Relay-Version: version B 2.10 5/3/83; site utzoo.UUCP Path: utzoo!mnetor!seismo!rutgers!mit-eddie!EDDIE.MIT.EDU!Love-Hounds-request From: Love-Hounds-request@EDDIE.MIT.EDU Newsgroups: mod.music.gaffa Subject: AM Kate? Message-ID: <8703191844.AA27458@EDDIE.MIT.EDU> Date: Thu, 19-Mar-87 13:35:00 EST Article-I.D.: EDDIE.8703191844.AA27458 Posted: Thu Mar 19 13:35:00 1987 Date-Received: Sat, 21-Mar-87 04:50:38 EST Sender: daemon@mit-eddie.MIT.EDU Reply-To: Love-Hounds Organization: Love-Hounds Anonymous Lines: 23 Approved: nessus@eddie.mit.edu Really-From: Pulled out the CD of HOL yesterday (after returning from jury duty), set the player to loop starting at 2:19 in "Watching you...", recorded the secret message a few times on cassette, and transferred the cassette to my 4-track cassette machine. After trying both directions at a variety of speeds with various equalizations, I'm clueless. I did, however, discover why Kate has never achieved the enormous popularity in the US she so obviously deserves. Let me explain. At one point I tried an EQ setting drastically peaked in the midrange to try and enhance the vocals, with the track switched to mono. Sounded a lot like a cheap AM radio with a 3" speaker. Sounded absolutely awful, too. At which point, it struck: Kate isn't popular in the US because she doesn't mix for cheap AM radios. Any sensible "artist" KNOWS that a mix which sounds good on cheap AM radios is an absolute necessity for commercial success in the US (I'm told, in fact, that Peter Gabriel recorded most of Security through a cheap radio shack amplifier with a 5" speaker just to get that sound). Maybe somebody should tell Kate. But be sure to break it to her gently... -Dan Riley (dsr@crnlns.bitnet) (currently absolutely elated at finally having acquired The Dreaming on CD)