in the room,"

22 ENIUStC AN COtVI 08.2012 Powell explains. That setup-an Ampex mic "Jack wanted to cymbal that is the loudest ride cymbal on ::: goingthrough a Union Tube & Transistor More planet. It's coming through everything. tr ri':.s line-driver pedal and plugged into an Ampex have a vinyl record like, 'We should really clean this up,' and he 672 tube-amp speaker with an SM57 miking the said, 'Well, we'll just have Brooke plaf it."' amp-was used for White's vocals. "That amp that had no digital As this was a live take, Waggoner had to is buzzing like crazy, but you know what? It contend with an inexact time frame while re- doesn't really matteri'Powell says with a shrug. processing what- cording her overdub. "She was having a harJ "That happened. It was real, and I would never time nailing it exactly, but she ended up plal'- in a million years think of jumping through soever on it. so he ing this cascading part where she's playing some hoop to get the bttzz outl' an eighth note or a quarter note behind her White also sings through a Neumann U47 wanted to record original track," Powell explains. "Then u'hen or RCA 77, the signals for which go into the we were mixing, I fooled around with har-ing Neve console into a Universal Audio 1176 com- from the one-inch the pianos panned left and right and having pressor or Neve 2254 compressor in the desk. the drums in the middle. But when it got to "Often I'11 put the 77 and, the 47 up real close to to another one- the solo at the end, the piano washed out the each other," Powell says. 'And if Jack decides drums. So I panned the drums to the right. he wants to use the 47, we'lljust swing the inch. lhaven't and the tracking piano with the room and the 77 out of the way at 9O degrees, and then I'll drums to the left, and then I put Brooke's pian.- use that as a room mic to get the sound of his done that in, wow, on the right with the drums. When you listen room into the vocal. So there will be two vocal to it, it sounds like one huge piano, but it's re- mics, the mic plugged into the amp, maybe an a pretty long time. ally a double track." amp-mic DI, and a mic on the actual amp, and Because there were so many commitments they're all combined to one track to make the And of course to made early on,mixingBlunderbuss was not a collective entire sound. That's called commit- long arduous process: mainly panning, levels, ment. pcughs.l" make CDs and and a little bit of parallel bus compression via an Acme Opticon. "There's not a single Let It Bleed For White's solo work and the downloads, lalso song on this record that took more than four last Dead Weather record (), or five hours to mix tops, and that's with us Powell sometimes used two tracks for the recorded at high- going to lunch in the middle of it," Poweli drums, givingthe kick drum its own track to says with a laugh. "really punch it to tape," he says. But often- resolution digital, times, as with the lone Ranger soundtrack Blistering Guitar One of the mostpowerful they've been working on, the drums get at 9 6/24;', guitar parts on the album is the riffon "Sixteen bounced to one track to leave space for the Saltines," which White happened upon by ac- unknown, such as strings. While Powell uses Ludwig cident. "That's really funny because I was testing gobos in front of the drums and bass amp, -Bob a '60s Fender reverb tank to see how long the there's still a lot of sound melding together. reverb was lasting for whatever we were going to "The bleed is what makes the record sound on the tape, and since it's running at7-l/2, record that day," he says. "It has a Dwell knob, and right," lowell says. "That's what glues the you've got to be careful that you don't crush I was tryingto see where to put it. So I played that whole thing together." the transients," he says. riffon my Telecaster because I wanted that riff White's drum kit is a'60s-era, four-piece One challenge Powell had while man- to stop, and I was like,'Man, record this riffreal Ludwig kit with a22-inch kick (no hole). aging bleed was with the parlor-sounding quick. I'm startingto like it."' lLaughsf, Powell miked the kick drum with a Klemt double pianos on "Hypocritical Kiss." White, Powell miked up a'63 Fender Vibroverb Echolette ED12 mic (a modified AKG D12). drummer Carla Azar, Waggoner, and guitar- with a NeumannrJ 67,White played it ntice. He also placed a Shure SM57 on the top of ist tracked it with White playing and Powell panned the tracking guitar to the the snare, SM57 on the bottom, an occasional electric bass, as upright bass player Bryn right and overdub double-played through the AEA R92 ribbon mic for the rack and floor Davies was on her way from another ses- More pedal for a clean gain-to the left. "The toms, and an AEA R88 overhead mic. For sion. Waggoner initially played piano on an amp was on the floor, and I put the 67 righr compression, Powell used an ll76 fot the top upright Steinway (miked from behind on on the speaker, right on the outside edge of snare, an 1176 or Fairchild on the kick, and a the soundboard with a single mono U47 fet). the cone," Powell elaborates. "That's a single Neve 32609 or RCA 8A-6.4 as the final com- "When we played back the take, I noticed 15-inch driver. That U 67 went to Jack's \er-e pressor to tape. Bouncing everything to one that there r,fere a lot of drums in the piarlo 1073, and I go in the line input, not the mic pre track, Powell was careful not to make the track," says Powell. "Carla played pretty because the 67 has enough level that 1'ou don't snare too loud: "You only have so much flux loud, and Jack has this huge 26-inch ride need the mic pre. If I pad the mic, it alrvar-s

oB.2Ot2 EMTJSICrA:. :_'. 2:l sounds bad, so I'll use it without the pad and ume war. But I think it's a very bold move for just go in the line input." Jack to say,'I realize that there are records Guitar solos tend to be blisteringly loud on out there that are going to be louder, but I Jack White's . "I will push back on that don't care."' sometimes with him and be like,'Do you think Mastering without compression is some- it's too loud?"' Powell says. "But he's like,'It thing that White wanted to do for a while. For can never be too loud."' One happy accident years when he asked engineers about it, he really pushed a solo to the extreme; Powell didn't get a definitive answer. "I read this book, intended to send the guitar signal through the Perfecting Sound Forever fby Greg Milner], line input for "Take Me with You When You and it was very interesting, talking about Go"-but didn't. "That's a patching mistake," the loudness wars and the speed wars back he admits. "We'd been using this ribbon mic then-33 versus 45 [rpm]-and how history for some fiddle and mandolin, and I wanted and it was blowing up the Helios module in a has gone through all this bizarreness oftry- to use it on his guitar solo. We'd used a couple most unbelievably fantastic way." ing to get the best-quality sound. So this of Helios modules as EQ on another tracks, album came up, and I was like, 'Can we just so they were set up to go into the line input, Gompressionless Mastering One stipu- not change the dynamics ofthe song? Just which was perfectly great because I knew the lation White had for mastering engineer make it louder, but don't compress or limit level coming out of this mic would be loud. Bob Ludwig was that he wouldn't use any it?' Bob Ludwig was like, 'Of course we can He was playing that riff, and I patched into dynamics processing in the mastering pro- do that.'And I was like, 'Why the hell didn't the Helios and slowly turned the fader up, and cess. "There was a study from Earl Vickers anyone tell me that you can do that?! I've when I did, I realized that it was patched into fsfxnoaehine.eom,/docs/loudnesswarl about been asking this question for years!"' So the the mic input. Out on the floor, we have a re- the 'loudness wars,"' Powell says. 'As the master came back, and it sounded great. mote mic pre for the ribbon, so the ribbon was loudness war escalated, record sales went There's nothing squashed or lost in the dy- sending a huge, line signal into the mic pre, down. I'm not saying we're killing the vol- namics, and it still sounded really loud."

C ( t I 5' t " p r r'd z t tt ; :* : 1 a, 9 ry : ; : ::,' 5s t i,3'=',!,fio*; ;:;:: ; i' ; nd u ry * i::; "t; :;'; ; 4, " :i' ::i-: 1::';;:: ;; ' ti;" ;r : *F;n i: :; :; c < t 5 i"j:jl.:: in zy ;;,"7' irrt')r*"''o /" iwr'/ual/e 't.'teer' Sound' Tampa' FL Engineer' Morris - Dave Kaminsky -

"''!Fll "l'm not saying we're killing the volume war. But I think it's a very bold move for Jack to say, 'l realize that there are records out there that are going to

be louder, but I While leaving dynamic processing alone, resolution digital, at96/24. Mastering in this don't ca re."' Ludwig did have to do a double sessionfor BIun- case was basically just signal path integriry derbuss. 'Jack wanted to have a vinyl record that level rides, and equalization." Powell had no digital processing whatsoever on iq' he Ludwig's studio has two modified Ampex -Vance says. "So he wanted to record from the one-inch one-inch, 2-track tape machines. "Tim de "Our machine has different sets of playback to another one-inch. I haven't done that in, Paravicini of Esoteric Audio Research [EAR] electronics: his tube and then Mike Spitz's wow, a pretty long time. And of course to make used to make these beautiful tube electronics Aria Electronics with the solid-state, Class--\ CDs and downloads, I also recorded at high- that we used on one of the cuts," he explains. electronics. And then the recording machine

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--1 was an Aria Class-A machine, as well." every note was just right " Ludwig reveals. For the analog session, Ludwig used Man- In the end, White was pleased that he rva-s ley Massive Passive, George Massenburg, and able to avoid compression overload for Blun- SPL EQs. "If it was something that was a clini- derbuss. "Nowadays when you're recording.- cal thing that needed a cleaning up, I used the he says, "you put a compression pedal on ]'our Massenburg or SPL," Ludwig says. 'And when guitar going to your amp. The microphone it was an overall, fat kind of sound, it was the from your amp to the tape has compression on Massive Passive." it. Then you compress in a submix to another For the digital pass, Ludwigused a Pacific track. Then you compressed it again u'ith the Microsonics digital converter and a Merging bus compressor to the final stereo mix. Then Technologies Pyramix digital workstation. the stereo mix goes to mastering and gets com- In order to match the one-inch sound as pressed yet again. Then the album comes out closely as possible, Ludwig did careful alignment. and gets played to radio and gets compressed "When I did the EQ master for the one-inch, I yet again. Sometimes you're talking about ser- went through five alignment tones-the lk, l0k, one ofthe background vocals from the vocal- en or eight compressions of that original signal f5k, 1O0Hz, and soHz-to make sure that the down mix for just one second. Another micro- before someone actually hears it on the radio." playback of it was as accurate as I sent to it." scopic fix on a songwas a popped "P" on the And let's not forget MP3 compression: "Oh Ludwig spent some time doing subtle gain word "Put." "I had to do a separate pass using the God, yeah, totally!" r rides to push choruses and splicingtogether Manley Massive Passive with aI22Hz hi-pass fil- edits of different mixes. As the album had to be ter to get rid of the pop and edit in the 1O0 milli- Kylee Swenson Gordon is a writer, editor, mastered twice, it also had to be edited twice, so second fix into both the one-inch and the digital," and musician based in Oakland, CA. Her firs: much of his work went to splicing into the one- he says. And "Hip (Eponl.rnous) Poor Boy" re- book, Eleclronic Musician Presents the Re- inch master and then editing again in the digital quired multiple versions. "Jack went through cording Secrets Behind 50 Great Albums. domain. On "Freedom at 2r," Ludwig spliced in it with a fine-tooth comb until every mix and comes out this manth.

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