In terms of the jazz and boogie, its the synthesised sonics and arrangements.
And... Pete pioneered guitar sonics and arrangement gimmicks, even certain ways of strumming, that are now just part of Rock's DNA.
Standard instruments are deflected through reverb and other effects, each placed in its own sonic domain; the arrangements outline clear pop structures yet register as ghostly backdrops.
The result of these sonic and social arrangements was a situation in which the singers never had to strain to be heard, and in which an almost conversational relationship with the audience could be fostered.
Mr. Beam, 38, has been expanding his sonic palette and arrangements since "The Shepherd's Dog" album of 2007, and he continued the trend with "Kiss Each Other Clean" in 2011, but his new album carries him even further from his minimalist roots.
Using the studio as an instrument has encouraged reckless arrangements, sonic left turns, and futuristic compositional systems.
R.E.M.'s intuitive producer, Mitch Easter, teamed with pro-ball producer Don Dixon, and the pair smartly layered-up the project's sonics, instrumentation and arrangements as they evolved the band's usual recording process from 8-tracks to 24-tracks seamlessly, with no hints of jive or slickness.
They reproduce the set list, with the particular song arrangements and sonic configurations that the Dead employed that night.
Songs cycle in and out, and he and the band play many of them in a different key, to accommodate his aging vocal cords (he says that he prefers his late-career baritone to the tenor of his prime), but for the most part the big hits are always there, presented in the same arrangements and sonic array.
Tankian and his crew had experimented with all sorts of speaker arrangements and sonic contraptions before realizing that the only way to create a personal, private connection with the art -- a "complete turnkey solution," as Tankian describes in apropos industry-speak -- was the development of his Eye For Sound app.
