Favorite "mistakes" in great recordings

[Rib 13]

Electric Light Orchestra's Eldorado is chock-full of mistakes -- everything from cases opening and closing "snaps and clicks" because the LSO's union time ran out to talkback mics being left open, etc.....its loaded with errors and still wound up being a fantastic album regardless

 

[4dog]

every picture tells a story...and darn near every other song on that album..looseas a goose but rocks like a freightrain!

 

[bobyoung53]

(1198) Jerry Lee Lewis - You Win Again (From "Jerry Lee Lewis and Friends" DVD) - YouTube

Jerry Lee gets upset with how the bridge falls apart and lets the band know he's unhappy at around 2:46. I don't think they appreciated it. This recording went on a DVD.

The bass player makes a LOT of mistakes in that tune. I think that's who he's PO'ed at, he misses the changes every time among many other obvious mistakes.

 

[devnulljp]

Rick Beato explains it very well, as usual:

That is a wonderful breakdown ... and so depressing.
I've recorded a bit the last few years in studios with these tools and they can be very useful to fix little glitches, when you get a great take but someone flubs a note or something, but not overdone like the examples he shows and all the modern corporate rock I hear around. He's right, no wonder rock music is dying.

 

[PWRL]

Forgive me if this has been mentioned, already. I like this one for how much the mistake makes the whole song. As I heard it, Lou Reed and Sterling Morrison thought that the engineer would just open the can when the time came, and close it when it was over, for each verse, so they just made jokes the whole time. The whole story is in the book that came with the box set, but I haven't even seen my copy in a decade.

 

[nixdad]

Headphones on!
The Beatles, All My Loving. You'll hear Paul's mistake at 1:19:

 

[WillyW]

Joe Cocker’s voice cracking at the end of “You are so beautiful”

 

[Pauly 4001]

For some reason, John Wetton yells out "You don't! " after the first verse.

John Wetton was probably threatening a technician who had been sent in to turn down his amp. Thank god the techie failed.

 

[azureblue]

Vocals come in too soon after the guitar solo, vocals stop, pauses and then resumes (at about 1:58). What do we expect for a $64 recording? "Take 1." Very likely is in the top 3 all time greatest rock n roll songs EVER! A guitar solo to DIE FOR!

Great song!

Major goof that was not even bothered to correct! LOVE IT! Perfection is not desirable!

and the drummer gets lost on the bridge.

 

[Neon Scribe]

This one's been reported many times, here and elsewhere. Berry Oakley comes in on the wrong beat after the drum solo on "One Way Out" on the Allman Brothers Fillmore East album. The drummers, both of them, adjust to his playing almost instantaneously.

 

[g-dude]

Entwistle fails to modulate upwards with the rest of the band:



The absolute worst mistake ever - a voice crack at the highest note of your big hit in front of the largest audience you’ll ever play to:

 

[iiipopes]

On the outro track, "Her Majesty," Sir Macca's guitar ends abruptly without a closing chord. It is clipped because "Her Majesty" was edited out of the side two medley, as Sir Macca didn't think it fit between "Mean Mr. Mustard" and "Polythene Pam," so it was put on the outro. This meant it got the clash at the end of "Mustard," but lost the last chord to "Pam."
Her Majesty (song) - Wikipedia
Here's what it would have sounded like if the last chord had been included on the record:
The Beatles - Her Majesty (Take 3 Early Mix With Final Chord) - YouTube

 

[iiipopes]

And to add to "Polythene Pam," Sir Macca arguably scuffs his bass slide at the end of verse two during the chop chords into the lead guitar solo at 0:41 to 0:45.
Polythene Pam (Remastered 2009) - YouTube


Oh, and sorry, I can't resist: here's the picture of me walking across Abbey Road in the summer of 1985:

 

[TjMetalhead]

The whole album of Let There be Rock by AC/DC. The guitars are constantly out of tune on nearly every song since they were all tracked in 1-2 takes in less than 2 weeks. Especially on Overdose, in the beginning Mal flubs a few notes and tunes up real quickly.

 

[Acoop]

In the old days, mistakes, were made on intros and extros. ... Live recording was very much like a football game. ... Who stepped over the line and who stepped on who in a tackle. ... Plenty of blame but, let's go again.

 

[Hahaha]

This isn't really a mistake, but during the recording of the music for California Girls Brian Wilson keeps asking the Wrecking Crew to pick the tempo up a bit, which they never quite do. On the final recording you can hear the vocals singing a bit ahead of the beat, then pulling back to stay in time with the track. It's subtle, but noticeable, especially towards the end.

(1199) The Beach Boys - California Girls (with lyrics) - YouTube

 

[smeet]

I love this one, Wilbur Bascomb on Jeff Beck’s “Head for Backstage Pass”, it opens with one of the all time great bass solos. At the end, Wilbur does a cool rhythmic figure and loses his place. You can hear the drums come in correctly, and the bass comes in 2 beats later, and the drums join in to match him.

 

[bobyoung53]

This one's been reported many times, here and elsewhere. Berry Oakley comes in on the wrong beat after the drum solo on "One Way Out" on the Allman Brothers Fillmore East album. The drummers, both of them, adjust to his playing almost instantaneously.

Yes, that was pretty amazing. Berry came in one beat early.

 

[bobyoung53]

The whole album of Let There be Rock by AC/DC. The guitars are constantly out of tune on nearly every song since they were all tracked in 1-2 takes in less than 2 weeks. Especially on Overdose, in the beginning Mal flubs a few notes and tunes up real quickly.

And it's perfect!

 

[chanson]

I'm sure it's been mentioned already in this thread, but mine is John Bonham's squeaky pedal.