DANIEL BRAUNSTEIN: Reuniting with Volumes, Delusional Optimism, and Training Your Fans

Speaker 1 (00:00:00):

Welcome to the Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast.

Speaker 2 (00:00:04):

And now your host, Eyal Levi.

(00:00:08):

Welcome to the URM podcast. Thank you so much for being here. It's crazy to think that we are now on our seventh year. Don't ask me how that all just flew by, but it did. Man, time moves fast and it's only because of you, the listeners, if you'd like us to stick around another seven years and there's a few simple things you can do that would really, really help us out, I would endlessly appreciate if you would, number one, share our episodes with your friends. Number two, post our episodes on your Facebook and Instagram and tag me at al Levi URM audio and at URM Academy and of course our guest. And number three, leave us reviews and five star reviews wherever you can. We especially love iTunes reviews. Once again, thank you for all the years and years of loyalty. I just want you to know that we will never charge you for this podcast, and I will always work as hard as possible to improve the episodes in every single way.

(00:01:10):

All we ask in return is a share a post and tag us. Oh, and one last thing. Do you have a question you would like me to answer on an episode? I don't mean for a guest. I mean for me, it can be about anything. Email it to [email protected]. That's EYAL at m dot A-C-D-E-M-Y. There's no.com on that. It's exactly the way I spelled it. And use the subject line Answer me Eyal. Alright, let's get on with it. Hello everybody. Welcome to the URM podcast. I love these artist and producer episodes. They're actually my favorite to do and what's really, really cool about this one is that the producer actually used to be in the band. So there's quite a bit of serious history here. So we've got none other than Daniel Braunstein, who is a longtime URM guest now the mix instructor along with Raad Soudani from Volumes.

(00:02:12):

And again, Dan used to be in volumes at the very beginning. He's one of the people that was around for the inception of the band, so he only stuck around for an album and then followed his production career, which volumes is a great band. But it seems like Dan made the right choice for himself because look at his production career, it's really, really excelled. I mean, he's great. He's fucking great. And now he worked with volumes again, so full circle and we talk all about their history together and it's a cool episode. It should also be said that Dan Braunstein is on Nail the Mix this month, July, 2022 with the song Bend by Volumes. So it's very appropriate to this episode. Let's get started. Raad and Daniel, welcome to the URM podcast.

Speaker 3 (00:03:00):

What's up man? Good to be here. Thanks for having me and Dan,

Speaker 2 (00:03:03):

Glad to have you both. So we were just talking off air about how you're noticing that heavy music is experiencing a resurgence.

Speaker 3 (00:03:13):

Yeah, obviously I listen to a lot of Octane and satellite radio and stuff like that, and I'm hearing this new sound of metal slowly evolve, but I'm also hearing in the pop world, I think these pop artists are getting bored of doing the same thing over and over again. And I think the listeners are getting bored of hearing it. I'm hearing just more influence from heavy music, more influence from metal and heavy rock. The general public is starting to be okay with that being a mainstream genre again, which is exciting.

Speaker 4 (00:03:43):

I feel like a few years ago rap was taking over and it was like the epitome of music rappers controlled the radio and the look of how an artist should look and they were dominating, but then the substance for that sort of music kind of was going out of the window. I don't know. It was all sounding the same. It was all sounding the same. The substance is just, it lacks because it's just one specific stuff. It's like money, yada, yada, yada. And I think people got kind of sick of it and then looked elsewhere and just saw how bands are. It's really natural and organic and it's been going on for years, but yeah, came back.

Speaker 2 (00:04:25):

Okay. So whether perception and reality are two different things is a different conversation, but people do feel like the world is becoming a darker place and certainly if people feel that way, then to them it's true. So

Speaker 3 (00:04:39):

Just

Speaker 2 (00:04:39):

Assuming that that's true, do you think that the way that the world is going right now or feels like it's going has anything to do with why aggressive music is experiencing a resurgence?

Speaker 3 (00:04:52):

Yeah, I think it definitely is playing a part in it. I was talking with someone the other day just about the last couple years and what everyone's gone through and how life is now as opposed to how it was before. And we were kind of saying and agreeing that life has kind of been sterilized a little bit. There's been a lot of enjoyment sucked out of things that we used to do all the time and we took for granted. But when those things went away, I think people were all left with a void. And that's what you're talking about where people are maybe more depressed or more anxious or looking for more of an outlet to experience something that's more extreme.

Speaker 4 (00:05:28):

Yeah, that's an interesting take al. Maybe it's true. I mean maybe everybody was at home. There's a lot of pent up aggression and you want to go to a concert and let it out. Like hip hop shows or those kinds of shows, they're more like fly and you feel good and you feel happy and you feel swag or whatever. But when you go to a rock show, it's different. It's pent up aggression, you let it out. It is different. So maybe,

Speaker 3 (00:05:51):

And hip hop shows even dude, there's mosh pits. It's literally a metal show. I mean, that's something that's totally been borrowed from heavy music. We grew up since we've been, what, 13, going to shows and watching these kids just yell at the audience, make a circle pit, everyone moshed, go fucking crazy. I want to see you guys kill each other. Whatever. You're seeing that shit in hip hop and that you're seeing that same energy on stage. And kids love it because at its core, it's raw human emotion. It's raw power. People just want to go to a show and let loose. And I think hip hop and metal are actually really similar. And we've always talked about this, and Diego, who I started the band with, he would always say this to us, he was very ahead of his time. He was very young, but very ahead of his time. And he'd always be like, dude, hip hop is metal. It's the same thing. It's this constant groove and it makes you want to nod your head and it's heavy, right? It's like the 8 0 8 is basically just, it's like another version of a guitar or a bass. Even some of the same rhythms that you hear in hip hop are starting to pop up in metal. And I think there's something to be said about that for sure.

Speaker 4 (00:06:57):

Yeah, I remember we were doing different animals. Diego who took a future song, he copied the kick pattern and made one of our songs based on that. So that was pretty cool.

Speaker 3 (00:07:05):

Oh shit. Yeah.

Speaker 4 (00:07:06):

But yeah, hip hop's tight. I don't want it sound like I'm bashing it or anything. I listened to rap every day, but we're old, old now, bro. Yeah, we're just doing a little comparison here. That's the number one genre I believe, because Rock used to be, and I remember a few years ago I felt like bands were going out of style a little bit.

Speaker 3 (00:07:23):

Yep.

Speaker 4 (00:07:24):

Big time. They were. That's how I felt. And we were still doing it and we watched, we watched other industries or other genres just take over and get more recognition and it was a little heart disheartening, but it does seem like it's coming back around and it's like you have to throw instruments into your music. You have to have that live instrumentation nowadays because people want that and they need that,

Speaker 2 (00:07:46):

Not just being home. I think it was more than that. Being home and just hearing doom all around you. The economy's going to shit. There's war, there's a pandemic, people are dying jobs, all these things being home and isolated on top of this really uncertain situation, I think it gives people an excess of negative feelings that they need to get out somehow. And there's different ways to do that. Heavy music being one of the healthier ways. But I do think that people are just gravitating towards music and art that speaks to those types of feelings or comes from those types of feelings.

Speaker 4 (00:08:29):

This stuff is real. I mean, when you get in there and you're writing a song, it's not particularly to a certain degree to what other genres are doing. It's like this shit comes from the heart,

Speaker 3 (00:08:41):

Really. Like emotions, emotion. I always say this too, and it spans across every genre, but people in general want to feel something when they experience art, whether that's happiness or sadness or whatever, people or anger. Art is art. And I think that for a while, rock and metal were getting discounted as proper forms of mainstream art because they're so extreme. So now that void is open and it's wanting to be filled and people are enjoying filling that with something more extreme and you hear music, even Billie Eilish when she came out with Bad Guy and songs like that, those are very extreme songs. They're very unique and they're very different and I think the Listener has been trained now to accept something very different from any artist. So I think that that's exciting. I love that. That inspires me too. It's like I talk to all the bands I work with about training the listener as you go through your music career, so you train your fans to accept you for being multidimensional as an artist.

(00:09:46):

You train your fans to be ready for when you put something out, they're going to be okay with it sounding nothing like your old stuff. And I think that's important, and you have to keep things exciting as a band with the new Spirit box songs we just did, which are killer by the way. You've checked 'em out sick. Yeah, well I've checked out what's up. Awesome. Yeah, we wrote that rotoscope song and we were like, damn, people are going to hate this shit or they're going to love it. We'll see how well the band has trained their fans and their fans responded really positively to it because they like to see that something came out from the band and go, okay, well now what's it going to be? I want to be surprised. I want to be shocked.

Speaker 2 (00:10:26):

I think OPEC is a great example of a band that has trained their fans well because they became a classic rock band basically, and there are people who prefer them before that, but I don't think anybody feels like it was some crazy left turn or anything. You hear their stuff and it's like, yeah, it's just them. That's just what they do. He could put out an acoustic record, an instrumental acoustic record with just one guitar and the fans would just accept it as an pec record. Mike Patton, another extreme example of someone who's trained his audience well, he could fart into a microphone for 45 minutes straight and people would be like, okay, cool.

Speaker 3 (00:11:07):

I mean, I buy that shit for sure.

Speaker 2 (00:11:09):

Or it could be a soundtrack to some hit movie. It's whatever he wants. He's trained his audience Well,

Speaker 4 (00:11:15):

Yeah, listeners need to have more of an open mind and not think that a band's debut album, they have to sound like that forever. Let people change and explore because then when you go down, when time goes by and you have all these eclectic albums from one band, it's like, wow. And I have all these worlds to go into from my favorite band that cool

Speaker 3 (00:11:36):

Of a hundred percent. And I was reading somewhere too, it's like you're not supposed to every song from a band. I think that if every song that a band puts out is like, oh, this is a banger and this is sick and this is perfect. It's like you're supposed to experience not liking a song from a band or it's okay to put out a bad song,

Speaker 4 (00:12:00):

A band. Yeah, I have some favorites, have

Speaker 3 (00:12:02):

Some least

Speaker 2 (00:12:02):

Favorites.

Speaker 3 (00:12:03):

It creates contrast, right? And everything is contrast.

Speaker 2 (00:12:06):

My favorite bands, the Beatles and Muse, I basically hate about 60% of their songs,

Speaker 3 (00:12:13):

But it makes you love the songs you love even more, right? Yeah,

Speaker 2 (00:12:15):

Dude, they're great songs. The ones I love are

Speaker 4 (00:12:19):

Like God tier. Sometimes I'll go back and listen to the ones I don't like. You'll just come around and they'll end up being favorites, but or

Speaker 2 (00:12:26):

Not. And that's okay. But what I'm wondering is, okay, so you talk about training your audience. How does a band train their audience?

Speaker 3 (00:12:34):

I think you have to do it from the beginning, right? I think there's a point where you get to a certain level as a band having one certain sound, and then at that point you've kind of gathered your fan base of people that are expecting that sound every time. And then they're going to be upset if you're a 10 year career band and you've had the same sound for 10 years and your fans are die hard and they just want more and more of that same sound, they might be more inclined to poo poo your new material that you put out that's totally different. So I think it's something that has to be done from the jump basically, or at least very early on in the career. But I mean, I could be wrong. I mean there's plenty of examples of bands that have totally changed their sound after being consistent for 10 years, but you talk about the Beatles and what an amazing example of a band that's completely trained their listeners to love the entire variety of everything they've put out just because they like what the heart of the band is, and from each of their albums, their sound is totally different.

(00:13:39):

When they put out Yellow Submarine, I mean, that's crazy. That was, that's I guess the old school equivalent. Perfect example.

Speaker 2 (00:13:48):

That's the one where they almost lost, lost. Well, I wasn't alive back then, but yeah, I wasn't along for that one.

Speaker 4 (00:13:54):

Maybe we were too young, but possibly they were maybe getting ridiculed for some of these albums. I'm not sure. But

Speaker 2 (00:13:59):

Not too young. I wasn't even invented. I wasn't even near being invented when Submarine came out.

Speaker 4 (00:14:05):

Nonetheless, years later, you can see now they're timeless and now people love 'em, and it's like you might not have understood what they were doing then, but later on now you understand. That's the thing with music, every time I feel like we release an album, people hate it and then two years later they like it.

Speaker 3 (00:14:20):

That's funny.

Speaker 2 (00:14:22):

That's another thing I've noticed definitely with heavy music. So I have two thoughts. So one with training your audience. So basically, long story short is you find a way to get your audience to accept you for who you are and be cool with not loving everything. And then I think, or basically expect the unexpected. So if the audience is going to expect the unexpected with you and that's just part of your identity and part of how they know you, then it's less of a shock to their system than when a band that has sounded exactly the same for 15 years takes a complete left turn.

Speaker 3 (00:15:03):

It's almost like, how could they do that to me? They

Speaker 4 (00:15:06):

Betrayed me. Yeah,

Speaker 3 (00:15:07):

Exactly. When

Speaker 4 (00:15:08):

It comes to volumes, I mean, it's not like this is a good place to talk about. I mean, we started off as screams and heavy music, and then we implemented clean singing and people lost their shit. It was such a big deal, but it's like

Speaker 2 (00:15:23):

People gave you shit for that. Yeah,

Speaker 4 (00:15:24):

That's

Speaker 2 (00:15:25):

Interesting because I've always known you guys as a band with clean singing that fuses different influences, and so I came into knowing volumes, I guess, when you guys were already doing that stuff. So it's interesting for me to hear that you had trouble with that.

Speaker 4 (00:15:40):

Our job is just we want to get this music out to the masses, and it's like, well, singing is a beautiful art form, and it's like we implement that into our music and it blows people's minds sometimes. And it's just crazy,

Speaker 3 (00:15:53):

Especially in the early days

Speaker 4 (00:15:54):

Because

Speaker 3 (00:15:55):

Back the band formed it, 2009 is when we started the band.

(00:16:00):

So the band formed 2009, and back then it was like there was no clean singing. We put out the first EP and it was already enough just to have melodic sections with screaming over them. I feel like to us, that was the equivalent of a chorus or something. And back then we were making songs that were averaging five minutes and we thought there was nothing wrong with that. It just kept going and going. I listened to these songs now and I'm like, oh my God, this is so undigestible. Right? But then as the band evolved, the next album Via is when they were actually singing chorus, and I think that's what Rod's referring to is when that came out, people, the listener was already sort of ready for some melody because there were screaming. And then there was also these melodic parts, which was relatively unique for the genre at the time because basically the influences for the song were like Shuga Misery Signals and Ion Dissonance. That was kind of what we were like, okay,

Speaker 2 (00:16:58):

Not heavy on the melody,

Speaker 3 (00:17:00):

But misery signals. They had screaming over melodic parts, and that was a really heavy influence, and we always forget how influenced by that band we were. Yeah, I think, yeah, so it was like we did the ep and then because there was that melody, it was a segue we, because kind of pre-trained the audience to be like, okay, now here's the melodic part, just like that was on the ep, but now homeboys singing over it, and it's not so much of a shock. It's like, okay, this makes sense. And it's still surrounded by screaming, but it kind of presented the band in a way where it felt natural, like, oh, this is still the same band. This is just them evolving. Yeah, Dan

Speaker 4 (00:17:42):

Did a good job at doing that. Right. But then from the listener's perspective, I think some people were just upset, how could you include clean singing into your heavy music? It's like, how couldn't you? But what

Speaker 2 (00:17:53):

About now? Have they accepted it? I guess what I'm saying is at the time there was a shock, but do people even refer to you guys as a band with no clean singing? I

Speaker 4 (00:18:04):

Think the whole genre kind of fault, not saying we were the leaders, but followed suit. I think like Dan said, at the time there, it was kind of like emo music and heavy music, right?

Speaker 3 (00:18:15):

Yeah.

Speaker 4 (00:18:16):

And then people start blending the two and putting pop courses in their music and people really couldn't understand it, but more people started to follow suit and it started to becoming more apparent in music. And now you can't have a song without a great fucking singing melody course or what have you.

Speaker 3 (00:18:32):

Now that's the standard gold standard for the heavy rock

Speaker 4 (00:18:35):

Song now it's the gold standard. And yeah, I mean it's crazy because our job, we just want to get this out to the masses and let people enjoy music, heavy music, maybe start implementing more things. We like pop music and these beautiful melodies and throw 'em in our music and we like it. It's fun.

Speaker 2 (00:18:51):

It is interesting how clean singing is accepted now, man. I remember the nineties when implementing clean vocals into your metal band was basically the biggest risk you could take.

Speaker 4 (00:19:04):

Yeah. Here's the thing with that is that we were doing Screaming Man screaming and you tell your parents about your band, like, oh, my son's band. It's like the rah rah rah music. People weren't digging the rah rah rah, so they couldn't understand it. And it's like, so we wanted to pivot and throw in some more palpable things, and I think it's done very well actually. Now we have songs like Ben that are all singing, not a touch of Screaming and Hey, that song's doing very well in terms of plays and stuff.

Speaker 3 (00:19:35):

People seem to like it. And same thing goes for the low tuned thing and the Droney song thing, because when we started the band in 2009, there really wasn't a huge selection of bands that tuned down super low.

Speaker 2 (00:19:48):

Not a huge selection. No,

Speaker 3 (00:19:50):

Not a huge selection. The ones that were there were Acacia Strain after the Burial. I was going to say after Shuga, maybe Vela May, I don't know, maybe Veil

Speaker 2 (00:19:59):

Corn.

Speaker 3 (00:19:59):

Yeah, corn for sure.

Speaker 2 (00:20:01):

Do corn and Slip Not Count because they're so big.

Speaker 3 (00:20:04):

Yeah, I feel like that's a different level.

Speaker 2 (00:20:05):

Yeah. Okay.

Speaker 3 (00:20:06):

I won't even include them in this conference, but I remember the day that the band got signed, we got signed to Media Scare Records is I took the head of the label Baron at the time into my car outside of a show, and I played him. We had our demo that we had made in my bedroom that was like five songs, and we were doing program drums, we were doing di guitars, we were doing things kind of the way people do things now. And it was pretty fucking uncommon to have program drums in a song and di guitars. It was still at a time where most people were doing real instruments. And like I said before, stuff wasn't tuned quite as low. And I remember I took Baron in my car and I probably played him wormholes, and I was like, listen man, I guarantee you in five years, 10 years, everyone's going to be tuned low and songs are just going to be groovy the whole time. It's going to be these bouncy, groovy riffs. And he's like, you're totally right, man. You're totally right. You're signed.

Speaker 4 (00:20:59):

Dan's 19 at the time, by the way. This guy is ahead of his time. How does it

Speaker 2 (00:21:02):

Feel to be ahead of your time?

Speaker 3 (00:21:05):

Dude, it was crazy, man. Back then there was only two seven strings you could buy at Guitar Center. There was like the Iez one and there was the Schechter one, and they were both pieces of shit. And we bought two Schechter ones. Diego and I bought a white one. He bought a black one. And we're like, okay, so we're a seven string band like corn now. And that was our influence actually. You say corn, we were like, okay, what band uses a seven string corn? Alright, so let's do that. Let's copy corn, let's get seven strings, and then let's just do a lot of single note shit like Shuga did on nothing and on Catch 33, it's crazy. Even when you listen to Octane or something like that, every band is tuned down and these riffs are all gently riffs. We didn't even have the word gent back then. We called it Groove Metal. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (00:21:52):

I'm curious about a few things, the whole being ahead of your time thing. It's an interesting topic to me because a lot of stuff that my band didn't work for us and then a few years later became part of the landscape. So for instance, program lights, we were doing those in 2007, 2008 where it was really, really tough to have program lights. And then suddenly a few years later, everyone's got it, we're putting electronic music and metal got us so much hate, so much hate. And then just a few years later, we're no longer in the scene. And that's just like people do it and they don't get hate for it. And so to me, it's an interesting topic of doing things before they become part of the accepted language or just how things are done. And I've always thought that if you do it too early, it's the same as doing it too late to degree. It's kind of the same. So what I'm curious about is, so when you guys started doing the low tune guitars, I know you weren't the first, but there weren't that many around back then. It was definitely that and the program drums, all that, that's definitely ahead of its time. Did you get hate for it? And what is it that allowed you to see it through, I guess that didn't cause you to be like, eh, maybe that's pushing too far

Speaker 4 (00:23:16):

During the beginning of the time. This is definitely a Dan question, but I think these two, Dan and Diego approached this way differently than a typical band. They approached it from Pro Tools in or out or something. These guys, they were learning all these tools from Pro Tools and all these things you can use with these dws and their creativities were obviously going off and they just approached it way differently and used computer software for guitar sounds and shit. And it was new to me. I mean, I had no idea what the fuck was going on, so I was just watching them do all this and it was blowing my mind. But yeah,

Speaker 3 (00:23:59):

We had both spent a lot of time recording reel instruments too. I used to record bands in my bedroom after school, and I would do a lot of crust punk sort of power violence punk bands in my school, and it would just be like, come through, I'm going to plug you into my Baringer mixer into Garage Band. Fuck. Yes. And I've talked to you quite a bit about this too, about when you have less resources at your disposal, it makes you better when you have more resources. So I spent the first five years doing what I do, having no option but to bring in a drum set to my room, but to bring in an amp and bring in a guitar and record vocals in my closet and try to figure out how to make that sound good. And I think when you have the experience of knowing what it's like to have minimal resources, then when you finally get the computer that can handle a superior drummer and three tracks of guitar rig five or four or whatever it was, you're like, oh my God. The possibilities are literally endless. I have an actual studio quality recorded drum set. I didn't have to go and set up drums in my bedroom with two beringer mics and Radio Shack kick Mic or whatever the fuck I was using at the time. It was like, okay, I can really work with this.

Speaker 4 (00:25:18):

And these guys swung the bat multiple times before volumes happened. They were in multiple bands beforehand.

Speaker 3 (00:25:25):

Well, that's where the band started is from

Speaker 4 (00:25:27):

My

Speaker 3 (00:25:28):

Old band called The Unborn, which we were a kind of progressive death metal with Gent band.

Speaker 2 (00:25:33):

But what gave you the balls to see that through? Or was it you were upgrading your setup and your abilities I guess so much that the excitement of it. I know you know this from working with musicians, so many musicians are scared. They're scared to take risks, scared of how things will be perceived,

Speaker 3 (00:25:55):

Just

Speaker 2 (00:25:55):

Fucking scared. And a lot of 'em will not do anything. It's funny. You can never predict what's going to get big. So it's all a risk and it's all guesswork.

Speaker 4 (00:26:05):

I think Dan is a musician. He's a musician, but he also is an engineer. He's a producer. And at the time of that time in his life, he was a guitar player, musician and thinking about songs, but he was learning how to record and learning how to use these programs and even going to school for it. And I think those tools just fell in his lap, right? You were going through everything like, this isn't working for me. I need something that's better or

Speaker 3 (00:26:30):

Something. Yeah, it was my hobby. But also the reason I didn't give up is I like to think of myself as I have a sickness and that I'm a delusional optimist. And I would say probably the same thing about you, rod, and maybe anyone that same here joins a band and same with you. And I think there's a lot of risk in that. Being a delusional optimist means that you think that things are going to work out for you, and that's technically that's wrong. If you're going to look at the numbers and the percentages and the odds, your chance of succeeding with a dream or a vision is very low. So you have to have a certain amount of brain sickness to get into this industry and to convince yourself that what you're doing is going to work. And I think that that is, for me at least, that's always been the driving force, is this incredible sickness in my brain where I'm like, Nope, this is going to work. People are going to like this. I'm going to charge for it, I'm going to keep doing it. And in Rod's case, rod is the only member of the band that is standing today that has literally been in the band from the first band practice to today and not had one departure or issue. And I just want to say that I have a lot of respect for that. I mean, that's crazy. Thanks, man. To be in a band for 13 years now.

Speaker 4 (00:27:52):

Yeah, I think it started off because I was a smart kid and I saw these two smart kids. I'm like, dude, their music is great. What they're doing is great. This is something I must be a part of. It definitely came from Dan and Diego doing new things and having a new sound, and I was like, yo, I want to be associated with this. I need to be with these guys. What's up, dude? Yo, let me, Dan's mom, let me inside please.

Speaker 3 (00:28:18):

My mom was very accommodating, I'll put it that way.

Speaker 2 (00:28:20):

Delusional optimism. I haven't heard it referred to that way, but you basically just summarize something that I think about a lot because, and I know I've said this on podcasts before, but the way I think about it is I don't have kids and I don't want kids, but if I were to have a kid and they wanted to take the same path as me, how would I feel about that? And in reality, I'd feel really bad

Speaker 3 (00:28:46):

About it.

Speaker 2 (00:28:48):

And then the question is, would I, I've done real well. I've done real well and I'm very fortunate, but it's one of those things where it almost didn't happen so many times and it could still all fall to shit, and I don't think that it's a good path for anybody. It's a torturous path and it's a very uncertain path, and would I want that for my own kids? Do I even think that my own kid would be able to pull it off? And if you look at the numbers, like you just said, the numbers are stacked against you. So if I remove myself from the situation, I do have that delusional optimism where I always think shit's going to work out. I always have. And I look at it third person, I'm like, man, this is a really bad idea. It's a really bad idea. You probably shouldn't do it.

Speaker 3 (00:29:40):

Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 4 (00:29:43):

But isn't that how all successful stories come about? I don't know. People doubt you're doing something new. Yeah, they are. Like you say, it can fall apart, but I mean, you're an entrepreneur, you just assimilate your own risk all the time, but the reward is up there. This is what you do is great, it's awesome, and it's going to only get bigger from here.

Speaker 2 (00:30:03):

I'm not an Elon Musk fanboy at all. I respect the shit out of him, but I'm not huffing his farts like a bunch of people. But he did say something that I think is really cool, which is that you shouldn't think about what happens if this doesn't work out. You should think about what happens if this does work out.

Speaker 3 (00:30:22):

Oh, dude, yep.

Speaker 2 (00:30:23):

Yeah, take that. Look at it from that frame.

Speaker 3 (00:30:26):

That's what my therapist tells me. Don't set your goals on what you don't want. Set your goals on what you do want. If you ask someone, Hey, what do you want for dinner? Oh, well, I don't want sushi, I don't want chicken, I don't want meat, I don't want this. But what do you want? You got to know what you want. And what I was going to say before was I think going down this path of taking on a career, a goal, and starting up what it really is, a business that has so much risk, you kind of have to be okay with torturing yourself. I can speak for myself personally. I've gone through so much depression, so much anxiety, so much self-doubt, so many times where I wanted to absolutely give up that I cannot even count so many sessions that I've wanted to absolutely kill myself, not literally kill myself as an expression. But yeah, I think it's almost sadistic going into something like the audio world, the music world, being in a band, it's like you almost have this idea of I'd rather almost not exist than not fulfill this. It's like you have this, you know what I mean? You're like, it's not worth living if I can't fulfill this. And that's how I've felt.

Speaker 2 (00:31:36):

I know exactly what you mean. And the thing is that to someone who doesn't have that, they may not get it or they think that you're being dramatic or something, but to me, the thought of not following that voice is basically, I don't know what I would do. I might kill myself. My life would lose all its meaning. If I try to imagine what it would be like to not do the things I do, I don't mean if a business failed and I had to start another one. I don't mean that, I mean a completely different path in life that isn't something that's guided by that voice. I don't know what I'd do. I don't know how I'd survive

Speaker 3 (00:32:18):

Farmer's Insurance agency.

Speaker 2 (00:32:21):

I don't know how I would do it. I think too, there's a lot of successful people I've met if there's a lot who they'd be successful at many different things, but there's a whole lot more of them that I've met that they were built for the thing that they're doing and nothing else. And so it's really good that that thing worked out.

Speaker 3 (00:32:40):

Yeah, right, exactly. Or else you'd see 'em on the street somewhere. I mean, low key man. I mean, my studio is right by a main kind of area in town, and I have to say, I have seen members of multiple members and Rod will know probably one or two of 'em, but I'm not going to say any names. I've seen them homeless, and I look out of the corner of my eye, I see you guys sleeping on the ground and I'm like, oh my God, I was in a band with that dude in high school. Oh wow. It's crazy. And when you see that, it puts in perspective because you go, you look at that, you go, damn, if all my cards didn't fall on the table in the right order, that could have been me. I could be the one sleeping on the sidewalk.

Speaker 4 (00:33:25):

You also got to give yourself credit because you had more discipline and you knew things were wrong and what was right, and you chose not to do certain things and you knew you had to come through. You know what I'm saying? But it's your choice. It's your choice what you want to do, man. Some things do hinder your life outside of your control, but the choice is yours really. But yeah,

Speaker 2 (00:33:46):

The choice if other people are going to accept what you do has nothing to do with you. But if the public is going to like what you do, you have no control over that. Or if the industry is going to agree to spend money on you, things like that, you have no control over that stuff, but you can control your own choices a hundred percent.

Speaker 4 (00:34:09):

Taking

Speaker 2 (00:34:10):

Ownership of that is really, really important because there are so many, I guess so many uncertainties and there's so much stuff that you do have to just accept that at least the part that you can handle. You have to be absolutely on top of no room for error.

Speaker 3 (00:34:31):

Yeah, I want to say about Rod and as an example, as someone that's approached things from this delusional optimist standpoint, but also has been realistic. Rod's been going to school this whole time, and so

Speaker 2 (00:34:44):

Wow, that's impressive.

Speaker 3 (00:34:46):

I mean, you just got your degree, right?

Speaker 4 (00:34:48):

Yeah. Yeah. We were just talking about the voice in your head or whatever, but I guess I'm fascinated by a lot of different things other than music, and I'm up for challenges, and so audio engineering is cool. Then you have structural engineering and shit like that and how things work. Yeah, I mean, I'm just intrigued and I dunno. I went back to school and for, for structural engineering? Well, no, now I'm going to sound lame. I actually went back for philosophy. I was just finishing up an undergrad, but

Speaker 2 (00:35:17):

The CEO of Creative Live is a philosophy major.

Speaker 4 (00:35:20):

Yeah, dude, that's awesome. There you go. It's a good place to start. Can't really, I'm just trying to find avenues for myself as music is a tough business to be in, to be honest with you. The business model is semi broken. You make music to make money, but music's free. So I'm just trying to find new avenues for myself, but I'm happy. I'm still good. I've still got volumes and I'm just exploring other avenues and stuff.

Speaker 2 (00:35:48):

Sounds like you've got a healthy mindset. I'm a little jealous.

Speaker 4 (00:35:51):

Yeah, he really does. Rod's always had a good head on his shoulder.

Speaker 2 (00:35:55):

Yeah,

Speaker 4 (00:35:55):

That's awesome. Yeah, things got dark with me when you're in a band and you tend to soak up the wrong things in life, I don't know, but I was partying a lot and stuff, and you realize that's not important. That's not what gets your band to the next level. You got to go back to the fundamentals and stuff like that, and I've cut back a lot on that, and I definitely do have a new mindset on, and I just want to see the band succeed and I want to see all my friends and other metal bands succeed too.

Speaker 2 (00:36:26):

Yeah.

(00:36:27):

Hey, everybody, if you're enjoying this podcast and you should know, that's brought to you by URM Academy, URM Academy's mission is to create the next generation of audio professionals by giving them the inspiration and information to hone their craft and build a career doing what they love. You've probably heard me talk about Nail the Mix before, and if you're a member, you already know how amazing it is. The beginning of the month, nail the mix members, get the raw multi-tracks to a new song by artists like Lama, God Angels and Airwaves. Knock Loose OPEC shuga, bring me the Horizon. Gaira asking Alexandria Machine Head and Papa Roach among many, many others over 60 at this point. Then at the end of the month, the producer who mixed it comes on and does a live streaming walkthrough of exactly how they mix the song on the album and takes your questions live on air.

(00:37:19):

And these are guys like TLA Will Putney, Jens Borin, Dan Lancaster, toy Madson, Andrew Wade, and many, many more. You'll also get access to Mix Lab, which is our collection of dozens of bite-sized mixing tutorials that cover all the basics as well as Portfolio Builder, which is a library of pro quality multi-tracks cleared for use in your portfolio. So your career will never again be held back by the quality of your source material. And for those of you who really want to step up their game, we have another membership tier called URM Enhance, which includes everything I already told you about, and access to our massive library of fast tracks, which are deep, super detailed courses on intermediate and advanced topics against staging, mastering low end and so forth. It's over 500 hours of content. And man, let me tell you, this stuff is just insanely detailed and enhanced. Members also get access to one-on-ones, which are basically office hour sessions with us and Mix Rescue, which is where we open up one of your mixes and fix it up and talk you through exactly what we're doing at every step. So if any of that sounds interesting to you, if you're ready to level up your mixing skills in your audio career, head over to URM Academy to find out more, what do you consider to be the things that do get a band to the next level? I agree. The partying, ain't it?

Speaker 4 (00:38:41):

Yeah. You got to be respectful to everyone you're working with, right? The management, the agents, the venues, the staff, your fans. You can't cool guy him. You learn a lot from this industry, and first and foremost, you got to have good music and volume's always had unique cool music. Yeah. I mean, you can get lost in the sauce a little bit and party too much, but if you have the right intentions, you want to make good music and you want to be there for your fans and you want to be there for the whole community and help venues grow cities, grow music, grow, this shit grow, you got to be nice to everybody and not cool guy people and stuff like that. And I used to be a little bit of a cool guy, but I've definitely learned a little bit that little fuck boy vibe.

Speaker 3 (00:39:26):

Yeah,

Speaker 4 (00:39:26):

These people are everything. So yeah,

Speaker 3 (00:39:29):

Going back to Elon Musk, you mentioned, man, I probably said this to you, y'all at some point, but he was talking about when he made the cyber truck, he was talking about how you create something and what it is that allows you to create something that is going to be loved by the masses, and I think a big part of that, he said, you don't create something by making something that you think other people are going to like. You make something that you like and then you hope you're not alone in the world. You make something that you enjoy, that's awesome. Then guess what? You're not that unique. Other people will like what? You like the kiss of death for a band. We're talking about what makes a band successful. You want my opinion on what makes a band start to falter and be unsuccessful is when they start chasing something that isn't genuine in order to try to get success. Like, oh, if we do this, then people will like us. And to a certain extent, that can be a really, really, really bad thing.

Speaker 4 (00:40:30):

Yeah, you can go out of your means to get attention and it can backfire. We've seen it happen so many times. Yeah, that's a good point, Dan. You want to be genuine. You just got to have the right intentions while you're here and you don't want to be extra. I don't know. People can sniff it out now.

Speaker 2 (00:40:46):

People can sniff it out, but I think that the fact that it's all a gamble if you're doing stuff to please other people, that's just as much as a gamble as anything else. So you're guessing, you're trying to guess what other people are going to like. That seems really dumb. You need to trust. You need to trust yourself. You need to trust your tastes and find a way to trust your instincts in that if something really turns you on artistically and speaks to your soul and is awesome in your opinion that other people will agree, you just have to trust that You can't start thinking, I'm going to write it this way because other people will like it because full of shit, you're guessing. You have no way of knowing that that's how you make music mediocre.

Speaker 3 (00:41:30):

Another thing I like to always say is I'd rather hear a song that makes me pissed off because of how awful it is, than hear a song that makes me feel nothing. Because the whole point of art is to impact the listener, impact the viewer. The point is to invoke emotion. And if your art that you're making does not invoke any sort of emotion, then you failed straight up. And that's what's happening with watered down crap music. It's white noise. Okay, there's another song, there's another cool, oh yeah, I heard that song. Yeah, it was cool. To me, that's so much worse than saying, I heard this new song and I fucking hated it. Because at least when you say you fucking hate something, you're angry, you're pissed

Speaker 2 (00:42:13):

Feeling something.

Speaker 3 (00:42:14):

Yeah, you're feeling something. So that to me, mediocrity is the biggest form of failure, truly. I think I feel that way.

Speaker 4 (00:42:21):

Yeah, there's a lot of mediocrity going around.

Speaker 2 (00:42:24):

I mean, it's kind of the easiest thing. Yeah,

Speaker 4 (00:42:26):

I know it seems to work sometimes though, but it doesn't work for some people really.

Speaker 2 (00:42:32):

I totally know what you're saying though about not feeling anything. What that reminds me of is being at the dentist office and hearing music that they're playing over their radio, being like eight years old and getting my teeth cleaned and the adult contemporary station is on, and it's just the most boring shit, but that's all very successful music. But to me, it was the most boring thing I could ever possibly imagine, and I never understood how that connected with anybody. As it turns out, most of those artists didn't really connect with that many people. As it turns out, their labels were paying to get them on the radio and into rotation. That's why they were on there, and most of them didn't last pass one song.

Speaker 3 (00:43:22):

There's no longevity to it. To create longevity, you have to impact people emotionally, right? You have to take 'em on a journey, and that's how you have a full career. You

Speaker 4 (00:43:34):

Got to be a good artist, man. Got to be a good artist. And it all starts with having good, you just sit there, you have good ideas in your head, and you just go for it, man. I don't know.

Speaker 3 (00:43:44):

That's why I like to write shit. Most of the stuff that I write is, it's not me sitting in front of the computer. I have a very, very, very difficult time just sitting with a guitar or whatever, like a keyboard or something, and trying to come up with a song idea. For me. That's not the environment where I'm going to be enjoying a song in, so I'm usually in the shower or I'm falling asleep or I'm taking a piss or whatever. I just showed Rodda song idea on my voice memo was literally called Volumes Piss, and I didn't play him the first version of it, but the first version is literally me pissing into the toilet and humming a thing into my phone. That's when the best ideas come out, man. It's man, it really is. And so I think that because you're in that relaxed state, you're in that natural environment where your mind is wandering and everything has kind of calmed down and you don't have pressure to create. For me personally, that's where I can come up with ideas that I feel like are potent

Speaker 4 (00:44:46):

Because volumes means something to Dan, so he cares about it and he wants it to be genuine. And so I respect him for that.

Speaker 2 (00:44:53):

What's more genuine than pissing,

Speaker 4 (00:44:55):

Bro? Everyone pisses. That's relatable right there.

Speaker 2 (00:44:59):

Exactly. It's universal.

Speaker 4 (00:45:01):

If Dan didn't care, he would not care. And like, oh, he can make something and for volumes, and it would, okay, cool. But he cares, dude. I'm telling you, if you think piss is good, you should hear shit. I mean, the best ideas come when you're taking a dump. Come on guys, we all know that it was on my phone though. I'm too distracted. Or when you're just hanging around, I guess on your bed or something, I don't know.

Speaker 2 (00:45:23):

Or sitting on a couch, a lot of sitting on a couch mindlessly playing guitar. I find that a lot of good ideas happen there. Okay, so this is a good time to bring this up, co-writing, writing with artists, or more specifically you guys working together. I'm curious how that works in terms of writing what the process

Speaker 4 (00:45:48):

Looks like. Well, for context, for volumes, in the beginning it definitely was all DB and Diego leading the helm being scientists about this shit, what's working, what's not. Because obviously we just had this conversation. These two were kind of ahead of their time and we're all in the backseat just learning and watching and being supportive and stuff. And so I think Dan can more talk about how did it go for you guys in the beginning a little bit.

Speaker 3 (00:46:13):

We each kind of just, were writing stuff on our own just before we even decided to form the band. And actually when we started doing writing for real, we would just sit in Diego's garage or his room, and we'd either have amps that we plugged into or plug into guitar rig and he had an eki, and we would just jam ideas like that. And that was how a lot of the stuff was born. Just

Speaker 4 (00:46:35):

Kids having fun, it sounds like.

Speaker 3 (00:46:36):

Having fun. And I remember we wrote the song Wormholes in his bedroom with our friend DJ who was playing drums on an eki, and we just wrote the riff. It popped out, and then it was like I went home and recorded some shit. He went home and recorded some shit. Traditionally, the writing process for this band after that has just been very, very modern. It's been just passing ideas back and forth on the computer and stuff like that.

Speaker 4 (00:47:03):

In the beginning, it was really cool though. It really was just a bunch of young kids, genuinely happy about playing music, being around each other, just having that youthful feeling inside of you. And these guys would write riffs, send 'em back to each other, send 'em to us. We were

Speaker 3 (00:47:20):

Neighbors too. That also helped all of us. We all grew up in the West Valley, so Diego and Gus's House was walking distance from my mom's house, so I'd walk over there and he'd walk over to my place. Rod lived three minutes down. Michael Barr lived five minutes down. Chris, our drummer lived. We all lived in the same area, and we all grew up going to the same shows, watching the same bands. We all went to pretty much the same schools for the most part stuff.

Speaker 4 (00:47:46):

And we'd start jamming these riffs that Dan and Digger would come up with in a studio or in our rehearsal spot. And there'd be times where Digga will just be jamming and DB would be like, oh, that's so sick. Let's use that. I remember that's how paid in Full happened. Digga was just going, and you're like, oh, that's sick. Do that, but do that up here. Do it. And there's a song barn, like genuine kids getting in a room together and making things happen and stuff. And it was so beautiful, man. Those were such good times. And as like Dan said, as times went on and members disbanded, things changed and became a little bit more modern with Diego kind of taking lead while DB stepped down in a sense.

Speaker 3 (00:48:30):

I went on strike. I went on strike from the band for a few years, maybe seven years or something like that.

Speaker 4 (00:48:39):

There were things that as kids, there's eight of us in the band at the time, and we were all doing things that we don't always agree with. That'll happen. We're a

Speaker 3 (00:48:48):

Bunch of fucking

Speaker 4 (00:48:49):

Idiots, man. And it's easily to tick off. And so genuinely things just happen, unfortunately, and I don't know. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (00:48:57):

But then, yeah, on this last record, it was actually Max Shad, who he produced the False Idol Veil of Maya Record. And he's actually a commercial jingle composer. He doesn't even produce metal usually, but he's massively talented. And he had actually written probably 60, 70% of the record when the band approached me to start writing with them again, this was in the beginning of the pandemic. So for this last project was Max was like, here's what I have, let's fill in the space. And then I wrote four or five songs, and then we collaborated on them remotely because Max lives in Germany. It was a brand new crew. It was a whole new kind of method. And then Rod would take the stuff on his computer and work on it and touch it up. And then I said this in my nail, the mix questionnaire that I was going through last night about how we did it.

(00:49:52):

And during the pandemic, me and Max, we were being little bitches. We were like, no, we're not doing sessions. So Rod was like, alright, fuck it. I'll do it. Mike and Mike come over to my house and we'd go on Zoom with him, and Rod was in there tracking vocals, fearless, fearless. And he was in there tracking vocals and doing all that and engineering and comping. And then he would shoot it back to me, and we kind of did it that way. So this way it was ultramodern that we did it, but it was still, it wasn't like it was a band that was used to jamming in a rehearsal space and writing. And then they're like, oh, shit, we can't see each other now. What are we going to do? It was already very familiar to write this way.

Speaker 4 (00:50:31):

And the band, it's 12 years old, so there's a ton of eras and stuff. We just spoke about the first era, which was the golden era for the band. You had two super talented producers creating a new style of sound of metal for people to enjoy. And so as that went on, Diego took lead on No Sleep and sort of different animals. And I was definitely shadowing him and watching. And then, yeah, max Shad, who's been such a great friend of the band and understands the sound and he understands what this band is, he's always sort of played a member in the background. He was involved with different animals and he'd come in and provide songs. It would be so sick. And he ended up becoming really close with the band. And as Diego was respectfully doing his thing and kind of his way, making his presence not so apparent in the band like Max, we needed somebody like Max the Void to come fill the void.

(00:51:37):

I couldn't do all this. I couldn't do this stuff. So getting Max to come on board to help us out was the best thing to happen for the band, which led to us being able to work with DB again, because volumes was very chaotic and not a lot of people really wanted to work with the band, but Max took a chance on us and really saved us a little bit. And I'm very thankful for him, which led to us working with DB and db. He does it his way and you got to respect that. And how he wrote Bend All by himself and brought it to us, which we're just so happy to be able to work with DB again. And I mean, look, his song is doing so well and we're so happy to be able to work with Max and Dan because they're volumes. They really are. And I wanted it to be genuine. There was not a lot of people to work with because it was just me, Nick and Mike Terry at the time. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (00:52:34):

I also want to say, I think for me and Maxa like Diego passed away in early 2020, so I think that kind of gave us some fuel we have to honor this person's genius. I feel like every time, for me personally, at least when I was writing some of these songs, I was imagining Diego was watching me do it, and that gave me, it was an extremely weird feeling of this is something I'm revisiting that I created with this person that was so brilliant and so instrumental in this project, but that's no longer with us. And that kind of really put a fire under my ass to make it something that I think if he heard it, I think he'd love it and sign off on it.

Speaker 2 (00:53:18):

Isn't that beautiful,

Speaker 4 (00:53:19):

Man,

Speaker 3 (00:53:19):

That's so beautiful.

Speaker 2 (00:53:20):

Honoring legacy. But the way I said it sounds so proper. I guess, what's a way to it without it sounding that proper, the way you said it, I guess.

Speaker 3 (00:53:32):

I think that's good. It's honoring the legacy,

Speaker 2 (00:53:35):

But vision too.

Speaker 3 (00:53:36):

Vision and our friendship.

Speaker 2 (00:53:37):

It's more than just Legacy. Yeah, yeah.

Speaker 3 (00:53:39):

Volumes

Speaker 4 (00:53:40):

Has a crazy story arc, dude. Yeah,

Speaker 2 (00:53:43):

It's unreal.

Speaker 4 (00:53:43):

Gnarly. It's like an anime show. It's crazy.

Speaker 3 (00:53:46):

But

Speaker 4 (00:53:46):

Bringing Dan back was just so cool, but not to over, it's just crazy. This band's been through so much and

Speaker 3 (00:53:53):

We got Michael Barr back in the band, which he was also very inspiring as

Speaker 4 (00:53:56):

We miss Diego so much, we miss him every day. It's gnarly. It's gnarly to lose a person that you, you're so close with and stuff. And nonetheless, working with DB just feels so right. It's his birth child, and so he understands it very well. And so working with them has been containing the bands sound containing and moving it forward. Right. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (00:54:25):

Dan, for you, considering how long it's been or had been getting back into it once you were back in working on it, did it feel like a lot of time had elapsed or was it just like, yeah, I'm just doing this thing feels like no time has passed.

Speaker 3 (00:54:43):

It felt like riding a bike, honestly.

Speaker 2 (00:54:46):

Yeah, I figured, okay.

Speaker 3 (00:54:47):

And I actually felt like I had you do this. I had so much in my brain that needed to come out too. So it was almost therapeutic or it was very therapeutic in a way, who I am, those are my roots. And I think throughout our journeys in our careers with music, we always kind of take sidestep and go, oh, I'm not going to do this anymore. For me, I abandoned metal for about four or five years. I only worked on pop music. I thought metal was horrible and I never wanted to do it again. And when I started up back again, working with Spirit Box and working with Day Seeker and Silent Planet and starting to rebuild my arsenal of these bands and starting to co-write with them, and then volumes popped up. I think I had enough training already to kind of know what to do, and it felt just really, it was really easy. It was fun. It was fun and it was easy, and it was just the thing. Shit just kind of flowed out.

Speaker 4 (00:55:45):

Dan's a real artist dude. He dipped out and went and lived other lives and did other, absorbed other music, which makes him even a better producer today because he's so multifaceted. But

Speaker 3 (00:55:58):

Rod's a very

Speaker 4 (00:55:59):

Nice guy. Dan's the fricking man, dude. He's got ideas upon ideas, idea Factory.

Speaker 2 (00:56:06):

Do you feel like, so I'm just curious, all that time away doing other things, even though it wasn't specifically this, has it informed how you approach this? The reason I'm asking is just from my own experience of writing doth songs. Again, it had been a long time, man, a really long time. After I got warmed up, it took me a moment to get warmed up, but then suddenly it was just like, yeah, this is what I do. Not just that, but all the time that I had spent working on other things, suddenly I feel like I just knew what to do in a way that I didn't before. It's hard to explain.

Speaker 3 (00:56:51):

Yeah, no, it gives you a full new perspective because the journey that I went on after I sort of abandoned metal was a journey of working on pop music and hip hop and also doing a lot of music for tv. So in doing all that stuff, it sort of uncovered the mystery of like, wait a minute, making a song is much simpler than you think. And I think that that's a pitfall that a lot of metal musicians experience is overthinking, chronic overthinking, and not just relying on instinct. Especially when I was making music for sync for television, they give you, the company gives you, okay, you have to make a 12 song album and here's our references. You got to do an for Imagine Dragon songs. You have to do four Lumineer songs and you have to do four Drake songs or whatever the fuck it is.

(00:57:43):

And that would never happen. It would be like 12 of each. But anyway, you kind of have to go, all right, well, let's stream of conscious. You have to do it quick. You're like, all right, I'm going to crank this shit out. You make that in, you make a whole album in five days to a week and you're done. Wow. And you send it off and you go, okay, that was easy. That's insane. And then when it comes to a pop session, like a pop writing session, you walk in that room, you're with the writer, you're with a producer, you're with an engineer, whatever. You're with the artist, and by the time you leave that room, your song is more or less done. You cut the vocal, the vocals written, the instrumentals written, all the parts are there. Maybe you do a little touch up after or you send it to mix or whatever, but there's no overthinking. It's just you follow your gut and you just roll with it. When I was able to start back working on writing metal again, I employed all of that, which I learned from doing these other types of projects, and it kind of helped me to realize that I could simplify the process. It totally applied to rock and metal. No overthinking. That's my thing. And I mean, maybe it's like I've trained myself to be lazy, but I think the result of that is good sometimes.

Speaker 4 (00:59:01):

And just having that experience working with artists and collecting that experience in those hours, you just get more and more comfortable right around people.

Speaker 3 (00:59:10):

Yeah. Oh, that's a big thing too, when you're used to doing thousands of sessions and being in the room with all sorts of different personalities. And yes, I've worked with a lot of different personalities and it's helped me to learn how to manage different types of people and increase my social skills in the studio, which I've talked to you about before, Al. But that's a big part of it too, is you can't just shut down and be introverted. You have to create a comfortable environment when you're working with someone. My bands are, they're not just clients. My bands are like, they're my friends, they're my family. We hang out, we do stuff together. We talk all the time. And I think when you're comfortable with the people you work with, the quality of what you create can only get better because you're breaking down that barrier.

Speaker 2 (01:00:10):

What is your status in the band? Are you in the band or are you just producing this? Or is it just one of those undefined sorts of things?

Speaker 3 (01:00:18):

I'm not in the band.

Speaker 4 (01:00:19):

Why don't you tell us? I want to say some stuff.

Speaker 3 (01:00:21):

I want to know. I

Speaker 4 (01:00:22):

Want to say some stuff too.

Speaker 3 (01:00:23):

I'm not in the band, but I do want to say that what I did with volumes after I left the band, I still kept writing music with them. And that was the archetype for how I went on with my career.

Speaker 2 (01:00:35):

So it's like you're still a partnership there.

Speaker 3 (01:00:38):

Yeah, it's a partnership. I think it's what a band producer relationship should be. It should feel like a ghost member.

Speaker 2 (01:00:44):

Yeah. I guess what I'm wondering is that right there, I know that you said that all of the projects are like your family, all that, but this one has got to be a little bit more personal than a lot of other ones. And so what I'm wondering is even in the case of something this personal to you that is your roots, like you said, all these experiences that you had working with other people, it still must have helped you with how to approach this even if you already had a ton of history in this.

Speaker 3 (01:01:17):

Of course. I mean, I think that all of our experiences, everyone in the band and myself included all the time that we've had to develop ourselves and grow up and become adults and stuff like that, and to have all the different experiences that come with growing up, I think we all kind of came back together with a newfound respect,

Speaker 4 (01:01:38):

Right?

(01:01:39):

Yeah. Dan's not in the band. He's got his own work to do. He's got his own business, his own life. He'll never play. I don't know if he'll never play in a band, but obviously he's got his own career going, but he's not in the lineup for volumes, but he is volumes in a sense. He started the band, and so we just touched on the landscape of the riding. Everything's kind of changed and we just did happier, which was awesome to do. And now we're in such a great position. We all kind of have felt each other out and have done happier, and now we're in a good position to really go and do our next album together. And so it's like he'll be the producer of the album and he says he plays that role for bands. You want to be the producer, but the producer, he's like, tell us more about the role of the producer and stuff.

Speaker 3 (01:02:30):

I mean, I think there's different levels of doing it, right? There's the guy you come to and you have the songs and you bring 'em in and you record 'em and then you leave or whatever. But I tend to do, and I was just talking about Rory from Day Seeker, we just finished their record and he had a daughter when we started the record and now she's grown up. So we were like, okay, we took a long time to make this. We didn't just, that's to say how long did that take? I want to say it's probably a year and three months or so. So we were joking like, wow, when we started this, your daughter was just born. Now she's an adult. She's one. She's one and a half. But I like to take a lot of time and I like to have a lot of space between when you start and finish a project. And a lot of that involves just constantly evaluating what you're doing and constantly trying new things and giving that extra amount of time that I think a project needs. And that's why I don't actively produce a lot of bands at once because of that reason. It's more about quality than anything, and however long it takes is how it takes, and that's kind of how my process is. I think that the bands I work with enjoy doing things that way as well.

Speaker 2 (01:03:50):

That makes sense to me. When it comes to writing, where do you see, I guess the line between writing and production?

Speaker 3 (01:03:58):

I think that the line in modern day times has been slowly disappearing because where do you draw the line between writing and production? Traditionally, production was closer to engineering, if I'm correct. I mean, when you go to a producer, you have your songs and then they set the mics up properly and they get you to have the right takes and they comp your vocals together and maybe make an arrangement suggestion here and there, and then maybe they'll help you find patches for the keyboard and stuff like that. And it's more traditionally that's strict producing, right?

Speaker 4 (01:04:35):

And

Speaker 3 (01:04:35):

Then writing is like you're coming up with ideas from nowhere, right? Writing is a very kind of nebulous process that involves starting with nothing, and then you come up with something core progression or a synth line or whatever, a pattern of some sort. So to me, I think the line needs to be non-existent for me to properly get the most out of a band that I work with. And I think that's what my band's like to come to me for is it's a combination of both. I'm doing the technical stuff, but I'm also overseeing the writing and coming up with ideas and kind of taking it from nothing to a finished product. So I think there's no excuse nowadays to not do that as a producer. I think there's so much technology that we have, it's so easy

Speaker 4 (01:05:24):

To

Speaker 3 (01:05:24):

Do all that. To me, that's the bare minimum. If you're going to call yourself a producer, you got to be taking the project from nothing to something. You got to be pulling your weight and giving input. And

Speaker 4 (01:05:35):

There are a lot of bands who want minimal producer contribution, in a sense, very anal about their stuff and want to do it themselves and want the producer just to play the role. Minimal roles, as Dan said,

Speaker 3 (01:05:48):

Like an engineer role.

Speaker 4 (01:05:49):

But no, when it comes to volumes, we'll be asking Dan for obviously what we can get, his engineering, his producing, his composing his mind, and so we're very happy for that.

Speaker 2 (01:06:02):

One thing I'm curious about is what do you think about co-writes in Metal? Do you think that the perception of that is changing? Because metal bands have always had co-writes, like the good ones at least have always had co-writes, but I feel like there was a point in time where it was like you didn't talk about it.

Speaker 4 (01:06:21):

Yeah, there's no cloud over that. There's no taboo around it. In the beginning, we didn't ever need a co-writes, right? We had to super computer brain guys. And so as Dan left, it was hard to fill those fricking shoes, man. So we did have to outreach other people to help out and co-write like Misha Monsu on No Sleep, Brandon Paddock on No Sleep. When you start off in a certain way, and if you don't really fill it in with another Supercomputer db, I mean, how the hell are you going to get back to where you were? So that's kind of always been sort of an issue with the band in a sense, because we lost such a big soul member in the beginning. But yeah, we totally do it. And on different animals, that's where Max Shad started to come in co-writing with

Speaker 3 (01:07:06):

Max Shad, and I think it is become much less of a taboo subject. I think that everyone knows that it happens now and there's no elitism over it that maybe there used to be when I think a lot of that came from the fans, from the audience not understanding that that's very normal to happen.

Speaker 4 (01:07:25):

For me, there's always some sort of taboo. When we were doing Happier, I was in the room with Max there and I wanted to have some say in stuff or whatever, but

Speaker 2 (01:07:35):

Well, it's your band. Of course. I've always thought that the best bands do this

(01:07:41):

Always, and it's just that much how in the seventies and eighties, a lot of times the person you think you were hearing isn't who you were hearing. You're hearing a session musician, A lot of famous guitar solos are not the rockstar, they're the session guitar player. And that it was like this really well kept secret in the music industry. I think that a lot of the co-write stuff got filed under the same category of we don't talk about it, but the thing is, it's not the same thing as the lead guitar players too fucked up to play solos. We got to get this dude to come in and ghost. It's not the same thing. Different

Speaker 4 (01:08:25):

Maybe then there was a lot of money going around because people bought albums. You can give these guys hush money, but nowadays you really actually want to appreciate and showcase what the co-writers do, and you got to appreciate them as people, as artists, and you want to spread that around. And for us, that's Max Shad and that's DB right now. And in the past it was Misha with No Sleep and Brandon Paddock, and you want to elevate these artists in a sense, but not too much. You don't want other people to steal them from you.

Speaker 3 (01:08:54):

Well, I think it's a good time for producers more than ever. I think there was a period when the period you were just talking about where it was more hush hush and you could pay people off and stuff like that. But I feel like it's kind of going back to back in the era where there was Quincy Jones's out there, people like that, that were known for their sound and what they can bring. And it's actually a stamp that a band is excited to reveal. Exactly. We worked with this person.

Speaker 4 (01:09:26):

Exactly.

Speaker 3 (01:09:27):

It's kind of goes beyond the band because the cat's out of the bag now. So it's like if you have someone that you're excited about working with and that you feel like has elevated your project, then it only really, it kind of helps everyone. And I was talking to you and I did the Last Spirit Box mix when I was saying how a producer and a band can kind of join forces and lift each other up. And it's sort of this exchange of, I want to help you make your music better, and in turn you're going to help me make my career better, and you sort of grow. So to me, that's the beauty of, and that's why I love being a producer. It's like I get to sort of be a half member in every band that I work with, and it lifts me up when the band does well. It makes me more excited when a band that I worked with has success

Speaker 4 (01:10:18):

And I won't let it go too astray. And there's a reason why Dan's here in helping the band part of the band. We want to keep it as it was in the beginning. And we won't go to a stray though, that's for sure. We just keep it where it needs to be. Stick to the roots.

Speaker 2 (01:10:34):

Well, yeah, keep it in the family.

Speaker 4 (01:10:36):

Yeah. I'm excited to do this next record though, that's for sure.

Speaker 3 (01:10:38):

We got to do Piss Man. That one's a banger. We could just start it with the Sound of Piss maybe. I mean, does it need anything else? No.

Speaker 4 (01:10:46):

His old band had a song called Piss Christ, which is the meanest song on earth. That song was

Speaker 3 (01:10:51):

Sick,

Speaker 4 (01:10:51):

Piss Christ.

Speaker 3 (01:10:52):

We also had a song called Volumes. Yeah,

Speaker 4 (01:10:54):

Really?

Speaker 3 (01:10:55):

That was what we named the band after. And Gus, the original vocalist was in that band with me, and that was kind of where it was.

Speaker 2 (01:11:00):

Interesting.

Speaker 3 (01:11:01):

Fun fact.

Speaker 4 (01:11:01):

See, Daniel walked so we could fly, you know what I'm saying? He had a band before Howard Band that was like the band, the sickest band with the sickest sound.

Speaker 3 (01:11:11):

Rod was our biggest fan, dude.

Speaker 4 (01:11:12):

Literally me and Diego were their biggest fans for sure. That's awesome. We used to go to their shows and me and Diego would be up front. We'd be side by side, but I had no idea who the fuck this kid was. But later on we'd be in a band together, which is cool.

Speaker 2 (01:11:25):

It's cool how that shit works out.

Speaker 4 (01:11:26):

Yeah, I met my band boyfriend at a unborn show.

Speaker 2 (01:11:31):

As far as production goes, what's the partnership? So we talked about the writing side of it. I guess, Dan, when you're working with a co-producer in a band, or the band is the co-producer, how does that change at all, how you approach things as opposed to when I guess there isn't a co-producer

Speaker 3 (01:11:48):

To a certain extent, when you're working with a band that's capable, you're always working with a co-producer.

Speaker 2 (01:11:53):

Fair enough.

Speaker 3 (01:11:54):

I think it's discrediting to say that the members of the band, or at least the primary member writing member of the band, is not also a producer. I'm a strong believer in that because we were saying the lines between writing and producing, it's so blurry. I mean, I think anything that anyone brings to the table that elevates the song in any way is producing. So I am always an advocate of sharing that credit with whomever it is in the band that's actively doing that. And because of technology, I don't hold a golden key. Oh, I have the studio, so I'm the producer. Anyone in any of the projects I work with, and it is this way, is the active member is always sending me stuff with more than just guitar, more than just a barebone song. People are really producing stuff. Mitch, Mitch from Silent Planet, Mike, from Spirit Box Rod over here. Everyone is always bringing ideas to the table that are more than just sitting in the room going, okay, Dan, we're ready for you to produce us.

Speaker 4 (01:12:57):

That would be unfair and it would be whack because it is putting a lot of stress on the guy. But I think, like Dan said, it's managing personalities and preparing for these sessions. If you know you're going to work with a band that has a lot of cooks in the kitchen, like three personalities, it's all about finding a balance between where you're going to be, where your role is, and where the band is. And that's what makes the project fun or not, because you have to communicate respectfully and stuff like that. And it's a lot to manage when there's a lot of cooks in the kitchen.

Speaker 3 (01:13:27):

I forgot to mention Rory from Day Seeker as

Speaker 4 (01:13:29):

Well, but we'll be able to manage the volumes one coming soon. I'm pretty sure. It's nothing too crazy.

Speaker 3 (01:13:34):

It's going to be very, very fluid. Everyone has a really clear understanding. And for me, I think, and I wrote about this a little bit in my nail the mix questionnaire. One of the questions was, what is the challenges of this mix slash production? And one of the challenges for the band is this is a two vocalist band. So there's two mics in the band. One spells it with a Y, and that's how you can differentiate them. Mike and Mike are like, they're a duo. So for me, it's not just about writing. And then one guy writes something and the other one comes in and records this part, and that's it. It's like, and I've had conversations with this. These guys are my friends and I told them, we need to write this together. I want you guys to come in and feel ownership over your parts and work out together the duality of how you guys are bouncing off of each other.

(01:14:27):

Because that's an element in this band that not a lot of bands have. So I think that that's something that is going to be very interesting to explore this time around with the album is getting the two vocalists to sort of become one mind. And that's where my job becomes a bit like, not a therapist, but I almost feel like sometimes it is, man. I like to be like a coach, like, yo, we can do this. You guys are fucking powerful together. Let's find your strengths. Let's sit in the room together. Let's go grab some beers and talk about it. Whatever it goes. It's a lot of prep to sort of get the expectations set.

Speaker 4 (01:15:09):

Even

Speaker 3 (01:15:09):

Before you start creating,

Speaker 4 (01:15:10):

You got to know your role. And it's good to establish your roles beforehand because we've done records where you don't establish your roles and things get mixed up and it gets messy and stuff. But there will be times where you have to step back and let other people take lead. And that comes with mental maturity and being mature as an artist and just letting the process go. And number one, you got to do what's best for the song, for the band, and maybe you don't have the best idea and you have to back off and not take it personal and stuff like that. It's just managing your expectations. And it's funny. Yeah, we used to be very hard to manage in the studio with tons of personalities, heavy personalities. It was conflicting and hard, hilarious personalities though. And it can tear you apart, even though it can make good music, it'll tear you apart from the inside. So it's not like we have it all figured out. We're going to have to go through some hurdles together and respect each other and just make it through at the end.

Speaker 2 (01:16:07):

I'm looking forward to what the future brings and very much looking forward to the nail the mix session. Yeah, dude, I'm fucking stoked on it, but I think this is a good place to end the episode. I want to thank both of you for taking the time to hang out. Absolutely. Thank you for having me, and thanks Dan for having me here as well.

Speaker 3 (01:16:26):

Yeah, thank you. Total pleasure as always.

Speaker 2 (01:16:28):

Alright, then another URM podcast episode in the bag. Please remember to share our episodes with your friends as well as post some of your Facebook and Instagram or any social media you use. Please tag me at al Levi URM audio at URM Academy, and of course tag our guests as well. I mean, they really do appreciate it. In addition, do you have any questions for me about anything? Email them to me at al at M Academy. That's at M dot aca y and use the subject line answer me Al. Alright then. Till next time, happy mixing.

Speaker 1 (01:17:08):

You've been listening to the Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast. To ask us questions, make suggestions and interact, visit URM Academy and press the podcast link today.