Has Anybody Read ALL of THIS?

[junky]

Since we're repeating:

Kevin Elson has traveled with Journey doing their live mixes including remixing for radio broadcast, since 1979.

The guy in the blue hat is not an extra guy, he is Brent Jeffers, Jonathan's keyboard tech.

If this guy can't get these simple facts straight....

[Distant Voice]

From: Svante Pettersson - view profile
Date: Mon, Jun 12 2006 12:15 am
Email: "Svante Pettersson" <svante.petters...@gmail.com>
Groups: alt.audio.pro.live-sound


I am just back from Sweden Rock Festival, one of Europe's biggest hard
rock festivals. At the festival, I was working for Swedish Radio as a
producer for some of the live recordings done for the radio. Normally,
I am a live sound engineer but once a year, I tag along with my old
friends at Swedish Radio to have some fun on this great festival.

The biggest topic of discussion among our crew during the festival was
without doubt the Journey show. Things started off weird in the
afternoon when we realised that not only had they brought their
producer and studio engineer Kevin Elson along to mix the show, he had
also set up his FOH world at the very back of the house, backstage! He
was standing behind our recording truck with his stuff, listening to
the mix through two stage wedges standing on top of his console.

We were recording the show for the radio and the SRF dvd but beside our
48 track Pro Tools recording, we were told by Elson numerous times that
we also needed to record his mix that went to the PA. Fine, an extra
stand alone CD recorder was brought in.

I watched the show from out front and had a great time. The band
sounded excellent. I decided to watch the rest of the show from the
recording truck. Good sound and tv monitors with a feed from the big
screen out front. Even better than watching in your living room. :^) I
went backstage and on the way, I checked out Kevin Elson in action at
the same time.

When I got into the truck, our engineers was making funny faces and
saying things like, "poor guy!" Lead singer Steve Augeri could not sing
at all! No, it's not the old rethoric of calling a singer with a bad
day someone who "can't sing". Steve Augeri was constantly out of tune
and when he tried to reach the high parts, his voice just died in a sad
croak. But didn't it sound good in the PA out front? I went out to
check again. Yes, the vocals sounded terrific. Was I going insane?

I went back into the bus and the engineers started to question my
sanity too as nothing could be done out front to fix this disaster. The
main project manager for our business at the festival showed up and was
as surprised and puzzled as I was when he heard what was coming down
that vocal line to the truck.

After a lot of running back and forth and scratching of heads, one of
the recording engineers plugged in a pair of headphones into the CD
recorder that was recording Elson's house mix. In that mix, the vocals
were perfect. With one headphone on and the other listening to our feed
in the bus it was obvious that something fishy was going on.

We looked at our surveillance camera on stage and noticed a guy sitting
a bit out of place to the left of the drum tech. I went up on stage to
have a look and there was a guy with two digital multitrack recorders,
apparently sending a prerecorded, correct vocal to the house mix but
not to our bus. There were also some prerecorded synth pads and backing
vocals but we got those to the bus.

This raised so many questions and things running in our heads:

* This was not a temporary solution to help a guy having a bad day on
tour. You don't bring that rack with recorders and one extra guy on
tour to have a backup in case the singer gets a cold. Ok, the rack and
the operatot could have been flown in but wouldn't it have been easier
to just cancel the show if the guy was sick?

* Another thing suggesting this was not just a guy with a bad throat
was that in our feed, the "real" live vocal line, Mr. Augeri was not
holding back like he probably should have done if he had a bad throat.
He was launching head first into the performance screaming his lungs
off. If he has a throat problem, it will only get worse by this
behaviour.

* Neal Schon of Journey has said in interviews that Augeri had throat
problems on the last tour, forcing them to use the drummer to sing lead
vocals on some songs. On the last album, Augeri sings half the songs
and the other members sing the rest. "Because it was fun" according to
interviews with band members. Yeah, maybe so but maybe also to help a
singer who can't sing?

* If the singer really is this bad, why not just kick him out?

* The other band members put on a stellar show. How do they feel on the
bus every night knowing they have to substitute their singer with a
tape? How fun can that be?

* How could Kevin Elson think that our recording engineers wouldn't
notice anything? Wouldn't it have been easier to feed the prerecorded
vocals to our bus too, or just deny us to record the band. We get to
record many bands but there are those that refuse too, without giving
any particular reasons. The first time one of our engineers went out to
talk to Elson during the show, Elson had the fixed vocals in his
monitors but he told our guy that "we probably have to take this home
and fix the vocals", as if Augeri had a bad day. Why lie a colleague
right in the face like that? Later, the cd from the FOH mix was
approved for broadcast the next day. No fixing needed because it was
already fixed.

I don't have any strong feelings against spicing up a live show with
some fatter backing vocals or backup things that makes the show better
but substituting the lead vocals? Reverse karaoke? I'm a big Journey
fan and I don't get sad or angry, just very confused.

/Svante

Reply


From: Svante Pettersson - view profile
Date: Mon, Jun 12 2006 12:34 am
Email: "Svante Pettersson" <svante.petters...@gmail.com>
Groups: alt.audio.pro.live-sound
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I put up some blurry pictures:

Kevin Elson mixing backstage, our recording truck in the background:
http://www.blackpage.se/journey/DSC05055.JPG
http://www.blackpage.se/journey/DSC05056.JPG

The guy in the blue cap to the left of the drum tech is handling the
multitrack machines:
http://www.blackpage.se/journey/DSC05060.JPG

/Svante

I'm pleased Svante exposed this info, this needed to be seen by the fans...

I've been told this has been going on for quite some time...

[wildone]

well it seems like people are saying things are being made up.But then they read this and still they think it's all made up ...funny
Date: Mon, Jun 12 2006 12:15 am
Email: "Svante Pettersson" <svante.petters...@gmail.com>
Groups: alt.audio.pro.live-sound


I am just back from Sweden Rock Festival, one of Europe's biggest hard
rock festivals. At the festival, I was working for Swedish Radio as a
producer for some of the live recordings done for the radio. Normally,
I am a live sound engineer but once a year, I tag along with my old
friends at Swedish Radio to have some fun on this great festival.

The biggest topic of discussion among our crew during the festival was
without doubt the Journey show. Things started off weird in the
afternoon when we realised that not only had they brought their
producer and studio engineer Kevin Elson along to mix the show, he had
also set up his FOH world at the very back of the house, backstage! He
was standing behind our recording truck with his stuff, listening to
the mix through two stage wedges standing on top of his console.

We were recording the show for the radio and the SRF dvd but beside our
48 track Pro Tools recording, we were told by Elson numerous times that
we also needed to record his mix that went to the PA. Fine, an extra
stand alone CD recorder was brought in.

I watched the show from out front and had a great time. The band
sounded excellent. I decided to watch the rest of the show from the
recording truck. Good sound and tv monitors with a feed from the big
screen out front. Even better than watching in your living room. :^) I
went backstage and on the way, I checked out Kevin Elson in action at
the same time.

When I got into the truck, our engineers was making funny faces and
saying things like, "poor guy!" Lead singer Steve Augeri could not sing
at all! No, it's not the old rethoric of calling a singer with a bad
day someone who "can't sing". Steve Augeri was constantly out of tune
and when he tried to reach the high parts, his voice just died in a sad
croak. But didn't it sound good in the PA out front? I went out to
check again. Yes, the vocals sounded terrific. Was I going insane?

I went back into the bus and the engineers started to question my
sanity too as nothing could be done out front to fix this disaster. The
main project manager for our business at the festival showed up and was
as surprised and puzzled as I was when he heard what was coming down
that vocal line to the truck.

After a lot of running back and forth and scratching of heads, one of
the recording engineers plugged in a pair of headphones into the CD
recorder that was recording Elson's house mix. In that mix, the vocals
were perfect. With one headphone on and the other listening to our feed
in the bus it was obvious that something fishy was going on.

We looked at our surveillance camera on stage and noticed a guy sitting
a bit out of place to the left of the drum tech. I went up on stage to
have a look and there was a guy with two digital multitrack recorders,
apparently sending a prerecorded, correct vocal to the house mix but
not to our bus. There were also some prerecorded synth pads and backing
vocals but we got those to the bus.

This raised so many questions and things running in our heads:

* This was not a temporary solution to help a guy having a bad day on
tour. You don't bring that rack with recorders and one extra guy on
tour to have a backup in case the singer gets a cold. Ok, the rack and
the operatot could have been flown in but wouldn't it have been easier
to just cancel the show if the guy was sick?

* Another thing suggesting this was not just a guy with a bad throat
was that in our feed, the "real" live vocal line, Mr. Augeri was not
holding back like he probably should have done if he had a bad throat.
He was launching head first into the performance screaming his lungs
off. If he has a throat problem, it will only get worse by this
behaviour.

* Neal Schon of Journey has said in interviews that Augeri had throat
problems on the last tour, forcing them to use the drummer to sing lead
vocals on some songs. On the last album, Augeri sings half the songs
and the other members sing the rest. "Because it was fun" according to
interviews with band members. Yeah, maybe so but maybe also to help a
singer who can't sing?

* If the singer really is this bad, why not just kick him out?

* The other band members put on a stellar show. How do they feel on the
bus every night knowing they have to substitute their singer with a
tape? How fun can that be?

* How could Kevin Elson think that our recording engineers wouldn't
notice anything? Wouldn't it have been easier to feed the prerecorded
vocals to our bus too, or just deny us to record the band. We get to
record many bands but there are those that refuse too, without giving
any particular reasons. The first time one of our engineers went out to
talk to Elson during the show, Elson had the fixed vocals in his
monitors but he told our guy that "we probably have to take this home
and fix the vocals", as if Augeri had a bad day. Why lie a colleague
right in the face like that? Later, the cd from the FOH mix was
approved for broadcast the next day. No fixing needed because it was
already fixed.

I don't have any strong feelings against spicing up a live show with
some fatter backing vocals or backup things that makes the show better
but substituting the lead vocals? Reverse karaoke? I'm a big Journey
fan and I don't get sad or angry, just very confused.

/Svante

Reply


From: Svante Pettersson - view profile
Date: Mon, Jun 12 2006 12:34 am
Email: "Svante Pettersson" <svante.petters...@gmail.com>
Groups: alt.audio.pro.live-sound
Not yet rated
Rating:
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I put up some blurry pictures:

Kevin Elson mixing backstage, our recording truck in the background:
http://www.blackpage.se/journey/DSC05055.JPG
http://www.blackpage.se/journey/DSC05056.JPG

The guy in the blue cap to the left of the drum tech is handling the
multitrack machines:
http://www.blackpage.se/journey/DSC05060.JPG

/Svante[/quote] I would add that a friend of mine went to Sewden Rock to do a review for a magazine and spoke to the promoters of Sweden Rock they said quote 'If we had known the band were going to mime we would not have booked them!' I also asked him as a Journey fan what he thought,he said that yes apart from the guitars and drums all the vocals were lipped(not sure if he meant Deans?) and that they were not evan miming that well??
Take into consideration this guy is a fan who like myself has trevelled to see the band and that he had backstage access and spoke to the guys from Sweden Rock.Surely this cannot be one big conspiracy theory to many people are saying the same thing..me i am devastated that this is/could be true....what happened guys? [/quote]

how many time you goung to repeat this[/quote]

[Abitaman]

here we go again

[EightyRock]

Livintodo, after reading this, you might want to reconsider that the vocals are being more than fattened as occasional vocal help in some areas. This is full out lip synching and it has been going on for some time now.

[Distant Voice]

Livintodo, after reading this, you might want to reconsider that the vocals are being more than fattened as occasional vocal help in some areas. This is full out lip synching and it has been going on for some time now.

EightyRock,

Thanks for stepping up to the plate and sharing with Journey fans, this topic was emailed to me 3 days ago by a friend who once had connections with sony, but I was skeptical about posting this anywhere on the internet, you took the torch and ran with it...

Thank You-

[Rockindeano]

Eighty rock did what? Ran with it? oh ok.

[EightyRock]

No, I didn't run with anything. I just posted what had been sent to me. I didn't see it here and posted it for others to read. I decided if you compared the audio clips on RDO's blog and still couldn't figure it out, maybe you should read the stuff from the guys in Sweden that got indisputable proof. I think they were as shocked about it as anyone.

[heardonthestreet]

Eighty! We all knew about that from Dean's blog, long before you posted it

[NealIsGod]

Actually, it was here before it was anywhere. And it will be gone very soon.

[Liz22562]

And still the same old crap.

[JohnH]

Svante is a credible individual I've known for a long time on the net. I've never seen him post any sort of lies or rubbish. This is truly shocking stuff.

John

[Rockindeano]

And still the same old crap.

Well gee whiz Liz, there is another thread or other sites you know?

This is going to get really rocky the next week straight. I suggest you get a life raft.

[Red13JoePa]

COULD SOMEBODY PUT A GODAMM CLIFF NOTES VERSION OF THE SWEDEN (OR WHEREVER THE HELL IT WAS) GOSPEL THAT PEOPLE KEEP REFERRING TO????? Then we could all just suffer scrolling through only that to find out they're suspicious of Kevin Elson doing his job and JC's tech sitting near Deen. You would think "THE GUY IN THE HAT" was in Dealy Plaza 11/22/63 pumping an umbrella open and closed, open and closed.

[Dano]

OK, not that I've seen photos or video of him that many times, but the gentleman manning the board in those two photos looks nothing like Kevin Elson to me. At least not at all like he looked on "Behind The Music" a few years ago, which makes me question further the legitimacy of the allegations....

Dano

[Rockindeano]

OK, not that I've seen photos or video of him that many times, but the gentleman manning the board in those two photos looks nothing like Kevin Elson to me. At least not at all like he looked on "Behind The Music" a few years ago, which makes me question further the legitimacy of the allegations....

Dano

Dude, open your eyes. Svante knows Elson personally. That is indeed him..

[wildone]

OK, not that I've seen photos or video of him that many times, but the gentleman manning the board in those two photos looks nothing like Kevin Elson to me. At least not at all like he looked on "Behind The Music" a few years ago, which makes me question further the legitimacy of the allegations....

Dano

Dude, open your eyes. Svante knows Elson personally. That is indeed him..

next week sounds like it's gonna be a fun week!!!Gonna make some popcorn sit back and watch the show!!!

[Dano]

Eyes wide open, and it still doesn't look like him to me. Sorry.

Dano

[jrnyman28]

EightyRock,

Thanks for stepping up to the plate and sharing with Journey fans, this topic was emailed to me 3 days ago by a friend who once had connections with sony, but I was skeptical about posting this anywhere on the internet, you took the torch and ran with it...

Thank You-

Hey DistantVoice, welcome back. Anymore Steve Perry info?? You never did follow up with ANY if that.

[Monker]

Hey DistantVoice, welcome back. Anymore Steve Perry info?? You never did follow up with ANY if that.

EXACTLY what I was thinking.

[swepett]

Svante knows Elson personally.

No, I don't! Where did you get that idea?

[Liz22562]

I don't need a life raft Deano. I swim rather well, thank you very much!

[NealIsGod]

Svante knows Elson personally.

No, I don't! Where did you get that idea?

Shhh, everything Deano says is true. Don't you know that?

[swepett]

Since we're repeating:
Kevin Elson has traveled with Journey doing their live mixes including remixing for radio broadcast, since 1979.

Ah, someone else said this somewhere else and now I get a chance to comment. I am a big fan of Journey, but like so many other fans in Europe, I have never had the chance to see the band, or even get into them in a super nerdy way since Journey never was the HUGE SUPER BLOCKBUSTER band I've realised they was in the USA. I've listened to the albums and read covers and noticed that Elson worked with the band in the studio. I had no idea he was travelling with them as their FOH engineer.

The guy in the blue hat is not an extra guy, he is Brent Jeffers, Jonathan's keyboard tech.

Thanks for the info! Again, this is nothing I could know and info I thought I would get by posting my story to a forum full with people, many of them American, with insight to the US music business.

Ok, so that guy on stage was Jonathan's keyboard tech. Weird then that he wasn't handling a rack of synths, like keyboard techs usually do, but what looked as a rack of two multitrack recorders. No, I don't know this to be 100 % true but i saw him handling something that looked like tapes from a drawer at the bottom of the rack.

Before I went to the festival, I was thinking many times about if I shold bring my big professional digital SLR camera. I decided not to do that since I was there working. I now wish I had brought that camra with it's bitchin' zoom lens. Then I could have proved what I think I saw was right, or we could decide that I was wrong.

If this guy can't get these simple facts straight....

I never claimed to have any facts about people involved. And, to most people, knowing the names of the band members personal crew is not "simple facts". I know the names of most of Deep Purple's crew but that's because I'm as big a DP nut as you probably are a Journey nut. But I would never claim anyone (fans, newsgroup posters, journalists, plumbers) writing anything about DP should know the names of all their crew, family and cats, especially not after having their first live experience with them.

What surprised me most about this whole thing is that very few have contacted me personally. I've seen the "Definitive proof" thread on this site but today was the first I heard about these discussions here. And yet so many people are ready to write me off as an idiot and as someone lying and being out to hurt the band. Or that I don't exist? What kind of crap is that?

What I know is that Steve Augeri's vocals sounded different in our truck and in the speakers out front. You can call me an idiot but I know what I heard. And now Andrew has said that the band uses backup tapes and in the "Definitive proof" thread, Tommy Denander has said he kow from "sources close to the band" that tapes are used.

Everyone is free to believe what they want.

[Liz22562]

Thank you for replying to Deano's post regarding you knowing Elson.

[knox]

Thanks for chiming in. I appreciate what you have brought to this situation.

[Liz22562]

Someone's credability just took a major hit.

[Paul_UK]

Someone's credability just took a major hit.

Hmm, better get that life raft ready!! Haha!

[Sundet]

Well well.
I watched Journey's Sweden Rock show from the front row - situated right in front of Augeri's mic stand. Now, I've never been a diehard Journey fan and was mainly at Sweden Rock for Porcupine Tree, but I liked Raised on Radio, Trial by Fire and Arrival enough to remain in the front row for Journey's gig.

Whilst I wasn't excactly impressed by their performance, I thought Ross Valory put on a good show and when Neal Schon finally was heard in the mix, I was amazed by his playing as well. I was aware of Steve Augeri's previous vocal problems through reading Andrew's interviews and I must admit I was a bit anxious to find out what Mr. Augeri's voice sounded like. I was, however, quite impressed by his singing on the night, although a friend of mine - who attended the gig standing further back - found Augeri to sound a bit too Michael Bolton for comfort (as he put it).

To get to the point of the discussion: having paid somewhat close attention to Mr. Augeri for most of the gig, I have absolutely no reason to believe he was using a backing tape, miming, lip-synching or whatever he is accused of doing. Surely there were backing tapes running for some background vocals and keyboard parts, but Mr. Augeri's lead vocals seemed real enough to me, and as I said: I paid close attention! With that said, IF Mr. Augeri has been using tapes for quite some time it's possible that me might've rehearsed the parts as to make it impossible to tell that he's singing along to a tape. However, as he talked during songs on several occasions I find it hard to believe the seemingly improvised talking would've been impossible had he been using a backing tape running - at SOME point he would surely have exposed himself?

Whilst not wanting to conclude either way, I can only say that, as an attendee of the Sweden Rock gig, I saw nothing suggesting Steve Augeri's lead vocals weren't real.

[Monker]

What I know is that Steve Augeri's vocals sounded different in our truck and in the speakers out front. You can call me an idiot but I know what I heard. And now Andrew has said that the band uses backup tapes and in the "Definitive proof" thread, Tommy Denander has said he kow from "sources close to the band" that tapes are used.

Everyone is free to believe what they want.

I don't see people denying they 'use tapes'. I see people not willing to take the leap from using tapes to enhance the live sound...which Journey has been doing FOREVER...to saying Augeri is lip-synching.

What you say above is simply adding your opinion of what you saw and heard to the stack of other opinions of the bootlegs, Are you willing to take the leap and say you know for a fact that Augeri is lip-synching...cuz it doesn't seem you are willing to go that far.