What Rudy Van Gelder Did "Wrong" [Article]

Interesting Reverb article about the 'perceived benefits' of Rudy's white hot recording process, with comments from Blue Note president Don Was, Posi-Tone's Nick O'Toole and a classic re-quote from Steve Hoffman himself.

I wasn't aware that Rudy would disguise his microphones so others wouldn't catch on to what gear he was using. Fascinating stuff.

What Rudy Van Gelder Did "Wrong"

 

I’m definitely in agreement with Mingus’ oft-cited quote about Rudy’s style changing players’ sounds. I first listened to Herbie Hancock’s “Empyrean Isles” in its entirety without realizing it included Tony Williams—one of the most distinctive drum sounds in jazz. The make and model of his trashy yet endlessly expressive ride cymbal has had drummers speculating on its make and model for years, but on BN recordings you won’t even hear it.

Bass players and drummers on BN albums seem to fare the worst. In most cases, they could be anyone (Blakey being the immediately identifiable exception).

Pianists can occasionally cut through and identify themselves melodically or rhythmically, but cutting everything off at 8-10k and then compressing it into audio sausage means you’re never going to hear the difference between say, Hancock’s lighter touch and McCoy Tyner’s heavy hand.

 

“Take three or four expensive German mics with a blistering top-end boost, put them real close to the instruments, add some extra distortion from a cheap overloading mic preamp through an Army Surplus radio console, put some crappy plate reverb on it, and record. Then, immediately (and for no good reason), redub the master onto a Magnatone tape deck at +6, compress the crap out of it while adding 5 dB at 5000 cycles to everything. That’s the Van Gelder sound to me.”

 

Can you translate?

 

It's more fun to fill in the blanks

 

Enough said

 

Although I'm inclined to agree with Steve I will admit that Rudy did have an instantly recognizable (albeit dirty) sonic fingerprint. Whether or not you like it you know it's RVG as soon as you hear it.

But I've often wondered why so many people love that sound. Ultimately I think it comes down to nostalgia mostly. Some listeners associate this sound to a time and place where they first heard these records. So the sound takes them right back there mentally. At least that's my two cents. YMMV.

 

Agreed. There’s also the fact that the BN catalog includes some of the best performers and performances of jazz when it was at its second most popular peak. Even though you’re viewing them through a slightly dirty window...

 

I really don't get the idea Don Was posits here, that the distortion in Rudy's recordings somehow translates to what he calls "immediacy." Distortion is distortion. End of story.

 

That’s a singular view that anyone is welcome to hold but musicians and producers use various types of distortion to positive effect.

So yeah, distortion is distortion but not all distortion has the same effect on music.

 

Obviously but here I'm referring only to the distortion inherent in Rudy's Blue Note recordings.

 

What did RVG do wrong? Nothing. Nor did Alfred and Francis.

 

Meanwhile, at Englewood Cliffs, April 1966...

 

Amazing! Thanks for posting. Here's a famous one recorded at the same place, same year:

 

Wasn’t Art Blakey’s “Free For All” recorded in Englewood? On the other hand, that’s Art—known to be one of the most gleeful and proficient punishers of VU meter pins in all of jazz.

 

And the horns too. Those guys were on fire at that session. I don't blame Rudy much for that one. He probably dialed it down as best he could but the sheer intensity on display was...well, intense.

 

By the way Mr Freeman @Reverb, it's not Ray DuNann but Roy DuNann...

 

An interesting article. If you don't notice that "Wrong" is in quotes, it sounds like an indictment of Rudy's recordings. He did have a recognizable sound that was/is not everyone's cup of tea. I have a few reservations about some of his recordings, but I am so glad he did what he did.

 

Can't be much "wrong" if the recordings turned out to be so great.

 

...he’s giving it four out of five stars....for accuracy

 

Someone (maybe in a thread here) once offered up a thought experiment of what classic BN albums would have sounded like recorded by other labels, for example Blue Train recorded in Columbia studios with its lush, natural reverb (think Kind of Blue) and more natural piano sound vs. Rudy’s spring verb and heavy-handed compression. As iconic as some of the BN recordings are in their existing forms, I’m not sure they would have suffered.

 

What are the sonics of a jazz ensemble in a small nightclub??