RIP Roger Nichols.
F~A~R~V~A~Mamey Sapote Eradication
Roger Nichols, who has died aged 66, was an American sound engineer and
inventor best known for his work with the jazz-rock group Steely Dan,
with whom he produced some of the highest fidelity recordings ever made.
Roger Nichols at his mixing desk
6:16PM BST 16 Jun 2011
Comments
Nichols worked with the group throughout their heyday in the 1970s and
during later sporadic recordings, as the musicians built a peerless
reputation for meticulous attention to detail and exceptional clarity of
sound.
He won seven Grammies, six of them for Steely Dan albums, the first
being their 1977 masterpiece Aja and, most recently, three awards for
Two Against Nature (2000). The other Grammy was for his role as producer
of the less fashionable country artist John Denver, with whom he had a
close association â€" based on their mutual passion for gadgets and
amateur aviation â€" from 1980 until Denver’s death in a
plane crash in 1997.
Among the other prominent artists on whose records Nichols worked were
Bobby “Blue†Bland, Johnny Winter, Ricky Lee Jones,
Placido Domingo, Frank Sinatra, Diana Ross, and The Beach Boys.
During his limited spare time, Nichols was also a Scuba diving
instructor and an amateur motor-racing photographer whose work was
regularly published . He also designed the Wendel drum machine/sampler,
first used in 1979 on Steely Dan’s Gaucho album.
The group’s core members, Walter Becker and Donald Fagen,
nicknamed Nichols “The Immortal†because he mysteriously
avoided electrocution in a potentially fatal studio accident. Despite
the exacting requirements and excessive workload the band placed on him,
he thrived on working with them and their producer Gary Katz.
“We’re all perfectionists,†Nichols said in an
interview in 1993. “It wasn’t a drag for me to do things
over and over until it was perfect. In my own way, I’m just as
crazy as they are.â€
Roger Scott Nichols was born in Oakland, California, on September 22
1944. His father flew B47s in the US Air Force and the family lived all
over America, but when he left the military in 1957 they settled at
Cucamonga, southern California. There Roger attended the same high
school as Frank Zappa, of whose guitar playing he made experimental
home-recordings on a basic reel-to-reel deck.
After graduating in Nuclear Physics at Oregon State University, Nichols
worked at the San Onofre nuclear power plant as a nuclear operator from
1965 to 1968. He was simultaneously developing a passionate interest in
audio equipment, mainly because he hated the “clicks, pops and
ticks†he would hear on records.
With two friends he began making recordings at jazz clubs and built a
recording studio in Torrance. They started by recording local high
school bands and then set up a hi-fi store supplying custom equipment to
music industry professionals, thus making many contacts. Karen
Carpenter, Larry Carlton and Kenny Rogers were among clients that used
the studio, and they eventually began supplying others, including the
ABC network.
In 1970, ABC hired Nichols to do studio maintenance and engineering, and
the following year Katz arrived with the New Yorkers, Becker and Fagen.
Since no one else had much notion of how to deal with them, Nichols
began working with them, and they instantly found common ground in their
dedication to “hi-fi†.
With Katz taking a mostly “executive†role as producer,
responsible for getting the best vocal performances out of Fagen,
Nichols was responsible for capturing the music on tape, with lustrous
results.
Their first two albums â€" Can’t Buy A Thrill (1972) and
Countdown To Ecstasy (1973) â€" were unusual for their lack of EQ
(or “equalisation†), a routinely-used technique for
manipulating the relative strength of frequencies. Instead, Nichols
concentrated on careful microphone placement.
Another of his ideas that became a Steely Dan trademark was
double-tracking Fagen’s vocals, and mixing one of the unison
doubles at around 75 per cent of the volume of the other. This subtle
effect gave his vocals the desired “thickness†without
being as obvious as other double tracking methods.
Steely Dan soon effectively became a duo, spending months recording each
of their albums with the cream of LA’s session musicians. Their
perfectionist approach meant that they never made backup copies of
master tapes (since this would inevitably mean a reduction in sound
quality). But this sometimes worked against them. During the making of
Katy Lied (1975), one of their 24-track masters was accidentally erased
by an assistant engineer, and a song from the Gaucho sessions was lost
in another accident; although the group spent $60,000 trying to
re-create it, they finally rejected the results.
After Steely Dan announced their split, Nichols also worked on
Fagen’s first solo album, Nightfly (1982), considered a
benchmark of quality by audiophiles. For the follow-up Kamakiriad
(1993), Nichols said that two years were spent programming the drum
machines to get “just the right feel†to meet
Fagen’s increasingly fastidious standards. The following year
Nichols also engineered and mixed Becker’s solo debut, 11 Tracks
Of Whack. When Steely Dan re-formed, he worked on Alive in America
(1995), Two Against Nature and Everything Must Go (2003).
In his later career Nichols spread his knowledge internationally in
“master class workshops†and as a technical consultant.
In 2005 he won a National Recording Academy of Arts and Sciences
Lifetime Achievement Award and set up his company, Roger Nichols
Digital.
Roger Nichols spent the last year of his life battling pancreatic
cancer, treatment for which nearly bankrupted his family. He died on
April 9, and is survived by his wife Conrad Reeder, a writer and
musician, and by two daughters .
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http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/8580588/Roger-Nichols.html
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Dave Moore
Here's a better copy of the obituary, without the many spurious characters:
=============================================
Roger Nichols, who has died aged 66, was an American sound engineer and
inventor best known for his work with the jazz-rock group Steely Dan, with
whom he produced some of the highest fidelity recordings ever made.
Nichols worked with the group throughout their heyday in the 1970s and
during later sporadic recordings, as the musicians built a peerless
reputation for meticulous attention to detail and exceptional clarity of
sound.
He won seven Grammies, six of them for Steely Dan albums, the first being
their 1977 masterpiece Aja and, most recently, three awards for Two Against
Nature (2000). The other Grammy was for his role as producer of the less
fashionable country artist John Denver, with whom he had a close
association - based on their mutual passion for gadgets and amateur
aviation - from 1980 until Denver's death in a plane crash in 1997.
Among the other prominent artists on whose records Nichols worked were Bobby
"Blue" Bland, Johnny Winter, Ricky Lee Jones, Placido Domingo, Frank
Sinatra, Diana Ross, and The Beach Boys.
During his limited spare time, Nichols was also a Scuba diving instructor
and an amateur motor-racing photographer whose work was regularly published.
He also designed the Wendel drum machine/sampler, first used in 1979 on
Steely Dan's Gaucho album.
The group's core members, Walter Becker and Donald Fagen, nicknamed Nichols
"The Immortal" because he mysteriously avoided electrocution in a
potentially fatal studio accident. Despite the exacting requirements and
excessive workload the band placed on him, he thrived on working with them
and their producer Gary Katz.
"We're all perfectionists," Nichols said in an interview in 1993. "It wasn't
a drag for me to do things over and over until it was perfect. In my own
way, I'm just as crazy as they are."
Roger Scott Nichols was born in Oakland, California, on September 22 1944.
His father flew B47s in the US Air Force and the family lived all over
America, but when he left the military in 1957 they settled at Cucamonga,
southern California. There Roger attended the same high school as Frank
Zappa, of whose guitar playing he made experimental home-recordings on a
basic reel-to-reel deck.
After graduating in Nuclear Physics at Oregon State University, Nichols
worked at the San Onofre nuclear power plant as a nuclear operator from 1965
to 1968. He was simultaneously developing a passionate interest in audio
equipment, mainly because he hated the "clicks, pops and ticks" he would
hear on records.
With two friends he began making recordings at jazz clubs and built a
recording studio in Torrance. They started by recording local high school
bands and then set up a hi-fi store supplying custom equipment to music
industry professionals, thus making many contacts. Karen Carpenter, Larry
Carlton and Kenny Rogers were among clients that used the studio, and they
eventually began supplying others, including the ABC network.
In 1970, ABC hired Nichols to do studio maintenance and engineering, and the
following year Katz arrived with the New Yorkers, Becker and Fagen. Since no
one else had much notion of how to deal with them, Nichols began working
with them, and they instantly found common ground in their dedication to
"hi-fi".
With Katz taking a mostly "executive" role as producer, responsible for
getting the best vocal performances out of Fagen, Nichols was responsible
for capturing the music on tape, with lustrous results.
Their first two albums -- Can't Buy A Thrill (1972) and Countdown To Ecstasy
(1973) -- were unusual for their lack of EQ (or "equalisation"), a
routinely-used technique for manipulating the relative strength of
frequencies. Instead, Nichols concentrated on careful microphone placement.
Another of his ideas that became a Steely Dan trademark was double-tracking
Fagen's vocals, and mixing one of the unison doubles at around 75 per cent
of the volume of the other. This subtle effect gave his vocals the desired
"thickness" without being as obvious as other double tracking methods.
Steely Dan soon effectively became a duo, spending months recording each of
their albums with the cream of LA's session musicians. Their perfectionist
approach meant that they never made backup copies of master tapes (since
this would inevitably mean a reduction in sound quality). But this sometimes
worked against them. During the making of Katy Lied (1975), one of their
24-track masters was accidentally erased by an assistant engineer, and a
song from the Gaucho sessions was lost in another accident; although the
group spent $60,000 trying to re-create it, they finally rejected the
results.
After Steely Dan announced their split, Nichols also worked on Fagen's first
solo album, Nightfly (1982), considered a benchmark of quality by
audiophiles. For the follow-up Kamakiriad (1993), Nichols said that two
years were spent programming the drum machines to get "just the right feel"
to meet Fagen's increasingly fastidious standards. The following year
Nichols also engineered and mixed Becker's solo debut, 11 Tracks Of Whack.
When Steely Dan re-formed, he worked on Alive in America (1995), Two Against
Nature and Everything Must Go (2003).
In his later career Nichols spread his knowledge internationally in "master
class workshops" and as a technical consultant. In 2005 he won a National
Recording Academy of Arts and Sciences Lifetime Achievement Award and set up
his company, Roger Nichols Digital.
Roger Nichols spent the last year of his life battling pancreatic cancer,
treatment for which nearly bankrupted his family. He died on April 9, and is
survived by his wife Conrad Reeder, a writer and musician, and by two
daughters.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/obituaries/8580588/Roger-Nichols.html
robert
mr. rogers died?