Recording engineer asks "Who do you want to sound like?"

Tony Palmer · Post by **Tony Palmer** » 7 Feb 2015 8:34 am

A friend of mine who has done extensive recording and playing professionally for decades told me he went into a recording studio and the engineer asked the question in my subject title. My friend was surprised but thought about it and said like Eric Clapton on his cover of Crossroads. Supposedly the engineer found a copy of that song, played it through his software, "analyzed" it, then adjusted his settings accordingly.
What kind of information could be pulled from another recording that could possibly influence the engineer....other than what he hears by simply listening?

mtulbert · Post by **mtulbert** » 7 Feb 2015 2:35 pm

That's something I never did in all my years of recording professionally. Normally, I would listen to the players in the studio to get a feel for what kind of tone they wanted and then would try to enhance it for the recording. '

My favorite story about something similar to this was a session I did with a very country keyboard player who was asked to sound more like Elton John. I told him just to play with a lot of attack and that made the producer happy. Afterwards, the piano player walked up to me and said thanks and by the way who is Elton John?

Laughed alot. This happened in 1973.

Russ Wever · Post by **Russ Wever** » 8 Feb 2015 1:05 am

. . . but how does that engineer react when 'John Doe'
goes in and replies that he wants to sound like 'John Doe'?
~Rw

mtulbert · Post by **mtulbert** » 8 Feb 2015 6:05 am

Hi Russ,

Really did not have that happen much, but one time I was doing a gospel group and the singers used their road band instead of hiring studio pickers. The bass play had a Gibson EBO bass which was one of the muddiest basses that Gibson ever made INMO. I tried to get him to switch to the Precision bass which had been set up professionally for studio use. He refused. No matter what I tried to do there was no way to get note separation and after the first take the producer complained bitterly about the bass sound even though I had warned him what would happen. So he says to me "Why we use Henry S. and get a great bass sound from him." I said so do I; why not just hire Henry?

Sounding like a player to me involves more than just the tone sounding like him. The style has to be matched as well which in most cases does not happen.

Russ, I hope I never encounter that situation; it can only lead to hurt feelings.

Charlie McDonald · Post by **Charlie McDonald** » 8 Feb 2015 8:12 am

I find it a strange question. 'Here's my band, we want to sound like the Doobie Brothers.' None of it makes sense.

Did this producer have a style or rhythm analyzer? And why?
Maybe he does feng shui analysis and water divining as well.

Even if he were able to sample the eq or the 'tone' of the recording, what could he do with that?
Snake oil for suckers, something to replace listening.
'I want to sound like Stevie Wonder!'
Signed,
Suspicious

Earnest Bovine · Post by **Earnest Bovine** » 8 Feb 2015 9:13 am

The engineer's question isn't quite as crazy as it may sound at first. Amp modelers have automated the process of emulating any amp you have for any guitar that you have. Fractal Audio has been doing it for years with the Axe-Fx II, but that's for linear changes to the signal (basically EQ). The newer Kemper profiler units can model the non-linear stuff (distortion, compression, etc).

To do this properly from scratch you need to have your guitar, and the amp you want to model. But of course they have already done lots of amps & guitars. As usual we don't expect they have done it for steel guitars & your favorite steel guitarists. It's too late for Jerry Byrd. But Paul Franklin could model his Little Walter with the Kemper profiler.

I don't think they are quite at the point where you can play the solo steel intros that Buddy Emmons did on Ray Price's There Goes My Everything or The Other Woman, and make your tone sound like the record.

Rick Schacter · Post by **Rick Schacter** » 8 Feb 2015 10:58 am

An amp modeling software called Bias has tone matching and it works pretty good.
I've been using it with my pedal steel as well as 6 string guitars and it sounds good to my ears.

John Macy · Post by **John Macy** » 10 Feb 2015 9:38 pm

You mean like the banjo player that asked the engineer to make his banjo sound good and the engineer replied "I can make it sound like a banjo, but I can't make it sound good...".

Tony Prior · Post by **Tony Prior** » 11 Feb 2015 1:46 am

it doesn't make any sense to me either. A typical session does not EQ or mix to a final product while recording, the initial track recording is to get a good performance on TAPE, not get the best tone . Sure, a good sound but thats not the immediate goal.

I'm certainly no PRO engineer but to me it sounds like the guy asking that question is less of a PRO than me !

" Man, I got your sound down perfect, your tone is like a real pro but your playing could use some help, do you own a tuner " ?

Bob Hoffnar · Post by **Bob Hoffnar** » 11 Feb 2015 7:48 am

Getting a good tone is an essential part of recording a good track. The less work you make for the engineer in mix down the more often you will get hired.

Charlie McDonald · Post by **Charlie McDonald** » 11 Feb 2015 8:05 am

Bob Hoffnar wrote:The less work you make for the engineer in mix down the more often you will get hired.

Exactly. I suppose if I don't grasp the original question, it doesn't seem like it should arise if you know what you want.
What I would look for in an engineer would be one clear enough of intent to change what he hears.

Tony Palmer · Post by **Tony Palmer** » 14 Feb 2015 4:39 am

Ok I would not post such a suspicious question if the person who told me was not entirely trustworthy and experienced. He's a keyboard player from England who has recorded with Savoy Brown, John Mayall, Fleeteood Mac, Howlin Wolf, Chuck Berry and a host of others! And of course the engineer did not mean sound like, as in talent, licks and skill, but rather eq and balance.
I posted because I never heard of analyzing a recording to gather data from it which would/could then be used for a new recording, and like most of you, was skeptical.

Tony Prior · Post by **Tony Prior** » 14 Feb 2015 5:09 am

I don't say and didn't say getting a good tone is essential at the time of tracking but thats a totally different thing than "who do you want to sound like ".

two totally different and unrelated scenario's. I too track with EQ up front ahead of the track and print to the track, ..but not because I want to sound like any of you guys !

In my limited pro sessions I have never been asked "who do I want to sound like" but I have been asked about overall EQ frequencies or overall tone that I like...

I still just find "THAT QUESTION" to be odd and don't confuse that with getting the best tone you can ahead of the recorder whether printing with EQ or not.

I have spoken with several "certain" session pro's that we all know and admire regarding tones on records and tracking, many laughed and said it had nothing to do with them it was all done post production. One of them even told me he never liked the tone on record, he thought it was way too bright !

So if tracking , the more reasonable question to ask is, are we tracking with EQ ahead of the recorder ? because if thats the case then you can spend some time dialing in what you desire.

"I wanna sound like Buddy with the Blade".

"Ok, whats that mean" or " you don't have a mid 60's PP, that ain't gonna happen "...

admin · Post by **b0b** » 14 Feb 2015 9:22 am

I used to have a piece of software that would analyze a source audio and a target audio, and then give give you a control to nudge the frequencies of the target 0-100% towards the source. It was very useful in mastering, to get a more consistent sound from one song to the next.

Alas, the computer that ran that software went obsolete, and I never replaced it. It was called FreeFilter, from Steinberg.

Rick Schacter · Post by **Rick Schacter** » 14 Feb 2015 10:20 am

I understood the question.
Of course no matter who you try to sound like, you will always sound like you.

But who hasn't heard a certain player's tone and tried to copy it as close as you can? I certainly do.

Modeling software or even some of the modeling amps like the Fractal get you even closer than you could probably do on your own.

Heck, as far as recording is concerned, not only will I try to mimic someone's tone, but I even try to mimic the entire mix of an album if I like it enough.

I do an A/B comparison with my mix compared to the album, attempting to get it as close as I can.

admin · Post by **b0b** » 14 Feb 2015 12:09 pm

Exactly what FreeFilter was good for, Rick. I used it to make a rock band sound more like Fleetwood Mac once. It did improve the overall sound of the mix.

Rick Schacter · Post by **Rick Schacter** » 14 Feb 2015 4:29 pm

Yes,Bob, those types of apps can be very useful.
An app that I've been using lately for doing an A/B comparison is called Magic A/B.

I put it on my master bus, load a track that I'd like to use as a reference, than compare my mix to the reference.
For modeling, as I said earlier, I've really been impressed with an app called Bias.
If I had enough money to get a Fractal, I would.

Tony Palmer · Post by **Tony Palmer** » 14 Feb 2015 8:53 pm

Aha! So it is possible. Interesting.....

Rick Schacter · Post by **Rick Schacter** » 14 Feb 2015 9:10 pm

Tony Palmer wrote:Aha! So it is possible. Interesting.....

It certainly is possible.

To be clear, the app that I've been using to tone match is called Bias Desktop.
I don't think Bias for iPhone or iPad has tone matching.
They're still very good amp modelers though.

Tony Prior · Post by **Tony Prior** » 26 Feb 2015 8:28 am

I understood who do you want to sound like to mean, playing style, tone, execution etc ...

Why not get one of these switch panels ?

Tony Palmer · Post by **Tony Palmer** » 26 Feb 2015 10:54 am

Ha! Yeah you could sell a million of those pedals, Tony :p
Ok, ok....the recording engineer really did ask the question but he meant "what BAND do you want to sound like". I assume he was looking for directions for the mix, i.e., dry or highly processed vocals, leads way out front or more subdued, snappy drums or buried in background, heavy or light bass, etc. so in that context it's really not an unusual question.
But it's what he did next that I didn't understand.
He analyzed a song...in this case a Clapyon Blues song...somehow...then proceeded to use THAT INFORMATION to adjust his settings.
What the heck could he have used to "analyze" the song track?
My friend who was presented with the question has done so much recording he can't remember exactly which studio it was or I would simply call the engineer and ask him.

admin · Post by **b0b** » 26 Feb 2015 4:00 pm

That's exactly what Steinberg's FreeFilter does, Tony.

Ian Worley · Post by **Ian Worley** » 26 Feb 2015 7:25 pm

b0b wrote:That's exactly what Steinberg's FreeFilter does, Tony.

Izotope's Ozone plugin can do the same thing, they call it "Matching EQ"

Rick Schacter · Post by **Rick Schacter** » 27 Feb 2015 9:25 am

Tony Palmer wrote:
I assume he was looking for directions for the mix, i.e., dry or highly processed vocals, leads way out front or more subdued, snappy drums or buried in background, heavy or light bass, etc. so in that context it's really not an unusual question.

Not an unusual question at all from the engineer.
They use to A/B mixes with a turn table and an album.
These days it can be done with software.

As I mentioned earlier in this thread, the Magic A/B plugin works extremely well for this purpose.

It's a great way to dial in your mix.
Just like playing styles, there are quite a few styles for mixing too.
A Motown mix is going to sound completely different from an Abbey Road or Nashville mix.
It's very helpful to have a reference.

For tone matching, as I said earlier, Bias Desktop works great and as we see from others who have contributed to this thread, there are a few pieces of software that can do the trick as well.

Tony Prior · Post by **Tony Prior** » 27 Feb 2015 6:22 pm

b0b wrote:That's exactly what Steinberg's FreeFilter does, Tony.

Ha, you mean one of those filters can make me PLAY like Buddy ?

I'll take two..!

t