80s, 90s, or Aughties?

Post date: Feb 16, 2012 6:25:23 AM

I generally am not a huge fan of 80s music.  It's not that I have anything against the iconic bands of the era, it's mainly due to the aesthetic of the sound.  I find that production during the era typically had too much reverb, cheap sounding digital recording technology, and thin sounding synthesizer sounds.

However, one of my favourite songs is "99 Red Balloons" which is a bad translation of "99 Luftballons" by the band Nena.  About 10 years ago I recorded it, but couldn't quite get the mix right with the equipment I was using at the time.  I had just got a Line 6 POD 2.0 amp simulator (which was all the rage during the early 2000s) so I used that to record all the guitar sounds.  It ended up sounding 'fizzy' and never full enough.  Somehow yesterday, I decided to re-record the rhythm guitar parts using my Dr. Z Maz 18 Jr. (all tube amp), Gibson ES guitar, and a Danelectro Cool Cat Drive V2 pedal (which is a poor man's Fulltone OCD).  I actually double-tracked the guitar and panned one track left and one track right (70%).  I left the majority of the other tracks untouched except for a bit of EQ.

From what I remember when I first recorded it, I first recorded the synth and drum tracks off a midi file I downloaded.  I used my Yamaha PSR-510 synth for this, which gives a 90s synth sound (compared to the distinctive 80s synth sound of the original).  The clean guitar parts are recorded with one of the Strats I've had.  So there you go, three decades in one song!

99 Red Balloons (MP3)