Sound and VISION
With the release of the mammoth 38-CD limited-edition of Woodstock, we spoke to producer Andy Zax about the trials and tribulations of restoring and remixing 50-year-old tape reels to bring the music played at the historic festival back to life
Compiling the release sounds like a task of Herculean proportions… “It’s the largest musical puzzle I – or perhaps anyone – has ever really had to solve. It is a fiendishly complicated thing. Three days of music, 32 acts and a big pile of tapes that have all manner of audio defects and difficulties – things that were touched by other people decades ago who cut things up and didn’t label where they put the parts. In many cases we’ve spent years trying to chase down small bits of tape that have gone missing or astray. It’s been a long but entertaining slog.”
How was it recorded back then? “Basically, the multi-track recording of Woodstock was done on two eighttrack machines that were being run at staggered intervals. So if somebody played a very long song, you would increase your chance that you’d get the whole thing intact, without having to edit stuff together. But the thing about those multi-tracks was that, even though there are eight tracks on the tape, one of those tracks was used as a synchronisation tone for film footage and one was generally used as an audience mic. So there are basically six real tracks on those reels that were used to record actual musicians and vocals.”
And the tapes have all been remixed? “Basically, 90 per cent of this stuff has been remixed. I work with a really brilliant engineer, Brian Kehew, and Brian is one of the great archival mixing engineers on Planet Earth, and there is nobody better that you want to work with on a project like this, because Brian is incredibly knowledgeable and passionate about Woodstock, as much as I am. He has the technical skills to be able mix this stuff in ways that feel appropriate.”
Was there anything that you couldn’t track down? “The only material that we actually don’t have is a couple of minutes of the Sha Na Na performance that I’m not actually sure was even recorded. I really only learned about it quite recently from talking to the band members. I sent one of them the performance and one of the responses I got back on this was, ‘Hey, where’s Teenager In Love?’ In my kind of spelunking through the archive, there really appears to be no sign that it was actually recorded. It was very close to the end of the concert, and I think that they were getting a little bit sleepy at the tape console, and I just think that somebody didn’t manage to record it.”
What, for you, was the highlight of the three days? “The Ten Years After performance, of course, is quite something. I’m Going Home – as anybody who has seen the movie knows – is a big highlight of the entire thing. And it’s literally the only track from that performance that has ever been released until right now. So I’m very happy that we’ve been able to shepherd the rest of it into the world – it’s an incredibly exciting and dynamic performance.”