What Does ILM Think of Daniel Lanois?

yup

it's kind of like everything i like about lanois freed of troublesome "songs" (which sometimes his cavernous production tends to overwhelm imo)

"ambient pedal steel" sounds like catnip to me, psyched

xpost I dunno we've talked about it before and I think the trademark Lanois production is a lot more about amps and guitars and rooms than production tricks. His solo albums are a million times less fussy than, say, "So." Though I don't think "So" is an indicative Lanois production, so ...

yeah I don't view his productions as "cluttered" so much as very very distinctive, and here I'm generalizing a bit but with certain albums and certain artists it's definitely putting a stamp on the album like I "Time Out of Mind" or "Teatro"...and can be a big heavy handed at times (IMO) but also really good, I mean he's definitely got a thing

this album is just the best

U2 made their best albums (Boy and Zooropa) without him, IMO.

I agree. They also made their best albums, "Unforgettable Fire" and "Achtung Baby," with him. They also made their worst albums without him.

guys u should hear the Joshua Tree, overlooked gem in the U2 catalog

It's one of their best! Or, alternatively, one of their worst, if you like the others better.

i'm a how to dismantle an atomic bomb guy & that one song from tomb raider guy myself

I like the "Batman" song. No Lanois on that one, though, it's a Nellee Hooper track.

i'm a how to dismantle an atomic bomb guy

― Pull your head on out your hippy haze (upper mississippi sh@kedown)

whoa this post is like

http://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2016/06/25/483514456/an-avian-mystery-rare-parrot-spotted-in-wild-for-first-time-in-15-years

i'm an avowed U2 "stan" and despite a couple of "gems" that one's my least favorite of theirs

Yeah, this was pretty much guaranteed to be up my alley and it is. Not blowing my mind as such but the sort of thing I can see myself putting on a lot. Like a smooth counterpart to Fennesz or something.

(iTunes promotional stunt album def the best, whatever it was called.)

but i feel like i've wanted an album of ambient pedal steel for a long long time

I think BJ Cole has been making those for decades.

what is a good bj cole album to start with

Sad eyes, sad eyes
Where're you going with that confidence?
Sad eyes, sad eyes
Where're you going with that confidence?

I'm going to where the boats go by
Caledonia river flows so wide
I'm going to where the boats go by
Caledonia river flows so wide

what is a good bj cole album to start with

― marcos, Tuesday, September 13, 2016 2:32 PM (forty-two minutes ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

iirc there are only two: The New Hovering Dog, which is the "classic," and one that came out many years later on Hannibal whose name escapes me but is probably more what you're looking for (less song-based). Both, as I recall, are really great if you dig this sort of thing. See also: Chas Smith (who's even further 'out')

I've listened to some later BJ Cole and always has an 'oh' reaction - one of those where you mean to return but never do. Just discovered the New Hovering Dog is on Spotify and has Robert Kirby arrangements (Nick Drake's buddy) and Danny Thompson on bass.

I've always dug "Indian Red" from the Wynona album, maybe its only because it expands on the mid-80s U2/Robbie Robertson sound, just, without the Bono or the Robbie. I especially like how Peter Gabriel used him as a plucked instrument and less-so for defining the entire palette.

...Bit of a proto Nigel Godrich?

I can't help but think that The Unforgettable Fire is the lousiest sounding album U2 put out in the '80s, and probably the worst production on a U2 album until Pop.

My ears must be broke

I'd kill to see All the Pretty Horses restored with Lanois' score

BJ Cole also did a record with Luke Vibert. I haven't heard it in quite a few years, but remember liking it.

'goodbye to language' is all I'm listening to this week in this household, only 36 minutes long but inexhaustibly great. the textures of Apollo smeared and extended out, unexpected late period add to the eno/lanois ambient music chapter (in the liner notes, evidently Eno tipped Daniel to the tiny sampler used for this album -- he bolted it to the steel guitar, to make it a physical part of the instrument)

interesting how the NPR preview & even my iTunes mp3 tags of the CD call it a Lanois solo album, but the packaging clearly calls it the duo: Daniel Lanois / Rocco Deluca

definitely time for me to go back and check out some of the other Lanois solos, especially the instrumental ones

All I know of Daniel Lanois as a musican is Eno's Apollo and now Goodbye to Language, which is knocking me out. Are all his albums in this vein or does he jump around?

A few, Acadie, For the Beauty of Wynona and Shine, are singer-songwriter but beautiful and excellent. Others are more experimental, some quietly, some more noisy.

He jumps around but they all have a lot of texture. I find his singer songwriter stuff to be excellent sometimes—his solo recording of "Where Will I Be" on Here Is What Is is amazing—but often pretty turgid.

"Where Will I Be" is such a wonderful song. He's got a couple, like that, which almost sound like standards at this point.

I think turgid is too strong a word. Like, this is slow and moody, but not turgid, imo:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I3MA_7GUoyQ

Kind of samey as a solo artist but excellent as a guest artist. His work with Eno and U2 in the million dollar hotel ost is gorgeous. I normally cant stand U2 but whenever Lanois is involved it sounds great. Also Oh Mercy might be one of my favorite Dylan albums for Lanois touch. Most of the Time might just be my favorite Dylan song

Kind of samey as a solo artist

Acadie is all over the place, stick with that and you're good.

"most of the time" is so fuckin' great

Didn't know he had a new one out.

The one I only really listen to repeatedly is Purple Vista so I'm down with ambient pedal steel

Also I might be biased because I've heard a local jazz singer covering this song several times and it sounds beautiful live but black dub's I believe in you sounds like a classic to me:

http://youtu.be/F13vy1fT870

Possibly. But I fuckin' hate the Black Dub singer w a passion (Chris Whitley's daughter). Or pretty much any Janis Joplin-influenced singer.

Yeah, Lanois really keeps/kept going to bat for her and that Rocco guy.

listened to lanois' new one this morning with this happening outside my bus window, perfect visual accompaniment
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/CviVRUbXYAEHwGW.jpg:large

Well...Wrt to Chris Whitley's daughter, given her father I bet she's had some tough times in her life so maybe he's just trying to help

i feel like wrecking ball is a big touchstone for a lot of modern country production

makes sense to me

https://www.facebook.com/vsnares/videos/10155282138718394/?hc_ref=NEWSFEED

Good interview w Marc Maron here: https://open.spotify.com/episode/63FyR8xMSuYYn578hjI2Ha?context=spotify%3Ashow%3A6L47MDMO3xuN2XBed7miEI&si=t8jTQ7hFSRiZLSTV0Q5vjQ

Good interview, I posted it in another thread.

I know he's talked about making loops for Time Out of Mind elsewhere, and it's been reported many times that Dylan gave Lanois a whole bunch of old blues records (e.g. Charley Patton) prior to recording just to show him what he had in mind. I didn't realize the loops were an insurance policy though, so that part was pretty amusing. (As Lanois explains it, It was understood that Dylan wanted an old blues sound, but Lanois was afraid that they would end up sounding like a bar band. So he gathered the key players that were hired for the album and had them play along with the exact same records Dylan given him. Then he wiped those vintage records from the multi-track so that all that was left was their own playing, and those were turned into loops. That way if things didn't go so well at the recording sessions, he could dig those up and use them as is or as a backing track to play along with.) It feels like the kind of idea that would come from someone who was a really great cheater in school.

Anyway, this was discussed in another thread, but while Lanois did a good job with Oh Mercy, he didn't know when to stop and the results as released can sound overproduced. I prefer the earlier mixes/alternates of at least a handful of tracks on Tell Tale Signs, specifically "Everything Is Broken" from disc one (less cluttered), "Ring Them Bells" from disc three (no obtrusive overdubs), and "Most of the Time" from disc three (the mix actually breathes, it's not swamped in goo, which Dylan complained about). Also "Series of Dreams," "Dignity" and "Born in Time" should've made the album, and I think Lanois pushed for them (especially those first two songs) but Dylan wouldn't budge.

See, I enjoy the production on Oh Mercy: even through the swamp fog, the instruments are distinguishable; the spartan crew helped.

xpost That's very similar to the story I'd head of Dylan hearing one mix in his studio or while Lanois experimented and did other stuff in a different room, with a different feed. So I guess there was no way Dylan could say "turn that shit off," lol.

I love reading Dylan stories when they pop up in Tape Op. Like this one, from David Bianco:

How did you come to work with Bob Dylan?

When I got this room going, I found that, without hyping it up too much, or jazzing it up with EQ — using the right microphone for the right situation — I was getting really great natural sounds. I recorded an acoustic-based record (Can You Hear Me) with a fellow named Keaton Simons. Live acoustic guitar, drums, and bass, for the most part — there were a few cuts when we went electric — and it caught the ear of Bob's manager, vis-à-vis the head of the record company. They liked the acoustics of the record. They wanted somebody who could get a "live through one mic" sound, and Chess Records was the model for it. Bob was on the road in Nashville; they pulled in to do a recording and there was one microphone open. Bob was in the control room and said, "That's the way a record should sound." Not that Chess Records were one mic, because they weren't, but Bob had that concept so they asked me if I could do it. I said, "Sure, I can do that. No problem." But what I did do was sneak some microphones in the usual spots everywhere. We had everybody in one room, with everything bleeding; like the organ at 110 dB with an upright bass right next to it. You can imagine the degree of difficulty was pretty intense. But I did have the one mic. I researched and found the microphone that they had in the studio in Nashville. It was an AKG C422, so that I had the same mic up. I wasn't going to blow that. I recorded that mic, along with a couple of stereo Telefunkens and all the microphones I had discreetly placed on all the instruments. I was prepared when Bob came into the control room and said, "I can't hear Mike's (Campbell) guitar." I had an SM57 tucked inside his amp and pushed the fader up. Bob said, "Oh, yeah. That's better!" It was a lot of fun; we had a lot of success and a number one with that record (Together Through Life). The next time we met up was for a Christmas record. He told me that everyone was asking him how we got that sound on the last record. But he said, "I'm not going to tell 'em. I can't tell 'em." But I'm actually not sure he had any idea.

I was reading Daniel Lanois' book (Soul Mining: A Musical Life), and he mentions that Dylan was a bit of a shadowy figure, showing up at random times, and whatnot. Was that your experience?

No, Jack Frost (Dylan's nom de plume) was the producer. You know, if you have a vision and stick to it, that is part of production. Being able to stay on course. There are actually only a few guys in this town that can do that. Once you get into "Alice in Wonderland" in the studio, things really change. Very few guys can really hang onto it. When I first met Dylan, I didn't really think about what I was getting into until I was driving down the I405, to Jackson Browne's studio (Groove Masters), even though I had done a bunch of prep. I did three days of intense equipment chats with the crew at Jackson's studio. I really wanted to make sure my ducks were as close to in a row as they could possibly be. I did a lot of plug charts, as well as lists upon lists on how we could do this thing. It really didn't dawn on me until I got near the Skirball (Cultural Center), and I said to myself, "Holy shit! This is Bob Dylan!" I started to realize what he meant to me. I started to psyche myself out and realized I had better tamp that down! When I finally walked in there and met him, the first thing I did was go to shake hands and Bob goes like this (makes a fist for a fist bump])and I shook his fist. First meeting! I'm thinking, "Oh, my God!" Nobody warned me about that. I wish I had gotten the head's up. Bob said, "So, we're going to go in there and listen to the templates, and then we're going to record." I said, "Oh, we're doing covers?" He looked at me and went dark, blank-faced, and then said, "They're not covers, they're templates." We go in and listen to this Otis Rush song, which became "Beyond Here Lies Nothin'." We would go in and listen to the old tunes, taking those grooves and modifying the licks. On some of the tunes he didn't change the lick. He would look in the control room and say to his manager Jeff (Rosen), "What did you think of that?" He'd reply, "It's really too close, Bob." And Bob would say, "Aw, fuck it!" (laughs) So they paid for those and definitely had to give credit! Once we were mixing and getting it done, he says to me, "They don't make records that sound like this anymore." I said, "Yeah, it's like a Gestalt recording; you get the big picture all in one go." He thought that was the funniest thing he'd ever heard. He doubled over laughing and said, "I couldn't have said it better myself, and I learned a new word!" He always wanted us to have our meals together, like a family, and he listened to people completely. Not what you would imagine. He was always like, "And then what'd you do?" He was that guy! I got calls to do interviews during the sessions, about the sessions. I turned to his manager and said, "They called me about doing an interview about the sessions." He shut his laptop and said, "You know, there's no upside to talking about anything about Bob." I went, "Nuff said... okay!" And then he opened his laptop again.

There was another great Dylan story I read in Tape Op (I may be misremembering the exact details), where the producer or engineer had gotten all these expensive ribbon mics and the like, but Dylan walks in and heads strait for the shittiest mic in the room and just says something like "let's go." So they hit record and get a take, everyone says it sounds great, and the engineer says something like "now let's just swap out that mic," and Dylan responds stone faced "I thought you said it sounded great?" And they record the rest of the album with that shitty mic. Again, could be misremembering, but it's something like that.

In Heylin's book he listens to the final mix of Down in the Groove or whatever on a boom box. "I think it could use more bass."

Engineers all seem to have great Dylan stories.

Mark Howard (Lanois's main guy) gave a great interview on Dylan: https://www.uncut.co.uk/features/bob-dylan-tell-tale-signs-special-mark-howard-37964/

Chris Shaw also gave on to Uncut - he got Dylan to switch to Pro Tools, and it's pretty amusing: https://www.uncut.co.uk/features/recording-with-bob-dylan-chris-shaw-tells-all-37854/

*one to Uncut

On some of the tunes he didn't change the lick. He would look in the control room and say to his manager Jeff (Rosen), "What did you think of that?" He'd reply, "It's really too close, Bob." And Bob would say, "Aw, fuck it!" (laughs) So they paid for those and definitely had to give credit!

LMAO

Great! We got to talking Lanois & Dylan here recently: Phil Spector's dead to me now Also good stuff about the roles etc. of producers.