Wednesday, November 12, 2008

TVD Update | So, what's going on with Orpheus Records?

Tonight we get a bit of an update. As Rick told us earlier and updated on the Orpheus website, "I floated the question as to whether we should remain open thru November and maybe December. While the response was not overwhelming, those that did respond were overwhelmingly positive... so... WE WILL BE OPEN ALL WEEKENDS IN NOVEMBER."

The month of December we understand, will be totally reliant on the customer response for November. Dizzy Dizzy with Sean Epstein will play in-store this Saturday at 9PM - and it's totally free.


(Image courtesy Flickr user afagen.)

TVD's Daily Wax | The Producers | Jimmy Page

Blues is a tricky genre despite its prevalence. It can either run its routine on ya' or TRANSCEND and lift right off the ground. Led Zeppelin spent very little time on terra firma alongside their peers and lifted off into misty, ethereal heights. And it's not because they perhaps had the best triumvirate of musicians and the finest drummer of all time (apologies to those Moon and Starr worshippers) it's because their studio performances were engineered, recorded, and produced so magnificently.

Via Wiki: "Page is credited for the innovations in sound recording he brought to the studio during the years he was a member of Led Zeppelin. During the late 1960s, most British music producers placed microphones directly in front of amplifiers and drums, resulting in the sometimes "tinny" sound of the recordings of the era. Page commented to Guitar World magazine that he felt the drum sounds of the day in particular "sounded like cardboard boxes." Instead, Page was a fan of 1950s recording techniques; Sun Studios being a particular favourite. In the same Guitar World interview, Page remarked, "Recording used to be a science", and "[engineers] used to have a maxim: distance equals depth." Taking this maxim to heart, Page developed the idea of placing an additional microphone some distance from the amplifier (as much as twenty feet) and then recording the balance between the two. By adopting this technique, Page became one of the first British producers to record a band's "ambient sound" - the distance of a note's time-lag from one end of the room to the other.

For the recording of several Led Zeppelin tracks, such as "Whole Lotta Love" and "You Shook Me", Page additionally utilized "reverse echo" - a technique which he claims to have invented himself while with The Yardbirds (he had originally developed the method when recording the 1967 single "Ten Little Indians"). This production technique involved hearing the echo before the main sound instead of after it, achieved by turning the tape over and employing the echo on a spare track, then turning the tape back over again to get the echo preceding the signal.

Page has stated that, as producer, he deliberately changed the audio engineers on Led Zeppelin albums, from Glyn Johns for the first album, to Eddie Kramer for Led Zeppelin II, to Andy Johns for Led Zeppelin III and later albums. He explained that "I consciously kept changing engineers because I didn't want people to think that they were responsible for our sound. I wanted people to know it was me."

In an interview he gave to Guitar World magazine in 1993, Page remarked on his work as a producer: “Many people think of me as just a riff guitarist, but I think of myself in broader terms... [A]s a producer I would like to be remembered as someone who was able to sustain a band of unquestionable individual talent, and push it to the forefront during its working career. I think I really captured the best of our output, growth, change and maturity on tape -- the multifaceted gem that is Led Zeppelin."


Led Zeppelin - Whole Lotta Love (Mp3)
Led Zeppelin - Stairway to Heaven (Mp3)
Led Zeppelin - The Song Remains The Same (Mp3)
Led Zeppelin - Kashmir (Mp3)
Led Zeppelin - Achilles Last Stand (Mp3)

TVD Ticket Giveaway | The Homosexuals | Thursday (11/13) at The Velvet Lounge

U.K. Post Punk legends The Homosexuals are back at it again and raising hell for the next month in support of their new 10” VINYL EP, 'Love Guns'. The band on a 17-date U.S. tour stomps into DC on this Thursday, November 13th with a show at The Velvet Lounge and TVD's got a pair of tickets to give away.

The Homosexuals – who have been a major influence on many young bands such as The Black Lips and Deerhunter – have been throwing down mayhem and have marched to a beat all their own since being formed by eccentric frontman Bruno Wizard in the mid-70’s. No matter how you talk about The Homosexuals' live show, it's almost always going to lessen the value of the real experience. They throw together "well-constructed Brit-punk — early-Buzzcocks-meets-Vibrators — with more intelligence and sense than blind aggression," as Trouser Press proclaimed.

Plead your case in the comments and we'll choose a winner for the Post Punk mayhem Thursday morning. Don't forget to leave us some contact info too!

"Simply put, one of the most flawlessly great British punk/post-punk bands."
—WFMU

"The Homosexuals were, by all accounts, one of those late-1970s UK garage-punk bands that deserved to reach a wider audience alongside icons like the Sex Pistols, the Clash, and all the rest."
—Marc Hogan, Pitchfork

"I just had the closest thing to a religious experience since my bar mitzvah... "The Homosexuals played the most dynamic, explosive set I've seen in a couple years."
—The Washington Post


The Homosexuals - Slow Guns (Mp3)

TVD First Date | ...with Feral Children

So, I said, "Hey, Feral Children, what's your take on vinyl these days?"

"Vinyl commands respect. It sounds better than any other format, has stood the test of time, and requires a commitment in the way of spatial concerns--both for the vinyl itself, and from a lack of portability standpoint. The idea of vinyl with digital downloads is a great thing that solves the problem my wife has of wanting to take the new Pleasureboaters on her elipticals at the gym, while I just want to sit in my favorite chair with a glass of scotch and listen to the record spin."


Feral Children - Billionaires Vs Millionaires (Mp3)
Feral Children - Jaundice Giraffe (Mp3)
Feral Children - Zyghost (Mp3)