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mqudsi t1_iuepkmk wrote

Wouldn’t have been easier and faster to just do another take?

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wowbobwow OP t1_iuer4of wrote

I'm not a professional musician, but I can wager a couple guesses:

  • The Stax Records 'house style' at the time was to record every player on every track all at the same time in one big room (as opposed to the more modern approach of recording each part separately). This was a big factor in the spontaneous magic of so many Stax recordings, including occasional flubs and goofs that made it onto finished tracks, which were often recorded in just one or two takes. Doing it over again would've reduced that feeling
  • Wilson Pickett was a notoriously violent, short-tempered man, and was well known for beating the shit out of people who he thought were messing with him. Tom Dowd was probably wise to offer to fix the problem while everyone took a lunch break rather than telling Pickett, "oops, my bad, let's do that whole thing over again"
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bolanrox t1_iufzz8h wrote

Also they bolted the amps and mic stands to the ground so they couldn't be stolen. Another reason for the consistency. That and booker t and the mgs were fucking tight

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imregrettingthis t1_iugjdbp wrote

As a former engineer if there is a magic take you want to use it at all costs.

If it sounds like magic I’ll use a take that has tons of mistakes or needs a lot of work to make it perfect because it just sounds so good.

The performance over everything so if they thought it was the right performance then I would assume they would go to any length of possible to use it.

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ahealthyg t1_iuexond wrote

Probably wouldn’t be the same. Sometimes people just can’t do the same thing again. I’m an audio engineer

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Implausibilibuddy t1_iug0490 wrote

Probably not not the exact same but neither we nor the band would have ever heard the original (if this weird "reel to reel shredder" story is true). The band knew how to play the song, they would have done another take and it would have been just as great. Different maybe, but they'd have still produced an excellent track, maybe with extra bits that made it even better. Or maybe the best version of the track was played in rehearsal the day before and never recorded, we'll never know.

Any musician or engineer with a lick of experience will know while it's nice to capture those lightning in a bottle moments, the vast majority of the time you're working with what you've got, and sometimes it's a hard slog of multiple takes and slicing the best bits together, or going home for rest to try again tomorrow with fresh ears.

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