Adventures In Mastering: ALICE COOPER "Billion Dollar Babies" for Audio Fidelity..

Pardon my ignorance, but was the Billion Dollar Bill that came with the album legal tender?

 

No, it was a poster.

 

Steve ... I enjoyed you sharing your challenges in putting these tracks together for the mastering process. Great job

 

I'm still getting my head around the notion of gluing mastertape together to finish edits...

 

Perhaps glue from sticky tape used to make edits? I don't think he meant that actual glue, as from a tube, was used to make edits, but I'm pretty sure that sticky tape was used to make edits. It would stand to reason that cellotape from 1972 is not quite as durable as the actual recording tape.

 

Yes, but why would sellotape from the 1950s or 60s be free from that problem? I don't ever recall Steve or any other mastering engineer making comments here about sticky glue needing to be cleaned from the master before.

 

I don't know, but every piece of sellotape that I've ever applied to anything from the 70's ended up being a mess 30+ later. I find it more surprising that we don't hear more of these stories. But I cannot be sure that audio engineers use the same kind of tape I used, it could be something different for all I know.

 

Yes, it caused massive inflation in the seventies - not before I bought a mansion or two though

Tim

 

see, I knew that was it! and they tried to sell us on the idea that it was the Arab Oil Embargo

 

Very interesting, to read about. Sounds like a real forensic excercise to get to the final product. I can't wait to hear the results of all that work.

 

News sent me over the edge. Just pulled the trigger and ordered the AF of '' Love it to Death '' & '' Killer '' . Hope I'm not disappointed

 

Killer is awesome. Raw, analog, all the anomalies of the times/era come thru. Makes for a great experience. Actually same deal with School, but there's something about the lower refinement of Killer...

 

Looking forward to them. Killer's my favorite followed closely by Love it to death. Can't believe I got them both new for $50. Hope I didn't overpay. Time to start the search for School's Out.

 

It just keeps getting better. Can't wait for this one. My new number one priority purchase!

 

salivating already

 

As always, a tip of the hat to Steve for the summary of his adventure and his lunch. Now if we could only have the earlier AF Alice titles as SACDs but that ship has left the dock.

 

Killer rocks, just amazing. I was less impressed with School's Out, but it's still better than the WB.
For LITTD, I'd say stick with the WB.

 

YES!
Can't wait to hear Billion Dollar Babies mastered by our Host!

 

Superb news Steve

I was afraid you'd given up on doing more Alice!

 

Steve,

I have to say I'm a little surprised to read this description of our work. We were judicious about lining up our machines to our set standard and the techs at the Record Plant were the best in the business (having all been graduates of A&R Studios). The only discrepancies should have been between the original album and any "bonus" material that someone may have added later. Also if our cross fades had been moved to the back of the reel, that was something that I'd bet the label would have done when we got to the era of iTunes. Are these in fact the real original tapes?

I'd love to see those tape boxes - so maybe you'd be so good as to put up some pics of them. I'd really appreciate it. I'll keep watching here to see if that happens.

And finally, I wonder why no one bothered to contact any of the creators of that stuff before doing this. It's not like we're that tough to find. I'm just saying.

Bob Ezrin

 

One more thing: the way we made records, the mastering was an integral part of the process. No one took our stuff and reinterpreted it for purposes of mastering. What was mastered back then is what we wanted to hear. Regardless of your take on the quality of the sound of the original album, that IS what we were going for and that's the sound that any true fan ought to be looking for.

What you seem to be doing is re-imagining our work using interim stage components. The EQ'd master was the final stage of production for me. I was in the room, hands on knobs, throughout that process in order to get what I wanted to hear on the vinyl as best we could given the limitations of that medium.

I'm not opposed to re-mastering early works. But I think it's important to try to maintain the intent of the creators in the process. As the head creator of that album, I have to say that reading this report makes me somewhat skeptical about what you guys did there. I'd be happy to listen to the results and give you feedback if you would be open to that.

Bob Ezrin

 

I'm looking forward to hearing Billion Dollar Babies with all the power, all the majesty, all the thunder that Bob Ezrin intended, and which Steve Hoffman will bring out.

 

Good thread - delighted to see Bob Ezrin post here.