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Albuquerque is about to welcome one of the greatest and longest-lasting names in rockabilly, Jim Heath, better known as the Reverend Horton Heat. The good reverend will bring his special brand of psychobilly to Sister Bar (407 Central Ave. NW) on Feb. 29 for a sold out show. We sat down with Heath to discuss retro production and artificial intelligence.
The Paper.: You really nailed the production style on your latest record, Roots of the Rev (Volume 1). That old, retro sound has become the Holy Grail in modern mixing. How much of that is using analog equipment versus production?
Heath: It’s a combination of several different things. I would do so much to get that sound. The very front end is pretty important. It’s not just using old microphones, and old mic preamps. A lot of people are realizing that that stuff was incredibly high-tech. The Neumann U 47 [a mic manufactured in the 1940s] is still right up there within the industry standard for microphones.
So, you can’t just throw up old microphones and say, “We’re going to get an old sound.” You can’t just use mic preamps. You have to think about things like the mic placement—like, us being in the room together and using mic bleed between the instruments. And then the instruments: The sound of a vintage drum kit sounds a lot different than a modern kit. So you’re talking about a lot of stuff, because at the end of the day, after all that, you’ve got to think about the back end.
It’s really funny though, because it was recorded in analog and digital but mixed to tape. That made a difference. But what’s odd is how little of a difference it made.
Why do you think modern producers are chasing that sound?
Well, I believe it’s for the same reason that I’m attracted to a lot of mid-20th century music. There’s a … romantic dreaminess—even the songs that aren’t romantic; the wild Rock and Roll—there’s still this dreaminess that’s more than just nostalgic. It’s got a dreamy character that’s just pleasing to people’s ears, and especially older people like me.
What do you think about AI music?
I’m often wrong, but here’s my prediction:
It’s about soul. I love James Brown and Motown and Elvis and those doo-wop bands. That music has soul. My prediction is that AI will never be able to capture that. And I predict we will find out that AI is highly overrated..
It can garner way more useless knowledge than my brain can, but my brain, your brain, our brains: We have intuition. We have emotion. In our DNA, there are various memories that go back, I think I’ve heard, 14 generations. That’s why we have intuition. That’s why you get a gut feeling when something is off. Some people have a phobia about bugs, right? Because at some point, back in those 14 generations, there was a problem with bugs.
I’ve heard this. Like everybody has the nightmare of the monster with big teeth chasing you, and that might be the generational memories of predators.
Absolutely. That’s in our DNA. So, AI might try to recreate it, but it won’t have the intuition, the soul. And love.
Love, spirituality, God—AI will never have any of that.