My crystal ball tells me this will get messy and that editing-muscles will be strained. At best.
Ugh!
Phoo, it really is harder to play with a click than without. Why is that?
It’s because people aren’t perfect and a click track forces them the be in mean and unnatural ways. Music should flow and a click holds that back.
Yet, good steady musicians don’t necessarily waver that much. A band playing all together can be all over the place and it can sound great because they are all together, pushing and pulling in a music way.
When layering tracks one at a time the base needs to be perfect because the natural interactions of playing together is simply gone. It can’t be added after the fact. Every track added at a later time has to fit perfectly the preceeding tracks, and if the previous tracks are speeding up and slowing down then so too much all later tracks.
If the original tracks were played sloppily then all future tracks will need to stick to the same sloppiness perfectly.
Not using a click track results in what some of us call the drunken drummer effect. If anyone has ever played with a drunken drummer (or been one listen back later) then you know what I mean. It’s not good.
And it’s no easy feat to make click track perfect tracks sound musically swingy, but it’s a lot easier than making a drunk drummer sound straight.
Hmm. But the ideal for those of us who do it one track at a time would be to start with tracks that are not to a click track, and that breathe in the right way, and then layer on those? I’ve just finished Emerick’s book “Here, There, adn Everywhere” and he mentions doing exactly this in when recording the Beatles several times. So if I get into the song enough, I could lay down the guitar and let the drummer play to that instead of a click - assuming that the drummer hears the song the way I do…? Or better yet, start with the drums, and get them right…
Yes, that is indeed the ideal, but doing that can harder than playing to click track. It’s like playing to a click track that’s changing. If it’s not changing JUST RIGHT you’ll be off. A lot is lost and unrecoverable when not playing together.
Emerick did that when recording the Beatles as a band. They didn’t bring in Ringo to lay down just his drums to nothing. The whole band, except maybe missing a member or two, played the rhythm tracks together. Guitar and drums - bass and drums – most likely drums, bass, and guitar or piano. They went over it and over it until they had a good basis to build the song on.
Starting with the drums and getting them right is the best way to go by a LONG ways. A steady drum track that breathes in the right way (as you say) is as good as a click and is natural to play to.
Learning to play with a metronome is one of the more difficult parts of becoming a better musician.
Actually, Phoo, I think I remember (and my memory is not always reliable) that in several songs they had Ringo hit the hihat to create a click track (and IIRC Paul conducting to keep it even), and in at least one case Paul recorded something all by himself and the rest was overdubbed on top, drums and all - was that Penny Lane?
I remember reading about it, thinking, wow, that is amazing.
I’ll see if I can find it.
Yes, but did Ringo try to change the feel of the songs by speeding up and slowing down at the appropriate times, or did he try to stay as dead steady as he could when hitting the hi-hat? Sounds like they were trying to create a click track just like we are needing.
Before we go off and analyze what the Beatles did, go back and listen to the drum and guitar tracks for this project. Do they sound steady enough to be used as the basic tracks?
no
Quote: (phoo @ Mar. 06 2008, 6:31 PM)
Yes, that is indeed the ideal, but doing that can harder than playing to click track. It's like playing to a click track that's changing. If it's not changing JUST RIGHT you'll be off. A lot is lost and unrecoverable when not playing together.
Emerick did that when recording the Beatles as a band. They didn't bring in Ringo to lay down just his drums to nothing. The whole band, except maybe missing a member or two, played the rhythm tracks together. Guitar and drums - bass and drums -- most likely drums, bass, and guitar or piano. They went over it and over it until they had a good basis to build the song on.
Starting with the drums and getting them right is the best way to go by a LONG ways. A steady drum track that breathes in the right way (as you say) is as good as a click and is natural to play to.
Learning to play with a metronome is one of the more difficult parts of becoming a better musician.
I come to the party late - apologies - but'll I'll still throw in my 2p.
I have to agree with Phoo on this one. A collab without a click track is really difficult. Especially when trying to add the rhythmic back-bone like drums and bass.
The problem is, that you are always listening for the tempo, always reacting, not driving forward. This results in slightly hesitant tracks rather than confident tracks.
Thinking about Ringo and the Beatles, some of Ringo's drum parts are more akin to percussion tracks than straight drum tracks. Perhaps that makes a difference.
And you can plan tempo changes into click tracks.
I am no where near being a professional but just for the heck of it…
Ever since learning to create a click track by using a midi HH and snapping it to a grid, I always start a project that way. Then make a rough sketch of the song, add in everything, remove the rough sketch and maybe even the HH click track and then go from there…
Point being that the click track might be boring but it makes it far easier to add stuff later on - midi items in particular.
1 cent…cha ching
cliff
Ah! It was Penny Lane - pp. 142 ff of Emerick’s book - Paul did the piano part first and then kept on layering things on top - Emerick describes Paul’s timing as “rock solid” and says that’s what made the feel of the song so good. I’d like to see a tempo map of PL, actually. I would bet there are variations that make musical sense, and all the overdubs matched them. So, wouldn’t the conclusion be that the best case would have a “master track” of some sort (piano in PL, click track, full rhythm section usually) that controls things?
I’m not disputing the need for a click track for those of us who are not Pauls, just thinking through things. 
I’ve met people who strike me as having that sort of sense of timing.
Quote: (TomS @ Mar. 07 2008, 1:31 PM)
Ah! It was Penny Lane - pp. 142 ff of Emerick's book - Paul did the piano part first and then kept on layering things on top - Emerick describes Paul's timing as "rock solid" and says that's what made the feel of the song so good. I'd like to see a tempo map of PL, actually. I would bet there are variations that make musical sense, and all the overdubs matched them. So, wouldn't the conclusion be that the best case would have a "master track" of some sort (piano in PL, click track, full rhythm section usually) that controls things?
I'm not disputing the need for a click track for those of us who are not Pauls, just thinking through things.
I've met people who strike me as having that sort of sense of timing.
I must check out that book Tom, sounds interesting.
I guess though if you've got "all day" in the studio it must be easier to get things right. Most of my tracks are from "stolen moments" where I want to get as much done as possible.
Sounds like a book I need. I have “All You Need Is Ears” already, so a book from Geoff Emerick will be a wonderful companion. It’ll be great to see how Sir George and Emerick’s views differ and are the same.
As for the great ongoing discussion about click tracks and feel…
Don’t confuse tempo with feel. Changing tempos and leading and lagging the beats are not the same things, though they are obviously very closely related.
A true click track is used to keep the tempo steady and provide a stating place and fallback (How many pop songs have real tempo changes?). Using a click doesn’t mean you have to stick RIGHT TO IT perfectly. Good Feel is knowing when and where to lead or lag (play ahead of the beat or play behind the beat) while not straying from the underlying steady tempo too far.
Tempo changes are part of the arrangement of the song. On top of pre-planned or improvised tempo changes there is the feel that is lead and lag, and speeding up and slowing down is some of that. Is that tempo change a result of a desired feel change or because the drummer or band happened to speed up or slow down a little?
(most drummers rush fills because of adrenaline, not because they intend to play a fill faster than the tempo)
Another monkey with a wrench is that many of us record songs by playing all the parts. When one person plays all the parts is way easier to make them fit together without a click for simple reason that one person will naturally speed up and slow down the same ways at the same places. When more than one person is adding tracks they will not naturally have the same groove, unless they have been playing together for years. They will have a tendency to pull apart instead of together. Think about the first times a new band rehearses. It will be rough until each player learns how the other players groove. Eventually, with practice they will learn to play together.
Now, take that scenario on step further. What would happen and how would it sound if just the drummer was not quite steady and has a tendency to speed up and slow down at places that seemed unnatural to most of the other musicians in the band, yet, the drummer for whatever reason, refused to try to play WITH the other musicians. He’d plow ahead at whatever beat he felt like at the time, not listening to anyone else but himself. The only way this would work would be if the drummer was rock solid and steady.
What would it be like if it wasn’t the drummer, but a guitar player that was like that?
I’ve actually been in a band with a bass player that was that way. He WAS the beat and tempo, and everyone HAD to follow him, regardless. That band went through six drummers before I joined. I was with them for two years. The only reason I stuck around was because he quit. He walked out with no notice because of the tension. The very first night without him, the new bass player was walk-on friend of the band that sort of knew the songs. He fumbled through but made it through the night OK. After that performance we got compliments that we had never sounded so tight. The reason was obvious.
You don’t have to look at each other to get or be tight, but you have to listen very closely to each other’s playing. This is how collaborating can like being on stage with people you’ve played with for years.
What THAT got to do with click tracks? Well…who are you listening to when the first tracks are laid down? What’s the band grooving to at that point?
A STEADY drum track laid down with out a click is as good as a click only if it’s steady and it leads and lags and changes the tempo where it needs to. It’s that drummer the isn’t listening to anyone else in the band. He better be right on the money.
A drum track that feels jerky or seems to just speed up for no reason is not a good track to use as a basis for a collaboration.
recording-the-beatles-geoff-emerick-speaks
This is pretty cool!
The book is pretty much like that. 
Listen to Rocky Raccoon… I don’t know how they recorded it but it doesn’t start ‘gelling’ till around half way through. Probably the most noticeable tempo ‘breathing’ I can recall in all the Beatles tunes I’ve listened to in a while.
There are some very professional people here.
I’m not one of them.
Not trying to do anything with even a hint of conformity or
structure. I know many people need structure or they are lost.
Yes, a click track is a good thing, but it automatically
creates a limitation. If you sat at a canvas, and the subjects
were already sketched, or it was a paint by number, right away
you would be constrained and your creativeness would be nonexistent.
For example, I may want to add a Tarzan call, and place it in
the timeline on it’s own track. Someone else may think - that’s
messed up. At that point, they can mute that track or time-stretch it
(always preserving someone else’s original) or add a reverb, etc.
It’s collaborative in the sense of a forum thread. Even this one.
Start out with an idea about making music, and before you know it
your reviewing a book, - it doesn’t detract from the thread, in fact
it enhances it.
Yup. 
Funny how much music is about ideas. Still, when monday rolls around, I’m going to listen to that drum track very carefully, sevenofeleven, and we’ll see if we can’t give folks another Penny Lane. 
My first thought on the drum track (and why I brought it up) was I was suspecting it got goofy in compression and extraction. Listen to yours Tom and let me know, I will make some notes on it where my copy feels ‘off’.
Well, I know that compression and extraction often make me feel pretty goofy, so it wouldn’t surprise me at all.