How did you get interested in music?
My father was a radio announcer. Early on I'd accompany him to the radio station, and go on various remotes. He was involved with fundraising for the Sloop Clearwater [Hudson River Sloop Clearwater, Inc.], which Pete Seeger founded. I went on to work at that station [WEOK FM in Poughkeepsie, now WPDH], and shortly thereafter I attended a recording session, loved it, and went on to try and get any work I could at the time.
What music were you interested in?
The Band, Cream, and Jimi Hendrix. Certainly a lot of the folk music I'd been exposed to through my father. He also totally won me over with jazz; I got seriously into Thelonious Monk.
How did you end up working at Albert Grossman's Bearsville Studios in Woodstock?
I started out sweeping the floors there — waxing them, in fact. This was early in 1975, maybe late '74. At the time, Studio A was a big empty space, and Studio B was a big room with acoustic treatment. The control room had four Westlake speakers, and the console was a Quad Eight.
How did you go from sweeping floors to engineering sessions with Todd Rundgren, The Isley Brothers, and Meat Loaf?
I did all the sessions no one else wanted to do. There was this jazz record by Anthony Braxton and Muhal Richard Abrams [1976's Duets]; the other guys didn't want anything to do with it and I thought, "Wow, those are hardcore guys. I'll do that." It kept happening like that. I forget how The Isley Brothers found the studio, but it was a pleasure to work with them.
That was the record with "Footsteps in the Dark" on it, right? [Go For Your Guns]
Yeah, great song. There was a lot going on. When we were doing [NRBQ's 1978 album] At Yankee Stadium, I was recording Meat Loaf at the same time. I was still working for Bearsville; I was not independent. John Holbrook was the other engineer then. He was there before me, and I assisted him. With NRBQ, I guess we had hit it off on a couple of sessions we'd done, where I was assisting. I'd actually met them in 1969, when they appeared at the Duchess County Fair. Here come these guys, with the longest hair anyone had ever seen, pushing their car 'cause I guess they'd run out of gas. They played and blew everyone's minds. Eventually they moved to Saugerties, and we reconnected when I assisted on a session at Bearsville.
At Yankee Stadium is regarded as the distillation of what that classic NRBQ lineup was all about. Do remember much about doing that record?
We did intense bits, because they still had to work on the road. We'd be in there for a couple of weeks at a time, stretched out over a winter. I think most of that record is all live, and the only things that were overdubbed were things to help the production.
Do you remember if you guys were recording on 16-track?
I think it was 24-track by then, at 30 ips.
How did you get Joey Spampinato's bass sound?
In those days we spent a lot of time on the amp sound, more than I think people do nowadays. It was definitely a combo [of amp and direct signals], though... we were into the modern world! [laughs] Still it was very straightforward, with no equalizer, but compression going to tape for sure. I think we used the old dbx 160 with the meter.
Obviously, so much of the band's personality comes from inside the mind of Terry Adams, and his use of the Clavinet.
Yeah, that's his [Fender] Twin Reverb, with a couple of mics on it. Terry has the right sound coming out of it, so it was pretty easy to get. Trying to fit it into the mix was sometimes a little more difficult. Each note has so much texture — that's what I love about it. They were one of the few bands that I saw that had an amazing band balance on their own. Live, it was incredible.
A really great road band often mixes themselves.
Yeah, that was always impressive to me. I always tell people today, "Turn the PA off, and check out what you're doing."
Did NRBQ come as a finished product?
Well, the rhythm tracks fell in pretty easily. Sometimes we would spend a lot of time on the solos and the interesting arrangements. It was a bit of a search, on occasion. We took advantage of the studio there... using the bathrooms and the hallway to get different tones.
Do you remember how many mics you'd use on Tom Ardolino's drums?
I think, at that time, it was probably mic'ing the toms individually. Probably tight mics on them, then some [Neumann] U 87s overhead, X/Y [pair] or something like that. I don't think I used a hi-hat mic on Tom.
Do you remember what the other mics might've been?
Probably an [Electro-Voice] RE20 on the bass drum, [Shure] SM57 on the snare, and Sennheiser MD 421 on the toms.
What about Big Al Anderson's guitar rig? His slapback effect is pretty distinctive and got more pronounced as time went on. Do you remember what you used for that?
I think he had a Binson Echorec. On the '80s records, I probably used some modulated delay, maybe an Eventide Harmonizer. I do remember that on At Yankee Stadium, we used a custom digital delay made by Bearsville's chief engineer, Ted Rothstein — a homemade thing in a big box. It was really great. I wonder where that went?
When it came time to mix, was that something that the band was involved in? Or did they let you do your thing while they went off to play more shows?
Well, this was before automation. The "automation" would be us manually doing that, and then splicing [mix passes] to either achieve the final mix or fix mistakes. It's something I miss about modern production; that the mix was more like a performance, for better or for worse. All of us from that period agree that if automation could've been hiding, and popped out when you really needed it, it would've been great. There was too much to do, plus everybody wanted to be there. I can remember on Joey's tunes, maybe it would be Joey and I mixing them if they weren't complicated. But otherwise, it was all hands on deck for the various jobs.
There are three distinct lead voices on those records. Was there a particular mic that worked best for each singer?
I remember Joey, for some reason we liked him on an RE 20 a lot. For Al we used the forerunner of the 414 [AKG C 12A]. For Terry, I think we used a [Neumann] U 47.
So it was tailored for their specific tonal qualities?
Yeah, unless it was like a background part — then a lot of times it would be [everyone] around one mic.
