Re: Miming

["Diane G. Corcoran" <diane.corcoran@snet.net>]

I may be wrong, but I believe it was pretty difficult to perform songs
"live" on TV shows back in the '60's. The few I remember that were live had
lousy sound ... drums too loud, vocals barely heard, etc. This may be
another reason why lip-synching was acceptable. I'm sure the bands that
performed on shows thought it was pretty silly to be starring on something
like Smothers Bros. and other such shows. Goofing off during their stint may
have been some sort of release. But, what do I know? I'm not a performer,
just a fan ...

back to the shadows ...

Diane
aka Corkface

-----Original Message-----
From: JohnPerry7@aol.com <JohnPerry7@aol.com>
To: TheWho@igtc.COM <TheWho@igtc.COM>
Date: Monday, February 23, 1998 6:51 AM
Subject: Miming


>In a message dated 23/02/98 05:59:13 GMT, you write:
>
>> This has nothing to do with your question Rich, but the above quote
>>  reminded me of something that has puzzled me for a while now.  I have
>>  seen quite a bit of footage of the Who on old variety or music
>>  television programs, and most of the performances were clearly lip
>>  synched.  I mean REALLY clearly lip synched.  Even if I somehow
>>  failed to notice that the songs generally sound exactly the same as
>>  the version on the album, there are often dead giveaways like backup
>>  vocals performed with no microphones.  So I have to wonder: were
>>  people in the 60's so naive that they didn't notice that these bands
>>  on television were just miming along to their records, or did
>>  everyone know and just not care?
>
>1)  It was rather uncool to be seen trying too hard to match your dubbed
>track.
>
>     People had great fun seeing who could make it THE most obvious they
>     were miming c.f. Hendrix. - or for that matter Keith playing 12" away
>from skins.
>
>2) A frequent setup was to perform a Live Vocal over a pre-recorded backing
>track.
>
>Occasionally a new vocal would be sung ON TOP of existing one.
>There's an RSG! where Sonny & Cher do 'I Got You Babe'  - Cher manages ok
but
>Sonny's tracking of his own first vocal is so bad it comes out sounding
like
>bad flanging....
>
>Sometime the track would be the actual single (minus vocal) ; sometimes
it'd
>be  specifically re-recorded to sound a -little- different from the record.
>
>If you look closely at Smothers Bros. show I think Daltrey IS singing live.
>
>
>j.
>