BUSTER ODEHOLM: Mixing in a Car, Writing Inhuman Riffs, and Listening to “Haters”

Speaker 1 (00:00:00):

Welcome to the Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast. And now your host, Eyal Levi. Welcome to the URM Podcast. Thank you so much for being here. It's crazy to think that we're now on our fifth year, but it's true, and it's only because of you, the listeners. And if you'd like to see us stick around for another five years, there are a few simple things that you can do that would really, really help us out, and I would be endlessly appreciative. Number one, share our episodes with your friends. If you get something out of these episodes, I'm sure they will too. So please share us with your friends. Number two, post our episodes on your Facebook and Instagram and tag me and our guests too. My Instagram is at al Levi urm audio. And let me just let you know that we love seeing ourselves tagged in these posts.

(00:00:57):

Who knows, we might even respond. And number three, leave us reviews and five stars please anywhere you can. We especially love iTunes reviews. Once again, I want to thank you all for the years and years of loyalty. I just want you to know that we will never, ever charge you for this podcast, and I will always work as hard as possible to improve the episodes in every single way possible. All I ask in return is a share post and a tag. Now, let's get on with it. Welcome to the URM podcast. I am Eyal Levi, and my guest today is Mr. Buster Odeholm, a Swedish producer who also happens to be the lead guitar player and producer for a band called Human Last Breath, as well as the drummer for a band called vi. Based on his work with humanity's last breath, he gained a lot of notoriety.

(00:01:49):

Just he has this ability to make sounds that are just pulverizing and that got the attention of acts such as Born of Cyrus, wins a plague, Oceano sworn in, and many, many more. He's a very in demand up and coming producer, and his ability to take things that are just typically impossible, not impossible, but close to impossible to get sounding clear and punchy, he just makes them sound massive. Massive, and the clarity and the details all there. And it's really, really incredible stuff that he does. But not only are his skills impressive, but I think that he's got a very relatable story because he learned how to do this production stuff so that he could make his own music sound great. And how many of you out there can relate to that? How many of you out there can say, that's me? I know that that is me. That's the reason I got into production. I wanted to make my own band stuff sound great. That is one of the major pathways that modern producers use to get into production. And Buster is an example of someone who has made a career of it. So that sounds like you. I think you're going to enjoy this episode. Here goes, we're in Florida right now. We're in Orlando because we're here for now, the mix, which is really, really awesome.

Speaker 2 (00:03:18):

And I just got word that the tap water, you can't drink that shit.

Speaker 1 (00:03:22):

Fuck no. So I used to live here. We're lucky because right now it doesn't really smell like eggs. Too bad.

Speaker 2 (00:03:29):

Okay.

Speaker 1 (00:03:30):

The water. The water. So if at

Speaker 2 (00:03:33):

All, sulfur. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:03:34):

Yeah. There's a lot of sulfur. We're very close to the water table here. There's a lot of sulfur in it. And

Speaker 2 (00:03:39):

I mean, at least you can put a lighter and it burns in Flint, Michigan or whatever.

Speaker 1 (00:03:45):

No, that's a different story. I think that's just sewage. Yeah. Okay. Yeah. That's

Speaker 2 (00:03:50):

Methane.

Speaker 1 (00:03:51):

Yeah, that's toxic waste.

Speaker 2 (00:03:52):

Oh,

Speaker 1 (00:03:52):

Great. In Flint. That's not toxic waste here.

Speaker 2 (00:03:55):

Okay.

Speaker 1 (00:03:55):

It's just a natural occurrence that Oh, really? That I believe that there's just the water coming from the ground is very close to man. Someone who knows the exact answer is going to tell me. But for instance, you can't have basements here because if you just dig three feet or something, you're going to hit water. So most people don't have basements. Only super rich people who, it's a major operation. The water table is so high. There's a lot of shit in the water. Not poop, but just sulfur and things like that.

Speaker 3 (00:04:32):

Yeah, sulfur. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:04:32):

So sometimes you'll be taking a shower and suddenly it just starts to smell like eggs and you come out smelling worse than when you went.

Speaker 2 (00:04:42):

Yeah, that's what I'm thinking. Do you want to clean yourself in dirty water?

Speaker 1 (00:04:46):

No, no. It's disgusting. Call it an omelet

Speaker 2 (00:04:49):

Bath. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:04:50):

Yeah. It was horrible.

Speaker 2 (00:04:52):

It doesn't sound great.

Speaker 1 (00:04:53):

No, it wasn't great at all. And certainly don't drink that shit.

Speaker 2 (00:04:57):

I won't. I won't. I haven't. But I had to ask before I might've tried if I didn't ask.

Speaker 1 (00:05:03):

Did they give you the free waters

Speaker 2 (00:05:05):

Here? Yeah. Yeah, I got it.

Speaker 1 (00:05:06):

Okay, good. So at least it's survivable.

Speaker 2 (00:05:09):

Yeah, for sure.

Speaker 1 (00:05:10):

But that's not enough for this whole trip. They only gave you two, right?

Speaker 2 (00:05:14):

Yeah. So I had to take the expensive

Speaker 1 (00:05:16):

Ration that out.

Speaker 2 (00:05:17):

Yeah. Expensive Fiji water that I have to pay for, but that's fine.

Speaker 1 (00:05:21):

I'll give you, I have a lot of water in my room. And you know what else we should do? Since we're here and together, we should do a grocery order for you.

Speaker 2 (00:05:31):

We should. We should. Yeah. Yeah. And

Speaker 1 (00:05:32):

Then you can get all the water you want. Cool. See, we take care of people here. Yeah, they do here at

Speaker 2 (00:05:38):

URM. Nice hotel with a pool and a gym and all that stuff.

Speaker 1 (00:05:43):

Yeah. I mean, I think there's nothing, I mean, there's a lot of things worse, but in our little realm of privileged first world existence, there's nothing worse than going to a different country where you're jet lagged and you're under pressure to perform at your best and you're going to be watched by everybody.

Speaker 2 (00:06:03):

You mean like tour?

Speaker 1 (00:06:05):

Yes. Just like tour and get to someplace where they don't care about what condition you're in. And some people think that that's just acting like a rock star if you don't like it. But if you don't have proper facilities, decent enough, food and water, all those things, you're not going to be comfortable. You're not going to do as good of a job.

Speaker 2 (00:06:29):

I agree.

Speaker 1 (00:06:29):

I think when you're 21 and touring, you kind of don't give a fuck.

Speaker 2 (00:06:34):

Maybe.

Speaker 1 (00:06:34):

Maybe.

Speaker 2 (00:06:35):

I haven't toured much. Actually.

Speaker 1 (00:06:38):

I didn't tour when I was 21, so I don't

Speaker 2 (00:06:39):

Know. Okay. But you've toured a lot.

Speaker 1 (00:06:41):

Yeah, I toured when I was 24 though, and I didn't give a fuck. Then I only started to give a fuck when I got closer to 30. That's like the age when things change.

Speaker 2 (00:06:51):

I feel like I've always been a bit skeptical about touring and kind of like, how is this fun? How is this something I like to

Speaker 1 (00:07:00):

Do? It's a good thing to be skeptical about. What was it you were skeptical of?

Speaker 2 (00:07:05):

I mean, going to other countries that are way, I mean, I don't want to sound like an asshole here, but I'm kind of used to Sweden and Sweden is great, and when certain things aren't at the same level, it can be hard, I think. But I'm probably the most privileged thing I've ever said in my life. It's pretty privileged. But at the same time, I have a free will and I don't have to tour if I don't want

Speaker 1 (00:07:30):

To. It's true. Well, look, the thing is, you're right about everything you just said. The thing about touring is until you get big, you have to basically accept living really shitty. Even if you're in a bus, it's really shitty. The thing it's interesting to me is bands that are first starting, they dream about the bus. It's the biggest deal on earth. They see bands in a bus and it's like, fuck, I want that someday. But it's not that much better. It's really not.

Speaker 2 (00:08:02):

It's a disease incubator or whatever.

Speaker 1 (00:08:04):

Yeah, it's exactly what it is. There's a lot of disadvantages to it. Also, you can't go anywhere. You get to the venue at seven in the morning, you're stuck. Only the biggest bands have a bus and a hotel

Speaker 3 (00:08:18):

Because

Speaker 1 (00:08:19):

They're so fucking expensive that no smaller bands that can afford a bus are going to afford a bus and a hotel

Speaker 3 (00:08:25):

For sure.

Speaker 1 (00:08:25):

So you're showering even less than on a van tour in a bus tour. So only bands that make the bus shit work are like, they got to be oppe level and higher. When you're at that level and higher. Then they've got, and I'm just using them as an example because one of them might be listening and be like, we didn't get hotels on this and that tour, but I'm just saying you have to be of significant to where you can do buses and hotels. So I don't know, man, being on a bus isn't that cool?

Speaker 2 (00:09:03):

No. I mean, I've never toured on a bus. I've been on a bus, but like a tour bus. But I haven't toured on a bus like that. I've done a lot of flying gigs, which is the worst because if you are playing the same day, you're flying, you're playing essentially without sleep and all

Speaker 1 (00:09:20):

That stuff. It's discombobulating.

Speaker 2 (00:09:22):

And the day after you go, also you wake up early to fly back and flights and stuff like that. It's not something I like either. So it's privileged way of thinking, but I mean, I don't have to do it if I don't want to.

Speaker 1 (00:09:37):

So are you afraid of flying or you just not like it?

Speaker 2 (00:09:40):

I don't like it because I'm six four.

Speaker 1 (00:09:42):

That's right. That's right.

Speaker 2 (00:09:44):

So I don't fit and I can't sleep. And I mean, the other guys in the band are afraid of it, and that's a problem as well. But I'm fine with it,

Speaker 1 (00:09:53):

Man. Even first class seats aren't going to be comfortable for you. They're not.

Speaker 2 (00:09:56):

I mean, a lot more at least. But

Speaker 1 (00:09:59):

In Europe, man, the first class in Europe is not first class in the us. First class in Europe is just coach seats. And what they do is they block off the one in the middle. So it's like the same setup, the no different. It's just no one sits in the middle seat.

Speaker 2 (00:10:17):

That's weird. Why would you want that for twice the price or more?

Speaker 1 (00:10:21):

I don't know. I don't know.

Speaker 2 (00:10:24):

What you want is to be able to lay down. That's probably the biggest thing if you're going to pay for first class. Right.

Speaker 1 (00:10:31):

But they only have that on super long flights and that's way expensive.

Speaker 2 (00:10:38):

Casey s stat flight.

Speaker 1 (00:10:39):

Yeah. Well, okay, so that comes in different levels. So the Casey s stat stuff where he'll be like, I took a $20,000 plane

Speaker 4 (00:10:50):

Ride. Yeah, Emirates.

Speaker 1 (00:10:50):

Yeah. So that's like first class, I guess. First class is actually kind of rare. Not all airlines have that. I guess what we're actually talking about is more like business.

Speaker 4 (00:11:01):

Yeah. Or

Speaker 1 (00:11:02):

Short range first, which is they're just multiple different categories.

Speaker 2 (00:11:08):

Do you get that to do

Speaker 1 (00:11:09):

Business flights?

Speaker 2 (00:11:10):

Sometimes. Yeah. Sometimes

Speaker 1 (00:11:11):

I don't pay for it though. I'm not, dude, it's like $10,000. Fuck no.

Speaker 2 (00:11:17):

That's crazy.

Speaker 1 (00:11:18):

I have really good status with my airline.

Speaker 2 (00:11:21):

I can imagine.

Speaker 1 (00:11:21):

Loyal. So I'll get upgraded. The one thing that I will pay for is the premium economy seats for me, but then that makes the upgrade a lot easier. But if I've got a bed on the international flight, that shit ain't paid for. Hell no. Seriously, I've looked at some of those flights. It's like $13,000 round trip. It's like, really? Hell no.

Speaker 2 (00:11:48):

It's crazy.

Speaker 1 (00:11:48):

For one night. Well, two nights because you got to fly back. It's

Speaker 2 (00:11:51):

Probably worth it for who's a lot richer. I mean, that's nothing for them.

Speaker 1 (00:11:57):

Yes. If it's nothing for them, cool. And then also the reason it's called business class is because they're sending executives and the whole idea is that the executive sleeps on the flight so that they can arrive in the morning and go do business. And when you're talking about major companies worth hundreds of millions of dollars where every day is huge amounts of money, what's the big deal?

Speaker 2 (00:12:22):

Yeah. I mean, I get it.

Speaker 1 (00:12:24):

We're not in that category.

Speaker 2 (00:12:26):

No, we're not. We're fucking metal dudes. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:12:30):

I think that for you with your size regular first class wouldn't even make a difference too much.

Speaker 2 (00:12:35):

Yeah. I mean, I have asked on really long flights too, if I can lay down and maybe stretch, but they're super picky about that. But the flight here, the plane was so huge. I got to do it because there was room and I just did it. I don't give a fuck. So I really need to stretch my back sometimes to be able to sit down for that long

Speaker 1 (00:12:56):

Man. If I had known about that, I would've tried to get you seats that there are certain seats

Speaker 2 (00:13:04):

That, oh, with the, what's it called? Emergency exit thing. Yes. Yeah,

Speaker 1 (00:13:08):

Maybe we can change your seat on the way back to that.

Speaker 2 (00:13:12):

That would be great.

Speaker 1 (00:13:12):

I'll see what I can do. That's cool. So the other guys in your flight on your bands are afraid of flying.

Speaker 2 (00:13:18):

Yeah. Yeah. We have problems with that. I'm not going to name any names, but we have some issues with that. And sometimes it's fine. Sometimes it's not fine.

Speaker 1 (00:13:27):

I feel bad for them because I used to have that, have that real bad to where I wouldn't go on family vacations, but I got over it.

Speaker 2 (00:13:35):

But I mean, I feel it as well, but you just kind of have to ignore it. You just have to not think about that. You're in a huge metal tube in the sky. Same with cars. When I learned to drive, I was scared. I was so scared. You're feeling it. You're feeling the weight. You should be scared. You're feeling the weight. You're feeling the speed, and you're feeling the danger. But then you just kind of get used to it and just forget about it, which kind of is a bad thing because you're not really realizing what you're operating.

Speaker 1 (00:14:07):

I mean, do you ever think about the fact that when you're going on the highway at whatever kilometers per hour, I don't know what, so

Speaker 2 (00:14:14):

110 is standard.

Speaker 1 (00:14:16):

Yeah, that's probably around 60 or 70 miles per hour and all that's separating you and the car next to you is just like one meter or less. That's three feet for you. Dumb Americans. But that's craziness.

Speaker 4 (00:14:32):

Yeah, it

Speaker 2 (00:14:32):

Is.

Speaker 1 (00:14:33):

That's like two steps or one little move away from chaos.

Speaker 2 (00:14:38):

If we're alive in a hundred years, the people there will probably look at back at that and think, that's crazy. How could they do that?

Speaker 1 (00:14:45):

Well, maybe. Have you ever seen those videos of building practices in some third world countries where these really man unfortunate dukes will just be on the outsides of buildings?

Speaker 2 (00:15:00):

Like the guys from Philippines that are working in the Emirates Arab Emirates and they have no safety and barely any salary in the sleep on the floor.

Speaker 1 (00:15:08):

That level of danger, I wonder if, if us 200 years from now will be looking at how we used to drive now and be like, God, they were fucking reckless.

Speaker 2 (00:15:17):

Yeah, probably with all the stuff. I mean the food, the way we treat food and meat and all that, and the safety regulations for buildings and how we drive everything is very dangerous.

Speaker 1 (00:15:31):

That's one of the reasons I wanted to stop touring was I remember on one of my last tours sitting in the us, we were in a van for this, and I was at the very back, not driving, just laying there. And we were just going through a cornfield and I was just thinking, this is really fucking dangerous. If we crash, I'm not strapped into anything. Who the hell knows what could happen? This is not worth it. We're going to be getting paid $250 for this gig

Speaker 2 (00:16:04):

Risking your life. Yeah,

Speaker 1 (00:16:06):

That's how I started. I couldn't stop thinking that way. I'm risking my life for what?

Speaker 2 (00:16:12):

It's pretty logical to think like that. I mean, I've heard stories from Jara before. I was in the band, they toured in Russia and the driver was watching a movie while he was driving. And I mean, they just forced themselves to fall asleep and just hope that they were alive when they woke up.

Speaker 1 (00:16:28):

If they woke up. If they woke up, yeah. Hope that they were alive when they woke

Speaker 2 (00:16:32):

Up. Okay, sorry.

Speaker 1 (00:16:37):

I dunno. I just said that. It made me think for a second. There was this

Speaker 2 (00:16:40):

One woke up dead and awake. I don't know how that works.

Speaker 1 (00:16:44):

It No, you're dead.

Speaker 2 (00:16:46):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:16:47):

Once I was on this tour, it was Ja fur cowboy on Earth advised icon in Europe. And on the first night we were playing in England and we had two buses. And I remember going to the bar after the show and the two bus drivers were at the bar having drinks, were going to drive us in two hours.

Speaker 2 (00:17:07):

Crazy. But that's also an American thing that, I mean,

Speaker 1 (00:17:10):

That was in England,

Speaker 2 (00:17:12):

But I've met Americans that are going to dinner with me and having three beers and then just driving home in Sweden, you'll get just

Speaker 1 (00:17:22):

Sales time. That's not okay.

Speaker 2 (00:17:24):

But you have a higher threshold for when you're allowed to drive than in Sweden, I think

Speaker 1 (00:17:28):

In some places. But it's one of those things that kind of like smoking. There was a time where you could do it anywhere. And now it's pretty much verboten. Anywhere you go, you're not going to be allowed to smoke inside a restaurant. If you light a cigarette in certain places, people are going to look at you like, what the fuck are you doing?

Speaker 2 (00:17:49):

And I personally think that's good.

Speaker 1 (00:17:51):

No, I think it's great. But drinking and driving as crazy as this is going to sound, there was a time period where people just did it. And it was not that it was legal, but it was more societally acceptable. And people who were maybe below the age of 35 or 30 in the us, you're not going to understand what I'm talking about because you probably didn't live through it. It was only in the past few years has it become a big societal taboo. I know that people look at drinking and driving now fuck that motherfucker if they know someone who does it because we've got Uber now. So whatever, excuse, there was no excuse. And I know someone who killed somebody that way. So I've seen the first

Speaker 2 (00:18:37):

Vince sne.

Speaker 1 (00:18:38):

Yeah, but I mean, I know someone who was a friend of

Speaker 2 (00:18:41):

Mine

Speaker 1 (00:18:42):

Who she was a really good girl about 10 years ago. She drove home drunk from a bar and hit a pedestrian and killed him. And it is just now getting out of prison. So I've seen it, and I know that in society people are, they don't look kindly on drinking and driving anymore just because you have fucking Uber. You really, whatever fake excuse you had before that, a lot of people were just like, oh, it's just two miles or just whatever. Now. No excuse whatsoever.

Speaker 2 (00:19:17):

If we're speaking about Sweden and America, I mean imagine all the smaller countries that are not as state controlled or whatever, like Bolivia or whatever. I bet all of those drivers are drunk. Who knows. Or Russia or whatever.

Speaker 1 (00:19:32):

I would not want to fuck with their police though.

Speaker 2 (00:19:35):

Yeah. But if you go on tour, you're all of a sudden on a highway with a bunch of drunk people driving, most

Speaker 1 (00:19:42):

Likely could be your driver.

Speaker 2 (00:19:43):

Yeah. Could be your driver.

Speaker 1 (00:19:45):

So just so you know, let me just say that if your band members want to ever get over their fear of flying, there's ways to do it. I did it

Speaker 2 (00:19:54):

Medication or

Speaker 1 (00:19:55):

No. So I did take medication. But the medication doesn't solve the fear.

Speaker 4 (00:20:00):

No,

Speaker 1 (00:20:00):

It just solves your symptoms. I actually solve the fear. I can fly without medication. Now the only time I take medication on a flight is if I want to sleep.

Speaker 2 (00:20:08):

Is it like meditation or

Speaker 1 (00:20:10):

It's a combination of things. It involves a lot of learning. A learning about aviation.

Speaker 3 (00:20:16):

Oh, really?

Speaker 1 (00:20:17):

Because once you start to understand it, it's hard to be so afraid of it. Because a lot of the fear I've notice comes from people. They're having an emotional reaction to something that's super unnatural and think they're in huge danger, which is understandable. It feels that way.

Speaker 2 (00:20:37):

But you can say the car comparison as well. You're not afraid of being in a car, but you're afraid in an airplane, which kind of doesn't make sense.

Speaker 1 (00:20:45):

It's not rational. That's why. So there's an emotional component. You can use that car analogy. People used to use that on me, and it doesn't matter. I'm terrified of being on an airplane. I'm not terrified of being in a car. I realized that the car is more dangerous. But the thing is, once I started to learn about flying, really learn about it, I started studying as if I wanted to learn how to do it, and now I do want to learn how to do it. And then I really started reading on statistics and just knowledge changes things. Now I know just how safe it really is. Safe as fuck, way safer. And now I'm afraid

Speaker 2 (00:21:23):

In car walking in the city,

Speaker 1 (00:21:25):

Dude, being on a plane is seriously one of the safest things you can do. And it seems counterintuitive because you're in a tube flying really fast, really high. But there's just so much that goes into the safety

Speaker 3 (00:21:40):

And

Speaker 1 (00:21:42):

That safety is built on blood basically. It's true.

Speaker 2 (00:21:47):

Yeah, of course. Of course.

Speaker 1 (00:21:49):

And

Speaker 2 (00:21:50):

All the flight, the accidents you hear of is scaring everyone. I mean, there was last year wasn't there a lot of with the same model

Speaker 1 (00:22:00):

Of plane? 7 37 max, the max three I believe, or max nine. But yeah. So what happened with that was that Boeing released, so the 7 37, I won't talk about this too much, I'm going to bore a bunch of you. But basically there's a new version of the airplane that the engines were brought forward, which shifted the weight forward, which is different. And so there's a software that was created to compensate for it. However, they didn't train the pilots about this software. The pilots didn't even know in some cases that the software was there. So what the software would do is if it felt the plane pitching in a certain direction weird because of the weight, it would automatically correct.

Speaker 2 (00:22:52):

And they corrected as well,

Speaker 1 (00:22:53):

But they didn't know that it was doing that. So the plane is correcting it like it's supposed to, but the pilots think there's something wrong. So they start fighting the plane, then the plane fights back harder and you get chaos. So that's what happened both times because they didn't train the pilots. But now obviously that's not going to ever happen again.

Speaker 2 (00:23:14):

Do we know what happened with the Malaysia one?

Speaker 1 (00:23:17):

No,

Speaker 2 (00:23:17):

That was just, well, the first one was the second one that just disappeared. Right?

Speaker 1 (00:23:20):

Well, there were two. There was one that was shot down by Russian. Russian missile. Yeah, Russian separatists. Really just Russian forces that aren't

Speaker 2 (00:23:30):

Let's get into Russian. No, I'm just

Speaker 1 (00:23:31):

Joking. Russian forces that aren't technically Russian but are shot it down. But then the one that disappeared, the theory is that they had some sort of depressurization and everybody went to sleep and it just flew and flew and flew and then ran out of gas and crashed. Wow. People thought that it was terrorism at first, but now a lot of people are thinking based on all the data, that really what happened was something failed also for the pilots. So the pilots passed out, everybody passed out. So it was like a ghost ship.

Speaker 2 (00:24:04):

Oh shit. And just kept going.

Speaker 1 (00:24:06):

Yeah.

Speaker 2 (00:24:06):

But it's weird that did they find the plane or

Speaker 1 (00:24:09):

They found pieces of it washed up on shore all the way in Africa and stuff. Crazy. That's how they know it's because one piece washed up in Madagascar and had a serial number.

Speaker 4 (00:24:21):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:24:22):

Yeah. They have not found that plane.

Speaker 4 (00:24:25):

That's nuts.

Speaker 1 (00:24:26):

It is nuts.

Speaker 4 (00:24:27):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:24:27):

So let's talk about you.

Speaker 4 (00:24:30):

Let's do it.

Speaker 1 (00:24:31):

But about touring. About touring. So it doesn't sound to me like you're big on travel. I'm not. Is it because you'd rather be in the studio?

Speaker 2 (00:24:39):

A lot of it is. I get really bored. I get also, I mean if I'm not mixing in a week or two, I get, what's it called when you don't get your drugs? You get the

Speaker 1 (00:24:51):

Withdrawal

Speaker 2 (00:24:51):

Withdrawal. Kind of like that. Yeah. I just really love what I'm doing and I don't want to leave. I'd rather do what I'm doing.

Speaker 1 (00:25:00):

Well, that's kind of what Will Putney does

Speaker 2 (00:25:03):

Really.

Speaker 1 (00:25:03):

Yeah.

Speaker 2 (00:25:04):

He doesn't want to tour with end and stuff like that. And his other band, right?

Speaker 1 (00:25:07):

Fit for an autopsy.

Speaker 2 (00:25:08):

Yeah. Fit for autopsy. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:25:09):

People listening, correct me if I'm wrong, maybe he plays shows with them here and there.

Speaker 2 (00:25:13):

Yeah,

Speaker 1 (00:25:13):

I don't know. I've never seen pictures of that. At least not recently. I don't think he tours with them at all. 99.9 9 9 9 9 9. 9.9. 9.99. Eight oh 7%. Just we go for accuracy.

Speaker 2 (00:25:30):

Yeah, for

Speaker 1 (00:25:30):

Sure. This is a very accuracy oriented audience. Yeah. Yeah. I'm pretty sure that that's what he does.

Speaker 2 (00:25:35):

I have a similar situation going on right now actually, because I have a band from Stockholm that I'm producing and writing for, and I'm going to be in the music videos and stuff like that as a drummer. But as far as touring, they're getting booking agents and all that and labels, huge labels and stuff,

(00:25:53):

Which is really cool that everyone's interested in the music we're doing. But I've said from the start, I don't want to tour. I don't want, especially not a new band, just touring like that. They really want to tour a lot. So I was just clear in the beginning, I don't want to tour. I will play. If they get to the level that really cool, big, huge festivals, I'm down, of course. But also by then they might have a new drummer that they'd rather do it with. And I can respect that as well, of course. But it's rather just write and produce and mix.

Speaker 1 (00:26:30):

Lemme just say I'm kind of jealous that that's even an option now because I'll just say real quick, 15 years ago that was not looked at favorably because my co-founder and my band wanted to be that way. He didn't want to tour. He hated the idea. And it was probably better for him not to tour. He had some conditions, let's just say conditions that didn't.

Speaker 2 (00:26:55):

Yeah, I have diabetes type one, so I mean that's hard. If I somehow don't have insulin or whatever, I'm in trouble.

Speaker 1 (00:27:01):

Yeah, yeah. Oh yeah, for sure. His were more of the

Speaker 2 (00:27:06):

Mentally.

Speaker 1 (00:27:07):

Yeah, yeah, more of that. I don't want to talk shit about him.

Speaker 2 (00:27:10):

Let's not.

Speaker 1 (00:27:11):

But he was not really suited for that level of stress and human interaction basically. He just wanted to write the music, perform on the records, and man, that was such a problem for the label. So I tried to construct exactly what you're talking about doing the live lineup, which I was a part of. What Will Putney's done, which is totally fine, but I guess the world wasn't ready for that in 2004, 2005. And it almost got us dropped. It was a huge serious issue.

Speaker 2 (00:27:44):

Why did they want him specifically on stage?

Speaker 1 (00:27:47):

Because they like his voice.

Speaker 2 (00:27:49):

Oh, he was a singer.

Speaker 1 (00:27:50):

He was a singer.

Speaker 2 (00:27:51):

Okay. Then I really understand it. It's easier because it's easier to do it if you're,

Speaker 1 (00:27:57):

But it's def metal.

Speaker 2 (00:27:58):

Yeah. Alright. But at the same time when if you really like a band and another singer comes up on stage, that's just

Speaker 1 (00:28:08):

Kind of weird. Yeah, dude. It's a shitty situation to be in for me too. I didn't find out about this until we were already getting signed. Yeah. Oh shit. Yeah, but we're not talking about death. So have you ever had a dream of

Speaker 2 (00:28:22):

Touring? Yeah, when I was a kid, but I didn't really know what it was all about. I really love playing live. It's fun. It's really fun. But I mean everything around it for me, I'm not saying I'm anti touring. I will tour with my own bands that are like Il Jar and HLB, but all those guys are the same way as me. So we will tour if there's a great deal and we feel that everyone has time and it's a great thing. That's fine.

Speaker 1 (00:28:48):

So it's got to be the right circumstance.

Speaker 2 (00:28:50):

Yeah. The only thing I'm saying is I'm not the guy that can't wait to get out on tour. Fair enough. That's all I'm saying.

Speaker 1 (00:28:58):

That makes sense. And as far as production goes, did you start just to be able to do your own stuff? So many people definitely.

Speaker 2 (00:29:07):

I had a rare thing because my dad is an engineer,

Speaker 1 (00:29:11):

Like an audio engineer

Speaker 2 (00:29:13):

Has a studio, all that live technician and a studio technician knows how to tune drums, knows how to mic up drums, everything. That's awesome. So that's like, again, I'm pretty privileged that way,

Speaker 1 (00:29:26):

Man. I don't think that you have to have a parent that is in music. I know lots of people who don't have who. They're the first in their family to have the musical bug. I also, a lot of people who got it from their parents, me included,

Speaker 2 (00:29:44):

Same here.

Speaker 1 (00:29:44):

It is what it is. You can't pick your parents.

Speaker 2 (00:29:46):

No, you can't. And I've had tons of help from him. I mean when I started my bands and stuff, he showed me, the first doll I worked in, I don't think I remember what it was called, but I think it was like an old, we only had Max when I was a kid. So it was like a sound something, but it sound forge. No, but it was not GarageBand. But I remember we had GarageBand as well on that computer, but it was another one called Sound something. But he showed me that and I had my pod and I recorded, I think I learned how I went to music school, so I learned how to program drums in Reason. I did that in Goal and brought it back home and I tracked guitars in that do through our Mbox one, the one that stood up, the old one. So that's what I started with and that's all because of him, of course. And I had drums at home when I grew up, which I played on when I was like

Speaker 1 (00:30:46):

Three. Man. That's so cool. So did he do records or is he more like the local studio guy who just does different gigs or He did, what was the nature of his?

Speaker 2 (00:30:56):

I think it was he has two brothers and they had a band and they had a studio together and together they

Speaker 1 (00:31:05):

Bought. So he's like one of us just

Speaker 2 (00:31:06):

From an earlier generation for sure. Like Beatles covers and stuff like that. That's awesome. He had a studio that burnt down with a lot of gear that sucks. But he had drums and I got to have him at home. I think I got 'em when I was nine or eight. I got him set up in my room. For some reason, my family let me play a lot, which is crazy. That's great. Even my sister was sleeping and I was allowed to play somehow. I don't know why, but I got to do it. And that's why I could learn all that I've learned.

Speaker 1 (00:31:46):

Hey parents, if you want your kids to be good at music, start them young and let them play whatever they want to play.

Speaker 2 (00:31:53):

If you kind of notice that they have something that they're interested in it and they have a capability to do it, then let them do it.

Speaker 1 (00:32:01):

The younger the better. Absolutely. Because the more their brain forms with that, the more likely they are to actually be good at it when they become an adult. I've seen it so many times with people. How young were you when you knew you wanted to do something with

Speaker 2 (00:32:18):

It? There's pictures of me when I was two where I had, when you eat Asian food, you have those sticks. I used those. We had our own at home, so I used those as drumsticks

Speaker 1 (00:32:31):

And

Speaker 2 (00:32:31):

I was two. So it was from the get

Speaker 1 (00:32:34):

Go. I believe it. I was three when I started playing violin because of being taken to the symphony and watching the violinists.

Speaker 2 (00:32:41):

I saw imagine X factor ish or whatever it's called, when children get to get dressed up and sing their favorite song on tv. We had that in Sweden called S. It's like, aim for the

Speaker 1 (00:32:54):

Stars. I'm not even going to try.

Speaker 2 (00:32:56):

No, don't do it. I had the urge, but

Speaker 1 (00:33:00):

I was like, wow, I'm going to

Speaker 2 (00:33:01):

Lose that. So we had that and I saw Kiss Love It Loud or whatever it's called. It would start with the drum thing that got me sold on Rock and Hard Rock and stuff like that. So that kind of propelled me into doing that stuff. And I just And how old were you? Probably five maybe or something like that. Fucking young. And I saw that and I went crazy for it. So all of my allowances went to KISS records. So I was all about kiss. I think I had like 25 kiss records at the end of the period where I bought records. So I just spent all my money on it.

Speaker 1 (00:33:38):

So what's interesting to me here is that people always talk about how in Sweden, there's those social programs of music education in schools very

Speaker 2 (00:33:48):

Important.

Speaker 1 (00:33:49):

Yes, very important. However, not everybody has a family at home. Nope. Like that.

Speaker 2 (00:33:56):

Or a drum set at home.

Speaker 1 (00:33:57):

Yeah, that's what I'm saying. So Sweden or no, Sweden. I still think that say you were born here in the US

Speaker 3 (00:34:06):

Who

Speaker 1 (00:34:06):

Doesn't have social programs like that with your family, you probably would've still ended up doing what you're doing now.

Speaker 2 (00:34:13):

Sure, definitely.

Speaker 1 (00:34:15):

I think that's far more important than any program that comes from the outside world is what happens

Speaker 2 (00:34:22):

At home. But I was so lucky. It is crazy specifically with the kids thing, because there was a shopping mall near where I lived where a guy sold off his entire KISS collection, which is rare every month when I got my allowance, I just went there, picked a record and just kept on doing that till I had a lot. So there was rare shit I bought and stuff. I mean, if you go to a record store, back then they had maybe a couple of his records, but they didn't have hundreds. So I don't know his name or anything, but he sold a lot to me and that way I got to hear a lot of

Speaker 1 (00:35:00):

What would you do with them? Just listen or would you try to learn them?

Speaker 2 (00:35:03):

Always

Speaker 1 (00:35:04):

Learn. I'm minding your five or 6-year-old

Speaker 2 (00:35:06):

Kid. Yeah. But the thing about that is I had an, what's it called? Interval? What's it called? The ear. When you have the ear, you can identify notes.

Speaker 1 (00:35:15):

Perfect pitch.

Speaker 2 (00:35:16):

I don't have perfect pitch. I have the interval pitch.

Speaker 1 (00:35:19):

Oh, relative pitch.

Speaker 2 (00:35:20):

Relative pitch, yeah, yeah, yeah. So I know the distance automatically. Me too. So that, oh cool. So that helped a lot in learning the songs. But I started on drums, but that helped as well, just having the ear for it. So I kind of just automatically had my headphones on and played the drums to kiss and it went on from

Speaker 1 (00:35:41):

There. So relative pitch for, I know, I just want to quickly explain to people that. So perfect pitch, just in case you're wondering, I think a lot of people don't know this or they're curious about, they want to know if they've got it or if their kid has it. Perfect pitch is something you're born with, you can't develop it. You can develop your musical understanding and all that, but the basics of you hear a note, you identify that note Exactly that you're either born with it or you're not. I tried to develop it and I tried so hard and then

Speaker 2 (00:36:15):

You can, if you really remember songs and you know what key they're in, but that's relative. Yeah. You're using the relative pitch to identify.

Speaker 1 (00:36:22):

Yeah, no, this is like they can hear an air conditioner whining an A flat. So pretty cool. My dad has it and I would test him. Actually Jason Soff has it, and he used to play this game called the Tone Goblin Game. That was his a IM handle,

Speaker 2 (00:36:44):

A-O-L-A-O-L.

Speaker 1 (00:36:45):

Instant messenger for those of you who are too young to know. But Tone Goblin game was where you would be on the phone with him and just play a random sequence and he would tell you the numbers and it could be long, long, long stretches of it. He's got perfect pitch,

Speaker 2 (00:37:06):

But it's kind of like I'm just reciting numbers to you and you just recite 'em back for him. That's probably the same

Speaker 1 (00:37:11):

Thing. That's what it is. I wish I understood how they know, because before they know notes of names, they've still got

Speaker 2 (00:37:18):

It.

Speaker 1 (00:37:19):

That's the part that's crazy to me. But they

Speaker 2 (00:37:23):

Don't know it's a, when they're born, they have to learn the alphabet to know what an A is.

Speaker 1 (00:37:29):

Yeah, exactly. So that's why I'm wondering how do they know what they're hearing before they have the vocabulary. Maybe someone who teaches this stuff can chime in the comments or something or hit me up and tell me. But I've always wanted to know how does someone with Perfect Pitch express their perfect pitch before they have a musical vocabulary?

Speaker 2 (00:37:51):

Yeah, who knows?

Speaker 1 (00:37:52):

But you've got relative pitch

Speaker 2 (00:37:54):

Just

Speaker 1 (00:37:54):

Relative, which is arguably better to have. Because why? Because, okay, so I've known a lot of people with Perfect pitch. Lots of classical musicians have

Speaker 3 (00:38:02):

It.

Speaker 1 (00:38:02):

They say that it's a curse because you can't listen to, maybe now you could, but back then they couldn't listen to any music on the radio. They can't listen to anything because before autotune and stuff, it was really frequent for shit to be way out of tune super flat. And I guess I can hear it really well now, but they could hear it to a level where it was just, it ruins their day. Or if the air conditioner is humming an A flat and they're practicing violin and they're hearing an A flat the whole time, it makes them crazy. Yeah,

Speaker 4 (00:38:42):

I get that.

Speaker 1 (00:38:42):

Yeah. So everywhere they go, it's like, have you ever seen one of those superhero movies where they first have their powers and their powers are too intense and they have to learn? That's what it sounds like to me.

Speaker 2 (00:38:56):

Yeah. Yeah, it does.

Speaker 1 (00:38:58):

So relative pitch apparently is a good happy medium because enough to where you can work, get shit done, understand music, but it's not like a constant bombardment.

Speaker 2 (00:39:12):

I didn't know I had it until I was 17 or something because when I went to music school, school, what happened? I went to music school and I learned the music theory and they kind of showed me the intervals and I just instantly knew what it was because they just told me the names of the intervals and they played it. And I was like, okay. So every time I hear two notes, I wouldn't know what the distance are between them. But I already knew that before because I was constantly learning songs at home on a guitar and I could hear a riff and I instantly knew how to play it if it was a relatively simple riff.

Speaker 1 (00:39:52):

So how would you express it before you learned the vocabulary?

Speaker 2 (00:39:58):

I, I think I wouldn't express it.

Speaker 1 (00:40:01):

You would just learn easily?

Speaker 2 (00:40:02):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:40:03):

Okay.

Speaker 2 (00:40:03):

I just hear a riff and I was like, okay, I hear that it's that distant between notes and my hair with the chord and I could just do it.

Speaker 1 (00:40:09):

You didn't know that it was even a thing Probably. It's just,

Speaker 2 (00:40:12):

Yeah, I didn't know.

Speaker 1 (00:40:12):

You just understood music.

Speaker 2 (00:40:14):

Yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:40:14):

Makes sense. Did learning the vocabulary part change anything for you? Did it help?

Speaker 2 (00:40:20):

Just helped me explain it to other people if they knew what I was talking about. That is many people I was in bandwidth didn't really know what I was talking about because I had say, go to that note on that note, like a guitarist and he didn't know. And I would say the interval and he still wouldn't know. So it didn't really help me, but it's cool to know. It was cool to learn the way third Fre,

Speaker 1 (00:40:45):

Second string, fourth fre, fifth

Speaker 2 (00:40:47):

String. That's right.

Speaker 1 (00:40:49):

Whatever you got to do to communicate. But I mean, I guess in the long run, did it help with your

Speaker 2 (00:40:54):

Being? Yeah, it certainly helps if I'm programming based or something like that. I just know how to do it pretty fast. But I wouldn't say it has helped me a ton or held me back a ton. It is what it is. It's just a thing.

Speaker 1 (00:41:09):

What about theory? Did you learn all that stuff too?

Speaker 2 (00:41:11):

Not all of it. I had a good grades in it, but I don't know the fancy chords and scales and stuff like that. I forgotten all about that. I just really know the intervals or notes.

Speaker 1 (00:41:25):

The basics.

Speaker 2 (00:41:25):

Yeah, the basics. I'd say

Speaker 1 (00:41:27):

It's interesting to me, I learned some of it to a certain degree. I never really went to that level of really being to identify every fancy fucking chord and the super, super in-depth stuff that the jazz guys use.

Speaker 2 (00:41:44):

That's

Speaker 1 (00:41:44):

Kind of where I started to be like, eh,

Speaker 2 (00:41:47):

Same.

Speaker 1 (00:41:47):

And it's honestly never come up.

Speaker 2 (00:41:50):

It doesn't really,

Speaker 1 (00:41:51):

Yeah. And then I hear bands like oppe using those chords. But the thing is, I've never heard Michael ever talk about theory ever. And I think he said he doesn't know any, which I'm not sure I believe, but just they're too damn good.

Speaker 2 (00:42:08):

I mean, the Arda guys, I remember the guitarist he asked me two or three years ago, he asked me what the rhythm was. That's kind of the level we're at with those guys. But they make the craziest musics. I'm not going to say anything about that.

Speaker 1 (00:42:25):

So I guess what I'm getting at is how important do you think that the traditional music training is? Because gone through it.

Speaker 2 (00:42:34):

Yeah, if you're not musical, it will help a lot if you really want to do music. But if you are already musical enough, you don't really need it. If you can write music without it, you should.

Speaker 1 (00:42:45):

Yeah, I agree. It helps. I noticed that. So back in those days when I was going to school, a lot of people would say they didn't want to learn theory because it makes you robotic or it kills your, and I thought that was bullshit. And they would tell me that that's what I was going to do to me. And what they didn't understand was the reason I was writing theoretically complex stuff was because that's how I heard it. It's not, it's something I learned the learning part. All it did was help me write it down. And then, because I would write shit by hand back then and then it would help me try to explain it to other people. But when I was sitting there writing, they seem to have this idea that you would sit there writing and then think to yourself, well

Speaker 2 (00:43:34):

What about this scale?

Speaker 1 (00:43:36):

Oh wait, it's not proper. I would never do that shit ever.

Speaker 2 (00:43:41):

But if you're a musician, like Adam Neely has a video on this, specifically this topic, but he is a guy that needs to be able to read music. They put music in front of him and he just plays. And that's fair if you want to learn that and helps. What?

Speaker 1 (00:43:58):

Adam Midy,

Speaker 2 (00:43:59):

The bass

Speaker 1 (00:43:59):

Bassist. Okay. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (00:44:01):

And he needs to be able to learn music from

Speaker 1 (00:44:04):

Reading it. But he's in that world.

Speaker 2 (00:44:06):

Yeah, he's really in that world. World. The academia of music

Speaker 1 (00:44:11):

And that jazz world too. So I kind of feel like this about school in any field really. The field you're in requires formal knowledge or degrees then that's what you have to do. Same as doctor or lawyer. If you are in the jazz world or musical academia or whatever, you're going to be in scenarios where you have to know this

Speaker 3 (00:44:36):

Shit.

Speaker 1 (00:44:38):

If you play jazz gigs, you're going to get charts. You have to know this stuff. You can't just get

Speaker 2 (00:44:44):

By. It's pretty cool to watch that. There was a drummer, GG JP Bove, who was stand in for periphery and he learned all the stuff with reading it. But the cool thing he explained there was that he could memorize it faster because of that. So that's also valid. If you have to learn shit fast and you know how to read music, that would probably be faster than just sitting down listening and start to remember stuff

Speaker 1 (00:45:13):

Probably faster. Absolutely.

Speaker 2 (00:45:14):

So it all has its kind of use, I guess use cases for using the knowledge in that way.

Speaker 1 (00:45:21):

Man, even in metal, Kevin Talley,

Speaker 2 (00:45:23):

Shout out to him. I borrowed all his gear for a gig in Spain and Resurrection Fest with Vilada because our airline got rid of all of our gear. So he lent me everything.

Speaker 1 (00:45:36):

He's cool like that. He's cool. Just so for people who don't know, he was the drummer in my band, but he, I'd say for the 2000 through 2010 and on, but in that time period specifically, it was one of the best deaths.

Speaker 2 (00:45:51):

He played for everyone. Played for everyone. Slayer, Mr. Index,

Speaker 1 (00:45:55):

Black Dahlia, murder Devil Driver. I think he did a Ga Suff one.

Speaker 3 (00:45:59):

Sation.

Speaker 1 (00:45:59):

Yeah. He actually joined Suffocation.

(00:46:03):

I don't understand why he was in my band. He did the Red Chord. He did so many bands and I remember that he would learn this stuff in one night too. I remember with the devil driver situation, John Berkland, the drummer who's now the drummer and Bad Wolves, he got food poisoned in the morning and they asked Kevin to fly in that day and play a show that night. He learned it on the plane and wrote his little charts that he would always write these little charts. And I think that's what he did with Black Dahlia murder too. He had to learn that stuff within a day and a half. Yeah. So yeah, writing and Inger. Alex Inger, anytime I've worked with him, when he's learning stuff, he's got charts in front of him

Speaker 2 (00:46:50):

From the other guy. What's it called? His teacher, the guy with two Toms. That was Rutger's teacher. The guy who played in the periphery.

Speaker 1 (00:46:58):

Matt?

Speaker 2 (00:46:59):

No, no, before.

Speaker 1 (00:47:00):

Oh, I don't know.

Speaker 2 (00:47:01):

Okay. Nevermind. Travis.

Speaker 1 (00:47:03):

Oh, Travis Orbin is rooting her's teacher. Yeah.

Speaker 2 (00:47:06):

Interesting Was at

Speaker 4 (00:47:07):

Least

Speaker 1 (00:47:07):

I didn't know that. Okay, that makes sense. And I know drum charts are different than the charts we would read as a guitar player, but there's a time and place for that stuff.

Speaker 2 (00:47:17):

I actually wrote HL B's first album, the self-titled one. I wrote that entirely in Guitar Pro.

Speaker 1 (00:47:25):

Like no guitar.

Speaker 2 (00:47:26):

No guitar.

Speaker 1 (00:47:27):

Tell me about that. Because you're a guitar player.

Speaker 2 (00:47:30):

Yeah, I'm both a drummer and a guitar player. So as far as that goes, that was the first time I heard Vil Jara. I was like, okay, I need to step up my riffing to a whole another level that doesn't

Speaker 1 (00:47:41):

Before you were in the band.

Speaker 2 (00:47:43):

So that doesn't include me sitting down playing because I understood that me sitting down playing those types of riffs would not happen because the way they record riffs are like, there's a lot of editing and the way they track it is so tightly involved with how the final product ends up.

Speaker 1 (00:48:01):

But did you know that then? No. Then it just sounded crazy.

Speaker 2 (00:48:04):

Yeah. I was like, these guys are crazy. I don't know what they're doing. And the only videos online were them in the rehearsal space. I was like, oh. So they're doing that shit in rehearsal space. I need to step up my game. I had to tap stuff out for the guys to learn. So I already kind knew Guitar Pro. I just started writing there to make weirder riffs. Just crazier riffs.

Speaker 1 (00:48:30):

Weirder, because you weren't

Speaker 2 (00:48:32):

Constrained. Control V. Yeah. If you copy a section and then copy it and it got offset. So it got kind of weird loops going on instead of being just four four and just starting

Speaker 1 (00:48:44):

Over.

Speaker 2 (00:48:45):

I made long loops of riffs that just continued forever.

Speaker 1 (00:48:48):

Interesting. And not constrained by your hands, I guess. Okay, I want to talk about this. I've talked shit about people who write in Guitar Pro, but I have no shit to talk about you. I think you're awesome. And I know that obviously you have a serious musical background

Speaker 3 (00:49:05):

And

Speaker 1 (00:49:06):

You know what you're doing. So you are not what I'm talking about when I talk shit about it. So here's where I'm coming from when I've talked shit about it, and when I say I talk shit about it, I've talked shit about it and I've written articles for Metal Sucks about it 10 years ago, and here's what was bothering

Speaker 3 (00:49:25):

Me.

Speaker 1 (00:49:26):

I would get bands to record who had never played their parts ever who didn't know if their parts were even doable, but they weren't really skilled to begin with. So it's not like the Shuga drummer programming drums on an album just because he hurt his wrist and just fuck it. Everyone knows he can play it in it. It's not like when Fear Factory decided to have programmed drums as a production choice, when obviously Fear Factory could play

Speaker 4 (00:49:56):

Gene O.

Speaker 1 (00:49:57):

Yeah. Could play whatever he wants. So I was getting bands who couldn't play shit, who they were just programming Guitar Pro and then coming into the studio and wanting to record this stuff and it was like, have you ever played this? This makes no sense on the guitar. And it's not like I'm working with some genius who they did it that way, but then they're going to know how it makes sense. And so I was making the argument that it was getting people disconnected from the actual act of making music. It was getting bands disconnected from actually playing. And I was feeling like that.

Speaker 2 (00:50:38):

But it is, it's correct. I'd say that's correct.

Speaker 1 (00:50:41):

Okay. Alright. So I'm not off with

Speaker 2 (00:50:43):

That. No, but I don't think it's a bad thing because it's all about the music and the end result. Fair enough. And someone sitting at the bus and listening to the riff, that's crazy sounding. I don't care at all if you can play it, I don't care at all if you can play it live or whatever. And some of the riffs I've written or barely, barely possible to play, but on record, they're sounding nuts. And that's what I care about.

Speaker 1 (00:51:08):

So here the thing is, that was not happening with the people I was talking about.

Speaker 2 (00:51:13):

Okay.

Speaker 1 (00:51:14):

It's not that their riffs sounded nuts, it's more like they were just laid out stupidly.

Speaker 2 (00:51:20):

Okay,

Speaker 1 (00:51:20):

So

Speaker 2 (00:51:21):

Did it make sense

Speaker 1 (00:51:22):

They weren't playable? Not because the guy wrote something like Igor

Speaker 2 (00:51:27):

Or

Speaker 1 (00:51:27):

Whatever. We're just listening to Igor. Everyone listening. I-G-O-R-R-R. Check it out.

Speaker 2 (00:51:33):

Yeah, the new song with the corpse grinder on it. It's sick

Speaker 1 (00:51:36):

Or Yeah. And also a song called Very Noise. Just check it out.

Speaker 2 (00:51:42):

It's such a good title.

Speaker 1 (00:51:44):

Yeah.

Speaker 2 (00:51:44):

How much noise? Very noisy, very noise.

Speaker 1 (00:51:47):

But that's what I mean. It's not stuff that's crazy. It was just stuff that was stupidly laid out. It was impossible to play because it stupidly laid out and it was stuff that it was like metal core. It wasn't like they were breaking any boundaries.

Speaker 2 (00:52:05):

It was like teleport drifts, like one note at the second fret and one at the 16th fret straight after

Speaker 1 (00:52:11):

When you could just play it a few strings higher.

Speaker 2 (00:52:14):

But that's also a thing. I'll have to explain that. That's the classic thing. When you look at people trying to cover Vilada songs, listen closely. People are doing the thing you say, if you have the note on the 16th threat, they'll just bring it down here to the fourth threat or whatever because it's easier to reach, but it doesn't have the same sound. It I

Speaker 1 (00:52:36):

Agree completely

Speaker 2 (00:52:37):

At all. The same people make the covers and they will pick the right notes to be fair, but they won't pick the right fret or the right string because Vja does a huge amount of riffing on the thickest string above, above the 12 fret way high, which gets this bass is sound,

Speaker 1 (00:52:57):

By the way. I'm with you on this.

Speaker 2 (00:52:58):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:52:59):

Amal, the other guitar player in doth, and I used to talk about them as vertical bands versus horizontal.

Speaker 4 (00:53:04):

Okay.

Speaker 1 (00:53:04):

Mastodon is a band that plays up and down. We used to do that a lot too. So we would do vertical riffs a lot, play it on the 12th fret instead of the fifth fret because of the way it sounds. And then also when I track guitar players, if we're doing harmony parts, even on simple metal Core third harmonies, I would always have them track it on the same string because otherwise, yeah, the tone difference would just be weird.

Speaker 2 (00:53:35):

You just kind of have to evaluate it yourself and listen what sounds best. But that's not how they were thinking. No, they're just thinking this is a note on this fret. Nothing more than that.

Speaker 1 (00:53:45):

So with these Guitar Pro guys, dude, they weren't thinking about it the way we are. Where you have a note on the second fret and then the 16th fret, and you're doing it on the same string for an artistic reason. The artistic reason is you want that certain kind of feel that you'll get at. That's not what was happening. They were just writing rifts that are stupidly laid out because they weren't thinking it through. That was my issue. It wasn't like I'm all for pushing the boundaries. And I guess intentionality is one of my biggest musical values. I think

Speaker 2 (00:54:18):

That you have to have intention on what you're doing and do a certain thing because it sounds better.

Speaker 1 (00:54:25):

Yes, exactly. And Guitar Pro was getting people disconnected from that in some cases. But then we've got people like you where it's not, and I understand completely your ethos that what really matters is the end result.

Speaker 2 (00:54:40):

I wanted it to sound inhuman.

Speaker 1 (00:54:41):

Yeah,

Speaker 2 (00:54:42):

That's because the main focus with these two bands is a lot of evil sounding riffs. And evil isn't human, I don't think pure evil. I mean, humans can be evil, but humans aren't evil if you think about him broadly. So it's kind of Ted Bundy's

Speaker 1 (00:55:00):

Pretty evil,

Speaker 2 (00:55:01):

But I wanted it to, but he was

Speaker 1 (00:55:02):

Nice to his daughter.

Speaker 2 (00:55:04):

Great. Sorry, I wanted it to sound like inhuman or something

Speaker 1 (00:55:10):

Else. I was just using that Ted Bundy example because someone I know wanted to prove to me that

Speaker 2 (00:55:17):

He was a nice guy.

Speaker 1 (00:55:17):

No, not that he was a nice guy, but that everybody deserves redemption because they have a good side. And I

Speaker 2 (00:55:23):

Don't depends.

Speaker 1 (00:55:25):

I think there's a line. Yeah, there's a line somewhere. Yeah. Hitler had a

Speaker 2 (00:55:30):

Dog. I mean, Stalin doesn't really didn't deserve any.

Speaker 1 (00:55:33):

No. There's some people that have crossed the line. So you're thinking about evil more like in this the

Speaker 2 (00:55:40):

Alien type of sense. Something that's inherently foreign, that's a fancy way of putting it.

Speaker 1 (00:55:48):

Okay. So something that's not like a human trait or all

Speaker 2 (00:55:55):

Should sound foreign. It shouldn't sound like something you've heard before.

Speaker 1 (00:55:59):

Fair

Speaker 2 (00:55:59):

Enough. It should sound mean as if a human hears it. She or shouldn't think, oh, this sounds happier, this sounds whatever. But it should still have that kind of evil sound as far as notes or mission accomplished. Yeah, that's good. So that's kind of what I'm going for and whatever it takes,

Speaker 1 (00:56:22):

That to me is admirable. I respect that a lot.

Speaker 2 (00:56:27):

But I also stopped doing it. I only did it for that album.

Speaker 1 (00:56:29):

Why'd you Stop?

Speaker 2 (00:56:30):

Okay. I did it for that album and the EP after, to be fair. So then I created this session where I could riff and I had a finished mix on any riff I wanted to play so I can just record any riff and I could bounce it out and it would sound like the album, the same session I mixed the album in is the same mix I tracked the album in. So it is the same thing now, tracking the album, doing now, I can just have the final results like that. And that kind of made me start playing more. And I mean, I did the Guitar Pro thing for two albums and now I've done that. So the thing I'm doing now is different. I play and edit in a certain way and use the tools in the D instead of writing down notation because I want to hear the music. It was really, I kind of programmed drums and put the shitty Guitar Pro beside it to hear some sort of music going. I just had a bunch of guitar profiles and I didn't program drums in them or bass I just had, and I didn't even use a distorted guitar sound. It was just the worst sounding stuff. So that was kind of, I mean, if a riff sounds good in that though, it's a good riff. To be fair.

Speaker 1 (00:57:49):

That's true. And you can tell this with when great songs are great pieces of music are covered in other instruments or done eight bit, or you get a shitty piano midi version and it's still cool. A good example is the old Nintendo music.

Speaker 3 (00:58:10):

Yeah,

Speaker 1 (00:58:10):

For sure. The old Nintendo music. When you hear a crappy little mid piano versions or a badly played cover or a well played cover or eight vocalists doing it, or a dude with banjos or whatever, it's still just as the castlevania theme for instance, it's still just as good. Good music. People would also say that idea that if it sounds good on an acoustic guitar, it's good.

Speaker 2 (00:58:36):

Yeah,

Speaker 1 (00:58:37):

I don't know if I always agree with that because some riffs you can't actually play

Speaker 2 (00:58:40):

On. No, it kind of sounds weird with the pole muting and stuff,

Speaker 1 (00:58:43):

But still the concept I think is true. If it sounds good in a shittier medium, if it's still capturing you, then that's good.

Speaker 2 (00:58:53):

Yeah, for sure. I wish I could, I mean, there's a difference between the newer HLB material and the old, and I think a lot of fans notice it, and I think it has something to do with the Guitar Pro method versus me sitting down playing for sure. But that's what I'm doing now and that's the way it is,

Speaker 1 (00:59:12):

Right? As an artist.

Speaker 2 (00:59:14):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:59:14):

Yeah. It's

Speaker 2 (00:59:15):

Your art. Yeah, I want to do it this way, and that's what I'm doing.

Speaker 1 (00:59:19):

So how do you know that it's the finished product? I guess the reason I'm asking is because I'm so used to people getting an amp tone while they're tracking and then make the record and then they reamp it, or I'm just so used to scenarios that I've been involved with or just people I worked with or just people who have been on the podcast or whatever, talking about how the tracking and mixing are two totally separate things. How do you know that that's the final tone?

Speaker 2 (00:59:51):

It doesn't have to be the final tone. It doesn't have to be the final tone, but I'm tracking di, so I'm using AM Simms. That doesn't have to be the final tone. I amped when the album was done, and I'm probably going to do the same for this one. It's not the final tone, but it's definitely the final tracking because I wrote it and it sound good. It sounds good. Sounds like the way I want it to. Why would I retract?

Speaker 1 (01:00:13):

Oh yeah, yeah, for sure. Okay. What you're saying is when you're writing, you're writing it for the final,

Speaker 3 (01:00:22):

You're

Speaker 1 (01:00:22):

Not writing a demo.

Speaker 3 (01:00:23):

Yeah, for sure.

Speaker 1 (01:00:24):

Okay, that makes perfect sense. So then I'm assuming that when you're writing, your guitars are perfectly set up and

Speaker 2 (01:00:31):

Definitely, I wouldn't say perfectly, but try to. Yeah, well enough. I tried to have newer strings on and stuff like that, and the evert tune really helps for keeping it in tune and stuff like that. So that's not a problem really for me at

Speaker 1 (01:00:48):

Least. I've always told people that when that they should never consider a demo quote, just the demo for a number of reasons. The main one being that you never know what's going to end up on the final record. So even if they don't write like you, if they demo stuff and then plan to go to the studio, there could be little creative parts or leads or whatever. That just was a time in space, a time in place, a moment, what am I trying to say? A moment in time that can't be recreated. You're never going to play it better.

Speaker 2 (01:01:23):

That's the thing with the Vilada stuff that I got, they got some critiques on in the comments, why wouldn't they retract? Why would they pitch and stuff like that.

Speaker 1 (01:01:32):

Oh, you mean in the nail the mix ads?

Speaker 2 (01:01:36):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:01:37):

Yeah, let's talk about that in a

Speaker 2 (01:01:39):

Second. Yeah, the thing about that, I mean, I get their point definitely, and there's definitely some laziness to it, but one of the guitarists has a chronic hand pain thing that he really has struggled with for years, which means that some days he really can't play, and when he can play, he'd rather do something new than kind of retract something. We will retract some stuff. Definitely. Sometimes it's just like I made a better tone and they want to use that instead. So they'll retract. It's not a problem, but sometimes they just pitch the entire session to another tempo or another note, and if it sounds good, why not use it? But I was against it when they sent stuff to me like that. I was like, can't you just retract it? Because I hear a lot of artifacts here, but in the full mix, you're not hearing it.

Speaker 1 (01:02:33):

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

(01:03:24):

And these are guys like TLA, Will Putney, Jenz Borin, Dan Lancaster, toy Matson, Andrew Wade, and many, many more. You'll also get access to Mix Lab, which is our collection of dozens of bite-sized mixing tutorials that cover all the basics as well as Portfolio Builder, which is a library of pro quality multi-tracks cleared for use in your portfolio. So your career will never again be held back by the quality of your source material. And for those of you who really want to step up their game, we have another membership tier called URM Enhance, which includes everything I already told you about, and access to our massive library of fast tracks, which are deep, super detailed courses on intermediate and advanced topics like gain, staging, mastering, low end and so forth. It's over 500 hours of content. And man, let me tell you, this stuff is just insanely detailed and enhanced. Members also get access to one-on-ones, which are basically office hour sessions with us and Mix Rescue, which is where we open up one of your mixes and fix it up and talk you through exactly what we're doing at every step. So if any of that sounds interesting to you, if you're ready to level up your mixing skills in your audio career, head over to URM Academy to find out more. So there's a big difference, as I know because been in Nail the mix, there's a difference between our community, the gated community,

(01:04:53):

Once people are in nail the mix versus the people who respond to our ads and stuff. Our ads are the general public. We can't control how they behave on that and they behave the way that people behave on the internet. So for anyone listening, if you've seen our ads and you see the comments there, that's not how our community is. You can't police YouTube comments and first of all, it looks lame if you start deleting too many comments.

Speaker 4 (01:05:21):

Yeah, you should never do that.

Speaker 1 (01:05:21):

I only do it if the shit people are saying is starting to get destructive or racist or some shit like that if it's starting to cross the line. But if they're just talking shit, just let it go. Let's

Speaker 2 (01:05:34):

Do it. Yeah. I'd rather just explain to them and if they keep hating after that, it's like, okay, you just want to hate why. You

Speaker 1 (01:05:42):

Just want to hate.

Speaker 2 (01:05:42):

But sometimes, oh, they didn't understand. So they'll say, oh, okay, I didn't understand that.

Speaker 1 (01:05:48):

That is a lot of it. A lot it I've noticed is people just don't get it, and all you have to do is explain it to them calmly and rationally and they'll get it. I understand in some ways why people would say, why didn't you just retrack it? But the thing at the end of the day that I think is so much more important than doing things properly is whether the artistic intent is being carried out and how the end result sounds.

Speaker 4 (01:06:20):

Definitely.

Speaker 1 (01:06:20):

That's what really really matters. Also, a lot of these people that are talking shit, man, they're not necessarily making a living at this. And when you're making a living at this, you get sessions that aren't perfect, what are you going to do? Send them back? I mean, you could, but not always.

Speaker 2 (01:06:37):

No. But also a thing that I kind of can't stand is people that are just saying haters are going to be haters or whatever, or just labeling all hate as invalid or whatever. And I'm not like that. I'm not going to say, this guy said something hateful, therefore his existence is just invalid and he should just shut up. I agree. I'm not about that at all. People can criticize and be right. That's fair. Not because a guy is behind his computer and lives out in his mom's house that his brain can't produce anything good. Of course it can. Of course he has an opinion that comes from somewhere. I mean, I'm not going to just tell him to fuck off and just, oh, he's just a looser. You live in your mom's basement never. Plus you never even know if they live in their mom's basement. No, but I just see a lot of people that get critiqued that should get critiqued, that are just kind of saying that stuff to their community and only embracing the positive, which I don't really agree with.

Speaker 1 (01:07:41):

I don't agree with it either. I learned this back when my band was getting critiqued. I'd see critiques and I'd agree with him sometimes and I'd be like, this is really, really valuable because what he's saying are thoughts that I had in the studio, but I didn't fight for them and now he's noticing them and this is confirming something for me. Or sometimes I'll hear things that I didn't think of a critique on, maybe the way we do things that I didn't realize would have a certain consequence or would be interpreted a certain way. And that's how you find out you can't classify all negative feedback as people just being haters. There are some people though that are just toxic.

Speaker 2 (01:08:28):

Yeah, for sure. For sure.

Speaker 1 (01:08:30):

I'm not.

Speaker 2 (01:08:30):

But you always know when that's the case because they won't stop.

Speaker 1 (01:08:35):

They won't stop. No matter how rationally you try to engage them and explain it to them, they still just keep on coming. They turn up the volume on the eight. That just means there's something broken upstairs I think might be probably, they don't necessarily live with their mom though, in

Speaker 2 (01:08:52):

The basement. No, maybe not.

Speaker 1 (01:08:53):

Maybe not. I think that's a myth, man. I think a lot of people who get critiqued online, their way of dealing with it, dealing with it, it's

Speaker 2 (01:09:02):

A keyboard. Warriors.

Speaker 1 (01:09:04):

Yeah, dude. Everybody's a keyboard warrior. Everybody's online.

Speaker 2 (01:09:07):

Literally everyone.

Speaker 1 (01:09:09):

So these people that are talking shit, it could be a huge producer that's got 17 Grammys. You never know who these people are.

Speaker 2 (01:09:20):

Exactly.

Speaker 1 (01:09:21):

They're not all basement dwelling losers. Exactly. So treat them all with respect. And I do agree that it's an opportunity to educate them

Speaker 2 (01:09:32):

And don't just only take in the positives and just say that the others are just losers. You have to take it all in.

Speaker 1 (01:09:40):

Yeah. If you're going to accept the positive, you have to accept the negative too, in my opinion. Otherwise, you're just being selective about it. So when I saw those critiques about the session, I understood where they were coming from. Those critiques were not inside our community though.

Speaker 2 (01:09:58):

But to be fair, I fucked up the HLB session to be fair. That's my fault. That's all on me. I'll say that I don't care. Well make

Speaker 1 (01:10:05):

Mistakes.

Speaker 2 (01:10:06):

I care about that. I fucked it up, but I don't care about telling everyone I'm not going to hide. That was a mistake from my side, and I am sorry about that, but it's easy fix. It happens. It's also an easy fix. Yeah, totally. It's not a deal breaker, but I got guy who wrote me and I checked it out and he was right. So

Speaker 1 (01:10:28):

I'm sorry, dude. It happens. It totally happens. That's another reason for why should never take the stance of immediately looking down on people who tell you stuff like this because they could be, right.

Speaker 2 (01:10:43):

Yeah, of course.

Speaker 1 (01:10:43):

Oftentimes they are, of course. But man, seriously learning the difference though between a person who just has destructive intent versus someone, there's a few categories. There's a person who has destructive intent. Then there's the category of people who are just confused. They just don't understand when they're saying, why didn't you just have them retrack? They're not trying to be dicks.

Speaker 4 (01:11:06):

No,

Speaker 1 (01:11:06):

They don't get it because in their world you just have 'em retrack. They're just voicing their confusion and

Speaker 2 (01:11:14):

That's fine.

Speaker 1 (01:11:15):

And then there's other people, they'll notice a problem and they just want to help you out.

Speaker 2 (01:11:19):

Yeah, for sure. For sure. I'm not perfect. I won't say I am. So, I mean, I'm thankful for learning from my mistakes.

Speaker 1 (01:11:28):

Yeah, totally. So I think it's really cool that you've got this attitude towards that type of reaction, and I saw you responding to people and trying to explain things. And what's interesting to me is sometimes even when someone's being super negative about something, if I get in there and I'm polite with them and I just explain it to them, yes, you're right. Sometimes they'll just keep going. But sometimes that's all it takes. And we become friends. For instance, something that happens a lot is someone who's never been in the community. When people are talking about online programs or us, they'll just come in with a scam. Whoa, you can't learn that shit online or something like that. But the thing is, some of them are just being dicks. Some of them probably signed up for some shitty course by somebody who's never worked with anybody

Speaker 3 (01:12:28):

Who

Speaker 1 (01:12:28):

Just gave really bad information. There's a lot of that out there. Or maybe they signed up for something and then never got the info delivered, like, dude, that happens. So there's

Speaker 2 (01:12:41):

The first to say, I'll be the first one to say all these courses that are available nail the mix. And others, they've helped me a ton. And that's no scam or anything like that. It's just people showing their methods on how they achieve their sound. And that has helped me out a ton to achieve my sound.

Speaker 1 (01:13:02):

That's what we're here for. I mean, wouldn't be here if you thought it was a scam, but the thing is there, we've had to fight this stigma. There are a lot of scammers on the internet. There's a lot of people who see that there's companies like ours or pure mix or mix with the masters or whatever.

Speaker 2 (01:13:24):

Brian, the Masters great as well.

Speaker 1 (01:13:26):

Yeah. Who are doing good stuff and we make it look easy. Brian Hood, he makes his shit look easy. And so a lot of people think, oh, I'll just do it too Easy money. And they don't know what goes into it. They don't know. In my case, I'm working on, this is built, I was telling you, I have a relationships that go back 15 years and then my own career in music and then my partner's careers and mixed with the masters. You don't get the kinds of people they have on by chance. Exactly, yeah. Or pure mix. That's not Good

Speaker 2 (01:14:06):

Luck.

Speaker 1 (01:14:07):

Good fucking luck.

Speaker 2 (01:14:08):

Also, I want to thank Brian Hood for the shout outs on what the podcast YouTube did. He shouted me out as one of his students. Oh,

Speaker 1 (01:14:15):

Nice.

Speaker 2 (01:14:16):

And now I'm here. So it is

Speaker 1 (01:14:18):

Really cool. Well shout out to Brian Hood in general. I like that guy. A great podcast and super smart guy.

Speaker 3 (01:14:25):

Really.

Speaker 1 (01:14:25):

I went to Nashville a few months ago and had lunch with him. He's cool. Okay. So there's that level of stuff, but then there's a bunch of people who see that, and I'm not saying that you don't have the right to have a voice if you have no credits, but if you're going to be teaching people how to do this and you've never made a record before,

Speaker 4 (01:14:46):

Kind of weird.

Speaker 1 (01:14:47):

Kind of weird. And I think that people have bought that stuff from people who are just good marketers and then got in bullshit in return, and then that's why they think that it's all a scam. So when they see nail the mix, and we don't promise results, but we talk about a lot of benefits, and they see that, and then their immediate response is, well, that's a scam because they got scammed before.

Speaker 2 (01:15:12):

But that's a vocal minority.

Speaker 1 (01:15:14):

But there's enough of, well, all it takes though is a few people like that being loud. So I'll talk to them in public very, very politely, and I'll offer them a free month and just be like, look, I understand you may have had a bad experience somewhere else. I'll give you a month or two for free on the house. If you don't like it, no problem. But I want you to at least know what you're talking

Speaker 3 (01:15:40):

About.

Speaker 1 (01:15:41):

If you're going to say bad things about us, it should be based on

Speaker 4 (01:15:45):

Facts.

Speaker 1 (01:15:46):

Facts.

Speaker 2 (01:15:47):

Yeah,

Speaker 1 (01:15:47):

Absolutely. And lots of times those people become like some of the best customers

Speaker 2 (01:15:52):

And that's great. And you shouldn't give them shit for it. They have a bad experience and they thought this is going to be the same thing.

Speaker 1 (01:16:00):

And

Speaker 2 (01:16:01):

It's great that they realized that it wasn't.

Speaker 1 (01:16:03):

Yeah, though sometimes they're like, no thanks, I don't want you generosity. It's like, whoa. Yeah, they're that pissed.

Speaker 4 (01:16:10):

Jesus.

Speaker 1 (01:16:11):

Yeah. So I am understanding that you learned to really record and stuff, kind of like to fulfill your own musical visions. Right?

Speaker 4 (01:16:19):

Definitely.

Speaker 1 (01:16:21):

That's kind of like a very modern way. I did too. That's why I started producing. That's a very modern way to become a producer.

Speaker 2 (01:16:29):

It's about the passion for the music. It's not about like, oh, I'm going to learn this so I can make money. It's like, oh, I really want my band to sound great. And then if your band sounds great, other bands wants to sound great and they'll approach you.

Speaker 1 (01:16:43):

So is that how you started to get clients?

Speaker 2 (01:16:46):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:16:47):

I

Speaker 2 (01:16:47):

Mean I was lucky that HLB became, I wouldn't say we're big, but it became a name and production.

Speaker 1 (01:16:55):

It's a respect and name.

Speaker 2 (01:16:57):

So the production people were asking who did the production? And I said, it was me. And that's the way I got flys. But also the first album was a huge part of that. And Dino, I have to shout him out. He is like a stem master. Dino is, I can't pronounce his man. Honick Meta Honick or something.

Speaker 1 (01:17:18):

By the way, let me just say real quick. He was on

Speaker 2 (01:17:22):

The podcast.

Speaker 1 (01:17:22):

Yeah, I'm looking up his episode number.

Speaker 2 (01:17:25):

So I just want to mention him because the first HLB album, he did a STEM master of it. I really want to include someone else in the production because I wasn't as good back then. And I really wanted to make sure the album was sounding as great as it could. But I was still confident in taking responsibility for the majority of the sound because I did record it and I did track it and I did make the tones and stuff like that. So I was still saying, yeah, I mixed it, but he definitely helped me out for

Speaker 1 (01:17:55):

That. So you're in podcast number 1 42, Dino Madon Hus Nick. It was slow, but Correct. He's really, really great. Swedish producer,

Speaker 4 (01:18:07):

Madon

Speaker 1 (01:18:07):

Zi. Madon Zi.

Speaker 4 (01:18:11):

Yeah, Madden Hoik.

Speaker 1 (01:18:12):

He's great. And

Speaker 4 (01:18:14):

He's hot and sick.

Speaker 1 (01:18:17):

Do know Met Hot and Sick. Yeah, he does a lot of pop stuff. He comes from a heavy background, but

Speaker 2 (01:18:23):

Euro vision now.

Speaker 1 (01:18:24):

Yeah, he's killing it. But he's great. So I recommend podcast episode 1 42.

Speaker 2 (01:18:30):

Also, Dino, we should meet up. I live in Stockholm now.

Speaker 1 (01:18:34):

Yeah, Dino, what the fuck, bro?

Speaker 2 (01:18:35):

What the fuck, bro?

Speaker 1 (01:18:36):

Yeah, what is this? What is this shit? So what bands approached you at first? Was it like we like HLB, we want to sound like that?

Speaker 4 (01:18:45):

Definitely.

Speaker 1 (01:18:45):

Okay.

Speaker 4 (01:18:46):

Definitely.

Speaker 1 (01:18:46):

Did that throw you off at all or were you like, cool,

Speaker 2 (01:18:50):

Cool. I was stoked. I mean, I also mixed the EP before the subtitled, but I wouldn't say I was good at it enough back then. But I got clients off of that EP as well. My first clients, I got to charge a thousand bucks or 1,100 bucks for five songs, which is great for the first

Speaker 1 (01:19:10):

Client. Yeah, that's great.

Speaker 2 (01:19:11):

So that was crazy. Good. And off of that, it just continued. And Phillip, who sings for HLB now, his band approached me was the second band, and his band approached me and I mixed them like 2011 or 2012. And it just went on from there.

Speaker 1 (01:19:29):

Word of mouth though, right? Yeah. Did you ever do any sort of advertising or

Speaker 2 (01:19:34):

No

Speaker 1 (01:19:35):

Marketing

Speaker 2 (01:19:35):

That's like now with Impact Studios, that wasn't Impact Studios back then. So Impact Studios now we do advertising and stuff like that, but back then I didn't know.

Speaker 1 (01:19:45):

But Impact Studios, do you do advertising for studio stuff or for

Speaker 2 (01:19:49):

I do. Or

Speaker 1 (01:19:50):

For the

Speaker 2 (01:19:51):

Products? IRS and yeah, for irs. And our basis are NKI basis. We do advertising for those, but that also goes hand in hand with the mixing because our site has both things.

Speaker 1 (01:20:03):

But you're not doing ads for mixing, are you?

Speaker 2 (01:20:05):

Not really. Mostly product.

Speaker 1 (01:20:07):

Yeah. That's always been my experience. That products, yes, marketing and advertising works great for it, but the service of being a producer, the best marketing is your work. And the word of mouth. I haven't had a single person come on this podcast and this is going to be like episode 253 or four. There's lots of people. I haven't had a single one say that they used advertising or something successfully.

Speaker 2 (01:20:36):

Are they all the podcast? Are they all available on YouTube or is it on the nail link site

Speaker 1 (01:20:41):

Now? The mix site or Spotify or,

Speaker 2 (01:20:44):

Okay. So they're all on Spotify. Okay, cool.

Speaker 1 (01:20:46):

Yeah.

Speaker 2 (01:20:47):

Nice.

Speaker 1 (01:20:47):

Yeah, YouTube, we stopped uploading all of them on there. It was fucking up our algorithm.

Speaker 4 (01:20:54):

Oh.

Speaker 1 (01:20:54):

Because some of them people checked out, but some of them nobody checked out. And that just messes with the channel, unfortunately.

Speaker 2 (01:21:04):

Yeah, fair enough.

Speaker 1 (01:21:05):

And also it's a fraction of our total listeners.

Speaker 2 (01:21:09):

Yeah. I'm just realizing it now because I'm looking for podcasts when I'm at the gym and I thought I had listened to all of them, but I only listened to the YouTube once, so

Speaker 1 (01:21:20):

I have a lot to listen to. There's been some good ones too that you've missed.

Speaker 2 (01:21:24):

I will listen to 'em for sure. I learned a ton from the ones I listened to on YouTube.

Speaker 1 (01:21:29):

Have you heard Susan Rogers episode? Nope. Check that one out. Will do. Dude. She is the smartest motherfucker I've ever spoken to. She used to engineer for Prince when she was very, very young. And so she his go-to his person and she built gear for him too. And then at the age of 44, she decided to go to college, became a neuroscientist.

Speaker 4 (01:21:59):

Jesus.

Speaker 1 (01:22:00):

And so now she's a neuroscientist slash professor at Berkeley College of Music where I believe that she teaches audio engineering, but she also, I'm not entirely sure exactly what she is, but she's an actual neuroscientist, has done all kinds of crazy research about the brain and music and

Speaker 2 (01:22:20):

Really cool.

Speaker 1 (01:22:21):

Yeah, you should listen to that one and talking to her,

Speaker 2 (01:22:25):

I'm probably going to listen to all of them,

Speaker 1 (01:22:26):

But that one is specific if you want to just hear a genius talk.

Speaker 2 (01:22:30):

Yeah,

Speaker 1 (01:22:30):

Talking to her was trying to run after a Ferrari.

Speaker 2 (01:22:35):

I really liked the one with Mike as well, from the Doom soundtrack and stuff like that.

Speaker 1 (01:22:39):

Or Mick? Mick. Mick. Mick Gordon.

Speaker 2 (01:22:41):

Yeah, he's crazy. That was so

Speaker 1 (01:22:44):

Crazy. I'm trying to bring him back.

Speaker 2 (01:22:45):

I talked to him and back in 2016 I think, and he said that he had used my mixes as reference for the original Doom Sound.

Speaker 1 (01:22:55):

God, that's awesome. That was

Speaker 2 (01:22:56):

Crazy to hear. What a compliment. Like Jesus Christ or serious. So that's just nuts. So I really like what he does, and he's a great guy. He seemed like I love to meet him,

Speaker 1 (01:23:08):

Man. His episode was one of my favorites.

Speaker 2 (01:23:10):

Yeah,

Speaker 1 (01:23:11):

I am trying to book him to bring him back. I loved talking to him, man, that must feel awesome to get a compliment like

Speaker 2 (01:23:19):

That, especially back then. I was literally, the album he was talking about was the Born of Sirens one, and I mixed that in Boy Bedroom, what's it called? Where I grew up? Yeah, your childhood. Yeah, essentially. And that was like no calibrated monitors or No, nothing. That was just, yeah, it is a weird a thing.

Speaker 1 (01:23:40):

Was it kind of out of the blue

Speaker 2 (01:23:43):

In a way?

Speaker 1 (01:23:44):

Yeah, just to get,

Speaker 2 (01:23:45):

I hit him up because I wanted to mix doom. Oh, okay. Yeah. But I was naive asking him for that because I didn't realize the time constraints and the way he worked. That's like having someone else mix that is probably impossible to have happened. So that was it. So he just said, oh, you're that guy. I referenced your mix from Born of Es, and that was pretty nuts.

Speaker 1 (01:24:11):

You know how we were talking earlier about how you shouldn't take the good praise too seriously. Also, if you're going to ignore the bad, you got to ignore the good

Speaker 3 (01:24:21):

Too.

Speaker 1 (01:24:22):

However, I've always found that when I would get compliments like that from someone I really respect, it would help me on my mission. I remember Will Putney hit me up once in 2013 about the Contortionist album or something, which I don't think sounds good anymore, but at the time

Speaker 2 (01:24:44):

Is the one with Vessel the song Vessel?

Speaker 1 (01:24:46):

Man, I don't remember the names.

Speaker 2 (01:24:47):

You don't remember names? Okay.

Speaker 1 (01:24:50):

It's the one that's very dreamy.

Speaker 4 (01:24:52):

Okay.

Speaker 1 (01:24:54):

It's not with their current singer.

Speaker 4 (01:24:56):

Okay.

Speaker 1 (01:24:56):

Jonathan, the singer. Intrinsic. Intrinsic.

Speaker 4 (01:24:59):

Okay.

Speaker 1 (01:25:00):

Both Misha and Will hit me up to compliment me on it.

Speaker 2 (01:25:04):

That's cool.

Speaker 1 (01:25:04):

And it felt great, man. I really looked up to those guys. Some people loved it, some people hated it. A lot of people wanted it to be heavy. Of

Speaker 2 (01:25:14):

Course, that's always the case. If you were heavy once and you all of a sudden go soft, I guess, and people will hate you. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:25:22):

It wasn't soft, but it was

Speaker 2 (01:25:24):

No, but yeah, softer.

Speaker 1 (01:25:25):

Softer. But it still getting that sort of affirmation, did it help you at all? Or was it just like, oh, that's cool.

Speaker 2 (01:25:33):

Yeah, it's more like, oh, that's cool, because back then I'm really, really bad at first of all, remembering stuff like that and kind of telling people about that. I've never used stuff like that as a way of advertising myself. Look at me, because that's kind of a Swedish thing. You don't really do that. It's called law Again, it's a law. A law. It is not a real law, but it's just you shouldn't think you're the best. That's something. Or you shouldn't think you're the shit. So you kind of back off in that mindset a bit, which could be negative.

Speaker 1 (01:26:11):

I kind of see how it can help you from developing too big of a head, but I just mean more if you're ever feeling un unconfident or something, getting praise from someone that you look up to can be like, wait a second. Maybe I'm not up.

Speaker 2 (01:26:27):

I think fucked up. I've been quite confident from the get go. That's great with my parents being supportive and I give positive feedback a lot. So that always helps. And I try not to kind of go too deep in that hole and just getting praise all the time and just be, oh, thank you. I don't want to do that.

Speaker 1 (01:26:50):

Just do the work. Yeah,

Speaker 2 (01:26:51):

Just do the work.

Speaker 1 (01:26:52):

Definitely. Yeah. Makes sense. So when Born of a Cyrus came about, how did that come about? It's a great story. I want to

Speaker 2 (01:27:00):

Hear it. It's really cool. I was in LA with my girlfriend at the time and we were driving, we were going to do the highway one and stuff like that. Drive from LA to San Francisco and do, it's a great drive. Do the not. If you're mixing a song in the car and you're super like, what's it called?

Speaker 1 (01:27:20):

You get the nausea from going, not if you're mixing a song in the car. Could have just been the whole sentence.

Speaker 2 (01:27:25):

Yeah, yeah. But not only that, but guess you get emotion sickness too. Super emotion. Extremely. We had to stop and I almost puked and stuff. We heard talking about mixing a song in the car that's already crazy to begin with. It was hard. We were in the car and I saw Lee Post, we were looking for mixers, blah, blah, blah. And I knew he's added me because he liked HLB, so I knew that already. And I just commented, hit me up, that's it. Or I kind of wrote him and I misspelled stuff. You should send me your files, haha, whatever. And he did. I was like, hold on. So 10 minutes time or 15 minutes, I had a link. So I was like, oh shit. In the car? Yeah, in the car. And I had my gaming laptop and my Powers and Wilkins in-ears was a kind of fancy in-ear monitor, but it wasn't like, it is not something you'll mix on. But I mixed on it back then. So yeah, I just started mixing in the car and we stopped at kind of different Starbucks to get wifi for me to send out revisions for the mix, which it was pretty funny. And I stayed up all night and stuff because of the jet lag and also because I had to continue mixing and stuff like that. And there was huge names involved, like Nali Adam from, what's it called? Oh, Adam d. Yeah,

(01:28:48):

He was involved and a bunch of other guys, and I was this nobody, I didn't have a studio barely. I was just living at home. So that was such a crazy experience and I got the job and that was insane. That also propelled my career a lot.

Speaker 1 (01:29:03):

Did you know that those other guys were in the running?

Speaker 2 (01:29:06):

I did. I asked afterwards.

Speaker 1 (01:29:08):

Oh, okay. So while you were

Speaker 2 (01:29:10):

No, I was doing it.

Speaker 1 (01:29:12):

Would that have fucked with your head at all?

Speaker 2 (01:29:14):

Probably not.

Speaker 1 (01:29:15):

That's great, man. Can we talk about your confidence a little bit? Okay, sure. Well, no, you know, why not? I think it's a bad thing. I think it's a great thing because people hit me up for advice all the time, whether not just the students. I get hit up by lots of people for help with moving forward on projects. And I've just noticed a lot of people don't have confidence and they're easily scared of things and they're always waiting for a perfect situation and they're just scared and they feel like they're not good enough or they feel like they get something called imposter syndrome where they don't feel like they're worthy of something.

Speaker 2 (01:30:03):

I can get that though, but I get it more like I'm making a living off of mixing metal. No, that's not possible. That can't happen. Sometimes I am just thinking it's not possible. Sometimes some guy's going to knock on my door and tell me that, no, you have to pay this so you have to get a normal job or something like that. That's kind of my thought about it. This can't be real. Something will happen that will make me have to get a normal job.

Speaker 1 (01:30:33):

I feel that way too.

Speaker 2 (01:30:36):

Something, the feeling never goes away. Literally everyone else has to do a normal job. So it feels kind of strange that way and you kind of don't believe it.

Speaker 1 (01:30:46):

But I know a lot of other people who had, they had found out that those guys were in the running, they may have not have even tried. Oh

Speaker 2 (01:30:57):

No. Yeah, like you said, that's the confidence that comes from being the music teachers, darling. From day one in when I was a small kid, all my early music teachers were mind blown. This seemed like, and I mean probably back then was a bit of an asshole about it because I just thought I was the best back then. I had to work on that when I started and when I got older and started, I don't know, it's called gym. It's called When You Go to the gymnasium in Swedish, but I don't know what it's called. Maybe high school, I think

Speaker 1 (01:31:33):

High school it's

Speaker 2 (01:31:33):

Called. Yeah. So when I started high school, I was still an asshole about that stuff. You

Speaker 1 (01:31:37):

Had to learn some humility.

Speaker 2 (01:31:38):

I had to learn that and I had to learn how to get along with other musicians that weren't as skilled, I guess. And I had, so that was a huge thing. And the teachers told me they hated me in the beginning. I was good at what I was doing, but I kind of became a substitute teacher, which kind of was bullshit still, I think. But that didn't help my douchebag situation really. Years later when I was graduating and stuff like that, they told me I had gotten a lot better at that, but I was certainly bad. I was certainly not a nice guy back then.

Speaker 1 (01:32:14):

You seem perfectly nice now.

Speaker 2 (01:32:16):

But I've worked on it a lot. And also I've been humble, of course, of all the talent that internet and YouTube brings and I'm like, oh shit, I'm not the best

Speaker 1 (01:32:25):

Once. It's not easy, but it's one thing to be the best person in your school, but then once you're in the world, you're up against people who were also the best in their school and more, you're talking about people that are now the best in the world at this kind of stuff. But okay, so here what I'm curious about is what does it feel like, if you could describe it, when a job like that comes up, like you just said, even if you had known that these guys were in the running and you would've gone for it anyways, can you describe what that would feel like or what that feeling is? The reason I'm saying that is because if people who get this imposter syndrome or listening, maybe they can listen to how you felt about it or how you held yourself physically and try to take that on themselves next time They were afraid, well, this

Speaker 2 (01:33:22):

Is a lot of pressure answering

Speaker 1 (01:33:23):

Stuff. No, it could be something as simple like I just said, fuck it. That's what I tell people.

Speaker 2 (01:33:28):

I probably thought this is my chance and I will crush this, and I am familiar with their music and the files I get are great. I can do this. I can only do it the way I want it to sound, and they'll just have to decide if that's the sound they want or not. So I can only do it my way, and if they don't want it, fine, then that has to be the way it goes.

Speaker 1 (01:33:54):

The worst that could happen in your mind was they didn't take it.

Speaker 2 (01:33:57):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:33:59):

That clearly you didn't seem too emotionally concerned.

Speaker 2 (01:34:02):

I mean that would suck of course, but I can only do my best.

Speaker 1 (01:34:05):

Yeah, well see here, the thing is a lot of people, I think will think about the worst case. They don't take it and then they'll amplify it to this huge proportion where it doesn't need to be that it can be something as simple. Yeah, it's disappointing. But isn't it awesome that the opportunity even

Speaker 2 (01:34:26):

Came up? Of course, they chose you, they let you do it, which is a huge thing.

Speaker 1 (01:34:32):

Yeah, that's how I always took these things.

Speaker 2 (01:34:34):

But I've gotten to mix bigger bands as well, which I didn't get. Make them suffer is an example. I got to mix them, but that didn't go anywhere and those guys are huge. So that didn't go anywhere. And of course I was bummed about it, but what can you do? I just kept on going. More opportunities will arise if a good one arises. There's probably more people that think the way they think as well.

Speaker 1 (01:34:59):

That's how I always looked at it, was if I'm even being considered for something, that right there is the win.

Speaker 2 (01:35:07):

Yeah,

Speaker 1 (01:35:07):

The getting the actual job is a bonus. Of course,

Speaker 2 (01:35:11):

You're on their radar. That's good.

Speaker 1 (01:35:13):

Yeah, exactly. So the worst that could happen would be that they choose somebody else, but I'm on the radar. When you did do that test mix, the first the Born of a Cyrus, did it even cross your mind? They might not take it, or were you just like, I'm going to do this?

Speaker 2 (01:35:32):

I don't know really. I just thought I was more stoked. These files are great, this mix is really heavy. I'm happy about this. This sounds good. That's what I'm happy about. So I'm happy about the work I did, regardless of them taking it or not, because I got to do my version of Born of Cyrus.

Speaker 1 (01:35:51):

Got it. So you had found a way or not found a way, but you enjoyed the process?

Speaker 2 (01:35:56):

Yeah, it's like my love for mixing kind of takes over. I'd

Speaker 1 (01:35:58):

Say that's what I was hoping to hear from you, not what you just said, but I was just hoping to hear something along whatever lines felt honest to you and that makes sense. So if the love for mixing is what took over, there's no real room for fear in

Speaker 2 (01:36:16):

That. No, not from me at least.

Speaker 1 (01:36:18):

Yeah, man, I've been talking about that with some people lately that one of the most important things really when doing anything like this or you want to be an entrepreneur or musician, whatever, is finding a way to love the process. Because if you don't, then these issues, are they going to take it? Are they not going to take it? They're going to become way bigger. And then that imposter

Speaker 2 (01:36:46):

Syndrome, they should be smaller because the hours you should have spent on mixing should be a world trade center and you're not getting that job should be a small house because you spent that time that you got on their radar and you got good so that they knew who you were, which is great. And if you're not getting the job, that's too bad. But you've got to try and you will probably get to try in the future as well.

Speaker 1 (01:37:14):

Because if you're on the radar, what it means is that they consider you to be at a certain skill level. So they're only going to try people who they believe to be a certain skill level. Then the decision becomes a combination of politics and personal choice, like personal taste. So if they get five mixes, they're all going to be good. Probably they're all probably going to be pretty damn

Speaker 2 (01:37:40):

Good. I wish I could hear,

Speaker 1 (01:37:40):

I'm sure they're all good, but there's something about the one that gets picked that either the manager says, this is the best political move, or the band says, I like this one the best. Or some combination therein.

Speaker 2 (01:37:56):

I think Lee or someone over there probably stuck up for me, I think because since I was a nobody back then, me getting that job compared to Adam D or N is quite small. So some of 'em must have stuck up for me, which of course I'm super thankful for. That has to have happened, right?

Speaker 1 (01:38:17):

Yeah, absolutely. But the point still being that just the fact that you were in that situation is the win. And I don't know, I encourage people who are afraid to move forward with things, to find a way to love what it is that they're doing so that whatever voice it is in their head that's telling them they don't belong or it might not work, it's definitely not going to work If you don't do it,

Speaker 2 (01:38:42):

Of course you have to do it. Yeah, you have to make it sound the way you want to and kind of trust that.

Speaker 1 (01:38:48):

So after born of a Cyrus, did that kind of change things for you?

Speaker 2 (01:38:54):

And also the HLB was the first milestone, then probably born of Cyrus, and after that I got continued work, I'd say, so I could start living on it more or less. So that definitely helped me out.

Speaker 1 (01:39:10):

So it's interesting, some people have the one project that turns everything around, and then other people say that they have that one project that they think is going to turn everything around and then it takes 10 more. So you never know. You never know. You just have to keep going.

Speaker 2 (01:39:28):

Yeah, you should do it for the love and the other stuff comes along if you're good or if you spend the amount of time you have to.

Speaker 1 (01:39:36):

How many hours a day do you normally put in?

Speaker 2 (01:39:38):

Nowadays it's not as much as before, because before I experimented a lot more. I tried everything and I always had new references I wanted to talk, so I got super obsessed and I could do 12 hour days and stuff like that and not eat. But nowadays it's way less, I mean maybe four or five hours a day for that stuff.

Speaker 1 (01:40:00):

And then your ears are,

Speaker 2 (01:40:01):

No, my ears are fine. It's just like I'm a fast mixer, so the most time I spend on it is always waiting for revisions from the guys. Okay, got it. Yeah, so that's the time that I'm waiting for other bands, I would say,

Speaker 1 (01:40:16):

Man. Do you ever put a time limit on that or just whenever they get to it?

Speaker 2 (01:40:21):

I don't put a time limit on it. No. I should probably do that though.

Speaker 1 (01:40:26):

I think it is hard though. If you're dealing with a sign band, they're on tour, you can't do that. But I feel like with certain clients, like locals or

Speaker 4 (01:40:36):

Whatever,

Speaker 1 (01:40:37):

It's probably a good idea. But some bands you just can't. I just know some people who would be like, you have 48 hours. If I don't get notes back in 48 hours, I'm going to consider this approved. Ooh, damn, that's harsh.

Speaker 2 (01:40:52):

Yeah, harsh.

Speaker 1 (01:40:53):

Yeah,

Speaker 2 (01:40:53):

I've never done that because it takes a long time to listen to stuff and take it all in. It takes a long time.

Speaker 1 (01:41:00):

Yeah, I think that that was their written policy, but they didn't always enforce it, so they had that policy just because some people are just being lazy and they try to keep on a schedule, but obviously if they're working with legit bands that are on tour or whatever, they're not going to do that

Speaker 2 (01:41:23):

For sure.

Speaker 1 (01:41:23):

I would hope not. Let's get to some questions from listeners. We've got a few.

Speaker 4 (01:41:29):

Cool.

Speaker 1 (01:41:30):

Steve Gordon, what was your first baritone six string guitar. He's got a few questions, so I'll just ask one at a time.

Speaker 2 (01:41:37):

Okay, so we got one for HLB. That was a variety. I played drums back then and we got a kind of deal for Australian builder ethereal guitars. So we got one that was 28 inch scale and it had barnacle aftermath and was built with fancy Australian wood types. I don't really know. So that's the first one we got. And I tracked the self-titled with that.

Speaker 1 (01:42:07):

Alright. Did you always use a baritone six string with the tuning E-B-E-A-A, BA for your music?

Speaker 2 (01:42:14):

No, I, I think we started in a just regular drop A, then we went to drop GI think, and we added the dissonant notes. We do the two thinner strings are, it's called a half, I dunno what it called. It's like a half note between them. So instead of doing that big stretch for doing the dissonant cords, we just do the one grip on the same fret. So it's kind of a strange tuning, but we'd had a lot of riffs that were utilizing the dissonant screechy things, so it was way easier to do it that way. But we did like seven strings on that ep. Then we got the ethereal guitar, we went down, I think we went down to F first, so that tuning, but a half step up. Then we went down to E for some reason. I don't really know why, the reasons why, but we went to E and I kind of stuck on E because the rest I could pitch, I realized. So I don't really have to go lower or stuff like that. So that's where we're at now.

Speaker 1 (01:43:25):

Makes sense. So Nolan Beadon, I was wondering, hey Buster, I know you use a lot of mini base in your production. How do you convince your clients to go this way?

Speaker 2 (01:43:37):

I get a lot of low tuned stuff from clients and not all of 'em have a dingwall basis, which is for me, the only option for the low tunings.

Speaker 1 (01:43:48):

What is it about Dingwall basis?

Speaker 2 (01:43:49):

It's the scaling.

Speaker 1 (01:43:50):

So they're just constructed for this?

Speaker 2 (01:43:52):

Yeah, they have the long nick, they have the 37 inch scale for the thickest string and I sampled three of 'em and I sell those on the impact studios and I use 'em a lot myself because I just track them a special way how I play and they go extremely, extremely low. So you can barely hear the note, but bands who come to me, they have listened to Vil Jara and HLB, which are tuned super low. So they want the same thing. So that's just what I tell. I mean if they have great track base, fine, I'll use that for sure. I think track bass always sound better, but like I said, they don't have the basis that can take that low tuning.

Speaker 1 (01:44:35):

Alright, let's see here. Well, lots of people are asking about your approach to making guitar tones. And I'll just say that we did a q and a yesterday that's available for nail the mix subscribers. It's in Buster's Human's last breath session. So if you're a subscriber for February, 2020, we talk about that quite a bit. And also we are making a fast track all about Busters guitar methods and DT two guitar methods. So we'll leave that out of this because it's going to be covered in detail for you guys. We already talked about mid bass, but this question kind of piggybacks off of the last one Will Duff, what's your mindset when deciding whether you're going to utilize a programmed instrument in your production over tracking the real instrument and how do you manage the band relationship? IE, the drummer or bass player maybe doesn't play on the album at all. So we already talked about bass.

Speaker 2 (01:45:40):

Yeah, but I will say this track stuff, real stuff is always better, but there's rare occasions that I get it, but mostly they don't know how to tune drums. They don't know how to mic the room mics or whatever. They don't know how to set it up properly to get the sound they want. Not even what I want, but I know they want a certain sound, but they don't really know how to get it. So the files I get get midi drums very often, and that's never a problem. It's always like, here's the files, MIDI drums, MIDI bass, that's it. And that's usually the case. And I, I've learned how to make that work for me and I offer tracking. I offer, I can track your guitar and your bass. I offer that as a service, so if they want that, I can do that as well. But most times it is just a guitarist that's making riffs and a find a singer and a drummer and stuff like that. But he makes the music and he just sends me the files and I have to go through 'em.

Speaker 1 (01:46:41):

Yeah, so it's like a constraint of the situation oftentimes.

Speaker 2 (01:46:47):

Yeah. There's no money in music, so there's no money to spend on recordings

Speaker 1 (01:46:51):

That makes sense. In certain situations. You just got to make the most out of what you have to work with. I posted this the other day that a professional mixer is a professional problem solver. I posted that as a poll and I've always believed that and producer do. But basically an audio engineer is a professional problem solver. You're solving the problems of budget, you're solving the problems of time, you're solving the problems of tuning, the problems of weird arrangements, all of it. You just have to solve the problems somehow. And having a limited budget comes with its own set of problems, not having the money to go record drums.

Speaker 2 (01:47:32):

Also, some genres can call for samples and stuff like that. I grew up on Morbid Angel and if anyone has listened to Morbid Angel, they use the most cheapest trigger system for their stuff. It's like one shots and it just sounds like, and I am used to that and I always have liked that stuff and I always thought it sounded super extreme. It sounded like a machine gun and it really fits with the riffs and the drums are so clear and so cliquey. And I really love that because I grew up on death metal, so I'm all about that stuff. But I also like the natural tones and those go with certain types of music and the trigger sounds goes with a certain type of music. So you have to just make it work and kind of pick the method for the

Speaker 1 (01:48:20):

Genre. So speaking of, here's a question on that topic from Thomas V. Rodriguez. How do you go about choosing the right drum samples for an album that you're mixing?

Speaker 2 (01:48:31):

Yeah. I tend to go for, if he wants super straight up answer, I'd say I'd go for tune track for the more triggered sounding stuff and I go for gg d for the less triggered sounding stuff for the more natural sounding stuff.

Speaker 1 (01:48:43):

Makes sense.

Speaker 2 (01:48:44):

Pretty easy answer.

Speaker 1 (01:48:45):

And from there, it's just what you like. Right?

Speaker 2 (01:48:48):

And I can blend. I blend. Yeah, I blend both of them. Just what I feel like and what I think sounds the best for the song.

Speaker 1 (01:48:56):

One thing that I think people get wrong when choosing samples is trying to make something they don't like work.

Speaker 2 (01:49:04):

Yeah, it's true.

Speaker 1 (01:49:05):

Yeah,

Speaker 2 (01:49:06):

We use this. I don't know why we do it, but we use this and we'll have to make it work. I was like, why?

Speaker 1 (01:49:11):

Well, you have 10,000 other options. Why don't you find one that works exactly first, then mold

Speaker 2 (01:49:18):

It.

Speaker 1 (01:49:18):

I've never understood that.

Speaker 2 (01:49:20):

It's weird, but it is. Like we talked about, some people are not thinking all the way, really going all the way on how to get the end result. They're just going half the way in their brain. So it's like a mixture that is a guitarist and he gets shitty the eyes and it's really important for him to get the mix to sound good. He's not thinking about re-tracking. Why isn't he? Isn't he thinking about re-tracking? He can't ret track. He's a guitarist. Just do it. It would sound better, but maybe he just thinks this is the files I get. I have to make him work. I have to mix him. No, you can just retrack him. If it's really important to you to get this to sound great, just retrack it. Go all the way,

Speaker 1 (01:50:04):

Man. Sometimes you have to fight. I don't know if you have to do this. Sometimes I have to fight my own brain to push past my own barriers because what you just said, this guitar is not good enough. I could just ReRack it. That type of idea is so obvious. The answer's so obvious.

Speaker 2 (01:50:24):

Or a choir. I've done shit like this. I've heard a song and I'm like, this needs a choir or this needs a harmony. Oh, I can sing. I'll just ret it. I just track it myself and put it in there. And it worked fine. And the band was like, this is really cool. What V is T is this? I'm like, no, it's me singing.

Speaker 1 (01:50:42):

And you just felt like it needed it, so you did it.

Speaker 2 (01:50:45):

Yeah. It's like the Kaco, it's Kaco who inspired me because he sings all the harmonies on his stuff for other bands, which is really

Speaker 1 (01:50:53):

Cool. So don't be afraid to do something if you feel like it's needed or to fix something if you feel like it's needed. Man, I love that you're saying that. I just think that our brain is designed in a weird way to kind of just accept what it's given. I don't know why

Speaker 4 (01:51:15):

Survival or whatever,

Speaker 1 (01:51:16):

I'm not sure where it comes from. Maybe someone listening knows, but to just accept what you're given and just be like, these are the constraints. Some of the constraints are real though, right? Budget, that's usually real. But even that can change, but there's no drummer that real. Some of these are real.

Speaker 3 (01:51:38):

Or

Speaker 1 (01:51:38):

The thing like you said with Vita, the guy's hands.

Speaker 4 (01:51:42):

Yeah,

Speaker 1 (01:51:43):

That's a real constraint.

Speaker 4 (01:51:44):

It is.

Speaker 1 (01:51:44):

However, not all of these constraints are real.

Speaker 2 (01:51:47):

No.

Speaker 1 (01:51:48):

Some of them you really can just fucking redo.

Speaker 2 (01:51:51):

Yeah, for sure.

Speaker 1 (01:51:52):

How do you decide?

Speaker 2 (01:51:53):

Yeah,

Speaker 1 (01:51:54):

The difference between a

Speaker 2 (01:51:55):

Real, I think if it's really necessary, I can do those. I think those are extreme cases like me tracking vocals or me tracking guitars. But you really have to consider if it's realistic and if it's really necessary. And if it is, just do it. If you're lucky, you can just ask the band, if I retract these, can I get an extra a hundred bucks or whatever because I really think this will improve the mix. Or you just send the retract mic and you say, this is me retracting your guys' guitars and this is with your guitars. And they have to decide which, and if you pick this one, I would like to get paid for the work edit.

Speaker 1 (01:52:34):

Yeah. Or maybe do one section.

Speaker 2 (01:52:36):

Yeah, just one section. Yeah, for sure. For sure.

Speaker 1 (01:52:38):

That way,

Speaker 2 (01:52:39):

Yeah, you don't have to do the entire thing for sure.

Speaker 1 (01:52:42):

Have you done that? Have you sent the A and B?

Speaker 2 (01:52:44):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:52:45):

How often have they been like, no, just go with ours?

Speaker 2 (01:52:48):

Not often.

Speaker 1 (01:52:49):

Yeah. But hey, at least give 'em the choice.

Speaker 2 (01:52:51):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:52:51):

Yeah. Then it's their choice. Luke Wilson's wondering, how do you determine how many vocal tracks a session will need, and is it a more effective way of avoiding automation later in the session? Let me just explain something real quick. From what I've seen in your sessions, you have a different track for type of vocal. So there will be any musical part that's treated kind of differently, gets its own track rather than being on the same track and then just automated

Speaker 2 (01:53:19):

Later. I tried to do that as least. I mean I tried to do that with the new HLB, the unreleased thing. I had high one, high Dub, mid and low and stuff like that. But I just realized his voice can be adapted to one way of processing it. And it sounds fine, but some guys have such drastic differences on their voices, so they have to have a separate track to have different processing because if he does a low and it has a bunch of 400, 300 hertz and he does a super high scream and it has none of that. So you have to process it differently to get a cohesive sound with both. And also different buses if you want the vocals to get louder when there's more takes versus a compressor bringing the volume down when there's more takes than before. That's also a thing to consider if you want it louder, you should have a separate bus. If you don't want it louder when everything is playing at once, you should have it all sent to a compressor or whatever.

Speaker 1 (01:54:25):

Yeah, makes sense. Another question from Will Duff, what was your progression path to becoming a professional producer slash mixer and what tips would you give us guys trying to follow in your footsteps? We already talked about your path, but any tips for people trying to follow in your footsteps.

Speaker 2 (01:54:44):

I mean, the best way now I'd say besides spending a lot of hours on learning and referencing what you think are the best mixes and your objective has to be to crush the mixes you really love and make it better. If that's not your objective, you're doing it wrong. I think,

Speaker 1 (01:55:04):

Man, that's so interesting that you say that because of nail the mix we are seeing every single month, a lot of people submitting mixes of shit that was already released, and I don't really think too many people are thinking that they're going to crush that mix.

Speaker 4 (01:55:24):

They

Speaker 1 (01:55:25):

Should, and they shouldn't say it out loud just so that don't type it just so that nobody thinks you're an asshole or delusional

Speaker 2 (01:55:34):

Because if you're like, I'm going to crush, should the goal, if you

Speaker 1 (01:55:36):

Go TLAs mix, oh no. It's like, bro, you're delusional.

Speaker 2 (01:55:41):

Yeah, but it's your taste. Yes. You will have different tastes than him.

Speaker 1 (01:55:46):

Absolutely.

Speaker 2 (01:55:47):

So based on that, you can crush it, but according to yourself and you should be about making your own

Speaker 1 (01:55:53):

Sound. Absolutely. So I totally agree with you that, again, I'll say it, just don't type this so that people don't think you're crazy, but in your heart of hearts, you in your own mind should be trying to crush the other person's mix, and if you feel like there's no way you can ever do it, that's the type of thinking that you should try to get rid of. Even if you're looking at a Will Putney mix and it's fucking amazing, that's great. Maybe it's a huge challenge, but you should still go into it trying to win that battle you might not achieve. You might not win that battle at first. If you're first starting out, you most definitely aren't going to win that battle right away, but the only way to really, really get great at it, in my opinion, is to have huge goals like that and then go for them every single time. I would do a mix when I was mixing, I wanted it to be my best mix ever, and I would put up references by people like Putney or Jay or Jay,

Speaker 2 (01:57:04):

All that's, I've

Speaker 1 (01:57:05):

Been, yeah, Jay Rossin or whoever, and be like, at least try, at least I'm going to try to get better than them. Didn't really work, but I got better and better and better. There were a few times where I was starting to approach that level because I was zeroing in on beating a standard.

Speaker 2 (01:57:27):

You'll focus on different stuff as well because your hearing is not developed, so you might not focus on his hi hat sound. You might focus on the drum star, have more attack. Then you find a way to get your drums to have more attack. Then after that you'll notice that his bass is deeper and you'll find a way to make that happen and you'll, as your ear progresses, you'll hear different stuff because if you're making something happen and you're listening and you're like, this still sounds better, why is this sounding better? And your ear, you will listen so closely and find out what are the things that you think are better and you'll attack those specifically in the next mix or whatever, and until you think your mix is better or at least as good.

Speaker 1 (01:58:15):

Yeah, on par.

Speaker 2 (01:58:16):

Yeah, on

Speaker 1 (01:58:17):

Par,

Speaker 2 (01:58:17):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:58:17):

That's a really, really good way to put it because it's true. I think we've had a lot of people who submit mixes to nail the mix and they didn't get picked for the top 20 or whatever, and they don't understand. They're convinced that their mix is fucking awesome. Then I hear it and it's not awesome at all. It's not even close. Usually the ones that post really angry comments, their mixes are far from awesome, and I'm trying to think what is it that leads them to believe this because I want to help them. That's what we're here for. I know some people want to attack those people, but for me it's like I'm not here to attack these people if they actually think that their mix was that great. There's a few things going on. First of all, the room could be all fucked up and they don't even know what they're

Speaker 3 (01:59:05):

Hearing.

Speaker 1 (01:59:06):

But I think deeper than that is what you said when you're first learning, your hearing's not that developed, so you're focusing on

Speaker 2 (01:59:14):

Certain

Speaker 1 (01:59:15):

Things. Yeah, so maybe it's the first time they got a punchy kick drum and so

Speaker 2 (01:59:20):

They hear their kick drum is punchier than the mix, and it was like, then mine's better.

Speaker 1 (01:59:25):

Yeah, exactly. Because what they're focused on, but they're not hearing everything. Of course. It's a combination of a shitty environment with that focus. So yeah, man, too. I remember the first time that I got a snare bomb because it took me a long time to figure out how to do a good one before there were a million videos on how to do them, and I got one and I was like, fuck yeah. Finally. Then I didn't listen to it for a few days, went back and my mix still wasn't as good as whoever I was referencing, but I got the snare bomb down

Speaker 3 (02:00:02):

And

Speaker 1 (02:00:02):

Then, then it was like, wait a second, my symbols are interfering with my guitars.

Speaker 2 (02:00:07):

Yeah,

Speaker 1 (02:00:07):

We'll deal with that next.

Speaker 2 (02:00:08):

Yeah, and you learn as you go. For sure. Yeah. That has to be those two things that probably made him think that his mix was better than it actually was, so who knows?

Speaker 1 (02:00:19):

Listening environment, man. How important do you think it is?

Speaker 2 (02:00:22):

Extremely. Since I have no idea how I managed to make mixes for big bands without having calibrated systems, that's mind blowing to me. How? Because if you put a speaker in a room, it'll sound like another speaker in another room. It sound like a different speaker. You have to have, it has to be flat like some, or at least somewhat flat to reference correctly. But at the same time, if you have a room that you've been in all your life and it has no calibration or anything, and you're listening to your favorite mixes and they sound great, then you probably can use that room to do your own mixes because if you reference your favorite mixes and they sound great in those speakers, your mix is going to sound great in those speakers as well if it's a great mix.

Speaker 1 (02:01:20):

So really it just comes down to knowing what you're working with, and I think the perfect example of someone who proves that is Joey. Joey Sturgis, is that he never worked in a treated room and he used $700

Speaker 3 (02:01:33):

Monitors.

Speaker 1 (02:01:34):

They're pretty good monitors, but they're not like he used the seven Xs, whereas a x sevens a

Speaker 4 (02:01:43):

Seven.

Speaker 1 (02:01:43):

I always confuse it with a vent sevenfold, but I mean, I have those now, and I used to have super nice Channel X and everything, but since I don't mix, I don't need those, but I have have those atoms. They're fine, but they're by no means barefoot,

Speaker 2 (02:02:01):

But I don't am, I think expensive is better. When I bought my Amfi, I really realized that these aren't making me mix better. What is making me mix better is sonar works and the reference and the calibration making me mix better. It's not like these monitors are when you get over a specific price, I think it's kind of like a luxury item. It's nice to have, but you really don't need it at all.

Speaker 1 (02:02:28):

I agree. But in Joey's case, he didn't have Sonar Works either.

Speaker 2 (02:02:32):

No.

Speaker 1 (02:02:32):

He had a totally room.

Speaker 2 (02:02:33):

I had Mackey's for $300. I mixed, but

Speaker 1 (02:02:38):

You knew them.

Speaker 2 (02:02:38):

Yeah, but I mixed a bunch of stuff on.

Speaker 1 (02:02:40):

Yeah, that's my point is if you know what you're listening to, that's really what matters. And Sonar Works is great because it helps make sure that you actually are hearing what you think you're hearing. But at the end of the day, I think that despite a bad room and despite cheap speakers, if you know what you're hearing, you can win.

Speaker 3 (02:03:02):

And

Speaker 1 (02:03:02):

I've known several people who've proven that. Obviously though a perfectly treated room with sick ass speakers, that being the key, you could be in a million dollar room with $20,000 of Amon, but if you don't know what you're hearing, that doesn't really help too much either.

Speaker 2 (02:03:22):

Correct.

Speaker 1 (02:03:22):

So knowing what you're hearing is the actual thing that really matters in the end, regardless. I think that's why some people can mix in headphones, which blows my mind,

Speaker 2 (02:03:33):

Which I do.

Speaker 1 (02:03:33):

Yeah, that's what I'm saying, because you know what you're hearing.

Speaker 2 (02:03:35):

Yeah. I've started in in-ears, actually, not monitors, but in-ear headphones, I'd say. That's what I started in because I feel I really get up and close to the sound, and I really hear all the details since I'm blocking out everything else outside, so that's what I'm used

Speaker 1 (02:03:53):

To. Whatever works, man.

Speaker 2 (02:03:55):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (02:03:55):

Well, Buster, thank you for doing the podcast.

Speaker 2 (02:03:58):

Thank you, dude. This was fun.

Speaker 1 (02:03:59):

Yeah, it's been a pleasure having you on.

Speaker 2 (02:04:01):

Yeah, thanks for having me.

Speaker 1 (02:04:02):

Okay, then another URM podcast episode in the bag. Please remember to share our episodes with your friends, as well as post them to your Facebook, Instagram, or any social media you use. Please tag me at ai Levi URM audio, and of course, please tag my guests as well. Till next time, happy mixing. You've been listening to the Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast. To ask us questions, make suggestions and interact, visit URM Academy and press the podcast link today.