PRB
August 25th, 2013, 10:46
Just finished watching a great documentary called Sound City (http://www.dailynews.com/general-news/20130130/documentary-capturing-van-nuys-legendary-sound-city-studio-premieres-thursday-night-in-la) about the recording studio of the same name (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sound_City_Studios) in Van Nuys, CA. It was famous for recording many great rock albums starting in the 1970s. It was also famous for the Neve Board (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Neve_8078) they bought, for 75,000 dollars in the early 1970s.
Tom Petty's “Damn the Torpedoes” album was recorded there in 1978-79, and at the start of the song Even the Losers, there is a woman's voice that says “It's just the normal noises in here!” In this Sound City documentary, they interviewed Tom Petty and some other members of his band, and they spoke about the recording of that album. But, he was never asked about it, nor did any of the other band members mention it. They spoke at some length about the fact that many songs on that album were recorded "straight to tape" in one take, rather than recording tracks separately... I went Googling and apparently the story behind the voice is still a mystery. It was pointed out that the studio manager during this time was a woman named Jemima Eddy, so maybe it was her.
Tom Petty's “Damn the Torpedoes” album was recorded there in 1978-79, and at the start of the song Even the Losers, there is a woman's voice that says “It's just the normal noises in here!” In this Sound City documentary, they interviewed Tom Petty and some other members of his band, and they spoke about the recording of that album. But, he was never asked about it, nor did any of the other band members mention it. They spoke at some length about the fact that many songs on that album were recorded "straight to tape" in one take, rather than recording tracks separately... I went Googling and apparently the story behind the voice is still a mystery. It was pointed out that the studio manager during this time was a woman named Jemima Eddy, so maybe it was her.