AT Date: Fri, 20 May 2005 14:16:14 Billy Spradlin wrote:

>The Byrds "Spanish Harlem Incident" on the Mr. Tamborine Man LP, Chris 
>Hillman hits a really bad note on his bass halfway into the song. I always 
>wondered why producer (the late) Terry Melcher, who was a perfectionist in 
>the studio didnt catch that. He forced the Byrds to record 60+ takes of 
>"Turn Turn Turn" before they got it right.

Sometimes what is perceived to be a flub (whether obvious to most ears or 
not) has been left in deliberately. Case in point -- the guitar solo in 
Diesel's "Sausolito Summernights" (WTF?)....the one in The Odds' 
"Heterosexual Man"....and the one in TPOH's "I'm An Adult Now". Deliberate? 
Incompetent? Or ingenius?

My point being is that Melcher may not have let that bum note on the Byrds 
song get by him at all and may very well have embraced it as part of the 
vibe of the song or for a myriad of other reasons no one will ever know.

I recall recording an original song on my band's first LP in 1986 and I 
brought in a female vocalist to sing a different set of words, in harmony, 
underneath my lead vocal line. When we played the piece back it worked 
melodically -- but the first word in each of the lines combined made it 
sound like I was saying the word "visper" rather than "whisper". Not knowing 
that this is what caused the problem I assumed that my original vocal was 
sung incorrectly and went back and redid the lines. Same problem. We 
isolated the two vocal parts....both of us were singing correctly and on 
key....so we started tearing the track apart looking for a ghost vocal track 
that might have been interfering with the line. To no use. I decided, in the 
end, that the bizarre nature of outcome was worth leaving in. No one else 
has ever noticed it. But, I know it's there.



Jaimie Vernon,
President, Bullseye Records
"Not Suing Our Customers Since 1985!!"
http://www.bullseyecanada.com
Author, Canadian Pop Music Encyclopedia
http://jam.canoe.ca/Music/Pop_Encyclopedia/