JOEY STURGIS: The Asking Alexandria conflict, how producers get paid, secrets to perfect tuning

Speaker 1 (00:00):

Welcome to the Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast, brought to you by STA Audio. Sta Audio creates zero compromise recording gear that is light on the wallet only. The best components are used and each one goes through a rigorous testing process with one thing in mind, getting the best sound possible. Go to audio do com for more info. And now your hosts, Joey Sturgis, Joel Wanasek, and Eyal Levi.

Speaker 2 (00:28):

Hey my people. Welcome to another lovely episode of Ask Joey. If you'd like to ask me some questions, send me a short little email To Joey at U Academy was the subject line. Dear Joey, and I'd be happy to answer your questions. This is the opportunity where you guys get to ask questions to me and I answer them live on the air here. So the first question is a production question, and let's take a look at what we're dealing with here. This question comes from user Danny and he says, I'm curious about asking Alexandria's album from Death to Destiny. Would you say you approach things differently from a production standpoint whenever you are not mixing the project? If so, what would these differences be? Thanks a lot. PS, can we have Mr. Bendis on the podcast? We'll have to reach out to Bendis and see if he'd like to join the podcast, but yeah, let's talk about this album because things didn't go down the way they were supposed to.

(01:29):

Originally I was supposed to do the entire record it was going to produce it engineer at Mix Master. That's kind of the normal Joey Sturgis thing. That's what I normally do. And everything was fine. Everything was on par and ready to go for that. And then we went out to LA to record vocals because Danny wanted to stay in LA while we were recording vocals, and I thought it'd be cool anyway. So I just kind of took the opportunity as a chance to get to work in a different space and do whatever Danny wanted to do because ultimately if Danny's happy, he's going to be doing good vocals. However, what happened is once we got out there, he just did not have a strong work ethic and he was not prepared. And so we only got a few songs done in the first session. We burnt a lot of cash and I had to go home because I was booked up for the next six months.

(02:21):

So the train kept moving for me. I didn't have any time to wait for him to get his shit together. And so we just moved on and then the label comes back and says, okay, Danny wants to record some more vocals. And I'm like, well, I'm mixing a record and I'm producing two records at the same time right now at my house. I can't go anywhere, I can't do anything. Sorry about that. So they're like, okay, okay, well we'll just go record the vocals with some other people. And so that, I forget who all we worked with, but I still was producing the record and giving my notes and stuff as he recorded, but then it just got to this point where he was taking forever and I had already moved on to so many different, I think I had completed a few albums literally waiting for him to get ready.

(03:08):

And eventually it just got to this point where when they were ready for me to mix the album, I was so deep into so much work that there was nothing I could do and I had to just tell them like, look guys, I literally can't mix this right now. I could do it maybe a month from now. And they were like, oh, we can't wait that long. And so then they went and hired a different mixer and sometimes that's just the way it goes. And so the mix turned out completely different and that's the way the cookie crumbles. I wish that I could have gotten to mix it. I think that my approach in the production and recording process was with the idea that I would be mixing, so giving it to someone else to mix kind of screwed the project over, I think because they just have a different style of mixing they're used to.

(04:02):

Bindu is the guy that mixed it, so he's used to working with a real kick drum mic, whereas I had a sample with a room sample and the real kick all mixed together into one stereo file just for an example. So if you can imagine Ben, this mixing style, he's used to pulling up a kick on a mono channel on his board, whereas I have this stereo stem that, so that's going to take two channels and by the time you run it through the board, it's not, the mono thing isn't gelling anymore because no two channels are the same. And so you get all these little inconsistencies and it turns into a pretty big mess after a while. So anyway, that's what happened there. Next question comes from user Michael and he says, Hey Joey, I wanted to ask today about software engineering and ask about what tools and fundamentals you need to get to learn in audio plugin design.

(04:55):

I've touched on it at university for two years with my audio degree. We created a basic plugin and a synthesizer and xcode. Can you elaborate on what you use to create plugin software frameworks, coding language, and how you can develop an idea into a product? As I'm sure many engineers would love to solve problems and create a product at the same time. What areas do you need to learn to create your own simple plugins such as the Desecrator? Do you use pre-made frameworks or do you start from scratch? Thanks for everything you've done at URM and that's Michael. So Michael, you definitely want to learn c plus plus. I mean that's huge. You want to be able to write your own systems and structures and I guess your own processors stuff you want to learn is basically how to manipulate audio that it all comes down to math algorithms.

(05:50):

Compression, for example, is an algorithm and if you modify how that algorithm behaves, you change how your compression sounds or how your compression comes out. As far as frameworks, there's a ton out there. I mean, just do your research. Obviously you're going to have to pick what's right for you, depends on your licensing options and your money and all this stuff. I would not recommend that anyone just go out and try to create plugins or software companies. It's not easy. It takes a lot of time, a lot of expertise and a lot of knowledge. But hopefully you guys are out there being creative and just working towards your production careers because that's what we're here for. Alright, so let's take the next question and that's going to come from for some reason I get the same question twice and then I have to click it again.

(06:41):

Okay, here we go. So next question comes from user Dennis and he says, hi Joey. I've been a big fan of your work for years now since I even knew who you were. I always thought your mixes sounded larger than life and your plugins are a freaking amazing. Thanks a lot, Dennis. He says, I've learned so many game changing techniques since the Joey Sturgis Forum podcast and nail the mix. So thank you so much. Joey has been asked, Joel has been asked a few times what his must read books are. I'm wondering if you have a list of books that inspired you or you think everyone should read?

(07:15):

I like a lot of business books and I'm a very technical guy, so I like to read technical things. I like to read technical processes. Some books that I've recommended in the past are from Zero to One by Peter Thiel. It's pretty cool. I love the any of the, I think, hold on, lemme just take a look here. There's some good Warren Buffet books that I like to read because I think financial education is the one thing that you don't really get from a lot of schools and college. They just do a poor job of teaching it, but you should get the Intelligent Investor. It's a great book.

(08:10):

I don't know, man, it's weird because a lot of the books that I would recommend to you do not have anything to do with audio. So I don't think that I can really sit here and give you a list of those books because they have nothing to do with what you're interested in. But I do think that everyone should read and everyone should definitely find their own authors that they really like. And I highly recommend a lot of the stuff that Joel recommends. I think me and Joel are sort of on the same wavelength there. And so yeah, those are always a really good resource just to go with what Joel's saying. All right, so the next question comes from user Dave. He says, thank you so much for diving into the recording education world. It is amazing to get insight from you guys. It has helped me so much and continues to do so.

(09:09):

I spread the word about URM and nail the mix constantly. Oh man, thank you, Dave. That's awesome. I have a question about guitar tuning. I've always struggled to make heavy double track guitars sound huge in any of my mixes unless they're perfectly tuned with each other in every chord. And also in relation with the bass for bass, I know you sometimes like to program the MIDI subbase and I've heard of producers working on Nickelback auto tuning Bass di with melaine to make sure the low fundamentals are in tune. However, for heavy guitars, I can't find easy and efficient ways to keep them in the tracking process sounding as Intune as your guitars and Kevin Chico's guitars, those seem to sound perfectly in tune at every note and power chord for very low type tunings. I know that the proper scale length of the guitar is important.

(09:52):

However, even when recording a drop C on a regular scaled guitar with a 13 to 62 gauge, I'm having issues keeping it all in tune. I always have guitarists go to a good looser to have their instruments intonated and adjusted. Even telling the looser that we'll be in the studio still, I often end up with a tune specifically for almost each note. Or sorry, lemme let me reread that still. I often end up having to tune specifically for each note punching in, which is very, very tedious and annoying for the guitar player that I'm tracking. Can you please explain what you demand of bands with their instruments, technique, strings, loosers, and your own tracking process to ensure that you can quickly, efficiently track guitars that are super in tune and sound huge. What are some of your tips when working with a new band? Well, to break it down for you, there is not a quick way then there's not an efficient way.

(10:48):

Guitars are just basically pieces of shit instruments that need to be redesigned by somebody. And I'm sure there's some good models out there, but they probably cost $10,000. The quick thing you can do is get an evert tune system, which will basically prevent your guitar from going out of tune. It's impossible for it to go out of tune, but back when I didn't have Evert tune and back when I was doing the records you're talking about, essentially you just got to sit there with your ear and listen to every single thing that you record into the computer and do not accept any crap. So anything that sucks, just delete it, do it again, and do it over and over and over until it's right. So the big thing that I like to do is just use my ear, have patience, tell the guitar player what he's doing wrong and try to fix the problem at the root, which is usually the hands or the handling of the guitar or the guitar itself.

(11:49):

So the guitar sucks, then get a better guitar, fix it, whatever. Typically these losier they're not going to do. And for anyone that doesn't know what a looser is, it just means it's a guitar guy sets up guitars, they're not going to be smart enough to do it right for the studio. I mean, these guys learn how to set up guitars typically, and they're okay at their jobs, but I've never had anyone that I know other than maybe Nick Sampson that can set up a guitar properly and make it work for the studio. In fact, when I was working with Nick Scott, he would set up all the guitars and he's a guitar player and he is an engineer, so he knew what it took. It's just a matter of getting it set right. And a lot of those guys don't set it right for the studio, even if you tell them that they think they know what they're doing, but they don't.

(12:42):

And also, I had my dad as a resource, he helped set up a lot of guitars for me and during a lot of the tracking process that I've done in the past. So attention to detail, you can always check out my public figure Facebook page, which is, I think it's facebook.com/joey, and every once in a while on there I tweet out or post out some products that I use that help with the process. So make sure you click on any of those links. Those are all my affiliate links. I get paid to share those with you, but those are tools that I actually use. I mean, those tools are powerful and they're amazing. So I highly recommend using those. For example, there's a thing that I have on my page right now if you're listening to this right when it comes out called the Act Face Guitar String Action ruler.

(13:38):

But don't just search for that, go to my page and get it from there because that helps me out. But yeah, got to get it right at the source. So important. And so this next question is going to be about essential recording tech and it comes from Louis. He says, dear Joey, I joined Nail the Mix about three months ago and absolutely love the service. Thank you, Louis. Thanks for making such a knowledge rich and friendly community. It really has helped my production tremendously. With regards to my question, I always love mixing the sessions you provide because they come with such high quality source material. I always feel that my personal mixes are hindered slightly by subpar recording. Can you briefly summarize some absolute essentials and regards to recording technique with any specifics relating to metal and general project management before mixing begins? Well, the big thing you need to worry about with quality in regards to quality is attention to detail.

(14:36):

I mean, just listening to if you plug in the guitar, is there a buzz? And if there is a buzz, do whatever you got to do to get rid of that buzz. When you plug in a microphone and you hit the snare, does the snare sound like crap? Then go out there and freaking tune the snare some more. Try a different mic. Don't record if it sounds like crap. And I want to tell you guys a little story. One time we were down in Orlando recording some drums and the weather in Orlando is kind of funky because you've got humidity to deal with. And this studio we were in was all made out of wood and it had an air conditioning system, but the humidity still affects the wood and still affects the drums a little bit. And so we set up all these Toms and we get the heads going on there, stretching the heads and getting them in tune.

(15:27):

We had a nice drum tech, I mean a brilliant guy that knows exactly what he's doing. And we had four engineers in there and a drum tech and an amazing drum player, and the best drums, the best drum heads, everything, all the mics you could ever want, all the preempts you could ever want, everything set up perfectly and still sounded like crap. And it took us six hours of tuning those freaking Toms and getting those mics moved around until we had a sound that we liked. So if you are not spending six hours on one Tom sound, then you don't know what it's like to get a world-class recording because that's what's happening. I'm sure Al will attest to this is there's times where you're in the studio working on guitar tone for four days and you're not getting anything done. You're just sitting there playing guitar every day for four days until you get a guitar tone that you like. So that happens.

(16:33):

Next question comes from Colton and it's about royalties. Hey Joey, I've been listening to the podcast since Dave Ros episode and finally was able to purchase Nail the Mix a few weeks ago. I'm absolutely floored with how awesome it is. Well done for all of you. Thanks, Colton. That's really awesome. He goes on to say, anyways, my question is relating to royalties. I just listened to an episode where somebody asked about royalties as a producer, and I always thought a producer worked basically from an upfront pay like booking studio time as a guy was an ear for songwriting and producing what situations would call for royalty negotiations, and when should I even ask for royalties? Perhaps my understanding of producer's role is kind of skewed. Thanks in advance. Well, thanks for listening and thanks for writing in. Yeah, you should absolutely get royalties. Now the thing is, this is what sucks is because the word royalties gets thrown around a lot and a lot of people don't really know or understand all the different intricacies of how this stuff works.

(17:32):

So I'm going to tell you some information, but it's going to make you even more confused, but maybe you'll do your own research eventually. We'll probably have some classes on this, but I'll do my best because I mean, this could span into a five hour class easily. But essentially what a producer should get paid for is they should be paid an upfront fee to work on the album. And we're going to call this just a fee. It's just, Hey, I'm paying you to do some work, right? So that's the first way that you get paid. The second way you should get paid is called a producer point and the standard is one to three. So a top-notch producer probably is going to get three points, maybe even more. Sometimes middle ground producer is going to get two points, and every producer in my opinion should get one point, but most of the time they don't.

(18:28):

A point is basically just a percent, and typically this percent is based off of the band's percent. So if the band has 18% on their record deal and you want three of it, you're either asking for 18 minus three or you're asking for 3% of the 18%, which can be a much smaller number. I typically ask for three of the 18. So 18 minus three, that means the band now has 15 left to split and I get three that's of the sales. And then you've got mechanical royalties, which are legally required to be paid by the government, requires the company to pay mechanical royalties. So that's a different royalty. It's usually somewhere between 7.50 cents split between everyone in some sort of fashion that you agree on. And then, and that's per song I believe, or per album, I can't remember which one. And then there's writers, the writer's royalties, where you get paid by ASCAP for performance when the song plays on a radio or it gets used on a YouTube video or something, you get paid for that. But that's where it gets confusing. Then there's all this stuff to talk about. It's like, well, how do you ask and how do you get it? Blah, blah, blah. And then there's really just a lot to it. You have to set up all kinds of accounts. You have to have a good lawyer, you have to know what you're looking for. You have to understand all the little tricks that they use to try to prevent from paying you any royalties.

(20:08):

Yeah, so I'm not going to get into all that. I mean, that's a huge can of worms, but at some point we are going to attempt to try and make a course about that or answer that question more in depth. The final question comes from user Jake and he says, Hey, I've got a question about bands that don't want to record more than they're able to do live. I have three bands in a row that said this to me. I've tried to give them a few things to think about, but it's not sinking in. There are two things I tell them, but it's not always successful. The first idea I try to get across is that a recording is the same as a photograph. When you play live, it's like you're in 3D and when you record, it's more like a photograph in 2D. So the idea with the recording is to make it sound 3D again by adding stuff to it.

(20:55):

The other thing I try to convey is that you have to have the potential for infinity more people to hear the recording than will ever see you live. So they won't even know. I know it's a long setup for the question, but how do you approach the mindset of a band that only wants to record what they can do live? Do you just go with it or do you fake and retake it and get doubles? Thanks, man. Okay, so this is a huge question because I have a different feelings about it. I'm going to refer back to a cool story that I heard about when, gosh, I'm going to forget his name right now, but he recorded the most famous Nirvana album, and Kurt famously wanted just one guitar track, and he knew that the guitars weren't going to sound good as just one. So what he would do is he would just basically record the band playing the song multiple times live and then sort of sneak in a second guitar, take from one of the other takes and put it in there in order to have two guitars without Kurt really knowing that that was what was going on.

(22:04):

And that's interesting because it goes against what the band stands for and what they want, but at the same time, it's the right choice. So I think what I'm going to say here is if you think it's the right thing to do and you know that it's going to be good for the band and you have to really remove yourself from this equation and be unbiased when you make this decision, then yeah, you should do it. But most of the time, I'm going to lean on the band because the band is hiring you to do a job and the band wants you to bring the best out of the band. So sometimes that might mean recording them just how they would sound live, even if you know it's their own demise. But I always try, I really try to do what's best for the bands, even if they won't agree, but I don't like to do stuff behind their back.

(22:53):

So you have to be very ethical about that and be very careful about that. Alright guys, that's going to cut it and that's going to do it for Dear Joey this time. Thank you guys for listening. Remember, if you have any questions, I would love to answer them. Just send your questions to Joey at M Academy with this subject line. Dear Joey, and I would be happy to answer them next time. If you're listening to this episode before the end of April, it's your last chance to jump in on the Decker session with Nail the Mix. So go to nail the mix.com/decker, make sure you are signed up. Yeah, that's going to be it, guys. Thanks for listening. Until

Speaker 1 (23:33):

Next time, the Unstoppable Recording Machine podcast is brought to you by STA Audio. Sta Audio creates zero compromised recording gear. That is light on the wallet only. The best components are used and each one goes through a rigorous testing process with one thing in mind, getting the best sound possible. Go to stem audio.com for more info to ask us questions, make suggestions and interact. Visit urm.academy/podcast and subscribe today.