LC: So you started working at Sunset Sound Recorders around 1963.
Something like that.
LC: What were you doing before then?
I had my own record label. I was recording school orchestras and things like that and pressing LPs. I used to go to Radio Recorders and cut mono lacquer masters and press with Research Craft using their new, anti-static vinyl. Then I got a job working as an apprentice engineer for Liberty Records' recording studio [Liberty Custom Recorders], the home of Johnny Burnette, Bobby Vee and the Chipmunks.
LC: I interviewed Snuff Garrett a while back [#73].
I worked with Snuff. Lovely man. He's got great stories. We used to record song-publishing demos for Hill & Range Music, which were [songs written by] Jackie DeShannon and sung by P.J. Proby for Elvis Presley. We were doing these all the time and Snuff was involved as a Liberty Records A&R man. He was the shining star, producing the hits. I started there and then Liberty Records was sold to Transamerica [Corporation] and they closed down the studio.
LC: Liberty Records had their own recording studio.
It was upstairs on La Brea Boulevard and Challenge Records used to be downstairs, so we had the Ventures recording there fairly regularly. When I was without a job I just started walking the streets, walked into Sunset Sound Recorders, met [Salvador] "Tutti" Camarata and talked to him about big bands and the way to record them. He was intrigued and that was it.
LC: You mentioned the Ventures. Were those sessions at Liberty?
I did some of the Ventures at Liberty, but when I left for Sunset Sound Joe Saraceno, who was their producer at Liberty Records, brought them to Sunset Sound. So we'd record the Ventures — do side one from 10 am to 1pm and side two from 2pm to 5pm, edit it together, cut masters that night. The album was on the street in five days.
LC: That's pretty fast.
That's the beauty of mono.
LC: Of course. Do you remember which records those were?
I can't remember the names. They were great guys and they really just came in and played.
LC: That's a quick way to make a record. Before Sunset Sound you'd been working at a studio affiliated with a label. Now where were the jobs coming from?
It was affiliated with a label — Disneyland Records [now Walt Disney Records]. Tutti Camarata was the head of A&R [for Disneyland] and he built the studio [Sunset Sound]. We had Annette [Funicello] and all the Storyteller albums. In the morning I would be recording commercials from 8 am to 10 am and then do a Storyteller album where Mickey, Donald and Goofy would come in. We'd take Disney's animated movies and do them like radio shows. In the afternoon I would do some jazz or some rock 'n' roll — mainly surf music at that time.
JB: Was Mickey Mouse in costume?
[laughter] No, he didn't have to be. He had a tail and four fingers. He was born that way!
LC: So you could be doing a children's record and The Doors in the same day? Same day, absolutely — and a commercial for Midas
Mufflers. It was normal! Let's say that I would do this children's record and we were doing songs. We'd bring in a band, maybe eight to ten pieces with Annette in the vocal booth. We'd record for three hours, tear that session down, put up a jazz session for Pacific Jazz [Records] and then tear that down. Then The Doors would come in or whomever else. This went on and on and it was no big deal.
LC: Do you feel like that kind of variety really reinforced your skills?
I loved the variety. In those days radio didn't narrowcast like they do now, where you now have a hip-hop station, an adult contemporary station, an oldies station, oldies jazz, oldies rock 'n' roll and oldies middle of the road. Back then the local stations all around the country played everything. It was popular music. It didn't matter. It could be Dave Brubeck's "Take Five" into a Frank Sinatra song into The Doors' "Light My Fire" into an Aretha Franklin song into Muddy Waters. Everybody was on the station. Because of that there was a whole variety of music available to me. I remember doing six months for Muzak. We'd do a week or two of Mexican music — the most indigenous music through Tijuana Brass. Then we'd do Martin Denny-style Hawaiian music. It went on month after month after month and it was the best school I ever had. We did everything live to stereo and mono, running a 3 -4 track as a protection and that was it.
LC: Did you listen to other records to get an idea of how things could be done?
I listened constantly. I still do. In fact, I used to have my system in the studio of Sunset Sound — not in the control [room], but in the studio. When I wasn't recording I was out there listening to records. Records were cheap then — you know, two bucks. You'd go to the store and come home with 10, 15, 20 albums and you had to listen to them all. Some of them you lived with. Everything influenced me, especially a lot of the contemporary albums of the day. Some records had on the back how they were recorded — what machine and what microphones were used. I remember Crown Records used to do that — Bones Howe [#64] used to engineer them and he was an early idol. When I got my shot I'd put up that microphone and I go, "Oh my god, it is that sound." It was wonderful.
LC: You mentioned Bones Howe. Were there other engineers that you were aware of that you started noticing?
