And Alan Wilder was the drummer for Depeche Mode


This web page purports to list the vocal and instrumental personnel on each track (except for the instrumental) of Ladytron's "Witching Hour." Yet there's a numbing sameness to the lists:

  • According to the page, Daniel Hunt, Mira Aroyo, and Helen Marnie are the vocalists on every song.

  • According to the page, Reuben Wu is the only keyboardist on nearly every song, and Hunt, Aroyo, and Marnie don't play keyboards at all on the album.

  • According to the page, Daniel Hunt is the one and only guitarist on every song.


This is like saying that Harrison, Lennon, McCartney, Ono, and Starkey were the singers on every song on "The Beatles."

One interesting tidbit: two viola players (Justin Lingard and Semay Wu) are listed in the credits for "Beauty*2."

Now let's switch to Wilder, and this excerpt from a 1993 interview:


Q: What's an example of how the performance element comes through on _Songs_?

A: Let's take "I Feel You." All the drums on there are played. Most of
them were sampled and then sequenced in the form of drum loops That's
not to say that they don't change as the song goes on. There's a series
of loops, which are sequenced together, using Steinberg Cubase, in a
different structure from how they were originally performed.

Q: In the past, you might have programmed the rhythm without any
performance.

A: Exactly. In this case, we're applying the technology to a performance
to make sure that you get all the dynamics of a human performance, all
those slight timing changes that make something feel human. On "Walking
in My Shoes," for example, there are different loops in the verse, an
additional loop comes in on the bridge, and the chorus brings in a
complete change of drum sound and rhythm. Plus there are different drum
fills, hi-hat patterns, and top percussion parts in each section. The
combination of all that gives you the impression of the rhythm changing
all the time.



And, in this essay about A Flock of Seagulls, there is a significant discussion about Alan Wilder playing the metaphorical drums:


It is easy to forget, nowadays, that although so many groups of the early 1980s used synthesisers, the vast majority also used traditional electric instruments, and drums, which are not electric at all, although they are often amplified with electric microphones and amplifiers and so forth. None of the aforementioned leading lights of the New Romantic movement entirely dispensed with their drummers, and indeed some of the groups which were even more heavily in thrall to the space-age world of the electronic keyboard - particularly New Order and Depeche Mode - either retained their drummers or, in the latter case, made Alan Wilder play the drums because the rest of the band didn't like Alan Wilder very much, they were jealous of him, standing there behind the keyboard, like Chris Lowe of the Pet Shop Boys, but with leather trousers. Many groups have metaphorically made Alan Wilder play the metaphorical drums, although only one group has literally made Alan Wilder play the drums, that group being Depeche Mode, in which group Alan Wilder was in. He is like Jesus Christ; just as Depeche Mode in 1990 made Alan Wilder play the drums, so too did the society of wherever it was that Jesus Christ lived in BC 30 or whenever... that society made Jesus go from playing the keyboards to playing the drums, and then he left to do a solo project and was never heard of again. By the end of the 1980s the technology which powered the drum machine had advanced to such a state that it could also power musical synthesisers; the machines which had once held rhythm patterns could now hold melody as well, and poor Alan Wilder stroke Jesus Christ was left with nothing to do. But I digress.


Did you?

Well, let me digress and talk about live instruments. Before Wilder played the drums, Gore played the guitar. One chapter of Dave Thompson's book focuses on a song that, while never appearing on any regular Depeche Mode album, has come to define the band in the late 1980s - "Route 66." According to Thompson, that was the first time Gore had played the guitar while recording - maybe accurate, maybe not, but it certainly sounded different from anything the band had done before.

Back to studio personnel:


Among recording studio personnel, it is a well-known fact that many bands break up during or shortly after a recording project. Some theories about why this occurs are:

a.) It is the end of a cycle, or a sense of completion, and for some, time to move on.

b.) Musicians feel very “evaluated” when hearing themselves recorded. Even if the band frequently records their shows, it’s just not the same as a studio recording. Flaws that can go unnoticed during a live show become very apparent.

c.) People spend so much time together on the project that they just get sick of each other. I suppose there are many reasons for the recording studio curse. I can attest that it has happened to us three times!



Hey, two Beatles quit during recording sessions. Here's the first:


As the 1960s progressed and the Beatles' musical interest propelled them further into the studio, Ringo found himself with less and less to do. While John and Paul were working on arrangements and George was adjusting his guitar sound, Ringo was in the corner playing cards with Mal Evans for hours on end. By the time of the White Album in 1968, with the other Beatles producing masterpieces daily, Ringo felt distinctly expendable.

After a particularly tense session on 22 August, 1968, he quit the band. The Beatles weathered the storm, recording "Back In The USSR" the next day with Paul behind the drumkit. However, the band managed to persuade Ringo to return within a few days.



Here's the second:


Paul McCartney’s solution was to “get back” to what they used to do best: playing live without overdubs or edits.

The other three Beatles were not enthused about going back on the road, so a live television show was planned. The rehearsals were filmed at Twickenham for broadcast at some future time. But what the cameras captured was a group in turmoil. At one point George Harrison quit, returning after a few days. So the television show was dropped.



For the record, the third Beatle to quit (Lennon) did so during a business meeting, and the fourth (McCartney) did so via a press release.

From the Ontario Empoblog

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