Stereo recording through decades: left / right balance

[foq1978]

There's been a terrible storm last year - it took me 4 hours to come back home from work (it usually takes me about 45 minutes). The rain was really heavy, etc. Long story short: My car's left speakers stopped working.

I've noticed then that not having the left channels was much more of an issue in older (60's, 70,s early 80's) recordings than in recent ones (late 80's to 2010's).

Do you think this is partly (or totally) because of the advent of the walkman, which popularised headphones for the audiences? Left/Right separation is much more noticeable (and often unpleasant) through headphones than through speakers.

Funny thing: I remember silencing left/right channels of The Beatles albums so I could pay more attention to particular instruments. In some cases, the vocals were completely obliterated by fading one of the sides.

However, since my iPod, which I use in my car's audio system, doesn't have a "turn mono" function, I am now trapped into this.

PS: I know I should have fixed my car's audio system by now. I've been busy.

[foq1978]

No replies so far, or are you talking through the left speakers?

[pasta4lnch]

On some of the first mixing consoles there wasn't a pan pot, but a switch. you had left, right and center.

plus there wasn't much attention payed to it as most people listened to music mono anyway. I even remember growing up in the 80's seeing the word "stereo" as a selling point on boom boxes etc.

I learned how to sing harmonies (well, tried to learn to sing harmonies ) to old Simon and Garfunkel albums where you could take out a whole voice. Kinda cool actually, listening to different mixing styles.

[SLIV]

I actually like it when bands do radical panning. Its kind of daring and it totally opens up the sound more. You can squeeze more in with hard panning. Sure, there's the problem with headphones but I think with some attention to volumes its not too bad.

I think people don't do hard panning as much nowadays is because everyone's scared of making a mistake. Its the same reason why everyone overcompresses the final mix-- got to be as loud (as the next recording). No risk taking.

[brianrost]

When stereo was in it's infancy, radical separation had a "wow" factor. Today it just sounds archaic.

A lot of early stereo (classical and jazz stuff and big-budget pop like Sinatra) was recorded live in the studio...no overdubbing...and most of those had natural sounding stereo imagery.

It was the fascination with overdubs that started causing trouble. The first multitrackers were 3 and 4 track machines which limited spatial positioning when mixing to stereo. Until the late 1960s, many stereo mixes were afterthoughts and all the time was spent on the mono mix. The rise of eight track studios and record companies dropping mono releases entirely changed everything.

[tangentmusic]

Yes, hard panning was the norm on the old school (original at the time!) recordings in the early '60's. You could take an early Beatles song, and pan all the way right or left to hear John or Paul's vocal track on it's own. I like modern songs that use some hard panning for various tracks. For instance, on the new Yes album "Fly From Here" there is some hard panning of opposing random keyboard & guitar parts. It really makes the songs sound "fuller" and more "spacious" in the overall mix.

[Ottsworth]

Originally Posted by tangentmusic

Yes, hard panning was the norm on the old school (original at the time!) recordings in the early '60's. You could take an early Beatles song, and pan all the way right or left to hear John or Paul's vocal track on it's own. I like modern songs that use some hard panning for various tracks. For instance, on the new Yes album "Fly From Here" there is some hard panning of opposing random keyboard & guitar parts. It really makes the songs sound "fuller" and more "spacious" in the overall mix.

I always find it annoying when listening to Beatles tracks that the drums are hard panned (can't remember but I think they panned them right). It's just so off-putting! I'm surprised it doesn't make the needle jump!

[Savage_Dreams]

i love panning! if a band has 2 guitarists, i want to hear one left one right. on a lot my former bands demos, just one guitar track, panned a bit to one side. then i have 2 channels of bass, clean down the middle, distorted to one side. i dont care if people say its weird, i like weird. i hate how so much stuff today sounds so one dimensional. whats the point of 2 guitarists if it just sounds like one? as far as the headphone thing, i like panning even more then because you completely hear the separation. obviously like anything though, it can be done badly.

[groooooove]

i think in modern times engineers know better than to do that. its cool for an effect- but really to make a good mix you dont want anything panned too hard to either side. headphone usage may have a lot to do with it, too.

[teleharmonium]

Yes, the Walkman era did help push mixes toward the center.

But re: Beatles records, remember that most of them were mixed for mono first, and the Capitol versions that Americans were familiar with had wacky fake stereo mixes that were more or less afterthoughts. Same with Pink Floyd's "Piper", "Pet Sounds" by the Beach Boys, and many other albums of the time. As a serious record collector I always avoid fake stereo versions of titles that should be mono.

The later Beatles albums that were actually mixed in stereo by George Martin hold up a lot better on headphones.

I enjoy wide use of the space when it's done well. The move away from that is one of the many casualties of people treating music as something they want in the background all of the time when they are doing other things no matter where they might happen be or how crappy and small and poorly placed the available speakers are.

Then again, I've seen plenty of home stereos with decent sized speakers where one speaker was placed on top of the other.

[foq1978]

Guess what: I've heard the The Killers' debut album yesterday, and there was a lot of hard panning. Especially in some of their best known songs (Somebody Told Me, Mr Brightside).

It kind of made me enjoy them more.