NICK PILOTTA: How to become indispensable, getting a studio internship, and the art of shutting up

Speaker 1 (00:00:00):

Welcome to the Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast, brought to you by Line six. Line six is a musical instruments manufacturing company that specializes in Guitar, amp, and affects modeling and makes guitars, amps, effects, pedals and multi effects. We introduced the world's first digital modeling amp, and we're behind the groundbreaking pod multi effect, which revolutionized the industry with an easy way to record guitar with great tone. Line six will always take dramatic leaps so you can reach new heights with your music. And now your host. Hey Eyal

Speaker 2 (00:00:34):

Levi. All right. Welcome to the Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast. I am Eyal Levi and I am back from my month long break. It actually wasn't a break. I've been working this entire time except for one horrible week where I didn't have a computer or a phone and I felt completely disconnected from the world. And I recommend that everybody do that at some point. Impose it on yourself just so that you understand how much you are tied to these digital leashes. This past week has been fucking terrible, and I know it's a first world problem, but holy shit. So are those of you guys listening who I know are addicted to Facebook, addicted to your phones, addicted to video games, addicted to anything with a screen? Try to disconnect yourself at some point when you can. It's kind of enlightening. So anyways, on this episode, wanted to bring someone that those of you who watch now the mix may be familiar with, you've heard me talking about him sometimes, but reason that he's coming on is because a lot of you guys ask us always and forever how to get a job in the industry, or you tell us you want to work for us, or how can you get a job at a studio?

(00:02:07):

How can you make it happen? And this dude is 21 and already works for Andrew Wade and us, meaning URM, flying around to do nail the mix with us and have been training him to film stuff and knows what he's doing. And for us to share somebody with Wade, first of all, it was a big deal. And second of all, for us to trust some kid that was born in 1996 with it is another big deal. And I know a lot of 30 year olds who couldn't handle the same responsibilities. So I wanted to talk to him about how he made it happen. And advice for those of you who are trying to work for somebody, cool and get your name out there and maybe some things not to do because man had some hellish interns in the past that have done nothing cause problems. So anyway, dudes name is Nick Pilotta. Hi Nick.

Speaker 3 (00:03:22):

Hi Eyal, how are you?

Speaker 2 (00:03:24):

I'm okay. I feel like I was just hanging out with you a couple hours ago filming stuff.

Speaker 3 (00:03:29):

No, we definitely weren't just hanging out three hours ago.

Speaker 2 (00:03:32):

Yeah, I know. So

Speaker 3 (00:03:33):

Thank you for those kind words. Also, by the way, I really appreciate that.

Speaker 2 (00:03:37):

You're welcome. I mean, it's true. So I don't want to make you feel uncomfortable by harping about your age, but I do think that that's a big deal.

Speaker 3 (00:03:49):

No, no, I fully understand that. Yeah, that's kind of the biggest thing that everyone brings up too with me, is like, holy shit, you're 21. And it's like, well, yeah. I mean, I can't change that, but yeah.

Speaker 2 (00:04:00):

Well, I dunno. I know a lot of people would've killed for those types of opportunities when they were 21, but, so I want to start by talking about something that me and you were actually talking about yesterday. I know that when we first talked about bringing you on here, you didn't want to say that you went to Full Sail. And I understand why. It's kind of like when I used to live in Boston and I went to Berkeley, a lot of the local studios had something against Berkeley kids. And one of the first times that I went to a studio to just check it out, and I told them I was from Berkeley, they were like, oh, really? You probably shouldn't say that around here. I was like, why? In my mind it was like, doesn't that mean I'm serious? You want me

(00:04:55):

Since I go to Berkeley, you take me more seriously than just some dude? And he's like, no, the Berkeley kids all think that they're the hottest shit ever. They have horrible work ethic. And so they're kind of generally a joke around Boston. And obviously we've got a lot of Berkeley people listening. And if this doesn't apply to you, then cool, but I'm sure it applies to some of you guys. So it take a long hard look in the mirror and make sure that this isn't you. But those are the same reasons that you didn't want to talk about the fact that you went to Full Sail on this podcast. And I can tell you that I've had some terrible, terrible interns come from Full Sail as well. And so it seems Go ahead.

Speaker 3 (00:05:47):

No, I was just going to say, that's kind of all I hear too is anywhere that I've interned really before Andrew was a lot of, we've had negative experiences, not just with Full Sail, but just in any recording school. I've gotten, like you said, Berkeley kids, they've had problems with Berkeley kids, places that I've worked at. They've had problems with RECW workshop or whatever, the REC workshop in Ohio. They've had problems with that too, just the kids that just think that they know the entire universe and no one is better than them kind of thing.

Speaker 2 (00:06:26):

Yeah. Did you tell me that you guys had an intern that was basically telling Andrew that his own mixes rule?

Speaker 3 (00:06:35):

Yeah. Yeah. Someone's been just talking about how check my mixes out, and Andrew's like, I don't even want to hear them kind of thing. I don't know.

Speaker 2 (00:06:47):

I mean, not to sound like a dick or anything, but the thing about getting in with this kind of job, as you know, is part of it is having a really level head, maintaining a level head and not being a cock bag, right?

Speaker 3 (00:07:04):

Yeah. That's all it really is, is just knowing your place even if you're older, but if you start out at the bottom of the barrel, that's where you are. So for me to come in and just be like, Andrew, all this shit sucks. That would be like, really? Who are you, Nick? Why would you even say that? Why are you even here? Kind of thing. And that's the attitude that a lot of people that I've known that went to school or that I went to school with kind of have where it's like they're the first ones to say, no, you're wrong, kind of thing. And it's like, well, okay, well, your attitude is just shit, and no one's going to want to hang out with you or work with you

Speaker 2 (00:07:42):

Or hire you, right?

Speaker 3 (00:07:44):

That too, or Yeah, exactly. Want to work eight hours with you a day. No, thank you.

Speaker 2 (00:07:50):

That's kind of what happened with, well, let me just say also it's not full sales fault. This is totally a certain type of attitude that students across the board get. But I would, for instance, if you're going to go intern somewhere and they tell you what kind of DA they work in, don't argue with them about what kind of DA they work in. Either learn it or go try to intern somewhere else, just for instance, don't act like better.

(00:08:25):

And I think that what I'm getting at or what I've come to realize is it's really easy to get one of these jobs because there's so many people out there that have a horrible attitude or don't know what they're doing, that if you just keep your head down and do a really, really good job and are personal, you'll end up in a situation like yours where you've got multiple different people trying to share your time. Right now, you've got us and Joey Sturgis and Joel and Andrew sharing your time. So I think that that's kind of a big deal. Let's start, how did you even get in with Andrew in the first place? How do you think that you managed to get past the, I guess the first threshold, the hanging out threshold?

Speaker 3 (00:09:21):

Cool. So my story's kind of interesting. I mean, everyone probably says that, but mine's almost creepy, I guess it's not really creepy, but 16 years old, then I am sitting there skipping school, watching Andrew's creative lives and stuff. I was super big fan of a day, remember super metalhead in high school and everything. And I told myself I would love to work with Andrew at some point in my life at any point that I can. And then from there, all I did was just practice and listen to that kind of genre to try and get myself back up on that, try and get myself focused on how this genre is produced and everything, and try and get all that stuff squared away. And of course, my mom and dad were telling me, well, you need to go to college. You need to get an education that's important in this day of society and all that stuff. So it's like, okay, well, I am super into music, and I was looking at either Berkeley or a Full Sail. I got in and I took a tour of Full Sail as well, and I knew that Andrew was in Ocala, which was an hour and a half north of Orlando. And Orlando is where Full Sail is. So I just said, all right, I'll just go to Full Sail closer to Andrew that way, and I can get in that way.

Speaker 2 (00:10:45):

That's not creepy though, in my opinion. I know you're about to take it to another level, but we always tell people who are like, I live in a town of 5,000 people. I don't know why I'm not getting clients.

Speaker 3 (00:11:01):

It's

Speaker 2 (00:11:01):

Like, dude, you got to move,

Speaker 3 (00:11:04):

So

Speaker 2 (00:11:05):

Go on.

Speaker 3 (00:11:05):

No, absolutely. No, and that's also kind of why, because I knew I wanted to go into music, but I lived in Pittsburgh at the time, Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, and the music scene there is kind of shot to begin with. There's a lot of live music going on, but there's not much going on recording wise to get clients and everything. So that's why another reason why I wanted to get out as quickly as possible. But yeah, I went to Full Sail mainly with the entire sole intent of a, I needed to have a degree, my parents wanted me to have a degree, and B, Andrew was in Florida. So the time that I enrolled in Full Sail, which was like 2015, so I had just turned 18, it was around the same time that Andrew was actually converting his studio from Ocala to Winter Park. He was at the time I think living with Jeremy from a day to remember, and they were working out of a house together doing records together.

(00:12:04):

And so like, oh, okay, cool. Well, now basically he was living super close to where I was going to school, which was great. So what I did from there was basically I knew I needed to make money. So from there I got a bunch of jobs with the school part-time jobs, and then I also found two or three part-time jobs outside of school. And then also while taking the accelerated program of Full Sail, which is two classes a month at Super, it's rigorous, I guess they describe it one semester of classes is put into one month, but the accelerated part of it is that there's two classes in one month. So it's essentially two semesters worth of two classes put into one month.

Speaker 2 (00:12:52):

Got it.

Speaker 3 (00:12:53):

And it's like a 22 month program, and you leave with your bachelor's. I feel like I'm having an advertisement for this school right now, but that's basically, I just wanted to give you an idea of what the workload was like. So I was doing all that stuff, and then I had tried to add him on Facebook or whatever. I was following him on Facebook or something like that. And I saw that Andrew had posted that he was selling something on this website called OfferUp, and he was selling this old surround sound system that he didn't want anymore for 80 bucks. And at the time, I had $300 to my name, so I was kind of broke, but

Speaker 2 (00:13:36):

So you decided to invest in your own future

Speaker 3 (00:13:39):

By buying

Speaker 2 (00:13:40):

The surround sound

Speaker 3 (00:13:40):

System? Yeah, I was like, I'll hit him up and see if he even still is selling it. So I hit him up and he was still selling it for 80 bucks, so I was like, screw it. I'll go get the money out now and drive to his house. So I drove to Andrew's house to buy this surround sun system that I had no need for period, but that was my chance to meet him, shake his hand, let him know who I am, kind of put a face to the name. And at that time, I had nothing prepared as a human for this job or this career. So I was just like, I'd love to help out if you ever need any help or anything in the future with any recordings. And he was like, oh, what's your studio name? And I was like, I don't really have one, just here's my email. And I fricking gave him my Yahoo email and that was it. And we talked about Pittsburgh for five seconds, and then I drove away. And then yeah, that was it. That was the extent of my conversation with Andrew, and then basically a whole year passed of me working as much as I can, keeping my grades up as much as possible.

Speaker 2 (00:14:48):

Do you realize that to a lot of people, that would've been it right there. Yeah. That would've been like your goal was to meet Andrew or whatever, and you met him and for five seconds and that's it.

Speaker 3 (00:15:00):

No, yeah. See, that's obviously a cool thing to do to meet someone that I idolized as a kid and everything, but obviously the goal is to work with him. And I know like you said, that would be the extent of it for people, but man, you always got to think forward, I feel like, and always got to be like, that's not enough. That's how I kind of live my life, which is kind of good and kind of bad at the same

Speaker 2 (00:15:20):

Time. No, it's good. For instance, I remember when I was on my first tour ever in the airplane on the way to Europe, I was filling in for a band and it was my first tour and also the other guitar player in the band's first tour, we were both filling in for this band and we were at the back drinking and he was like, I'm glad that I get to say that I did this if this never happens again. And I was like, really? You want to be able to say that you did it once and it never worked out again? Really? You'd be okay with that. To me, that would be the most depressing fucking thing to have gotten into the goal. And then it only worked once. It was like, no way, dude. I'm going to turn this into my life.

Speaker 3 (00:16:07):

Exactly. Exactly. That's what a lot of people in my life were super negative at the time when I actually had met him, my girlfriend at the time was just not thinking forwardly about my life too or whatever. And the people I was with, my parents were always super supportive and super stoked that I met him and everything, but a lot of my friends were like, yeah, that's a one time thing kind of thing. And you got to think, well, okay, if you want to think that, that's fine, but I'm going to keep pushing to make this my career kind of thing. So yeah, it's like how can you have that mindset of this is it, and then if this ends, I can be happy and satisfied. It's like, well, I would be crazy depressed if I didn't do this. This is what I wanted. You know what I mean?

Speaker 2 (00:16:53):

Yeah. Okay. So good. So I don't think that's a bad attitude. I think it's a necessary attitude. So a year went by?

Speaker 3 (00:17:01):

Yeah, basically a whole year went by of me just saving up some money, basically doing the college thing of just eating whatever you can that's not $10 a meal going out to eat. I would just do the little college thing and saving up money. And then I had from meeting Andrew through OfferUp or whatever, we became friends on Facebook. So that was cool. And then by doing that though, I remember I had a really shitty day. It was such a shitty day. My car had broken down, the radiator went and it overheated. And then on my way home from stopping installing every five seconds, the tire went flat and it was just a super crummy day. And I remember I got home,

Speaker 2 (00:17:48):

Sounds like my Wednesday last week.

Speaker 3 (00:17:50):

Yeah, I was going to say, yeah, it sounds like a certain similar situation that just happened with you. But yeah, I finally get home and I'm like, I just want to lay down and scroll through Facebook and not do anything today. It was one of those kind of days. And of course the first thing that popped up on my feed, it was Andrew posting on Facebook, is anyone around today? I need some help building some things at the studio. Hit me up if you're interested. And it was just, now you know how the Facebook post thing says just now. So he legitimately had just posted it. So I was one of the first people to hit him up immediately. I immediately sent him a message on Facebook, and I don't even think he said anything besides the address and was just see you there. And I was like, okay, cool.

(00:18:41):

So I drove there straight to the address the next day. I know I just said my tire went and everything, but that's because literally I had my roommate drop me off. So I get there and in the entire dated member band is there practicing that day, which was super weird to see. All of this all happened one day. And then yeah, Andrew showed up and then we started, we immediately started working together. He immediately was like, all right, I need this wood to go down on the floor. And I was laying hard wood floor and staining the concrete floor. I mean, you own the studio BA rent studio being here, so you know what the floors are like the studio B drum room floor needed to put down. We needed to stain all of the floors in the studio, the apartment needed done, all that stuff. It was basically just walls. So any pictures that you see now, everything that's been put up, I had some sort of hand in.

Speaker 2 (00:19:44):

So everyone listening, if you see the studio where we do nail the mix or you look on Andrew's page and you look at his super nice studio or you look at the pictures I've been posting of us filming or whatever, that's the audio compound studio. That's the studio that I've been renting for the past year and now URM took over and they've been basically building it by hand for the past two years and it's pretty gorgeous.

Speaker 3 (00:20:13):

Yeah, I came in at a time when there was no one. It was literally just like Andrew and the dude that's been building it out, Joel, he's like a local just guru of building places. He's helped with a lot of things. He's helped Jeremy out with personal things for his house and stuff and all that kind of thing. So this guy's super smart and it was literally just Andrew and him, from what I understand, building the foundation of the place. And then he just needed some extra hands to put the actual cool shit up, the different panels and obviously the flooring and everything too.

Speaker 2 (00:20:49):

Alright. But I'm sure that you're not the only person who helped build stuff. How did it go from that to suddenly your editing is vocals?

Speaker 3 (00:20:58):

Yeah, so it was like I actually, I started with another kid, Bailey at the time, who's a super awesome guy and we both were the only ones that were helping Andrew at the time. So Andrew and I and Bailey were basically building out the studio for the first three months that I was there. And then because we had just been building so much we needed, or Andrew I guess needed to start working with clients again and everything. So he would let me sit in on sessions with him and I could ask any questions that I want in return for building the studio out or whatever. So we got a client in or abandoned, and I offered at the time, I was like, Hey, obviously I would love to do more than just build the studio out. I have experience in audio. I would love to tune these vocals for you tonight to show you what I'm capable of to get these back to you. And he was like, all right, yeah, sure. And he gave me the files that night. I had to go to school that night. And then after school I just did the tuning, brought it back the next morning, and we sat there and he was like, all right, it's judgment time. And played them and he was like, oh wow, this is actually usable. This is great. And then from there we sat on the couch and he was like, so yeah, I want you to officially know that you're my intern, blah, blah, blah.

(00:22:33):

And that's kind of how it started with just me taking the initiative.

Speaker 2 (00:22:37):

It was funny about that situation where it all was just a sudden, you need to take advantage of this opportunity right now about helping build stuff or you want to tune vocals better get it done by the morning. Those I've encountered those types of situations with quite a few people and that right there, that first impression could go such a long way towards ensuring gainful employment. And so many people drop the ball on that. If you get the opportunity, get the shit done fast.

Speaker 3 (00:23:18):

That's how I think too, where it's like he's at least offering to potentially trust you with big records edits that will go on big records. Why wouldn't you be excited to get that done immediately? I don't understand how people would be like, yeah, well I got to check my schedule. I got my part-time job I got to go to, so can I get it to you in three days? It's like, no, he get it done tomorrow,

Speaker 2 (00:23:43):

But I've got in that that's normal.

Speaker 3 (00:23:48):

And I think Andrew has too.

Speaker 2 (00:23:49):

Yeah, of course he has. I'm sure he has multiple times. And I've gotten the response through email from people who took four days instead of one day, and they were kind of angry like, sorry dude, I have to make a living too. It's like, well, sorry dude. You're the one who wanted the opportunity.

Speaker 3 (00:24:12):

And

Speaker 2 (00:24:12):

There's another kid who did get it done in one night. So John Douglas who has been on this podcast and we, you're going to actually film him next week, a lot of people who listen to this know who he is. He started off assisting me and has graduated to bigger and better things, but it was kind of like that when I tried him out, he got that shit done fast. He was not fucking around in terms of getting it back to me, whereas a lot of other people did, man, they just took, and it's not even, they took two months. It's like they took three days as opposed to getting it to me that night or the next morning.

Speaker 3 (00:24:57):

And the thing with Andrew is he always told me, this isn't paid work, so I can't expect you to do it. You know what I mean? It's on me. And that's the thing, it was all free labor, so it's all my volunteering. So he can't be like, yeah, I need this tea. I need this by tomorrow. He just like, yeah, if you want to try it, go ahead. It's up to you to take the initiative to be just the better that you can be and get that stuff to him the next day or him or her the next day.

Speaker 2 (00:25:27):

Yes, it's up to you to impress him. That's all there is to it. It's not. So when people take that attitude of, well, I've got to make a living. Oh, I've got my schedule. I've got things that pay me or I already pay for that I need to prioritize. It's like, well, look, that's the opportunity. Of course we can't make you do it. We're not paying you, but it's up to you if you want to impress us or not.

Speaker 3 (00:25:59):

It was always like, if you can get it to me and it's good and it's timely, this could lead to paid work. Do you know what I mean? Yes. And I feel like that's kind of how I start with URM too, where it's like if you do it timely and well, this could lead to an actual career and a actual job with money.

Speaker 2 (00:26:19):

That's what I've always told people, and I think that some people thought who didn't get it, told me that I was lying. It's like, no, you just took too long.

Speaker 3 (00:26:31):

Right. Someone else came who wanted it more.

Speaker 2 (00:26:33):

Yeah, John Douglas definitely didn't think I was lying and you didn't. So with URM, well, first of all, the reason that I gave you a shot with URM was because of you going to Atlanta

Speaker 3 (00:26:50):

That time. Yeah. So I wish we could probably talk about that, I guess then, well, I guess that kind of wraps up the story with Andrew where it's like, yeah, I offered to do free work for him and in return, I dunno, I guess I did free work for him and then he liked it so much that he let me have a shot at it, and then he taught me basically everything that he knows. And so now I have worked on every single record that he's done in the past year and a half in some way, one of the bigger ones being the new wage war record, which is really cool.

Speaker 2 (00:27:23):

Which sounds great.

Speaker 3 (00:27:24):

Yeah, it's a really killer record.

Speaker 2 (00:27:27):

And you're not an intern anymore with him,

Speaker 3 (00:27:30):

Right? Yeah, now I'm basically his assistant engineer, so it's really

Speaker 2 (00:27:38):

Cool. So just to let people know a little background on me, I was at a studio in Florida and I left in 2014 and I moved back to Atlanta and I had a lot of gear that I took back to Atlanta with me, and I never planned on coming back to Florida, but one day I saw a post by Andrew that he was building a studio and wanted somebody for his beer room to rent it. And I don't know why, it just, something told me I needed to get on that immediately, and I did. I think I responded within five minutes of him posting it something just

Speaker 3 (00:28:20):

Very similar stories.

Speaker 2 (00:28:21):

Well, I'm really, really good at spawning an opportunity and pouncing. I've always been really good at that. Absolutely. It's actually gotten me really far in life, whereas because I've never been a star kind of person, there's always been people who are better known or whatever, but I've just always known when to jump on something opportunity wise. It's always been like, I don't know, I think some people don't see it kind of like they're colorblind to it. To me it's very clear.

Speaker 3 (00:28:58):

It's obvious. Yeah. I feel like we're in the same boat with that. It's almost obvious when you see the opportunity happen and

Speaker 2 (00:29:05):

Counts

Speaker 3 (00:29:05):

On it.

Speaker 2 (00:29:05):

Yeah, exactly. Like beckoning you. So the thing with that studio was that it was at that point, nine months away from being even usable, and that turned into over a year. So for over a year I was living in Atlanta, my gear was in storage, and Andrew's studio wasn't even a thing, it was just a future thing. And I retired from recording bands, but at some point, I guess you wanted to use the broom, and I wanted someone to use the broom too, because I wasn't going to be there all the time. And it was kind of like I was paying for it for no reason.

Speaker 3 (00:29:58):

Well, you had started to want to do URMs in the beer room, and so you bought a desk and I built the one that is in all the pictures in the front desk, and I think Bailey built the mix one that we use that's in the back corner, but I had kept helping you in the nail, the mixes. It was one weekend.

Speaker 2 (00:30:23):

Yeah. The idea was to turn it into a video studio like it is now, but it was so infrequent that it was kind of stupid for a while and it wasn't ready and it was just like, I don't know, I just had faith that it was going to come together. But yeah, at some point it was like, okay, now it's ready and now the mix should use it. I've been paying for it or we'll pay for it, but my gear's in Atlanta,

Speaker 3 (00:30:59):

Right. So yeah, you had wanted to do that. So I got the room set up, I built the desk, and then there was obviously no gear and I said, well, where's the gear at? Or where's the gear located? It was half your shit was in Audio Hammer and half of it was in Atlanta. So again, my roommate at the time, Jacob, the same one that drove me, he offered to help me get your gear from Audio Hammer as well. So we got a U-Haul, drove up to Audio Hammer, got all the stuff that was in Audio Hammer, put it on a U-Haul, brought it back, dumped it here, and then I was like, okay, so that's half the gear. And you said the rest of it's in Atlanta, and you said, yeah. And I was like, okay. And you had told me, you said if you can get Studio B set up, you can use it whenever you want.

Speaker 2 (00:31:50):

And that's kind of like the same thing as the opportunity that Andrew extended before that we were talking about. It's like, yeah, I mean I know it's a big ask to be like, Hey, if you set it up you can use it, but hey, at the same time, it's a big opportunity. It's like if you set it up, you can use it.

Speaker 3 (00:32:13):

I don't understand how I would've been able to say no to that. Literally this gear is obviously incredible. You know what gear you have. So the fact that you said if you set it up, you can use it whenever you want, whenever we're not using it for now, the mix, I immediately was like, alright, perfect. So obviously my piece of shit car that I was driving at the time couldn't get me to Atlanta. So I went and rented a huge ass SUV just for a day. I was still kind of broke. I literally rented it for 24 hours. So I had gotten it in the afternoon one day, drove straight to Atlanta, got to your storage space, filled up the SUV with as much as I could, slept there for three hours and then drove back to get the SUV back in time because I only rented it for a day.

(00:33:06):

But I went to Atlanta and back in one day to get the rest of that gear so that I could potentially set this gear up because Andrew was also training me at the time to be able to work with local bands as well, or work with bands too. So I was like, damn, I may as well do this. Why wouldn't I do this? This is such a great opportunity. And then I got it fully set up and then the nail mixes started to look cooler. It was more of a setup and I got to use it for any of the edits that I did for Andrew. I was using the room and then I also was working with bands on my own, which I still am doing whenever you guys aren't here using it for another mix. So it's worked out really, really well. And again, it just comes down to I could have easily just said, no, I don't want drive to Atlanta, but that would be so dumb because I feel like I wouldn't have any of the opportunities that I have now if I didn't just do that one thing.

Speaker 2 (00:34:02):

Probably not because you probably would've just been at that point just some other intern kind of kid who's name I forget, which is most, that right there impressed me enough to where then I started talking to Joey and Joel about We should keep an eye on you. But again, with the, it's a big ask to be like, Hey, drive to Atlanta from Orlando, but I guarantee you 49 out of 50 people would've been too busy or would've been like, I don't know about gas, I'm broke or whatever. But what would've ended up happening would've been that you wouldn't have gotten the gear. And then at some point I would've just paid for my own U-Haul and gotten it myself. And then you wouldn't have ever made that really positive impression. And when we would start looking for somebody to employ, we would've just gone through who we already knew.

Speaker 3 (00:35:14):

That's the thing. I feel like opportunities you have to make your own opportunity or else nothing will really come. That's been my experience so far with anything that I've done in my life or even just what I do personally in my life. You have to make your own opportunities to pop up. No one else is going to do it for you. It's not like you were going to come to me and be like, Hey, go to Atlanta or do this for me. I had to ask, can I go there to get it, to set it up for you kind of thing.

Speaker 2 (00:35:47):

Yeah, exactly.

Speaker 3 (00:35:49):

And I think that's where everyone will say it's so hard to get a job, or it's so hard to find work in audio or it's like, your life is so awesome. How do you work with Andrew that's so sick? It's like, well, only thing I can tell you is that I wanted it and I made it happen. And Andrew talks about the same thing in his life where he will discuss not for one second, I think this wouldn't happen. And that's kind of where I'm at too, where I never once am my life doubted that I wouldn't work for Andrew and if I did everything I could to make that happen, I did it. And with that brought so many awesome opportunities with you with meeting Joey, with meeting Jewel, with meeting every single person that's happened and nailed the mix, every single producer that we've brought on.

(00:36:31):

But I think, I don't know if I can speak for you, obviously this is your opinion as well, but I feel like my girlfriend at the time now, not at the time, my girlfriend now lives in Nashville and Billy Decker's thing in April was going on, and I knew that you guys were going there, so I thought, I remember calling you at the middle of the night. I know you were up, and I was like, Hey, do you guys need help with Nail the mix in April for Billy Decker? I would love to volunteer and come help. And you were like, you don't have to, but you can if you want to. Again, the same situation. So I just took the four days off from working with

Speaker 2 (00:37:12):

Andrew, but you're leaving something out, which is I told you that we would absolutely cover no expenses or pay for it.

Speaker 3 (00:37:20):

Right? That's another thing you said, we can't pay you. We can't pay for what you're doing, we can't pay you to do anything, but if you want to come help, by all means come. So I drove, I've spent, keep in mind, this is just to anyone. I've spent so much of my own personal money and I'm broke as hell. Like I was broke now, I mean, I'm not rich at all, but I can pay rent, which is cool. But I was spending so much of my own money and I still kind of do in some aspects just for different random things. For the Nashville thing, I drove to Nashville from Orlando to do this. And then also I think the one thing that I always get with Joel is I knew Joel liked Green Juice or whatever. So the first day that you showed up or whatever, I had a green juice ready for Joel, and he just is so stoked on that and I think he keeps telling me that.

Speaker 2 (00:38:16):

Yeah, well,

Speaker 3 (00:38:17):

It's small things like that that make a huge difference. If you know what someone likes and you can get that and show up without even being told to go get a green juice, that again sets you apart from everyone else. Another thing that I did with Andrew is, I don't know if anyone knows of the data, remember web episodes that go on the homesick and common courtesy web episodes, but I remember one of them, Andrew requested big boss alter ego requested from the guys to go get a pink icings, rainbow sprinkled donut or some shit like that from Dunking Donuts or something. So that's what I showed up with on the third day of working with Andrew. I mean, that's kind of tacky and stupid, but again, that's just another thing that has to be implanted in his brain. Or if he doesn't remember who cares. But that's still another thing that might set you apart as to like, oh, he's the dude that brought that Ha. Even if it's funny or even if it's a joke, at least he can relate something to your name. That way he doesn't forget you,

Speaker 2 (00:39:30):

Which is really easy, which can happen very easily.

Speaker 3 (00:39:33):

Right? Yeah. Like you said, it's super easy to forget names of people if you don't do something that sticks out. So just doing something small that just pops your name out more and makes you known. That's the first time I had met Joel was when I gave him that green juice, whatever, at Billy Decker's place. But since then, we've obviously become friends and through working at Nail the Mix in April helping you out, I feel like maybe that's what helped me secure some sort of job or the job with you guys that I have.

Speaker 2 (00:40:05):

Yeah, so because Nick did that, went to Nashville, not just went, but you did a great job. So that was the other part of it was that you kind of got thrown in the deep end and did a great job to where we were like, all right, we can try this again. So we tried you out again for the architect's one in June, and then we're like, all right, cool. So now, so everyone knows we flew Nick out to LA in July, flying him with us to Sweden in September, and we've got a few more now. The mixed trips planned between now and the end of the year, and you're going on every one of them and getting paid for it too. So that's a big shift,

Speaker 3 (00:41:03):

Right? Yeah, it's a big life shift for me, just doing something that I felt would try and set me apart to just try and secure something with you guys. Obviously I respect you and Joey and Joel so much. I would love to be part of the company. So what can I do to be a part of the company? That's my mindset with everything. It's like, okay, well what can I do? Okay, well, I know that I have a place to stay in Nashville. Okay, great. So I'll go there and just on my own dime and try and secure something and work as hard as I can. And it all just comes back to it's not hard. It's not hard to just be a cool dude. I feel like maybe it is, I don't know. It just comes. I'm not saying I'm a cool dude, whatever, but it just comes easy to just be personable and work hard. Those are things that I feel like I've never had an issue with because why not? If you're awkward, you're never going to get opportunities that might arise if you're just kind of cool and mellow and able to work hard. Those are the biggest things

Speaker 2 (00:42:14):

In our situation. I mean with now the mix, we're not recording bands, but if we're going to be taking someone around the world with us to meet, to work with all these really badass mixers and producers, we need someone that's not going to make us look like an idiot. They're representing us. So we would not be able to have someone who couldn't hang. It just wouldn't work,

Speaker 3 (00:42:42):

Right?

Speaker 2 (00:42:43):

I'd get mad.

Speaker 3 (00:42:45):

I feel like it would only make things harder already stressful enough, flying all the equipment and everything, and then having someone that is just hard to work with in any situation, whether it's the nail, the mix situation, or just working with them eight hours a day in a studio setting, working close to them, being in the same room as them the whole day. You need to be personable. You need to be friendly. Even hygiene, things like smelling good. You don't want to work eight hours in a studio. If I wreaked and just sat next to Andrew the whole day, leaning over his shoulder, watching what he is doing, I feel like he'd be like, oh dude, this is really awkward. Do you know what I mean?

Speaker 2 (00:43:28):

And in Florida it's easy

Speaker 3 (00:43:30):

To do that, especially in Florida too. So it's stuff like that, just being on top of that. And

Speaker 2 (00:43:38):

It's doing a lot of stuff that a lot of people might feel like they're too good for,

Speaker 3 (00:43:44):

Right? Right, exactly. It's like, oh, I'm too good for this. I'm too good to sweep the floor, or I'm too good to take out the trash. It's like I'm not even an intern anymore. I'm paid to work here and I still will clean the countertop off or take the trash out. Just being a cool dude. That's being a good dude.

Speaker 2 (00:44:05):

Well, it's also when they talk about the Millionaire restaurant owner who still will lay out silverware or on that show Shark Tank that everybody will watch whenever. I mean, I know it's a TV show and stuff, but those are real deals that they make and I love it when they'll get someone on there who thinks that they're too good to give away a certain amount of the company or too good to take a financial hit versus their employees or too good to do this or too good to do that. And then you'll get Mark Cuban just strike them down and be like, no fucking way. If you feel like you're too good to do the work, I don't want to work with you.

Speaker 3 (00:44:59):

Exactly. That's one of my favorite shows. I feel like that mindset is what I always want to be thinking of. Just watching how people react to people who actually have money kind of thing, where it's like, how do they respond? I think it's fascinating watching people's pitches and like you said, watching people who think you don't deserve that much of my company. Well, he's the one that's going to fund you the money that you asked for. So I don't know, I think it's fascinating and I think that, yeah, it's just really cool.

Speaker 2 (00:45:31):

Yeah, it's just really cool. I agree. That's a good way to put it. So hey, I've got some questions from our crowd. I told them you were coming on and since you're doing what a lot of people want to do, we got some questions. So here's one from Eli Dore Madar. He said, I'd like to know how to work faster under a busy schedule. Seems like you're the guy to ask.

Speaker 3 (00:46:04):

Yeah, so that's kind of a tricky question. Again, it all comes down to how much you want it. So I was a full-time student. I had four part-time jobs when I started interning for Andrew, and then I was also interning for Andrew. So it's like I was always constantly busy, but I also always had things to turn in for Andrew. The next day I was working and maybe sleeping two hours a night, maybe just because school would start at nine. I'd get out of one immediately, go to the studio till four, start my part-time job from four till seven 30. By the time I get back, everything that was recorded, it needs to be edited now. So from eight till however long I needed to do, I'd do the edits and then obviously my other part-time jobs would come at different times to, but it was constant go, go, go, go, go. And for a while, for eight months of my life, I think I was sleeping a total of two hours a night. I was doing 120 hour work weeks. But that's just what I feel like in my personal experience. That's what you need to do if you want to get to the point where you can then control your schedule. But it's all about time management. The biggest thing is not wasting time.

(00:47:27):

I don't even know what the statistics are about social media and everything, but I feel like everyone just scrolls there for two hours a day and wastes time like that. I was just so gung-ho about working constantly that you just need to stay focused and manage your time properly to where,

Speaker 2 (00:47:45):

Well, when you talk about time management, I know you're very organized.

Speaker 3 (00:47:50):

Yeah, I do things by a schedule. The best thing you can do is regiment yourself to be like, alright, it's 8:00 AM I need to go to the gym, or it's now nine o'clock, let's eat breakfast before we start working. That's kind of how I live my life. For a while I didn't, but I realized quickly the more things that I brought into my life, the more I needed to be better with my time or else I just get overwhelmed and anxiety would come and all that stuff. So you definitely need to, well, again, it's my opinion, but I would make a schedule that you can always set to be like, alright, so this is my time to edit. I need to do all these edits in this time, and if I don't, I got to go over and that's going to push you to keep working harder and working faster, but also working accurately.

(00:48:46):

Or this is my time that I have to be at school, so I have to go to school. So you just automatically take that chunk of time out of your day, you know, have to be there kind of thing. And then anytime that you need to go into your sleep schedule, that's what I had to do where it's like, okay, well this is when I should be sleeping, but I need to work. So it's a game of give and take or whatever of like, well, I could further my career or I could sleep another two hours. And that's where I think a lot of kids will, especially at my age,

Speaker 2 (00:49:20):

Dude, at your age is the time to fucking do that. Once you get past 30, you just can't, and it goes down every year. You can't be pulling the two hour za night anymore. So those people listening that are under 25 and you have opportunities, now is the time to fucking redline yourself.

Speaker 3 (00:49:44):

I don't have a family. I don't have crazy mortgages or anything. So now is the time to just slave away at work and focus on work before eventually that time comes where I do start to have a family or I do buy a house, and that's when it's like, all right, well now these things matter and all that kind of stuff. But for now it's just time to work, work and stay focused and stay humble and keep driving your passion forward and not taking, I don't think I took a day off for eight months, eight or nine months from when I first started with Andrew until I think it was the end of the wage roll record in November of last year. It was constant. So yeah.

Speaker 2 (00:50:30):

So when you talk about time management, besides the schedule, did you adopt any system you read anywhere? I know a lot of people like getting things done system, or were you just like, I'm just going to schedule 'em a time and that's it.

Speaker 3 (00:50:45):

I tried to get into reading books or watching seminars and stuff, but it was just like, I feel like I'm smart enough to do this on my own. So that's,

Speaker 2 (00:50:54):

You already know. I mean, honestly, dude, it's not that complicated.

Speaker 3 (00:50:57):

It's not hard. It's not hard to be like at 8:00 AM I need to do this and you do it. I don't need to watch a hundred dollars seminar to be told what to do with my time and everything kind of like that. You know what I mean? Or buy a $40 book to learn about my time management. But again, I understand reading those things and don't get me wrong, reading those things and watching those things will make you better.

Speaker 2 (00:51:18):

And if you do need them, then definitely pay the money for them.

Speaker 3 (00:51:22):

Yeah, exactly. If you are unmotivated to, if you can't do that yourself and you need someone to tell you to do it or push you to do it, if that's all it takes, then that's what it needs to take. There are some people I guess like that too, but for me personally, I've always just done things for myself and I just pushed myself to do it, and it's like a constant fear of failure. So that pushes me to work hard and plan things out to where I don't fail. Does that make sense? Yes. It's like I, I'm constantly worried or for a while when I was interning with Andrew, I was constantly on edge that at any point now some random dude's going to come in and show me up and do all these things that are way better than me and I'll be kicked to the curb and not be working with him anymore. That was my mindset for a while of just,

Speaker 2 (00:52:19):

Honestly, that should be your mindset throughout your life. I don't have those kinds of feelings. Someone's going to replace me at the company I own, but we have to think of competitors. What if someone someday comes along and kicks us to the curb in terms of what they offer? And if we don't keep that front and center, someone will.

Speaker 3 (00:52:44):

Right, exactly.

Speaker 2 (00:52:46):

They will eat our lunch.

Speaker 3 (00:52:47):

Exactly. That's exactly what I was thinking constantly is just like, if I don't do this now and if I don't get these edits to Andrew tomorrow, someone else will. So I need to do this now kind of thing. And that's how I've lived. That's how I still work, even though things are kind of not set in stone, but things are way better than how they were before of uncertainty with my career and everything.

Speaker 2 (00:53:10):

So here's one from Louis, Jaime Flores, Luis. Hello, Luis. Hi, Luis. When you were at the beginning of your career, did you ever feel like success was impossible to attain? I sometimes feel like I have tried everything and still see no results. I would like to know if you felt the same way and how you dealt with those feelings.

Speaker 3 (00:53:31):

Yeah, man. I mean, that's a great question because I think that kind of ties into the fear of failure that I was talking about where even when I do cool things like work on the wage roll record, I would sometimes go home at night and say, I'm not doing anything with my life. This sucks. I'd have crippling. So that always pushed me to, I always felt like I always had that feeling of crippling, but I always tried to push through it by working harder, I guess.

Speaker 2 (00:54:05):

Yeah. And let me just say that Daniel Day Lewis, one of the greatest actors of all time, I was reading an interview with him and watching an interview with him and people were like, he was getting asked how he had the courage to play some of those roles or did he worry that he couldn't? And he said that every single time he takes some role, the dude from there will be blood or Abraham Lincoln or something crazy. He has a day where he's basically in a fetal position and he's convinced that it's over and he's not going to be able to fucking do it ever, and everyone's going to find out, and then he just does it

Speaker 3 (00:54:56):

Right and are so many, I've had so many days like that where it's just like you go home super bummed out and depressed. I mean, not depressed, but more like, man, I feel like I'm not doing good enough, or I feel like I'm not getting this done. So how I would cope with that or how I would deal with that is I would immediately just leave the house and go try and do something, or I would stay in the house, but I would call my girlfriend or my mom or my grandpa just to talk. And luckily for me, I've had a super awesome supportive system, people who care about me, people who care about my wellbeing and my success and want nothing but the best for me. So I've had the ability to sit down and call these people and be able to talk about what's going on in my head and just get some sort of reassurance that you're doing the right thing or someone's being able to tell me that you're doing the right thing and being able to handle all your workload and essentially just find ways to relax,

Speaker 2 (00:56:07):

To basically get yourself out of that mental state.

Speaker 3 (00:56:10):

It's like you go home and you're super crummy. You can sit there and be crummy and let it flow into the next day. Or you can just sit there and watch the office with your girlfriend and try and relax for the evening and let your mind sink back into things are okay, this day is just one day. The next day it'll be even better. Always go to bed thinking tomorrow will be better. Or tomorrow, what I did today was fine, but tomorrow will be better kind of thing.

Speaker 2 (00:56:41):

I mean, you can't control how the day went, but you can control how you react to it. And there's a lot of things you can do to put yourself in a better mood. For instance, some people like working out, some people just want to relax, whatever it is, do something to change your mental state,

Speaker 3 (00:57:03):

Right? Yeah. I used to go for runs all the time to try and just clear my mind. That worked for me on top of just chatting with someone that I cared about, about a completely different topic, that stuff would calm my mind and let me at least go to bed, ready to go for the next day kind of thing. So

Speaker 2 (00:57:26):

Cool. Here's one from Jaime Patrizio, Jesus, which is Nick, congrats on the early success. When you came in as an intern, what did you expect to learn versus what you actually learned? And also what did you do on your downtime away from Andrew Wade studio? And also it would be nice to know what level engineer you were before deciding to take up an internship.

Speaker 3 (00:57:50):

Okay, so what did I expect to learn versus what I really learned working with Andrew?

Speaker 2 (00:57:57):

Yeah,

Speaker 3 (00:57:58):

I guess I expected to learn, I don't even know. It's weird working with your idol because you fantasize. I'll work with the data, remember every day, and I'll work with all the cool bands that it works with every day, and it would be super cool, but I mean, I've worked with the data member guys before, once or twice just doing random stuff. But honestly, I don't know what I expected it to be. I expected it to be super movie like, I guess. And then I got here and it's like, all right, yeah, here's a shit ton of work. Leave the room and do it. It's like, okay, cool

Speaker 2 (00:58:33):

Movie. You like, yeah, what I want to hear what that

Speaker 3 (00:58:39):

You show up and it's like, alright Nick, you're here now, so let's start mixing together. Let's start, I need your ears because you're crucial to this project. And it's like, yeah, that's not true at all. It's more like, Hey, this drummer sucks and I need these edits done. Can you put it in time for me? And it's like, Jesus Christ, this guy can't play to a click track. Let's waste three hours of our lives fixing a drum thing that you could have just submitted, blah, blah, blah, blah, all that kind of stuff. That's what really happened. But that's fine because that's what I want to do. Obviously I want to work with bands and when I wanted to work with that stuff, but it definitely wasn't like, Nick, I need you to assist on my mix and make it sound better. Lord knows that's not what I was going to do at the time. So yeah, I expected that. And all I got was work, and I got a lot of knowledge though. What was the second question?

Speaker 2 (00:59:42):

What you do on your downtime, but I feel like you already covered that.

Speaker 3 (00:59:46):

Yeah, I kind explained that. So the other one was, where was I before

Speaker 2 (00:59:50):

As an engineer. Yeah. And you did work at other studios? Yeah,

Speaker 3 (00:59:55):

We

Speaker 2 (00:59:55):

Haven't touched on that at all. Really?

Speaker 3 (00:59:57):

No. I worked at another local studio here in Orlando, but I mean, it was a complete joke. I never sat in, sat the control room twice and watched the dude record a rapper to an MP three, and it was like, this is not what I want to do with my life. And all I would do is sweep the floors and just try and hit up artists that would just laugh because it was a shitty studio. So that was kind of a bad taste in my mouth as to working in a studio. And then I went home for Pittsburgh for two months at an internship at a studio in Pittsburgh. And that was the same kind of thing. The engineer wouldn't let me watch him. He'd be like, I need you. I don't like people sitting over my shoulder. So I'd have to awkwardly sit in the back of the room and try and see his tiny screen, what he's doing, because I didn't know what I was doing.

(01:00:50):

But other than the random intern stuff of constantly vacuuming the same floor or cleaning the countertop that you cleaned yesterday, that no one went into the kitchen yet. You know what I mean? Just doing the random things that you feel like you have to do as an intern. And then, yeah, he would yell at me for, there was a feedback loop and I had just caught, he was sending a bus to the same bus, and that was the feedback loop. And all I said was, I think it's that bus. And he pulled me out of the room and was like, I could have done that. Why did you do that? I guess he was super like, this is my studio. I don't need you to tell me what to do. But I was just trying to help. You know what I mean?

(01:01:32):

But I mean, that's again, just two sour tastes in my mouth of Jesus. Is this what the industry really is? And then you get an opportunity with Andrew, it's like, Nope, that's not what it is. This is incredible. Let's keep going. But yeah, I had interned at two different places before Andrew, and then I had basically just been doing home studio stuff on a crappy Toshiba laptop with a PreSonus two channel interface that my mom bought me for my birthday when I was 14 or 15. And then that's when I started to dive into Olive Andrew's productions and stuff. I was in a band, I was doing the pop punk thing with a band, and we had gone in to do an ep, and I just loved recording and seeing that aspect of it way more than performing. And then that makes sense. I had also blown, I was a singer.

(01:02:29):

I had blown my vocal chords. I was doing a bunch of different choirs and musical theater, and I had gotten two vocal nodules on my vocal chords, which put me in vocal rest for four months. So I was like, I can't really handle singing anymore, so I'll just focus on production. So I spent that time really diving into all of the different things like how an EQ works, how a compressor works, what is an impulse response, things that I feel like everyone should know before they try and work with big dogs like Andrew, knowing what an impulse response is, or knowing what an audio suite plugin is in pro tools or that kind

Speaker 2 (01:03:08):

Of stuff. I feel like I've had people try to intern for me who didn't even own a daw.

Speaker 3 (01:03:13):

Yeah, it's like how can you even think that?

Speaker 2 (01:03:17):

Yeah. I mean, cool that you've got the initiative to try to get the gig, but what are you thinking doesn't even own a da. What are we going to do? What are we doing? So here's one from Mike lma, which is aside from having a great work ethic, what technical skills did you have to be great at right off the bat, or what technical skills have you consistently had to use from the beginning to get you to the next step?

Speaker 3 (01:03:46):

This is an awesome question because I think this is really important. I feel like you need to have that niche thing that you're really good at that sets you like, okay, he can do this, so that's good that we can keep giving him this work while he learns other things. So I feel like I was really good at vocal tuning. I had had to in the local bands that I was recording when I was at home in Pittsburgh, no one could sing, so I had to tune people. So I would get really good at vocal tuning, and that was the first thing that I had offered to Andrew because I knew my skillset. I had never edited real drums in my life before working with Andrew. I had never edited guitars before. I mean, I've recorded them, but I've never edited real instruments before because I was doing Steven Slate and everything.

(01:04:35):

I was doing midi drums and all that stuff. So what I had to do was vocals. So I would just record vocals and I had to teach myself how to tune and get good at it because it needed to be good. So if you have that niche thing that you're really good at, that should be the first thing that you offer as what you can do to make the person that you want to work with make their lives easier. So by tuning all five songs on this EP for Andrew, I'm saving him however many hours of work by tuning all of the vocals. So that is super important, I think, to have that. One thing that you're really good at

Speaker 2 (01:05:13):

With John Douglas who was editing drums.

Speaker 3 (01:05:16):

Yeah, he's a drum editing wizard

(01:05:19):

Actually. I had been told by Andrew, I need you to start editing drums for me. And he was the first guy that I went to. I went and listened to his podcast with you guys. I knew I had needed to learn from the guru, and then I watched Andrew do it. And I think another thing is things you need to be really good at catching on quickly. It can't be like, this is the fifth album we've done together and I've had to redo all of your edits. You need to be, if the record that you're doing, this is your first time editing drums, it's okay to have mistakes I feel like.

Speaker 2 (01:05:54):

But

Speaker 3 (01:05:54):

The next record, the next record, you should knock out of the park immediately.

Speaker 2 (01:05:57):

No one, unless they're a dickhead, is going to ride you if you make mistakes your first time. And that's absolutely right. I wouldn't ride anybody for that. And the people I worked under, they were cool my first few times when I made dumb mistakes and that kind of stuff's going to happen. I mean, that's part of teaching somebody, you have to expect that. But yeah, you're right. If they don't pick up quick, you got to move on. Life's short,

Speaker 3 (01:06:30):

Life's short time is money.

Speaker 2 (01:06:31):

Yeah,

Speaker 3 (01:06:32):

Yada, yada, yada,

Speaker 2 (01:06:32):

All that shit. It's true. So here's one from Jay Lehi, which is I'm starting an internship next week. That is pretty much the first big step of my career. I'm lucky to get the opportunity as it's pretty big and a competitive studio, so I don't want to mess it up. What would be your tips to get the most out of the experience and maximize my chances of being capped on at the end? Thanks.

Speaker 3 (01:06:54):

Well, first of all, congratulations. That's awesome. That's really cool that you got into a cool studio like that, and I hope that you're still there. The things that you need to capitalize on are focus on while you're there to make the most of your experience is, this is going to sound weird, but just don't talk Literally if you're in a session, just don't talk at all, period. Just watch and listen and learn. The second you open your mouth and try and give an opinion or

Speaker 2 (01:07:29):

Just try to help with, tell them that they're sending a feedback loop on a bus.

Speaker 3 (01:07:34):

Exactly. That's just going to make the session go weird because you're trying to take control of it. I learned that very quickly. Han don't talk because he doesn't care. Even if the engineer is an idiot, it's his studio and it's his or her studio and it's their way or the highway, essentially, you're in their house. So the least you can do is just sit there and learn from them. And if you don't agree with them, that's fine. Don't do what they do in your personal work. But if you're there working for them and it's what they say, that's what goes. Yeah. That's pretty much the biggest thing is to just listen and learn and don't essentially give your opinion or your feedback because you're the new guy. Do everything diligently, do everything correctly and do everything fast, but it needs to be high quality. So even when it comes to vacuuming, don't spend an hour vacuuming the damn studio, just vacuum it and make sure you're doing it right, and cleaning countertops and taking trash out. It's all

Speaker 2 (01:08:43):

Actually, you could do it all quickly, but just pay attention

Speaker 3 (01:08:46):

When

Speaker 2 (01:08:47):

You're doing it

Speaker 3 (01:08:47):

Right. It's not rudimentary at work where you're like, yeah, I'll just move the vacuum around for four seconds and I'm done. You can do it quickly and accurately and you can do anything quickly and accurately. It's just like you said, not drifting your mind away and focusing on what you're actually doing. That's the hardest part, I think, is, yeah, it's a boring job of vacuuming, but if you do a good job, people notice, and that's the first thing that they notice is the quality of the job and how quickly it was done to them.

Speaker 2 (01:09:12):

And you don't want people to notice you for the wrong reasons too. If part of your intern job is to clean, you might not get noticed for cleaning, but you'll definitely get noticed for doing a bad job at it.

Speaker 3 (01:09:26):

Right, right. Yeah. You won't be like, won't like, man, this toilet looks so good. Who did this? They're

Speaker 2 (01:09:34):

Going to be like, yeah, I'm going to upgrade from intern to house cleaner.

Speaker 3 (01:09:38):

Yeah. It's like they're going to be like, who didn't clean this toilet? Jesus Christ, this is disgusting. That's what they'll say. They won't be like, this is immaculate. Great job, Nick. You're going to move from this to mixing all my records. That's not what's going to happen. It needs to be like, yeah, they won't talk about you positively. You won't get noticed for it, but you'll get noticed for doing it poorly. So always just make sure whatever you're doing, it's the best job that you can do because that's what's going to set you apart, and that's what's going to make you stay around and stick around. And when the opportunity comes when the engineer is sick, or when the engineer has to cancel and you're the only one that's in the studio and you're the one that's been sitting there quietly learning the equipment and learning what he's doing, he's going to say, Nick, I'm super sick.

(01:10:29):

I know you're doing a good job or whatever at the studio. Do you think you'd be able to handle this one? Then boom, there's your opportunity right there, because you're a good cleaner. You're not noticed for it, but you never have been told this is horrible and you've been quiet watching everything. You've been quiet, learning every single thing that he's doing, learning his ways, learning their ways, so you're able to take that opportunity and do it. That happened with Andrew. He had to give you an example. I had never tracked drums for record for him before, and this band was on the last two days of their time here before they had to leave, and they were an out of state band. And something came up with Andrew personally where he was like, I have to go and they need to track these drums. Like, Nick, do you think you can do this?

(01:11:16):

And that's where it comes down to. Yeah, you got to step up to the plate there and be like, I can do this. And again, that's just another thing that took my relationship with Andrew further was because all I did was sit there and watched what he was doing when he recorded drums, he would let me ask questions, obviously, and if the dude doesn't let you ask questions, they're insane. But he let me ask questions about what he's doing or why he is doing that technique to help you understand things. And then from there, I knew what his drum setup was, what his drum techniques were, what his miking techniques were. For me to be able to go and record the album and get it done for him while he had to go take care of things personally. That's how you get your ins, I feel like is just focusing, being a good dude and working hard and just not slipping up on things that are just rudimentary.

Speaker 2 (01:12:04):

Yeah, I agree. Here's an interesting one from Johan Martin, should I give up because I'm a little introverted?

Speaker 3 (01:12:12):

No, no.

Speaker 2 (01:12:13):

I think everyone, not everyone, but I think most people in this line of work have social anxiety disorder and they're a little introverted.

Speaker 3 (01:12:21):

Yeah, absolutely. I didn't realize the kind of social anxiety I had until I think I started to go to the meetups with URM. I feel like I'm pretty good at social gatherings and parties and stuff, but the second I met other strangers who were in the audio field too, I was like, whoa, how do I even approach this conversation? So I started to become introverted and slowly, now the more we do it, the more I'm getting relaxed with it. In LA I feel like I was pretty relaxed with it, but it's like, yeah, you've been

Speaker 2 (01:12:52):

To a few of them now too. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (01:12:54):

So I feel like you can definitely be introverted, but do not give up. That's the last thing that you want to do. If this is your passion and you might be a little introverted, it just takes getting yourself out there to be comfortable with situations. I totally understand being an introvert and wanting to just focus on things yourself and then do things in your own way or whatever, and have social anxiety. I get that fully. It just takes, I think it took me going to a bunch of meetups to then be able to be comfortable to talk to just different guys about things and talk about their projects and vice versa and be cool and be able to talk friendly and be able to talk, I guess, as a human and

Speaker 2 (01:13:38):

Well, social skills are definitely something you can learn and you don't have to suddenly become the life of the party person or something like that, but you can definitely learn how to get along in the world to find

Speaker 3 (01:13:57):

Totally agree. You definitely, you can't learn to not be an asshole, but you can learn how to be social, I guess, if that makes sense. You can't change. I feel like personally, there's no way that people can learn to not be a dick. That's just how they are. But you can learn to slowly come out of your shell a little more from introverted to being a bit more extroverted and being more sociable and being able to hang out. I think the coolest thing is with URM, you have the ability to talk about what you like with other people. There might be some other introverted people there too who are having a tough time, but if you're able to say, Hey, what are you working on? And then you bring up the same plugin that you both use and it's like, oh wow, how cool is that plugin? Yeah, yeah, blah, blah, blah, blah. There you go. Automatically 45 minutes later, you're talking about every single thing that you do in your sessions, and you're talking about different funny band stories, and I feel like that's what URM gives you is these meetups too, give you the ability to chat with people who are in the same realm as you, who are going through the same thing as you, and also know the same tools that you know kind of thing.

Speaker 2 (01:15:07):

Yeah, I definitely encourage everyone who's in a town where meetups happen or wants a meetup to happen to make them happen, to actually go to them, because where else are you going to get the chance to hang out with a bunch of other people who want to be audio engineers as well as pro audio engineers all in one place. They're your people. It's a great opportunity.

Speaker 3 (01:15:33):

It's also people like Kyle Black and Andrew Wade, these people are going there too. It's not like it's just the community. It's the people that you've seen and then know the mixes. Andrew went to the Orlando one, a bunch of guys, I dunno, the other guy. Jeff was there for sure. Kyle Black was there.

Speaker 2 (01:15:49):

Oh, in la? Yeah, Jeff Dunn was there. Kyle Black was there. The last one, me and Joey were there. Bob Rochelle was there, and Nashville. Billy Decker came to that

Speaker 3 (01:16:02):

One. Guitar, Harville, Blackville Brides was there. You're never going to know who you're going to meet those things. And it's cool to meet these people that you might look up to for your mixes. Kyle Black was a huge inspiration for me to be able to meet him. I love the stuff he does with state champs and everything, so that was super cool to just sit there and have a drink with him and talk with him. So

Speaker 2 (01:16:24):

Those

Speaker 3 (01:16:24):

Opportunities come.

Speaker 2 (01:16:25):

And the thing is, these well-known producers and engineers also have social anxiety problems, and they also come from that background, so they also enjoy meeting people who are doing the engineering thing. It's not like you become a well-known engineer and suddenly 50 engineers in your town or something. You're still kind of isolated. So our guest mixers actually enjoy coming to these and meeting people. So you guys should come and work on your social skills. And here's one from Chris Whited, which is what's your daily schedule slash routine? Do you even have one?

Speaker 3 (01:17:11):

My daily schedule and routine? Yeah. I mean, I go off of a schedule, but now things, well, this month has kind of been a little hectic. We've been doing a fast track with John Brown doing how to record, I guess, solid guitar amps and the different amps that you can choose, different mic selections, amps, sims, amp, modelers, everything down to how to get a good, what to use when you're recording guitars essentially. So that's been going on this entire month and I've been setting up for that a lot. It's kind of just been me, you, and John doing that. So it's been a lot of fun learning all that stuff and everything. So my normal schedule has been kind of affected from doing the course, but I'm anticipating that more of that this is probably going to happen in the future. Who knows?

Speaker 1 (01:18:08):

Yes.

Speaker 3 (01:18:09):

Cool. That was me asking Al if I'm going to do this more, am I fired? How good of a job did I do now? But typically, I wake up, I wake up, I don't eat breakfast. I dunno why, but I don't try and go to the gym every morning. And then from there I go straight to the studio and for the past couple months, it's literally just been like I'm at the studio until I need to stop working at the studio. I do a lot of work with Andrew still, but I don't, we've recently been working on the studio even more so we haven't had many bands in at the moment. So this has been giving me the opportunity to work on my own bands and work on my own production skills and becoming my own sort of producer and having my own sound, which has been really cool. I get to bounce that off of Andrew and he gets to give me tips and tricks on what he would do. So

(01:19:10):

I basically work in the studio all day. I take a break when I need my ears to take a break. I take a break when I get hungry for lunch, I'll leave the studio and just go buy a quick lunch, and that gives me a break and everything. Come back, eat some sort of dinner, leave for dinner, and then hang out with my girlfriend in the evenings and just try and wind down and relax. The day was probably long, getting the studio at nine practically, or whenever time I get to the studio, it's typically before 10. Yeah, that's basically, it is just work really hard during the day and then relax really hard in the evenings because I feel like that's super important is to, it's

Speaker 2 (01:19:53):

Part of doing the work, in my opinion, is recovering from the work

Speaker 3 (01:19:58):

You need to work so hard that you work into your schedule. This is time to recover. And I think when I was working so hard for those eight months, I feel like that almost kind of negated my work.

Speaker 2 (01:20:10):

It does.

Speaker 3 (01:20:12):

I wasn't allowing myself to relax or just go hang out with friends because I was like, no, I need to be working because that's what's going to get me further is why working and Well,

Speaker 2 (01:20:25):

The thing is you say that now, you say that maybe it negated the work, but I know a lot of people who look back on that time period in their lives where they worked like that and they were like, maybe it was counterproductive. But the thing is that since every successful person I know has had a time period where they hustled like that, I think that it is productive because I don't know a single successful person that didn't have that time period where instead of having that hustle, that intense hustle, they were like, I'm just going to chill with my girlfriend at night. You got to get to the point where you can do that.

Speaker 3 (01:21:04):

Right. But yeah, I guess it's such a weird tightrope because I feel like there has to be some sort of point where you work crazy hours to get to the point where you can almost set your own schedule.

(01:21:17):

You have to work. I feel like there has to be that initiation stage of like, alright, I got to just grind and grind and grind until I get the break that I need. And then once the break comes and it's like, okay, well I worked super hard and I earned this. I earned the ability to now go home and just relax. I worked so hard that I now get to earn the ability to take a step back and breathe and not be 100% on work all the time how I was. And that also, ultimately, to be honest, it crushed a lot of my personal relationships, like friends constantly just denying, hanging out with friends, constantly neglecting the people that I cared about in that time. It's kind of a weird, depressing turn, but it's true. You need to be able to control that because you need to have a personal life as much as you need to have a work life. And I think I'm just young and I'm trying to figure out what that balance is, but I feel like everyone gets to the point where they've figured it out. And for me it was like, I need to just work super hard. And then I got kicked in the face with like, you are tired.

Speaker 2 (01:22:29):

Well, yeah, that'll happen eventually, but I mean, look, there's a reason for why lots of people with high intensity jobs have multiple divorces and stuff like that. It just is what it is. I like the phrase, you can do anything you want in life, but you can't do everything

Speaker 3 (01:22:52):

And

Speaker 2 (01:22:52):

Something's got to give.

Speaker 3 (01:22:55):

Exactly. That's actually a really awesome quote. What was it? Again? You can do anything you want, but you can't do everything.

Speaker 2 (01:23:02):

Yes.

Speaker 3 (01:23:02):

Yeah, I love that because I've realized that, and it took losing lots of relationships and losing opportunities with friends and parties and weddings and stuff to be like, yeah, you lost that.

Speaker 2 (01:23:21):

Yeah, but the thing with weddings, the way I always saw it was, if you look at it statistically, probably going to be divorced within two years. So I would rather just do the work.

Speaker 3 (01:23:33):

That's true. Well, I've made it a goal for myself to hopefully with the woman that I married to never divorce. I would never want to put a family through that kind of thing.

Speaker 2 (01:23:44):

That's so nice for those people. You're such a good dude. Thank you.

Speaker 3 (01:23:48):

No, yeah, you have to set those kind of goals though, I feel like.

Speaker 2 (01:23:53):

No, it's true. Alright, so last question, and this is from Max Kessler, which is were there moments during the first few months of your internship where seemed like everything was coming at you at once and it seemed like a bombardment of information? And if so, how did you overcome those hurdles and manage to crush it from there on out?

Speaker 3 (01:24:14):

I knew what he was going to ask. The second you said that,

(01:24:18):

Yeah, everything was coming at me all at once. Immediately the second Andrew found out that I had audio potential. It was like, alright, let's throw everything at the wall and see what sticks. And luckily a lot of the edits that I did kind of stuck. So it was then like, okay, we have a full length album and here's the vocals to tune, perform the background vocals and tune them, edit all the drums, quantize all the drums, and then make a midi map of those drums, record the bass and then edit the base. All of these things kind of just slap you in the face at once. And it is definitely easy to sit there and be like, holy shit, holy shit, holy shit, how do I do this? But I feel like that adrenaline pushed me to get better. And like you said at the start, I knew that going into it, Andrew would not ream me for messing up the first time I did it. He would just be like, this is what you did wrong. Here's what you can do next time and do better. So yeah, things would bombard me at the beginning, but things just get slowly easier the more you do it. I was so intimidated by tracking drums.

(01:25:40):

I was always thinking, how do you keep all of that in phase? How do you record that and how do you make sure nothing clips constantly and how do you make sure that you're getting the right takes and how do you know when the drummer's hitting correctly? That was such an intimidating thought to me, and that's why I was always just like, you know what? Screw it. I'm not even going to try. We're going to use Steven Slay. We're going to use Superior. We're going to do whatever it takes to not record drums. That's what I was doing when I was working at home, but doing more and more records and recording more and more drums, you just get comfortable with it, but you need to throw yourself at it. It's almost good that a bunch of things landed on my lap at once because that forced me to learn strengths quickly and learn where I'm not good so that I can make those just as good as the other things that I was good at. Vocal tuning. Vocal tuning was easy, but it was still work. So I just knocked that out quickly to then know that I needed to spend most of my time on drums because I needed to make them sound good in time and you don't hear the edits and all that stuff. So yeah, I got bombarded definitely. And I feel like anyone who

Speaker 2 (01:26:48):

Anyone will,

Speaker 3 (01:26:49):

Yeah, anyone will. And even if it's just at any level vocal tuning for the first time, that could feel like a huge bombardment, but in my situation it was like, here's the entire record. Let's get this edited. And it's like, oh

Speaker 2 (01:27:04):

Boy, the bombardment doesn't stop. If you're progressing in life, the bombardment doesn't stop. There will always be something like, right now we're putting together this URM summit fucking bombardment. So much stuff. So much stuff that we got to learn. We've never done something like this for the first time.

Speaker 3 (01:27:26):

That's crazy.

Speaker 2 (01:27:27):

Yeah, there's always going to be that, so should just accept it and love it and do your best with it. Well, thanks for coming on, dude.

Speaker 3 (01:27:36):

Absolutely.

Speaker 2 (01:27:37):

Thank

Speaker 3 (01:27:37):

You for having me.

Speaker 2 (01:27:39):

Yeah, and people, if you want to talk to Nick, ask him more questions or just hang out. He is in the URM group and he will, since he's traveling with us, he will be at a lot of the URM meetups that myself and Joey and Joel will be at. So come and hang out with him or yeah, like I said, talk to him in the Private Producers club group. Yeah,

Speaker 3 (01:28:02):

Absolutely. I don't think I'm anything big. I'm just a guy that's working with my hero and now my other heroes. So if do have any questions you want to ask me or if you do want to talk to me about anything, just hit me up on Facebook or whatever and then from there we can just keep chatting or whatever you want. I'm here to help people. I've had so many awesome opportunities come my way. It's the least I can do to help someone else. So thank you AAL, for all the opportunities you've given me, and I really appreciate your time today.

Speaker 2 (01:28:30):

Cool. Thanks for coming on.

Speaker 3 (01:28:32):

Absolutely. Thanks everyone. See you. The

Speaker 1 (01:28:33):

Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast is brought to you by Line six. Line six is a musical instruments manufacturing company that specializes in guitar, amp and effects modeling and makes guitars, amps, effects, pedals and multi effects. We introduce the world's first digital modeling amp and we're behind the groundbreaking pod multi effect, which revolutionized the industry with an easy way to record guitar with great tone. Line six will always take dramatic leaps so you can reach new heights with your music. Go to www.linesix.com to find out more about line six. To get in touch with the URM podcast, visit urm.com/podcast and subscribe today.