I've always been fascinated with the production on Dick Dale's Misirlou. It's perfect and nothing sounds like it. It's unlike his other versions or his other songs from the period (though The Wedge is also something!)

It really stands out. I can't think of anything else surf or surf-tangential with that combination of ambitious production, virtuoso musicianship, and pristine fidelity.

I've never heard any (reliable) information about that recording session, which is odd because there must have been a bunch of people there -- musicians, engineers, producer, ... I really want to hear clues about how they made that recording.

This is 1962, right? So 4-track? Some of it must be overdub, right? Or did they orchestrate all that production with horns, solos, piano, claps, etc. and live mix it perfectly?

I've read that Dick Dale claimed he didn't use Fender spring reverb yet when he recorded that session. But the record is obviously dripping with the distinctive sound of spring reverb. It's clearly on Dick's guitar, and after the piano comes in it's also distinctively on the hand claps. So maybe the studio had its own spring reverb and had it on a send? Or what? Maybe Dick Dale mixed up memories of early singles recording sessions that clearly didn't have spring reverb.

There's something else peculiar about the guitar timbre, reverb tails, and tightness that makes it sound slightly speed up. Is that possible? It was a common technique in that era to push a recording just a little into the uncanny.

And why does the stuff played on the high e string not sound like any other Stratocaster ever? It's really full, punchy, and articulate, and not at all ice-picky. Doesn't sound like a Strat bridge pickup nor neck pickup. Doesn't sound like tone roll-off. Doesn't sound scooped/resonant peaky like 50s pickups. Doesn't sound like later era Dick Dale. Is it recording magic or what?

Who played the piano arpeggios? Ferrante and Teicher? Who else played on the session? Who arranged it? How did they do it?

So many questions.

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Last edited: Mar 11, 2023 19:29:25

According to the book "Surf Beat" by Kent Crowley (p. 98), all the overdubs were done by producer Jan Davis and pianist Bob Roberts, who just added more and more stuff till the song sounded alive and cooking enough. The inital recording seems not to have been done at the Rendezvous but in an empty hall, and the reverb on guitar and other tracks is supposed to come from feeding the sound through a "wooden box". (Whatever that's supposed to mean.)

In general, Crowley's book is not know for its accuracy, but in this case, the whole account is taken from an article from John Blair in Pipline Magazine 2006, which I haven't read but may provide more details regarding the recording.

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Great question! I've always assumed that Dicks guitar tone when using the bridge pickup was helped by the reverse configuration of the pickup and the strings being inverted to that configuration. The high E being a bit more mellowed and the low E having more bite.

Some of the surf music historians that could shed more light on the questions would be Lorenzo, Ivan and John Blair.

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Oh wow thanks for all the good info.

So I'm speculating -- rhythm section on one track, lead guitar on another, and then two left over for overdubs/bounces? Were people at that point using two machines to bounce back and forth? At any rate the fidelity is so good it doesn't sound like any of it has been bounced down multiple generations.

Yeah I guess it makes sense that the spring reverb was added in mixing. I wonder if that wooden box they used wasn't maybe covered in Tolex and provided by Leo Fender? Or else it's entirely possible it was a one-off put together by some studio engineer. Hammonds had spring reverb since the 1940s, so I imagine it wasn't entirely uncommon for people to adapt them for other uses. Joe Meek had built his spring reverb box by 1957 (supposedly using a spring from a garden gate).

Ah it was produced by Jan Davis. That makes sense -- his own records are jaw-dropping. Clearly a advanced feel for record production/arrangement. Only his own records trend to have a much more raw, harsh, lo-fi fidelity. I love his stuff. What else did he produce for other artists?

Anybody know any other records Bob Roberts played piano on?

One time I broke my high E and didn't have any extras around so I put on a B instead and very nervously tuned it up (and bottomed out the vibrato tension). Must have been a 16 or 17. It was a revelation -- a thick snappy sound and an absolute joy to tremolo pick on. So I believe that must be part of the recipe to that sound. (But of course it was the first string to break again.)

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I guess I can answer a couple of my own questions:
https://www.discogs.com/artist/784926-Jan-Davis
https://www.discogs.com/artist/721460-Bob-Roberts-2

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Yes that distorted electric piano sounds so sweet. Cool piano playing on the b side too. But very sloppy and raw fidelity recording compared to Misirlou. https://youtu.be/gghGc_4X8ZY

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What happened was that Dick's dad James Monsour came into Rendezvous with this track his son had recorded' reported Jan. 'At the time Rendezvous was handling distribution for Dick's Del-Tone label and so we listened to the track and it was interesting but dead sounding. Rod Pierce said for me and Bob to take the track into the studio and liven it up with some overdubs. So we added all the shouts and handclaps, some extra rhythm guitar and Bob on piano. I think we ran it back and forth through our old Ampex mono recorders about six times adding this or that. When we finished it really cooked.

Oh wow. So interesting that the arrangement on the production stuff was all an afterthought like that. It all comes together so masterfully. There goes my theory that they added reverb to the guitar channel while mixing it. If they were simply using mono tapes best they could have done is throw spring reverb onto the mono master they got from Dick's dad. Probably that's what they did then, huh? Everything sounds big and reverb-y. Maybe it was super dry before they did that.
Also, I guess what sounds to my ear like expert riding of mixing desk faders to balance the different parts was just careful balancing of performance dynamics and compression from hitting tape six times. I'm really surprised after that many generations with the gear these guys would have had at that time it didn't start to sound distorted or dull.

It's definitely spring reverb on the guitar and the claps. It's got that unmistakeable sploinginess. Sure tracks from the era got drippy-sounding non-spring reverb, like for instance Unsquare Dance, but the sploing means just one thing. I'm convinced of it.

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John wrote:

Bob Roberts is credited with writing Space Race by the Hodads.

My copy of the record, Danny, credits Lou Josie as writer of "Space Race." The Hodads were essentially Lou Josie and Jan Davis. They were musical partners for a time. The flipside, "After Dark," was written by Bob Roberts and Lou Josie, FYI. Record produced by Jimmy King, aka Lou Josie. Stories like this one have given many of us who research this sort of thing a lot of headaches.

My bad, Discogs didn't differentiate between A or B side of the single.

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