Whatever happened to Barry Diament

Whatever happened to Barry Diament? He was the Atlantic Studios mastering guy who mastered Led Zeppelin, U2, Bob Marley, Bad Company, and a ton of other artists' CD's back in the 80's. He just kinda fell of the face of the earth. Has he done anything recently? Anybody know anything about him?

 

he mastered also ELP

 

Been on Slayer, Genesis and Bob Marley projects.... Not sure about "lately", but he's done quite a bit...

 

Gosh, years ago I read a story on him in Mix or something like that. He seemed to sound like sort of a purist in the article, using as little processing as possible.
Does the sound of his CDs back that up?
Dan C

 

Yes. But curious how so many of the albums he remastered were later done over again, the Zeppelin being the most obvious examples. And not always to our liking, though certainly to somebody's.

ED

 

He might have gotten a tough break being able to only work with later generation masters during the 80's CD rush. I thought his Bob Marley CD's sounded OK for it's time. I think Led Zep, Bad Company sound way better now remastered (I know there are arguements about Zep CDS's) but again it could be his sources that were crappy, not his work. That's why I was wondering if he did anything more recently.

 

IIRC, he also worked on new recordings at the time, including Edie Brickell and the New Bohemians "Shooting Rubberbands at the Stars". I think that's a pretty nice sounding record.

PS: I might be way the hell off here 'cause it was so long ago, but for some reason I associate that article with this record. Maybe it's because I was listening to it while reading. Anyone have the CD handy?

 

He wrote a small article in The Absolute Sound way back when, discussing the virtues of using 1st generation masters. He included a short list of CD's which were mastered using original tapes. I will try and find it. I do remember one of them was White City by Pete Townshend.

 

I would love to read it if you find it.

 

Barry once had a few "comments" about Steve and his work on Pet Sounds. I don't have the issues of The Abosolute Sound where these appeared, but I do have the issue of The Tracking Angle where Steve was interviewed and this was one of the things discussed.

 

I know he did new releases back in the mid-80s. He did Ratt's "Dancing Undercover". It has a nice, funked-with sound.

Too bad he doesn't appear to still be in the mastering game. We need guys like him. Maybe he got pushed out because he refused to use NR and maximize levels.

 

The original ELP: S/T CD mastered by Barry Diament is an excellent, very smooth sounding disc.

 

But the newer Marley CDs don't sound better than Diament's. In fact I think Diament's were better and I've kept them.

 

Whoa... I thought I was up on the CD versions of Pet Sounds but I never heard about this!

I learned the record from the original (circa 1994?) CD. The intros were WHAT?

 

I agree they sound good probably because he had access to good masters. I though the Bad Company CD's sounded horrendous but I think Atalntic used crappy masters for a lot of their back catalog in the 80's.

 

I recall reading his comments in some collector magazine like Golmine a few years ago. There was quite a big bruhaha over it.

I have the box set. Does that help?

 

The article was from 1986. He states that when mastering, he basically went direct from the analogue playback unit to the digital, with the shortest cable length possible. I will try to post some excerpts when I have time.

His list was quite short...

Pete Townshend "White City" was from a flat digital copy of the master.

CSN&Y "Daylight Again", Robert Plant "Pictures At Eleven" and AC/DC "For Those About To Rock.." were made from original 1/2" analogue master tapes.

 

Sorry mate, don't agree here. I have sitting in front of my face Bad Co.: 10 From 6 and it is mastered by Barry Diament and it sounds like a great flat-transfer IMHO. His ELO masterings blow away all of the "remastered" versions including those "Mastersound Gold" ELO albums.

 

Me too. I still feel that his early Zeppelin CDs are the most natural sounding, with decent life to them. I dont think they are from 1st generation tapes, but I like them better than the remasters. I especially like Graffiti. I also like his 10 from 6 as well.

 

Well, he goofed, but it was an honest goof. A good reporter or reviewer would have called you and asked for a quote as to why you did this, whereupon you could have set him straight.

I think your famous example of that Laser Disc review you always joke about comes in to play here. Was it Citizen Kane that this reviewer gave a less than stellar review to? (He said that he had to take points off because he was disappointed that Kane was not in color or wide-screen and that it had just mono sound; naughty!)

 

An honest goof is one thing, not doing your homework quite another...I remember that CITIZEN KANE fiasco! That and THE THIRD MAN were among the early Criterion Collection titles we all went ga-ga for, because finally you at least got an idea on home video what a theater print might look like; nice job, for the time.

Mistakes with countoffs are notorious: on both Chris Montez' "Let's Dance" and Tony Joe White's "Polk Salad Annie," the countoffs were part of the original 45's; though some reissues got them right later on, some did not, lopping off the countoffs because whoever remastered it thought it *didn't belong* and didn't bother to reference it with the old vinyl to find out.

Honest mistakes, but not the kind you want to make. Somebody always notices....

ED