JASON LIVERMORE: The Blasting Room’s Workflow, The Future of Big Studios, and Why Gear Doesn’t Matter

Speaker 1 (00:00:00):

Welcome to the Unstoppable Recording Machine Podcast. And now your host, AAL Levy. 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 Levy urm audio. And let me just let you know that we love seeing ourselves tagged in these posts.

(00:00:55):

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. Hello everybody. Welcome to the URM Podcast. My guest today is Jason Livermore, who's a co-owner and operator of the Blasting Room Studios with Bill Stevenson. He's worked with acts such as The Descendants Rise Against the Data. Remember, ban Overboard, alkaline Trio, no Effects, and a laundry list of other groups. I introduce you, Jason Livermore. Jason Livermore, welcome to the URM Podcast. Thank

Speaker 2 (00:01:50):

You. Pleasure to be here. Thank

Speaker 1 (00:01:51):

You. Glad to have you.

Speaker 2 (00:01:52):

Thanks.

Speaker 1 (00:01:53):

So what's it like running an actual facility in this day and age? And I don't mean this day and age, like the modern day with the advent of home studios. I mean this day and age in crazy ass quarantine time. So I imagine that probably gone to a lot more remote work.

Speaker 2 (00:02:13):

At the beginning of the year, we started a record for a band called Rise Against that we've done a bunch of records for,

Speaker 1 (00:02:18):

Do you mean in 2020 or 2020?

Speaker 2 (00:02:20):

In 2020, yeah. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:02:21):

Okay.

Speaker 2 (00:02:21):

Basically we were getting close to being finished and the singer Tim got kicked out of his hotel. They were like, I'm sorry, sir, you have to leave. We're closing down. And he was like, Hey guys, I think we're done recording. It was a crazy thing.

Speaker 1 (00:02:34):

Well kicked out as in quarantine, kicked out,

Speaker 2 (00:02:37):

Kicked out. They removed everyone from the hotels. He went to two separate hotels at the end of the recording, and that's when the quarantine stuff was, or I suppose it was quarantine, just the lockdown started happening and he had to move from two different hotels. And finally there was nothing left in the town. So it was like, I guess we're done and we were really close to done. But that was kind of a weird thing that obviously I had never experienced before into a recording session.

Speaker 1 (00:03:05):

Normally bands get kicked out of hotels just for being assholes,

Speaker 2 (00:03:08):

Just for being dicks, but not just for living.

Speaker 1 (00:03:12):

Not this time.

Speaker 2 (00:03:12):

Yeah, I mean, they could have been dicks, but that was the beginning of the year. And then we were going to mix the record with Andy Wallace, but he decided to self quarantine himself. So I ended up mixing the album here. So that ate up a couple good months of my time during the quarantine, and it was a little strange because the rules were so unknown. I was like, man, should I drive to the studio? You're not supposed to go anywhere. Maybe I'll tell 'em getting groceries if I get pulled over. It was just kind of crazy. So it was basically just me in the studio by myself for a couple months, and then I had backed up work that I was doing mixing and whatnot, and then it was probably around the summer where stuff really started to slow down. People were supposed to come in and they've pushed it back a year or canceled or whatever. So yeah, the summer was not that rad for the recording. It was probably maybe the middle to the end of the summer where things started to, people was starting to come back in to the studio and we started to pick up and we're probably at maybe 75% now.

Speaker 1 (00:04:17):

That's pretty impressive

Speaker 2 (00:04:18):

Compared to normal. We have four studios in the building now and five different engineers. So between all of us, we get, most of the rooms are filled at one point or another.

Speaker 1 (00:04:30):

That's a feat to pull off in normal times in the modern day, let alone these crazy ass circumstance we find ourselves in.

Speaker 2 (00:04:40):

Yeah, yeah, totally. For real. I mean, we got some of those PPE loans, which helped us out a little bit, paying the guys when there was probably two months where nobody could come in to record period. But we had a lot of remote work, like you were saying. I did a lot of mixing and mastering stuff. I feel like it didn't change that much for us in a sense. I mean, at least personally wise, I'm like, oh, I'm going to the studio and I'm in a room by myself. Wow, this is different. Not

Speaker 1 (00:05:15):

That's the thing is I think actually audio people were well suited for this.

Speaker 2 (00:05:19):

Oh,

Speaker 1 (00:05:20):

Because we just spend most of our lives alone anyways, so what's the difference?

Speaker 2 (00:05:27):

And there's less traffic on the way to work.

Speaker 1 (00:05:30):

Yeah, I do think that obviously, I mean you just said it, but anyone who had projects booked to record in person took some sort of a hit. But I do think that just about everyone I know who's like I would consider good, did just fine last year. They just found other ways to make it work, and part of me feels like as much as it sucked in a way, it is a window into the future. I mean, that's the direction things are going anyways.

Speaker 2 (00:06:02):

No, I totally agree with you. Because obviously it sucked and everybody's life was upended and whatnot, and I was in the back of my mind. I'm like, is this really a bad thing? This is kind of cool. It makes nobody care about half the things that they care about anyways. That

Speaker 1 (00:06:19):

Don't matter.

Speaker 2 (00:06:19):

That don't matter at all. It's like hot. Do I have to go back and see Kim Kardashian on the fricking newsfeed? Shit, that doesn't matter. It doesn't matter, and we don't have to pay attention to it. So it's kind of cool that this happened in that way to upend people's just bullshit lives.

Speaker 1 (00:06:37):

Do you feel like it did that also with clients, as in people caring more about the bottom line? Does this rule, does it not rule rather than caring too much about

Speaker 2 (00:06:49):

Just putting out garbage to put out garbage

Speaker 1 (00:06:53):

Or interband, drama management, drama, all this stuff that goes along with making records that just the industry side of things, just weird stuff, like arbitrary deadlines, arbitrary people to please those weird things.

Speaker 2 (00:07:11):

The arbitrary deadlines is the biggest thing because all of a sudden record that was supposed to come out last summer has got pushed back a year. And then besides that, even people are just wondering if they do release records, will anyone listen to them now? Or on the converse, it's kind of like, well, if we release a record now, we won't be able to tour, so we're wasting a record. And those are some of the things that happened. But you're saying the deadlines, it's kind of like people are just like, they're not worried about things that don't matter. They're not worried about a deadline. It's like, okay, so we put it out a week later, so what of it is somebody banging your door down? We need that record now.

Speaker 1 (00:07:56):

Obviously, I think some deadlines are legit. Say that there's a huge tour they want to time it with

Speaker 2 (00:08:02):

Or

Speaker 1 (00:08:02):

A huge tour cycle that's already planned out.

Speaker 2 (00:08:06):

Something

Speaker 1 (00:08:06):

Real, something real,

Speaker 3 (00:08:08):

Something

Speaker 1 (00:08:09):

Tangible. Okay, then that makes sense. But sometimes these deadlines are exactly arbitrary. And the one that I can think of that kind of illustrates my point the most was that I was working on a record many years ago that needed more work. This was a band that should not have gotten signed, but they got signed. It was in the era between 2006 and 14 where they were signing just way too many bands to metal labels for abysmal budgets and basically flooding the market with local bands. And this band needed two or three more weeks worth of work. It was not ready. And label did not give a shit. They wanted it. They wanted it, but guess the date they wanted it December 20th. It's like, you're not even going to be in the office until January 6th.

Speaker 2 (00:09:04):

No one's going

Speaker 1 (00:09:05):

To open this up. We had a major fight about it, and I burned my bridge with the label because I stood my ground. It's like, you're not even going to be there. I know you're not. You're leaving December 15th, maybe December 10th, and nobody's going to look at anything until at least January 6th. So why do you need it now?

Speaker 2 (00:09:24):

Yeah. Well, most of the people that are in the position where they're like, we need it now. We need it now. They're not going to be there in a year anyways. So you burned your bridge, but it probably won't matter. There'll be somebody taking his shoes,

Speaker 1 (00:09:34):

It didn't matter.

Speaker 2 (00:09:35):

Yeah, we're fine. If they were smart enough to know that the deadline didn't matter, they might still be there working.

Speaker 1 (00:09:41):

Alright, so speaking of burning bridges, what's your opinion on that? I think it's an interesting topic because people will give that wisdom of don't ever burn a bridge, make friends with everybody. But we know that that's impossible. You can't actually maintain a career and be friends with everybody.

Speaker 2 (00:10:01):

Sure.

Speaker 1 (00:10:02):

So what's your take on that?

Speaker 2 (00:10:04):

I would not want to burn any bridges if I didn't have to. And I think the older I get, maybe the more, I don't want to say back down on things I don't believe in, but I just don't have the energy to fight people on things that I don't care about. Whereas when I was younger, maybe I was like, I am right and you are wrong and I'm going to prove it kind of thing. I've probably burned a few, but nothing major. And it was mostly with people that I probably wouldn't want to work with anyways in the future. You know what I'm saying?

Speaker 1 (00:10:33):

Well, I think that that's kind the key is that it is good to, in an ideal world, never burn a bridge. But it's also true that there are some people you may not ever want to work with again. It's okay to let things burn to the ground though. I think that what you said is key, that you got to realize whether or not you're making a stand for winning an argument or for something that actually matters,

Speaker 3 (00:10:57):

Right? Yeah, totally.

Speaker 1 (00:10:59):

What do you think when you're working with a client and they come to you with say some sort of a vision for what it is that they want to do and say that there's a few opposing visions, like Singer has one, vision manager has another label, has another. What matters to you?

Speaker 2 (00:11:18):

What matters to me? Yeah.

(00:11:20):

I guess mostly that you make a record that you feel everyone can connect with in some form or another. If you're being drawn to one extreme or the other where it's, so you're alienating some people, I don't want that per se as far as the direction I would probably follow their lead or whoever. I always lean towards the songwriter and less of the manager in the label. The musicians themselves, it's their thing. Me coming from bands that, so I would lean towards that and just follow their thing unless I thought their thing was just completely ridiculous. And then at one point it's like I'm not a puppet, so when I work on somebody's record, it's like me is coming out into it whether or not I like it or not. So if they're asking me to do something that's crazy, I can't even do crazy maybe because that's not achievable with my senses.

Speaker 1 (00:12:19):

Do you feel like sometimes the business end is at odds with the songwriting team?

Speaker 2 (00:12:25):

Oh yeah. In the past it's always been, it's rushed. We've had handfuls of records where you'll get the demos or you'll hear stuff and you'll kind of be like, we need to push this back. Not that they're not ready, maybe in the sense that they can't play, but the songs just aren't enough to snuff or they're just like,

Speaker 1 (00:12:43):

They just need that extra little bit of love.

Speaker 2 (00:12:45):

They need an extra bit of love. And so you go and you try to explain it to the manager or the label, and we've had the response in the past, make the songs, fix it, do it, you'll do it, you'll figure it out. It's like, whoa, will we have you heard the demos? Kind of thing. But that's usually the response of people who are in the labels or the management. They want to put it out on time, and I don't know if they care how good it is or they don't trust you when you say it needs to be better.

Speaker 1 (00:13:15):

I'm split on this. Sometimes I feel like it's best to not tell them anything because they're not going to understand anyways.

(00:13:24):

So involving them, telling them it's not ready, and I'm just saying this because of times that I have fucked up things by telling the label that there's a problem. When I think back on those times, I wonder, what if I had just not said anything and just let it be? Would they have noticed there was a problem? What if we got to the end and at the very end I just said, Hey, we just need five more days. But I didn't say what the problem was or anything like that. Just look, we're not going to get done. We need five more days at the end. Would that have been easier than hitting them up at the beginning and saying, Hey, these songs need work?

Speaker 2 (00:14:02):

Yeah, always ask for forgiveness, not permission.

Speaker 1 (00:14:08):

I actually do believe in that. Do you believe in that?

Speaker 2 (00:14:10):

I do believe in that because I feel like people are afraid of the unknown in a sense. So if you're asking them to do something, they're like, oh, we don't know how that's going to turn out. No, don't do. Exactly. Don't do that. But if you do it and they see it, they might go, oh, that's cool. Or Oh, whatever, that doesn't matter. Who cares? Like, sorry, you're late kind of thing. It's always easier I think, at the end than in the beginning.

Speaker 1 (00:14:35):

It's kind of like when you're showing an artist an idea, I think it's a lot easier to just show them the idea itself rather than talk about the idea.

Speaker 2 (00:14:45):

I hate the whole talk about thing. I mean, you got to do it with some people, but some people they'll just get off track and it's kind of like, you guys, we've been talking about this thing I wanted you to do for an hour, an hour, a half, an hour, or whatever it is. It would've taken us 30 seconds to just do it. Just shut up and do it. Exactly. Or if you had an idea and you recorded it yourself and you played it to the band, they'd be like, oh, that's cool. What's that? As opposed to, Hey, I got an idea. What do you guys think? And no, no, no, we're not going to take anyone's opinion except for our own,

Speaker 1 (00:15:18):

I think. I mean, it's coming from a good place. I think they're just trying to be protective of what's important to them. Sure.

Speaker 2 (00:15:24):

So

Speaker 1 (00:15:24):

They're immediately on defense shooting intruders

Speaker 2 (00:15:29):

At the door. I guess some more than others.

Speaker 1 (00:15:32):

Some more than others. But I also think that on the business end, managers are, they're programmed to say no. That's the initial response. Their job ahead of anything else is turning things down that the artist or the producer doesn't want to say no to.

Speaker 3 (00:15:53):

Right?

Speaker 1 (00:15:54):

Yeah. So I think that presenting them with an idea that's off the beaten and path is going to most likely end up with a no because first of all, how are they supposed to understand the idea that's in your head?

Speaker 3 (00:16:06):

Right?

Speaker 1 (00:16:06):

So it's weird because I think it's best to not say anything, but then at the same time, it's not good to not be transparent. So it's this weird line, you got to walk, I feel like.

Speaker 2 (00:16:19):

Yeah, no, you're probably right. And it seems a lot of times the less the label knows about the record, it seems like it goes smoother. The band is more at ease. And then also you don't have these deadlines. Hey, so-and-so's showing up this week to listen to the record. We got to make rough mixes for him. Okay, lemme just go waste a day and a half of my life making something that plays all these tracks we recorded. So when the guy gets here and goes, is this finished? Of course it's not finished yet. These are rough mixes kind of thing.

Speaker 1 (00:16:54):

Well, that wouldn't have happened in 2020.

Speaker 2 (00:16:57):

No, absolutely. And I think that's going to be a beautiful thing. Well, maybe not beautiful, but you just don't get visitors that you don't need, per se.

Speaker 1 (00:17:08):

One of the things that I think is really cool about how society is going to change the needless travel is going to be eliminated though I do think that there's still a place for person to person interaction. I think people were traveling too much for dumb reasons. I know just for us traveling to do nail the mix every single month for five years straight and then not being able to travel at all and having to figure out how to do nail the mix remotely.

Speaker 3 (00:17:37):

I

Speaker 1 (00:17:37):

Mean, we'll still travel for it when it opens back up and not as much, it'll have to be a very special occasion. Say that the mixer doing now the mix doesn't know how to work the internet or something, or it's Andy Wallace or something,

Speaker 2 (00:17:53):

Or it's Andy Wallace or somebody you want to go hang out with.

Speaker 1 (00:17:56):

I want to hang out with all of 'em. It's, there's some cases where some people are so technically savvy that we don't need to be there. We can send them this kit that we have. They set it up awesome. And also with the remote setup, I'm talking to them face to face as opposed to talking to the back of their head

Speaker 2 (00:18:15):

Being on the couch.

Speaker 1 (00:18:16):

Right. So it actually makes it easier to communicate. But yeah, I think that pointless travel is going to be eliminated and people are going to think about when they need to travel. I think the record label visits sometimes they were very important because say I remember one or two times that they and R guy brought a booking agent that was looking into the band, a powerful booking agent, and got them stoked on the band,

Speaker 3 (00:18:46):

Which

Speaker 1 (00:18:46):

Then got them signed to that agency, which then got them great tours. So I've seen that happen, but then I've also seen that this junior a and r guy just wants a plane ticket somewhere

Speaker 3 (00:18:59):

And to

Speaker 1 (00:19:00):

Hang out in the studio and has no reason to be there.

Speaker 2 (00:19:04):

And then you're catering to 'em for three quarters of a day. You're wasting your time

Speaker 1 (00:19:09):

Wasting a bunch of time.

Speaker 2 (00:19:11):

Yeah, you're wasting your time.

Speaker 1 (00:19:13):

So speaking of time, I want to talk about, I guess what was referred to as the golden years, like 2003 through 2013, you and Bill Stevenson were working on what, 10 albums a year?

Speaker 2 (00:19:26):

Yeah, working 80 hour work weeks.

Speaker 1 (00:19:29):

Yeah. That's insane. What I'm wondering, how did you guys manage your time through that so that everything got done? Because I know from experience and other producers that sometimes getting booked that much seems like a blessing, but it's a curse because projects bleed into each other. You end up with a backlog,

Speaker 3 (00:19:52):

People

Speaker 1 (00:19:53):

Get pissed off that you're working on two projects at the same time, et cetera.

Speaker 2 (00:19:56):

Yeah, we didn't run into too much of that, honestly.

Speaker 1 (00:20:00):

Then I want to know more about your time management.

Speaker 2 (00:20:02):

Yeah. So yeah, there's Bill and myself, and then there's two other guys that work with us. And so we each sort of split up our workloads and we have a Google sheet or a schedule. It was like these things are happening these days in this studio and these things are happening these days in that studio. So there was always a schedule, and if something didn't jive with the schedule, we would sort of rearrange what needed to be done before the end of the project

Speaker 1 (00:20:33):

For people working on the same project.

Speaker 2 (00:20:35):

Yes, correct. Yeah. We rarely had stuff spill out. The only time that something like that would happen is if the singer lost his voice and he would have to come back.

Speaker 1 (00:20:45):

But that's the kind of stuff, I mean,

Speaker 2 (00:20:46):

Well, we have four studios here and five guys working. So if that happens, well then one of 'em goes and does that job and it's not really messing up with what's going on in the other parts of the building.

Speaker 1 (00:20:59):

So you have a workflow buffer?

Speaker 2 (00:21:01):

I would say. So either that'll just been fortunately blessed that there's not too many singers that have blown out. And then obviously, let's say the singer blowout thing after you've made a bunch of records and you're like, well, now the music's done, we're going to do the vocals. It's like you learn how dumb that is. So you start recording the vocal on day one, you have a demo or you make a demo and the singer starts singing the first day and you do it the whole time he's here. So if you finish early, you do it again, maybe you're going to get better takes this time. So I think it's just after you make a bunch of records, you got to manage your time and figure out where to spend the time and what to do not to make the mistakes. And when you're working every day for 10 years in a row, it's like that kind of just worked itself out.

Speaker 1 (00:21:52):

There were a lot of inefficiencies I noticed in what was standard for heavy music production for a while

Speaker 3 (00:21:59):

That

Speaker 1 (00:22:00):

I don't think are so much the case anymore. For instance, what you just said, waiting until the very end to start vocals, that just seems so stupid, ridiculous. It dawned on me one day, it was like, why do we keep putting ourselves into this situation with the most important part of the record? We're like treating everything else like the most important thing and then the priority. We're treating as an afterthought and we're not ticking into account biology. Not smart.

Speaker 2 (00:22:29):

Yeah, no, not smart at all.

Speaker 1 (00:22:31):

Yeah. Another one that I thought of that blew my mind was, so there's guys that reamp every time, no matter what, every time they never use the original tone, which is fine. They get great tones, so I'm not knocking their abilities. But if they know that a hundred percent of the time they're going to reamp without question, then why did they spend a week dialing in the original tracking tone?

Speaker 2 (00:22:59):

Yeah, no, that's ridiculous.

Speaker 1 (00:23:01):

Yeah, stuff like that.

Speaker 2 (00:23:02):

I know though. I think that's more common in the metal world or the super heavy rock world. When I would make a record, I would spend forever days getting a guitar tone

Speaker 1 (00:23:11):

And then use it

Speaker 2 (00:23:12):

And use it and be completely satisfied. And then I remember, I think the first time I did it, we were recording an As I lay dying record, which is definitely on the metal end of the spectrum for what we normally do, and Phil was kind of like, why are you spending all this time getting these guitar sounds? I'm like, what the fuck are you talking about? That's what you paid me for. I'm trying to get you an amazing guitar sound. Well, we're going to Reamp. And it's like, wait, what the fuck for?

Speaker 1 (00:23:44):

Yeah, it's a part of the process for a lot of people. Not everybody does it though. There's some metal producers that stick to the original tone, but the thing is, the ones I'm talking about who get an original tone, really work on it and then reamp anyways, the original tone is awesome already. So they spent a long time crafting this thing. Knowing that they're going to throw it away doesn't make any sense.

Speaker 2 (00:24:12):

That makes zero sense. That would be very frustrating if that happened to me too much.

Speaker 1 (00:24:16):

Or knowing you're going to replace the kick drum, so why are you spending three days getting the best kick drum sound ever if you're not going to use it?

Speaker 2 (00:24:26):

That or there's also on the performance too. Some people get up, oh, your first double was a little bit light. You need to make a more consistent, yada yada. It's like, no, you don't. Don't even need to play the damn thing.

Speaker 1 (00:24:39):

Alright, so speaking of inefficiencies, you corrected the thing with the vocals. You just figured out that this is dumb, we need to be starting at the beginning. Are there any other things like that that you just realized after doing it for a few years, we should be doing it in this order of operations?

Speaker 2 (00:24:57):

I could tell you the order that we do it now.

(00:24:59):

Essentially, we'll start pre-production and Bill usually does pre-production in our second B studio. So the band's here and they're doing all that. And while they're doing that, if let's just say it's a couple days long or something, I'll be in the other room getting the drum sound or maybe even setting the guitars up at the same time while there's no band and getting that all dialed in. So as soon as they're ready to go done, they may even spill the pre-production out further. I'll just take the drummer when he's not needed the drummer and just start recording drums. And as soon as I'm done with the first track recording drums, it goes to another guy and he starts editing. As soon as that's done, pre-production is probably over by then a day or two in start doing the bass in a second room. So we're doing drums and A and bass and B and kind of doing this big circle until the drums are finished.

(00:25:52):

And as soon as the drums are finished, I'll start tracking guitar while they're doing bass vocals in the other room. And as soon as I'm done with all the guitar, maybe let's say half of the album is completed, I'll start mixing while other guys are finishing the other stuff in other parts of the building. So it's like there's never any downtime per se, and what would normally take one guy two to three months would take us three weeks. So I think that's how we ended up just getting tons of records back to back. We could get it done so much quicker. It didn't necessarily cost less, more manpower, but I think time is oftentimes worth more than money. So people appreciated that we could get a good record done in three weeks

Speaker 1 (00:26:40):

If you can make it sound as great in three weeks as it would take somebody awesome three months.

Speaker 2 (00:26:46):

Oh yeah,

Speaker 1 (00:26:47):

That's worth paying more for.

Speaker 2 (00:26:49):

Yeah. Yeah. So essentially that's how we do it, and it worked out pretty well.

Speaker 1 (00:26:54):

That means that you guys have to have some really good communication.

Speaker 2 (00:26:57):

Yeah, very true.

Speaker 1 (00:26:59):

How long has everyone there been working together? I mean, I know you and Bill go back forever.

Speaker 2 (00:27:05):

Yeah, yeah. We started the studio in 94, so it's almost been 27 years that we've been up and running.

Speaker 1 (00:27:12):

It's a long time to be partnered with somebody in this industry.

Speaker 2 (00:27:16):

You're very true. Yeah, it is. But the other guys, so we have another guy named Andrew Berlin, and he started working with us in 2000, and then sort of our newest main engineer, Chris Bel started, I think it was in 2010 or 11

Speaker 1 (00:27:34):

Newest. So he is already been there a decade. Yeah,

Speaker 2 (00:27:36):

Yeah. We have a newer guy than that, but he's not a main engineer. He's a boy genius who he built studios for us and fixes gear and figures out what needs to be done and does it. He's an all purpose guy.

(00:27:51):

So there's five of us here, and we all know each other pretty well. Yeah, it's easy to communicate or just to trust. If you're all working together and you admire each other's work, there's no need to micromanage everything as far as the communication, it's like just let them do their thing, and then when you get it, you go with it. Unless something's kind of, whoa, what happened here? Why did you do this? And then you might ask them, but sometimes you just trust their vision of what they're doing instead of trying to get your fingers in it all.

Speaker 1 (00:28:24):

I think that trust is one of the most important things that a producer can have, both with the clients they work with and with whoever they partner with, or whoever they're working for. I feel like a lot of the horror stories you hear about producers saying the band didn't listen or things like that, they were a nightmare. Yeah, there are shitty bands. There are shitty clients. Yes, that does happen.

Speaker 3 (00:28:52):

But

Speaker 1 (00:28:52):

I do feel like a lot of the time, if you read between the lines of the horror story, what I hear is the client didn't trust me and that's why they weren't listening. I don't want to admit that.

Speaker 2 (00:29:07):

I would totally believe that. I think we're fortunate in that at least when we started, bill was in Black Flag and the Descendants. So all the kind of punk

Speaker 1 (00:29:15):

Credibility,

Speaker 2 (00:29:17):

All the punk bands that we've worked with, they're just coming there with open arms, and it's already like maybe we've toured with a bunch of 'em in whatever bands we were in at the time, and so we're boys. It's not so much of the producer and the band. It's like band members doing other band members stuff. So I feel like we got more credibility or just leeway. People didn't have a big as a bone to pick, I guess, to prove like, Hey, I wrote this song and you guys can't do this or that. So we got lucky like that. And maybe as we went on and started branching out beyond just straight up punk rock, if the band was too big or we hadn't known them that well, I think when you start to run into that, the trust thing, we're like, well, our manager sent us here, who are you guys? Kind of thing. But that didn't happen too often.

Speaker 1 (00:30:08):

When it does happen or when it has happened, what's your approach for dealing with it?

Speaker 2 (00:30:12):

Oh, geez. Try to talk 'em into that. I mean, this sounds bad that you're right. Somehow prove to them that you think that your experience or your idea may be the right one to go. And then if they don't believe it, then show it to them somehow. Like we were talking about earlier with ideas or whatnot. I mean, occasionally you just have to let it go be like, oh, you don't want to rerecord your tracks because this, this, and this. Okay, well, I guess I'm just going to pitch correct them and chop 'em up and move them and fix 'em, or have somebody else replay. What do you think about that? You don't want to be a total dick, but sometimes you have to.

Speaker 1 (00:30:54):

Well, I think sometimes you have to establish boundaries and standards.

Speaker 2 (00:30:59):

Sure.

Speaker 1 (00:31:00):

I mean, that is what they're paying you for. I have encountered situations on tour where a band will be talking shit about a producer. Sometimes they'll talk shit about a tyrant, but more often than not, I hear them talking shit about producers that were too lenient, they're too lenient, and just they didn't bring enough out of them, and they let too much go. Which it's interesting because you think that they would complain about

Speaker 3 (00:31:30):

The other way.

Speaker 1 (00:31:31):

I mean, everyone's different, but I think that overall, they're expecting you to bring the best out of them regardless of if they argue in the moment

Speaker 3 (00:31:41):

Or

Speaker 1 (00:31:42):

Not. So knowing when and how to hold your ground, very, very important skill. It's weird because in the moment it might be uncomfortable, but we all know that people are going to forget that moment by that night.

Speaker 2 (00:31:57):

Oh, yeah. No, I have a band, which I won't say their name, but I remember I was mixing it, and the singer was really upset that I was using too many triggers on the kick drum and the drummer, he needed that. He needed some help. So I was trying to explain it to him that he had his own ethos about what was going on, and I was getting worked up, and he's getting worked up, and Bill takes me out of the studio and he's like, look, dude, this is going to be the best sounding thing this band has ever done. Do not worry about any of this. And I was like, oh, okay, cool. Because thinking the band's going to leave because I'm not doing what they want me to do, but I'm making the best record for them that they've had. And so I had to work around the trigger thing with the variety of different engineering things to make it work, but I stood my ground in that sense, which for the course of the record, this is going to make the record better, and I can't let you deter me from that.

(00:32:59):

But sometimes you can't just straight up go, look, dude, you're wrong. I mean, you want to, but you may have to dance around it until they see your way or you just deliver it the way that they want it.

Speaker 1 (00:33:09):

Yeah. Well, I think part of the art of being a good producer engineer is in conflict resolution.

Speaker 2 (00:33:17):

Yeah, totally.

Speaker 1 (00:33:19):

Yeah. In conflict management, conflict resolution. I think that's part of it. It's not just the audio. It's knowing how to manage these crazy personalities.

Speaker 2 (00:33:30):

Right. Totally true. Totally true. And I mean, there's two aspects of the album. It's like what the public hears. They have no zero idea how you got to where you got. They only care if it moves them, if they like it, if it sounds kick ass. And then there's the band, you'd think that ultimately having the best record would be that's what they would want. But sometimes, I mean, you have to make it fun. You have to make it an enjoyable experience in a way for them to be like, want to come back. Even if you created the best record ever, if they didn't have a good time doing it, they might not come back. So you have to balance those two things out.

Speaker 1 (00:34:14):

Yeah, I've heard some very big bands who went to a very successful producer that they made their biggest record ever with, and they didn't go back because it was such a psychologically traumatic thing to work with them. He would pit them against each other, always causing dramas, gaslighting them the whole time, just making them, causing them to almost break up basically. And what they did with him though did come out

Speaker 2 (00:34:49):

Amazing. Fantastic.

Speaker 1 (00:34:50):

Yeah, they just won't go back. And I've heard about this scenario a few different times with a few different bands and some awesome producer, and part of me wonders is that because bands now, meaning now in the past 10, 15 years, don't have tolerance anymore for the old school music industry tyrant, or has it always been that way? And we're just hearing about it because we hear about more things now?

Speaker 2 (00:35:18):

I'm not sure. I'm not sure. I mean, well, let's say the old school music tyrant. Back when I first started, there was at least 10 times as much money in making a record than there is now. There was more writing on it. So maybe those guys are

Speaker 1 (00:35:37):

Needed a tyrant.

Speaker 2 (00:35:38):

They needed a tyrant, there's more riding on it. They didn't want to have their money wasted, or they can't have a failed product or that kind of thing. Now, people still want to put out a good record, but if you're only paying, I dunno, five or 10 grand for a record, which seems like nothing, it's kind of like, well, just let us do our thing. If you cared more, you'd probably give us more money to do it.

Speaker 1 (00:36:01):

Yeah. I remember I had a manager at one point in time, and we were talking about points on records that had $7,000 budgets, and we were like, we are not going to sweat this label for what's going to maybe bring in $50,

Speaker 2 (00:36:20):

$2 and 34 cents.

Speaker 1 (00:36:23):

Pick and choose your battles.

Speaker 2 (00:36:25):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:36:26):

This is not one of them. It's just not worth it. To be fair, the records I'm talking about definitely are more than five or $10,000, but they're still not a million dollars or something. They're not even a quarter of a million dollars.

Speaker 2 (00:36:41):

Yeah. The tyrant thing is interesting as well, because I sort of feel like they're putting their stamp on the album in a way, or they have a very, very similar style of each record sounds similar, and they have to be a tyrant in order to always get their way to make sure it ends up sounding that way. Whereas some other guys who have more like a, I don't know, they say, I don't want to put my stamp on it. I want the band to shine through. Maybe they're definitely more open to doing different shit and not being the head of the pack, the tyrant guy.

Speaker 1 (00:37:23):

Well, you don't hear about George Martin having been a tyrant. No.

Speaker 2 (00:37:26):

For

Speaker 1 (00:37:26):

Instance, and he's known for having been open to doing whatever.

Speaker 2 (00:37:32):

And also, I mean, at a certain point, I know that there's tons of people out there that are way better at playing the guitar or anything, writing songs, knowing about music than I am. I feel like I'm good at a whole bunch of stuff, but you have to realize when somebody's better than you are, they know more. Take their opinion. It's only going to make the record better.

Speaker 1 (00:37:52):

I think that's a tough pill for some people to swallow, but it's very freeing once you've become cool with it.

Speaker 2 (00:37:57):

Right. Yeah. I mean, as long as you're not scared, oh, these people are going to find out that I'm a fraud and they paid me and blah, blah, blah. Just accept what you're good at and try to get the best result in the end, however you do that.

Speaker 1 (00:38:09):

Yeah. I think that people don't expect other people to be perfect at anything. I think that what bothers people more than someone not being amazing at something is them pretending like they're amazing at something. They're not.

(00:38:25):

So if you don't know how to do something or there's somebody better and you just say it and you account for that, people working with you will give you that leeway generally. For instance, I know how to tune drums, but I'm not what I would say an expert. So there's a drum tech that I always hire, and I have no problem saying, this guy is 800 times better than I will ever be at this. We should just get him, you don't want me doing this. Trust me, you don't want me doing this. I can get us out of a bad situation, but I'm not going to be able to make it as amazing as we all want it to be. And I've never had anybody walk out because of that. Once we got that drum tech in, and me and him worked together, they were stoked by how good it sounded. You had to be upfront about the stuff that you're not great at.

Speaker 2 (00:39:17):

Sure. Yeah. Or let's say there's guys like Rick Rubin, it's like, well, he hires the best people. That's the producing job. He's

Speaker 1 (00:39:24):

Great at that,

Speaker 2 (00:39:25):

Is hiring everyone that's the best than have them do the job. I'm sure there's more to it than that, but

Speaker 1 (00:39:31):

It's interesting. One of the bands that I'm thinking of, well, I didn't talk to them personally about this. I read about this in Guitar World or something, was Slipknot was talking shit about working with Rick Rubin, and he had just produced their most successful record ever, and they said that they would never work with him again, and we're just talking shit. And then it became their biggest record ever with the most singles, and it just, I don't know how many millions of copies. It sold lots. And I remember a few years later, they said that they took for granted how good they had it with him. They just didn't understand his method of going about things. It didn't make sense to them.

Speaker 2 (00:40:14):

They had an expectation of what his job should be, and he didn't meet their expectation, but he probably superseded it by doing stuff that they don't even think about, and that's how they ended up with that great record is him putting him in the spot to do what they needed to do,

Speaker 1 (00:40:32):

Which is a very rare skill.

Speaker 2 (00:40:35):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:40:36):

If it wasn't such a rare skill. It's interesting because people talk down on that style of production, the executive producer style, but if that was so easy, more people would be really good at it and would have track records like him, but they don't, and there aren't that many people who are that good at it. It's actually really hard.

Speaker 2 (00:40:56):

Yeah. I've never worked with him, but he's kind of fascinated me because he's not a musician and he's not an engineer, and he's not a producer in the traditional sense.

Speaker 1 (00:41:07):

It's like an executive producer.

Speaker 2 (00:41:09):

I was like, I guess he could be the head of Amazon or some company, not music per se, but he's taken his leadership role through something that he loved. It's kind of like, wow, it's just a different style of a producer than you're used to,

Speaker 1 (00:41:28):

But the engineers that he hires are they're

Speaker 2 (00:41:31):

The best

Speaker 1 (00:41:31):

Without fail. Yeah, they're unbelievable.

Speaker 2 (00:41:34):

Like Andy Wallace, Andy Wallace, Brendan O'Brien, those guys, they were working for him When I was a kid. You'd look on the record and you'd be like, oh, produced by Rick Rubin. All that's cool. Oh, Andy Wallace, who's that? And then five years later, it's like Andy Wallace. He's the king of the world, but he started out as Rick's engineer.

Speaker 1 (00:41:54):

It's amazing having not just an eye for talent, but knowing who to pair with the right artists. I mean, that's team building, right? That's like customized team building per project, which means that he has to know everybody and understand what their skill sets are and what the boundaries of the skill sets are, and then also understand what the vision for the record is, and then know exactly which personality types are going to work together and just

Speaker 2 (00:42:26):

That's crazy.

Speaker 1 (00:42:26):

Yeah. It's high level.

Speaker 2 (00:42:29):

That is high level, high level management.

Speaker 1 (00:42:31):

Yeah. I just think a lot of people don't understand it of what you said. They have an expectation, they have an idea in their head of what the job description is should

Speaker 3 (00:42:39):

Be, right? Yeah,

Speaker 1 (00:42:40):

Should be. I've always thought the job description is present a record that's as good as possible. I

Speaker 2 (00:42:45):

Mean, that should be the description is to get the record to be as good as possible, and then for the budget that you were paid for in the time that somebody wanted it, and however you get it done, as long as you meet those three criteria, then you've done your job.

Speaker 1 (00:43:00):

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.

(00:43:52):

And these are guys like TLA Will Putney, Jens Borin, Dan Lancaster, toy Madson, Andrew Wade, and many, many more. You'll also get access to Mix Lab, which is our collection of dozens of bite-sized mixing tutorials that cover all the basics as well as Portfolio Builder, which is a library of pro quality multi-tracks cleared for use in your portfolio. So your career will never again be held back by the quality of your source material. And for those of you who really want to step up their game, we have another membership tier called URM Enhanced, 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 game 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. 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. Do you ever feel like there's anything about your workflow that doesn't fit what client's job description would be?

Speaker 2 (00:45:19):

Geez, I don't think so. I mean, nothing that pops off the top of my head. I mean, for the last handful of years I've been working by myself anyway, so I don't really have a set schedule per se, except for when I want to come and go or kind of thing as long as I get my work done on time. But yeah, I don't think so.

Speaker 1 (00:45:36):

It's a good thing.

Speaker 2 (00:45:37):

It is a good thing that I have to think, well, I always get in a fight with this guy he thinks I should follow, and no, it's not like that. I don't know.

Speaker 1 (00:45:44):

Maybe that's why you're still in the

Speaker 2 (00:45:46):

Game. Yeah, still working.

Speaker 1 (00:45:49):

The thing that you were saying about having the multiple people, though, I have seen bands have an issue with that. Not always, but I've seen them have an issue with that in certain scenarios. Sounds to me like you guys had good communication with your clients and they knew what they were getting into, but I know of some scenarios where there was multiple people there and they would go to a producer and then get passed off and they'd get pissed about that. They thought they were going to be working with the producer the whole time.

Speaker 3 (00:46:20):

And

Speaker 1 (00:46:20):

There's some cases where it wouldn't be a good thing because the producer would just pass them off on some kid or whatever, not some equal, who just happens to not be the head producer or whatever. There's a big difference between having a partner that's an equal and then just passing it off on an underling. You don't want to do the work.

Speaker 2 (00:46:44):

Sure, yeah. That doesn't really happen here.

Speaker 1 (00:46:47):

Doesn't sound like it.

Speaker 2 (00:46:48):

No, that doesn't happen here. Maybe there have been instances in the past where a band member would've been like, oh, I thought I was going to record with you. And then you might just be like, oh, okay, well cool. Let's do it. And you switch around your schedule somehow to make that work. Unless it's something that's like, well, you really should work with this other guy on this, because that's what he's really good at, which is the case. Each one of us sort of have specialties, if you will, after working on the record. So many times I record guitars, I record drums, bill records, bass bill, records, vocals, and then sometimes the other guys will take in on the bass job. One of the guys that records bass for us now, he's an amazing bass player. It's like, he should record your bass parts kind of thing. So yeah, back to your point, you do get people sometimes that unless you explain to 'em upfront, like the schedule and who's working with who, they get confused. But you can easily work that out

Speaker 1 (00:47:47):

If you know how to communicate,

Speaker 2 (00:47:48):

If you know how to communicate. I guess I'm taking that for granted.

Speaker 1 (00:47:51):

It doesn't sound to me like you guys have many interns or

Speaker 2 (00:47:55):

We do, actually, we have two interns.

Speaker 1 (00:47:58):

How does that work?

Speaker 2 (00:47:59):

Every six months, we hire two interns.

Speaker 1 (00:48:02):

So you're seven people.

Speaker 2 (00:48:04):

Okay. So there's me and Bill, there's Andrew, Chris, Jonathan. Yeah. Two interns. Yeah, seven people. The interns don't come every day though. They sort of rotate. They trade off.

Speaker 1 (00:48:14):

Okay. What's the criteria for that? It sounds like you guys already have all the jobs pretty much covered.

Speaker 2 (00:48:22):

We do have all the jobs pretty much covered, but the longer the core of us work, let's say Chris and Andrew, where if Bill and I were extremely busy would be our editors or our catch all kind of guys. They have their own projects that start coming, and then they're really busy too. So interns are good. Where you get, well, the criteria is hopefully they know what they're doing. They've gone to a recording school or they've showed some sort of aptitude for it, playing you what they've done, or explain that I have a studio at my house, but I want to learn more, blah, blah, blah kind of thing. You get somebody who knows what's going on, and then you can give them, not projects, but pieces of the recording, drum editing, vocal tuning, that's a little bit more advanced, obviously, but that kind of stuff to prove themselves. And it's pretty much every person who works here, with the exception of Bill started as an intern. I was the original intern. I moved out here in 94 and sat on the couch for a month, kind of just

Speaker 1 (00:49:23):

Good decision.

Speaker 2 (00:49:24):

Yeah, my mom didn't think so at the beginning, but so we're all interns, and that's how we've hired people. It's kind of like a real life job interview, if you will. And that's maybe why we've ended up with having a really good staff. If the person that was interning wasn't any good, well, they didn't get hired. So you're only hiring the best or people that work with you? Well, or personality wise or all the above.

Speaker 1 (00:49:49):

It's like they're making it through a filter, basically.

Speaker 2 (00:49:53):

And it doesn't happen too often. It's like maybe once every five years we'll get somebody new.

Speaker 1 (00:49:58):

I feel like recording internships are the great filter. They talk about in evolution, the thing that prevents a type of life from evolving into the next type. I feel like recording internships are the great filter for engineers. A job interview is not enough.

Speaker 3 (00:50:17):

No, not at all.

Speaker 1 (00:50:18):

Because you're not going to know how the person responds to stress. You don't know how they're going to respond to a high profile client in the room. You don't know how they're going to respond to weird requests at weird hours. They're not going to know any of those really important things.

Speaker 2 (00:50:37):

When I first started working here, bill would have me do crazy stuff. I mean, it's not really crazy, but he'd be like, go do my laundry. I need you to clear off this trash off my porch and pick up some pantyhose on the way back. We need to make a pop filter kind of thing. And I'm just like, I never worked at a studio. I'm like, what is this? Why is this guy doing this stuff to me? But it's like you have to know how to do everything. It seems like when you're an engineer or figure out where there's problems, analyze 'em, learn how to fix without instruction from someone else. You know what I mean?

Speaker 1 (00:51:14):

Yeah. Only ask questions if you really don't know.

Speaker 3 (00:51:19):

Being

Speaker 1 (00:51:20):

Resourceful is key. I mean, you're there to make somebody else's life easier. So if every time there's a problem, you're asking the boss to solve it for you, you're not making their life easier.

Speaker 2 (00:51:31):

Right, right. Yeah. Well, he would give me stuff to do, and I would first couple of times I'm like, well, I've never done that before. I don't know. And then after a bit you're like, oh, you never say that, ever. You'd just go, yeah, I'll do that. Figure it out. And you figure out how to do it. And that's what makes you good, is you figured out all these problems on your own. So you have that skillset.

Speaker 1 (00:51:51):

So what element of an internship do you consider it to be appropriate for questions? Where do you think the time and place is for them to get their mentorship? Or where do you think that comes in?

Speaker 2 (00:52:06):

A lot of times for me, that's like when I'm working by myself. I mean, I always have a sort of a deadline, but a lot of times it's kind of like, not really. I could get it done within this seven day period or something. And so if they want to come in and watch me mixing or mastering or something, a lot of times I'll show 'em how I'm doing, what I'm doing, how I'm doing it, unless I'm too busy, in which case I'll be like, yeah, you can sit on the couch and watch. Don't talk to me. So there's those two things. It's like it just depends on the time crunch and whatnot. As far as asking questions when you're doing actual work with clients around, hardly ever, in my opinion, unless it was like, I don't want them, Hey, why are you doing this on that guy's drum set? And you did this on the last guy's drum set. Just dude, shut up. You know what I'm saying?

Speaker 1 (00:52:56):

Write it down and ask later.

Speaker 2 (00:52:58):

Yeah, pretty much. Yeah. Answer a question when clients aren't around and you have the time to do it, I'm pretty free with my knowledge or questions or whatever when people ask me.

Speaker 1 (00:53:10):

I think though, one of the most important things about an internship though, isn't so much what you get told about how to do things. It's being able to observe how they're done. Paying attention. That's where you're going to learn. Because sometimes producers, and you notice this with a lot of professional creatives is some are better than others at this, but they don't always think about what it is that they're doing. They just do it because they've been doing it for so long. They have an instinct for doing something. And so there might be 20 micro steps to get to a certain outcome that at this point, they don't even think about that stuff. So they hear or see a problem, they already know the solution.

Speaker 2 (00:54:00):

Yeah, it's not a problem.

Speaker 1 (00:54:02):

It's not a problem. So they do whatever they need to do to create that solution, but that solution, when you break it down, it's like 20 different steps that is now just automatic for them. It's hard for them sometimes to break that down and explain it.

Speaker 2 (00:54:19):

You couldn't explain it to someone. Yeah. That's like when I used to have a mastering software, it was called Sound Blade or Sonic Solutions. It was real finicky. It was a pain in the ass. And if I had to send something out, I would call up, whoever's working there, Hey, can you send this out for me? They're like, okay, what do you do? And I'd be like, oh, shit, I'm not in front of the screen. I think you hit command R and that'll open this up. And oh God, I'm not sitting there. I don't know the button. But if you were sitting there, you wouldn't even think about anything. You'd just go done. But when you have to think about what you did or how to get there, you're like, oh God, I don't know. I have to do it. You have to do it. You can't explain it.

Speaker 1 (00:55:01):

That's why it's better to just observe, I think.

Speaker 2 (00:55:04):

Yeah,

Speaker 1 (00:55:06):

Actually. Because when you get the explanation from somebody, unless they are experienced in explaining that's part of what they do, they might not give you the right explanation.

Speaker 2 (00:55:18):

Yeah, yeah, totally. Because not even what they do. They just think they do that, but they're not.

Speaker 1 (00:55:23):

Yeah. It's interesting. We've had some nail the mix episodes, not many, a few where even with me asking the right questions, the person mixing just did not know how to explain anything. And so I'd be like, so why are you doing that? I like it.

Speaker 2 (00:55:42):

It sounds good, man.

Speaker 1 (00:55:43):

What do you like about it? Yeah, exactly. What do you like about it? Just sounds good.

Speaker 2 (00:55:47):

It sounds good.

Speaker 1 (00:55:48):

And then just keep mixing, not saying anything. It's like, so what are you doing now? Just to me, you

Speaker 2 (00:55:53):

I'm mixing. I'm mixing. Yeah,

Speaker 1 (00:55:57):

Mixing as if we're not there, which cool. But

Speaker 3 (00:56:02):

Yeah. Right.

Speaker 1 (00:56:04):

I mean the mixes always sound great, but yeah, not everyone is good at explaining things, but that doesn't mean they've got nothing to teach.

Speaker 2 (00:56:12):

Sure.

Speaker 1 (00:56:13):

So intern's job is to observe.

Speaker 2 (00:56:16):

You have to be a better student, right?

Speaker 1 (00:56:18):

Yeah, exactly. Because you're learning from non-professional teachers. Just out of curiosity, where do you see the future of big studios now that there are so many home studios,

Speaker 2 (00:56:31):

Right? I think didn't just, capital just closed down two weeks ago.

Speaker 1 (00:56:35):

They did, but okay, so I don't mean that style. I don't mean the mega studios. We already know what the deal is with those. I mean more like the multi-room facilities, like the one you guys run,

Speaker 2 (00:56:47):

Right? Well, so that's kind of like you have to start back a ways, I guess 10, 15 years ago, we would make records the whole thing. Completely. The whole thing.

(00:57:00):

And then it turned into we're not making a record anymore. We're making an ep. Okay, now we're not making eps, and now we're making singles. Okay, now we're only recording the drums with you. We're going to do the rest ourselves and give it back to you to mix. Alright? We're going to do it all ourselves and we're going to give it to you to mix. Okay, we're going to do it all of ourselves and you're going to master it. So it's kind of like my workload, per se hasn't lessened that much, but it's just changed shapes tremendously as people do more and more themselves and budgets start shrinking, but at the end of the day, most people don't know how to make things sound good. So I feel like I will always have a job in my building, which I'm fortunate to be here for so long.

(00:57:56):

It's very cheap and we've had opportunities to expand and whatnot, and I think that's part of why we've done so well is we've kept our costs low. But back to the music part of it, people are always going to need me. Not everyone's going to figure out how to do what I'm doing or do it as well, and nor should, they should concentrate on their thing on making music and whatnot. So if you have the skills and what people need, I don't think you're going to go out of business per se, but if you're just fluff and you were around and that because people were expecting they had to go do that, that might go away. I think you have to have the right things to offer people to keep business.

Speaker 1 (00:58:38):

And there were a lot of studios like that. Somehow they managed to get gear and stay open, but they never did anything that sounded good.

Speaker 3 (00:58:48):

It

Speaker 1 (00:58:49):

Was weird. And I just think that it's because there were no other options, really. So people just went to them. You see this in local scenes a lot. There'd be the popular local place that just sucked.

Speaker 3 (00:59:01):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (00:59:02):

Now why would a band go to that place when they can just use superior drummer or something and it'll sound better than that place.

Speaker 2 (00:59:10):

No, you're very, very true. I don't think it's so much about the workplace, the tools that you have, I believe it's definitely the guy, the person that's in charge. If you're good, you can be good on almost anything. So the places that are going out of business, they just must not have the people that are there to make it all happen just or they got too much overhead in this place.

Speaker 1 (00:59:37):

Or both.

Speaker 2 (00:59:38):

Or both.

Speaker 1 (00:59:39):

Yeah. I think that this is why a recording studio is not a valuable thing to sell in terms of selling a business.

Speaker 3 (00:59:50):

You're

Speaker 1 (00:59:50):

Not going to get a 10 x multiple from an investment firm or some shit like that. That's not going to happen because no matter how much gear you have in it, the value is not in any of that. It's in the person who makes the records. And so they could literally have a laptop and a slate microphone and some headphones and make stuff and sounds amazing with a thousand dollars a month in rent and $3,000 in gear. That's it.

Speaker 2 (01:00:24):

Yeah, it's crazy Now. It's crazy that you can do that. Gosh, you don't need anything really. You just need a laptop and skill. Skills and skill, I mean, other than let's say places like Ocean Way or something where they've had a kind of a revolving door of amazing engineers and whatnot, but their actual studios have a sound that you can't really get anywhere else unless you've got the UAD plugin, of course. But there's places like that that you think wouldn't, hopefully wouldn't go out of business. You never know.

Speaker 1 (01:00:56):

You keep hearing about these places. Question being that you could just do everything on a laptop if you know what you're doing. What role does gear play for you now?

Speaker 2 (01:01:08):

Gear plays sort of much less of a role for me. I used to buy between 30 and $50,000 worth of gear every year. New mics, preamps, compressors, whatever, just toys to keep myself occupied and hopefully improve my work, if you will.

Speaker 1 (01:01:24):

Did it improve your work?

Speaker 2 (01:01:26):

I think it may have improved my work, maybe not so much because of the actual gear, but it made me work in a different way or gave me a different idea kind of thing. And then so after learning that stuff, now I've found the select few pieces of gear, which I think matter and whatever I'm doing, and the rest is just like, oh, I know how to get that sound. Just I need to do this. And I just feel like I can chase that sound on whatever I have now, just if it's in my head the right way. Before, in the past, I would've been like, I'm not getting the sound. Maybe I don't have an API preamp. And you're like, no, that's not it. But you have to go through all that experimentation with gear to kind of know that it doesn't matter nearly as much as you think it would.

Speaker 1 (01:02:18):

Where does it matter?

Speaker 2 (01:02:20):

I feel like in Mastering Gear matters a lot. The smallest details matter. When you have something that you can't alter as much per se is like when you're recording, you can make the whole thing with 50 sevens and have a great recording, but when you go to master it, if you don't want to completely change it, you got to have really top-notch stuff and pick your cables and pick your power supplies and pick everything just to not wreck it, but recording. It's not quite as much I don't think. Gosh,

Speaker 1 (01:02:54):

Why do you think people worry about it so much?

Speaker 2 (01:02:57):

They don't know. They don't have the experience. I had an intern in here the other day and he goes, oh yeah, and he uses Logic and I've only ever really used Pro Tools, but he had Logic and Pro tools and he had one other DAW on his laptop and he was running the same program out, and he was like, I swear, I swear the logic sounds better than the Pro Tools does. I swear. And he's going back and forth and he goes, I don't know which one I should use, but I think this one's a little bit better. And I'm like, you know what else would sound like a little better? Well, if I grab this fader here and I moved it half a db, now it sounds better than those other two, doesn't it? You don't know what you're focusing on or what to chase when you're inexperienced to know, dude, just work with whatever you have. What's the most comfortable that you can get the job done? If you want it a little brighter, just add a little more trouble to it, not to be so precious about it, I suppose.

Speaker 1 (01:03:59):

I think also it's just easier to think my work isn't as good as this person's work. I just need to purchase this external item and then this problem's going to be solved, not I'm going to need to work for maybe a few more years and develop myself.

Speaker 3 (01:04:18):

It's me.

Speaker 1 (01:04:20):

Yeah. Realizing that it is you. If your work isn't where it needs to be, you need to get better. I think that that's tough for a lot of people. It's tougher certainly than I don't have a stressor. That's why my vocals don't sound great. I can save up $1,300. Why not?

Speaker 2 (01:04:39):

Sure.

Speaker 1 (01:04:40):

And no one can actually say there's anything wrong with a stressor, right?

Speaker 2 (01:04:43):

For

Speaker 1 (01:04:43):

The most part, everyone agrees that they're awesome, but I don't think that anyone who doesn't know how to record vocals has gotten one and suddenly known how to record vocals.

Speaker 2 (01:04:53):

Yep.

Speaker 1 (01:04:54):

Maybe it's happened. I seriously doubt it.

Speaker 2 (01:04:57):

How'd you get that vocal? I just smashed the distress, man. Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:05:02):

Well, you know what? I think that one of the reasons that people think that kind of stuff sometimes is because they have heard people who don't know how to explain what they're doing. Say something like, I just smashed the stressor on it, like 20 db a gain reduction, good to go. And they make it sound like that's all it is,

Speaker 3 (01:05:21):

Right?

Speaker 1 (01:05:22):

Yeah. So a beginner reads that interview with somebody amazing who said something like that, and then they think, oh, okay, cool. I just need to buy a distress, smash the shit out of the vocal and we're good.

Speaker 2 (01:05:34):

And that's it, right?

Speaker 1 (01:05:35):

Yeah. That's it. That's all there is to it.

Speaker 2 (01:05:37):

Doesn't matter how good the singer is.

Speaker 1 (01:05:39):

No, that's it. Just smash some stuff. So how long were you doing this before you started making a living at it?

Speaker 2 (01:05:48):

Let's see. So I started here in 94, and I think in 2000 when I met my wife, I was making $12,000 a year working here, and she goes, you need to ask for a raise. And I was like, oh, okay. So I go into Bill, Hey Bill, my girlfriend thinks I need to get a raise. Okay, how's 15 an hour sound? Okay, great. And so it was probably six or seven years before I started to make an okay thing, and maybe six years after that where I was living comfortably, so let's say 12 years,

Speaker 1 (01:06:29):

Like a comfortable adult life,

Speaker 2 (01:06:31):

Like a regular adult life. I didn't have posters in my living room and whatnot.

Speaker 1 (01:06:37):

How long were you doing it before you got the internship?

Speaker 2 (01:06:39):

I hadn't actually worked in the studio before that. I had a four track and then I purchased Nate Track and I would record the band. I was in the basement. That was kind of my extent of it.

Speaker 1 (01:06:50):

Why did Bill give you a shot?

Speaker 2 (01:06:53):

Why did he give me a shot? Good. Okay. So I lived in Seattle before I moved out here, and my roommate

Speaker 1 (01:06:59):

Here being Denver, right?

Speaker 2 (01:07:01):

Fort Collins. Yeah. It's like an hour north of Denver. And I was living with all Bill's band at the time, their manager. And so their manager got them a record deal with Interscope and Bill and the other guy in the band, Stefan, the guitar player. They had recorded a bunch of other people, but they decided they were going to build the studio instead of spending all the money somewhere else. And so they were going to move to Colorado to do that. His name was Don Robertson. He was the manager. He's like, I'm moving out to Colorado.

Speaker 1 (01:07:33):

Don Robertson, who then went to Century Media.

Speaker 2 (01:07:35):

Yeah, the president of Century Media. Yeah, he was my roommate.

Speaker 1 (01:07:38):

Interesting.

Speaker 2 (01:07:38):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:07:39):

Small world.

Speaker 2 (01:07:39):

Yeah. Don's like, Hey, I'm going out to moving out to Colorado. You should come with me. And I was out of college for a year, and I'm like, okay, cool. So paid off all my debt, decided I was going to move out with him and started that way. And I had met Bill a handful of times beforehand. He would come out to Seattle to record bands, and so he stayed at my house. And when they were on tour also, they stayed at our place a couple times. So I had met him prior and I had just got out of college. And so I think Bill maybe saw some potential, like college graduate motivation, whatnot, have him come out, see what happens, test the waters,

Speaker 1 (01:08:22):

Just basically knowing some people and him just kind of already knowing that you're not a weirdo. Yeah,

Speaker 2 (01:08:29):

That I'm not a weirdo that I've got, I've got some stuff going for me.

Speaker 1 (01:08:33):

Yeah. So you were vetted. You were vetted.

Speaker 2 (01:08:36):

I was vetted, yes.

Speaker 1 (01:08:38):

So even though you didn't have a real studio experience, I guess your personality was cool enough and you were vetted enough to where he felt comfortable with the idea

Speaker 2 (01:08:51):

Pretty much Exactly that. And then I was with Dawn too when I first showed up, and I was helping him do his, he was a manager back then, do management stuff, and I was just kind of like the first intern.

Speaker 1 (01:09:05):

It just goes to show that the social side of this, in some ways more important than the audio side of it in some ways, not in every way, but in some ways it is

Speaker 2 (01:09:16):

In some ways. For sure.

Speaker 1 (01:09:18):

It might get you the job before your audio skills do,

Speaker 2 (01:09:21):

Right? I mean, I don't want to say you can always learn how to do the audio. Some people clearly cannot. No.

Speaker 1 (01:09:28):

Within reason.

Speaker 2 (01:09:29):

Some people are gifted, but oftentimes a lot of those people that are gifted, they don't have the personality side of it.

Speaker 1 (01:09:36):

They're gifted with a shitty personality too.

Speaker 2 (01:09:39):

Yeah, exactly. Right. So it's like you got to have one or the other, hopefully both. But either you're really good at making records and everybody hates you, but they still go to you because you're really good at making something sound good, or you're a really kick ass guy and everyone loves to hang out with you. You,

Speaker 1 (01:09:56):

But you're still pretty damn good.

Speaker 2 (01:09:57):

You're still pretty damn, and you got to still be pretty good. And if you're not pretty good, get people around you that are pretty good.

Speaker 1 (01:10:05):

Like we said before, though, people might not go back to you if you're difficult, no matter how good you are. I think that in order to be at the level where people overlook your personality, you better be making them a shit ton of money.

Speaker 2 (01:10:20):

Yeah, pretty much. I would agree. I would agree.

Speaker 1 (01:10:25):

That's what makes people tolerate bad behavior in music, I think is money. And the moment that that money train stops or isn't there, the threshold for bad behavior is way, way, way lower.

Speaker 3 (01:10:37):

Right.

Speaker 1 (01:10:38):

I wonder too, thinking about no tolerance for tyrants in the old days, I wonder if part of it also is because musicians have evolved since the old days too, in that they're much more on their shit than they used to be. They know more about the business, they know a little bit more about recording. They just know more. They're far more educated. They have to be. There's no place for fuck up musicians. I mean, some of them are, but by and large, the stereotype of the fuck up rockstar who's a total space cadet, junk out loser

(01:11:13):

Who doesn't know anything and just has everybody else doing everything for them who couldn't make their way through an airport if you gave them a map or GPS. I think that while there's a minority of those, I don't think that those survive the industry the way they used to because they don't make money for people the way they used to, and people don't put up with it. And so the class of artists you have now are, they're just probably smarter people and more aware. They don't put up with as much shit. They don't have to.

Speaker 2 (01:11:45):

Yeah. I think also you're saying, I guess with the advent of all the home recording stuff being so easy nowadays, they can do it themselves. I've had so many bands come in and they played me their demo, and I've been like, this is your demo. What do you need me for? Kind of thing. People are getting a lot better at doing this

Speaker 1 (01:12:11):

When that happens. Do you feel like you're talking yourself out of a job?

Speaker 2 (01:12:14):

I do. Sometimes you don't really want to downplay yourself too much. I've seen both sides of the spectrum where I've witnessed myself or others exuding so much confidence that you can watch people just believe you. Oh yeah, this guy, dude, did you hear how he was talking about that? Yeah, he's our guy. He's doing it. But at the other time, maybe you don't need the job as much anymore. The longer you've done it, or you're confident enough in your skill. I know what I've done in the past, people know what I've done, so I am just being honest with you. Here, take it or leave it kind of thing.

Speaker 1 (01:12:50):

I've had that happen where I was working on a mix and it was killing me, and so I asked a friend of mine to just take it over, and they were like, why? Sounds fine. You're crazy.

Speaker 3 (01:13:04):

Yeah.

Speaker 1 (01:13:05):

It was like, I'll pay you. Shut up. They didn't take it.

Speaker 3 (01:13:10):

They didn't do it.

Speaker 1 (01:13:11):

No, they didn't do it. They didn't see the point.

Speaker 3 (01:13:13):

Right.

Speaker 1 (01:13:14):

I've encountered that a few times. Also, with bands coming in with something that just sounds so good that what's the point?

Speaker 2 (01:13:21):

Right? Why don't we release this?

Speaker 1 (01:13:23):

But sometimes they come in with something that sounds good, and the point is that there is something missing.

Speaker 2 (01:13:29):

No, you're right. I always say that when you first hear the demo, maybe it's you're like an initial listener and you're like, holy shit, this is good. Or you just don't expect it to be that good. And therefore, if it's that good, you're like, really? Oh, wow. But then you take the record, you work on it, and then when you're finished and you go back and you play your finished thing to the demo, you're like, oh, that demo sucked. I mean, it didn't suck, but you don't really realize how much better it's going to get until you really immerse yourself into it.

Speaker 1 (01:14:00):

Yeah, exactly. And so that's why I think that maybe talking ourselves out of a job isn't always the best idea.

Speaker 2 (01:14:08):

You're probably right.

Speaker 1 (01:14:10):

I mean, they came to you for a reason. Right?

Speaker 2 (01:14:13):

Exactly. Exactly.

Speaker 1 (01:14:14):

So anyways, I think this is a good place to stop the episode. I want to thank you for hanging out, man. It's been a pleasure.

Speaker 2 (01:14:22):

Yeah, you as well. Thanks for having me.

Speaker 1 (01:14:24):

Yeah, anytime. I've enjoyed talking to you. 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 al Levy 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.