Why do some 60s recordings sound so much better than others?

[LR90]

I’ve been listening to some 60s music recently and one thing that struck me was the variability in fidelity between old tracks of a similar vintage. This got me thinking why some tracks sound so bad compared to their contemporaries.

Take ‘A Whiter Shade of Pale’. Fantastic song, but the fidelity is awful:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z0vCwGUZe1I

It’s the same story with ‘See Emily Play’ by Pink Floyd:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7c0EDM-Yu9o

And ‘Flowers in the Rain’ by The Move:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_laosNxqzNg


They sound like old recordings, right? Very distant and not at all crisp or ‘present’.


Now, compare them with ‘A Day in the Life’ by The Beatles:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UYeV7jLBXvA

‘Good Times, Bad Times’ by Led Zeppelin:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TA9Rec1qAFQ

Or ‘No Expectations’ by The Stones:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0aNbZIOvrMI


Now, all of these songs were recorded within a period of about 18 months in 1967-1968, but the latter three recordings, to my ears at least, are MILES better.

It could be argued that the Beatles, the Stones and Zep were bigger bands at the time and had access to better equipment and engineers, but all of these recordings were made at the same small number of London studios — EMI, Olympic, Regent etc.

Pink Floyd even recorded their debut album at Abbey Road at the same time The Beatles were recording Sgt Pepper. So why does ‘Piper at the Gates of Dawn’ sound so pants in comparison?

FWIW, I’m not critiquing the music here, just the quality of the recording. I love all of the above bands.

[StevieBee]

I think - and any audio geeks, feel free to correct - it's down to the tapes used.

Back in the day, the tapes could only be overwritten so many times before their quality began to diminish. It was very expensive so the number of reels made available to bands for recording was limited. So bands that were prone to making several attempts at getting a song right were disadvantaged compared to those that could nail it sooner.

The list of consumables in recording was greater than too: valves, mechanical sliders, etc. I would imagine that the likes of Led Zeppelin and the Beatles could demand that these be new when they enter the studio and I suspect that The Move would be less able to demand such things.

And the late 60s was a time or rapid development in music tech. Stuff that was recorded in 66 or 67 may well have been using gear that had been in use since the mid 50s whereas stuff recorded in 68 and 69 used the latest tech that remained in use through to the mid 80s.

[Yahonza]

Although tapes and microphones would have made a difference, the production is also key here.
For the 3 albums mentioned - Jimmy Page produced Led Zeppelin - in fact he is responsible for their sound.
Jimmy Miller for the Rolling Stones and of course George Martin for The Beatles.

For Pink Floyd - see Alan Parsons for Dark Side of The Moon - still the recording standard even though it was made in 1973.
Compare that with everything they recorded before.

[LR90]

These are both really interesting points. Thanks for taking the time to respond.

From what you've both said, I think it might be a combination of things. Certainly the bad recordings sound 'tapey', like they've been recorded onto cassette. Weirdly though, The Beatles were renowned for not only doing loads of takes, but also bouncing tracks down on the multitrack to make space for more overdubs.

And while this must have had a negative effect on the audio quality, their recordings always sound comparatively crisp. Take 'Strawberry Fields Forever' - they spent more time recording that than any other band had ever spent on a pop single at that point, and yet it still sounds good.

The point about consumables and valves is a really good one — I hadn't considered that. This is an issue that seems to have largely been resolved by the mid-70s, when solid-state desks were becoming the norm, but multitrack tape recording was still being used, so could this be the answer?

Interestingly, Pink Floyd's debut was produced by Norman Smith — the Beatles' first engineer. Of course, no one compares to George Martin, but I can't believe the slightly naff sound quality was down to him. After all, EMI were famously fastidious about everything (they didn't upgrade from 4-track to 8-track until 1968 as they wanted to be 100% sure of the quality) so I can't believe they'd let a substandard producer produce an album.

[nuyorican]

Are you familiar with these recordings before hearing them on Youtube?

What I'm saying is: who knows what the person who uploaded the video used as a source? They may have recorded the song off the radio with a stapler before compressing it to 128kb MP3.

[LR90]

Good point. But yes I do have most of the above on CD.

I was listening recently on Spotify, for full disclosure. While not audiophile quality, Spotify should be good enough not to be colouring my judgement of the recordings.

[DickyC]

You also have to take into account the target audience. A lot of pop was played on old biscuit tins and wouldn't have benefitted from high quality recording.

I'm often disappointed to hear records from my youth in the 60s played on decent equipment now as the songs don't sound right; they're not as I remember them.

[nuyorican]

When did music begin to be released in stereo? Perhaps the bad sounding ones are mono recordings?

I'm just guessing here. It's an interesting subject. I'm music mad, but my tastes tend to coincide with the arrival of the 12" single, so most things sound good to me. From the late seventies to the early noughties anyway.

Actually, maybe that could be it? Music mastered for rubbish 7" vinyl, and intended for (as the previous poster said) people playing them at home on biscuit tins.

[gazza285]

Studio time and budget probably had a lot to do with it, and the experience of the band and engineer/producer.

At the time Procol Harum, The Move, and Pink Floyd were bands only just starting their recording career, with modest budgets, while Jimmy Page had been a big league session guy for years before Zep started recording.

[Nethybridge]

As has been mentioned in a previous post, with the
abundance of crap record players maybe the mix for singles was
designed less for hi-fi, more for volume, whereas album tracks could have more time spent on them soundwise.

I notice this on an early CD of Simon and Garfunkel's
Greatest Hits, the quality is dire, but it's 30% louder than any CD I've got

[StevieBee]

LR90 said:

Interestingly, Pink Floyd's debut was produced by Norman Smith — the Beatles' first engineer. Of course, no one compares to George Martin, but I can't believe the slightly naff sound quality was down to him. After all, EMI were famously fastidious about everything (they didn't upgrade from 4-track to 8-track until 1968 as they wanted to be 100% sure of the quality) so I can't believe they'd let a substandard producer produce an album.

EMI and most of the other recording companies at the time (and thus studios) were generally geared up to record Classical music. For this, the onus for attaining musical quality is squarely upon the performer and the task of the studio, sound engineer and equipment was to record that as close to the original sound as was technically possible.

Pop and rock introduced a new type of musician - the producer. This was someone who'd play around with stuff to achieve interesting sounds which was contrary to the ethos of many studios at the time. Instruments and the like also took this idea on. For example, the Marshal Amp works because it doesn't work. It has an inherent flaw in its design that distorts the sound but that sound has a pleasing effect. Distortion was (and is) the enemy of the classical recording but often the very basis of pop and rock.

So perhaps there was a case of the producer's creativity out-stripping the technical capacity at the time... but they still gave it a go anyway.

[W124]

Time. Time is money in recording studios. Time or luck.

[cherryowen]

Yahonza said:

Although tapes and microphones would have made a difference, the production is also key here.
For the 3 albums mentioned - Jimmy Page produced Led Zeppelin - in fact he is responsible for their sound.
Jimmy Miller for the Rolling Stones and of course George Martin for The Beatles.

Certainly Page had spent years as a session guitarist before forming Led Zep, so was very familiar with recording studios and techniques.

[dudleybloke]

Certain sound engineers will have a certain sound. Might be the same equipment but it's used differently.

[Hill92]

LR90 said:

Now, all of these songs were recorded within a period of about 18 months in 1967-1968, but the latter three recordings, to my ears at least, are MILES better.

The original recordings were made in that period but none of these are the original recordings. They've all been remastered from the original master recordings at different points over the past 30 years. That process is going to be more effective in some cases than others depending on the quality of the master recording, who and how the remastering has been performed and the format that the remaster was produced in and ultimately uploaded to YouTube as.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Remaster#Music

[Neddy Sea Goon]

As a side but related issue, I wonder sometimes if playing older recordings on more modern equipment can let you hear things that you hadn't heard before

[gazza285]

StevieBee said:

…the Marshal Amp works because it doesn't work. It has an inherent flaw in its design that distorts the sound…

What inherent flaw would that be?

[StevieBee]

gazza285 said:

StevieBee said:

…the Marshal Amp works because it doesn't work. It has an inherent flaw in its design that distorts the sound…

What inherent flaw would that be?

IIRC, the first batch of Marshall amps were delivered with a fault that caused a certain distortion. Jim Marshall spotted this and rectified the problem for the next batch but these were returned because bands and guitarists preferred the sound of the earlier 'faulty' ones so he had to de-engineer the design to bake-in the fault that generated the desired sound.

There's an interesting documentary knocking about, on iPlayer I think, about Marshall amps.

[BrownBottle]

It's interesting that you've raised this subject as I had been thinking about it recently myself, I think it was after reading another thread about which songs had the best production on them.

I came to the same conclusion that as you go back in time once you hit the 60's some of the quality sounds absolutely terrible sometimes to the point where it actually grates on me and I find it unlistenable.

[dinkel]

DickyC said:

You also have to take into account the target audience. A lot of pop was played on old biscuit tins and wouldn't have benefitted from high quality recording.

I'm often disappointed to hear records from my youth in the 60s played on decent equipment now as the songs don't sound right; they're not as I remember them.

Jazz and classical tunes from the late 50s and 60s sound great though: labels used thicker vinyl and it shows off.

Stereo became a thing in the late 50s and quality recordings jumped to next levels.

Many R&B and R&R labels had a recording studio on the corner of a street and lacked the hi tech of the bigger labels.

I love the deepness of the mid-range and the soft high tones from older recordings.

It's an imperfection I can really appreciate.