Nirvana- Nevermind
Nirvana was an American rock band that was formed by singer and guitarist Kurt Cobain and bassist Krist Novoselic in Aberdeen, Washington, in 1987. Nirvana went through a succession of drummers, the most notable one being Dave Grohl, who joined the band in 1990. Despite releasing only three full-length studio albums in their seven-year career, Nirvana has come to be regarded as one of the most influential and important rock bands of the modern era. their most famous album being Nevermind. Grunge music with which it was associated became the most written about phenomenon in contemporary popular music since the birth of punk.
Before its September 1991 release, Geffen Records were hoping to sell 250,000 copies of Nevermind. But Nirvana's second album went on to shift 100 times that amount. Nevermind was nirvana's second album following on from the album "Bleach". Bleach was well received by critics, but failed to chart in the U.S. upon its original release. Nevermind on the other hand was another story because even though there were low commercial expectations by the band and its record label, Nevermind became a surprise success in late 1991, largely due to the popularity of its first single, "Smells Like Teen Spirit". By January 1992, it had replaced Michael Jackson's album Dangerous at number one on the Billboard 200 chart. , and the album has sold over 50 million copies worldwide. Nevermind was in part responsible for inventing the genre Grunge and bringing it to to a large mainstream audience,this was a big factor to its success. Because of this fame it has been ranked highly on lists of the greatest albums of all timee by publications such as Rolling Stone and Time.
The Recording of the album was approached very much from the live perspective, with the drummer set up in the middle of the room and the bass and guitars isolated for separation. Nonetheless, the sound engineer Butch Vig, was determined to push the band in order to achieve the right results, and to this end he had Krist Novoselic redo some of his bass parts and Kurt Cobain performing quite a number of guitar overdubs. the band didn't want the album to have any of the instruments too washed out with reverb or echo, they wanted everything to be fairly dry and in your face.
Dave Grohl's kit used an AKG D12 and a FET 47 on the kick, they built a drum tunnel consisting of old drum shells attached to the bass drum and extended out about six feet. That way you can move a mic back three to four feet, by having the drum tunnel, the kick is isolated, so that you don't get all of the cymbal bleed, this means that the bass drum mic isn't picking up other drums in the recording, this will make the kick drum more defined in the album, this making the overall quality of sound improve. Using a Neumann U67 and an LA2A, most of Cobain's vocals were recorded in the small Studio B at Sound City and ran straight to tape. The results alternate between a smooth, compressed, phasey sound.The guitars were in some cases, so over driven that the end result bears little resemblance to the instrument that originated it. Cobain doubled a lot of the rhythm guitars, he also overdubbed clean and distorted tracks in almost all of the little solo sections. The album also used a fair amount of compression on the vocals so that Cobain dynamics were controlled , Kurt also did some double-tracking, particularly on choruses, he did that quite a bit on the record such as Breed, there was also two tracks of harmony's performed by Dave Grohl on songs such as in Bloom.
Comparison to other Album:
The techniques utilised in the album Nevermind are similar and can be compared to the album "wasting light" by the Foo Fighters , this is because Dave Grohl, the former drummer of Nirvana, decided that Twenty years on from the landmark recording of Nevermind he would reunite with that album's producer, Butch Vig. He also decided to buy the the mixing desk used in Nevermind and set it up in his garage. this meant that the album was completely recorded with tape instead of computers. the tape made wasting light have a very raw and similar sound to what Nevermind had. The band believed an analogue project would help the band reclaim its artistic freedom. The album incorporated 3 guitar tracks which were sometimes very over-driven, this is similar to the Nirvana grunge sound. because the album used tape instead of computer, they were limited on what they could , the tape makes the album sound more like a live recording with slight imperfections, this can be compared to Nevermind as that was also recorded very much from the live perspective.Evaluation of my own recordings:
When recording our own instruments I recorded a electric Stratocaster into fender 20 watt amp using a Shure SM58 dynamic microphone and also an AKG C1000S condenser microphone. I decided on using these two microphones as I wanted to not only record right next to the amp but also pick up the acoustic reflection from around the room. I did this by placing the C1000S the other side of the studio and turned it the other way, by doing this the sound waves would have bounced against the walls before getting to the microphone meaning a more ambient sound. I chose the dynamic Shure SM58 as it could handle the high sound pressure levels resonated from the amplifier. When both tracks are played together the recording has a natural reverb tone and also record more bassy tones which the Shure microphone didn't pick up as it was very close to the speaker. This electric guitar would have been similar to the way nirvana recorded their guitars on nevermind as i learned they also used two microphones on the amp. the overall sound quality of this recording was very crisp and in seemed to pick up the crunch tones on the amp without the mic becoming to over driven and distorted. To improve this recording I would say that the amp could have been put in a separate room than the performer, this would have meant that there were no background sounds of the plectrum strumming the strings and the amp would have been isolated. or if another room was not available the amp could have been turned up so the background noise could not be heard. It could also be improved by making sure the performers guitar was perfectly in tune as it sounds slightly out. When recording the guitar there was the performer was in the booth with the guitar, I was operating the recording the software in the control room and we also had a person in the booth setting up the microphones making sure the instruments has a good quality sound. this is very similar to the the layout of where Nevermind was recorded as there was also two technicians . Constraints we came across when recording were factors such as cutting of the tracks too quickly instead of letting the note ring on and then edit later. We also experienced some feedback from the microphones when in certain positions, this was a problem as it could ruin the recording. We also were unable to add add effects such as a chorus pedal this meant the recording was a bit dry.
Acoustic Guitar
When I recorded a 12 string Guitar with two Condenser AKG C1000S, one 30cm in front of the sound hole and the other 20cm in front of the neck. This technique was incorporated so I was able to put both recordings together to capture all of the sound resonating from the guitar. And also to create a more ambient tone on the recording. As it was recorded in a completely sound proof studio there was no background noise. this made the guitar sound like a professional recording and would have been similar to how bands like Nirvana would have recorded an acoustic guitar. I also feel like as the quality of recording was to a good standard this meant the expression of the performance was captured and therefore involved the listener. Using the two mics instead of one increased the amount of tonal range on the recording and also picked all of the sound resonated from the hole of the guitar. this is similar to the way nirvana recorded the son 'something in the way' as they used similar techniques to record an acoustic guitar. The way that the recording could be improved is that occasionally throughout the recording there would be a tapping sound of the plectrum hitting the body of the guitar. to improve this the performer could adjust his technique so this did not occur, if he were to do this the recording would therefore improve.
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