There's a topic I've been wanting to discuss lately, especially with other musician's. Lately there has been a trend for bands, especially Garage Bands & Rockabilly bands to release their recordings in lo-fidelity.  Basically, setting up a mic or two in the room and getting a live sound, but with all the bleed between instruments, it's pretty lo-fi. There's usually a lot of distortion from over driven amps, especially the bass, which is such a large sound wave it's hard to capture. Plus tons of white noise from ringing cymbals.

I don't understand this approach. I generally record live, but wth all the instruments separated & the vocalist in a booth. This gives you better mixing options and overall clarity of each instrument.

I know a few bands that are pretty popular on the club circuit but can not get their music played on the radio because it;s so lo-fi. It's pretty short sighted really. It may be cool to be trendy & retro, but ultimately, it's closing doors that could help some of these bands actually go somewhere with their music.

I've been recording for over 30 years. I've seen so many trends come & go. Luckily I had the foresight early on, as did my band mates to record at the highest quality we could. My first recordings with The Speedies were done at Skyline & Electric Lady studios in NYC. Not only have they stood the test of time, but since they were recorded in such high quality, those recordings are still generating income for me as they've been used in commercials and as a theme to a skit on the Jay Leno show.

So my advice, to the younger bands out there. Don't sell yourself short. If a record is un- listenable why even bother?

The bands you listed recorded with the right amount of reverb and ambiance so they didn't sound bland though it was really clean.  Cool sounding peddles helped as well.  I like lo-fi but I like it done well.  The early Mummies 45s were done much better than the later albums which were so distorted you couldn't understand anything.
 
John Carlucci said:

@ Alison, There are many well respected garage bands from the original 60'S period & the 80's revival period that did not record in lo fidelity. The Electric Prunes, The Music Machine, Arthur Lee & Love, The Standell's, The Chocolate Watchband, the Mircle Workers, The Cynics, Chesterfield Kings, & my own band, The Fuzztones. It's a matter of preference, & I prefer to hear music that is recorded well. @ Nic, speaking of Jimi Hendrix, I recorded my second 45 over 30 years ago at Electric Lady Studios. So there's absolutely no way I can get into Low-fi, when I started at such a high quality studio. My process does not differ much from yours. We also record live, however, the studio I record in has isolation booths so the various instruments & vocals cann all record onto different track so there is no bleed from other instruments. We use those as basic tracks that we build upon.

@ Alison, There are many well respected garage bands from the original 60'S period & the 80's revival period that did not record in lo fidelity. The Electric Prunes, The Music Machine, Arthur Lee & Love, The Standell's, The Chocolate Watchband, the Mircle Workers, The Cynics, Chesterfield Kings, & my own band, The Fuzztones. It's a matter of preference, & I prefer to hear music that is recorded well. @ Nic, speaking of Jimi Hendrix, I recorded my second 45 over 30 years ago at Electric Lady Studios. So there's absolutely no way I can get into Low-fi, when I started at such a high quality studio. My process does not differ much from yours. We also record live, however, the studio I record in has isolation booths so the various instruments & vocals cann all record onto different track so there is no bleed from other instruments. We use those as basic tracks that we build upon.

Dig it. Refer to the only video on my page for demonstration of lo-fi recording circa 1988. Sounding more '67-'68.

 
Alison said:

tha' Hell?  "Garage Music" by definition is LO-FI!  It literally refers to kids playing music in their G A R A G E S!  You can hardly get more lo-fi than that! Its the whole spirit of the genre! Sheesh...lame-os up in this mug...

yep

Alison said:

tha' Hell?  "Garage Music" by definition is LO-FI!  It literally refers to kids playing music in their G A R A G E S!  You can hardly get more lo-fi than that! Its the whole spirit of the genre! Sheesh...lame-os up in this mug...

tha' Hell?  "Garage Music" by definition is LO-FI!  It literally refers to kids playing music in their G A R A G E S!  You can hardly get more lo-fi than that! Its the whole spirit of the genre! Sheesh...lame-os up in this mug...

I agree with you. You need to find a balance between lo-fi and clarity. When I recorded my 45 in the basement I just went for the sounds I was looking for and didn't settle until I had them. No baffles, deadening, gtrs and amps mic'ed except bass went direct to board since you can be clean with bass and not have it be noticeably different from the rest of the recording. Drums with one mic, then mic'ed to the mixer thru small ghetto blaster playback to get the sound I was looking for. The a-side drums were recorded in a drum room at a friends' house because I needed better drummer than me for that side and sounds from about 1968 with more umph to 'em. It is a matter of taste. You can be lo-fi w/o sacrificing clarity if you want but too clean will get you the wrong sound sometimes. Lo-fi is definitely cheaper. This was a solo project except for the better drummer on the top deck. Recording a band live can be done well too in a lo-fi way. We've done some decent stuff in the basement on 4 track. Just have to tweak the knobs right. I guess you need the right audience who knows how the music you play is supposed to sound. Reminds me of the idiots who can't tell a great song they never heard before and dismiss it because it wasn't a hit so it "can't be good". 
 
Nic Rodriguez (Gloom Merchants) said:

It's frustrating to me that most people seem to care more about the quality of a recording than the composition and performance. Sure, I love the sound of good instruments, good equipment and a good audio engineer, but I would rather be a lo fi shitty recording of Jimmy Hendrix than a clean and clear Jonas Brothers. It may just be the mix but sometimes clean rnr/punk just sounds boring. I like it when garage, blues and punk bands got that live sound. I think its a matter of taste and the music style. 

In the case of my band, the vocalist often times wants more distortion. I would like more clarity but we can't afford it, we don't have the equipment, time or money. We record everything live, we do one takes. My interface has 2 inputs, and there are 4 sources of audio when we record; a shitty little line 6 amp for guitar, an identical line 6 amp for the vocals, a snare and floor tom. So, there's 2 mics for 4 instruments. We never get to jam so when we do we just record new songs as we go almost improvised, then I overdub bass guitar and keys/lead guitar when my band mates are not here. Sure I would like to have more control of the mix but we still like the product even know we know the vast majority of people will not give it a listen after 3 seconds just because of quality alone. It's what it is. 

I think it's a matter of taste. It depends on the style of music. An orchestra would want every single detail and the full spectrum of dynamics. A psychedelic rock band may want enough clarity to hear the harmonics and psychedelic overtones. But for punk rock, garage and blues rock the recording, more often than not, sounds better live; the level or rawness is up the artist. 

It's frustrating to me that most people seem to care more about the quality of a recording than the composition and performance. Sure, I love the sound of good instruments, good equipment and a good audio engineer, but I would rather be a lo fi shitty recording of Jimmy Hendrix than a clean and clear Jonas Brothers. It may just be the mix but sometimes clean rnr/punk just sounds boring. I like it when garage, blues and punk bands got that live sound. I think its a matter of taste and the music style. 

In the case of my band, the vocalist often times wants more distortion. I would like more clarity but we can't afford it, we don't have the equipment, time or money. We record everything live, we do one takes. My interface has 2 inputs, and there are 4 sources of audio when we record; a shitty little line 6 amp for guitar, an identical line 6 amp for the vocals, a snare and floor tom. So, there's 2 mics for 4 instruments. We never get to jam so when we do we just record new songs as we go almost improvised, then I overdub bass guitar and keys/lead guitar when my band mates are not here. Sure I would like to have more control of the mix but we still like the product even know we know the vast majority of people will not give it a listen after 3 seconds just because of quality alone. It's what it is. 

I think it's a matter of taste. It depends on the style of music. An orchestra would want every single detail and the full spectrum of dynamics. A psychedelic rock band may want enough clarity to hear the harmonics and psychedelic overtones. But for punk rock, garage and blues rock the recording, more often than not, sounds better live; the level or rawness is up the artist. 

It's not like we're trying to make it bad or something.. we just don't know better haha... That was my opinion on the first demo my band recorded with drums and everything by our selfs.. But really i have never been so proud of anything i have released. That song is Love And Sweet Dreams with The Dandelion Seeds (shameless blalbalba) But we didn't do it live though. But it was all very quick going so it's raw and haven't been fuckted with it. I hate when you record in studio and some fucking wanker master it and kill the music. BUT if I would get chance to record in a good studio and stuff I would ofcourse go for it. Just make the record guy straight what we are thinking about.. or just kick him out and do it our selves...

  I think some of you have missed the point.  My point was that lo-fi recordings can & will hold an artist back. There are outlets, whether it be a radio station, a podcast or even a Garage Punk Hideout compilation, where a recording will be rejected because the quality is too low. Genre is irrelevant. There are plenty of hi-fidelity Garage Punk records. The Music Machine & Love are perfect examples. They both still have attitude & plenty of soul and I can hear all of the instruments.

 Another missed point. I don't necessarly consider home recordings  made on a computer as Hi Fidelity either. I record in real studios. I understand not everyone can afford that, but even recordings done in a garage can have a good "room' sound if the microphone's are placed properly.  Garage band, & basic versions of pro-tools are good for songwriting purposes and making demo's. But when I'm recording with a full band, I prefer using a good sounding room, not a virtual room.

does anyone remember bootleg tapes off the mixing desk? or the c-86 compilations? each to his own. but if we applied the same criteria of quality control to musical styles, garagepunk, punk rock, rock'n'roll, metal, thrash, hardcore, etc. would compare very unfavorably to jazz, western swing, rockabilly or classical music. and lyrically, how many bands compare to cole porter, irving berlin, hoagy carmichael, lieber and stoller, etc. i like lo-fi cos1) i can't afford expensive recording equipment 2) i like the sound. i've got plenty of brilliantly-recorded music in my record collection, and plenty of lo-fi thrashy stuff. i adore what horror deluxe are doing!

anybody can sound like a million bucks with garageband these days,but it's still the musical ideas that count. except, of course, for equipment fetishists!

Nothing wrong with melody.  I love melody myself.

electrocute your cock said:

I love lo-fi but I don't wanna hear something that sounds like shit. A little rough around the edges is great, but I also want to be able to make out the melody.

 

Melody? Man I'm getting old.

You probably meant "the words". : )

electrocute your cock said:

I love lo-fi but I don't wanna hear something that sounds like shit. A little rough around the edges is great, but I also want to be able to make out the melody.

 

Melody? Man I'm getting old.

dear natalie...., what a wonderful citation. is that john donne, or the great bard himself?

Natalie Pryce said:

But home-recording isn't the so called 'best' recording.  As top studios will have so many new pieces of technology that are meant to act as a crucible to take out all the little errors and imperfections.  Which, of course, results in all the magic being taken out because as we know it is our imperfections and our mistakes  which make us up and give us our personality.

 

"When a scholar studies something he strives,

to kill what is already alive,

and with all the parts they've lost the whole,

for the piece that's gone is the living soul"

John Spokus said:

I don't understand why somebody doesn't want to make the best sounding record they can. The technology is so accessible now, it's easy enough (for me) to do it right at home.

I love lo-fi but I don't wanna hear something that sounds like shit. A little rough around the edges is great, but I also want to be able to make out the melody.

 

Melody? Man I'm getting old.

I don't personally see anything wrong with imperfections (such as going "in the red") but to take things in the other direction and just make things intolerable just seems pointless.

Natalie Pryce said:

But home-recording isn't the so called 'best' recording.  As top studios will have so many new pieces of technology that are meant to act as a crucible to take out all the little errors and imperfections.  Which, of course, results in all the magic being taken out because as we know it is our imperfections and our mistakes  which make us up and give us our personality.

 

"When a scholar studies something he strives,

to kill what is already alive,

and with all the parts they've lost the whole,

for the piece that's gone is the living soul"

John Spokus said:

I don't understand why somebody doesn't want to make the best sounding record they can. The technology is so accessible now, it's easy enough (for me) to do it right at home.

Is it just me or does this post keep coming up blank?  I'd see it for less than two seconds and poof...it's gone.

 

As for lo-fi, Even Billy Childish's recordings have a quality to them.  The Mummies first batch of 7 inches sounded like Back from the Grave recordings and the Makers had a low end 60s sound.  Even Supercharger's first album was pretty good.  I don't get it where answering machine quality started to become this badge of honor.

John Carlucci said:

Just to prove my point a little further... I noticed this quote from Kopper regarding the Garage punk compilation series & whether or not there will be a volume 7...

kopper said:

I don't mind continuing the series, but the quality of the submissions has to remain consistently great. Many of the songs I got this time around weren't as good, and a few sounded like they were recorded at practice sessions or were just poorly mixed in general.

 

So, even here on the Garage Punk Hideout, recording quality matters. As I said before, if you do not record your band to sand as good as it possibly can sound, you are holding yourself back. Wondering if any of the people I butted heads with in this forum were amongst those whose submissions were rejected?

 

like punk never happened!

What would Billy Childish do?

He'd grow a moustache. An outstanding, lo-fi moustache.

This is a tough nut to crack, to be sure. No matter how you record it, if it sux it doesn't matter how many mics or inputs you use. Some bands sound great with minimalist techniques, others REALLY need the "studio magic" to sound anything but bad.

I think it was the Who with Anyway, Anyhow, Anywhere as it wasn't just the feedback but the way Pete Townshend was flicking the switch on the head of his guitar and cutting out the sound. But i don't think it was the pressing plant so much as it was Brunswick the label that had concerns.

This is sort of on topic but not really since this is referring to a live show vs. recording. I went to a local bar for a show that doesn’t normally have punk/thrash/metal bands like those playing that night. It has more of a redneck/Hoosier type of crowd. The first band started their sound check. When they were warming up, were getting a lot of nasty, noisy distortion and feedback. There was a group of regulars at the bar making more and more pissed off comments: “God, make it stop! i’mlosingmymind, sweartogod I’m gonnaRIOT! Dude, STOP IT!!! A guitar is NOT supposed to SOUND like that!”
Countless bands were slagged off when they were first around because they “couldn’t play” and were “unlistenable noise” and years later are considered classic from fans and critics alike. I don’t mean just recently either. Sex Pistols, Ramones, Beatles, Elvis were all looked at as trash from serious music critics/fans and just normal people.
“The future of rock and roll...Bruce Springsteen...HE'S FUCKING IT ALL UP!”
Quick, name the actor that delivered that line and the movie!
Which band was it that recorded a song that had feedback or distortion or something on it and the pressing plant sent it back thinking that it was a mistake and no one in their right mind would do that on purpose? Was it The Yardbirds, The Who, The Beatles, Link Wray, all of them? I can’t remember.

Great discussion, I can see both sides of the argument. (what rock and roll fan would not??)

However I think a lot of people are selling a lot of old records short by calling them lo-fi and by thinking by doing a sloppy job recording they will capture magic. Make no mistake those engineers knew how to use their limited equipment. If you think your going to get a Gary US Bonds sound by recording poorly with ironically bad choices your sadly mistaken. The 45's are so well engineered that they sound great un-amplified with your ear 3 feet away picking up the sound directly from the needle.
lets not forget that even many of the classic old Motown records are in fact by todays standards lo-fi and raw.

I will not get into slagging any bands records, however I personally find the lo-fi thing, especially on vocals is often little more 'REAL' or "RAW" than whatever that annoying voice effect "Usher" uses. (love in this club) Dare I say it can be gimmicky in the wrong hands, not that there is anything wrong with it. Some bands/ people can brilliantly pull it off and some can't.
Its dangerous territory to aim low. A good lo-fi sound for vocals (for me and not everybody admittedly) Is when it is just on that fine line and it is the perfromance that pushes into the red. Same goes for a guitar. Devil Dogs' "Saturday Night Fever" album by example a great raw recording to my personal tastes.

But this is just my opinion. And the label "garage rock" is quite wide it seems and there is room for everybody's taste from Rock and rollers to Rockers to Punk Rockers to the current Hipster interest in lo-fi.
It sort of like saying you like Motorhead and people assuming you also like Pantera. Or saying you like Joe Tex and people assuming your into 70's disco. Not that there is anything wrong with it.

It takes all kinds.
At the end of the day the only thing that will stick around is good rock and roll. trying NOT to sound like Huey Lewis here but most likely failing so yeah "the heart of rock and roll is the beat" I said it. However to be clear I disagree on Mr. Lewis' other famous opinion song. it is NOT "Hip to be square".