It seems people really like you and that opened doors for you in the business, beyond simply engineering. What do you think it is about your own personal make-up that brings that into play?
I dunno. Back then, if we're talking about Rumours and the '70s, I was a young guy and I was pretty determined. I was a little quiet, probably, but I was very confident in my abilities. I had learned a lot from watching engineers, some of them really great, and I memorized everything. By the time I got to Rumours I had done a number of live albums — Joni Mitchell was the most notable [Miles of Aisles]. I did the strings for Wings' Venus and Mars; Paul McCartney came up to me and said it was one of the best string sounds. I was very comfortable with what I did. When they hired me to do Fleetwood Mac, all I had to do was just be myself. I didn't want to hold back. I told them on the third day [of tracking Rumours] that we were going to get a Grammy for this record. They went, "Sure." So I was intent on doing that, but then they threw me a curve. On the second or third day in the studio they said, "You can't just sit there, turning knobs. You have to participate and listen to what's going on. We want you to be our eyes and ears." We'd just done two takes, so it was questions like, "Which tempo did you like better? Which take did you like better? Were any of us stepping on each others' toes?" They wanted to make sure they were playing well, and that you could hear everything. They basically wanted me to learn to be a producer, like, "Here's how you do it."
Did you start to listen to the takes as they were going down carefully enough to have that information?
Yeah, I started taking notes. I basically produce by engineering. If I can't get all of the sounds to come up and be a good mix, it's like, "What's wrong?" If the sounds aren't the problem, then what is the problem? A couple of takes later I said to Christine [McVie], "Well, I was really having trouble hearing you and Lindsey [Buckingham], because it seemed like I couldn't tell your parts apart." She said, "Oh, Lindsey, why don't you play up a third and I'll play down a third." So I memorized that. Next time I said, "Hey, I think you guys are stepping on each others' toes. Can one of you play up and the other down a little bit?" They said, "Yeah, sure. We can do that. Thanks Ken!" I was like, "Wow... okay!"
Things they might not hear because they're focused on their own parts.
Yeah, right. That's really what production is. It's like English language; putting in the commas, the periods, and being a traffic cop. "Wait! You were playing way too much. Play half as much. You're playing perfectly and you guys work together." Sometimes, with these new guitar players, it's like, "Are you going to continue to play all the way through?" Don't they know if you play all the way through that the human ear, just like a buzz, will just notch it out? "They're not going to hear you at all. Is that what you want?"
I'm convinced that so much more of our time should be spent arranging,
Right. And less is more.
Do we enter into sort of a doctor/patient thing when we're in there making a record with someone? After writing a book about it years later, did you feel there were any points where you were putting too much out there?
I didn't think there was any trust violated. And I hope I'm right!
I'm not saying that in a critical way.
Right, but I thought it was my story. It's not their story. It's my story of what I went through being a fly on the wall and being right there. So yeah, maybe I had some hesitations about discussing John McVie's drinking. But he's a big boy, and he knows it! I'm not telling any secrets, and he made a terrific record. I just wanted to paint the picture of what it was like to be sitting in there and working with these people on a big-time album. And yeah, I might have told a little bit too much, but most of the time I tried to be more complimentary.
That must have been a rough time for him too, personally of course.
Yeah, but no. The deal on that was that Christine basically said, "John, I can't stand the drunk. So give me John the sober guy, and I'll stay." And what did he choose?
True. Partway through making that album Mick came to you and Richard Dashut [co-producer with Ken and the band] and said, "I'm giving you guys co-production credit." You got points at that juncture, which was a completely life-changing for both of you, I'm sure.
Completely, yeah.
When you look back at that, are you still blown away by that gesture?
Yes and no. It was a great gesture, but I believe good things come to those who deserve it. Many times I've said, "Look, if you don't want to give me points, if you don't think I'm doing the job, then don't. But if you think I'm doing the job, then I want to be paid." We were working very, very hard. Richard and I were in there, day in and day out, coming up with ideas. We deserved it, we earned it, and they were right by giving it to us.
I could see other scenarios where someone might not offer it.
They went on vacation for three or four weeks and left me and Richard with Lindsey. Mick would have never done that before, but now he was comfortable with it. I think the whole world should learn that lesson: If an employee is doing a damn good job, give them a bonus. You don't have to go crazy, but give some kind of acknowledgment.
I've been in scenarios where I'm not sure if the band's considering me just an engineer. Sometimes you get a co- production credit, and at least you get the credit, which can make our careers.
Well, I've worked with assholes who didn't. I did everything on Joni Mitchell's Miles of Aisles. I chose every single mic, I did all the EQ, and I did everything on every show. We did 40 shows for Joni. Henry Lewy (her producer) came in, kind of cockily, one day and said, "Hey, I'm just going to play producer, and you can play engineer." So, great. He didn't have much to say to me. I was doing my thing, and he might say, "Okay, now is a guitar solo, so get ready." Then, when the record came out, he didn't even put my last name on the record. I said, "Henry, I'd like to at least get a gold record." He said, "Gold record? I've got plenty of them here. Do you want one?" I was like, "You prick!" He knew it was important, and that's a pretty shitty answer.
In Making Rumours you compare the recording technology of the '70s with what we have available now. What do you think of the changes that we've seen?
I think it's great. I think that Pro Tools is tremendous, and it makes my job a lot easier in some ways. But after writing the book, and talking about it enough, I've realized that one of the blessings about analog was that it was a slower process. We had bigger budgets; we weren't in a rush to go anywhere. When you're running analog tape you had to rewind. I'm sitting at the console with my artist out there, and we're connected with microphones and speakers. I'm talking to them when they've just finished a guitar part, vocal, or whatever. While I'm rewinding I have to fill the time, so it's like, "Hey, Lindsey, that was a great part. On that second verse, you started doing this syncopated thing. I don't know what it was, but it was really cool." He'd say, "Really, could you play that for me?" I'd stop and play him back the part. And he'd say, "Wow, that was cool. I didn't realize that." So I'd say, "Do that some more." You have all this talking. But in Pro Tools it's just, "Boom, boom, boom. Start again." I have to reach over and say, "Stop. Just stop. Let me talk to them." I want to slow this process down and bring talking and creativity back into it. With Fleetwood Mac, they were all sitting in a room with us and they had no place to go. My daughter [Colbie Caillat] comes in here and is like, "I've got 40 minutes to do the vocal. I've got to go to another meeting." I'd like to say, "Could you just listen? Sit down, and talk about the music." Pro Tools is great for editing, structuring, and things like that. But slow it down. Just take your time. If you're in a Pro Tools room now in somebody's garage or something, your overhead is really low.
There should be more time to talk.
Exactly. That's why I'm here. This room costs me a hundred bucks a day.
I know you thought about writing a Making Tusk book, but maybe not. One of the records that never gets talked about much is their next album, Mirage [1982].
You're right.
The majority of that was done in France. Going on from Tusk, which was sort of seen as a "failure"...
Anti-Rumours.
...even though it sold millions of copies. What were the feelings and thoughts going into Mirage?
Mirage was basically going to be Rumours II. I believe we got off-track. Lindsey got way off-track on Tusk; he just wanted everything to be grungy and really nasty sounding.
Cardboard boxes...
Yeah. I mean, it just hurt my ears. Some of the guitars and distortion were tearing so bad that it made me nauseous. I tried to bury that stuff. I have to hand it to Lindsey, as much as he was dedicated to being different on Tusk, he wasn't with everybody else's songs. He didn't grunge them up. One of the first days we figured out the description was that we were going to make this a "dark" record; and not Rumours, for sure. He was pissed off, like, "I hate bands that do the same thing twice."
The world wouldn't have minded!
No. And the whole band wouldn't have minded, really. He basically threatened to quit, like, "I'll walk out." He tested himself the first time and found out that he'd gotten away with it, and he started to get more obstinate. When Mirage came about, we came together and said, "There's nothing wrong with Rumours, but let's see if we can beat it. Let's see if we can make the songs fatter and the sounds stronger." Engineering- wise, we cut that at CCIR [tape EQ curve setting], because I read somewhere that it gave a cleaner top and a stronger bottom.
Yeah, it makes for a different sound versus NAB/AES settings.
So we cut that album in CCIR. Rumours, by the way, we did at 0 [operating level] at NAB, with Dolby [noise reduction], because I wanted to keep the transients.
I know you mentioned in your book, too, that one of your things was to preserve the transients and use noise reduction to record at a moderate level so you weren't getting that limiting kind of thing from tape.
I did a drum date a couple weeks ago. The drummer was playing tambourine and he was up there, close to the mic. I asked, "Do you hear that going 'click, click, click'?" I had to tell him to back off.
I love grabbing a ribbon mic for that and moving someone back away from it.
Even when it sounds like it's not, it still is distorting. I remember at Wally Heider Studios they had some sort of peak indicator we brought in. I'd set it up on the board, and I was like, "You're kidding me! This thing's broken." I couldn't get back off the mic far enough with the tambourine. The thing was still lighting up. We did Rumours at 0 NAB, and then Mirage at +3 CCIR. Rumours is really bright and mid-rangey. Tusk is very dark, with some grunge in the 400 to 800 cycles range. Meanwhile Mirage had more peaks at 400 to 800, but also more peaks on the lower-end thumping.
It's cleaner in a way, with more of a punch to everything.
