i did a quick google on it since the mackie thing was always something my mentor mentioned, and wanted to make sure he was on point. So it appears there is truth in both statements, yours and mine. good stuff man, i was under the wrong impression, i thought the entire song was recorded using the mackie 8bus.
https://www.mixonline.com/recording/recordin-la-vida-loca-making-hard-disk-hit-374667
Relevant quotes from the article-
"On a completely different level, "La Vida" is a milestone of technology: the first Number One record to be done completely within a hard disk system. In addition to changing the course of mainstream pop music, "La Vida" may also turn out to be a pivot point in how records are made."
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"Child and Rosa worked out the song in Child's writing room on keyboards, with a decidedly low-tech boom box cassette recorder running constantly to document the composing process. Once the structure was worked out, Child handed the song over to programmer Randy Cantor, who set about creating sequenced drum, percussion and synthesizer parts, which would become the basis of the recording. Those parts were recorded through a Mackie 32+24*8 console to a 64-channel Pro Tools system."
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"The tracks were then turned over to Dye for additional recording. The horn parts, some of which were used to augment layered synthesized horn parts and others for riffs, were played on flugelhorn and trombone by Tony Concepcion. All of the recording was done direct, without a console; Dye miked the horns with an AKG C-12VR, placing it rather close in on the bell. "I wanted a very in-your-face sort of sound," he explains. "Other [horn] tracks on the record have that sort of mariachi/cantina sound to them at times, but for this song we wanted it brash and sharp." The rest of the signal chain was a Focusrite Red preamp, an Empirical Labs Distressor for compression, and Pultec EQP-1A and Neve 1031 equalizers. The same signal chain was used for live percussion parts."
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"notably the surf-like guitar part (one of Rosa's production inspirations, performed by Los Angeles-based session player Rusty Anderson to an ADAT tape with a slaved two-mix from the Pro Tools)."
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"The final mix kept the project completely in the digital domain, done to a Panasonic 3800 DAT deck, with no analog backup. "The thing about analog is that you know the sound is going to come back warmer, with a rounder, fatter low-end sound and smoother top-end transients," says Dye. "But recording in an all-digital domain, the sound you get out is the sound you put in. You have to make sure that whatever the sound is, it's what you want it to be, because that's what digital is going to give you back.""
