[[email protected]]

I imagine Martin and Emerick mic'd up John's J-160
Gibson for the great acoustic Beatles' tracks, but can anyone
confirm it? Of course, this guitar came with a pickup.
If mic'd, what mic was used? Thanks.










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[geezer]

If memory serves, the J160 had a magnetic p/u at the end of the
fretboard. ( I don't think piezos were used in the late 50s/early 60s
anyway. If they ever were, the sound would likely have been really
bad.)

Anybody who can't hear the difference between a magnetic pickup and a
mic, just ain't trying.

Do you have any tracks in mind where you think they might've used the
pickup??

-glenn


wrote:
I imagine Martin and Emerick mic'd up John's J-160
Gibson for the great acoustic Beatles' tracks, but can anyone
confirm it? Of course, this guitar came with a pickup.
If mic'd, what mic was used? Thanks.

[[email protected]]

"geezer" wrote in
oups.com:

If memory serves, the J160 had a magnetic p/u at the end of the
fretboard. ( I don't think piezos were used in the late
50s/early
60s anyway. If they ever were, the sound would likely have been
really bad.)

Anybody who can't hear the difference between a magnetic pickup
and a mic, just ain't trying.

Do you have any tracks in mind where you think they might've used
the pickup??

-glenn


Strange backhanded compliment. Not not tryin', just
starting out and learning.
Tracks like Norwegian Wood have Lennon on a great
acoustic guitar sound. I'm sure he was playing the J160,as it
sounds like one, and I assumed it was mic'd, as I said. You
confirming that? How about the mic?





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[Nil]

On 17 Aug 2006, wrote in
:

Tracks like Norwegian Wood have Lennon on a great acoustic guitar
sound. I'm sure he was playing the J160,as it sounds like one,
and I assumed it was mic'd, as I said. You confirming that? How
about the mic?

In that particular case, I'm sure it was a mic. You can hear a lot
of pick sound.

I can't think of any Beatles acoustic guitar sounds on record that
sound like the pickup was used. I wouldn't be surprised, though, to
learn that some of what I hear as electric guitar is actually
acoustic with the pickup being played through a guitar amp.

[Scott Fraser]

I can't think of any Beatles acoustic guitar sounds on record that
sound like the pickup was used. I wouldn't be surprised, though, to
learn that some of what I hear as electric guitar is actually
acoustic with the pickup being played through a guitar amp.

The intro to "I Feel Fine" & a lot of of other stuff were that guitar
plugged in. It sounds pretty electric.

Scott Fraser

[Scott Fraser]

If memory serves, the J160 had a magnetic p/u at the end of the
fretboard. ( I don't think piezos were used in the late 50s/early 60s
anyway. If they ever were, the sound would likely have been really
bad.)

Correct, there's a single coil between the fretboard & the sound hole.
Fortunately, no piezos at the time.

Scott Fraser

[HKC]

"Scott Fraser" skrev i en meddelelse
oups.com...

I can't think of any Beatles acoustic guitar sounds on record that
sound like the pickup was used. I wouldn't be surprised, though, to
learn that some of what I hear as electric guitar is actually
acoustic with the pickup being played through a guitar amp.

The intro to "I Feel Fine" & a lot of of other stuff were that guitar
plugged in. It sounds pretty electric.



But not the main riff, that's George. The other guitar plays kind of the
same but in chords with the much dreaded G add9, Andy Summers special. There
are some live footage of them doing that song where Lennon plays the 160, I
guess that must be going through an amp considering the PA systems at the
time.
It's quite a complicated part if you have to do the vocals at the same time
but Lennon does surprisingly well. Not that I mean to put him down but many
really good guitar players would have a hard time doing what he seem to no
problems with at all.
Actually that entire song is quite difficult, Ringo's drumming isn't by any
means beginners stuff either but I guess that kind of drumming was more
standard at the time not unlike 60s drummers ability to play a really fast
shuffle.
As for using the pickup on the 160 I agree that the Beatles most likely used
it now and then for it's semiacoustic qualities (they left very few stones
unturned) but for acoustic sounds I'm sure that a mic was used. George
Martin is pretty much the master of acoustic recording so he's not likely to
settle for a midrangy, low impedance single coil sound when you consider the
mics they have in Abbey Road.

[geezer]

Well, it wasn't backhanded, and it wasn't a compliment. It was just an
observation that the sound of a magnetic pickup and a mic are so
different that it should obvious which is which. The confirmation would
be in the listening.

Don't know what mics they used. EMI was primarily a classical studio,
so I'm sure it was top of the line gear.

I'm hearing an implied question here. Are you trying to figure out
what you should use to record acoustic now? Or are you just into
recording or Beatles' trivia? Nothing wrong with that, but I'm sure
there's documentation of the EMI sessions out there, and that a
Beatles' enthusiast would know about those resources.

-glenn



wrote:

Strange backhanded compliment. Not not tryin', just
starting out and learning.

[Ian Bell]

geezer wrote:

Don't know what mics they used. EMI was primarily a classical studio,
so I'm sure it was top of the line gear.


Most of the pics I've seen of Beatles' seesions use the expected Neumanns
but I have seen several where Rigo's kit have an AKG D90 as an overhead.

Ian

[Scott Dorsey]

wrote:

Strange backhanded compliment. Not not tryin', just
starting out and learning.
Tracks like Norwegian Wood have Lennon on a great
acoustic guitar sound. I'm sure he was playing the J160,as it
sounds like one, and I assumed it was mic'd, as I said. You
confirming that? How about the mic?

Great acoustic guitar sounds come from microphones.

Pickups are for weird effects. And the Beatles... well, the Beatles
did engage in weird effects, so I could imaging them using the pickup
for something.
--scott
--
"C'est un Nagra. C'est suisse, et tres, tres precis."

[Romeo Rondeau]

Strange backhanded compliment. Not not tryin', just
starting out and learning.
Tracks like Norwegian Wood have Lennon on a great
acoustic guitar sound. I'm sure he was playing the J160,as it
sounds like one, and I assumed it was mic'd, as I said. You
confirming that? How about the mic?

Sometimes they plugged it in, sometimes they didn't. When they used it for
acoustic sounding tracks, they miked it... usually with a Neumann. "I feel
fine" was mentioned. The feedback note was John using the pickup on his
J-160e plugged into an amp (Paul is also playing a bass note at the same
time), main riff is played by George on an electric through an amp. The
acoustic is miked on the rest of the song.

[[email protected]]

"The intro to "I Feel Fine" & a lot of of other stuff were that guitar
plugged in. It sounds pretty electric. "

Sounds like a tape edit intro to me....

Lean the J160E against the bass amp, hit a bass note to activate it
into "that" distinctive feedback, and there ya go....

Doesn't mean the 160E was used for the tune itself...

[Jonathan Roberts]

Scott Dorsey wrote:

Great acoustic guitar sounds come from microphones.

Agreed. Piezos are a way to make great acoustic guitars sound like cigar
boxes with rubber bands on them.

(I do have a guitar with a piezo bridge on it -- but it's a solid-body
electric, and in this case, the piezo adds some interesting sounds to
the mix -- literally.)

--
"Coloured and animated, the concerts and spectacles are as many
invitations to discover the universes of musicians and artists
who tint with happiness our reality."
To reach me reverse: moc(dot)xobop(at)ggestran

[Romeo Rondeau]

Great acoustic guitar sounds come from microphones.

Agreed. Piezos are a way to make great acoustic guitars sound like cigar
boxes with rubber bands on them.

I disagree. Rubber bands have a much warmer sound :-) Seriously, though.
Sometimes you don't have much of a choice, acoustic guitars are hard to mike
on stage and not have ringing problems or just plain outright feedback. If
you have high volumes on stage, you are pretty much limited to the piezo at
least into the wedges.


(I do have a guitar with a piezo bridge on it -- but it's a solid-body
electric, and in this case, the piezo adds some interesting sounds to
the mix -- literally.)

Fishman makes a line of combination mike and piezo system that works well.
It's standard equipment on some Martin guitars, but can be bought
seperately. The sound is quite good when you blend the two. It makes the
guitars sound more like guitars and less like banjos :-)

[Jonathan Roberts]

"Romeo Rondeau" wrote:

I disagree. Rubber bands have a much warmer sound :-)

g

Sometimes you don't have much of a choice, acoustic guitars are hard to mike
on stage

Good acoustic sounds live are tough all around ... and the piezo might
be the best of a bad situation. I don't want to sound like a shill for
the company but there is that "Aura" box from Fishman which improves the
tone of the piezo radically; I'm sure that other companies will come up
with similar devices sooner or later.

Fishman makes a line of combination mike and piezo system that works well.

A friend has a similar system on his guitar (which I believe is a
Breedlove, but he's not played live for a couple of years so I've not
seen it in a while), but I've only heard him play it in small venues
where you can also hear some of the sound of the guitar directly, so
I've not been able to evaluate it properly.

--
"Coloured and animated, the concerts and spectacles are as many
invitations to discover the universes of musicians and artists
who tint with happiness our reality."
To reach me reverse: moc(dot)xobop(at)ggestran

[Marc Wielage]

On Aug 17, 2006, commented:

I imagine Martin and Emerick mic'd up John's J-160
Gibson for the great acoustic Beatles' tracks, but can anyone
confirm it? Of course, this guitar came with a pickup.
------------------------------snip------------------------------

All of this stuff is discussed at length in the soon-to-be-released book,
RECORDING THE BEATLES. You can get info on it he

http://www.recordingthebeatles.com

The book is expensive ($100), but looks to be fairly thorough, at several
hundred pages. [The website appears to be down at the moment, but I'm
certain it'll be up again shortly.]

--MFW