Recording over the years

A funny story from Duane Allen....

In 1979, the Oaks were set to release their third country album for ABC/Dot records. Their first single, "Sail Away," had a release date, and they were under some pressure to meet a certain deadline. They finished their vocals and left on a tour on the west coast.

While out west, Duane got a call from their producer at the time, Ron Chancey. He found a mistake in one of the lines. The third verse was supposed to start with, "Then a smile comes upon me," but when Duane was recording the lead vocal, he sang "BUT a smile comes upon me," which caused the line to not make much sense. It was impossible for Duane to make it back to Nashville in time to rerecord the line before their deadline with the record company, and shipping it to the coast and fixing it in a studio out there was also out of the question due to time constraints.

The solution? Duane told Ron, "Just sing the line yourself." Chancey went into the studio and did his best Duane Allen impression and put the words "then a" on the beginning of the verse, blending it with the rest of Duane's vocals, creating a virtually seamless edit. Now, keep in mind, this was 1979, and recording technology, while versatile, was still somewhat laborious.

Compare that to 2005, when Duane received an e-mail while on tour in the midwest from a TV station....Richard Sterban's bass vocal on a song they'd shot was completely absent; the recording equipment either never picked it up or it was somehow deleted after it was recorded. Either way, they had a television performance for "Elvira" that was missing it's signature "oom papa mow mow"!!

Duane had the station e-mail him the tracks for the song that they had. He called Richard's room, and they set up a microphone in a hotel room. Richard resang his vocals for "Elvira" right there in the room, they recorded it, and e-mailed his part back to the TV station. Within a couple hours, a potentially disastrous flaw was corrected, and with relatively little pain.

Recording technology has come so far that virtually anyone can record, edit, mix, and master a project from just about anywhere. Ernie Haase once noted that some of his and George Younce's vocals for the Cathedrals' Faithful project were recorded at a hotel in Pigeon Forge. I dare you to figure out which ones.

No wonder there's an overabundance of gospel acts today; if you have a laptop and a microphone, YOU TOO can record a CD!!