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Guerilla
Recording Techniques – An Exclusive Interview With Eddie Kramer |
By
Ryan Sparks
This summer marks
the 40th Anniversary of the Woodstock Music & Art Fair or
simply just Woodstock as it’s more commonly referred to. Held in upstate
New York over the course of a weekend in August of 1969 Woodstock was
certainly one of the largest gatherings in the history of rock ‘n roll.
The man responsible
for getting everything down on tape during the three days of peace,
love, drugs and mud was none other than sound engineer Eddie Kramer.
Kramer’s recording history dates back to the mid 60’s where he first
plied his trade at Pye and KPS Studios in England. He eventually joined
Olympic Sound Studios in London where he would engineer albums for the
likes of Traffic and The Rolling Stones. At Olympic Kramer was assigned
to work with Jimi Hendrix who at the time was a young up and comer, but
would soon go on to revolutionize the guitar. After moving to The Record
Plant in New York City in 1968 Eddie continued to develop his
relationship and work closely with Jimi to ensure the sounds and colors
the guitarist was picturing in his head successfully translated to tape.
Their creative partnership resulted in the double album Electric
Ladyland, arguably the pinnacle of Jimi’s career. Eddie would also
oversee the construction of Jimi’s dream studio Electric Lady which was
only partially complete at the time of the Hendrix’s death in 1970.
Kramer has gone on
to either engineer or produce some of the biggest selling and most
enduring records of all time. Artists such as Led Zeppelin, Kiss, Peter
Frampton, Carl Perkins, Humble Pie, David Bowie and Anthrax have all in
some way or another benefited from Kramer’s unique skills.
Now with the 40th
Anniversary of Woodstock just around the corner Sony Music’s offshoot
Legacy Recordings are issuing The Woodstock Experience which focuses on
five artists who appeared at the original festival, Jefferson Airplane,
Janis Joplin, Santana, Sly & The Family Stone and Johnny Winter. Each
double disc release includes their classic album from 1969, while the
second disc features their complete performance from Woodstock
remastered by none other than Kramer himself. All told there are a
staggering twenty four songs across this collection that have never been
released before in any format, so these collections are a must for any
classic rock fan.
I could have talked
for hours with Eddie about Woodstock and the various different artists
he has worked with over the past forty plus years. However, due to
scheduling issues time was tight at the end of what had already been a
day loaded with press, so I had to settle for ten minutes with the
master. In the end it was an honor to be able to have him share his
Woodstock experience with Classic Rock Revisited.
Ryan: Woodstock was
a truly unique, one a kind festival. When did you first begin to hear
rumblings that something like this was going to happen and how did you
become involved?
Eddie: The
rumblings and the thunder in the distance from Woodstock. It came about
through the film company. I knew that Jimi was going to be playing up
there and the film company called me and said “Hey you record Jimi, why
don’t you come up and record the whole thing?”
Ryan: You arrived
at the sight early in the morning…
Eddie: I see you’ve
done your research.
Ryan: I have. After
you surveyed the scene did you think you’d have enough time to get
everything in order to be fully prepared for when things started?
Eddie: No way. I
had doubts that we were ever going to get anything, but these guys were
great. The crew was tremendous and they pulled it together. We got going
and three days of drugs and hell became part of American history.
Ryan: Tell me about
your recording setup. You had two eight track machines.
Eddie: Yeah two
eight tracks, a twelve channel board and some little Shure mixers.
Ryan: A bit of
primitive setup.
Eddie: Primitive I
think is a mild understatement.
Ryan: You and your
crew had to stay awake for three days straight, how many people did you
have with you, was it just yourself and Lee Osborne?
Eddie: Yeah it was
basically he and I. The stage crew of course they were the ones who we
were trying to communicate with, which was rather difficult.
Ryan: How did you
manage to avoid being dosed?
Eddie: Wait, where
did you hear that? That’s all fabricated. There were no drugs at
Woodstock. I’m sorry that’s the wrong festival. We were fine; there were
no drugs as far as we were concerned. The only thing we had was the
vitamin B12 shots to keep us all going. We slept on the floor of the
truck for a few hours you know? Somebody had to do it.
Ryan: The film crew
didn’t have enough film to capture everyone’s performance; did you have
a similar problem?
Eddie: No we had
plenty of tape. Tape wasn’t a problem, we rolled tape all the time
whereas the poor film guys they were struggling with five cameras trying
to keep it all going.
Ryan: There’s a lot
of new music on these new Woodstock Experience CD’s.
Eddie: I have to
ask you a question, have you heard any of it yet?
Ryan: I have.
Eddie: Which ones
have you heard so far?
Ryan: I listened to
the Jefferson Airplane, Santana and Johnny Winter, which was fabulous.
Eddie: Great.
Ryan: Do you have
any idea why some of this stuff went unreleased for forty years?
Eddie: Talk to the
lawyers [laughs].
Ryan: You’re not
only a legendary producer/ engineer but you’ve also captured some great
images of some of rock’s greatest musicians with your camera.
Eddie: Thank you.
Ryan: In addition
to Jimi did you manage to shoot anyone else at the festival while they
were performing?
Eddie: No, I took
some pictures at the very beginning of the show before any of the
artists appeared. I was standing on the stage taking multiple pictures
of the crowd, but the only things that survived are my two pictures of
Jimi. Once the recording had settled down on Jimi I said “Ok guys watch
the meters, watch the machines, I’m going to run out for like ten
seconds”. I ran out with my camera and shot about two or three pictures
of Jimi and then ran back to the truck. The rest of the stuff that I had
shot -unfortunately Chip Monck had borrowed all my slides and they got
trashed in his house when his Father died and his mother threw all of
his pictures, and mine out.
Ryan: Any crazy
stories spring to mind while you were recording any of the bands, did
any of them pose any kind of challenges?
Eddie: Woodstock
was a challenge my friend. The whole of Woodstock was a challenge.
Every artist presented his own peculiar set of challenges. You’re
dealing with battlefield recordings here; these are not for the faint of
heart [laughs]. You had to figure out where each microphone was, which
band was coming out, what they were going to be playing, who’s playing,
what’s playing. You know that old Abbot and Costello routine who’s on
first? It was just like that.
Ryan: Everything
was done on the fly.
Eddie: On the fly,
on the mosquito. You tell me.
Ryan: With such an
impressive and extensive back catalogue of work, where does Woodstock
rank on your list of achievements?
Eddie: You mean in
terms of live performance?
Ryan: Just for you
personally.
Eddie: Oh Woodstock
has to stand out, [pauses] how does one even begin.
Ryan: You’ve
captured some of rock’s most iconic live albums, how would you compare
it to some of those?
Eddie: It was the
most difficult, but it also yielded some of the great performances of
our time. It certainly stands out in my memory, how could it not. It was
a political statement, it was a socio-economic statement, and it was
everything that one reads about; it has done that. It continues to
influence subsequent generations, which I’m very pleased about.
Ryan: At that time,
in that moment did you think you were capturing something magical that
people would still be talking about forty years later?
Eddie: No I was
only too concerned about getting the damn stuff to record, and making
sure it appeared on tape, that was my main concern. I didn’t care about
history! Who cared about history then! You could worry about that forty
years later.
www.woodstock.com
www.kramerarchives.com
