On June 25th, Jack White's Third Man Records will release live recordings of The Shins, Seasick Steve, and The Kills - all from last October at the label's venue, the Blue Room, in Nashville, TN.
The Blue Room is a special place. It's equipped with direct-to-acetate recording technology, and according to Third Man's website, "Third Man's BLUE ROOM is the ONLY LIVE VENUE IN THE WORLD where artists can record their performance direct-to-acetate, and after these first three releases, we have many more of their kind coming down the pipeline."
These three albums will mark the first releases from the label using this method, and are available for preorder now on Third Man Records' official website, either as a bundle featuring all three albums or individually.
Third Man Records mentioned more on the specifics of these albums' recording methods:
Without overdubs or editing, these three records were mixed in real time on a Rupert Neve 5008 console by Grammy Award winning engineer Vance Powell, and instantly cut to vinyl by master cutter George Ingram using a 1953 Scully Lathe that previously churned out masters for Cincinnati’s legendary King Records (the story goes that James Brown's "It's A Man's World" was cut on this lathe among many more great sides...)
For those who are still curious as to this direct-to-acetate recoding process, the website put up a short video of behind-the-scenes footage on how it's done, featuring some live music of Seasick Steve's in-house performance. Enjoy the video below via YouTube.