The recording is very similar to the ones I was doing at the time, an OTRF array. but he's using $2000 B&K mics, and all I had were my much beloved and missed AKG 451's. Of course, there's one other tiny difference. His was from the front row of the Taper section and had his mics on stands 7 feet tall, and mine are in the middle of the section, 25 feet in the air, and have 6 different mics hanging off the array, recording for friends and benefactors.
One night in '91 out of the blue, there's this ripple of sorts coming towards me, and it's Dan Healy, legendary FOH engineer for the Dead, and he's craning his head up at my array and goin' "What in the hell have you got up there?" in an actual tone of interest, and not the scorn one might expect from a road vet like him. Because i know, what I'm thinking up and doing taping-wise is going against most of the section and their Nakamichi 300 shotguns that are all middle and no highs or lows. I explain what I'm doing, and he gets a look on his face and goes "huh" as he processes. He then grins says I can see where your going, Cool." and we shoot the audio shit for a minute. I apologize for going up in '88 and asking for more Phil, and he laughs it off. Then BAM, just as quick as he shows up, he's gone. I kept the mics that high to minimize the crowd noise of the howler baboons and drunk idiots("HEY! IS THIS GONNA FUCK UP YOUR TAPE? AAAAAHHHHOOOOOOOOOO! Fuck you guys!") found at every show.
WAIT A MINUTE. IT'S BEEN 20 FUCKING YEARS SINCE THIS SHOW? HOLY CTHULU. time goes fast when you get married, move have a child, move again, get divorced and move once more.
Currently, I am sitting in the booth at Giants Stadium, circa 1991. DAMN this sounds good. As with most of Clay and Brenneke's tape with the B&K mics, the sound of the mics is almost dead flat, and has no particular character, more of a clinical observation. And let's all be thankful that they had the cash and know how to make it happen. My tapes are colored by the 451's tendency to be a touch bright, but I liked that. I tried to use them in as neutral a way as I possibly could, until 94 when I battery powered the Mackie 1202 and had those nice preamps, a little bit of eq, and an excellent mix between tow AKGs with the cardioid heads wide left and right in the OTRF and and two with the short shotgun heads pointed more directionally and added to give some center fill. The Help/Slip/Franklin's from '95 were recorded this way and I was closer to the front, and it can still fool my head that I'm in the omnibus. Having the dead neutral recordings are a valuable tool to have to compare all others to.
http://www.archive.org/details/gd1991-06-17.fob.brennecke-young.GEMS.95644.flac16
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