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Original Sgt. Pepper’s session master tape CLICK ON IMAGE TO SEE LARGE VERSION
NORMALLY, LOOKING AT A TAPE BOX IS NO BIG DEAL, but when it’s an original multitrack master tape from a Beatles session, we’re dealing with pure audio archaeology. And with today’s 09/09/09 Beatles hoopla, I thought I’d share a bit of Beatles history…
Years ago, while on a jaunt in the U.K., I was fortunate enough to get way, way close to this holy relic and somehow had the foresight to snap a picture of the tape in question to share with you now.
What you see here is a 4-track master on 1-inch tape from The Beatles’ Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band sessions. Using two 4-track machines to create tunes with eight or more tracks using tape editing, track bouncing and manual sync methods, The Beatles, George Martin and crew went through a LOT of tape in the course of producing the album.
Recorded at 15 inches per second (the maximum speed on a stock Studer J37 deck) at Studio Two in EMI Record’s Studios on London’s Abbey Road on January 20, 1967, this 10.5-inch reel tape contains tracks from “A Day in the Life,” with rhythm on track one, vocals on track two, bass/drums (and apparently tambourine) on track three and orchestra on track four. The notation beneath the track listing notes that a better phrasing of the words “blew his mind out in a car” is on another 4-track tape recorded with a different take.
Recorded on February 2, 1967, the other 4-track tune on this tape is “Sgt. Pepper’s,” with rhythm on track one, effects on track two, horns on track three, and vocals (with printed echo) on track four.
The “GE” initials on the box indicate the engineer was Geoff Emerick, with PMc (Phil McDonald) assisting on the first session and “RL” (Richard Lush) on the second date.
The tape itself was EMI’s house brand.
Who says that archaeology is all about ancient history?
________________________ When not working on MIX stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here ARIEL PLAYS “ARE YOU READY TO ROCK” and check ‘em out, doing a recent in-store performance for The Gap’s 1969-2009 40th Anniversary “Born to Play” celebration.
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LES PAUL, THE AVIATOR??? Here’s another astounding story about a side of master guitarist/inventor Les Paul that’s never been referenced anywhere and here it is for the first time. Interestingly, the link to this whole episode starts years ago in my studio. Stay with me for a bit and enjoy this amazing revelation about a side of Les few people know about…
In 1988, I was recording Greetings from Ariel, the debut album with my band, ARIEL. It was a fun rock excursion and featured a number of well-known guitar players doing guest solo spots. We had already recorded tunes with Ronnie Montrose, Jeff “Skunk” Baxter, Brad Gillis, Bill Spooner, Danny Kalb and Craig Anderton-all monster players in their own right, but I wanted to record something with Les Paul as well.
I called Les, asking if he’d be interested in doing a session. I told him we could do it any way he wanted. We could do it at his house, or at a studio in New York, or I’d fly him out to California and we could do something in L.A. during Winter NAMM, or we could do something in my place near San Francisco. He said no, because he was retired from that and if he consented to do my project then he’d have to do a lot of explaining to Lionel Hampton’s manager, who evidently had been calling fairly frequently, trying to get Les to do a project with Lionel.
Les started asking about my studio. Thinking that this meant he was perhaps warming up to the idea of doing something for his old pal George Petersen, I gave him a detailed description of the gear, which included an Akai ADAM digital 12-track, a highly modified 56-input Soundcraft 600 analog desk and a homemade digital 4-track mastering system made from interlocked Nakamichi DMP recording processors-essentially hotrodded Sony PCM-F1 units.
My studio, circa 1988
Next, Les asked where the studio was and I said it was in Alameda, California. Then the bombshell hit. “ALAMEDA, CALIFORNIA!” Les shouts. “Years ago I swore I’d never return to that &%#$&#$ Alameda, California!” The immediacy (and vigor) of his response made me think of the Three Stooges’ “Niagara Falls” routine, where Curly goes berserk whenever he hears the phrase “Niagara Falls.” Something was going on here, and I wanted more information.
I asked Les for some extra details and he told me the most amazing story. At some point during his Army stint during World War II, he was flying in a two-seater Army Air Corps plane over the San Francisco Bay Area.
During the flight, the plane developed a massive hydraulic leak, started losing control and spraying fluid all over the cockpit. Les said he was soon soaked with the fluid and evidently “some other fluids” (thankfully he didn’t elaborate about the “other” fluids) as the plane suddenly starts losing altitude.
NAS Alameda, circa mid-1940’s
Fortunately, down below, the two spotted the Alameda Naval Air Station with its long, clear runways reaching out into San Francisco Bay. Somehow the pilot manages to make it to the runway, but the plane hits hard, bounces up and on second impact, the wings snap off.
This leaves the two occupants wheeling down the runway in the fuselage, with little control while trying to stop before the plane ends up in the bay. Just before the breakwater, they finally manage to stop the plane, but getting out, Les and the pilot face the mile-plus walk back to the control tower.
Off in the distance, the pair noticed a jeep heading towards them. Salvation at last! And after surviving a harrowing landing, at least they won’t have to walk back. The jeep pulls up with a sailor/driver and a furious officer, who screams “You have no right to land an Army plane on a U.S. Naval facility!”
Les never did tell me what happened next, but he concluded by saying, “That’s why I’ll never return to Alameda, California.”
And after that experience, I’m not sure I’d blame him for feeling that way. ________________________ When not working on MIX stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here ARIEL PLAYS “ARE YOU READY TO ROCK” and check ‘em out, doing an in-store performance two weeks ago for The Gap’s 1969-2009 40th Anniversary “Born to Play” celebration.
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HAVING BEEN A FRIEND OF LES PAUL FOR 25 YEARS, I have many good memories about him and I’d like to share a few of these. I called Les up once in April, 1994 (for some reason I still don’t remember) and as we made some small talk, I asked him if he heard the news about Richard Nixon, who had passed away the weekend before. As soon as I mentioned the name “Richard Nixon,” Les suddenly became very belligerent, and started screaming “Richard Nixon—that good for nothing &%#$&#$!!!” Once I got Les to calm down somewhat, I meekly asked “so I guess you didn’t like that guy?”
In some very strong words, but in a far calmer voice, Les finally replied that he hated Richard Nixon. I asked why and he said it went way back to the days when that &%#$&#$ Nixon was vice-president—and before, when he was known as Richard Nixon, “commie fighter.”
Les explained that back in 1953, he got a phone call from Richard Nixon. Once he heard the voice say “This is Richard Nixon,” Les muttered (expletive deleted) and hung up. A minute later the phone rang again, Les picked it up and the routine repeated. Finally the phone rang a third time, with Nixon saying “Les, this is really Richard Nixon,” thinking the reason for the earlier hang-up was because Les assumed it was a prank call.
Figuring he wasn’t going to shake the VP, Les asked why he called, and Nixon explained he was calling to ask whether Les and Mary Ford could play a command performance at the White House for (the new) President Dwight Eisenhower and First Lady Mamie Eisenhower. Although Les didn’t think much of Nixon, he was definitely in the “I Like Ike” camp, and immediately agreed to do the gig.
The day of the show came and everything went fine—at least until halfway through the show, when Nixon jumps up on stage between songs and asks Les to play a request for the First Lady. At this point. Les starts worrying, because he and Mary are playing to backup tracks with Les using a footswitch to trigger the start/stop cues on a tape recorder/amplifier hidden in a box he sits on during the show. The tape has rhythm guitar and Mary’s harmony parts sequenced on the tape. There’s no way to change the order of the songs during the show and he doesn’t want to reveal that their amazing full stage sound comes from taped tracks—a common practice now, but certainly a rarity in 1953.
Finally, Mamie Eisenhower thinks about the request and says she’d like to hear “Vaya Con Dios,” which was on the charts at the time. Les says “I think we can do that,” clicks on the footswitch and begins playing. Coincidentally, “Vaya Con Dios” was the next song on the tape! So there’s you explanation of why Les always hated that &%#$&#$ Richard Nixon.
The NAMM Connection Flash forward 49 years later. In 2002, during Summer NAMM in Nashville, Sony was hosting a special event for a limited number of members of the music/audio press—a private dinner with special guest Les Paul. I was among those few chosen to attend, and as I was friends with Les, Sony’s Paul Foschino asked me if I would do an interview-style conversation with Les after the dinner, which everyone would listen in on. I gladly accepted the offer and also encouraged them to videotape Les’ stories for posterity, which they did.
As the moderator/interviewer, I asked Les about his early days, developing the solid body guitar and his experiments with sound-on-sound recording and multitracking. Towards the end of the evening I threw in this zinger: “So Les, I understand you once had a chance to meet Richard Nixon.” I figured that would add some spice to the conversation, but was surprised when the wiley Les—knowing the cameras were rolling—wasn’t wrinkled at all. In a very matter-of-fact tone, he calmly explained that he was very excited about the propect of playing for President Eisenhower, and at one point Mamie asked for a request, which happened to be in the order of the sequence was playing.
No screaming. No expletives. But now you know the real story.
Hopefully, somebody at Sony still has the tapes from that evening. And hopefully those tapes don’t have any unexplained gaps.
But you never know…
_______________________ —Thanks to Rick Clark for the photo above of Les and I from that Sony dinner.
When not working on MIX stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here ARIEL PLAYS “ARE YOU READY TO ROCK” and check ‘em out, doing an in-store performance a week ago for The Gap’s 1969-2009 40th Anniversary “Born to Play” celebration. ________________________
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WE OFTEN GET A LOT OF STRANGE ITEMS IN THE MAIL at the Mix offices here, but the other day we were intrigued by the arrival of a rather odd parcel. Within the ordinary-looking outer packaging was an unmarked black box (somewhat reminiscent of the black monolith from Stanley Kubrick’s 2001-A Space Odyssey) and within that was a Mackie Onyx 820i analog mixer with FireWire interfacing, a copy of Pro Tools M-Powered software, a DVD marked “Insert Me” and a page of instructions printed using ransom note-style cut-out letters. The outside of the mixer’s box (shown in the photo below) touts a large notice saying it’s COMPATIBLE WITH PRO TOOLS M-POWERED in large letters with the words “and Logic, SONAR, Cubase, etc.” listed beneath in smaller type.
In true Mackoid tradition, the DVD had a short video clip of a Mackie employee with an altered voice, wearing a stocking (actually it was a pair of pantyhose) over his face to conceal his identity. The mystery spokesperson explains a few people were chosen to receive this “top-secret” parcel and then goes to play part of a Pro Tools session through the 820i. More mysterious perhaps was the other file on the DVD–an installer for the “Mackie Universal Driver Version 1″ that would let Mackie products act as an audio interface/front end for Pro Tools M-Powered software. If so, it’s a big deal–a lot of impact for a relatively few lines of code.
Assuming this isn’t simply a case of reverse-engineering on Mackie’s part, this development is significant for several reasons. Up until this point, Digidesign has been exceedingly protective about its hardware, with the only sanctioned deal being certain gear from sister company M-Audio working with the specially branded Pro Tools M-Powered software. So this is either the first step (admittedly, a small step and not a leap) toward penetrating Digidesign’s “software curtain” on Pro Tools hardware, or simply opening the market somewhat on the M-Powered side to bring more users into the Pro Tools fold. And once there, some of these users would, in theory, eventually upgrade to Pro Tools LE or a full-bore Pro Tools HD system, making it a coup for Mackie and a win on Digidesign’s part.
Yet, other than a mysterious note, a new FireWire-enabled mixer and a driver with a LOT of potential, there are many questions and few answers–at least so far. What other products are planned? Will/can other manufacturers join in the fray? Will this lead to third-party openings for other Digi products, such as Pro Tools HD or Pro Tools LE? In all, quite a mystery. However, more information should surely come on September 9–Mackie’s “official” launch date for the 820i. But one thing’s for sure: This story ain’t over yet. Not even close. Stay tuned to mixonline.com for more developments.
We’ll be watching this one!
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
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EVER WONDER IF SOMEONE’S PUTTING YOU ON? We always appreciate getting e-mails and comments about Mix and the industry in general, but every once in a while, we just gotta wonder whether someone’s putting us on. It’s the web equivalent of the phrase “O.K., Where’s the hidden camera?”—wondering whether Allen Funt is gonna come out from behind a curtain. And sometimes, maybe it’s simply a sad reflection on whoever actually sends these things.
One time, some guy inquired, asking for a recommendation about what kind of outboard mic preamp he should buy. Someone told him his tracks would sound much better if he bought a Neve preamp. I replied that to in order for us to maintain some kind of impartiality, we have a policy of not recommending any specific products unless it is part of a written article, review, etc. But out of curiosity, I asked him what kind of mics he had. He replied he had a couple of Shure SM57s.
Believe me, there are few mics more amazing than this must-have, time-tested classic, but at this point the “Candid Camera” alarm went off in my mind. However, diplomacy set in and I recommended he could probably get more quality for his money by first getting some better mics which later—once he’s ready to invest in a super-quality preamp—would really make sense. Problem is some schmoe, an “expert,” no doubt, gave some one-size-fits-all advice that really didn’t fit his particular situation.
Another time, some guy e-mailed after reading what we assumed was a thoroughly tongue-in-cheek article I wrote on the back page of our AES issue last year with a bunch of joke press releases called “Products You Won’t See at AES”. You can check it out here: CLICK HERE FOR ARTICLE.
Among other things—including gems such as “The Roach Coach Music Library,” a “Drunkulator” plug-in and a “Stoogelizer” outboard processor—the list described the “Virtual Sur-Reality” helmet, which would give users the visual impression they were mixing in Abbey Road studios or the Sydney Opera House rather than the cheesy studio or dumpy basement club they were in.
It was written in jest, yet some poor soul actually thought it was real (talk about sur-reality!) and wondered how he could contact the manufacturer. I’m sure it was quite a letdown for this person to hear the truth, but maybe there’s a lesson to be learned here that indicates there might be a market opportunity for someone to actually make such a product. Any takers? And hey, if it’s on the Internet, it’s gotta be real… doesn’t it?
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
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DURING MY 28-YEAR TENURE HERE AT MIX, I’ve done hundreds of interviews with people in all aspects of pro audio–engineers, producers, live sound mixers, artists, educators, studio owners, manufacturers, designers–you name it. But it isn’t very often that I’m the one being interviewed, although a couple of these instances occurred recently. One was by my old friend Alan Parsons, who was doing some kind of video documentary and talked to me about Mix magazine during the AES show. It’s too bad he didn’t interview me about the time we spent a week teaching audio seminars (and goofing off) in Argentina for some events sponsored by the wonderful Mercedes Onorato, but like the old saying goes, what happens in Buenos Aires STAYS in Buenos Aires. There are a lot of great stories about that trip, but maybe some other day…
My other interview was by the awesome, talented publicist Marsha Vdovin, who spoke to me a couple weeks ago about my work with the TECnology Hall of Fame, which I founded five years ago as a spinoff to the TEC Awards, to honor audio innovations and innovators from the relatively short (OK, 125-year) history of pro audio, going back to the early work of pioneers such as Edison and Berliner. Marsha’s project had to do with this year’s induction of Bill Putnam’s 1176 compressor—truly a classic in anyone’s book. In fact, I was equally honored to have Bill Putnam Jr. (of the reborn Universal Audio) be on hand to accept the award in the memory of his father.
The sad side of pro audio’s history is that it’s fleeting, very fragile and often poorly documented. Researching this stuff ain’t easy. Many manufacturers are long since out of business. At some companies, no one remains who has any knowledge of the original product—even a few years later. The history of pro audio—our very lineage—is woefully neglected and sources are scarce, if not impossible to find, so ANY effort to chronicle our past is a worthwhile effort. You can check out profiles and information about all of the TECnology Hall of Fame inductees to date by clicking on TECnology Hall of Fame, http://mixonline.com/TECnology-Hall-of-Fame/.
Anyway, after all these years, it was great to chat with Marsha about some of the background behind the event and recall a few highlights. But rather than spoiling all the fun, you can check it our yourself at the Heritage Section of Universal Audio’s website. These guys really understand the importance of history.
As a sidenote to this year’s TECnology Hall of Fame, one of this year’s other inductees was for the Kurzweil 250 keyboard, and although Ray Kurzweil wasn’t able to attend, we were pleased to have his daughter Amy accept the award on his behalf and keeping with the trend, Eric Blackmer, son of the legendary late David Blackmer, accepted the induction for his father’s classic dbx 160 compressor.
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
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YOU CAN TELL IT’S AN ELECTION YEAR. Members of the Senate and House of Representatives in Congress are considering the Commercial Advertisement Loudness Mitigation Act, which would require the Federal Communications Commission to prescribe a standard to preclude commercials from being broadcast at louder volumes than the program material they accompany.
The text of this proposed legislation (bills H.R. 6209 and S. 3154) states:
“Within one year after the date of enactment of this Act, the Federal Communications Commission shall prescribe pursuant to the Communications Act of 1934 (47 U.S.C. 151 et seq.) a regulation that provides, in connection with any video programming that is broadcast or that is distributed by any multichannel video programming distributor, that—
(1) advertisements accompanying such video programming shall not be excessively noisy or strident;
(2) such advertisements shall not be presented at modulation levels substantially higher than the program material that such advertisements accompany; and
(3) the average maximum loudness of such advertisements shall not be substantially higher than the average maximum loudness of the program material that such advertisements accompany.”
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
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I HAVE MASTERS–LOST MASTERS–ON MY MIND THIS WEEK. A couple days ago, I got a blog reply from a guy named Tony Vick, who once upon a time, was in a band called “The Din.” So far so good, but the bad part comes in because the group was signed to Rocshire Records, a label funded entirely by money embezzled from (aircraft giant) the Hughes Corporation. Tony had read an archived copy of my “How to Make a Million Bucks in the Music Biz” AudioBites column (July 2007) and was wondering if I had any leads on how he could get access to his masters. Unfortunately I don’t have any leads to help him–maybe someone out there knows where the FBI keeps master tapes that were seized as part of criminal investigation 25 years ago, but my guess is that the odds aren’t in Tony’s favor on their survivability today. And IF anybody does know, please drop me a line and I’ll get the word out.
Anyway back to today’s story… A month ago, I wrote about walking through URBAN ORE, the local recycle/reuse store three blocks from the Mix offices, across the border in Berkeley.
During my lunch hour today, I went by to peruse their latest offerings. Every once in a while, this place has something surprising–by the way, that Neve/Necam 96 power supply is still on the shelf there–but what I saw today was both odd and sad: Hundreds and hundreds of reel-to-reel tape masters–analog and digital (probably Mitsubishi)–which mostly were marked with notes/track sheets from Fantasy Studios, although some had Hyde Street Studios markings. There they were, quarter-inch, half-inch, 1-inch (probably ProDigi 32-track) and tons (literally) of 2-inch analog reels–piled up high on pallets and rolling freight carts. Most seemed to be mid-late ’80s and ’90s–and mostly Ampex formulations.
How did they get there? This one’s easy. Most studios offer tape storage for clients’ materials, and over time, people forget to pick up their masters. And with the recent ownership change at Fantasy Studios, somebody figured (and rightly so) that they weren’t really responsible for master tapes from sessions going back two decades or more, so after being degaussed, these abandoned masters went off to the recycle store.
Warning to the wise: If you have masters that you’ve been storing at some studio–any stiudio–from years back, you might just look into getting them back–before they disappear.
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
RESPONSE FROM FANTASY STUDIOS
Nina Bombardier, the previous studio manager, tried for 1-1/2 years prior to the changeover of ownership to contact the rightful owners of the tapes. While many people did respond and pick up their masters, there were many who did not. I personally witnessed her day after day try to contact people via phone, email, and letter. Feeling that more than the “best reasonable effort” was made to contact the owners of the tapes, Concord Records, the previous owners of the studios made the decision to donate the remains to Urban Ore for recycling. All tapes had been degaussed before and after donation. The state of California states that it is a courtesy not an obligation for a studio to store the works of an artist more than 30 days. (This is something that we stress to clients). Many of these tapes had been there 20 or 30 years. Having to clear out the vault for a new tenant forced the decision. I share this to give a more complete picture to the situation.
Jeffrey Wood Fantasy Studios
REPLY FROM GP: Thanks Jeff, for the clarification. Certainly it was never my intent to blame either you, Nina, or Fantasy Studios for the disposal of masters that were essentially abandoned after some 20+ years of storage. But at least you’ve made it clear that prior to disposal, these were properly degaussed. So rather than a treasure hunt for lost masters, maybe this is an opportunity for on-a-budget recordists to perhaps pick up some bargain 2-inch stock, as I assume most of the 1/4-inch stuff is full of splices and leader, making it less than useful for re-use, except as a source of clean take-up reels. My main intent in the column was to wake some people up who may be facing similar situations where their masters may be lurking in other facilities. Thanks again for your comments. –George Petersen
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LAST WEEK’S MIX NASHVILLE EVENT WAS AWESOME. Two jam-packed days of seminars, panel discussions, hands-on product demos, music performances and fun. Interestingly, one of the more unexpected highlights was a mostly informal get-together party after the first day’s conclusion. With free beer, food and cookies, it was a great chance for all the attendees to talk, do a little networking, make a few industry contacts and check out some great local talent. One of the more unexpected things was that for a “local” event, I talked to people who had come from Colorado, New England, Atlanta, New Mexico, Los Angeles and even Indonesia–and all of them said the trip was most worthwhile. For some highlights, click on MIX NASHVILLE and check it out, but the bottom line was everybody said the event was great. It’s definitely gonna happen again next year–be there.
If you wanted solid advice on recording and live sound, there was plenty to be heard at the Mix Nashville seminars. I was hosting three different panels —on using plug-ins live, studio design/speaker optimization and placement and “Recording the Band,” a panel about tracking during live shows. During the latter, veteran Robert Scovill offered this suggestion: When you’re on tour and recording lots of shows, make sure that along with your multitrack files, also include a 2-track mix with your archive. This way, weeks, months or years later, someone who may be going through dozens of shows (or more) won’t have to load and re-create an entire mix session just to determine which song performances to use. Even if you’re pressed for time, a board mix on CD-R will do as a quick reference. And make sure you label and document everything.
Sometimes it’s the little touches that can make your life a lot easier down the road–even when you’re off the road.
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
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THERE’S SOMETHING COOL, HIP AND INHERENTLY GREEN about recycling and every now and then I go by this very cool (and very Berkeley) place called Urban Ore, which is just a couple blocks away from the Mix offices. This is a locale where people bring old furniture, leftover building materials and obsolete technology stuff to be resold, reused and otherwise redistributed to people in the know. It’s essentially a huge old warehouse and outdoor sales area brimming full of STUFF of every sort (and well sorted), ranging from consumer electronics, plumbing/electrical supplies, picture frames, desks, sinks, tubs, windows, doors, slightly overused–meaning really beat up–musical instruments and occasionally (but alas, not too frequently) even PRO AUDIO.
But today in the electronics section–among the piles of Kodak Ektagraphic slide projectors, 1970s-era slide programmers/dissolve units (in case anybody is old enough to remember olde-style multimedia/multimage), Mac 8600s, vintage PCs, turntables, cassette decks and piles of Jaz/Zip/Bernoulli drives–was a more unusual item.
A Neve/Necam 96 power supply.
Unfortunately, no other Neve gear was lurking about, but at a mere $50 buckaroos, you could have this monster of monsters: About six rack spaces high, it must have weighed about 100 pounds–they just don’t make ‘em like this anymore. What awesome construction!!! I was even tempted to bring it home and adopt it myself for resale or some future project, but this was like the big one you toss back into the pond, hoping that it will make someone else’s day.
But the real mystery in the back of my mind was what tales this thing could tell. Where did it come from? What great projects did it once supply (pun intended) the juice for? Some things I may never know, so if anyone DOES know, let me know and help me finish this Unsolved Mystery for the rest of the world…
I hate telling you this, because, for one, I don’t want anyone to be misled and think that among the porcelain toilet tanks, printing presses and dictaphones that haunt this place, there are boxes of dusty Neumanns in every corner–which there aren’t, although today, they had a 15-inch Peavey Black Widow woofer (untested and missing its aluminum dust cap) for $12, a solid-looking single-15 cab in faux wood finish–empty, but sporting road handles and dual front ports for $25 and an empty (but extremely heavy) dual-12 cab–it was a generic roadcase-looking box (no handles)–for $20 or so. Yet at the same time, they were trying to sell some heavy black/chrome older steel Atlas speaker stands (NOT MIC STANDS) priced about $260–I’m not sure who came up with THAT price!
So you never know what to expect. Besides this week’s Neve PS, they also had a Sony SDDS 35mm projector soundhead for $25–not bad if you need one–and an Ampex 35mm mag stripe stereo reader (the “penthouse” style) also for $25, but it will be a while before that one moves… Oh, and if you happen to need to need some 35mm exhibition reels, they have both 6,000 and 13,000 foot versions in stock this week.
When not working on Mix stuff, George Petersen records and performs with the SF Bay Area-based rock band ARIEL. Click here www.jenpet.com/ariel.html and check ‘em out. ________________________
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