Another 'How do I get Phil Lesh's tone?' thread

[bassilisk]

I understand he reached a point where he was banned from the mixdowns because he was hearing colors and making suggestions to the engineer like it needs more purple....

[edwin]

I highly doubt that. With some exceptions later in their career and at the very beginning, the Grateful Dead handled most of their own technical work. So, certainly anyone who was working with them would probably have had a lot of sympathy for his point of view, shall we say. He also has had a good understanding of the technical aspects of music, so its doubtful that he would have been limited to such abstractions in making his views heard.  
 
Early on, the Dead did have difficulties in the studio interfacing with the straight world resulting in a letter from Joe Smith, their Warner Bros. rep, to their manager that read in part:
 
The recording in New York turned out to be very difficult. Lack of preparation, direction and cooperation from the very beginning have made this album the most unreasonable project with which we have ever involved ourselves.
 
Your group has many problems, it would appear, and I would believe that Hassinger has no further interest or desire to work with them under conditions similar to this last fiasco. It's apparent that no one in your organization has enough influence over Phil Lesh to evoke anything resembling normal behavior. You are now branded an undesirable group in almost every recording studio in Los Angeles. I haven't got all the New York reports in as yet, but the guys ran through engineers like a steamroller.
 
It all adds up to a lack of professionalism. The Grateful Dead is not one of the top acts in the business as yet. With their attitudes and their inability to take care of business when it is time do so would lead us to believe that they never will be truly important. No matter how talented your group is, they're going to have to put something of themselves into the business before they get anywhere.
 
More is explained at this link:http://www.blairjackson.com/chapter_eight_additions.htm and if you read the quotes about Phil, you will realized that the difficulties were more a case of cultural miscommunication than some spaced out drugged up hippie being weird.
 
BTW, hearing colors is known as synthesthesia. My wife is synthesthetic and as an artist has utilized this to her benefit. (www.artscent.com and http://www.wix.com/dshartstudio/dawnspencerhurwitz) Her visual art is informed by her career as a perfumer, which in turn was inspired, both in structure and technique, by her painting background. Her paintings often have fragrances that go with them (and those fragrances themselves, as art pieces in and of themselves, are constructed with the concept that they exist beyond being created to exist as a pretty thing that you wear). So, if you were constructing a fragrance with her and requested more purple, not only would she take you seriously, she'd do it!

[slammin]

Wow, talk about perspective!
 
Hear color. Draw fragrances.  Really, not so far fetched from what we do everyday when you boil it down to things like, acting upon emotions, or any of the other tangibles that most are familiar with.
 
Thanks - I've never quite grasped the correlation between art and form in the manner in which you describe, but now that you mention it, it makes perfect sense!
 
I guess I never thought about it that way.

[lbpesq]

Wasn't there a story about Phil or maybe Bobby asking the record company engineer for the sound of heavy air, or something like that?  I think Phil tells the story in a documentary I've seen.
 
Bill, tgo

[edwin]

They talk about it in Anthem to Beauty, but in the link I provided, Hassinger said it never happened in the studio. Who to believe? Still, the heavy air was not as weird as it might seem. Weir was referring to colored sound, which he probably got from Phil. Colored sound (ie. pink, white, etc. noise) was a big thing in the late 50s and early 60s with the electronic music crowd (not to be confused with what gets called electronic music these which is dance music, as opposed to the music that evolved out of the modern classical scene). Phil was probably well aware of these things, what with his studies at Mills College and hanging with TC and all.

[hieronymous]

Thanks for that link Edwin - lots of great reading there! Here's the section on heavy air:
 
Bob Weir is fond of saying that he drove Hassinger to the brink by asking the producer to come up with sound of heavy air on the record, but Hassinger dismisses that: That did come up, but that was earlier. That might have even been in Haight-Ashbury. I just looked at him when he said it. But he said it in such a serious way, I didn't really know how to react. Actually, a little later we did seriously look into trying to get into a certain quality of sound like I suppose he was talking about. We were going to take all the equipment out to the desert east of L.A. and record out there, but it never happened.
 
Relating to the concern with color in 20th century music, Alexander Scriabin was a late-19th/early-20th century composer who was deeply involved in the relationship between color and sound. He even had a colour organ which, instead of producing sounds, projected light!  
 
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Alexander_Scriabin#Influence_of_colour
 
One of the things I appreciate about the Dead is the fact that they are so much more than just a rock band - they incorporate so many influences, both from early American music as well as the 20th century classical and electronic music via Phil.

[pace]

IIRC Weir's request for heavy air was for the breakdown in Born Cross-eyed. While in mixdown, it's a hard demand to meet, but in regards to live sound, especially outdoors, humidity is an often neglected factor when tuning a system.  
 
As far as synthesthesia goes, I can attest that it is a very 'real' condition, and one of the fundamental building blocks to all those perfect pitch courses that you used to see in the guit/bass mags back in the day.... While they were really teaching how to develop a good sense of relative pitch, relating the color spectrum to our 12 tone system can be a helpful tool.  
 
FWIW, The only time I see color generated from a vibrating string, is in the vicinity of A 110hz or 220hz, and the colors generated are green and red. No joke....

[lbpesq]

I often used to see music as color.  Of course it was usually in Winterland, I was hanging with about 5000 other people, including the Dead, and as for the alteredness of my consciousness at the time, I plead the fifth!  lol  
 
Bill, tgo

[edwin]

Not an uncommon experience, given the circumstances, but, interestingly, not something in which Dawn has ever indulged. Some of us are lucky enough to be born with it!
 
When I was at Berklee and in some of my subsequent projects, I have experimented with using colors and images as a musical score. it was an interesting exercise that has had application in the rest of my musical life. Given that music is a language with which we communicate, I think it's useful to be able to make these connections. Now, if I want a jam to be more blue, I have something to work with. Listeners might not get it, but perhaps there is some coherent abstraction they might grasp.

[s_wood]

Interesting!  
I have always been fascinated in the interactive nature of music, especially live music, and Edwin's comments above got me thinking...so here is the Socratic question (sorry for the veiled reference Edwin   If Edwin wants the jam to be more blue, and applies a technique that, for him, progresses to that end, but a given listener doesn't get it as presented but instead hears, feels or sees something else, has Edwin failed?  
 
For me, the answer is no.  If I am part of an ensemble, we may wish that a song, or perhaps its tonality, groove or lyrics, convey a certain idea.  However, a listener might hear something completely different than what was intended...which, for me, is beautiful and very cool.  As the players, we can only do our best, but if a listener wants or needs to hear the music as something else, so be it.
 
End of thread hijack

[rusty_the_scoob]

Heh!  Back to the practical matter.... to the setup in the orignial post I'd switch to D'Addario Half Rounds ideally or any good set of flats, and a pick.  My preferred easily-available pick is a Dunlop 2mm Gator Grip.  I like the graphite ones as well but they're tougher to get and more expensive, and 90% the same pick.  I use both types interchangeably.
 
This will all put you closer to an 80's Phil sound IMHO, but it's a good start.  1977 requires a shortscale neck and warmer, less modern amplification.  You can get close enough with a 34 neck if you work the mids on that SF-2.

[glocke]

If you pick guys havent checked em out yet, try the john pearse buffalo horn picks...I have one that has a cut for your index finger.
 
http://www.jpstrings.com/brnew.htm
 
They are a little pricey, but seem to last awhile.

[cozmik_cowboy]

In '77 Phil was playing his osage orange Mission Control Alembic - I don't think that was short scale.
 
Peter

[sonicus]

I think it was perhaps medium scale .   I saw that Bass  on the work bench in person while it was  opened during  it's wiring procedure. I still have a few pictures of it.

[bigredbass]

I think I experience hearing colors, as every time I hear rap music I see red.  Yodeling does it as well.  Occasionally, there's no music involved, like listening to an interview with Lars Ulrich.  Any record of homicidal overtones with this?  And more importantly, does Phil remember what he sounds like?
 
J o e y