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(Sittin’ On) The Dock Of The Bay - Otis R
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crapfromthepast View Drop Down
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Points: 99 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote crapfromthepast Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 10 October 2013 at 2:14pm
I knew I remembered something about how Steve Cropper did the mix for "Dock Of The Bay", and I found the article. From the Wall Street Journal, January 3, 2013, an excerpt directly from Steve Cropper:

Quote Back at Stax on Monday, Atlantic Records' producer Jerry Wexler called. Atlantic handled Stax's distribution. Jerry said we had to get an Otis single out right away. I said, "Jerry, we just lost Otis. We don't have anything mixed yet, and I can't even think about it." Jerry insisted.

So early on Tuesday morning I began mixing "Dock of the Bay" alone. I wanted to enhance the bay image, sort of like a secret message to Otis. I called a local friend for sound effects of the sea and gulls and added them lightly in places.

When I finished the mix the next morning, I took the master tape to the Memphis airport and handed the box to an attendant flying up to New York. She was met in New York by an Atlantic rep, and the label made a test pressing for Jerry.

But Jerry had a problem with it. He wanted Otis's vocal to be louder and wanted me to remix the tape. I felt it was perfect and didn't want to touch it. Then I had an idea. The tape Jerry had was a stereo mix—with the bass and guitar coming out of the left speaker and the drums and vocal track on the right.

By turning the stereo mix into a mono mix—having the same audio information come out of both speakers—the vocal would come up two decibels. So that's what I did, but I never thought I'd fool Jerry. He loved what I sent, and that's what you hear on the single.

Years later, I was in Sausalito on tour and found myself at a place by the bay having a hamburger. I was watching the water when my eye caught something. The ferries crossing from San Francisco turned a little as they came in, creating a rolling wave to cushion their arrival at the pier. That's when it hit me. Otis had been watching the ferries roll in.


The full article, which is a very nice read, is here.
There's a lot of crap on the radio, but there's only one Crap From The Past.
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The Hits Man View Drop Down
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Points: 0 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote The Hits Man Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 10 October 2013 at 5:27pm
I have a stereo mix on the Atlantic Records 50th
Anniversary 2-disc CD from 1998. I do not have the Cat #.
The disc is HDCD encoded. I think this should make a nice
foldover, which I just did.
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Points: 1 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote Yah Shure Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 10 October 2013 at 9:14pm
Originally posted by crapfromthepast crapfromthepast wrote:

John convinced me that if you fold down the stereo mix, the drums are much softer than on the mono vocals-out-in-front mix. So this isn't a fold-down.


Ron, is it too late to un-convince you? :) Mark was able to convince me that it was the track on the T-L Superhits 1968 CD that has some wonky phase issues. I was able to confirm that by summing the stereo track from a 1973 Atlantic Records 2-LP 25th Anniversary set, which relocated the drums from Siberia to somewhere across the bay.

And thanks for providing the link to that story!
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Points: 99 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote crapfromthepast Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 11 October 2013 at 5:03am
I think if I did the fold-down in an unbalanced way, using
a little more than 50% of the channel with the drums and a
little less than 50% of the other channel, I could probably
adjust the level of the drums pretty easily.

So to summarize: there's the stereo mix, the true 45 mix
that's a fold-down of the stereo mix, and that other mix
that has the vocals too far back.
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The Hits Man View Drop Down
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Points: 0 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote The Hits Man Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 11 October 2013 at 7:36pm
Originally posted by crapfromthepast crapfromthepast wrote:


So to summarize: there's the stereo mix, the true 45 mix
that's a fold-down of the stereo mix, and that other mix
that has the vocals too far back.
   I know it's
subjective, but That last one you mentioned was te
original mono mix. I don't think the vocals are too far
back.   If anything, I think the stereo/foldover mix has
the vocal too loud. I wish Jerry Wexler had liked it.
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Points: 208 		Post Options Post Options   Thanks (0) Thanks(0)   Quote aaronk Quote  Post ReplyReply Direct Link To This Post Posted: 25 August 2015 at 6:26pm
I'm pretty sure this was all sorted out, but I wanted to comment about the mixes on Jim's 45s. His promo and both of his stock copies all have the same mix--the mono mix with the vocals in front, which apparently is a fold-down of the stereo mix.
Aaron Kannowski
Uptown Sound
91.9 The Peak - Classic Hip Hop
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