Doo Wop Sound!

[thatjazzbassguy]

I'm not even sure if it's a thing but I've been trying to look into some doo wop vocal groups from the 50's and 60's such as The Cleftones, The Monotones, The Silhouettes, Dion Dimuci and so on...

Does anyone know the kind of gear that was sort of "standard" back in those days for these kind of recordings?

Thanks a mil!

 

[Michedelic]

I'm not even sure if it's a thing but I've been trying to look into some doo wop vocal groups from the 50's and 60's such as The Cleftones, The Monotones, The Silhouettes, Dion Dimuci and so on...

Does anyone know the kind of gear that was sort of "standard" back in those days for these kind of recordings?

Thanks a mil!

Gear, as in recording gear? Because, for the most part, the voices were the instruments. There might have been some occasional rhythm accompaniment, but it would have been the standard pop/rhythm and blues hardware of the moment of the given recording…drums, upright bass, piano, guitar strictly in a rhythm role, sax as the primary soloist. Dion was of a later time, so I’m sure electric bass came into play, along with the fuller backing. The Mills Brothers, a doo-wop forerunner act of the 40’s, employed a lightly strummed acoustic, but would vocally imitate instruments like trumpets.
Doo-wop basically faded by the 60’s, but the Four Seasons carried on with a mutation of it, using standard rock’n’roll backing, as well as related groups from The Tokens, Happenings, Vogues, to the Arbors, but that was more of all-around pop sound; then there was the soul vocal group realm, like the Delfonics.