Beatles: The extra overdubbed snare.

A lot of later Beatles recordings have an extra snare overdub. Presumeably to give some extra punch. The first one though was on Another Girl from Help.

But why didn't they just record Ringos snare differently so they wouldn't have to go through overdubbing yet a snare? It's always puzzled me.

 

I guess that Bernard Purdie's claim about all his drum overdubbing was really true!

 

Hey Bulldog, I'm So Tired and Yer Blues come to mind.

Not an easy feat when you're recording live to one track.

 

There are many more. I Am The Walrus is one of them. It seems to be centered around recordings from late 67 and all of 68

 

Not guilty is another one.

 

True but thats more like a full drum track and a percussian track only with a brushed snare. Like Calling Elvis (Dire Straits).

 

That was what i was thinking too. And when they were a later in the recording of a song they realized it and dubbed another snare in.

Now these days it is commonpractise to stack the real snare with a bit of sampled snare to make it snappy. (Unpopular truth, but most modern rock albums has this). So really they were way ahead of the rest in doing this.

 

That is one of the most frustrating songs to listen to - dead drums and a quick fade out.

 

I also seem to recall reading in one of my bazillion Beatles books or magazines that Norman Smith had to overdub a high hat part on a Beatles song due to some technical issue, but don't ask me for a source because I have no idea at this point where I read this factoid, or if it is actually documented satisfactorily to meet our stringent forum standards.

 

Well, for my money if they were gonna overdub a snare drum on anything , they should have overdubbed three of them on "Helter Skelter".
For a song that gets mentioned by some people ( me not included) as proto metal, or super heavy Beatles, etc., the snare drum has a tippy tap sound that doesn't really match the intensity of the rest of the track IMO.

Ringo should have taken the tea towel off of his snare for this song.

 

There is some kind of overdubbed drums (not sure if it is tom + snare or snare alone) on "Glass Onion". Ken Scott mentions this in his book-----the last 'clomp-clomp' bridge sounds thinner because he accidentally erased the overdub track it was on by punching in too soon. He seems dismayed that the some fans regard that change as "brilliant" when it was merely a mistake.

 

"Mumbo" by Wings had an overdubbed, deliberately trashy sounding second snare too (and the "Mumbo" link at the end of the album has that snare by itself).

 

It sounds like "Good Day Sunshine" has one, straight drum track and a second with the cymbal crashes and the snare doing the triplet fills and occasionally doubling the beat.

I also read that the whole thing started when the snare got lost as they began to overdub more. I think it's a cool effect.

 

Get out my head - all of my thoughts exactly!

I hate the tea towel!

 

Well, it's nice to know that I'm not a cult of one here regarding the tea towel.

 

I believe it was on "Can't Buy Me Love." The tape got wrinkled and someone had to fix it other than Ringo, as they were on tour in the States. Emerick talks about it in his book, but that can be suspect. I believe Lewinson can back it up as there is a session fee during mixing to an unnamed musician.

 

Thanks for coming up with my source. I did seem to recall that it was Emerick came up with the story. Knowing Emericks reliability facts -wise though, and lacking alternate documentation, I was covering my butt with disclaimers here.

 

I think "You Won't See Me" has an overdubbed hi-hat
but that may have been more for added effect

 

Could be. I'm not near any of my reference things at the moment to look it up.

 

Page 150, "The Complete Beatles Chronicles" Lewisohn -- March 10, 1964 -- during the stereo mixing of many tracks including "Can't Buy Me Love." In 1991, a document was uncovered suggesting a "drummer" participated in the 10:00am - 1:00pm session. He was paid a Musician's Union fee of 5 pounds 15 Shillings. Ringo was on set filming "A Hard Day's Night" for his Ringo solo scenes. Hard to imagine he could have stole off to do a drum overdub at Abbey Road. This is probably the story Geoff talked about.

 

LOL! I'm a big fan of the tea towel but I know what you mean. It just wasn't a sound that suited every track and Helter Skelter is one of them.

 

Sure does.

 

This will likely be addressed again by Lewisohn in Tune In: Vol. 2, due to arrive in 2059.