80s music and reverb

[VitaminD]

Name a commercially successful Pop song from the 1980s..

Now listen for reverb.. I bet there is a lathering of it somewhere in the mix.. typically on the snare and sometimes entire drum bus (including kick drum!!) but it seems to be there.. heavily.

Is this when digital delays were becoming more common or does it go further back (no pun intended) than that?

I get the feeling it was a new effect in the rack of many producers and mixing engineers and thus it was overused as a result.. by the late 80s/early 90s it seems the reverb amounts were tamed a bit.. well somewhat.

[planetearth]

Name a commercially successful Pop song from the 1980s..

Now listen for reverb.. I bet there is a lathering of it somewhere in the mix.. typically on the snare and sometimes entire drum bus (including kick drum!!) but it seems to be there.. heavily.

Is this when digital delays were becoming more common or does it go further back (no pun intended) than that?

I get the feeling it was a new effect in the rack of many producers and mixing engineers and thus it was overused as a result.. by the late 80s/early 90s it seems the reverb amounts were tamed a bit.. well somewhat.

Well, this is all just my opinion, but it's an interesting topic, and since you asked....

There's quite a difference in production style and music from the early '80s to the mid-'80s to the late '80s. The early '80s still had the "dead", Steely Dan/The Eagles sound of the late-'70s (think Steely Dan's "Hey Nineteen"), where there's very little reverb or even room ambience. (This is not a knock on Steely Dan, The Eagles, or even their sound; it's just an example.) The studios at the time even had "Live End/Dead End" designs, so you could choose if you wanted ambience or not.

When synths became popular in pop music (early- to mid-'80s), reverb had to be added, and yes, many producers may have gone overboard with their new toys, in an attempt to keep the sound from being too "dry". But I think a lot of that faded out by the late-'80s. There was still quite a bit, but if you're comparing it to the hip-hop and grunge sounds of the early '90s (styles which are completely different from "pop"), then it's definitely noticeable.

Steve

[SODDI]

It's all Ivo Watts-Russell's fault.

Try listening to the first Dead Can Dance CD (1984) - there is so much reverb it is almost painful. Everything is smooshed into reverb moosh.



Nearly as bad is Ivo's house project This Mortal Coil's first CD, "It Will End in Tears" - but since each track was produced independently it's not so egregious. It even sounds good on Elizabeth Fraser's version of Tim Buckley's "Song to the Siren".



And everyone wanted to sound like that. *I* wanted to sound like that.

These days i think very carefully before using a reverb. And I usually strip it 100% wet to a separate track and EQ the shit out of it.

[GeckoYamori]

The trend had its start in the very early 80's in two isolated cases. Can't remember what the studios were called, but one was in the UK and one was in the US. Both of them had gotten really tired of the "dead" 70's sound and had built recording rooms with a lot of reverbation in them. Phil Collins was recording some drums, but there was a noise gate in the signal chain which they had forgotten about which abruptly cut off the tail of the reverb, giving the trademark massive sound. After that more people started aping it, and eventually it got so popular that they simply added non-linear settings for digital reverbs.

[robogone]

I agree that it was different depending on what part of the 80s you look at. In the early 80s you still had a lot of producers using an echo chamber in the basement of the studio if one was available. Then there was the sudden surge in digital units and the use of gated reverb. Later in the decade it was all dialed back by quite a bit.

As for Phil Collin's recording session starting things, I think that was the start of gated reverb being used, but the increase in amount of reverb started a little before that. People like Martin Hannett would be good examples, where they created more sparse music so that you could slather it in reverb without it getting too muddy.

[toothnclaw]

Who cares, it was just a production fad, and luckily it faded away soon, never to be coming back.

Wish many other things would go in the same direction.... e.g. wub-wub-wub, you know....

[osiris]

I've cleaned up a bunch of dance music from the 80's and 90's and you can see - the snare and reverb are often higher than the kick or anything else...

[Aloysius]

Interesting ...



Martin Hannett and Tony Wilson at Strawberry Studios in July 1980

[kbaccki]

Who cares, it was just a production fad, and luckily it faded away soon, never to be coming back.

Wish many other things would go in the same direction.... e.g. wub-wub-wub, you know....

Oh come now... who doesn't enjoy a little robot voice... or some atonal wwaaaNNHH waanhh waannh wanh wanh vvrrrwwwaaaHHHHH vvrrrwwwwaaaHHHHH VVRRRRWWWWAAAHHHH VVRRRRWWWWAAAHHHH every now and then?

[kritikon]

It's a bit of a sweeping generalisation. Don't forget that the 80s started out with late punk/new wave too, and that certainly wasn't all reverb-washed. Stranglers, Clash and plenty of other big names weren't all about reverb.

It was only some synth stuff, and some indie guitar stuff. Loads of the goth guitar stuff used delays but weren't particularly heavy on reverb. For me, one of the 80s' seminal albums was Avalon - not overdone with reverb at all. IMO one of those albums that just nailed every aspect of the mix, in the same way DSotM did previously.

Acid House and other pure electronic forms were going well in the 80s and they weren't at all about reverb.

Somone mentioned This Mortal Coil - yeah, they certainly liked their reverb ( ), and I suppose Enya is remebered as quintessential 80s - but it wasn't all that music by a long shot. I could list plenty of dry-ish and well mixed 80s bands.

But it does make sense that some music got into reverb in a big way, because affordable reverb units only really got going in the 80s. Boys and their toys etc.

Same today - will we remeber all music as being squashed to oblivion? Some abuse limiters and compressors simply because they're now so accessible. But not everyone does it.

[VitaminD]

It's a bit of a sweeping generalisation. Don't forget that the 80s started out with late punk/new wave too, and that certainly wasn't all reverb-washed. Stranglers, Clash and plenty of other big names weren't all about reverb.

It was only some synth stuff, and some indie guitar stuff. Loads of the goth guitar stuff used delays but weren't particularly heavy on reverb. For me, one of the 80s' seminal albums was Avalon - not overdone with reverb at all. IMO one of those albums that just nailed every aspect of the mix, in the same way DSotM did previously.

Acid House and other pure electronic forms were going well in the 80s and they weren't at all about reverb.

Somone mentioned This Mortal Coil - yeah, they certainly liked their reverb ( ), and I suppose Enya is remebered as quintessential 80s - but it wasn't all that music by a long shot. I could list plenty of dry-ish and well mixed 80s bands.

But it does make sense that some music got into reverb in a big way, because affordable reverb units only really got going in the 80s. Boys and their toys etc.

Same today - will we remeber all music as being squashed to oblivion? Some abuse limiters and compressors simply because they're now so accessible. But not everyone does it.

I think you could have missed

Name a commercially successful Pop song from the 1980s..

[robogone]

I think you could have missed

Name a commercially successful Pop song from the 1980s..

He mentioned Avalon and Enya - I think both of them count. And by the early 80s I think you could certainly count the Stranglers.

[VitaminD]

But he specifically mentions punk/new wave, indie, acid house, and a couple bands I've never knew existed (were they popular outside of UK?) such as the stranglers or avalon.. quick wiki search claims they have their roots in other genres..

oh and Enya isn't anywhere close to pop shes 'celtic'/new age from the albums I have of her.. almost chillout.. but she uses about three metric ton of reverb anyways.

In any case, I was listening to 80s pop playlists on spotify.. around 30-40 songs.. and I noticed the overwhelming majority were drenched in reverb in some form or fashion.. sometimes the whole drum bus, sometimes the guitars and vocals, and sometimes just the snare. Got me wondering if this was just a new tool in the mixing engineers bag at the time.

Also wondered how many of these songs would sound if they were produced today.. or in other eras..

[SODDI]

Interesting ...



Martin Hannett and Tony Wilson at Strawberry Studios in July 1980

Martin Hannett, another producer who believed that a loaded revolver was vital component in a recording studio. (Phil Spector, Jack Nitzsche)

Did someone say reverb?



It's interesting. I have always loved/hated his production work on the Joy Division recordings. He certainly was a pioneer in creating a completely artificial, completely manipulated audio space.

[robogone]

But he specifically mentions punk/new wave, indie, acid house, and a couple bands I've never knew existed (were they popular outside of UK?) such as the stranglers or avalon.. quick wiki search claims they have their roots in other genres..

oh and Enya isn't anywhere close to pop shes 'celtic'/new age from the albums I have of her.. almost chillout.. but she uses about three metric ton of reverb anyways.

In any case, I was listening to 80s pop playlists on spotify.. around 30-40 songs.. and I noticed the overwhelming majority were drenched in reverb in some form or fashion.. sometimes the whole drum bus, sometimes the guitars and vocals, and sometimes just the snare. Got me wondering if this was just a new tool in the mixing engineers bag at the time.

Also wondered how many of these songs would sound if they were produced today.. or in other eras..

Not really sure what consitutes 'pop' then. In the early 80s in the UK the charts were filled with new wave and synth bands so they really made up what was considered pop music then.

In the early 80s the Stranglers produced a string of hits, and Avalon was probably one of the most pop oriented songs that Roxy Music produced. I would not be surprised to see either band appearing on 80s pop lists on Spotify.

To me Enya was certainly pop music. Horrible stuff, but I always recall her music being looked down at by those who liked traditional celtic music as there was little of it left in what she produced. She had at least one UK number one single, so by definition she produced popular music.