GRAHAM COCHRANE: YouTube Growth, Monetizing Without Ads, and Why “Fix It In The Mix” Is A Lie

Speaker 1 (00:00:00):

Welcome to the Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast, brought to you by Apex High Quality Analog here for the recording studio For over 40 years, the patented Apex Excite Circuit has been audio engineer, secret weapon for signal enhancement, adding depth and punch to the lows and clarity and sparkle to the highs. Visit apex com for more information. And now your host, Joey Sturgis, Joel Wanasek and Eyal Levi.

Speaker 3 (00:00:26):

Well, today we have someone really cool. His name's Graham Cochran of the recording revolution. And what's really cool about the recording revolution is that it's kind of blown up in terms of being a source of a place for people to start with mixing and engineering, and he's offering a lot of really awesome information at a very easy way to digest it. And he's also been on Creative Live, which is really cool too, and you could check out his EQ and compression masterclasses that he has. There's two different classes on there, both on creative live.com.

(00:01:06):

I just think that his whole thing is that you don't need to go to a massive studio to get a good sound, and so he tries to show people how to make the most out of what they got or easy alternatives they can make to what they already have easy to purchase. He doesn't do stuff with expensive gear. He does everything with, I guess, stuff that the common person or the beginner can use, and he shows you how to make the best of it. So I think he's doing a very good thing.

Speaker 4 (00:01:42):

Absolutely.

Speaker 2 (00:01:43):

Welcome to the podcast, Graham, how are you doing?

Speaker 4 (00:01:45):

Hey, thanks so much. I'm doing great. How are you guys doing? Awesome. Fantastic.

Speaker 2 (00:01:49):

I'm doing pretty good. Your voice sounds really nice, so congrats on that. Thanks.

Speaker 3 (00:01:54):

Yeah, yeah. You actually have one of the best sounding voices out of any of the guests. What are you using? What's your voice going through?

Speaker 4 (00:02:01):

It's just going through a road in T one A, right into my interface, right into Skype.

Speaker 3 (00:02:07):

And what's in your room? Is it a treated room?

Speaker 4 (00:02:11):

Yeah, but it's not that amazing. But yeah, I'm kind of in the mixing sweet spot, so it's probably the most treated place the mic could be.

Speaker 3 (00:02:18):

We were actually laughing about this last time, but lots of times we'll get some guys on here that are a level mastering engineers who would be as audio file as audio file, can get kind of dudes with like a hundred thousand dollars monitoring rigs and all that, but they can't record their own voice to save their life, and they end up sending us these files with distortion on them and dogs barking and just you name it. So we're always impressed when someone has a super clear, good sounding voice.

Speaker 4 (00:02:54):

I aim to please. So glad it's going to make your job a little easier.

Speaker 3 (00:02:58):

Absolutely. It definitely will.

Speaker 2 (00:02:59):

Great. Yeah, we've already introduced you a little bit here and kind of tried to explain a little bit about the recording revolution, but perhaps you have a clearer version that you could share with our audience.

Speaker 3 (00:03:10):

And we were basically saying that your whole thing is helping people who might not have a huge studio but have a home studio or want to start a home studio and letting them know that they aren't bound by that they can get the best possible results out of that as well. And you basically just show them how to maximize what they have, work with what they have and how to make money with what they have.

Speaker 4 (00:03:37):

Yeah. Bingo. You got it. Cool. Okay, then boom, that was boom,

Speaker 2 (00:03:43):

Done. Let's get some ice cream. So what's, I'm curious, what are some of the earlier challenges that you faced with recording Revolution and how did you actually overcome them? Because it's been a pretty big success, right?

Speaker 4 (00:03:56):

Oh my gosh. Yeah. I mean, the first thing is that I didn't expect it to be what it is at all. I had no master plan. I really was completely clueless and still feel very clueless about what it is that I do. But yeah, man, it was challenging at the beginning because I was trying to help my friends originally that were all musicians that would send me list. It would send me a list from Sweetwater Musician's friend and say, Hey, here's in my cart. Here's what I'm going to buy so I can set up my studio. What do you think? I'd be like, man, that's way more money than you need to spend. Let me save you a few thousand dollars and you'll still be able to get just as good results. And so I was always helping my friends navigate what to get if they're brand new, and then basic stuff like EQ, compression, how to use a doll, just stuff so they could get rolling and make their demos.

(00:04:42):

I knew they were talented. I knew they were good at what they did on the musician side, but they didn't really know the engineer side. And that's what started the recording revolution is I was tired of saying the same thing over and over again to my friends. So my wife got smart. She said, write it down, write all this, make it a couple of articles. And at the time I was freelance recording and mixing, and I had always done it on the side, so it was two chicken to go out on my own and do it full time. And then when I lost a day job at a really inconvenient time during the recession and had just bought a house and had our first child and it was Pressure City and I was ramping up my freelance and I had some clients, but not enough to go from part-time to full-time in one week.

(00:05:27):

And so it was right around that time I'd already started blogging a little bit and I was thinking maybe I could use this to get more freelance clients. And that's kind of what originally I was thinking, well, maybe I'll ramp it up because I might be able to get more freelance clients. But I was still writing for my friends and people like them, and at the very beginning, it just seemed that people came out of the woodwork to read this stuff and to watch my crappy videos back in 2010, and it was helping some people. I didn't know how they were finding it, but the challenge at the beginning was just like, I don't know how to blog or make videos, or I definitely don't know anything about monetizing a website, so am I just wasting my time making all these free articles and videos for nobody? So it was a mess of confusion if that sums up the beginning of the recording revolution. You

Speaker 2 (00:06:12):

Had the real life pressure of this has to work, or I don't really have a second option.

Speaker 4 (00:06:18):

There was the pressure, which was good for me. If someone said, Hey, quit your job and become a content creator slash freelance engineer full-time with no guarantee pay, I was like, no thanks, right? I think I want to support my family. I'm not an idiot and I need to pay the bills. And I just had not a lot of vision as it were. So I don't think I'm very entrepreneurial. The people that I've met over the years, when they were 10, they had a plan to take over the world, but at the same time, there was no pressure because I was like, well, what else am I going to do? I could go to Home Depot and work during the day and then mix at night, but I don't want to go to Home Depot. I enjoy helping people and writing these articles, and I didn't feel any pressure that it had to work in the sense that I didn't know any different way to run a blog, so I just ran it the way I would want it to be run. I wrote articles that I would want to read that would've helped me when I was getting started. I made videos that would've helped me back before YouTube would've existed. That would've been great to have had that resource. I didn't think anybody was reading my site. So I was as open and controversial as I think I am today. I don't think it's that controversial, but some people seem to hate would've have to say. And so the

Speaker 5 (00:07:29):

Internet,

Speaker 4 (00:07:30):

My ignorance helped me just get my content out really though. Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (00:07:33):

Weird. I guess that's just par for the course with the internet.

Speaker 4 (00:07:36):

Yeah, that's all it is.

Speaker 3 (00:07:37):

Do something good someone will hate.

Speaker 2 (00:07:39):

Yep. So how long was it before the recording revolution was actually your full-time income?

Speaker 4 (00:07:43):

It took me maybe two years.

Speaker 2 (00:07:46):

Okay.

Speaker 4 (00:07:46):

Yeah. I made no money off of the website for about six months, and then I made some dollars came in, but it took me about another 18 months after that to replace what was my previous salary two years prior.

Speaker 3 (00:08:00):

What was the money coming in for? Was it one of your courses or how were you monetizing it early on?

Speaker 4 (00:08:06):

Yeah, it was all courses. I didn't know that if you start a blog or a podcast or something that typically people try to drive traffic so they can sell advertising. I didn't realize that was what people did. So I was like, well, honestly, I didn't think about monetizing until I was trying to make some videos on Pro Tools. And at the time, YouTube would only let me do 15 minute videos, and I wanted to teach somebody who knew nothing about Pro Tools, how to be super, super confident pro tools, but it would take me three to four hours of video if you came over to my house and sat down next to me and we had coffee. And I said, okay, let me make Pro Tools not scary to you, and then you'll be able to go home and make records with it. That's going to take so many YouTube videos is what I was thinking. So I was like, how about I just record it and put it online as a download and maybe sell it super long and took me a long time to make and maybe someone will buy it. And when somebody first bought that thing, I was like, wow, what a concept.

Speaker 3 (00:09:03):

It must have been the best day.

Speaker 4 (00:09:04):

It was one of the best days ever. I still have that PayPal screen grab like my AKA, my first dollar, and that was how I was monetizing at the beginning, and it's the primary way I make a living through this now is selling in-depth courses.

Speaker 2 (00:09:17):

So you've worked under some producers and some mastering engineers, is that right?

Speaker 4 (00:09:22):

Not necessarily mastering engineers, but mostly in the recording and mixing world? Yeah, I worked at a studio for a little while. I hated that process, but what

Speaker 3 (00:09:29):

Did you hate about it? Nobody

Speaker 4 (00:09:31):

Liked making music. It wasn't fun anymore. It was all pressure. I would go into work with these people and everyone had a frown on their face, and I was just so confused. I was like, man, I got into this. I really like making music and it's fun and y'all are not having any fun. And if this is the way my life's going to be and I'll get paid nothing and have to work crazy hours that I can't really support a family on, then I'm out of this.

Speaker 5 (00:09:54):

The music industry has a way of taking away your soul and crushing you, and you really, really do have to love this. But there are people that are doing fantastic,

Speaker 3 (00:10:08):

But I definitely know what Graham's talking about. I know where he is coming from. There's plenty of ways that the music industry can become a really, really sad place. So I've experienced it myself. That was one of my main motivators to get out of being full-time in the music industry and to doing all this stuff like what we're doing with the podcast or Creative live or whatnot. It's been to try to get away from environments like that. So I completely know what you're talking about, cra. That's a very, very real part of studio life. Yeah,

Speaker 2 (00:10:45):

There's sort of two things that we kind of do on the show, and that's to try and motivate people or give them tools that will help them motivate themselves as well as give them advice on what to do with that motivation. So once you're motivated, so what is the right thing to do to actually propel yourself to that next step? And I guess the question for you would be how did you land some of those gigs and was there anything that you learned from those situations that you walked away from as a wiser man?

Speaker 4 (00:11:16):

Oh, I mean there's been a ton of those. So on the freelancing side of things, in a lot of ways, like I said, my ignorance helped me. I mean, I was making records in my dorm room at college because I said, Hey, I have an inbox in Pro Tools, I can make a record. Why not? Why not? I didn't know any better. I was messing around with Corg eight track hard disc recorders and high school and in some free cakewalk software on my Dell PC before I got to college. And it was all just magic to me. It was all just a new, if you're a musician and you get into recording, you guys know this. It's like a new instrument to play. It's a new way to be creative, even if you've already written the songs. Wow. Now you get to create the recording of 'em, and it's a whole nother art form.

(00:12:01):

So my ignorance and excitement in that in some ways help me just reach out to my musician friends at school and say, Hey, do you want to record demos? You want to make a record? You need me to record your live recital? And it was like the guy walking around putting up flyers that I cut grass. I was the guy that was walking around saying, I can record you. And I had no fear or no shame, and I didn't know that I was bad. And I'm really glad I didn't know because I'm the kind of person, if I thought I wasn't very good, I probably would've just stayed inside and played Xbox instead. But

Speaker 3 (00:12:32):

Well, you know what? I really think there's a lot to be said for fearlessness, and I've read in many places and in many studies that the people who advance the most in life are the ones who either feel no fear or who feel their fear and they ignore it. So to just say, I want this goal, and you go for it and don't let fear stop you. I think that that's a great thing that people should pick up from this, because I think for a lot of people, it is scary to put themselves out there, especially if they do think they're not that good. It could be real scary for them and it could actually keep them playing Xbox. So to just have no shame and have no fear and just go for it, that's the best way I think.

Speaker 5 (00:13:19):

Well, it's like the fear of public speaking. A lot of people fear it more than death. So I hear, and it's weird because having come from a background of playing in a band, I've always enjoyed being in front of people, but I remember taking a speech class in college and watching people sit up there and just shake from nerves and trembling, and you're thinking, God, they're only talking to eight other people. What's the big deal? It's just a lot of people, it's a self fear of being judged and throwing yourself out there, for example, on the internet can be pretty brutal at times, and it definitely can make you question everything you're doing no matter how good it is or how bad it is.

Speaker 4 (00:13:55):

Oh, absolutely. I mean, yeah, that was the new lesson with the recording revolution, and I was actually really honored to be at Dave Satos show on Satos Place recently, and one of the questions that came up was, what's your biggest challenge with being a YouTube content creator? And that was exactly what I talked about was not having my soul crushed. We talking about Soul Crush, and that's the biggest challenge is I had no idea, again, little ignorant me that I could put out videos that are free. I'm not asking you for anything. I literally took time to make this video to show you how to do something and you could a complain about it. I never really understood that it was free. So it's about worth about as much as you paid for it. How dare you waste our time. I know. And then I'm going to go back to watching kitten videos Now.

(00:14:43):

I can't believe I wasted my time. They were complaining about the video, some of them, but it was that people would complain about what I was wearing in the videos, I don't like your V-neck t-shirts or What's up with that? I don't like your hair. I'm like, what? So I was surprised, and at first I was just like, then why do this? This is dumb. These people are like, mean, I did this for friends that I care about these people. They want to complain about something. So that was just a new experience for me. And I early on had to weigh like, is this actually helping people? If it is, maybe I'll keep doing it if it's not, I don't really want to deal with these clowns on YouTube. So it was an interesting experience.

Speaker 5 (00:15:28):

Yeah, that's crazy. I used to run a very, very successful guitar blog site before YouTube took over the world of instruction, called in sing guitar.com, and it got hacked a few years ago, and I just had been too busy to restore it, but it was very, very well received, and we'd done over a million unique hits and eight years or something like that, and putting your name on something like that and being the lead person and putting out and writing articles and doing content is just an open invitation for people to come after you. And I mean, I have an inbox folder full of just hate mail that I've saved over the years, just kind, I mean, you're pissed when you read it, but you go back years later and as you've been more successful and you read it and it's kind of entertaining, but it's just amazing the things that people say and they do, and for what reason? It's like, I pay for this website out of my own pocket. I get all these people to come and write to help you get better at guitar, and you take that as I am some sort of evil, conniving, terrible person that needs to be destroyed. Okay, cool.

Speaker 3 (00:16:31):

It just comes with the territory of doing stuff on the internet. So I definitely think that maybe not reading comments is a smart thing or just letting it slide off your back, like water off a duck's back or

Speaker 5 (00:16:45):

Yeah, it takes training

Speaker 3 (00:16:47):

Arrows bouncing off your armor basically. It definitely does take training. I know when my band first got signed and bad reviews would come in or people would hate us online, I'd get offended, and I paid attention when I saw movie stars saying that they never read their own reviews because why would they put themselves through that? They want to enjoy their lives. Why do they need to read that? Do they just want to purposefully have a bad day? Is that the, so then I realized, no, my MO is not to have a bad day. These comments don't matter. What matters is the views and the sales, and if people are enjoying the shows and then fast forward to doing stuff online, like Creative Live or whatever I've done, I judge by view count and sales count and the positive reactions because I feel like there's always going to be those dudes who just have it in them to hate, hate, hate, hate. So you can't let it get you down, in my opinion. And for everyone listening to this, you can't let that get you down.

Speaker 4 (00:17:52):

Oh yeah. And I hate that. It sounds like all I've talked about is the negative side of things. These are the biggest challenges with being a content creator. You guys are aware of that being a band, being an engineer, where you put your work out there, anything you put out there, the haters are the biggest challenge, and it's, who is it? John Acuff talks about critic math. You get a thousand compliments or positive reviews and then one negative one, and that's negates all of them. Yeah, a thousand plus one equals one negative review, and it's so true. So it takes, I'm still trying to figure that out and I can be doing so well because I know that what we've able to do here, the recording revolution has helped so many people, and then I can forget that an instant when someone says, well, that video's dumb, or I think the mix in that video sounds horrible, so I'm going to listen to it. And you're just like, oh my gosh, am I horrible? And I thought it would go away a lot sooner and it doesn't. But most of the people are so helpful and so encouraging, and they're the only reason why I'm still doing this. Otherwise, I would've moved on if there was no one I could help, there would really be no financial ability to keep up this site. And all the time it takes took

Speaker 2 (00:19:00):

Me the last two or three years to really get over it. Now I'll go to a video, like a Ask Alexandria video or something and it'll have 4 million views and 95% likes, and then scroll down a couple of pages and there's a comment on there that's just asking, Alexandria sucks or whatever, and it doesn't phase me anymore luckily, because I learned that the quickest way to failure is trying to please everyone and you'll never do it. So I always keep that in mind whenever I'm reading negative comments. And for me, it really seems to help.

Speaker 5 (00:19:34):

Yeah, it's like a PAC mentality too, because if you go and you defend yourself and it's like a bullying, everybody jumps on and, oh yeah, let's bury this guy just because it's the cool thing to do, and then all of a sudden you have 10 times more people coming at you and you're like, hold on. All I was just trying to do is justify what I was saying, and you just got to realize that it's a waste of time. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (00:19:54):

So Graham question then, if it took you two years to get to full income status with recording revolution, what were you doing in the meantime?

Speaker 4 (00:20:06):

Dude, my time was split between creating as much content as I possibly could. I didn't know anything about SEO. I still don't, I didn't know anything about online marketing. All I knew was how to create content. So I figured why don't I create as much as I possibly can and let the cards and the chips fall where they may. And then the other half of the time was trying to record as many bands as I could and mix as many bands as I could to support my family. And it was working ish. But I mean, I try to tell people too that there was 18 months in there where we were on food stamps as a family, and my kids were on my kid at the time, and my daughter was on Medicaid. And it was a real low point for my pride because I feel like I'm working hard and I see momentum. But then you got to tell your family and your friends, what is it you do again? What Mexican bands, and I have this blog about audio and Right. How many kids do

Speaker 5 (00:21:01):

You have, Graham? I have

Speaker 4 (00:21:02):

Two daughters of six and three.

Speaker 5 (00:21:04):

Congratulations. I have two and about to have a third in a few weeks here.

Speaker 4 (00:21:09):

Wow. Congrats, man.

Speaker 5 (00:21:11):

How do you deal with your wife during that period of time? Because when I got married before I had children, it was the same thing. I was playing in a band and trying to make it, I'm like, oh, yeah, we're going to blah, blah, blah. We're working so hard. And she's just like, yeah, yeah, yeah, show me the money. So after that, then it was going onto the studio, which was a slow grow. I mean, I had a good out of school it job out of college where I was making a really good office salary. Then I lost my job and I just said, you know what? I hate, this isn't who I am. And I kind of went for it and started this studio and made literally one 10th of my salary that first year or so dealing with my wife and my parents and stuff like that. At that time, it was just shameful. I go to family functions and they'll be like, oh boy. Oh yeah, so you got a job yet and blah, blah, blah.

Speaker 2 (00:21:58):

When are you going to get a real job?

Speaker 5 (00:21:59):

It was really, I remember for me, that resonates a lot. And that was very frustrating when I was getting into this stuff. And it was a real challenge, and you have to sit there and tell your wife, and then you want to have kids. You're like, oh my God. Because nothing motivates you more than when you actually have a child that's a dependent and you realize that you've got to put food on that table no matter what, whether you have a good day or bad day, and that's a kick in the butt. I

Speaker 4 (00:22:22):

Survived those first couple of years because my wife supported me. If she didn't, I would've quit because I was doubting myself. And if she was like, man, what the heck are you doing? I would've been like, yeah, I have no idea. So let's fold this up. So I was on the recording, evolution almost didn't happen. So it's just been one of those stories of I'm glad my wife as awesome as she is and supports me. She knew early on that this was onto something that there was, I don't know. She saw what I saw that people were all about what I was saying. It resonated with people. People actually took advice and went implemented and got results, and nothing speaks louder than people going and doing something and actually working for them and them getting excited about it, and then them telling you and telling other people. And so even though the dollars weren't there, she saw that I enjoyed it. She saw that it helped people and she was the only person except for maybe my brother who's my best friend, who I didn't feel judged by during that time. But every other interaction was just like, what is it you do again? Does that work? Does that make money? And the first couple of years I was like, I don't know. It will. I feel good about what I'm doing, but I have no good answer for you.

Speaker 5 (00:23:33):

That's a great one at Christmas, isn't it? Oh

Speaker 3 (00:23:36):

My gosh. So I guess having a very strong support structure helped you through the, I guess, lean times.

Speaker 4 (00:23:45):

Oh, absolutely. And to be honest, when I started this, it was in panic mode. Like I said, I'd lost my job and I was just starting to blog and I was like, oh my gosh, what am I doing here? What am I going to do? And I'm a Christian, so I pray a lot and I try to discern what does God want me to do in my life? And I was, I'm so confused, so confused during that time. And I felt that he was telling me over and over again that I was doing the right thing, that doing the recording revolution was what he wanted me to do. And that was really hard to discern because at the same time, I read my Bible and I can see verses that tell me that I need to provide for my family, and that's actually in there.

(00:24:22):

And I'm like, well, is this really providing or am I just going into my office and creating content, shooting videos and interacting with people's questions on Twitter? I really had a hard time personally and experientially justifying what I was doing in light of is it taking care of my family? And it was cool and all, and people liked it, but between feeling like I was meant to do this and then my wife who when I would have moments of freak out, she would say, no, this is what you're supposed to do. I think this is really helping people. Let's ride it out a little bit longer. I mean, she was freaked out too. She prefers having money in the bank than not having money in the bank if you ask her. Well,

Speaker 3 (00:24:56):

Yeah, don't

Speaker 4 (00:24:57):

They all? Yeah, go figure. But she was really a huge support.

Speaker 2 (00:25:01):

Well, I was going to ask you, I know there's a lot of people that listen to the show who are probably trying to figure out how they can get more clients. And of course when you start out, I feel like it is highly location based, and that's why I was going to ask you is what's your location? Yeah,

Speaker 4 (00:25:16):

So I'm in Tampa, Florida, and when this happened, I had just moved from Virginia to Tampa, so I actually didn't know anybody in the area.

Speaker 2 (00:25:23):

So was it hard for you to ramp up and find local musicians that would trust you to work on their music? And was there any kind of challenges there?

Speaker 4 (00:25:33):

Absolutely. So ironically, I didn't do much in the local scene and I still don't do as much as I thought I would do in the local scene. It all became all my past clients in Virginia. I'd reach out to them still and be like, Hey, man, send me stuff to mix. I'm more than happy to mix your record. I flew up there a bunch of times and recorded records, and then that became a thing that I started to do was mobile recording. I just sort of fell into it because the artists that I knew didn't live anywhere near me, and so I would literally pack a portable rig and fly to Virginia, Boston, wherever to make a record in someone's house or their church or their basement. And that kind of became a way of life for a few years, so didn't do much locally. That's awesome.

Speaker 2 (00:26:15):

One of the key things you said there is that you kept in touch with all the people from where you used to live, and that's a good strategy, I guess overall is to keep a little book of everyone that you encounter and to, I guess not take advantage, but make them happy that they want to hire you again and keep those contacts, keep in touch with those people, and they might not necessarily reach out to you. It might not be intuitive to them to hit you up again. So every month or so, maybe there's a regular basis where you're hitting those people up and saying, Hey, is there anything you guys need? Are you guys working on any new music? What have you been up to? That's something that I did early on and worked really well for me. I would also make sure that anyone who worked with me had such a great experience that they would go home and if they played any shows with other bands or went on tour, they would share the story, which would've given me additional clients and have a lot of people coming in based on those.

Speaker 3 (00:27:14):

I think that being mobile helped me tremendously, and I think it's easier than ever these days to be mobile because recording technology has gotten so small. You don't need to wheel an enormous racks across the country of compressors and EQs and all this. You can do it with an interface in the laptop, but when I was recording without having these extra things I do, when I was 100% producing bands, that's how I would take care of gaps in the schedule or bands dropping off. Things like that was I would look to places out of town and see how I could travel to them to keep recording. I wouldn't let it be limited to just people coming to me, and I'd never really got people from my area anyways. People would travel to me to record, but I also would travel to them. I mean, I've flown to la, I've flown to Detroit, gone to Portland, gone to England, gone to France to record, and being mobile has just been a lifesaver for me. So I recommend that to everybody, be able to go to the client if you can.

Speaker 4 (00:28:28):

That's awesome.

Speaker 3 (00:28:28):

Yeah. So I was wondering, did you go to school to learn how to record or are

Speaker 4 (00:28:34):

Yeah, both. I was self-teaching during high school, and then I just wanted to be a rockstar, so I didn't really feel like college was a necessity to be a rockstar. So I remember my parents, they had saved up money and my grandfather had saved up money, which was a huge blessing, but they said, look, we saved up for you your whole life to go to college, so you can do whatever you want, but you're going to college and after that you can go try to be a rock star. And so I found out that you could go to college for audio recording. So I was like, all right, cool. So compromise. So I'll be able to make my own records and because that's all I got into recording for is to make my own records. And I think, Joey, that's kind of your story too, and mine

Speaker 5 (00:29:15):

As well.

Speaker 4 (00:29:15):

There you go. Yep. So that's all I wanted to do. I didn't really care about other people's music at the time. I cared about mine. And so yeah, I went to school in Virginia at a place called James Madison, and they had a great audio program, and that's when I started to actually learn how you're supposed to make records, which was really good at times and also really bad at times. I learned some bad stuff in audio school, but

Speaker 3 (00:29:36):

What was bad about it? And the reason not to go into a negative place. But the reason I'm asking that is because if we can stop people from spending 80 grand and four years of their life in certain places, I want them to know what they're getting into. So I'm just curious, what did you think was bad about it? Oh,

Speaker 4 (00:29:55):

Yeah. So this is a huge topic in general. I would say go to school if you can pay for it. And when I say pay for it, I mean pay cash for it. I don't like debt personally, and I'm so sad that so many of my friends are, like you said, loaded down with $80,000 student loans once they get out of school and they still have to go be an intern somewhere or they still don't get paid anything. So I'm like, man, how are you going to get ahead in life? And you're already got 80,000 behind?

Speaker 3 (00:30:20):

Yeah, how are they going to get the money to open their own studio eventually, or to just buy the gear needed to have a good mobile rig when they're on the line for that much money?

Speaker 4 (00:30:29):

No jokes. Yeah, that's why if you're like, well, I guess I'll go do this, and I have no money saved for school, it makes it a tough sell for me, but I was fortunate to have it paid for, so that was great. But I was going to answer your question, ail was the thing that I didn't like about Audi School that I didn't know at the time was at least where I was taught, my professors taught me a certain way to record, which was maybe descriptive of the time we were living in, this was early two thousands, like oh 1, 0 2. And so everything was like, Hey, digital is now the future. So record everything clean and never process on the way in. And so you don't back yourself into a corner and you can always compress it or EQ it or do whatever later. And so it was all about just get it super clean and you can change it later, which is a legitimate way to work.

(00:31:17):

But that was one of the things that actually made it harder for me to make records because then recording became, this was my interpretation of that, and what it turned me into recording became just capture the source, man. Just capture the source as quickly as you can because mixing is where you make a record. Mixing is where you invariably make your decisions is what I was taught. It's where you make your compression decisions, your EQ decisions, your effects decisions. So I became a person that was like, record everything clean if you're recording guitar, don't have any effects on your guitar. And it made mixing way longer and harder for me, and I kept wondering, why is this so hard? Or really the mix was not really good in the end because it had no direction, because when I recorded it, the album had no direction. It just sounded like a direction list, like a producer list, soundless recording. So that was one thing that I felt like I was taught is that's the way you have to do it for my professors at least. And I've had to undo that way of thinking for me. And sometimes I still record clean if that's what I want it to sound like, or I'm really not sure. But I was never taught to make decisions. I was never taught to commit, and that made the process too long for me.

Speaker 3 (00:32:25):

Ooh, committing is such an important thing to do.

Speaker 4 (00:32:28):

It helps me tremendously. Yeah.

Speaker 3 (00:32:30):

Yeah, we preach that one, commit, commit, commit as early on in the process as possible, but it requires a big amount of confidence in yourself and trust that what you're hearing is worth committing to. But how can you get a record done with no direction? Now, I do think that the one saving grace of that type of thinking that you're describing is to get safety net clean copies of stuff like safety net di dr. Put a trigger on the drum so that you can use it later and stuff. But to just record something that has no vibe, no stank, no art to it, and then to expect the mixer to understand what it's supposed to be doesn't make sense to me, because I've noticed that lots of the great art happens at the moment of recording

Speaker 4 (00:33:24):

Bingo.

Speaker 3 (00:33:25):

So yeah, you're not letting that happen if you don't record. With that in mind.

Speaker 2 (00:33:31):

Some of my favorite things that I've done very quickly, nothing left to be done at the end. Get the guitar sound now, hit record, commit that. And I think it kind of works the same way in songwriting as well too. It's not like I'll write the verse later. I've got a good chorus. I think a lot of the songs, some of the greatest songs have three to five minutes. I mean, that image and heap song that's really famous, she wrote it in seven minutes.

Speaker 3 (00:33:58):

I know John Lennon said that you always finish the song that night when he was teaching his son how to write music. The number one rule was finish it that night. Don't let it linger. Start a new song the next day. If the song you wrote that night, that day wasn't good, whatever, you write another one, but do not let it linger. The idea is only fresh once. Lightning only strikes once. So finish it, do what it takes, and if it's not great, you move on to another one.

Speaker 4 (00:34:29):

I love that

Speaker 5 (00:34:30):

The term we've been kicking around a lot is hot potato. Treat it like a hot potato when the inspiration hits. Just do it, get it done, get it out of the way, and don't procrastinate. Because if you do and you don't commit, you're going to miss that inspiration. And those moments sometimes don't come so often, so you just have to capitalize off of it. You,

Speaker 4 (00:34:48):

It's hard for newer engineers and musicians to do that because of, like you someone said, just a lack of confidence. And I think there's a lack of confidence, not just because they're newer, but because they somehow believe, and for a while, I believe this too, that there is a right way to make a recording or it's indicative of the questions I'll get, and maybe you guys get these as well. I know you guys have done recording workshops, and it's like, how do you get a good kick drum sound? And it's like, well, there's a lot of cool sounding kick drum sounds. They're very different. What kind of kick drum sound do you want? And the problem is they think that there is a right kick drum sound or a right guitar tone or the right vocal sound, and so they're afraid of getting it wrong, wrong.

(00:35:37):

There's so much fear of what if I do it wrong? Or what if it doesn't sound professional that there's a lot of apprehension, lack of confidence, can't commit. So they just sort of record things aimlessly, and then they look to a plugin or a fancy trick or a side chain or something to magically turn they're fearful track into something amazing. And so I think a lot of times just having the guts to say, I'm going to make something that sounds cool to me and I don't really know or care if it's right or if it's the right way to do things, can be a beneficial practice.

Speaker 3 (00:36:08):

I think one of the best ways to get over that fear is to just do whatever it is you're afraid of a lot. For instance, if you are afraid or procrastinating on getting a kick drum sound, well then try to get 10 kick drum sounds. If you're procrastinating working on a mix because you don't know what you're going to do with the vocals, well then mix them 10 different ways. Just make yourself mix them 10 different ways. And even if the first few rounds suck by 10 times later, they're not going to suck. And what that does also by doing a bunch of versions, is that each version becomes less important in your mind. So if you're so scared of this one thing, this one thing is just like burrowing a hole through your brain and not letting you go forward. If you do 10, you can't focus on that one thing anymore. So that's one way that I've kind of overcome fear of moving forward on things is instead of focusing on that one thing and multiply it, and then you can't be scared of it, now I have five kick drum sounds to choose from. Which one do I like best? Which one fits best? And then by doing that, also you start to realize that there is no right or wrong. There's just context. Does it fit in the context of this song and this mix? Yes or no? Easy.

Speaker 5 (00:37:25):

Well, I feel like to improve anyways, you have to make a ton of mistakes. So it doesn't matter if you record a guitar and it sucks when you get to mix, you'll be like, okay, it was crap. So reamp it, try it again. And from that experience of making a lot of mistakes or having results that would you consider under power, that's how you get better. You just have to listen to your work, be aware of what it is and how it stacks up, and then think about how you can improve it, try stuff, be experimental.

Speaker 2 (00:37:54):

And when I started out, I had that same attitude, which was do stuff that I think sounds good. I never really was afraid to, I wasn't apprehensive about it at all. I think I've probably told the story way too many times in the podcast, but I had a Radio shack microphone. I would just sit it on my table and I would play drums next to it, and then I would record that into Sony Acid Pro and then open the stock EQ that came with it and tweak it for hours and hours and hours and wasn't afraid of anything. So experimentation is another thing that, like you said, Joel, that's something that a lot of people need to do more of.

Speaker 3 (00:38:34):

And just be fearless. Do your best, even if you are scared, pretend that you're fearless.

Speaker 4 (00:38:39):

Oh yeah.

Speaker 3 (00:38:39):

Fake it till you make it on the fearless front. Well, there's a lot of studies too, between successful and non-successful people where a successful person will get an idea and might or might not get that pang of fear of what if it fails? What if it's dumb? What if they still go for it anyways? They put that to the side, whereas the non-successful person gets the same idea. Everyone gets good ideas, there's no shortage of ideas. So the non-successful gets the idea. And then the natural fears come in the what ifs, what if, what if you're dumb? What if you'll fail? What if? Well, you'll get made fun of, tomatoes will get thrown at you, and then you'll get drawn and quartered, and then they just don't do anything about it. So question for you. It's 2015. It's a tough market. Lots of people are recording now. Do you have any advice for people that are production beginners who are trying to come up in this tough market and either supplement their income or go full time?

Speaker 4 (00:39:41):

Oh yeah, absolutely. I think the people that are going to make it in this industry are the people that aren't looking at the crowded market and saying, oh my gosh, everyone is making records now. How am I going to stand out? It's the people that are focused on being their client's favorite and adding as much value as possible. So there's a couple of things you can do there. One is don't be a jerk, and that'll get you a lot farther than a bunch of people. So that eliminates maybe 20, 30, 40% of the population, maybe more. I'm being conservative. Don't be a jerk.

(00:40:16):

Be all about if you have one client, even if it's a free client, let's say you're starting out and you're making a record for some friends and it's for free and you're just getting experience, they're getting a free recording. Make it as amazing as possible and treat them royalty. Treat them like they are a high paying client, and don't phone it in. Be creative, make them happy. If they're not happy with how things are going, find out ways you can add more value either in the recording phase and the mixing phase and make it what they want. If they're having challenges, solve them and just bend over backwards. Like Joey said, having clients that want to work with you again because you are a joy to work with, word of mouth is still how things work in this world. It's just been only exaggerated by social media.

(00:41:01):

Absolutely. So word of mouth is the most powerful thing you can have or have destroyed. And they say all things being equal, all other things being equal price or competency, let's say. Or maybe even if you throw some of those out, people prefer to work with people they know and trust. And so it's very easy to be somebody's trusted advisor to be someone's helper. And that's why I try to think about any client I have. And now if it's a student of mine, I want to be their trusted advisor, meaning I want to suggest things that will help their recordings get better, even if it means working with somebody else or checking out somebody else's tutorial. Or if somebody does something better than me, I can have a lifelong relationship with this customer if I do everything I can to make sure that they get what they need and they get value. And people recommend you because of that. So you may not have a lot of clients right now, but the ones that you do have, you will always stand out because you do excellent work, but you make their lives better because you add so much value and you make it all about them and not about you.

Speaker 2 (00:42:10):

Yeah. Another thing I always recommend is to be consistent, but also be someone that they can count on. And if you figure out those two things and if you figure out how to do it to enough people, you'll be set for a long time. Now, the music industry of course, changes a lot, and people don't tend to stay with the same producer forever. I mean, some people do, some don't. So you have to keep that in mind. But as long as you're being someone that they can count on, and if you say that you're going to have it by Tuesday and you turn it in by Tuesday, then that's huge too.

Speaker 4 (00:42:49):

Absolutely. Another thing I was thinking about too is going back to the what's the right way to record or the right way. Kick Drummer should sound everybody and their mom right now is trying to get good at recording and mixing and good is a made up benchmark that we're all shooting for. Maybe it's a certain type of record or whatever, but I think the people that are probably stand out the most long-term have a good career in this, are the people that are innovative in terms of sounds. It's like funny, Dave Posada always says it's better to sound new than to sound good.

Speaker 5 (00:43:19):

That's awesome. Yeah, that's great advice. I agree.

Speaker 4 (00:43:21):

Yeah, I think that is the most encouraging thing I could say to somebody, because you could be brand new at this, but you could think of a new way something could sound, and man, that's exciting when you think about it that way.

Speaker 2 (00:43:31):

We've got some questions from our audience that we'd like to

Speaker 3 (00:43:35):

Ask you. So Michael McDonald is asking, could Graham discuss the history of how he found success with his YouTube tutorials and what, in his opinion are the opportunities that the YouTube platform might provide for musicians, engineers, creative folk? In 2015? What, if any, are some smart, effective ways to use technology like YouTube to put your name out? Oh,

Speaker 4 (00:43:58):

Great question. There's a million ways to succeed with YouTube. I have a lot of friends that have popular YouTube channels and they do different things. What's worked for me is having a consistent voice. So I figured out early on what the recording revolution is going to be all about. I'm going to teach you how to make killer records with really affordable stuff, AKA, what you already own, which is always the cheapest stuff, the stuff you already have. And so I'm always going to challenge the notion that you need to spend more money. I'm going to challenge that consistently. I'm going to show simple tips. I'm not a very complex person. I can't wrap my head around really complex things. So I keep my teaching very simple. I always focus on simple moves, foundational elements, and I teach from a musician standpoint, not an engineer standpoint, because I'm more musician than engineer.

(00:44:47):

So I always think about it as a song of music and not about it as a formula that you plug this frequency into this and you get this result. So I kind of know all those things about the way I teach. And so when people find my, I say all that to say, when you find my channel, you either instantly jive with it and go, oh, cool, this is what I'm looking for. Or you go, this guy A, I don't like his V-neck, I don't like his fohawk, and B, it's too basic for me, or he doesn't know what he's talking about. I want someone to show me some really crazy sick advanced stuff because they want the next level, whatever that means to them. So they either like it or they don't. And I try to be as consistent as possible, and I want to divide as quickly as possible.

(00:45:26):

You want your YouTube channel to be very divisive in that way, either. It's not for everybody. You can't be for everybody. So if you're a clothing line, are you clothing line for all human beings, old people, young people, male, female? Or are you a clothing line for 18 to 25-year-old men that live in the city and they have high paying jobs? It's going to define what style you create. And for those guys, your clothing line is going to be perfect. And for grandmas that live in the middle of Wisconsin, they're going to say, no, that's not for me. And that's a very good thing. So you want your YouTube channel to be very clear how you're going to grow an audience, a loyal audience, an audience that loves you, and other people will go somewhere else. But that alone won't make you a living unless like some of my friends, I have a guy friend who's named Peter Hollands, and he's a big acapella singer, producer, and he was an engineer, but he also is a singer songwriter, and he's just gotten big on YouTube these last four or five years just doing killer music videos, very highly produced, all acapella.

(00:46:24):

He arranges popular songs, records them all himself, mixes them, and then produces these high budget videos. And maybe he does one a month, maybe two a month, and they take 'em a long time. But between selling records through that or YouTube advertising or things like Patreon where you can get some supporters, he makes a full-time living creating YouTube videos. On the other hand, don't make hardly anything off of actually YouTube. YouTube for me is a place to be discovered, grow an audience, and then I try to send them to my site because my site is where I can get them to join in my newsletter or I can send them even more material and eventually let them know that I have really in-depth courses that a small percentage of them will buy, but that's enough to make a living. So I use YouTube to direct people back to my mailing list. So I would say start a mailing list from day one.

Speaker 2 (00:47:16):

And if you're in a band and you're listening to this, you need to make a mailing list. I tell every band, why don't you have a mailing list? It doesn't make any sense. The only reason why I even know anything that's happening with Deftones or Slipknot is because they email me because I'm too busy doing other stuff and I don't pay attention to all the music news that's going on. And when they email me, I open it because I like the band, and it's usually something really cool. So why aren't you doing that?

Speaker 3 (00:47:46):

There's also a really practical reason to start an email list, which is you might have a lot of followers on social media, and that's great in social media groups and forums and whatever. That's all fantastic, good job. But what happens if they decide to change their rules concerning something that has been giving you a lot of traction? We know Facebook changes their rules all the time at the drop of the hat and certain features that maybe were great that some people were using just will one day you'll wake up and they don't exist anymore. So your email list is the one thing that you own that gives you contact to all your people no matter what. Rules get changed on social media networks, you still have your email list so highly recommended.

Speaker 4 (00:48:38):

A hundred percent agree. Absolutely. And emails are still the best way to get in touch with people is the most direct thing.

Speaker 2 (00:48:44):

Here's a question from Jason LaFontaine. Awesome. Last name killing name.

Speaker 4 (00:48:49):

Yeah.

Speaker 2 (00:48:50):

Graham has the audio income project and coaches, individuals starting up a recording mixing business. What is the most common mistake that he sees his students make when they first start out, and what is the most valuable piece of business advice that was ever given to you, Graham?

Speaker 4 (00:49:05):

Oh, so you want all the goods for free? No, that's a great question.

Speaker 2 (00:49:09):

Sign up at recording Revolution.

Speaker 4 (00:49:11):

Yeah, just buy my course. No, no. I'll tell you. I tell you. So I see so many mistakes. One of them is kind of goes back to the YouTube channel. I review a lot of these students' websites. They built up their portfolio site. They want to freelance, they want to get into recording and mixing. And what I'm trying to teach them in this course is how to start doing this as a little side income. My goal is to teach 'em how to make 500 to a thousand bucks a month on the side doing it. And it's a really manageable goal, and I do that for a reason. I want people to realize that, oh wow, I'm able to bring in an extra 500, a thousand bucks a month doing what I love for a few hours a week while I keep my day job or while I go to school.

(00:49:51):

And then the guys that are crazy into it will ramp that up, and if they get really good, they'll go for it. But other guys will just be happy to have some extra money. So I'm teaching these guys how to do it, and a lot of 'em have never set up a portfolio website. And the biggest mistake I see is on their sites is a, they're like the Walmart of audio. I'll record you, I'll mix you, I'll master you, I'll produce your videos, I'll you song write. I can do everything. And you don't want to do everything. You want to be able to do everything, but you don't want your site to be like, Hey, I do all these services. You want it to be very, very clear that you are an expert at mixing. All I do is mixing. There's something amazing about stumbling across a guy's site and all he does is mixing.

(00:50:31):

You think, huh? All he does is mixing. He must be good at mixing. He's not even bothering with recording or mastering. He specializes. And now you may be able to do lots of different things, but I say pick a thing or two, but pick what's your main thing, your unique offering, and then make your site as clean and simple as possible. And people have cluttered their websites with all kinds of stuff. Like everything they're doing all kinds of random pictures and the websites are all about them. This is me. I went to audio school. This is my gear. And nobody cares about you when they come to your site. And I mean that in the nicest way possible. Nobody cares about me when they come to the recording revolution.

Speaker 2 (00:51:11):

One of the best books ever written. Think Dale Carnegie. He said, if you want to interact with someone, make it all about them. What

Speaker 3 (00:51:18):

If the Dale Carnegie book was called Nobody Cares. That would be really cool. That would be hilarious.

Speaker 4 (00:51:24):

It's true. I just try to tell guys to think about the person coming to your site. You're lucky they even found your site. If they find your site, what do they care about? They care about their music being made and it's sounding awesome. So you want the first thing that they see on the site to be like, let's make your music sound frigging awesome

Speaker 2 (00:51:43):

Keyword.

Speaker 4 (00:51:44):

Yeah, you've got great songs. Let's turn 'em into radio ready releases or whatever it is. Or it's all about them because then people are like, yes, yes, that's what I want. And then they want to know like, well, is this guy any good? They can hear what you can do, but again, and you turn it all the way to be about them, let's get your music worked on. Let's make your stuff sound good. And every site is always backwards. It's always about me because everyone's afraid. They need to justify, well, this is what I've done. These are all the people I've worked with. I'm really good at what I do. And people care less about that. They care about results. And so can you get them results and can you focus on them? So that's huge for getting off the ground and having a site that I think converts to probably an email or consultation. Did that answer the question? Cool.

Speaker 3 (00:52:25):

Yes. Very well. I think so. Yeah, that was a really good answer actually. AJ Vianna is asking, what are some of the challenges apart from time and technical you encounter when putting out the volume of videos you do? I'll

Speaker 4 (00:52:37):

Tell you right now, it's staying focused and motivated. Sometimes I've been writing and creating articles and videos on recording music and mixing music in the home studio for coming on six years now, three times a week, usually every week. The volume of it, it's getting to a point where sometimes I'm like, man, I have to remember that there's always new people at the site that have just found me that are in the same place that I was when I started. And they still need some of the same concrete things taught to them in a fresh way that's relevant to them. And so trying to think them and not think about, well, I've already covered that, or I've said my piece on that, try to come up with new ways. I don't also want to duplicate what's on my site, but come up with new ways to share the same things that will still help people.

(00:53:26):

Because I still believe that there's some real basic things that people are getting wrong when they're recording and mixing that I was getting wrong. When I have a bad mix, it's because I'm getting these things wrong. I still feel like it's the same core tenets that I'm trying to preach, and it's staying focused and motivated to keep doing that when my interests can wax and wane depending on how the month is going. So yeah, it's hard to be consistent and to have the same excitement and the same passion to serve these people who have found my site and taken the time to even look at my site. I want to serve them with as much enthusiasm and help as I did when I started this thing. So that's probably my biggest challenge.

Speaker 3 (00:54:03):

So what do you do to keep it fresh?

Speaker 4 (00:54:05):

Oh, man. Keep making mistakes, keep making music and making mistakes. I

Speaker 3 (00:54:11):

Always

Speaker 4 (00:54:11):

Try to write about those. I just sent a video to my list yesterday. I always try to send bonus stuff to them that I don't post and send a video about how I've been getting my butt kicked. On this site that I have with my buddy Joe Gilder, we call Dueling Mixes. We mix the same song each month and our members mix it and we kind of duke it out. And there's literally a voting system who did a better job mixing it, me or him, and he's been kicking my butt the last four months straight. Usually it's kind of back and forth, but four months he's been winning. And I'm like, dude, what do I got to do to beat this guy this year? My summer, I've been off. And I'm always listening to his mixes and watching his tutorials to see what did he do differently?

(00:54:45):

What do people like about his mix versus mine, the exact same tracks. And I've noticed some real basic things that I would have this killer mix I thought, and then the snare drum level just wasn't right. And when you listen to his mix, the snare just jumps out of the speaker much better. I'm like, ah, man, I couldn't even bother to turn the snare drum up. I spent hours mixing this thing, the snare drum's not right. So I sent a video just talking about some of the mistakes I've been making this summer and the lessons I've been learning. And that kind of stuff is really helpful to people because they're struggling with the same things I struggle with. So I try to share my mistakes, try to share new things that I've learned that have helped on a record. I try to read magazines and watch tutorials to see what other people are doing.

(00:55:25):

I love the voyeurism aspect of one of your guys' creative live classes or YouTube where I can see what other people are doing. Everybody makes records differently and go, huh, will that work? And then try it on a piece of audio and go, man, that was really cool, or a variation of that work. So I'm constantly trying to stay in it myself so that it keeps me excited about it because when I get into a routine of just teaching stuff and I haven't been excited about something in music lately, then I can tell that my content's just not as great. I'm not excited.

Speaker 3 (00:55:54):

That makes perfect sense. So basically keeping yourself new and the worst of Dave Sato. I would say relevant, just keeping relevant, keeping abreast of what the new tricks are and what people are doing and what people are paying attention to, not just relying on stuff that you made in the past.

Speaker 4 (00:56:16):

Absolutely. And if you have an email list, if you're a band, this is another reason I have an email list. If you're a band or you're a content creator, don't just use the list to broadcast stuff like when you've got a show or when you've got a video or a product, use it to gather information, ask good questions and say, what is your biggest challenge right now if I'm creating content tutorial? So ask people, what is your biggest frustration in the studio? Or ask your fans, what are some of your favorite records you're listening to right now and why or what's your favorite record on our song on our record least recently? Or where do you want us to play a show? Or what are you interested about the band? Ask people and they will tell you what they want and then you can give them what they want and it'll probably inspire you and get you excited too.

Speaker 3 (00:56:59):

Cool. And one more question from Tom Bussy Clark. I guess what I mean is since Graham's content is predominantly geared towards home studios and that he's a musician himself, what is some advice he can give to help overcome issues that you may have mixing your own music? So I guess, do you have any advice for people who aren't mixing for clients but are mixing their own songs? How do you separate from this is my song and then become just the objective mixer?

Speaker 4 (00:57:30):

Yeah, that question comes up a lot. It's a good one, and I think that's a huge part of my audience at least. So when I make my own records, I always try to pretend like the next phase and the line doesn't exist. And that kind of goes back to what we were talking about with commitment. When I record, I try to pretend like there is no mixing phase, so if something doesn't sound good, I'm like, man, Graham, don't be lazy. Just make it sound good now, make it sound awesome now. So what do we have to do to make this sound awesome if it's a vocal or drum or something. So I try to do that. So by the time I get to the mixing phase, I've got something that I think feels really cool and I'm really excited about. And then since it's my own music, that's the worst stuff.

(00:58:11):

I've written it, recorded it, performed it, and now I have to mix it. I really do try to record everything and walk away and then come back and just zero out the session and just try to pull things up and mix it with just volume faders and pan with no plugins from scratch as if I've never heard it before. Because sometimes I notice that man, when that shaker track is really loud, actually feels cool. I didn't really have that up in the mix when I was recording it. Or I'll pull up something in a weird volume that I wasn't expecting and it'll remind me that there's a part that I really liked or didn't like, and I'll try to hear the song in a different way. And I just try to not overmix it, because if you're the guy recording it, hopefully you made it sound really good on recording day. And if it's not sounding good enough and you're mixing it, it may just be that that's the edge of your ability and that's okay. You finish that project, we were talking about that earlier. Finish it, send it out into the world, warts and all, and move on to your next project. That's how you're going to get better at this whole thing. Yep.

Speaker 3 (00:59:08):

Yeah, absolutely. One thing that I've noticed, we do a lot of Skype crits and we're also very engaged with our audience. I've just noticed that people will work on the same material for way too long. I've even noticed this as a producer, when every once in a while do an unsigned band and they bring in a set of songs that are the same songs they've had for eight years. It's like, keep moving on. If something's not good enough, you'll get better If you move on to the next thing, move on to the next thing. Move on to the next thing. Your songs will get better, your mixes will get better, everything will get better. And since you have more under your belt and more that you've done, you won't care as much about every individual little song. You'll have a bigger ability or a stronger ability to say, yeah, that sucks. Let's move on.

Speaker 4 (01:00:01):

That's huge. Who is it? Ira Glass is famous. That long quote he has about what he wish he knew about being a creative and getting good at your craft when he started, which is to not quit because it takes a large body of work to actually get as good at your craft as the taste that you have in your head. And

Speaker 3 (01:00:20):

That's

Speaker 4 (01:00:21):

Exactly what you're talking about, is that if you're never finishing those 10 songs you wrote back in high school because you're afraid that they're not perfect, you're actually fighting against the best thing you could do to get better at this whole thing is produce a large body of work. And that's both sad and also encouraging, because it doesn't mean you have to be someone special. Everyone has to go through that process if you're creative.

Speaker 2 (01:00:44):

I think it was Dave Grohl who said something about, you have to write 10 terrible songs before you write one good one. He said something like that, which I really liked. So I had a band come in here this year and they brought 36 songs and we narrowed it down to 13. And that was nice. I feel like that's the way it should be. A lot of guys come in seven songs and we have to write four.

Speaker 3 (01:01:09):

Yeah, definitely write a lot more than can ever possibly use.

Speaker 2 (01:01:15):

You could apply the same thing with mixes, do more than one mix on a song.

Speaker 3 (01:01:18):

Yeah,

Speaker 2 (01:01:19):

That's a good idea.

Speaker 3 (01:01:20):

Yeah, I know The Beatles said you need to write at least a hundred songs before you get all the bad ones out of you. And they said that the reason that George Harrison took a while to become as great of a writer as Paul and John, this comes straight from their autobiography. They just said that he started later. So they were already done with all their bad songs when he was just starting to get serious about writing. So within a few years though, he had gotten all the bad ones out of his system. He had written a few hundred songs, and that's when you started to hear the really great George Harrison songs while My Guitar Gently Weeps or whatever other great songs he's written. There's tons of them. But yeah, it takes, like you were saying, a large body of work more than 10,000 hours, in my opinion.

Speaker 4 (01:02:07):

So

Speaker 3 (01:02:07):

With that, Graham, I want to thank you for coming on. You've been a fantastic guest.

Speaker 4 (01:02:11):

Yeah, thank you so much. Oh, dude, I'm honored. Thank you guys. Man, I'm honored to be in a conversation with all three of you. You guys are very good at what you do. I love what you guys are doing continuing to add to this community that we're a part of helping so many people, and I hope people continue to listen in and take your advice and do it.

Speaker 3 (01:02:30):

And likewise, man, I've been following your stuff for years and really, really appreciate what you've been doing for everybody. I think that there really needs to be more people like you and what we're doing, helping to raise the bar out there because I don't know if the schools are doing it, but music definitely needs it.

Speaker 4 (01:02:50):

Absolutely. I

Speaker 3 (01:02:50):

Agree. Thanks for having me on, guys. Thank

Speaker 4 (01:02:52):

You

Speaker 1 (01:02:52):

So much. Thanks, grant pleasure. The Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast is brought to you by Apex High Quality analog gear for the recording studio. For over 40 years, the patented Apex Exci Circuit has been audio engineer secret weapon for signal enhancement, adding depth and punch to the lows, and clarity and sparkle to the highs. visit.com for more information to ask us questions, make suggestions and interact. Visit URM academy slash podcast and subscribe today.