Studio Three (control room), EMI Studios, Abbey Road
Producer: George Martin
Engineer: Norman Smith
The final day of studio work for With The Beatles involved the creation of a stereo mix of ‘Money (That’s What I Want)’.
The mix was made in a three-hour session beginning at 2.30pm, and was overseen by producer George Martin.
As so many overdubs had been added to the song, it was felt that further tape-to-tape copying would risk losing audio fidelity. To get around this, the stereo mix consisted of two separate mono mixes, one played through each left/right channel.
Page last updated: 7 July 2022
It fascinates me how George Martin achieved a stereo mix with center filled with vocals and handclaps!
My theory is that normally we would have instruments on the left & vocals on the right, but we have a piano overdub, so George and Norman pushed vocals to the center, leaving the space for the piano on the right.
All George Martin did was take his 2 mono mixes an put one In each channel causing vocals in the center.
Great website!
Just one thing. This doesn’t make sense : “To get around this, the stereo mix consisted of two separate mono mixes, one played through each left/right channel.”
Two different tapes being played in sync at the same time? Impossible in 1963. They would have drifted wildly out, causing phasing issues. The vocal would never have stayed in the centre. One of the first crude attempts at sync’ing 2 tape machines together can be heard on “A Day In The Life” (the bit with the rising strings), but even that drifts out considerably in places.
Two different mixes from the same tape done at the same time? Possibly, but that’s just called a “mix”, not “2 mixes”. They could have fed the same tape to 2 independent mixing desks at the same time I suppose, but I’m not sure there would have been the space (or the connections) to wheel in another desk. And then you would need to be able to sum the 2 mixing desks together, either by feeding one of the outputs into the other, or requiring a *third* desk.
ps I’m a professional sound engineer, so I do know a bit about this stuff. 🙂
Hey Jeff. Thanks for your comments!
I’ll try to dig out the sources of the double-mix claim. I agree it does seem odd.
I think they probably recorded the vocals at half volume onto both tracks. Seems the only logical conclusion.
Ok, but 2 mono mixes would cause 2 rhythm tracks played on both channels. The rhythm track is only on the left. My theory is that they put July 63 recording without the piano overdub and then they put 2nd track – vocals with September piano overdub, and put both recordings in sync.
Left – rhythm track
Center – vocals
Right – piano
Sorry, if it’s confusing!
So far as I read, Martin disn’t sync two mono mixes but two twin-track tapes, each one having the vocal on one track and instruments on the other. As this was done later in the year, he could do it on four-track tape. Maybe he muted the duplicate vocal track so they wouldn’t have sync problems?