1 00:00:02,039 --> 00:00:07,975 Welcome to the show about all things making music from the creative process and workflow to gear and recording techniques. 2 00:00:07,975 --> 00:00:13,341 I'm your host, Brian Funk, musician, producer, Ableton certified trainer and author of the five minute music producer. 3 00:00:13,341 --> 00:00:15,323 Let's learn to become better music makers. 4 00:00:15,323 --> 00:00:17,965 Welcome to the music production podcast. 5 00:00:22,860 --> 00:00:25,992 Today I'm speaking with mixer and producer Mixer Man. 6 00:00:25,992 --> 00:00:33,728 Mixer Man has worked on gold and platinum albums and artists such as the Far Side, Ben Harper, Lifehouse, Amy Grant, and many more. 7 00:00:33,728 --> 00:00:43,965 He's the author of The Daily Adventures of Mixer Man, Zen and the Art of Mixing, and his new book is Mixer Man's Ultimate Guide to Producing Records, Music, and Songs. 8 00:00:43,965 --> 00:00:52,210 We had a great conversation about his decades of experience, his new book, and how technology has changed and will continue to change how we produce music. 9 00:00:52,248 --> 00:00:56,040 Please welcome Nixerman to the music production podcast. 10 00:00:56,138 --> 00:00:59,332 Hey, if you're enjoying this show, then you'll probably like Producer Head. 11 00:00:59,332 --> 00:01:03,664 It's a podcast that explores creativity and music making hosted by Toru. 12 00:01:03,664 --> 00:01:09,127 Toru is a music producer who loves exploring the creative process and the mindset behind successful artists. 13 00:01:09,127 --> 00:01:12,849 I've had Toru on this show and he's had me on the Producer Head podcast. 14 00:01:12,849 --> 00:01:21,634 Producer Head features raw unfiltered conversations about the creative process, struggles and breakthroughs with a wide range of artists and music makers. 15 00:01:21,666 --> 00:01:25,587 I like the show a lot and as a listener of this show, think you might like it too. 16 00:01:25,587 --> 00:01:28,768 Check out Producer Head wherever you get your podcasts. 17 00:01:29,449 --> 00:01:30,669 All right then. 18 00:01:30,806 --> 00:01:31,869 So we're on the air. 19 00:01:31,869 --> 00:01:34,590 Welcome to the show Mixer Man. 20 00:01:35,571 --> 00:01:36,381 How are you, Eric? 21 00:01:36,381 --> 00:01:37,526 Good to see you. 22 00:01:38,372 --> 00:01:40,002 It's been fun to get to know your work. 23 00:01:40,002 --> 00:01:45,974 Thanks for sending over Mixer Man's Ultimate Guide to Producing Records, Music and Songs, your new book. 24 00:01:46,488 --> 00:01:47,345 Yeah. 25 00:01:48,600 --> 00:01:49,400 Very cool stuff. 26 00:01:49,400 --> 00:01:51,421 I mean, you cover a lot in there. 27 00:01:51,421 --> 00:02:03,457 There's, you know, just everything from getting started in like a home recording studio situation to compression microphones, oh dealing with dynamics between band members. 28 00:02:03,497 --> 00:02:08,340 There's, I mean, probably fair to say ultimate guide. 29 00:02:08,340 --> 00:02:13,442 You really try to hit on just about everything I could think of to put into a book like this. 30 00:02:13,550 --> 00:02:18,330 Yeah, that was the that was kind of the goal after Hurricane Helene hit. 31 00:02:19,290 --> 00:02:26,830 You know, in 2012, I wrote just to go back a little bit, I wrote Zen in the Art of Producing. 32 00:02:26,830 --> 00:02:28,390 And I always wanted to revise it. 33 00:02:28,390 --> 00:02:32,450 But every time I went to revise it during the pandemic, I went to revise it. 34 00:02:32,510 --> 00:02:37,190 I was like, I don't know, people just don't work like this anymore. 35 00:02:37,190 --> 00:02:38,710 I mean, some people do. 36 00:02:38,710 --> 00:02:40,630 But like, it's just so niche. 37 00:02:40,630 --> 00:02:43,438 And I wanted to really expand it. 38 00:02:43,438 --> 00:02:59,942 And, you know, these days, everybody is a producer, musicians are producing themselves or producing other acts and ah songwriters are producers and um artists are producers and 39 00:02:59,942 --> 00:03:03,403 like, it's very difficult to produce yourself. 40 00:03:03,403 --> 00:03:13,556 So I wanted to really break down everything throughout the process from the technical to the thinking behind it. 41 00:03:13,694 --> 00:03:25,689 and really like go through, continue as I did in Zen and the Art of Producing to explain, you know, how a producer thinks and how a producer works so that you understand what 42 00:03:25,730 --> 00:03:29,054 aspects you're missing when you're doing it yourself. 43 00:03:29,966 --> 00:03:30,786 Hmm. 44 00:03:31,146 --> 00:03:38,173 Well, I think maybe there's a good distinction to draw here because I mean, even the name of the show is called Music Production Podcast. 45 00:03:38,173 --> 00:03:51,334 And I think I'm using it, the word production more in terms of creation, as opposed to the more traditional role of the producer back in the day when you would actually book studio 46 00:03:51,334 --> 00:03:52,645 time and go in there. 47 00:03:52,645 --> 00:03:56,619 um Do you mind just kind of differentiating those two? 48 00:03:56,619 --> 00:03:58,700 Cause I think there's a lot of people that just 49 00:03:59,060 --> 00:04:03,871 understand the word production like you would in normal life. 50 00:04:03,871 --> 00:04:06,789 Like, you produced and you made something, you created something. 51 00:04:06,789 --> 00:04:07,229 Right. 52 00:04:07,229 --> 00:04:09,694 But it was a much more specific role. 53 00:04:10,232 --> 00:04:14,073 Well, a production, and you're right, you can use it very broadly. 54 00:04:14,073 --> 00:04:17,484 I I produce a book, right? 55 00:04:19,264 --> 00:04:20,055 Exactly. 56 00:04:20,055 --> 00:04:22,545 So, I'm producing dinner. 57 00:04:24,006 --> 00:04:31,578 So, um you know, I often, if I'm working with a band in the studio, I assign someone to produce dinner for me because I don't want to think about it because I'm thinking about 58 00:04:31,578 --> 00:04:32,828 everything else. 59 00:04:33,068 --> 00:04:38,910 But a production is basically, in music, is the arrangement. 60 00:04:38,910 --> 00:04:40,550 um 61 00:04:41,186 --> 00:04:50,559 Now what goes into the production is the evaluation of the performances and um all the decision making process that goes through with that. 62 00:04:50,559 --> 00:04:54,429 But the production really is just the arrangement. 63 00:04:54,650 --> 00:04:58,971 And the mix is really just the arrangement too. 64 00:04:58,971 --> 00:05:10,794 Only we deal with balances and we're dealing with technical things to help um get the music to do what we want it to do um sonically. 65 00:05:11,374 --> 00:05:20,577 But even then, try to ah tell people, the sonics, they don't matter nearly as much as the reaction. 66 00:05:20,577 --> 00:05:27,358 And a great mix of a production is something that does what the song does. 67 00:05:27,358 --> 00:05:32,720 So if the song has forward motion, if the song has a payoff, then we want to accentuate that payoff. 68 00:05:32,720 --> 00:05:36,781 ah And we have all sorts of tools at our disposal to do that. 69 00:05:36,781 --> 00:05:40,654 uh Rhythm, um 70 00:05:40,654 --> 00:05:50,779 uh counter melodies, and we want to push the listener forward through the production the same way that the song naturally does that. 71 00:05:50,840 --> 00:05:55,262 And that gives us a better payoff and that gives us a reaction from the listener. 72 00:05:55,482 --> 00:05:58,984 And when I'm working, that's always what I'm thinking about. 73 00:05:59,204 --> 00:06:03,046 Now, producing, you're running the show. 74 00:06:03,286 --> 00:06:08,929 If a band hires me to produce them, then I'm taking control of the budget. 75 00:06:08,929 --> 00:06:10,530 ah 76 00:06:10,530 --> 00:06:14,131 Because if I don't have control of the budget, I don't have control of anything. 77 00:06:14,131 --> 00:06:22,275 ah I can't get to a point where we're only halfway through and we have no more money because somebody was spending it on things that I didn't approve. 78 00:06:22,275 --> 00:06:24,136 So I need control of the budget. 79 00:06:24,136 --> 00:06:35,180 I need to have a vision ah that I can sell to the band and that we can follow through to the end. 80 00:06:35,180 --> 00:06:39,438 ah 81 00:06:39,438 --> 00:06:45,318 You know, sometimes you get towards the end and someone has an idea that they want to take this thing completely out in the left field. 82 00:06:45,318 --> 00:06:48,078 I said, no, we've talked about this. 83 00:06:48,078 --> 00:06:51,458 We're going to make this record the way we've set out to make it. 84 00:06:51,458 --> 00:07:01,298 You know, occasionally we might go off in a different direction, but in general, I'm going to keep everybody on track and we're going to make the record the way we envisioned it and 85 00:07:01,298 --> 00:07:02,738 the way it was sold. 86 00:07:03,418 --> 00:07:07,020 And I'm in charge of, you know, the budget. 87 00:07:07,020 --> 00:07:19,550 I'm in charge of, as a producer of the performances and getting the most out of the people ah and leading the charge and leading the team to create the production. 88 00:07:19,550 --> 00:07:25,276 And it's an all-encompassing, all-involved process of producing a record. 89 00:07:27,878 --> 00:07:31,619 Yeah, so you're really big picture minded here. 90 00:07:32,320 --> 00:07:34,150 Yeah. 91 00:07:34,150 --> 00:07:43,513 can, I know that feeling too of you're working on a project and then that, Hey, what if we just turn it into like a, you know, space Odyssey. 92 00:07:43,513 --> 00:07:47,694 And then all of sudden we got this whole new vision of what we're working on. 93 00:07:47,694 --> 00:07:56,034 And sometimes I mean, those can be fun ideas, but you have to know when to reel those in and be like, look, if you ever want to get this thing done. 94 00:07:56,034 --> 00:07:58,943 and especially if there's money and budgets involved. 95 00:07:58,943 --> 00:08:01,960 We need to stay the course here a little bit. 96 00:08:02,400 --> 00:08:13,246 Money and budgets force you to stay within, you know, certain, stay in your lanes and not just go crazy because if you can't get any more money and you go way off track, you're 97 00:08:13,246 --> 00:08:13,506 done. 98 00:08:13,506 --> 00:08:15,457 You'll never finish it. 99 00:08:15,838 --> 00:08:20,580 so the, you know, budgets are very good for that, but a lot of people are working without a budget. 100 00:08:20,580 --> 00:08:31,106 And when you're not working without a budget, then the discipline required to finish becomes far greater importance because you have nothing, no guard rails. 101 00:08:31,106 --> 00:08:35,329 force you, so you can go, I'll make it this way, I'll make it this way. 102 00:08:35,590 --> 00:08:40,914 And a big problem that a lot of people have is they do not finish their productions. 103 00:08:40,935 --> 00:08:53,376 I saw someone put up a poll on one of the Facebook groups, and I wasn't surprised by the result, but I was glad to see it, and it was that the biggest problem that people had was 104 00:08:53,376 --> 00:08:55,588 finishing their works. 105 00:08:56,089 --> 00:08:57,740 And the problem is they... 106 00:08:57,740 --> 00:09:02,735 They don't, never feel like it's done or they never feel like it's good or it's good enough. 107 00:09:02,875 --> 00:09:10,963 And so as a result, or it never gets done because they keep trying to change it and change it and change it and they're never satisfied. 108 00:09:10,964 --> 00:09:13,586 And that's the loop that people need to get out of. 109 00:09:14,134 --> 00:09:14,994 Hmm. 110 00:09:15,314 --> 00:09:19,535 Yeah, because this infinite options, we talk about this all the time here. 111 00:09:19,616 --> 00:09:24,877 There's so many choices that it can be paralyzing and there's so much editing you can do. 112 00:09:25,197 --> 00:09:30,739 And there's really no objective way to know that something's finished. 113 00:09:30,739 --> 00:09:32,429 It's all judgments. 114 00:09:32,429 --> 00:09:34,379 It's all personalities. 115 00:09:34,660 --> 00:09:38,021 So you could decide something you did. 116 00:09:38,021 --> 00:09:39,801 A live performance was good enough. 117 00:09:39,801 --> 00:09:40,451 That's great. 118 00:09:40,451 --> 00:09:41,067 Sounds nice. 119 00:09:41,067 --> 00:09:41,822 Let's put it out. 120 00:09:41,822 --> 00:09:43,872 Or you can sit around and 121 00:09:44,026 --> 00:09:50,974 work on it endlessly, overdubbing, fixing, nudging things, trying new plugins out. 122 00:09:51,586 --> 00:09:54,957 And it's all after pursuit of perfection, but there is no perfection. 123 00:09:54,957 --> 00:09:59,209 There's only like how it causes you to react. 124 00:09:59,209 --> 00:10:04,672 I mean, you know, a lot of people ask, well, how do you know when a mix is done or how do you know when a production is done? 125 00:10:05,112 --> 00:10:14,156 When I can't like, when I'm listening to the production and I can't stop singing it to it and I can't stop moving to it and I forget that I'm supposed to be right there now 126 00:10:14,156 --> 00:10:19,098 evaluating the mix of the production, that's when I know it's done because 127 00:10:20,192 --> 00:10:22,164 It takes me where I need to go. 128 00:10:22,304 --> 00:10:25,848 And I know if it does that to me, it's gonna do that to others. 129 00:10:26,449 --> 00:10:27,890 And that's what we want. 130 00:10:28,364 --> 00:10:30,345 Yeah, I do pretty much the same thing. 131 00:10:30,345 --> 00:10:37,122 I try to find a point where I've realized I've listened to it without judging it and just enjoyed it. 132 00:10:37,303 --> 00:10:42,848 And sometimes I'll do that even by putting it on and maybe doing something else. 133 00:10:42,848 --> 00:10:50,755 Maybe I'll fold the laundry or something so that I'm not listening as in what's wrong with this? 134 00:10:50,755 --> 00:10:51,636 What do need to do? 135 00:10:51,636 --> 00:10:52,817 What's wrong? 136 00:10:52,817 --> 00:10:53,912 And just. 137 00:10:53,912 --> 00:10:54,522 Hey, you know what? 138 00:10:54,522 --> 00:10:55,394 That was pretty cool. 139 00:10:55,394 --> 00:10:57,584 Nothing jumped out and I enjoyed it. 140 00:10:57,584 --> 00:10:58,498 It felt good. 141 00:10:58,498 --> 00:11:06,718 Like you said, the dance test that doesn't move you a little bit is always nice to just get up and feel it a little bit. 142 00:11:06,988 --> 00:11:07,958 Yeah. 143 00:11:08,119 --> 00:11:19,217 The best is when I get to a point in a mix where I'm just tapping my foot or actually more bouncing my leg and I'm making noise in the room while I'm trying to listen to this thing. 144 00:11:19,217 --> 00:11:20,398 It's like, whatever. 145 00:11:20,398 --> 00:11:21,509 This is great. 146 00:11:21,509 --> 00:11:23,160 This is why we got to know this. 147 00:11:23,160 --> 00:11:26,092 Yeah, the feeling of enjoyment kind of takes over. 148 00:11:26,092 --> 00:11:29,995 eh Yeah, that's a great time. 149 00:11:30,616 --> 00:11:31,326 But you're right. 150 00:11:31,326 --> 00:11:33,258 It is just the. 151 00:11:33,979 --> 00:11:35,460 It's probably the hardest thing. 152 00:11:35,460 --> 00:11:45,709 It's probably the biggest problem I see people and even people that have finished music are afraid to share it sometimes because they don't know if it's good enough and it's it's 153 00:11:45,709 --> 00:11:46,850 crippling. 154 00:11:46,850 --> 00:11:52,534 I've found for myself to think about my work as 155 00:11:52,684 --> 00:12:00,071 like a larger body of work and all this stuff I'm creating is just little entries in that body of work along the way. 156 00:12:00,071 --> 00:12:02,843 And this is where I am right now. 157 00:12:03,625 --> 00:12:04,846 okay. 158 00:12:04,846 --> 00:12:10,274 don't think I can do that if I have something I've been working on for five years and say, this is where I am right now. 159 00:12:10,274 --> 00:12:12,573 In five years, I'm changing so much. 160 00:12:12,573 --> 00:12:17,326 I would lose that larger picture vision that you got. 161 00:12:17,326 --> 00:12:23,028 eh You can't name a record that took five years to make that was anybody's ever heard, right? 162 00:12:23,028 --> 00:12:24,788 So why take five years? 163 00:12:24,788 --> 00:12:25,158 Right. 164 00:12:25,158 --> 00:12:37,812 It's not gonna as you're not increasing your odds and the thing is like I mean I make things and I think I know what the reaction is gonna be and I'm often wrong. 165 00:12:37,812 --> 00:12:47,414 So like you can maybe you're not you but someone's listening to their work and they feel less than about or whatever, but you don't know 166 00:12:47,628 --> 00:12:49,600 what people are gonna think about it. 167 00:12:49,600 --> 00:12:57,425 And a lot of times they're listening to the sound and they're like, it's not as great as this mixer stuff or this producer stuff. 168 00:12:57,425 --> 00:12:59,347 But people don't listen to sound. 169 00:12:59,347 --> 00:13:00,828 People listen to music. 170 00:13:00,828 --> 00:13:08,374 So put the music out there and then you see the reaction and the more you put out, I mean, this is a numbers game. 171 00:13:08,374 --> 00:13:12,097 The more you put out, the more chance you have at a reaction. 172 00:13:12,097 --> 00:13:14,558 And then when you hit on something, 173 00:13:14,904 --> 00:13:25,007 you know, when you finally hit on something that you could see, oh, this is working, then you can kind of stay in that lane and in that direction for a moment and kind of 174 00:13:25,007 --> 00:13:26,690 capitalize on that. 175 00:13:26,690 --> 00:13:30,524 But you don't find that by never releasing something. 176 00:13:31,715 --> 00:13:37,380 Well, you hear it time and time again, bands, artists will say like, you know, I never thought that was going to be the hit. 177 00:13:37,380 --> 00:13:38,041 Yeah. 178 00:13:38,041 --> 00:13:39,602 It wasn't even our first single. 179 00:13:39,602 --> 00:13:44,946 was one we kind of put out as, you know, second side on the third single. 180 00:13:45,928 --> 00:13:47,959 like, you don't even know it when it happens. 181 00:13:47,959 --> 00:13:57,678 So to be so worried about it while you're doing it doesn't make a lot of sense because it is really kind of. 182 00:13:57,678 --> 00:13:59,380 There's so many factors coming to play. 183 00:13:59,380 --> 00:14:08,923 mean, just the time your music comes out, like what's going on in the world and people's lives or even what season is it can really make a big difference in how it impacts the 184 00:14:08,923 --> 00:14:09,834 person. 185 00:14:10,898 --> 00:14:21,566 I don't know it personally, but I can almost guarantee you that the Red Hot Chili Peppers did not think the bridge was going to be one of their biggest singles. 186 00:14:21,566 --> 00:14:27,631 ah It's just not like a single kind of song, but yet it was. 187 00:14:27,631 --> 00:14:31,704 The first time I heard it, I'm like, my God, this has to come out as a single. 188 00:14:31,704 --> 00:14:34,455 This is like the best song on this album. 189 00:14:34,716 --> 00:14:37,788 And then when it did, I was surprised that they put it out. 190 00:14:38,446 --> 00:14:39,067 Yeah. 191 00:14:39,067 --> 00:14:51,326 Well, I can remember watching interviews with the band back in the nineties, working with Rick Rubin and Rick Rubin like asking to see uh Anthony Kiedis' poetry. 192 00:14:51,326 --> 00:14:52,331 And I'm like, what's this? 193 00:14:52,331 --> 00:14:54,719 And he's like, that's not a chili pepper song, you know? 194 00:14:54,719 --> 00:15:08,050 And then they start working on it together and it's a real departure from what they did, it really, I think showed their, you know, the depth and the... 195 00:15:08,174 --> 00:15:13,118 kind of versatility that they have and they really didn't tap into until that point. 196 00:15:15,307 --> 00:15:16,350 For sure. 197 00:15:16,494 --> 00:15:18,122 You just gotta make it. 198 00:15:19,362 --> 00:15:20,929 Just gonna make it, man. 199 00:15:21,614 --> 00:15:26,934 Yeah, my earliest recording studio experience was in high school. 200 00:15:27,214 --> 00:15:33,314 And it was in a basement studio, but it was through my guitar teacher. 201 00:15:33,314 --> 00:15:38,534 And he knew a guy that had, you know, eight app machines in his basement and a nice setup. 202 00:15:39,134 --> 00:15:42,814 But he put, my guitar teacher played the role of the producer. 203 00:15:42,994 --> 00:15:48,954 And we ran into issues kind of right off the bat being, you know, 17 year old kids. 204 00:15:50,424 --> 00:15:54,255 from like timing to arrangement things. 205 00:15:54,255 --> 00:15:58,186 And he knew what we had to spend and how much time we had in the studio. 206 00:15:58,186 --> 00:16:00,087 And he really reeled us in. 207 00:16:00,087 --> 00:16:02,515 He's like, okay, you're not gonna do all those fills on the drum. 208 00:16:02,515 --> 00:16:04,358 You're just gonna do this real straight thing. 209 00:16:04,358 --> 00:16:09,899 And you guys are gonna, know, don't sing that high, sing it an octave lower. 210 00:16:09,899 --> 00:16:19,562 know, like a lot of things to correct us that I think in the moment we were kind like, but that drum roll is so awesome, you know? 211 00:16:19,948 --> 00:16:26,441 But looking back, it made us have a much more listenable record. 212 00:16:26,481 --> 00:16:27,141 Right. 213 00:16:27,141 --> 00:16:34,544 Because I think we were so used to recording on four track tape recorders where you almost don't even hear some of the nonsense that goes on. 214 00:16:34,544 --> 00:16:37,105 Really, all you get on those is the emotion. 215 00:16:37,146 --> 00:16:38,166 Yeah, right. 216 00:16:38,166 --> 00:16:39,647 Especially the way we were recording. 217 00:16:39,647 --> 00:16:42,928 mean, there was no clarity or any kind of... 218 00:16:42,928 --> 00:16:48,010 uh We didn't even understand microphone placement at that time. 219 00:16:48,010 --> 00:16:58,381 Yeah, the moment you focused in, you can hear stuff with clarity, then all of a sudden things start to really stick out that didn't before, where they were energetic, but now 220 00:16:58,381 --> 00:17:00,014 they're just a distraction. 221 00:17:00,014 --> 00:17:01,254 Right. 222 00:17:01,434 --> 00:17:13,334 Yeah, and I really have come out, I guess it's like a full circle kind of thing where, maybe it's a 180 where now I'm often looking for some of those things in my music because 223 00:17:13,334 --> 00:17:15,994 everything's so perfect in time and clear, right? 224 00:17:15,994 --> 00:17:18,594 Where I'm trying to build that in a little bit. 225 00:17:19,254 --> 00:17:27,634 Where I find if it's almost impossible to get things to have that feeling for me. 226 00:17:27,967 --> 00:17:32,112 if everything's so perfect and tight because it's just not how I am. 227 00:17:32,112 --> 00:17:33,803 I'm not that kind of musician. 228 00:17:33,803 --> 00:17:35,601 I'm not trained. 229 00:17:35,601 --> 00:17:37,129 recording organic stuff? 230 00:17:37,129 --> 00:17:39,252 Are you recording programmed stuff? 231 00:17:39,252 --> 00:17:39,904 Both. 232 00:17:39,904 --> 00:17:45,268 It's usually often a mixture, or sometimes it's one or the other. 233 00:17:46,862 --> 00:17:57,722 But I mean, I view like rawness would be if the most raw production would be if you put a band in a room with one microphone and just record them, right? 234 00:17:57,722 --> 00:18:09,122 And the most polished one would be everything's sampled, everything's programmed, everything's to the, know, to dial in to the nth degree. 235 00:18:09,882 --> 00:18:13,122 So, you know, I view, 236 00:18:14,678 --> 00:18:18,571 I view these kinds of things and these decision points as modules, right? 237 00:18:18,571 --> 00:18:27,287 So like, where do I want the rawness or the polish to be in this production? 238 00:18:27,287 --> 00:18:30,718 And if I want it super polished, I'm going to program it. 239 00:18:30,718 --> 00:18:38,154 If I want it super raw, then I'm going to bring the band in and try and, and, and I don't want to correct mistakes. 240 00:18:38,154 --> 00:18:39,995 I don't want to correct the tuning or whatever. 241 00:18:39,995 --> 00:18:42,497 And there's any variation in between. 242 00:18:42,877 --> 00:18:44,460 And so. 243 00:18:44,460 --> 00:18:56,193 Like when you're programming, you have to like actually assiduously add the rawness because it's programmed, right? 244 00:18:56,193 --> 00:19:06,996 Or, mean, and you could do that by adding an instrument where you're, if you're adding an acoustic guitar, you don't have to play it perfectly and you don't have to quantize it or 245 00:19:06,996 --> 00:19:07,837 time it. 246 00:19:07,837 --> 00:19:12,118 And that will add like a bit of rawness to the production. 247 00:19:12,438 --> 00:19:13,318 So 248 00:19:14,134 --> 00:19:26,026 Anyway, I have all of these different kinds of modules that I use and I think about it this way because really we're not creating anything new. 249 00:19:26,026 --> 00:19:30,450 We're kind of mixing and matching things to make something new. 250 00:19:30,450 --> 00:19:33,773 But everything that we're using has been done before. 251 00:19:33,773 --> 00:19:38,988 It's just that the combination that we put together is what creates the new work. 252 00:19:40,806 --> 00:19:54,961 Right, that sounds like a nice logical, sensible argument against or for like the digital versus analog kind of thinking, the quantizer, not quantize, autotune or not. 253 00:19:54,961 --> 00:19:58,792 It's, you know, use, we have all these tools. 254 00:19:59,272 --> 00:20:06,862 I think maybe in my personal opinion, my personal taste is maybe we've gone a little too far with all the 255 00:20:06,862 --> 00:20:16,942 Corrective stuff and making everything smooth and slick and it's kind of nice now to bring some of that back in Some of the old ways a little bit balance it It's like when you get a 256 00:20:16,942 --> 00:20:23,702 new toy you want to use it on everything and then after a while I say, alright Well, maybe we'll just ease it in a little more 257 00:20:23,702 --> 00:20:27,117 It's easy to overdo it, for sure. 258 00:20:27,117 --> 00:20:27,932 Yeah. 259 00:20:28,814 --> 00:20:43,514 I mean, know, generative AI is going to change everything for us in the next few years in music production, because I'm not talking about Suno and Udio, which are interesting and 260 00:20:43,514 --> 00:20:49,214 cool, know, great for a consumer who doesn't make music and can't write music. 261 00:20:49,454 --> 00:20:53,513 Those are softwares where you can prompt it and it will make a song for you. 262 00:20:53,590 --> 00:20:54,261 Exactly. 263 00:20:54,261 --> 00:21:04,765 And you can even give it the lyrics so it'll make the song with your lyrics and you can feed it your demos and it'll it'll remake those for you. 264 00:21:04,765 --> 00:21:05,496 well, that's new. 265 00:21:05,496 --> 00:21:08,302 It's it's moving it at break next. 266 00:21:08,302 --> 00:21:12,382 If you're not checking every day, have no idea what's going on. 267 00:21:12,448 --> 00:21:22,686 So, you know, there's a lot of people that have negative reactions towards generative AI and, you know, I get it to some degree. 268 00:21:23,367 --> 00:21:30,253 And there's a lot of reaction to feeding the beast with copyrighted material. 269 00:21:30,253 --> 00:21:35,016 ah I don't want to go too far down that road. 270 00:21:35,597 --> 00:21:41,762 I feel that that AI learns the same and assimilates the same way that humans do. 271 00:21:42,018 --> 00:21:54,432 They assimilate everything they've learned and then they evaluate the patterns and a lot of the patterns we learn are innate and they apply them. 272 00:21:54,432 --> 00:22:03,485 They're not stealing, they're stealing the same way that a human does based on everything they've heard before. 273 00:22:03,865 --> 00:22:07,156 So to me, I don't buy that argument, but... 274 00:22:09,558 --> 00:22:16,723 Regardless, generative AI is going to be how we're producing music in the next few years. 275 00:22:16,904 --> 00:22:17,524 How quickly? 276 00:22:17,524 --> 00:22:17,914 I don't know. 277 00:22:17,914 --> 00:22:23,408 It's very difficult to predict these technology in general, but especially this technology. 278 00:22:23,538 --> 00:22:29,032 And there are generative audio workstations coming down the pike. 279 00:22:29,233 --> 00:22:31,894 Several of them. 280 00:22:32,355 --> 00:22:33,446 I can't name you any of them. 281 00:22:33,446 --> 00:22:34,847 I haven't investigated any of them. 282 00:22:34,847 --> 00:22:36,788 Bobby Yosinski put up a 283 00:22:37,190 --> 00:22:41,111 a blog post about it if anybody wants to go and investigate further. 284 00:22:41,111 --> 00:22:51,334 um so imagine like, you know, right now you'll program your kick drum and then your snare. 285 00:22:51,334 --> 00:22:57,236 Well, now, what if you want to lay down an acoustic but you want to lay down an acoustic that you're not capable of playing? 286 00:22:57,236 --> 00:23:04,908 um Whether that's too sloppy or too good. 287 00:23:04,908 --> 00:23:13,462 You know, I mean, I've had guys that are amazing acoustic guitar players that you ask them to play raw or sloppy. 288 00:23:13,462 --> 00:23:18,783 They can't do it because they've spent their whole lives shedding that out of their repertoire. 289 00:23:19,064 --> 00:23:21,985 So like they sound like awkward when they try to do it. 290 00:23:21,985 --> 00:23:24,966 Cause they're just kind of like pretending to mimic it at that point. 291 00:23:24,966 --> 00:23:27,507 Cause it's just not in their hands anymore. 292 00:23:27,968 --> 00:23:34,466 But if I want to lay down an acoustic guitar part and I don't want to be limited by. 293 00:23:34,466 --> 00:23:37,609 the player and what their capabilities happen to be. 294 00:23:37,609 --> 00:23:41,913 And I don't want to like necessarily audition five players till I get the exact right player. 295 00:23:41,913 --> 00:23:46,777 Well, I can have, we'll be able to have the generative AI make me the part. 296 00:23:46,777 --> 00:23:48,429 I can tell it everything I want. 297 00:23:48,429 --> 00:23:52,202 I can tell it the chords I wanted to fit with this chord progression. 298 00:23:52,202 --> 00:23:58,168 It's not like this thing where I'm not being creative or I'm not creating the thing. 299 00:23:58,168 --> 00:24:01,028 It's that I'd be using it as a tool. 300 00:24:01,144 --> 00:24:07,116 The same way I would if I bring an acoustic guitar player in and I sit him next to me, I say, well, let me hear what you got. 301 00:24:07,697 --> 00:24:11,278 And I don't like what he's got because I like what it's in my head better. 302 00:24:11,278 --> 00:24:15,780 So then we start working out what's in my head. 303 00:24:16,540 --> 00:24:21,362 And we keep working it until I hear what I want as a producer. 304 00:24:21,362 --> 00:24:22,443 And then we lock it in. 305 00:24:22,443 --> 00:24:23,463 Okay, we got that verse. 306 00:24:23,463 --> 00:24:26,605 Now let's go to the chorus and we work it out until we get the chorus. 307 00:24:26,605 --> 00:24:30,486 So it does everything that I want it to do from the verse into the chorus. 308 00:24:31,298 --> 00:24:36,111 And we're going to be able to direct AI in the exact same way. 309 00:24:36,111 --> 00:24:44,626 And we're going to be able to do it uh in a micro manner rather than this macro manner that we have available to us right at this moment. 310 00:24:45,390 --> 00:24:46,870 Hmm. 311 00:24:47,290 --> 00:24:54,750 That's an interesting way to look at it, especially on an instrument by instrument basis. 312 00:24:55,350 --> 00:25:09,830 I mean, we are seeing this stuff creeping into plugins that will, you know, create EQ curves and, you know, mastering like AI mastering suggestions for you. 313 00:25:09,830 --> 00:25:12,628 And I find a lot of that stuff useful. 314 00:25:12,628 --> 00:25:15,090 once in a while, the click that button where it learns it. 315 00:25:15,090 --> 00:25:18,362 And then you say, this is what it's thinking I should be doing. 316 00:25:18,423 --> 00:25:20,625 And then I go from there. 317 00:25:20,625 --> 00:25:22,597 Sometimes it's, yeah, that sounds great. 318 00:25:22,597 --> 00:25:28,992 Or sometimes it's like, okay, well, maybe not that much of a boost on that frequency or something. 319 00:25:28,992 --> 00:25:35,937 But, you know, it gives you, guess, like a suggestion to work with and get creative with, which is kind of fun. 320 00:25:37,259 --> 00:25:41,132 But I'm seeing it even inside, I use Ableton Live. 321 00:25:41,774 --> 00:25:48,214 And they have MIDI generators now as of Live 12, which will suggest like rhythmic patterns. 322 00:25:48,214 --> 00:25:50,574 It'll suggest melodic shapes. 323 00:25:50,574 --> 00:26:05,674 it's pretty, I'll say dumb as far as know, smart AI goes, cause there's other stuff, you know, and there's even people that have made some max for live additions to that stuff 324 00:26:05,674 --> 00:26:08,770 that allow you to type in the chord progressions you want. 325 00:26:08,770 --> 00:26:19,448 I'm thinking of like someone that goes by MIDI to the max as one where you type in the notes and you can even, it even does link in with chat GPT to give you more of what you're 326 00:26:19,448 --> 00:26:20,459 looking for, I guess. 327 00:26:20,459 --> 00:26:25,423 um But at this point, it still feels very creative. 328 00:26:25,423 --> 00:26:34,400 It still feels like you're doing it and you're making the ultimate decision and you're deciding yes or no, or you can go in there and adjust the results as well. 329 00:26:35,339 --> 00:26:36,690 It is creative. 330 00:26:36,864 --> 00:26:48,510 I wonder what the, some of the software perspective is like you trying to make your software intuitive, easy to use so that people can make their music and the software is 331 00:26:48,510 --> 00:26:50,481 not in the way of their work. 332 00:26:51,742 --> 00:26:54,474 When, how far do you let that go? 333 00:26:54,474 --> 00:27:00,857 Where do you, do you put the button that says create, you know, EDM track for me and then I'll edit that. 334 00:27:00,857 --> 00:27:06,560 There must be a real question coming up now like, 335 00:27:06,997 --> 00:27:10,074 how many of these features do we really wanna put in? 336 00:27:10,074 --> 00:27:11,354 uh 337 00:27:11,354 --> 00:27:13,694 they're gonna put them all in. 338 00:27:13,694 --> 00:27:18,720 you know, how people use or abuse a tool. 339 00:27:19,161 --> 00:27:27,147 You know, there's this terminology called AI slop and there's people that view AI slop, which is a real thing. 340 00:27:27,147 --> 00:27:40,618 don't deny that AI slop is all these Facebook pages that basically prompt a movie and it's got all sorts of errors in it. 341 00:27:41,278 --> 00:27:52,866 hands with six fingers or like a car that's like only got three wheels or whatever, know, it's crazy like glitches like that, that the, that the AI puts up, but in general, it's 342 00:27:52,866 --> 00:27:58,670 kind of a term for stuff that's generated, but not a lot of thought is put into it. 343 00:27:58,670 --> 00:27:59,911 It's more of a numbers game. 344 00:27:59,911 --> 00:28:01,432 Let's see what people react to. 345 00:28:01,432 --> 00:28:03,015 lets the AI create it. 346 00:28:03,015 --> 00:28:10,328 And then they put it up and they get the views, but they didn't like design it or consider what it is. 347 00:28:10,328 --> 00:28:16,881 that they wanted to get across or all the things that we need to do when we create things. 348 00:28:17,421 --> 00:28:26,745 And a lot of people view generative AI, they hate it so much that anything that uses generative AI or any AI whatsoever is AI slop. 349 00:28:26,745 --> 00:28:27,705 It's discounted. 350 00:28:27,705 --> 00:28:34,908 uh You're a hack, you're talentless, you're lazy if you use it. 351 00:28:35,389 --> 00:28:38,930 And like I've been putting up these comics, 352 00:28:39,128 --> 00:28:49,641 that I've been making on my, um, mixer man page and, uh, on Facebook and they've just been going bonkers. 353 00:28:49,641 --> 00:28:55,482 Um, these are, but these are like little satirical comics. 354 00:28:55,482 --> 00:28:59,463 I'm not just saying, Hey, make me a comic about this. 355 00:28:59,604 --> 00:29:07,338 Like I'm writing like thousand word, like prompts where I'm describing the entire scene. 356 00:29:07,338 --> 00:29:08,758 I know exactly. 357 00:29:08,758 --> 00:29:12,300 what I want the speech bubbles to say. 358 00:29:12,378 --> 00:29:21,222 And a lot of times after I generate one, I like, I'll go into Photoshop and I'll change what the speech bubbles say just to make the punch line hit a little better the way I want 359 00:29:21,222 --> 00:29:22,307 it to hit. 360 00:29:22,328 --> 00:29:25,750 And then there's the caption that I put up on the post. 361 00:29:25,750 --> 00:29:32,094 And so like I spent a lot of time, probably too much time writing and creating these things. 362 00:29:32,094 --> 00:29:37,908 And so the AI, all it does for me is draw it, right? 363 00:29:38,334 --> 00:29:41,975 And I get people just hammer me. 364 00:29:41,975 --> 00:29:47,697 Like if I put it on, hey, audio student especially, they hammer me for using AI. 365 00:29:47,697 --> 00:29:49,638 I should be ashamed of myself. 366 00:29:49,638 --> 00:29:51,318 I should be embarrassed. 367 00:29:51,318 --> 00:29:52,589 I'm embarrassing myself. 368 00:29:52,589 --> 00:29:56,850 say, I reply, hey, I gotta be embarrassed to be embarrassing myself. 369 00:29:56,850 --> 00:29:58,741 I'm not embarrassed, okay? 370 00:29:58,741 --> 00:30:02,522 So like, and it's just like, 371 00:30:05,794 --> 00:30:17,497 You you talked about the intelligent EQs and AI, you know, mastering and all this stuff, and they don't recognize that over the past, my entire career, we've been working our way 372 00:30:17,497 --> 00:30:20,178 incrementally to this place. 373 00:30:20,238 --> 00:30:35,682 and people are like the beneficiaries of all these technologies from electricity to the distorted guitar, to synthesizers, to drum machines, to all of these more automated tools. 374 00:30:35,682 --> 00:30:38,743 that we now use in our production. 375 00:30:38,743 --> 00:30:40,884 And it's a lineage. 376 00:30:40,944 --> 00:30:48,057 And they don't understand that they are the beneficiaries of this technology that allows them to work at home. 377 00:30:48,057 --> 00:30:52,309 Because you couldn't really work at home in the early 90s. 378 00:30:52,309 --> 00:30:57,071 You could, but you were working with a four track recorder and you were exceptionally limited. 379 00:30:57,071 --> 00:31:01,853 But if you really, really wanted to make records, you had to get into a studio at that time. 380 00:31:01,853 --> 00:31:04,300 Now everybody can work at home. 381 00:31:04,300 --> 00:31:07,413 and they are the beneficiaries of all of that technology. 382 00:31:07,413 --> 00:31:15,559 Yet, when it comes to AI, they want to draw hard line and say, no, that's too far, but you don't get to do that. 383 00:31:15,760 --> 00:31:23,867 You don't get to be the beneficiary of technology throughout all time and then say, no, we've got to stop it now because it doesn't work and it won't happen. 384 00:31:23,867 --> 00:31:33,074 And everybody who's reacting this way right now to AI is reacting in a similar way to the way people reacted to the internet. 385 00:31:33,186 --> 00:31:41,493 which I witnessed and to cars and to electricity distribution, which I didn't witness, right? 386 00:31:41,493 --> 00:31:43,554 But I did witness the internet. 387 00:31:43,555 --> 00:31:54,945 And after a few years, maybe a little longer than a few years, all of these attitudes, all of the naysayers were using the internet just like everybody else. 388 00:31:54,945 --> 00:32:01,410 And it's only going to be a matter of time when this happens with generative AI and maybe it'll kill us. 389 00:32:01,410 --> 00:32:02,401 before that happens. 390 00:32:02,401 --> 00:32:07,034 don't, don't, there's probably a 99 % chance that'll happen. 391 00:32:07,034 --> 00:32:10,856 I understand this, but I also understand that we're in an arms race. 392 00:32:11,357 --> 00:32:14,720 I'm getting way off now, but we're in an arms race now. 393 00:32:14,720 --> 00:32:22,725 And there's a reason why the United States will do nothing to curb the AI companies from training their models. 394 00:32:22,725 --> 00:32:26,147 Because if we don't do it, China will. 395 00:32:26,688 --> 00:32:29,634 And if, if you think it's better, 396 00:32:29,634 --> 00:32:34,982 that US companies are stealing, believe me, China will be stealing it more. 397 00:32:34,982 --> 00:32:36,354 And China is already stealing. 398 00:32:36,354 --> 00:32:38,706 They already don't care about your copyright. 399 00:32:38,808 --> 00:32:43,784 Okay, so what's going to prevent them from just spitting it back and selling it right back to you? 400 00:32:45,526 --> 00:32:52,930 Yeah, there was a race for sure and no one wants to come in second place on that one. 401 00:32:54,372 --> 00:32:57,553 I don't think there is, there might not be a second place. 402 00:32:58,890 --> 00:32:59,521 Exactly. 403 00:32:59,521 --> 00:33:02,958 And quantum computing ties in all of that too. 404 00:33:02,959 --> 00:33:06,224 You know, we have to develop the quantum computing first. 405 00:33:06,446 --> 00:33:08,549 There's going to be big problems. 406 00:33:08,738 --> 00:33:09,558 Hmm. 407 00:33:10,298 --> 00:33:13,099 Well, I can remember this stuff with the internet. 408 00:33:13,159 --> 00:33:20,761 You bought something online, you put your credit card in the computer or you went on a dating site. 409 00:33:21,341 --> 00:33:24,842 You're going to meet somebody you've talked to on the internet. 410 00:33:25,743 --> 00:33:32,264 And now that's like the primary way people get involved with each other. 411 00:33:32,264 --> 00:33:38,286 I couldn't imagine being a kid telling my parents that some stranger is going to pick me up in a car. 412 00:33:38,294 --> 00:33:39,415 and take me somewhere. 413 00:33:39,415 --> 00:33:48,341 ah And now I think parents would rather that stranger come pick you up than have your friend who just got his license come get you. 414 00:33:49,575 --> 00:33:50,700 Interesting, 415 00:33:50,742 --> 00:34:00,090 You know, just the way that's changed and um it's like we're happy to drive towards the horizon as long as you don't ever reach it. 416 00:34:00,090 --> 00:34:05,514 And now it's starting to feel like we're going to reach it and that's not OK. 417 00:34:05,514 --> 00:34:06,545 it is an interesting. 418 00:34:06,545 --> 00:34:10,358 Like question, like what what's the line? 419 00:34:10,358 --> 00:34:12,039 You know, why why why now? 420 00:34:12,039 --> 00:34:16,242 And I wonder if maybe that just sort of fades out as. 421 00:34:16,909 --> 00:34:20,009 I'm sure on one hand it's just we get more comfortable with it. 422 00:34:20,009 --> 00:34:21,649 We see it more and more. 423 00:34:21,649 --> 00:34:26,289 You know, after a while you start hearing about people meeting people online and it's not weird anymore. 424 00:34:26,649 --> 00:34:30,109 And then the kids that grew up with it, they know no other way. 425 00:34:30,109 --> 00:34:30,829 So what do mean? 426 00:34:30,829 --> 00:34:32,129 That's not weird. 427 00:34:33,422 --> 00:34:35,593 there's a desensitization process. 428 00:34:35,593 --> 00:34:39,304 At first it's shocking, can't fathom it. 429 00:34:39,325 --> 00:34:48,628 And then the more you see it and this desensitization occurs positively and negatively. 430 00:34:48,628 --> 00:34:56,412 Grooming of people is like a ah desensitization process. 431 00:34:56,412 --> 00:34:57,572 Putting up the... 432 00:34:57,572 --> 00:35:02,466 ah 433 00:35:02,466 --> 00:35:10,989 the process of learning a new technology and having it constantly be put in front of you over and over and over again, that's a desensitization process. 434 00:35:11,090 --> 00:35:15,412 And the further we get into that, the more acceptance we have. 435 00:35:15,412 --> 00:35:17,032 Okay, well this isn't bad. 436 00:35:17,032 --> 00:35:25,346 If you play poker and you can't fathom losing $10, well when you start losing $100 or $1,000, that's a desensitization process. 437 00:35:25,346 --> 00:35:28,177 Now you're very comfortable with losing that kind of money. 438 00:35:28,297 --> 00:35:30,778 So, you know, that's how it works. 439 00:35:30,914 --> 00:35:36,587 Yeah, well, we're very adaptable to our strength and maybe also downfall. 440 00:35:36,587 --> 00:35:54,147 Well, it's kind of funny in this case with your comics, which are definitely amusing and they look great and uh they're tapping into a lot of common things we as producers and 441 00:35:54,147 --> 00:35:55,567 music makers run into. 442 00:35:55,567 --> 00:36:00,642 ah know, this mix sounds amazing, too bad the song is un-listenable is one of them. 443 00:36:00,642 --> 00:36:02,543 You know, characters. 444 00:36:02,543 --> 00:36:10,987 Like, which is a great point that you, and this is something you talk about a lot in your book too, like the great song is, that's the most important thing. 445 00:36:10,987 --> 00:36:17,810 ah We don't care how it's, and you said it even earlier, we don't listen to sound, we listen to music. 446 00:36:17,908 --> 00:36:23,914 The song is sound and music is sound and like if those are great then the sound is great they go together. 447 00:36:24,302 --> 00:36:25,562 Right. 448 00:36:26,202 --> 00:36:37,602 But you're, it's not like you're using this AI to, like you're not starting a career in comic strip making. 449 00:36:37,602 --> 00:36:51,122 You know, you're, you're just putting out some memes, which are, um, things that, you know, we can all kind of relate to now, you know, we can all, we can all get these things. 450 00:36:51,202 --> 00:36:53,730 Um, even just like this is the one about 451 00:36:53,730 --> 00:36:58,579 going to heaven and there's no latency in heaven so he uses Bluetooth headphones to mix. 452 00:36:58,579 --> 00:37:01,605 um It's just... 453 00:37:03,904 --> 00:37:19,826 interesting the reaction is so strong against it and I'll tell you one thing where I see it in my own self where I get this strong negative reaction is a lot of times through 454 00:37:19,826 --> 00:37:30,604 emails especially for this podcast where for years I don't know what happens you get on an email list you have a podcast and then 455 00:37:31,214 --> 00:37:39,821 PR people start emailing you and I get a lot of generic emails that you know it's a template and it's like, hello, insert name. 456 00:37:39,834 --> 00:37:42,583 We really love insert podcast. 457 00:37:42,764 --> 00:37:50,590 And then it'll tell me like, I should really check out this chef who creates all these dishes made out of mushrooms and vegetables exclusively. 458 00:37:50,590 --> 00:37:54,032 It'll be great fit for insert podcast, you know? 459 00:37:54,373 --> 00:38:00,638 But my way of weeding through those was always if I could tell if it was personal. 460 00:38:01,054 --> 00:38:03,146 hey, Brian, know, the show's great. 461 00:38:03,146 --> 00:38:06,547 I love that episode you had with so and so, and you guys talked about this. 462 00:38:06,547 --> 00:38:10,503 It really reminded me of, so I've responded to that. 463 00:38:10,984 --> 00:38:16,970 I think most of us when we check an email, we're looking for which ones can I delete and which ones will I read. 464 00:38:16,970 --> 00:38:25,688 But now I'm getting these ones that are AI summaries of things I've done and AI kind of like. 465 00:38:25,688 --> 00:38:28,810 Hello, Brian, you've got very introspective conversations. 466 00:38:28,810 --> 00:38:37,425 For example, the conversation you had with Mixerman, we discussed the intricacies and it's just, it's like an odor it has. 467 00:38:37,818 --> 00:38:48,792 I think it's the feeling of getting fooled that is really kind of annoying when I see that, I'm like, oh, not another one of these again. 468 00:38:48,792 --> 00:38:51,533 then I'm like, well, I don't know if it's real. 469 00:38:52,396 --> 00:38:54,923 Yeah, because they're going to get better. 470 00:38:55,182 --> 00:38:59,142 And they have been, I've been watching it happen just before my eyes. 471 00:38:59,702 --> 00:39:05,042 And those, that's probably where I get it the most myself personally. 472 00:39:05,042 --> 00:39:09,662 just, I think maybe it's the feeling of being tricked or something. 473 00:39:10,742 --> 00:39:13,062 I'm trying to understand my own feelings on it. 474 00:39:13,080 --> 00:39:14,261 They are trying to trick you. 475 00:39:14,261 --> 00:39:25,962 mean, the person who's, but it's the person who's sending you the email that's trying to, to, to trick you into, I mean, trick, maybe that's not exactly the right word, but, um, 476 00:39:25,962 --> 00:39:32,497 you're, you're feeling that emotionally, but they're trying to get you to respond really. 477 00:39:32,497 --> 00:39:32,988 Right. 478 00:39:32,988 --> 00:39:40,284 And so you listed the ways that get you as a human being to respond. 479 00:39:40,600 --> 00:39:42,851 Those are the same things that get me to respond. 480 00:39:42,851 --> 00:39:50,035 If you just tell me, Mixer Man, you're great, and you don't tell me anything of any detail, then you're full of shit. 481 00:39:50,035 --> 00:39:54,127 Like, this is too easy to set, right? 482 00:39:54,127 --> 00:39:56,148 So, but. 483 00:39:58,158 --> 00:40:09,818 It's the person that's sending the AI that's getting you to respond that either for malicious reasons or because they want you to mention their chef on your show, which makes 484 00:40:09,818 --> 00:40:13,738 absolutely no sense because they're obviously not doing any real research. 485 00:40:13,738 --> 00:40:16,318 They're just treating it purely as a numbers game. 486 00:40:16,318 --> 00:40:17,858 There's 10,000 podcasts. 487 00:40:17,858 --> 00:40:24,278 We'll send out 10,000 emails to all those podcasts and whichever ones fit will maybe respond. 488 00:40:25,298 --> 00:40:26,118 I don't know. 489 00:40:26,118 --> 00:40:28,318 I don't know if that's going to be very effective. 490 00:40:30,956 --> 00:40:39,732 I mean, I've been using AI, you know, chat GPT to help me with things for probably a year and a half now. 491 00:40:39,872 --> 00:40:42,054 And you can see it's getting better. 492 00:40:42,054 --> 00:40:56,654 And if I need to write an email, um, not a personal email, but if I need to write an email to a company or maybe to an insurance company or to whatever, have chat GPT write the 493 00:40:56,654 --> 00:41:00,546 email for me because it can do it in about 30 seconds. 494 00:41:00,670 --> 00:41:02,601 It can include all the pertinent information. 495 00:41:02,601 --> 00:41:04,542 can read it and say, well, you need to add this. 496 00:41:04,542 --> 00:41:05,392 It'll add that. 497 00:41:05,392 --> 00:41:09,013 And I'm done in way less time. 498 00:41:09,013 --> 00:41:15,776 So, I mean, from a efficiency point of view, it's great. 499 00:41:15,776 --> 00:41:20,178 but if you're not involving yourself, if you're just letting it, that's AI slop. 500 00:41:20,178 --> 00:41:24,019 If you're just, that's an AI slop email, they're not involving themselves. 501 00:41:24,019 --> 00:41:24,610 They don't care. 502 00:41:24,610 --> 00:41:25,970 It's purely a numbers game. 503 00:41:25,970 --> 00:41:30,356 Just throw it out there, see what sticks, see who responds and 504 00:41:30,356 --> 00:41:32,206 and capitalize on that. 505 00:41:32,267 --> 00:41:50,612 But if you use, use the AI and you involve yourself with it and you uh start to understand how it reacts to prompts and how, how, how to kind of direct it, um, then it's a tool and 506 00:41:50,612 --> 00:41:56,614 you're still driving, but you're using it as a tool and, uh, 507 00:41:57,026 --> 00:42:07,955 We're all gonna be able to use AI as a tool, but you gotta learn to use it as a tool and understand just because some people abuse it and use it for AI slap and use it as uh a 508 00:42:07,955 --> 00:42:11,978 numbers game doesn't mean that that's its full potential. 509 00:42:11,978 --> 00:42:18,002 That's just lazy people and that exists, but that's just one way to use it. 510 00:42:18,156 --> 00:42:18,966 Hmm. 511 00:42:19,288 --> 00:42:24,154 Yeah, and some of those email exchanges, I might respond and be like, this, yeah, it sounds like a great guest. 512 00:42:24,154 --> 00:42:26,736 And then I'm now getting vetted. 513 00:42:27,558 --> 00:42:30,912 It's as if I reached out to them to get this person on my show. 514 00:42:30,912 --> 00:42:34,426 And then they're like, well, can you tell us about numbers or? 515 00:42:34,426 --> 00:42:35,568 I'm like, wait a minute. 516 00:42:35,568 --> 00:42:36,869 You emailed me. 517 00:42:36,983 --> 00:42:38,406 that exactly 518 00:42:39,756 --> 00:42:56,791 Yeah, you know, I have I use it as well for certain things and the thing that really sold me on it on its usefulness was uh I was doing a workshop last February. 519 00:42:56,791 --> 00:43:05,513 I went to the Ableton headquarters in Pasadena and I was granted access to use their facility to do whatever I want basically. 520 00:43:05,513 --> 00:43:08,774 So I wanted to do something called uh 521 00:43:08,898 --> 00:43:11,620 finish February, so like in February you finish something. 522 00:43:11,620 --> 00:43:15,062 So like you were saying, the biggest problem we have is finishing music. 523 00:43:15,062 --> 00:43:17,843 That was the goal of this workshop. 524 00:43:18,384 --> 00:43:22,305 So I decided to upload my book. 525 00:43:22,966 --> 00:43:28,710 I uploaded transcripts of certain episodes of my podcast where I'm talking about finishing songs. 526 00:43:28,710 --> 00:43:32,872 And then I asked it, what are some things I like to do to finish music? 527 00:43:32,872 --> 00:43:36,274 And then it's quoting me and it's giving me. 528 00:43:36,608 --> 00:43:39,540 my own knowledge of it. 529 00:43:39,540 --> 00:43:43,672 So it was really helpful in just organizing my thoughts. 530 00:43:43,672 --> 00:43:55,959 And it was really nice to be able to just put the stuff that I created, train it on me really, I guess, and get that unique perspective as opposed to a more generalized question 531 00:43:55,959 --> 00:44:02,273 where I might be getting stuff that I didn't say or didn't understand or I never actually did myself anyway. 532 00:44:02,273 --> 00:44:05,134 This was all my own information curated. 533 00:44:05,134 --> 00:44:19,214 Like that's a thing now like you can make your own chat GPT that you can put subscriptions for I haven't delved enough into it to know what how the numbers work, but you could 534 00:44:19,214 --> 00:44:32,154 charge subscriptions for and you can curate your chat GPT container with your knowledge and So that it's going to lean towards what you have to say before it starts just pulling 535 00:44:32,154 --> 00:44:34,534 things from everywhere else 536 00:44:35,202 --> 00:44:37,784 Yeah, that's pretty interesting. 537 00:44:37,784 --> 00:44:47,099 I mean, for me, that was like having another version of myself sifting through my book, sifting through things I've said, reading blog posts, watching tutorials. 538 00:44:47,099 --> 00:44:49,290 It's easy to forget. 539 00:44:49,290 --> 00:44:50,251 Yeah, it is. 540 00:44:50,251 --> 00:44:52,812 And otherwise I would have been doing that myself. 541 00:44:52,812 --> 00:44:56,844 But instead I got all of that and then I was, okay, let me structure this now. 542 00:44:56,844 --> 00:44:58,856 Let me put this together in a sensible order. 543 00:44:58,856 --> 00:45:02,077 Let me decide what I want to do, what I don't want to do. 544 00:45:03,296 --> 00:45:11,670 saved me a lot of time that way and probably gave me more useful information than I would have had if I would have done it myself anyway. 545 00:45:11,670 --> 00:45:15,011 So that was pretty cool. 546 00:45:15,111 --> 00:45:21,094 That was one of those moments where I said, whoa, like this is something pretty wild. 547 00:45:21,094 --> 00:45:22,675 I mean, I've fooled around with it. 548 00:45:22,675 --> 00:45:30,458 And uh I also teach high school English and I get essays and all kinds of stuff run through that. 549 00:45:31,862 --> 00:45:34,830 Which is a whole other funny topic, I guess, but... 550 00:45:34,830 --> 00:45:37,571 There's this whole thing where they're trying to catch people using it. 551 00:45:37,571 --> 00:45:40,052 It's like, wow, why are you trying to catch people using it? 552 00:45:40,052 --> 00:45:41,612 Teach them how to use it. 553 00:45:43,012 --> 00:45:47,474 mean, like, what are we gonna like pretend like it doesn't exist? 554 00:45:47,654 --> 00:45:59,057 Or are you gonna use tools that are wholly flawed to catch people using wholly flawed tools so that we bring in people that didn't actually use it to cheat? 555 00:45:59,237 --> 00:46:00,508 it's just, it's horrendous. 556 00:46:00,508 --> 00:46:01,868 I don't understand. 557 00:46:02,562 --> 00:46:10,957 It took us like what 30 years to stop doing cursive in schools after the word processor. 558 00:46:10,957 --> 00:46:14,322 It's like, or maybe longer, 40 years. 559 00:46:14,338 --> 00:46:15,258 Yeah. 560 00:46:16,239 --> 00:46:24,424 I mean, you want them to be able to have some basic skills of communication and stuff. 561 00:46:24,424 --> 00:46:36,120 it does make me say like, maybe if a computer can write this essay on the great Gatsby, that's been written a bazillion times by a bazillion other kids anyway, and only in school 562 00:46:36,120 --> 00:46:42,954 and academic situations, maybe we need to change what we're asking them to do. 563 00:46:43,010 --> 00:46:50,120 Maybe that's not a useful expenditure of their time and maybe that's why they don't care about it and they're not interested. 564 00:46:54,903 --> 00:46:56,118 It's some... 565 00:46:58,274 --> 00:47:03,117 It seems to be the way, like tools come along and we do resist them. 566 00:47:03,338 --> 00:47:15,456 And of course, again, too, it seems like the people that embrace those tools are the ones that progress and get ahead of the curve and start paving the way for the future. 567 00:47:15,470 --> 00:47:17,972 It depends on the technology. 568 00:47:18,090 --> 00:47:30,103 I like in the early aughts and in the daily adventures of Mixture Man, I talk about my disdain for this computer program that I named Alcehad. 569 00:47:30,284 --> 00:47:36,190 a um lot of people read it as all's I had. 570 00:47:36,190 --> 00:47:39,453 I use Pro Tools because it's all's I had, right? 571 00:47:39,453 --> 00:47:41,254 um 572 00:47:43,662 --> 00:47:55,302 When Pro Tools started hitting the studio, I had no interest in it, not because I didn't understand that DAWs were the future. 573 00:47:56,102 --> 00:48:04,362 My first gold album, which was Bizarre Ride to the Far Side, I recorded in a Spectral Sonics DAW. 574 00:48:04,362 --> 00:48:07,862 So I didn't have this aversion to digital. 575 00:48:08,302 --> 00:48:13,606 But when I started working in analog for years and I had like 10 years of 576 00:48:13,678 --> 00:48:17,358 Well, probably longer than that of working in analog under my belt. 577 00:48:17,678 --> 00:48:26,378 Like the deficiencies that these tools were offering as far as sonics were concerned. 578 00:48:27,058 --> 00:48:33,778 They didn't make my life easier because I liked the sound of tape and I liked the sound of analog still. 579 00:48:33,778 --> 00:48:38,178 And this was not really ready for prime time as far as I was concerned. 580 00:48:38,578 --> 00:48:42,414 Add into that, you know, and I'll see, ha. 581 00:48:42,414 --> 00:48:51,354 which is someone who uses Al-Sihad, would get paid like $300 a day on a session, on a big session. 582 00:48:51,354 --> 00:48:54,434 We're talking about half million dollar budget albums. 583 00:48:55,054 --> 00:49:07,914 But the recordist, and there was a period of time that I was operating mostly as a recordist, I was commanding up to $1,200 a day. 584 00:49:08,154 --> 00:49:10,564 And so just... 585 00:49:10,848 --> 00:49:14,220 It made sense for me to reject that technology. 586 00:49:14,541 --> 00:49:15,962 We still use it in my sessions. 587 00:49:15,962 --> 00:49:18,164 I didn't say, I won't do a session that uses it. 588 00:49:18,164 --> 00:49:31,455 We used it, but it made sense for me to not jump onto that bandwagon too soon because I had more value as someone with a lot of experience with analog recording. 589 00:49:31,455 --> 00:49:37,360 Cause it was still a hybrid process and we still recorded the big session, still recorded to analog. 590 00:49:37,360 --> 00:49:40,000 They just use the DAW more for. 591 00:49:40,000 --> 00:49:44,253 editing and processing the stuff and then went back to analog anyway. 592 00:49:44,533 --> 00:49:47,465 So you don't have to be an early adapter. 593 00:49:47,465 --> 00:49:49,597 It really depends on the technology. 594 00:49:49,597 --> 00:49:56,471 But I do think that people are going to get left behind in this technology. 595 00:49:56,471 --> 00:50:03,245 The question is the AI technology, but the question is how far behind and how difficult will it to catch up? 596 00:50:03,466 --> 00:50:09,950 I don't have the answer to that question, but I do agree with you that rejecting this technology at this point 597 00:50:10,094 --> 00:50:18,423 ah does put you in danger of being left behind to a point where you may not be able to catch up the way you want to. 598 00:50:19,505 --> 00:50:21,086 It's a possibility. 599 00:50:22,446 --> 00:50:28,026 Yeah, I guess this is, it's advancing a lot faster than DAWs did. 600 00:50:28,026 --> 00:50:29,906 It took a long time for them. 601 00:50:29,906 --> 00:50:30,986 A long time. 602 00:50:30,986 --> 00:50:39,126 I I didn't start using one until 2005 and they've come tremendous lengths since then. 603 00:50:40,106 --> 00:50:49,646 And it used to be like, I don't even really think about processing power anymore and things that were main concerns when you were working back then. 604 00:50:49,646 --> 00:50:52,546 Like, I don't know if my computer can handle another reverb. 605 00:50:52,807 --> 00:50:54,450 You don't even think about that anymore. 606 00:50:54,450 --> 00:50:59,683 um But this is like real fast. 607 00:50:59,683 --> 00:51:03,370 I guess that makes it more scary. 608 00:51:03,438 --> 00:51:16,698 It seemed to take forever because like I jumped in in 2007, but I jumped into in the box mixing in 2007 because budgets were starting to come down 2008 really budgets were 609 00:51:16,698 --> 00:51:21,538 starting to come down precipitously in LA. 610 00:51:21,838 --> 00:51:23,590 Where are you looking at? 611 00:51:23,958 --> 00:51:25,734 Long Island, New York. 612 00:51:25,734 --> 00:51:26,415 long. 613 00:51:26,415 --> 00:51:37,664 So they were starting to come down in LA and it was starting to get to the point where, okay, I no longer have this budget where if I, could allocate this for the studio and 614 00:51:37,664 --> 00:51:39,315 still have enough leftover for me. 615 00:51:39,315 --> 00:51:50,895 So it made more sense for me to keep my price the same and just mix from home that brought in all sorts of other things, you know, with the acoustics and getting a room that that's 616 00:51:50,895 --> 00:51:51,815 accurate. 617 00:51:51,815 --> 00:51:55,512 mean, it took me over a decade of struggling. 618 00:51:55,512 --> 00:52:03,566 to try and figure out how to make, you know, rooms in your house work. 619 00:52:04,067 --> 00:52:14,132 And it wasn't really until the last house, which I was renting, um I got that room really good. 620 00:52:14,132 --> 00:52:25,516 And then I built this room in the house that I bought and um it's a big room and I use the golden triangle. 621 00:52:25,516 --> 00:52:28,567 And then I've got cardioid monitors. 622 00:52:28,567 --> 00:52:30,448 for the, it took me what? 623 00:52:31,646 --> 00:52:33,826 Let's just say we got that together by 2023. 624 00:52:33,826 --> 00:52:48,897 It took me 15 years to really get myself in a space where I could trust the space and trust what I was hearing completely without having to like check and try and find the 625 00:52:48,897 --> 00:52:52,524 deficiencies in the room, try and find, you know, 626 00:52:52,524 --> 00:52:56,725 where, I'm blowing up the car speaker because I got too much, too much hundred Hertz. 627 00:52:56,725 --> 00:53:00,356 because I can't hear the hundred Hertz, you know, that sort of thing. 628 00:53:00,496 --> 00:53:03,387 So it was a long, long journey. 629 00:53:03,387 --> 00:53:13,920 took, you know, converters still were like, there were big differences between converters back then and oh, now just about any interface. 630 00:53:13,920 --> 00:53:15,380 The converters are not an issue. 631 00:53:15,380 --> 00:53:18,001 They're just not even, it's not even anything to even think about. 632 00:53:18,001 --> 00:53:20,682 It's part of your monitoring chain and you don't have to think about it. 633 00:53:20,682 --> 00:53:22,022 So don't think about it. 634 00:53:22,470 --> 00:53:32,817 Um, there's just so many other bigger fish to fry than your converters, but it took so long for plugins to come to where they are. 635 00:53:32,918 --> 00:53:38,002 And, know, it's just this slow incremental progress. 636 00:53:38,002 --> 00:53:44,407 And for people that never worked in analog, like they didn't know anything other than this. 637 00:53:44,407 --> 00:53:47,569 They just see it improving from their baseline. 638 00:53:47,569 --> 00:53:49,130 from my baseline. 639 00:53:49,166 --> 00:53:51,586 It took a long time of analog. 640 00:53:51,586 --> 00:53:57,446 It took a long time for it to get to a point where I'm like, yeah, I don't really need analog. 641 00:53:57,446 --> 00:53:59,166 I certainly don't need tape. 642 00:53:59,326 --> 00:54:12,226 I mean, if I'm recording, I definitely want to use analog, but for mixing, I don't need analog because my whole system of work is about applying distortion. 643 00:54:12,966 --> 00:54:17,494 It gives me more control because now I can apply distortion as layers on different things. 644 00:54:17,494 --> 00:54:19,075 It doesn't have to be recorded that way. 645 00:54:19,075 --> 00:54:20,857 I'm not stuck with how it was recorded. 646 00:54:20,857 --> 00:54:22,858 People record much more passively. 647 00:54:22,858 --> 00:54:27,061 So it gives me a lot more leeway as a mixer to, to fuck it up. 648 00:54:27,122 --> 00:54:33,417 And, um, you know, it's a whole different process, but it took forever. 649 00:54:33,417 --> 00:54:37,510 It seems like, I don't think that's going to be the case with AI. 650 00:54:38,446 --> 00:54:40,067 No, doesn't seem like it. 651 00:54:40,067 --> 00:54:47,103 Yeah, all that stuff, I mean, it's funny to think back to where we were. 652 00:54:47,103 --> 00:54:52,097 And like you said, even just worrying about like your interface and you're like, now it's like, whatever. 653 00:54:52,418 --> 00:54:53,979 Everything sounds good. 654 00:54:54,620 --> 00:55:07,182 When I first started, when I first moved up from four track cassette recorder, you know, and got a pair of ADAT machines, um which was... 655 00:55:07,182 --> 00:55:12,722 a lot of fun to have as like an 18, 19 year old, whatever we were. 656 00:55:14,022 --> 00:55:21,742 I've realized like, because I spent a little bit of time kind of obsessing like, oh wow, microphone placement and all this and how it gains stage. 657 00:55:21,742 --> 00:55:25,882 I was really worrying about it because I was realizing it makes a difference. 658 00:55:25,882 --> 00:55:30,522 But I also at one point just said, you know what? 659 00:55:31,082 --> 00:55:36,226 I could worry about this stuff and it'll take me forever to record my music or I can just 660 00:55:36,226 --> 00:55:39,537 Go at it, record these songs, not even worry about it. 661 00:55:39,537 --> 00:55:43,609 And even if I don't worry about it at all, it's gonna sound a hundred times better than my four track. 662 00:55:45,190 --> 00:55:46,838 And it really did. 663 00:55:46,838 --> 00:55:48,751 It was just night and day. 664 00:55:49,612 --> 00:55:55,854 And of course, if I would have applied some more knowledge, learned more, I would have gotten a lot further. 665 00:55:55,854 --> 00:56:04,462 But it kind of feels like that now where even if you have no clue what's going on, you come away with like a pretty decent. 666 00:56:04,462 --> 00:56:12,712 product in comparison to what you would need to know to get something decent out of some of that older equipment. 667 00:56:13,292 --> 00:56:14,242 Yeah. 668 00:56:14,642 --> 00:56:27,006 I think the biggest thing people struggle with is their acoustic environment, you know, cause I mean, if I'm, I realized when I recorded, don't remember what drummer it was the 669 00:56:27,006 --> 00:56:28,466 first, probably Jr. 670 00:56:28,466 --> 00:56:41,870 I recorded John Robinson the first time and I was like, I had drum tones in like 10 minutes time and usually would take, you know, two, three hours sometimes. 671 00:56:42,422 --> 00:56:52,525 with a band with just your average band drummer and like, and then I get these tones with JR in like two hours and like 10 minutes and I'm like, right. 672 00:56:52,685 --> 00:57:05,468 Well, when you have an amazing player in front of you and they have amazing balance on their instrument and amazing tone, like it's difficult to put the mics in the wrong spot. 673 00:57:06,088 --> 00:57:11,030 we're putting the mics up becomes and you need less mics too, right? 674 00:57:11,030 --> 00:57:12,428 So putting the mics up 675 00:57:12,428 --> 00:57:20,142 really is and, and, and, and the moving them and like finding the exact right spot, the sweet spot that's damage control. 676 00:57:20,643 --> 00:57:31,899 Like if they're great, you could capture them with one mic on a wire recorder and that will translate through that will come through their greatness because of that performance, 677 00:57:31,899 --> 00:57:39,653 because performance is sound and yeah, on the wire recorder, it's all limited bandwidth, but it still comes through. 678 00:57:39,673 --> 00:57:41,554 So like, 679 00:57:42,358 --> 00:57:57,478 That's when I realized that like, Oh, so when I spend all this time worrying about my mic placement and my mic preamp pairing and all this, that's because I need to fix what's in 680 00:57:57,478 --> 00:58:00,901 front of them or do damage control. 681 00:58:00,901 --> 00:58:11,818 Fix is a strong word, but you know, I need to do more because I don't have what I need coming out towards 682 00:58:12,078 --> 00:58:12,610 Okay. 683 00:58:12,610 --> 00:58:22,053 And so, you know, when I was spending time coming up with complicated recording techniques, I was a dedicated recordist. 684 00:58:22,053 --> 00:58:23,213 That's all I was doing. 685 00:58:23,213 --> 00:58:24,753 That was my job. 686 00:58:24,913 --> 00:58:26,314 I was in charge of the production. 687 00:58:26,314 --> 00:58:27,814 I was in charge of the performance. 688 00:58:27,814 --> 00:58:30,795 was in charge of capturing it. 689 00:58:30,955 --> 00:58:35,936 And I had plenty of time on my hands and I had to capture it well. 690 00:58:35,936 --> 00:58:42,278 I had to capture it accurately and I needed to give them all the tools they needed to 691 00:58:42,286 --> 00:58:44,967 Uh, have control later, right? 692 00:58:44,967 --> 00:58:54,640 So even if I had a great drummer that I could Mike with one Mike, I use lots of mics because I didn't want to put the producer in a position where they had no control over the 693 00:58:54,640 --> 00:58:56,650 drums, the drum balance. 694 00:58:57,550 --> 00:59:03,752 Anyway, I'm probably getting a little lost, but the thing is, you know, uh, you. 695 00:59:04,412 --> 00:59:10,498 The engineering, if you have to do the producing and you're doing the songwriting and you're the artist. 696 00:59:10,498 --> 00:59:14,641 The engineering is the least important thing. 697 00:59:14,641 --> 00:59:26,701 just capture it and get your room wherever you're recording such that you're capturing a somewhat neutral tone so that you're not getting just like this outrageous reverb or 698 00:59:26,701 --> 00:59:35,498 you're not in a closet where it's so dead that the moment you apply any kind of EQ into the lower mid range, you're gutting the sound completely. 699 00:59:35,498 --> 00:59:40,142 Like you need to have a reasonable acoustic space, but if you have that, 700 00:59:40,142 --> 00:59:47,464 There's really nothing, and you have a uh couple of decent microphones, there's really nothing preventing you from making great music. 701 00:59:49,567 --> 00:59:53,126 Yeah, I can remember those feelings, especially the vocals. 702 00:59:53,126 --> 00:59:58,472 know, I'd sing into a mic and I got to do all kinds of crap to make it sound okay and listen. 703 00:59:58,912 --> 01:00:04,576 And then I'd record some friends and like certain people would get on the mic and I'd be like, what? 704 01:00:04,576 --> 01:00:07,837 Like it's like, it's like already produced. 705 01:00:07,877 --> 01:00:15,602 Just your voice is so good that it sounds like I did all this work to it and nothing. 706 01:00:15,602 --> 01:00:16,632 It's just. 707 01:00:16,632 --> 01:00:17,883 how that sound comes out of you. 708 01:00:17,883 --> 01:00:28,614 Just like certain people, the way they hit the drum or the way they play the strings on the guitar, they're just, it's all in those, hands, the fingers, the voice. 709 01:00:31,682 --> 01:00:34,303 It's very obvious when you hear it, you know. 710 01:00:34,303 --> 01:00:43,428 um And that's some interesting advice, though, that, you know, just really worrying about the room. 711 01:00:43,428 --> 01:00:55,744 um Do you have any thoughts on things like the average folk could do to get their room to sound decent enough where they don't have to worry about that kind of stuff as much? 712 01:00:57,902 --> 01:01:02,242 um specific cases of course, but. 713 01:01:02,242 --> 01:01:17,738 I mean, you got people that, man, I go on the, I go on one of the acoustic forums on our groups on Facebook and then I'll read, you know, their whole thing. 714 01:01:19,542 --> 01:01:27,767 what they wanna do, their problems, and then you see the picture of their room, and you just go, oh my God. 715 01:01:27,767 --> 01:01:35,422 And you start to see all these pictures and you go, you got no chance, man, in that room, I'm sorry. 716 01:01:35,422 --> 01:01:36,902 I am so sorry. 717 01:01:36,902 --> 01:01:42,865 And every now and then I'll say it and you just get like, I get pummeled for it. 718 01:01:42,865 --> 01:01:44,056 you're being negative. 719 01:01:44,056 --> 01:01:47,628 No, I'm not being negative, I'm sorry. 720 01:01:47,628 --> 01:01:48,658 I'm being realistic. 721 01:01:48,658 --> 01:01:50,279 You have a seven foot ceiling. 722 01:01:50,279 --> 01:01:55,260 You have a hundred square feet, not even like all you're going to get our standing waves. 723 01:01:55,260 --> 01:01:56,720 Are you going to get a reflections? 724 01:01:56,720 --> 01:02:01,382 All that's going to get picked up by the mic like, or they'll have a closet. 725 01:02:01,382 --> 01:02:08,304 It's just completely covered in, in, in fabric or, or blankets and foam and whatever. 726 01:02:08,304 --> 01:02:12,805 And it's like, do you hear yourself in that closet? 727 01:02:13,005 --> 01:02:14,135 Does that sound good? 728 01:02:14,135 --> 01:02:17,146 Well, that's what the mic is picking up. 729 01:02:17,536 --> 01:02:24,329 And yeah, we can use a dynamic mic, but even a dynamic mic can't deal with that dynamic mic has better rejection qualities, right? 730 01:02:24,329 --> 01:02:27,630 It doesn't pick up nearly as much of the room as a, as a condenser does. 731 01:02:27,630 --> 01:02:33,752 Um, they're also much more sensitive to where you are on the microphone. 732 01:02:34,093 --> 01:02:47,518 So, you know, coming up with mitigation, uh advice in the abstract is just impossible because you don't, I don't know what anybody is dealing. 733 01:02:48,138 --> 01:02:51,761 And every situation is completely different. 734 01:02:51,901 --> 01:03:06,924 But the only advice I can give is if you could talk in your room and you listen and you aren't, you don't want it to be completely dead, but it's kind of neutral. 735 01:03:06,924 --> 01:03:14,420 Like the room like isn't really imparting a lot or the room is imparting good things either way. 736 01:03:14,680 --> 01:03:15,621 then 737 01:03:16,684 --> 01:03:18,475 that's a good place to be. 738 01:03:18,754 --> 01:03:32,440 And if you're getting your advice from people online, that is not a good place to be because there is a lot of misinformation where it comes to this. 739 01:03:32,440 --> 01:03:35,313 So you got to go to reputable sources. 740 01:03:35,313 --> 01:03:37,094 um 741 01:03:38,670 --> 01:03:53,530 You know, lot of these acoustic places will put up information on their sites and if they do acoustic design, like you want to get your advice from a professional that understands 742 01:03:53,530 --> 01:03:53,690 it. 743 01:03:53,690 --> 01:04:00,610 But even then it's limited because if you hire them, they're going to come into your room and tell you all you need to do. 744 01:04:00,610 --> 01:04:06,862 And if they come into your bedroom where your bed is behind you, they're going to tell you, dude, like you need a real room. 745 01:04:06,862 --> 01:04:08,804 What are you even talking to me for? 746 01:04:08,804 --> 01:04:11,557 could like, this isn't a room. 747 01:04:11,557 --> 01:04:13,389 This is like a little production area. 748 01:04:13,389 --> 01:04:15,150 So use headphones. 749 01:04:15,471 --> 01:04:20,495 And um I mean, I tell people they should use the slate system. 750 01:04:20,716 --> 01:04:22,597 I don't use their rooms. 751 01:04:23,239 --> 01:04:25,060 They hate it when I say that. 752 01:04:25,721 --> 01:04:26,606 Because I 753 01:04:26,606 --> 01:04:29,153 That's the kind of emulator. 754 01:04:29,563 --> 01:04:36,579 Yeah, they have these emulation rooms, which are basically just like CrossFeed with coloration as if you're in a room. 755 01:04:36,579 --> 01:04:39,202 And it's like, man, I don't want to hear coloration. 756 01:04:39,202 --> 01:04:46,126 The CrossFeed makes sense because the CrossFeed helps it so that it's not completely isolated to left and right. 757 01:04:46,126 --> 01:04:55,686 That's like, um, just, I'm not sure I understand that completely, but that's kind of like the way when I'm sitting in front of my speakers, even though there's a left and a right, 758 01:04:55,686 --> 01:04:59,906 they're interacting, but in headphones, they're not. 759 01:04:59,906 --> 01:05:01,784 So that's what we're talking about cross-feed. 760 01:05:01,784 --> 01:05:06,729 That's why it's harder to tell phase issues in headphones sometimes. 761 01:05:07,094 --> 01:05:15,892 Or sometimes it just sounds weird because I read a section of your book where you're talking about that where if you're, you you were talking about panning, I believe, and 762 01:05:15,892 --> 01:05:16,762 just. 763 01:05:17,582 --> 01:05:27,062 Yeah, sometimes if you pan something to left and there's nothing on the right, the headphone listener or the headphone mixer gets all weirded out by it, especially if it's 764 01:05:27,062 --> 01:05:28,622 their music. 765 01:05:29,272 --> 01:05:33,566 Well I remember listening to The Beatles for the first time on headphones and being like, what? 766 01:05:33,566 --> 01:05:38,390 The drums and the voice are all on this one side and everything else is all over here. 767 01:05:38,442 --> 01:05:41,856 You don't notice it when you hear it on the radio or when you're listening in speakers. 768 01:05:41,856 --> 01:05:44,078 I say when it's someone else's music, but he's yours. 769 01:05:44,078 --> 01:05:44,758 You're all of sudden. 770 01:05:44,758 --> 01:05:46,059 my God, I can't do that. 771 01:05:46,059 --> 01:05:47,230 I can't have that. 772 01:05:47,230 --> 01:05:52,373 You don't notice that everybody, every major record pans the guitars hard left and right. 773 01:05:52,373 --> 01:05:55,796 But now you're like, no, I'm a tow them in a little bit. 774 01:05:55,796 --> 01:06:00,239 It's like, listen, you only have, you can tow them in. 775 01:06:00,239 --> 01:06:01,449 The listener will never know. 776 01:06:01,449 --> 01:06:03,601 They have no idea. 777 01:06:03,881 --> 01:06:04,462 Fine. 778 01:06:04,462 --> 01:06:05,562 Whatever. 779 01:06:06,003 --> 01:06:11,298 But it matters for you as a mixer, because all you've done is you've taken, you have this much space. 780 01:06:11,298 --> 01:06:14,579 And now you've gone and you've made it this much space. 781 01:06:14,979 --> 01:06:22,161 And so that makes mixing more difficult because if you can put things out further, then you have more room. 782 01:06:22,161 --> 01:06:23,401 It's all space. 783 01:06:23,401 --> 01:06:29,823 And it would be no different from like taking your top frequencies and your bottom frequencies and filtering them out and going like this. 784 01:06:29,823 --> 01:06:34,644 But no one would ever dream of doing that for anything other than an effect. 785 01:06:34,644 --> 01:06:39,316 Yet, like there's this fear of like panning things hard, whatever. 786 01:06:39,316 --> 01:06:41,400 The listener doesn't care. 787 01:06:41,400 --> 01:06:43,552 They won't know that you pan something here. 788 01:06:43,552 --> 01:06:45,174 They probably will think it's pretty cool. 789 01:06:45,174 --> 01:06:59,329 I've never heard a punter complain about panning, but it will make your life a thousand times easier if you use the full width and the full height of your, of your mix palette, 790 01:06:59,329 --> 01:07:01,050 of your mix space. 791 01:07:02,272 --> 01:07:08,191 Sorry to pull you off that idea of just using headphones if the room's not good. 792 01:07:08,191 --> 01:07:09,574 ah 793 01:07:09,632 --> 01:07:09,962 Right. 794 01:07:09,962 --> 01:07:21,480 So the VSX are, I find like I just did a couple of monitor mixes in them and I'm like, wow, these mixes like they're on point. 795 01:07:21,480 --> 01:07:25,397 Like just like as far as frequency spectrum, like there's nothing weird going on. 796 01:07:25,397 --> 01:07:26,173 got my low end, right? 797 01:07:26,173 --> 01:07:28,742 Everything's like built up, right? 798 01:07:28,742 --> 01:07:33,958 I was like, wow, these are, these are actually, first when I heard them, I'm like, these are weird. 799 01:07:33,958 --> 01:07:35,750 I can't even wrap my head around these. 800 01:07:35,750 --> 01:07:39,682 Like, uh but then I realized like that's okay. 801 01:07:39,692 --> 01:07:44,224 because like if you get it sounding good in them, it'll sound good in other places. 802 01:07:44,224 --> 01:07:49,586 So I think people were right to, to really like these, these headphones. 803 01:07:49,586 --> 01:07:52,828 I just don't agree with the room coloration. 804 01:07:52,828 --> 01:07:53,788 sounds weird to me. 805 01:07:53,788 --> 01:07:56,129 Like I'm like, I don't even know what to do with that. 806 01:07:56,469 --> 01:08:03,122 I wish Steven would just put out like a cross straight up crossfeed, which a lot of, which you can get anyway as an app. 807 01:08:03,122 --> 01:08:06,493 So I believe as a plugin, you can get like a crossfeed thing. 808 01:08:06,493 --> 01:08:08,426 So it sounds a little more like it's 809 01:08:08,426 --> 01:08:10,616 interacting between the sides. 810 01:08:10,958 --> 01:08:11,739 That's cool. 811 01:08:11,739 --> 01:08:12,899 Interesting. 812 01:08:13,820 --> 01:08:26,379 Yeah, you this might be a good place to get you to bring up something I had written down that I was interested in your concept of the five planes of space in mixing. 813 01:08:26,379 --> 01:08:28,010 one of them is what you mentioned panning. 814 01:08:28,010 --> 01:08:29,851 And I love the analogy using the book. 815 01:08:29,851 --> 01:08:32,693 You say like it's like having a room. 816 01:08:33,534 --> 01:08:38,568 But you put all the furniture like five feet away from the wall and now you have no room. 817 01:08:38,568 --> 01:08:43,890 in there, whereas if you pan fully, now you've got all that extra space to place things in that room. 818 01:08:44,109 --> 01:08:45,400 Yeah, exactly. 819 01:08:45,400 --> 01:08:47,081 put your furniture against the wall. 820 01:08:47,118 --> 01:08:48,138 Yeah. 821 01:08:48,138 --> 01:08:51,358 So there's the, the panning is the left and the right. 822 01:08:51,618 --> 01:08:55,398 Uh, and then the frequency is the top to the bottom. 823 01:08:55,398 --> 01:08:57,398 The low frequencies are going to appear on the bottom. 824 01:08:57,398 --> 01:08:58,878 The high frequencies are going to appear. 825 01:08:58,878 --> 01:09:02,878 It's a tweeter level and come very directionally towards your ears. 826 01:09:02,878 --> 01:09:14,458 And like, if you close your eyes and you're on a, in a proper monitoring environment with a suite in the sweet spot, you can, you will actually, um, picture, can picture those 827 01:09:14,458 --> 01:09:16,774 frequencies in your mind, just building up. 828 01:09:17,259 --> 01:09:23,653 Then we have ah balance, which is our front to back. 829 01:09:23,653 --> 01:09:33,578 So something that's very forward is going to appear closer to us and something that's further back, lower level is going to appear further. 830 01:09:33,578 --> 01:09:42,253 But we enhance that with reflectivity because usually when things are further away from us, we hear reverberation or delay with them. 831 01:09:42,253 --> 01:09:47,064 So the reflectivity of those ah helps us 832 01:09:47,064 --> 01:09:53,008 to create the illusion of depth and space. 833 01:09:53,008 --> 01:10:00,343 then we have uh music uh goes across time, like it unfolds over time. 834 01:10:00,343 --> 01:10:02,345 So we have contrast. 835 01:10:02,345 --> 01:10:04,846 And contrast is dynamic. 836 01:10:05,126 --> 01:10:09,394 And we use less dynamic today than we used to. 837 01:10:09,394 --> 01:10:16,622 uh Like a classical song will have a very large dynamic range, but 838 01:10:16,622 --> 01:10:23,142 If you ever listened to classical music in the car, like you'll be driving along and like, you're like, why do I not hear anything? 839 01:10:23,142 --> 01:10:26,882 And then the next thing you know, you're like, it tears your head off. 840 01:10:27,022 --> 01:10:34,622 So we don't want our music too dynamic in noisy environments, which we're commonly in. 841 01:10:34,842 --> 01:10:43,262 So we use loudness, which means we use less volume dynamic in our music these days. 842 01:10:43,262 --> 01:10:46,902 So contrast becomes really important because contrast 843 01:10:47,002 --> 01:11:01,272 is how we, the illusion of a dynamic, ah if you have a sparse verse and a very dense chorus, and the verse is kind of warm frequency wise and the guitars come in very bright 844 01:11:01,272 --> 01:11:04,874 and gritty, those are both contrast planes. 845 01:11:04,874 --> 01:11:16,372 Because over the course of time, we get set up in the verse with this warm hug and then the chorus hits us and we're like, whoa, and we get a big payoff. 846 01:11:16,372 --> 01:11:23,833 even though there's not a huge level differential at this point between the two. 847 01:11:24,135 --> 01:11:31,366 And so contrast is our time-based and reflectivity are our time-based planes of space. 848 01:11:34,111 --> 01:11:36,833 I like that concept of contrast. 849 01:11:37,034 --> 01:11:43,177 I'm often telling people and reminding myself that everything's relative. 850 01:11:43,278 --> 01:11:50,543 Where if I want a loud section, it's only going to be loud if I have the quiet section before it. 851 01:11:50,543 --> 01:11:50,973 Exactly. 852 01:11:50,973 --> 01:11:54,806 It's like, and I ask these questions like, well, what's loud? 853 01:11:54,806 --> 01:12:00,982 You know, if I drop a glass on the floor, is that loud in the middle of the night? 854 01:12:00,982 --> 01:12:03,626 In a quiet house, yes, it'll wake you up. 855 01:12:03,626 --> 01:12:06,629 In a concert, won't even hear it. 856 01:12:06,629 --> 01:12:07,040 Right. 857 01:12:07,040 --> 01:12:17,052 So you have to sometimes almost sacrifice certain other parts of your song so that the next part has what you wanted to have for that impact. 858 01:12:17,226 --> 01:12:17,876 Absolutely. 859 01:12:17,876 --> 01:12:20,187 Like you could bring a snare fill up. 860 01:12:20,487 --> 01:12:29,039 You know, you're like, I want to really excitingly get the person into the chorus and you bring the snare fill up, which is a good move generally. 861 01:12:29,039 --> 01:12:37,252 But if you bring it too far up, now you've just shrunk the size of your chorus because that snare you've dwarfed it. 862 01:12:37,252 --> 01:12:45,114 And so you got to be really conscious about what happens when, because what happens now is affected by what happened before. 863 01:12:45,114 --> 01:12:46,674 That's the relativity. 864 01:12:46,731 --> 01:12:48,511 And that's the contrast. 865 01:12:50,187 --> 01:13:00,534 It was a big realization for me because in my early days I was like, I want my guitars to be big and fat, I the bass to be big and fat and the drums are gonna be big and heavy. 866 01:13:00,534 --> 01:13:02,215 And then they're all just small. 867 01:13:02,215 --> 01:13:04,656 They're all just normal, you know? 868 01:13:04,777 --> 01:13:16,355 But once I started making little sacrifices, well, I'll cut a little bit of that low end in the guitar so the bass has the room and now the guitars ironically sound thicker now 869 01:13:16,355 --> 01:13:18,316 because the bass is supporting them. 870 01:13:18,586 --> 01:13:30,374 Even though if you soloed him, you'd be like, kind of thin there, but it's just that interaction and the, everything it seems like is contrast. 871 01:13:30,374 --> 01:13:32,956 And I think that's how our senses work. 872 01:13:32,956 --> 01:13:38,900 I mean, I could be staring out into space and not really notice anything until something moves. 873 01:13:38,900 --> 01:13:39,741 What was that? 874 01:13:39,741 --> 01:13:46,105 Or if I'm sitting in a room, the air conditioner might be humming along and I don't notice it until it turns off. 875 01:13:46,746 --> 01:13:47,692 Where'd that go? 876 01:13:47,692 --> 01:13:49,384 I didn't even realize it was happening. 877 01:13:49,384 --> 01:13:54,068 um All of our senses kind of operate like that. 878 01:13:54,068 --> 01:14:00,834 They pick up on change and we're really playing around with that in music. 879 01:14:00,972 --> 01:14:01,883 Yeah. 880 01:14:01,883 --> 01:14:02,914 And we like change. 881 01:14:02,914 --> 01:14:09,109 We don't like change in our lives, but we like change when it happens in music and everything else. 882 01:14:09,610 --> 01:14:18,928 and, um, you know, it's really just more important than ever to get your contrast right and to use that. 883 01:14:18,928 --> 01:14:24,694 So your most important tool in mixing now, because everything's loud, like everything's really loud. 884 01:14:24,694 --> 01:14:27,436 Like there's not that much big, that's not much. 885 01:14:27,436 --> 01:14:33,554 that much volume difference between your chorus and your verse, so you need to generate that dynamic in other ways. 886 01:14:34,735 --> 01:14:35,695 Right. 887 01:14:36,855 --> 01:14:48,280 I've, I'm wondering how much you do this because this is kind of a new discovery in some of my work, but playing around with panning and changing it throughout the song. 888 01:14:48,280 --> 01:14:53,792 um I'm working on a uh EP with my band. 889 01:14:53,792 --> 01:14:55,503 We're three piece rock band. 890 01:14:55,503 --> 01:15:03,006 um And I just kind of on a whim did this like 891 01:15:03,170 --> 01:15:04,801 You can't do this, you're not allowed to do this. 892 01:15:04,801 --> 01:15:08,951 But I took the drums and I just made them completely mono on the verses. 893 01:15:09,252 --> 01:15:14,453 And then as the chorus comes in, I just automate them to be full stereo. 894 01:15:14,453 --> 01:15:24,376 And I was just blown away by like, making the drums mono, first of all, all these like little details that are in the verses that are generally quieter. 895 01:15:24,496 --> 01:15:28,397 Suddenly like there they are, they're over here, the drums aren't in the way. 896 01:15:28,397 --> 01:15:32,098 And then when the chorus comes in, it all blossoms. 897 01:15:32,406 --> 01:15:36,489 And I kind of thought the guys in the band would be like, what the hell just happened? 898 01:15:36,489 --> 01:15:42,312 Like the drums, no one noticed, no one picked up on it, but they felt it. 899 01:15:44,114 --> 01:15:49,548 I was very surprised with how much, especially in panning, how much I could get away with. 900 01:15:49,548 --> 01:15:55,206 Because sometimes you hear panning effects and it's like really obvious, something just swirling around your head. 901 01:15:55,206 --> 01:16:00,785 um But if you do it in these like transitional moments, 902 01:16:03,571 --> 01:16:09,980 Like I said, I would have never done this except I was just kind of feeling almost like mischievous as Nixon. 903 01:16:09,980 --> 01:16:14,226 Let's just say I made a copy of the session in case I ruined it. 904 01:16:14,226 --> 01:16:17,590 And I was really surprised at how effective it was. 905 01:16:17,804 --> 01:16:28,768 Yeah, that's like, that was you using contrast to its maximum right there because your switch going and panning is a very effective place for contrast. 906 01:16:28,768 --> 01:16:30,839 You're going mono to stereo. 907 01:16:30,839 --> 01:16:33,040 It goes, you're listening to it, you're here. 908 01:16:33,040 --> 01:16:36,482 You're not even noticing like the air conditioner that's on with the hum, right? 909 01:16:36,482 --> 01:16:41,104 And then it goes, and you're like, whoa, what just happened? 910 01:16:41,104 --> 01:16:42,364 This is great. 911 01:16:42,364 --> 01:16:43,404 I love this. 912 01:16:43,404 --> 01:16:45,045 That's a dynamic. 913 01:16:45,505 --> 01:16:47,686 So like, 914 01:16:48,959 --> 01:17:00,949 Sometimes I'll get a production, they'll have the guitars just blaring the whole way down, get rid of the right one on the verse, and then bring it back in on the chords. 915 01:17:00,949 --> 01:17:07,514 Now we're going from asymmetry to symmetry, very effective uh use of contrast. 916 01:17:07,915 --> 01:17:10,718 So, you you've got to derive it wherever you can. 917 01:17:10,718 --> 01:17:16,512 And that's a very effective way to do it, going from the mono drums to the stereo drums. 918 01:17:18,826 --> 01:17:22,910 It was a lot of fun and I kind of like laughed to myself. 919 01:17:22,910 --> 01:17:25,333 I'm can't believe I'm getting away with this, you know? 920 01:17:25,333 --> 01:17:39,026 But it was just a nice new dimension of expression for the song that, you know, we want the song to kind of explode at the chorus, you know, we're building guitar feedback and 921 01:17:39,026 --> 01:17:41,224 like, know, closed high-hats open up. 922 01:17:41,224 --> 01:17:42,356 noticed. 923 01:17:42,538 --> 01:17:44,432 That's all they noticed was that. 924 01:17:44,432 --> 01:17:45,816 They didn't notice what you did. 925 01:17:45,816 --> 01:17:49,714 They just noticed, whoa, that's really exciting. 926 01:17:50,114 --> 01:17:56,119 Yeah, was one of those moves where I was expecting to get a little pushback, like, I don't know about that. 927 01:17:57,060 --> 01:18:01,244 But it's, I guess also subtle enough. 928 01:18:01,244 --> 01:18:04,456 You're not really thinking about that. 929 01:18:04,456 --> 01:18:18,258 Like you said, the panning is, you notice it when you're making the decision to move that knob, but when you listen to music a lot of times, it's probably, 930 01:18:19,286 --> 01:18:22,833 on the list of things you notice, it's probably pretty far down the list. 931 01:18:22,833 --> 01:18:30,926 If you think about what the average listener hears, they hear the vocals first and then they hear music. 932 01:18:31,266 --> 01:18:36,487 Most of the time people are in like an acoustically mono space. 933 01:18:36,487 --> 01:18:39,668 They're not like sitting there in front of the speaker. 934 01:18:39,908 --> 01:18:44,189 They're wandering around or they're using a Bluetooth where the speakers are this close. 935 01:18:44,410 --> 01:18:45,390 Their phone. 936 01:18:45,390 --> 01:18:54,292 So really it's only the headphones and they're just such a skewed way of listening that like you don't want to be making your decisions based on headphones. 937 01:18:54,292 --> 01:18:59,846 They're designed to allow someone to listen in solitude without others hearing it. 938 01:18:59,846 --> 01:19:00,920 um 939 01:19:00,920 --> 01:19:05,755 they are not designed as a wholly accurate way of listening to music. 940 01:19:05,755 --> 01:19:19,187 So the headphone listener, I'm not going to pay them much mind and worry about their feelings about panning because they're using a skewed system that makes the panning more 941 01:19:19,187 --> 01:19:19,968 obvious. 942 01:19:19,968 --> 01:19:23,080 I'm going to stick to how it sounds in the air. 943 01:19:25,139 --> 01:19:33,124 Yeah, that's like the other instrument almost, the air, the room where you're listening. 944 01:19:33,124 --> 01:19:36,396 I think that's especially true when you're recording too. 945 01:19:36,396 --> 01:19:40,848 It's the room you're in, the air. 946 01:19:41,168 --> 01:19:51,434 The air especially is something I've been interested in because when you have tape, right, you got the hiss, it's almost got an environment through that noise. 947 01:19:51,534 --> 01:19:56,534 But when you're in digital, when you're in the computer, it's negative infinity decibels. 948 01:19:56,534 --> 01:19:58,374 This is so unnatural. 949 01:19:58,594 --> 01:20:04,774 So I'll often allow a little more noise into my recordings. 950 01:20:07,434 --> 01:20:12,154 almost too, you know, you're capturing a moment. 951 01:20:12,414 --> 01:20:17,654 So if somebody gets in the recording a little bit in the background, it's like, cool. 952 01:20:17,654 --> 01:20:18,974 Like now you're just part of it. 953 01:20:18,974 --> 01:20:21,582 You're part of the world of this song. 954 01:20:21,582 --> 01:20:26,522 People freak out about a little noise and I'm like, you have no idea. 955 01:20:26,522 --> 01:20:32,322 Like you don't even understand how much is on all these records that you love. 956 01:20:32,362 --> 01:20:35,062 You don't even know it, but it's there. 957 01:20:36,898 --> 01:20:42,522 Yeah, I don't really worry about it anymore. 958 01:20:42,522 --> 01:20:43,702 I used to. 959 01:20:43,823 --> 01:20:51,688 But there have been a few recordings I've done in my life that the things that got in on accident like kind of make it for me. 960 01:20:51,929 --> 01:20:58,793 have a song I did like almost 20 years ago, I guess. 961 01:20:58,793 --> 01:21:06,068 ah I was recording a classical guitar part and it's in the middle of like a rock song, but it got quiet and it's just classical guitar. 962 01:21:06,094 --> 01:21:14,374 And my cat just decided he wanted to hang out at that moment and like was going through my legs and his little collars jingling. 963 01:21:14,954 --> 01:21:16,954 it's loud. 964 01:21:17,814 --> 01:21:21,854 You know, I'm using a condenser to record a classical, so you hear it. 965 01:21:21,854 --> 01:21:24,674 And I almost redid it. 966 01:21:24,674 --> 01:21:26,214 But I was like, you know what? 967 01:21:26,214 --> 01:21:28,954 going to let Theo get in on this track. 968 01:21:29,088 --> 01:21:36,963 And still to this day, like when I hear that, I hear him walk through my legs and I remember where I was, what I was doing when I recorded that. 969 01:21:37,024 --> 01:21:40,156 And it's like half the fun of listening to the song for me. 970 01:21:40,156 --> 01:21:42,888 know, just the end. 971 01:21:42,888 --> 01:21:52,155 It's like that in a lot of old when I think like old Beatles recordings, there's always someone shouting in the background or there's some kind of noise that happens that's not 972 01:21:52,155 --> 01:21:56,308 really supposed to be there, but adds to the feeling that. 973 01:21:56,738 --> 01:21:58,133 People were here doing this. 974 01:21:58,133 --> 01:22:00,671 This is a moment in time that happened. 975 01:22:01,598 --> 01:22:03,231 Sonic photograph. 976 01:22:04,238 --> 01:22:07,881 It's like, well, we call them happy accidents. 977 01:22:07,881 --> 01:22:09,702 It's randomness. 978 01:22:09,963 --> 01:22:13,065 I'm a big proponent of randomness. 979 01:22:13,065 --> 01:22:23,774 uh purposely give myself opportunities for random things to happen. 980 01:22:23,875 --> 01:22:32,832 When I used to, when I was mixing on a console, I would leave, I wouldn't have the assistant reset it and I wouldn't have them. 981 01:22:33,166 --> 01:22:36,588 turn off all the EQs, I'd say leave it exactly as it is. 982 01:22:37,289 --> 01:22:39,570 I'd start plugging in the next song. 983 01:22:40,351 --> 01:22:45,634 You know, I remember on an Ian Moore song, I was mixing. 984 01:22:45,986 --> 01:22:51,479 I went from one with the full drum kit to one with just like a loop. 985 01:22:51,819 --> 01:22:55,842 And somehow the loop ended up on a channel that was completely filtered. 986 01:22:56,623 --> 01:22:59,004 And I didn't even realize it. 987 01:22:59,004 --> 01:23:01,518 Like I heard the filtered drum. 988 01:23:01,518 --> 01:23:02,488 and I'm bringing up the try. 989 01:23:02,488 --> 01:23:04,819 I'm like, that's, that's fucking great, man. 990 01:23:04,819 --> 01:23:10,002 He's, that was a good idea to filter that, that drum, that drum loop. 991 01:23:10,002 --> 01:23:14,990 And then he comes in he's like, wow, that's great that you filtered that drum loop. 992 01:23:14,990 --> 01:23:21,226 I'm like, I filtered the drum loop and I look and I'm like, oh shit, I'm filtering the drum loop. 993 01:23:21,226 --> 01:23:24,167 But I would have never like thought of that. 994 01:23:24,187 --> 01:23:26,298 Like that was just a random occurrence. 995 01:23:26,298 --> 01:23:31,170 So after that happened, I'm like, I just always, I'm going to leave. 996 01:23:31,392 --> 01:23:43,458 opportunities for random shit to happen because if it's if it's bad or fucked up, it's as easy to undo as undo it, But but if it's great, like you wouldn't have come up with that. 997 01:23:43,458 --> 01:23:44,298 These are good things. 998 01:23:44,298 --> 01:23:47,510 These are what make things feel that's part of the art of it. 999 01:23:47,510 --> 01:23:48,302 Really. 1000 01:23:48,302 --> 01:23:53,327 m Yeah, leave the door open for that stuff, right? 1001 01:23:53,327 --> 01:23:53,737 Sure. 1002 01:23:53,737 --> 01:23:56,509 Yeah, I've had that. 1003 01:23:56,509 --> 01:24:00,232 I miss that about having a mixer, having a console. 1004 01:24:01,414 --> 01:24:06,678 When I had my ADATs, I had my 24-track Tascam mixer. 1005 01:24:07,419 --> 01:24:09,741 And yeah, I never zeroed that thing out. 1006 01:24:09,741 --> 01:24:15,726 I see what would happen and half the time it was probably bad. 1007 01:24:15,798 --> 01:24:19,921 Every once in while something fun would happen where the mix would be totally different. 1008 01:24:19,921 --> 01:24:33,380 Like, wow, I really liked the way that sounds when the toms are that loud or something funny happens that you don't quite get that in the computer sometimes because you're so 1009 01:24:33,380 --> 01:24:34,550 deliberate. 1010 01:24:34,951 --> 01:24:38,874 But yeah, no, just invite the chaos. 1011 01:24:38,874 --> 01:24:45,624 I think that might be some of the antidote to maybe some of this AI stuff, some of this 1012 01:24:45,624 --> 01:24:54,294 generative stuff is to allow the world to happen, allow the chaos, the humanity in as much as possible. 1013 01:24:55,066 --> 01:25:06,695 I mean working with AI is kind of bringing randomness in because you you tell it you want to do this and then generates it and it's like, whoa, how did it add that? 1014 01:25:06,695 --> 01:25:08,156 Like what is that? 1015 01:25:08,156 --> 01:25:11,359 But that works, that's good, that's great, I like that. 1016 01:25:11,359 --> 01:25:14,301 Like I don't want to get rid of that now, right? 1017 01:25:14,301 --> 01:25:18,114 That's the same process of bringing randomness in to me. 1018 01:25:18,114 --> 01:25:21,556 So that's why I find it such an effective and interesting tool. 1019 01:25:21,848 --> 01:25:22,698 Hmm. 1020 01:25:23,258 --> 01:25:30,000 Yeah, I mean, anything with some imagination can become a creative tool. 1021 01:25:30,700 --> 01:25:36,622 So I don't think there's any reason to worry too much. 1022 01:25:36,622 --> 01:25:50,206 um I think we're just probably in reflecting now, the thing that bothers me is the fake out, feeling like I got fooled or something like that. 1023 01:25:50,206 --> 01:25:52,006 um 1024 01:25:53,170 --> 01:26:01,577 in like personal communication, like the breakdown of personal communication is might be where I'm feeling the nag of it, but. 1025 01:26:01,577 --> 01:26:03,398 uh 1026 01:26:03,694 --> 01:26:06,476 It doesn't come out without its faults. 1027 01:26:06,510 --> 01:26:10,754 and what does, what in the world does. 1028 01:26:10,754 --> 01:26:15,497 And doesn't mean that it's not, it could be a useful tool. 1029 01:26:16,037 --> 01:26:19,149 John Krivitz said this to me the other day, he runs Hey Audio Studio. 1030 01:26:19,149 --> 01:26:25,002 He's like, just because AI is a useful tool doesn't mean it's not inherently an evil one. 1031 01:26:25,443 --> 01:26:27,404 And that may be true too. 1032 01:26:27,414 --> 01:26:29,365 I mean, it has a point with that. 1033 01:26:30,466 --> 01:26:37,420 But, you know, there's an inevitability that we have to face and 1034 01:26:38,176 --> 01:26:41,810 you and I or anybody could say, I'm not going to use that. 1035 01:26:41,911 --> 01:26:49,880 That's not going to stop it because for every one of us that's not going to use it, there's two or three that will. 1036 01:26:50,602 --> 01:26:51,402 So. 1037 01:26:52,472 --> 01:27:00,057 Yeah, and within this like unknown landscape, there's a lot of room for innovation and new stuff. 1038 01:27:00,642 --> 01:27:02,919 Yeah, we have no idea where it's gonna go. 1039 01:27:02,919 --> 01:27:03,881 Really. 1040 01:27:04,322 --> 01:27:05,142 Yeah. 1041 01:27:05,283 --> 01:27:17,033 I could almost envision a world where some of this, the problems with it are the features in a way, you know, like you mentioned like the six fingered hand or there's, you you see 1042 01:27:17,033 --> 01:27:20,645 like AI band and like the guitar frets don't look right. 1043 01:27:20,645 --> 01:27:28,442 And some of these weird misinterpretations could almost be the thing we want, the thing we enjoy about it. 1044 01:27:28,554 --> 01:27:29,155 We are. 1045 01:27:29,155 --> 01:27:30,796 love distortions. 1046 01:27:30,796 --> 01:27:32,337 love distortion. 1047 01:27:33,239 --> 01:27:34,460 We love distortion. 1048 01:27:34,460 --> 01:27:44,609 Like Picasso never made anybody that was accurate or anatomically accurate. 1049 01:27:44,609 --> 01:27:47,772 But we love him for it, right? 1050 01:27:47,772 --> 01:27:48,913 But an AI does it. 1051 01:27:48,913 --> 01:27:50,834 Oh, that's crap. 1052 01:27:50,995 --> 01:27:53,827 I even made a comic about it where they're looking at a Picasso. 1053 01:27:53,827 --> 01:27:54,476 I see it. 1054 01:27:54,476 --> 01:27:54,967 Picasso. 1055 01:27:54,967 --> 01:27:55,734 Yeah, I slept. 1056 01:27:55,734 --> 01:27:58,777 And one calls it AI slop, the other says divine. 1057 01:27:58,777 --> 01:28:04,120 And it's like, and then everybody thought, well, you're comparing AI to Picasso. 1058 01:28:04,601 --> 01:28:12,928 No, I'm saying that you love the distortions that Picasso puts in it, but the moment a machine does it is pure crap. 1059 01:28:12,928 --> 01:28:14,229 How does that work? 1060 01:28:14,229 --> 01:28:16,230 Where I don't understand that. 1061 01:28:18,267 --> 01:28:24,673 I'm looking at this on Instagram right now and you gotta comment, why are all the paintings in the gallery the same? 1062 01:28:24,673 --> 01:28:25,833 Intriguing. 1063 01:28:26,146 --> 01:28:33,391 Right, so they focus on, you know, this thing that really isn't have much to do with the point of it. 1064 01:28:33,551 --> 01:28:37,960 That's like, that's actually kind of the more artistic thing about 1065 01:28:37,960 --> 01:28:44,833 It is actually kind of funny that the AI decided to put the same painting three times in this gallery. 1066 01:28:44,847 --> 01:28:45,588 Exactly. 1067 01:28:45,588 --> 01:28:48,915 then so I looked at it and I go, well, do I want to fix that? 1068 01:28:48,915 --> 01:28:50,278 I had the opportunity to fix it. 1069 01:28:50,278 --> 01:28:52,512 I'm like, no, that makes it funny. 1070 01:28:52,556 --> 01:28:55,947 Yeah, you might not think to do that, but you can see the humor in it. 1071 01:28:56,300 --> 01:28:57,804 Yeah, exactly. 1072 01:28:57,804 --> 01:28:58,734 Right. 1073 01:28:59,695 --> 01:29:08,781 Yeah, that's a fun way to, to exploit it almost, you know, to use its own shortcomings. 1074 01:29:08,862 --> 01:29:11,944 I mean, that's a lot of what we do even now. 1075 01:29:11,944 --> 01:29:22,701 I mean, I'm, I'm running stuff, I because set tape machine right here to make things sound a little more, you know, gritty and saturated and wrong. 1076 01:29:22,701 --> 01:29:27,778 And, um, back in the day when I had the four track, I was fighting against that. 1077 01:29:27,778 --> 01:29:30,741 But now it's like, I'm going to pull a little bit of that back. 1078 01:29:31,764 --> 01:29:41,947 You can imagine like maybe in a couple of years as AI improves, we'll be like, I kind of want those like weird hands AI used to make and you know, some of those funny things that 1079 01:29:41,947 --> 01:29:43,318 it used to do. 1080 01:29:43,720 --> 01:29:45,952 Like a retro feeling to it. 1081 01:29:46,414 --> 01:29:56,001 And the thing is you can't like the tape plugins, they don't actually generate that sound like, like, you know what it sounds like you've used it, you go and you use the plugin, 1082 01:29:56,001 --> 01:30:02,785 you're like, that's not like, I don't know what it is, but that's not what the tape did for me. 1083 01:30:02,785 --> 01:30:06,608 And then you go on the tape, you're like, there's that fucked up sound. 1084 01:30:06,608 --> 01:30:14,974 But people who've never used tape are using these plugins and a lot of them, apparently. 1085 01:30:14,974 --> 01:30:16,204 And it's like, 1086 01:30:17,038 --> 01:30:19,118 But that's not what tape did. 1087 01:30:20,278 --> 01:30:33,018 A lot of times they over exaggerate the saturation, But the transient response and like I use tape for fidelity throughout my career. 1088 01:30:33,018 --> 01:30:36,718 Most people that I knew tried to use tape for fidelity. 1089 01:30:38,510 --> 01:30:44,790 not like, oh, who are the two? 1090 01:30:45,350 --> 01:30:46,910 Their names are a scary meeting. 1091 01:30:46,910 --> 01:30:59,050 Like some producers did where they constantly abused it and their input to it and they were using electronics of the machine and they were using how the tape react as part of 1092 01:30:59,050 --> 01:31:04,830 the sound that they wanted to create, which was a creative decision. 1093 01:31:07,008 --> 01:31:08,941 I wasn't using tape in general. 1094 01:31:08,941 --> 01:31:14,488 Sometimes it would, but it would be an effect then I wasn't using tape in general in that manner. 1095 01:31:14,789 --> 01:31:24,232 And so like, if you really want the sound of tape and you want that, you know, that hiss the way it is and everything to sound, then you should use tape. 1096 01:31:25,294 --> 01:31:27,875 Yeah, I do enjoy a lot of those plugins. 1097 01:31:27,875 --> 01:31:32,296 I think they're fun for coloration and character. 1098 01:31:33,256 --> 01:31:39,476 But to your point, I guess, you know, when I run it through this cassette machine, that's what I get. 1099 01:31:39,476 --> 01:31:42,299 I have a VCR over here too for the same reason. 1100 01:31:42,319 --> 01:31:45,039 I don't have control over it. 1101 01:31:45,860 --> 01:31:49,160 And if I got another VCR, it would sound different. 1102 01:31:49,761 --> 01:31:52,061 but it's just how it sounds. 1103 01:31:52,061 --> 01:31:54,923 Whereas when I get into the tape, 1104 01:31:54,923 --> 01:31:56,795 Sometimes I have too much control. 1105 01:31:56,795 --> 01:31:58,908 just like, don't know where to draw the line. 1106 01:31:58,908 --> 01:32:04,194 And sometimes I find myself again in that sort of creative... 1107 01:32:05,898 --> 01:32:07,703 inability to make decisions. 1108 01:32:07,703 --> 01:32:12,065 Whereas if I just run it into my tape machine, like I said here, like that's what I got. 1109 01:32:12,065 --> 01:32:14,762 Onward. 1110 01:32:14,762 --> 01:32:27,032 I would buy analog gear like a compressor or like an Ampeg, not Ampeg, an Ampex like tape electronics or whatever to use as a mic preamp or whatever. 1111 01:32:27,173 --> 01:32:32,358 And I had some compressors that were so fucked up. 1112 01:32:32,358 --> 01:32:35,801 Like you couldn't even imagine what to use it for. 1113 01:32:35,801 --> 01:32:42,060 And I'm like, I'm keeping it in my rack until I find the thing that this is perfect for. 1114 01:32:42,060 --> 01:32:47,499 And I would just wait sometimes to be in there for years and then I'd like use it and be like, that's it. 1115 01:32:47,499 --> 01:32:48,501 This is great. 1116 01:32:48,501 --> 01:32:50,845 I'd never get this sound from anything else. 1117 01:32:50,845 --> 01:32:52,286 And then I'd sell it. 1118 01:32:53,248 --> 01:32:54,369 So, you know. 1119 01:32:55,116 --> 01:32:58,449 I got a few cheap microphones for that purpose. 1120 01:32:59,371 --> 01:33:09,134 They sound terrible, but sometimes in the context of a mix, they just live in their own little world and you just don't have to do anything. 1121 01:33:09,134 --> 01:33:11,086 pull that tone on your own. 1122 01:33:11,086 --> 01:33:13,074 Like it just has it. 1123 01:33:14,028 --> 01:33:17,751 Yeah, and I think you're also just, you accept it. 1124 01:33:17,751 --> 01:33:19,462 Well, that's what it is. 1125 01:33:21,044 --> 01:33:27,749 Whereas if I'm trying to emulate that tone, I'll spend hours trying to get it right. 1126 01:33:27,810 --> 01:33:33,918 I turned a telephone handset into a microphone, which is, you know, a real simple soldering job. 1127 01:33:33,918 --> 01:33:38,098 I don't solder anything, so anyone could do it. 1128 01:33:38,719 --> 01:33:42,472 And the sound of that phone is just great. 1129 01:33:42,484 --> 01:33:46,958 It sounds like you're having a conversation with someone like in the 90s. 1130 01:33:46,958 --> 01:33:50,507 The Village Studios had one of those that we would use every now and then. 1131 01:33:51,519 --> 01:33:59,739 And I often do that effect on things, vocals especially, but there's nothing quite like the real thing. 1132 01:33:59,739 --> 01:34:02,252 And also you just say, that's the real thing. 1133 01:34:02,252 --> 01:34:05,055 So I don't have to do anything to it from here. 1134 01:34:05,837 --> 01:34:06,879 That's what I'm going for. 1135 01:34:06,879 --> 01:34:08,180 And that's what it is. 1136 01:34:08,180 --> 01:34:09,952 End of story, move on. 1137 01:34:11,298 --> 01:34:12,178 Yeah. 1138 01:34:12,178 --> 01:34:15,361 Well, that's, know, vibe versus perfection right there. 1139 01:34:15,762 --> 01:34:21,667 And, know, when you worked all analog, you really had to work in vibe because you didn't have perfection. 1140 01:34:21,948 --> 01:34:29,874 When you have perfection, then you have to really, um, work hard to avoid perfection because it's so alluring. 1141 01:34:30,095 --> 01:34:38,822 But if you allow for vibe and randomness, which is kind of in the same area, you know, um, 1142 01:34:39,106 --> 01:34:41,438 then the pursuit doesn't become perfection anymore. 1143 01:34:41,438 --> 01:34:53,138 And when you aren't pursuing perfection anymore, that's the best place to be in when you're making music, because the perfection isn't in how you do everything. 1144 01:34:53,138 --> 01:34:56,321 The perfection is in how it comes to you. 1145 01:34:56,401 --> 01:35:02,606 And if you aren't trying to make it perfect, then it will become perfect. 1146 01:35:02,767 --> 01:35:04,688 So you get all Zen on you. 1147 01:35:04,929 --> 01:35:06,510 I mean, that's the truth of them. 1148 01:35:06,510 --> 01:35:12,872 That makes sense, you got your yin yang icon here on Instagram. 1149 01:35:13,793 --> 01:35:15,514 Because you're right, it's... 1150 01:35:15,914 --> 01:35:21,236 For me, my way lately has been working like at top speed. 1151 01:35:22,257 --> 01:35:29,900 Try to move through things as fast as possible so that I don't have a time to get caught up on the perfection aspect of it. 1152 01:35:30,160 --> 01:35:34,482 To just go for it, it feels good, cool, move on. 1153 01:35:34,592 --> 01:35:42,288 Limiting your time is like one of the most effective ways to do it because if you just force yourself to work really fast like I tell people in my mixing book, Zen in the art of 1154 01:35:42,288 --> 01:35:44,429 mixing, mix fast. 1155 01:35:44,429 --> 01:35:46,450 Don't think, do. 1156 01:35:46,711 --> 01:35:50,334 Mix, make your decision, move forward. 1157 01:35:50,334 --> 01:35:53,616 It's circular in nature, still you're gonna come back, you're gonna hit it again. 1158 01:35:53,616 --> 01:35:58,120 But don't try and search for perfection, try and search for speed. 1159 01:35:58,120 --> 01:36:01,742 Because if you limit your time and you work fast, 1160 01:36:01,804 --> 01:36:03,525 then you'll get a better product. 1161 01:36:03,525 --> 01:36:18,850 In general, you'll become less oversaturated, less hypersensitive, and you're not like, you're reacting to what you do rather than assuming you can pre-plan everything and make 1162 01:36:18,850 --> 01:36:19,750 it perfect. 1163 01:36:20,280 --> 01:36:21,130 Hmm. 1164 01:36:21,530 --> 01:36:21,900 Yeah. 1165 01:36:21,900 --> 01:36:29,293 And I think I got a lot of that through like demo-itis where you kind of make something quick and it's flawed. 1166 01:36:29,293 --> 01:36:30,103 It's got problems. 1167 01:36:30,103 --> 01:36:32,333 But like when you listen to it, it's like, it's cool. 1168 01:36:32,333 --> 01:36:34,894 You know, so now I'm going to do it the right way. 1169 01:36:34,894 --> 01:36:41,076 And then you really try to perfect everything and they're like, well, where's the feeling? 1170 01:36:41,076 --> 01:36:45,647 Like it doesn't, it sounds better, but it doesn't feel better. 1171 01:36:45,647 --> 01:36:48,660 It's contrived. 1172 01:36:48,660 --> 01:36:51,563 You're trying to match the feeling too. 1173 01:36:51,563 --> 01:36:56,607 You're to match the feeling, but you're trying to match the feeling by taking away all the things that give it the feeling. 1174 01:36:56,607 --> 01:37:00,450 So it's like you're just working against yourself. 1175 01:37:01,570 --> 01:37:02,372 Yeah, that's funny. 1176 01:37:02,372 --> 01:37:06,487 A lot of weird paradox going on there. 1177 01:37:06,487 --> 01:37:07,498 Yeah. 1178 01:37:08,556 --> 01:37:18,452 It is, and like when you're doing it too, like I think a lot of, like how I do it and how a lot of people listening probably do it, you're doing all the jobs at once. 1179 01:37:18,512 --> 01:37:28,058 So you're trying to be creative and artistic, but you're also trying to be critical and you're trying to manage your time you're producing, your engineering, your performing, and 1180 01:37:28,199 --> 01:37:33,526 they're very, some of those mindsets are very much at odds with each other. 1181 01:37:33,526 --> 01:37:37,623 And I feel the most recording vocals because you need to be in it, you need to feel it. 1182 01:37:37,623 --> 01:37:39,150 But then I'm also being critical. 1183 01:37:39,150 --> 01:37:39,797 Am I in key? 1184 01:37:39,797 --> 01:37:40,752 Am I in time? 1185 01:37:40,752 --> 01:37:41,599 Am I... 1186 01:37:42,101 --> 01:37:45,806 And it's like two different people in my brain. 1187 01:37:46,508 --> 01:37:50,581 Yeah, that's why that's why it's so difficult to produce yourself. 1188 01:37:50,621 --> 01:37:52,253 I mean, it always will be. 1189 01:37:52,253 --> 01:37:57,897 And that's why at some point, most people have to produce themselves. 1190 01:37:57,897 --> 01:37:59,528 There's nothing wrong with it. 1191 01:37:59,549 --> 01:38:09,467 But it's not really producing because, you know, if I was to produce you, it's still your music. 1192 01:38:09,467 --> 01:38:10,428 It's still your song. 1193 01:38:10,428 --> 01:38:11,238 It's still you. 1194 01:38:11,238 --> 01:38:12,459 It's still you performing. 1195 01:38:12,459 --> 01:38:14,001 It's still all that stuff. 1196 01:38:14,001 --> 01:38:15,852 It just becomes uh 1197 01:38:15,852 --> 01:38:26,462 a matter of efficiency and me coming in and saying, listen, Brian, these are the things that I think we want to accentuate with you. 1198 01:38:26,462 --> 01:38:34,312 And these are the things that I think we want to kind of pull back and, um, and then make a plan towards that. 1199 01:38:34,312 --> 01:38:38,014 But that's very difficult to evaluate on yourself. 1200 01:38:38,014 --> 01:38:38,815 Right. 1201 01:38:38,815 --> 01:38:45,568 So, you know, a sounding board is really important when you have bandmates, at least they, you offer 1202 01:38:45,654 --> 01:38:47,734 a sounding board for each other. 1203 01:38:47,795 --> 01:39:00,379 But when you're just in a room by yourself, you know, it's very difficult to get out of that left, right brain where you're trying to use both at the same time, which doesn't 1204 01:39:00,379 --> 01:39:01,479 really work. 1205 01:39:01,479 --> 01:39:10,830 You can only kind of use the left brain, evaluate the technical and then like get the hell out of it and go on your right brain and create. 1206 01:39:10,830 --> 01:39:11,870 Right. 1207 01:39:12,730 --> 01:39:24,690 Yeah, playing in the band over the last few years has been very helpful just to have somebody to say like, ah, take those effects off your voice. 1208 01:39:24,690 --> 01:39:25,910 Let's hear it without it. 1209 01:39:25,910 --> 01:39:28,930 You know, let's see what happens if this happens. 1210 01:39:29,010 --> 01:39:38,330 And I mean, probably 50 % of the time they say that to me, I'm in my head thinking like, I don't know if that's going to work, but you know, I'm being democratic and you you want 1211 01:39:38,330 --> 01:39:39,110 to. 1212 01:39:39,150 --> 01:39:44,953 The goal here is to continue playing music together, not to get my way on my guitar part, say. 1213 01:39:44,953 --> 01:39:52,356 So if I have to lose the vote on a guitar, say, fine, least we're all still playing music together. 1214 01:39:53,196 --> 01:40:01,030 Hearing that stuff and then trying things that you would probably not do yourself because you, for whatever reason, don't think it's a good idea. 1215 01:40:01,030 --> 01:40:05,282 And then hearing it work is so eye-opening. 1216 01:40:05,282 --> 01:40:06,962 It's like, wow, like. 1217 01:40:07,688 --> 01:40:13,662 I would have never done that because of whatever reason, but that's very effective. 1218 01:40:14,048 --> 01:40:26,543 And it's important to get people that can challenge you and challenge what your view of, ah really challenge, challenge your, what's the word I'm looking for? 1219 01:40:26,543 --> 01:40:27,324 You're right. 1220 01:40:27,324 --> 01:40:36,768 guess, Oh, I'm going to put the reverb because I always put the reverb on my vocal, but is that really the best treatment for this track? 1221 01:40:36,768 --> 01:40:42,730 And, know, I guess it'd be good for people to try and develop that critical side. 1222 01:40:43,496 --> 01:40:45,588 This goes back to the randomness again. 1223 01:40:45,588 --> 01:40:54,074 You know, when I'm trying doing discovery, I'll solo things together at different spots. 1224 01:40:54,615 --> 01:41:02,842 And that tells gives me a lot of information because it's random and I see how things work together and then I might come up with a great drop or whatever. 1225 01:41:02,842 --> 01:41:04,784 It's important to challenge yourself. 1226 01:41:04,784 --> 01:41:10,849 Well, am I just doing this because I always do this or am I doing this because it's right for the song? 1227 01:41:10,849 --> 01:41:12,530 What's right for this song? 1228 01:41:12,878 --> 01:41:15,861 how do I get myself out of my comfort zone on this? 1229 01:41:15,861 --> 01:41:21,827 At least to hear it, because if you hear it, I assume in this case, you liked it without the reverb. 1230 01:41:22,328 --> 01:41:27,533 But if you had challenged yourself the same way, you may have come to the same conclusion. 1231 01:41:27,674 --> 01:41:36,282 So it's important to really push yourself beyond your comfort zone and just try things and see where it lands. 1232 01:41:37,166 --> 01:41:46,730 Yeah, yeah, vocally for me, I'm probably trying to hide my own insecurities about my voice behind effects. 1233 01:41:46,851 --> 01:41:53,813 And then to have them say, no, strip it back, that's cool in this context. 1234 01:41:54,008 --> 01:41:57,120 You know, reverb is really a horrible hiding tool. 1235 01:41:57,920 --> 01:41:59,662 Everybody uses it for that. 1236 01:41:59,662 --> 01:42:01,303 I find anytime. 1237 01:42:03,245 --> 01:42:12,272 Anytime I put reverb on something that's particularly awful, it just becomes more awful because all I'm doing is elongating the amount of time I have to hear it. 1238 01:42:12,272 --> 01:42:15,334 So like, ah 1239 01:42:17,932 --> 01:42:19,272 Where was I going with that? 1240 01:42:19,272 --> 01:42:20,503 I'm sorry. 1241 01:42:21,663 --> 01:42:25,604 So you were talking about, um yeah. 1242 01:42:25,604 --> 01:42:38,188 So reverb, like I don't view reverb as a fix it tool or it can be used as an airbrush and it can be an effective airbrush for some things, but not so much for featured things. 1243 01:42:38,288 --> 01:42:45,610 And, but I view reverb and the use of that space, reflective space, purely in terms of intimacy. 1244 01:42:45,770 --> 01:42:46,562 Do I want 1245 01:42:46,562 --> 01:42:55,188 the song to appear intimate or do I want it to appear like distant, like a stadium, like there's a separation between me and my audience. 1246 01:42:55,188 --> 01:42:59,771 Do I want them to feel like they're sitting right next to me or do I want to feel that distance? 1247 01:42:59,951 --> 01:43:02,933 And the song kind of dictates that for me. 1248 01:43:02,933 --> 01:43:15,596 And I have a feeling that having heard this song that your bandmates who suggested this wanted to feel more intimacy with you as the performer on the song and 1249 01:43:15,596 --> 01:43:23,231 It doesn't matter the voice or the flaws of the voice because those exist either way. 1250 01:43:23,232 --> 01:43:25,773 And you're not really hiding it with the reverb. 1251 01:43:25,773 --> 01:43:28,876 You're just kind of accentuating or at least leaving it the same. 1252 01:43:28,876 --> 01:43:30,057 It doesn't hide it. 1253 01:43:30,057 --> 01:43:37,852 So really it just becomes a matter of, does it feel better with you close or does it feel better with you distant? 1254 01:43:38,050 --> 01:43:38,870 Hmm. 1255 01:43:39,250 --> 01:43:39,590 Yeah. 1256 01:43:39,590 --> 01:43:46,352 And I think the comment was, feels like we're in your mouth now or something like that. 1257 01:43:46,352 --> 01:43:48,053 You know, like we're in your throat. 1258 01:43:48,053 --> 01:43:50,093 Like we can feel it. 1259 01:43:50,294 --> 01:44:06,008 And yeah, we would go for like visceral garage rock energy, know, not anything polished ever, which is, which led us to actually like recording without a click and just 1260 01:44:06,008 --> 01:44:08,019 playing, we're like, well, that's what we do. 1261 01:44:08,019 --> 01:44:08,711 We just play. 1262 01:44:08,711 --> 01:44:12,506 So why are we going to now suddenly like try to be all perfect? 1263 01:44:12,506 --> 01:44:15,059 Like our whole shtick is that we're not perfect. 1264 01:44:15,059 --> 01:44:16,310 We're sloppy. 1265 01:44:16,566 --> 01:44:18,397 Yeah, so why fix that? 1266 01:44:18,456 --> 01:44:27,190 Because it's funny too, because as soon as we record to the click, like now my vocals really have to be on point. 1267 01:44:27,290 --> 01:44:31,252 I mean, I gotta be in tune all the way through and on time. 1268 01:44:31,252 --> 01:44:43,757 Whereas when we're just playing, I got so much more play with even rhythmically and with pitch and my bad voice doesn't sound so bad. 1269 01:44:44,806 --> 01:44:54,223 The moment I tune one note all of a sudden I had to three notes this way and three notes this way and then it just It's all downhill from there. 1270 01:44:54,223 --> 01:44:56,995 It's like, my god, we're tuning the whole thing. 1271 01:44:56,995 --> 01:45:02,298 So like I really As a mixer I don't tune too much. 1272 01:45:02,479 --> 01:45:12,626 I mean if there's a real clunker It's like pulling me out of the song every time it comes and I'll fix that but I Won't necessarily pull it perfect 1273 01:45:13,048 --> 01:45:15,461 just make it so it's palatable, you know? 1274 01:45:15,503 --> 01:45:21,614 But that's the thing, you fix, start making things more perfect and you gotta make other things more perfect. 1275 01:45:21,614 --> 01:45:24,018 It's this very slippery slope. 1276 01:45:24,258 --> 01:45:24,939 Yeah. 1277 01:45:24,939 --> 01:45:37,529 Well, it's been the challenge of mixing acoustic and electronic or digital instruments together for me is, you know, this, when I play C3 on my, you know, digital synth in the 1278 01:45:37,529 --> 01:45:43,314 DAW, that tuner is on C and it's, you know, that green dot is right in the middle. 1279 01:45:43,314 --> 01:45:48,698 When I play the guitar string, it's like, it's, you know, kind of waivers a bit. 1280 01:45:48,698 --> 01:45:49,878 Sure. 1281 01:45:49,919 --> 01:45:54,062 So when you have stuff that's so in tune, 1282 01:45:54,324 --> 01:45:56,937 anything that's not with it is weird. 1283 01:45:56,937 --> 01:46:07,870 But when everything's a little weird, then it's like, okay, like our in tune is like a neighborhood now instead of like one specific point in space. 1284 01:46:07,944 --> 01:46:09,416 Analog Slop. 1285 01:46:09,416 --> 01:46:10,638 It's your friend. 1286 01:46:10,638 --> 01:46:11,678 Yeah. 1287 01:46:12,038 --> 01:46:17,398 Actually this synth here, the Prophet 6 has a knob called slop. 1288 01:46:17,518 --> 01:46:23,518 And it just detunes the oscillators and the timing of the envelopes and the filters and stuff. 1289 01:46:23,518 --> 01:46:25,178 And it's great. 1290 01:46:25,218 --> 01:46:36,338 I mean, there's a point where it's, you know, off where you turn it too far, but you know, there's a nice spot there where it feels good. 1291 01:46:36,338 --> 01:46:39,938 It's not the same thing every single time. 1292 01:46:40,096 --> 01:46:41,272 it price. 1293 01:46:41,868 --> 01:46:44,630 That's the problem with samples, right? 1294 01:46:44,630 --> 01:46:45,981 It's the same every time. 1295 01:46:45,981 --> 01:46:57,729 And that's why now we have sample libraries with all these detailed articulations and, and like, and you like actually have to program it meticulously between the articulations and 1296 01:46:57,729 --> 01:46:58,310 stuff. 1297 01:46:58,310 --> 01:47:07,596 I can make a horn section sound like a real horn section within the context of a production, but it's really time consuming. 1298 01:47:07,596 --> 01:47:10,698 if it's just straight samples, it's like, you know, 1299 01:47:11,839 --> 01:47:12,996 Like that doesn't work. 1300 01:47:12,996 --> 01:47:14,692 That's just it. 1301 01:47:16,248 --> 01:47:22,894 Yeah, it's funny how we have to navigate that stuff and be aware of what's actually happening. 1302 01:47:22,894 --> 01:47:30,840 You like if you hit the snare drum harder, it's a little brighter and it's usually a tiny bit higher in pitch. 1303 01:47:30,840 --> 01:47:34,242 And now we're trying to program that all in. 1304 01:47:35,566 --> 01:47:37,066 Yeah, exactly. 1305 01:47:37,186 --> 01:47:39,046 Now you got to program it all in. 1306 01:47:39,046 --> 01:47:41,306 Like, oh, I want it to feel human. 1307 01:47:42,186 --> 01:47:43,046 Okay. 1308 01:47:43,406 --> 01:47:55,186 Well, so we're going to spend hours to try and make it human, meticulously programming every variation, random variation that happens naturally just by someone hitting stick on 1309 01:47:55,186 --> 01:47:56,390 a snare drum head. 1310 01:47:56,782 --> 01:47:57,442 Right. 1311 01:47:57,442 --> 01:48:07,017 That's when I start going down those rabbit holes, that's when like the acoustic guitar becomes the most amazing instrument in the world. 1312 01:48:07,017 --> 01:48:09,548 like, wow, you don't plug it in. 1313 01:48:09,548 --> 01:48:10,749 You don't charge it. 1314 01:48:10,749 --> 01:48:12,470 It doesn't need a battery. 1315 01:48:12,470 --> 01:48:14,721 You just play it and it just works. 1316 01:48:14,721 --> 01:48:16,802 It's like what we want everything to do now. 1317 01:48:16,802 --> 01:48:18,022 There's no cables. 1318 01:48:18,022 --> 01:48:19,783 There's acoustic drum set. 1319 01:48:19,783 --> 01:48:20,913 You just hit it. 1320 01:48:20,913 --> 01:48:22,214 oh 1321 01:48:22,214 --> 01:48:24,290 to practice a lot of years to get to that point. 1322 01:48:24,290 --> 01:48:29,768 Of course, right, but it feels almost like that's what we're trying to get again. 1323 01:48:29,768 --> 01:48:33,022 We're trying to get ourselves back to where we started. 1324 01:48:33,326 --> 01:48:37,558 Yeah, but without human involvement in any way. 1325 01:48:37,558 --> 01:48:39,679 Yeah, the shortcut. 1326 01:48:41,760 --> 01:48:56,386 Can I ask you a little bit, uh because we spoke about this very briefly right before we hit record, the story of how you kind of got your name out there um back with the daily 1327 01:48:56,386 --> 01:49:00,367 adventures of Mixerman, because this is a fun also. 1328 01:49:00,538 --> 01:49:07,490 I think it ties in nicely to what we're talking about, where the internet was this new place and it's weird to be on there. 1329 01:49:08,174 --> 01:49:20,380 You have this kind of early story of this kind of internet celebrity thing happening that I think maybe there's a nice way to kind of round out our conversation after talking so 1330 01:49:20,380 --> 01:49:23,722 much about new technologies and how this worked out for you. 1331 01:49:24,494 --> 01:49:35,194 So in 99, I was recording Ben Harper's Burn to Shine and my assistant, Dan, was like talking about Usenet. 1332 01:49:35,194 --> 01:49:36,454 And he tells me about Usenet. 1333 01:49:36,454 --> 01:49:37,334 I'm like, what? 1334 01:49:37,334 --> 01:49:41,814 There's a place where people go on the internet and talk about audio and recording? 1335 01:49:42,154 --> 01:49:42,994 Cool. 1336 01:49:42,994 --> 01:49:51,554 So I go on there as myself and I gave an admittedly inaccurate answer to someone about 1176 and quality of the compressor. 1337 01:49:51,554 --> 01:49:54,454 Someone handed my ass and said, it's a leveling amplifier. 1338 01:49:54,784 --> 01:49:56,435 asshole. 1339 01:49:56,435 --> 01:50:10,841 and I was like, no, no, no, no, no, I am not doing this under my name because like, I am going to get into fucking vicious fights with people on this fucking thing. 1340 01:50:10,841 --> 01:50:18,664 So, and there was no moderation on use that there's no, there's, if it's on there, it's on there forever. 1341 01:50:18,664 --> 01:50:19,585 Amen. 1342 01:50:19,585 --> 01:50:22,676 So I'm like, no, I'm going to go, I'm going to 1343 01:50:22,676 --> 01:50:25,888 So I come up with Mixer Man and I go on as Mixer Man. 1344 01:50:25,949 --> 01:50:32,314 for a couple of years I'm on Usenet and then, and I kind of make a name for myself. 1345 01:50:32,314 --> 01:50:36,978 I just tell people, know, listen, I'm in LA, I've done some known records. 1346 01:50:36,978 --> 01:50:38,678 So I know what I'm talking about. 1347 01:50:38,678 --> 01:50:41,201 So forget about my anonymity. 1348 01:50:41,202 --> 01:50:45,905 And I just let my, my, you know, my advice do the talking. 1349 01:50:45,905 --> 01:50:47,066 And so 1350 01:50:48,216 --> 01:50:52,447 company came to me and said, hey, we want you to do this on the internet. 1351 01:50:52,447 --> 01:50:53,898 We want you to moderate this forum. 1352 01:50:53,898 --> 01:50:55,828 All right, I'll moderate a forum. 1353 01:50:55,828 --> 01:50:56,728 That's cool. 1354 01:50:56,728 --> 01:51:01,550 So a year of this and there's just crickets and it's like, there's just nobody there. 1355 01:51:01,550 --> 01:51:05,451 And people are like, now they were suspicious of the internet. 1356 01:51:05,451 --> 01:51:07,331 Use net was the real deal. 1357 01:51:07,331 --> 01:51:08,462 The internet's bullshit. 1358 01:51:08,462 --> 01:51:11,992 That's just people trying to make money. 1359 01:51:12,653 --> 01:51:17,574 And so in 2002, ah 1360 01:51:18,158 --> 01:51:23,098 I had a family member that was going through a health issue and I needed to take a few months off. 1361 01:51:23,798 --> 01:51:36,818 And I got this idea to write this story about me as Mixerman in the studio with an infamous producer in a bidding war band. 1362 01:51:37,178 --> 01:51:41,978 And I would play it off that the entire thing was happening live in real time. 1363 01:51:41,978 --> 01:51:46,738 And I was just coming at the end of the day and posting up these blog posts. 1364 01:51:47,286 --> 01:51:57,039 And so I wrote the one, the first one, I put it up and Fletcher who was, who owned a company called mercenary audio at the time. 1365 01:51:57,039 --> 01:51:59,650 And he was running a form, one of the forums there. 1366 01:51:59,650 --> 01:52:02,811 He started putting it on at the time it was called gear sluts. 1367 01:52:02,811 --> 01:52:07,712 Now it's gear space and a couple of other audio forums. 1368 01:52:09,233 --> 01:52:13,174 George Masberg had one Craig Ann and, and so he puts up with it. 1369 01:52:13,174 --> 01:52:14,574 I'm within like. 1370 01:52:15,374 --> 01:52:24,114 I don't know, by the end of the, after five entries, like I would, was getting, you know, 200 people a day coming to the site in the first week. 1371 01:52:24,114 --> 01:52:27,334 I was refreshing and getting like five views. 1372 01:52:27,834 --> 01:52:31,433 Every time I refreshed, refresh five more views, refresh five more views. 1373 01:52:31,433 --> 01:52:33,414 I'm like, Whoa, okay. 1374 01:52:33,574 --> 01:52:38,254 After four weeks, there was 25,000 people coming in to read this thing. 1375 01:52:38,254 --> 01:52:41,914 And I had, and it was, it's totally a satire. 1376 01:52:41,914 --> 01:52:43,398 I'm totally like, 1377 01:52:44,012 --> 01:52:56,409 I mean, technically I'm trolling everyone with this, this, this idea that I'm on this session, but basically I wrapped up every bad thing or every, crazy fucked up thing that 1378 01:52:56,409 --> 01:53:01,511 happened on every session in my career to that point and put it all in one story. 1379 01:53:01,892 --> 01:53:11,177 And, uh, you know, I took all of the, the, the characters and I gave them composite aspects of different, different people. 1380 01:53:11,177 --> 01:53:14,078 Like the drummer was based on three different drummers. 1381 01:53:14,382 --> 01:53:22,685 The producer was based on three different producers and just little tiny personality things just to, you know, bring them alive in the story. 1382 01:53:22,946 --> 01:53:36,251 And so by the end of the story, like I was going, well, even at the beginning, I was going onto these websites and I'm like reading this reaction to this story and people are just 1383 01:53:36,251 --> 01:53:43,674 handing me my ass saying, I'm an atrocious person for posting these things and I've like, 1384 01:53:43,998 --> 01:53:55,144 You know, I should never work in this in this industry again And I mean they had a point if I was actually writing about a real session that actually but I was taking the piss and 1385 01:53:55,144 --> 01:54:05,050 the further along I got in it the more Crazy things would get and the more I was just trying to shake people off Which is what good satire does you bring them in you suck them 1386 01:54:05,050 --> 01:54:08,011 in and then you start to try and shake them off? 1387 01:54:08,212 --> 01:54:13,044 As you get further along the end and they're like, oh, I just I was had 1388 01:54:13,102 --> 01:54:14,042 Right. 1389 01:54:14,042 --> 01:54:20,082 And so I didn't give them the, I was had part because I couldn't shake so many people off. 1390 01:54:20,342 --> 01:54:23,082 Like usually you can shake off a good 90%. 1391 01:54:23,082 --> 01:54:25,422 I couldn't shake off people. 1392 01:54:26,002 --> 01:54:30,002 So for years, I wouldn't even admit that it was a satire. 1393 01:54:30,002 --> 01:54:36,282 Like I'm only like now kind of admitting it because we're 22 years out from it. 1394 01:54:36,282 --> 01:54:41,942 But, uh, by the end, I had 150,000 people reading this day. 1395 01:54:42,042 --> 01:54:42,846 Um, 1396 01:54:42,846 --> 01:54:46,108 Everybody in the, in the, in the industry knew about it. 1397 01:54:46,228 --> 01:55:00,211 I was getting emails from people that were on tour with Bruce with, with all these big bands are like, dude, I don't know if you've read this, but you got to read this or, uh, 1398 01:55:00,211 --> 01:55:03,187 everybody is reading the whole crew is reading this. 1399 01:55:03,187 --> 01:55:05,098 Even Bruce is reading it. 1400 01:55:05,098 --> 01:55:12,302 And like A and R people were telling, talking to me about it and saying, if I ever find this mixer man guy, 1401 01:55:12,302 --> 01:55:14,982 He's never going to work at this town again. 1402 01:55:14,982 --> 01:55:16,082 It's like that. 1403 01:55:16,082 --> 01:55:18,142 And it was just the craziest thing. 1404 01:55:18,142 --> 01:55:31,542 And it was viral and 150,000, you know, today that's nothing, but then, and in a contained niche, like container, like recording and mixing where people were, didn't have home 1405 01:55:31,542 --> 01:55:33,742 studios to speak. 1406 01:55:33,962 --> 01:55:38,922 Like that was an enormous amount of impressions in, the industry. 1407 01:55:38,922 --> 01:55:41,420 And now here I was, I had. 1408 01:55:41,420 --> 01:55:52,920 I had gold records to my name, well um beloved records from Ben Harper and the Farsight and the brand new Heavies. 1409 01:55:53,721 --> 01:56:05,571 I was way more famous as Mixerman, not that I was famous as Eric Severin, but I was now famous as Mixerman, far beyond what my discography, which was modest compared to others, 1410 01:56:05,571 --> 01:56:07,633 of course, I was still early in my career. 1411 01:56:07,633 --> 01:56:09,094 ah 1412 01:56:10,188 --> 01:56:15,859 I was famous as this guy, Mixerman and infamous too. 1413 01:56:16,120 --> 01:56:20,251 it was just, uh, it was a crazy time. 1414 01:56:20,251 --> 01:56:32,624 And so then I just kept going with the Mixerman thing, kept going with the forum and then started writing more serious books, less satirical, more, more about, you the inside of, 1415 01:56:32,804 --> 01:56:38,916 of mixing and producing and, um but keep it entertaining. 1416 01:56:38,916 --> 01:56:39,886 And I keep my wit. 1417 01:56:39,886 --> 01:56:48,735 throughout um and my dry sense of humor throughout them and they aren't meant as entertainment, but they are entertaining. 1418 01:56:48,756 --> 01:56:57,736 And so that's pretty much the beginning and then the story of how Mixerman came about. 1419 01:56:59,187 --> 01:57:08,632 It sounds like you rode that line of satire really well where There's enough truth in it that It almost truth. 1420 01:57:08,632 --> 01:57:11,714 You almost missed the point that it's satire 1421 01:57:12,366 --> 01:57:15,418 So if anybody wants to hear it, you can hear it for free now. 1422 01:57:15,418 --> 01:57:22,111 put it on, I took the audio book, which I made in 2012, which is like, based on fire sign theater. 1423 01:57:22,111 --> 01:57:24,693 I don't know if you're familiar with them, but they kind of did. 1424 01:57:24,693 --> 01:57:37,790 There were 60s comedy troupe that made plays based on 1940s radio where you'd have the guys with all the, the Foley things and the, and the sound effects and the, and the, the, 1425 01:57:37,790 --> 01:57:40,942 the Oregon and they'd have an Oregon player in there and shit. 1426 01:57:40,942 --> 01:57:42,022 And so 1427 01:57:42,456 --> 01:57:55,998 Basically, I did that and I had all my friends, Ken Scott, producers and engineers, very famous Ken Scott did The Beatles, um Ed Churney, Ron St. 1428 01:57:55,998 --> 01:58:06,218 Germain, some of the biggest names in the business hall came and Dave Ponsado and read uh the character lines for me, performed the characters. 1429 01:58:06,218 --> 01:58:09,208 And so I made this dramatization. 1430 01:58:09,208 --> 01:58:19,842 that anybody can listen to, just go to Apple podcasts and search the daily adventures of Mixerman or Spotify, any of them, and you'll find it and you can listen to it. 1431 01:58:19,923 --> 01:58:23,344 And, you know, now you know it's not real. 1432 01:58:23,584 --> 01:58:25,215 I'm not sure that matters at this point. 1433 01:58:25,215 --> 01:58:26,806 It's so, so old. 1434 01:58:26,806 --> 01:58:28,866 I don't think that will, will. 1435 01:58:28,866 --> 01:58:36,990 I mean, that was really the hook of it back then, but now you can enjoy it kind of as a historical perspective, I suppose of, of 1436 01:58:37,762 --> 01:58:42,106 some of the things that we went through with the technology at the time. 1437 01:58:42,247 --> 01:58:49,534 And you'll find that the crazy personality shit has not changed at all. 1438 01:58:49,535 --> 01:58:59,515 Like that's all the same, but it's just a different way of recording, but dealing with the same shit when it comes to the people and to crew trying to create in a committee 1439 01:58:59,515 --> 01:59:00,486 environment. 1440 01:59:00,686 --> 01:59:10,558 m Yeah, that's really fun and I guess, know, some things you are, the truth is stranger than the fiction. 1441 01:59:12,765 --> 01:59:15,798 It was so fucked up it had to be true. 1442 01:59:15,798 --> 01:59:17,896 Yeah, you can never write it. 1443 01:59:18,218 --> 01:59:29,224 I mean, was time I didn't dare tell people that it wasn't true even a years after like years after I told this drummer was just enamored with the story and he's like, you got to 1444 01:59:29,224 --> 01:59:30,225 tell me who the band was. 1445 01:59:30,225 --> 01:59:33,086 I'm like, there was no band. 1446 01:59:34,656 --> 01:59:39,309 I mean, you, you, might as well have told him I killed his mother or his mother died. 1447 01:59:39,309 --> 01:59:47,714 Cause that guy was like silent for like half an hour, just sitting there just like, my God, my God, this wasn't true. 1448 01:59:47,714 --> 01:59:50,355 He was so invested in it being true. 1449 01:59:50,355 --> 01:59:55,698 He could not even process it being not being a satire. 1450 01:59:56,438 --> 02:00:01,770 He'd probably seen a lot of that in his own life, in his own experience as well. 1451 02:00:01,912 --> 02:00:04,463 Yeah, I'm sure. 1452 02:00:04,784 --> 02:00:06,404 mean, everything's based on that. 1453 02:00:06,404 --> 02:00:07,962 That's the thing that people liked about it. 1454 02:00:07,962 --> 02:00:10,196 It was like, my God, this is my life. 1455 02:00:10,196 --> 02:00:10,537 my God. 1456 02:00:10,537 --> 02:00:12,037 I've seen all of this. 1457 02:00:12,037 --> 02:00:12,438 my God. 1458 02:00:12,438 --> 02:00:14,069 This is, this happens. 1459 02:00:14,069 --> 02:00:15,369 This is real. 1460 02:00:15,369 --> 02:00:16,970 Cause for them it was real. 1461 02:00:16,970 --> 02:00:19,502 Like they re they, they identified with it. 1462 02:00:19,502 --> 02:00:20,642 They identified with it. 1463 02:00:20,642 --> 02:00:30,578 I've met this person so many times like that, you know, ah I know this person, this archetype, like I have the picture of that person. 1464 02:00:30,578 --> 02:00:31,490 So like, 1465 02:00:31,490 --> 02:00:33,929 That makes it so it connects, you know? 1466 02:00:34,050 --> 02:00:34,810 Yeah. 1467 02:00:34,810 --> 02:00:35,060 Yeah. 1468 02:00:35,060 --> 02:00:36,331 I think I know that guy. 1469 02:00:36,331 --> 02:00:38,011 I know who you're talking about. 1470 02:00:39,512 --> 02:00:40,773 That's funny. 1471 02:00:40,953 --> 02:00:41,163 Yeah. 1472 02:00:41,163 --> 02:00:41,963 It's, it's cool. 1473 02:00:41,963 --> 02:00:50,237 And it's an interesting time for that to all happen, I guess too, or like you said, like just things blowing up on the internet. 1474 02:00:50,830 --> 02:00:52,770 you. 1475 02:00:52,971 --> 02:00:56,046 in technology and the industry, all of that. 1476 02:00:56,046 --> 02:01:04,454 Yeah, a lot of interesting stuff actually happening in that time too, guess even just how people were listening to music and... 1477 02:01:05,486 --> 02:01:09,186 Napster was around now, so now there was theft. 1478 02:01:09,586 --> 02:01:12,358 Yeah, it was a very interesting time. 1479 02:01:12,514 --> 02:01:13,414 Yeah. 1480 02:01:14,196 --> 02:01:16,358 And it still is, right? 1481 02:01:16,579 --> 02:01:20,262 We're heading into more and more interesting times. 1482 02:01:21,688 --> 02:01:23,745 We are, for sure. 1483 02:01:24,930 --> 02:01:31,757 Yeah, I'll definitely put a link to that in the show notes as well as your new book, Mix of Man's Ultimate Guide. 1484 02:01:31,757 --> 02:01:33,097 Yeah, looks awesome. 1485 02:01:33,097 --> 02:01:33,836 of wrapping up. 1486 02:01:33,836 --> 02:01:35,046 ah 1487 02:01:37,762 --> 02:01:38,353 There it is. 1488 02:01:38,353 --> 02:01:39,484 this is the book. 1489 02:01:39,485 --> 02:01:42,600 It's a big boy, 600 pages long. 1490 02:01:42,600 --> 02:01:46,736 You know, we touched on a lot of subjects that we talk about, that I talk about in this book. 1491 02:01:46,736 --> 02:01:48,358 ah 1492 02:01:48,496 --> 02:01:49,707 but there's so much more. 1493 02:01:49,707 --> 02:01:52,640 mean, there's a lot of technical stuff to get into. 1494 02:01:52,640 --> 02:02:03,439 it's randomly flipped polarity of microphones, know, like ways of miking preamps, compressors, programming tools. 1495 02:02:03,700 --> 02:02:05,884 Then I really enjoy. 1496 02:02:05,884 --> 02:02:08,309 can understand it is the thing, you know? 1497 02:02:09,376 --> 02:02:13,667 And I enjoyed the, it was the politics of band entity. 1498 02:02:13,667 --> 02:02:17,658 um That's just some great practical advice too. 1499 02:02:17,658 --> 02:02:34,383 Just the whole interacting with people, how to have important discussions and know when to listen and know when to stand your ground and just really useful human connection stuff in 1500 02:02:34,383 --> 02:02:35,593 there as well. 1501 02:02:36,526 --> 02:02:39,654 And that's big part of us, you know, like, um 1502 02:02:39,956 --> 02:02:48,707 at the end of the day, you're dealing with people and a lot of times people in vulnerable situations, sensitive, they're expressing themselves. 1503 02:02:48,707 --> 02:02:52,342 So knowing how to navigate those waters. 1504 02:02:53,312 --> 02:03:01,250 keep some, maintain some control over, you know, hurting, hurting everybody towards the goal. 1505 02:03:01,250 --> 02:03:02,090 Yeah. 1506 02:03:02,692 --> 02:03:03,062 Yeah. 1507 02:03:03,062 --> 02:03:11,941 And even if I think you're not working with other people, it's like we said, you've got so many different jobs when you're doing it yourself, it's almost like you're working with a 1508 02:03:11,941 --> 02:03:12,622 team of people. 1509 02:03:12,622 --> 02:03:17,236 So some of that stuff is applicable even in the solo situation. 1510 02:03:21,292 --> 02:03:23,023 He certainly will be. 1511 02:03:24,806 --> 02:03:28,619 Is there anything else we should get to before we wrap this up? 1512 02:03:28,619 --> 02:03:30,261 You've been really generous with your time. 1513 02:03:30,261 --> 02:03:33,514 I want to you have a day to have still. 1514 02:03:34,124 --> 02:03:37,417 I think I'm shocked how much we covered. 1515 02:03:39,020 --> 02:03:40,131 We covered a lot of ground. 1516 02:03:40,131 --> 02:03:44,109 It was a great conversation with you. 1517 02:03:44,109 --> 02:03:45,426 I appreciate it. 1518 02:03:45,504 --> 02:03:47,755 Thanks, I love talking to you. 1519 02:03:47,755 --> 02:03:51,937 So much to learn, so much experience. 1520 02:03:52,118 --> 02:03:57,641 I'll put links to everything, but Mixerman.net is a good place to start, I think, for people. 1521 02:03:57,641 --> 02:04:01,163 They can find all your books, which you have many that we didn't mention as well. 1522 02:04:01,243 --> 02:04:08,747 A real wealth of knowledge out there, and it's really kind of you to put that out for people to learn from and get some perspective. 1523 02:04:08,747 --> 02:04:13,430 And in the case of the Daily Adventures, a little laugh or two here and there. 1524 02:04:13,614 --> 02:04:27,414 Well, you know, I think that, know, one of the reasons I wanted to write this producing book this broadly was because I know how much things are going to change in the next few 1525 02:04:27,414 --> 02:04:27,614 years. 1526 02:04:27,614 --> 02:04:41,594 And I wrote it knowing it's got a shelf life because like, I'm ready to write the one where you and how to do it using AI too, you know, but it's we're not there yet, but 1527 02:04:41,594 --> 02:04:43,674 that's going to change everything. 1528 02:04:43,704 --> 02:04:47,757 But it's good to know how to do it yourself to some degree, you know? 1529 02:04:47,757 --> 02:04:49,789 And the human stuff, that doesn't change. 1530 02:04:49,789 --> 02:04:55,583 The human interaction and understanding how to drive a process, that doesn't change. 1531 02:04:56,785 --> 02:04:59,166 So it'll always have relevance on that side. 1532 02:04:59,916 --> 02:05:00,826 Yeah. 1533 02:05:01,267 --> 02:05:01,647 Yeah. 1534 02:05:01,647 --> 02:05:11,915 And the emphasis on the title too, I noticed the capitalization of producing, really stressing that aspect of it. 1535 02:05:11,976 --> 02:05:23,875 And I think you kind of cover a lot of the different ways we can interpret that word too, from the actual like kind of traditional producer standpoint, but also just to creating 1536 02:05:23,875 --> 02:05:29,900 and finishing and getting through and all the different steps it takes to actually 1537 02:05:30,072 --> 02:05:33,163 have the product of a piece of music at the end. 1538 02:05:33,912 --> 02:05:34,695 Yep. 1539 02:05:36,123 --> 02:05:36,913 I recommend it. 1540 02:05:36,913 --> 02:05:44,447 It's a good read, it's funny, it's informative, and it's something you can kind of flip to. 1541 02:05:44,447 --> 02:05:51,902 You can kind of jump around, you can read cover to cover, so there's a few different ways to approach it, which is also kind of cool. 1542 02:05:51,950 --> 02:05:58,756 I wanted you to be able to read it like a novel, but of course it's got encyclopedic value to it too, and resource values. 1543 02:05:58,756 --> 02:06:00,576 So you can jump around. 1544 02:06:00,590 --> 02:06:08,763 A lot of people say about my books that they can open it up, you know, on a random day and find something, a nugget. 1545 02:06:09,184 --> 02:06:13,298 And like they didn't necessarily make the connection. 1546 02:06:13,298 --> 02:06:16,510 Like the further you get to go along, the more you learn. 1547 02:06:17,231 --> 02:06:21,274 The more some things you glossed over, didn't really like realize 1548 02:06:22,008 --> 02:06:24,700 you know, what was meant by it. 1549 02:06:24,700 --> 02:06:31,336 And then you read it again a year later and you've kind of learned that lesson and then it makes sense. 1550 02:06:31,336 --> 02:06:34,288 And you're like, now I get this. 1551 02:06:34,288 --> 02:06:37,331 I didn't like even register that before. 1552 02:06:37,331 --> 02:06:39,162 Cause you can only learn so much, you know? 1553 02:06:39,162 --> 02:06:42,375 I mean, it takes like, I've been doing this nearly for decades. 1554 02:06:42,375 --> 02:06:49,371 So like it takes that long to learn everything and people want to do, want to do everything. 1555 02:06:49,371 --> 02:06:51,532 And it's like, okay, 1556 02:06:51,618 --> 02:06:57,930 But if it took me four decades to learn everything, how are you going to learn it everything in a year? 1557 02:06:57,944 --> 02:06:59,322 By reading a book, 1558 02:07:00,256 --> 02:07:07,413 is just not, but we can accelerate things and we can put your focus on the things that are important if you're willing to buy into it. 1559 02:07:07,634 --> 02:07:19,447 And I can give you tips and tricks to help you to accomplish your goals and to cause a reaction. 1560 02:07:19,968 --> 02:07:22,470 that's what can help people with the book. 1561 02:07:23,426 --> 02:07:27,310 Well, so many of these concepts are lifelong pursuits. 1562 02:07:27,310 --> 02:07:37,640 I things you might not ever master, you know, if you really, they're the kind of endless, endless journeys that you just. 1563 02:07:37,640 --> 02:07:44,273 become a world-class mixer if you don't mix every day on lots and lots of different things. 1564 02:07:44,273 --> 02:07:46,754 The only thing you mix is your own stuff. 1565 02:07:46,814 --> 02:07:53,717 You're going to become a good mixer at some point at mixing your own stuff. 1566 02:07:53,837 --> 02:07:59,069 like people think that they can just do that and then they can become great at mixing. 1567 02:07:59,069 --> 02:08:03,661 And it's like, no, you're only going to get so far with that. 1568 02:08:03,661 --> 02:08:06,038 Like I didn't become a great mixer. 1569 02:08:06,038 --> 02:08:10,862 until I was doing it every single day for years. 1570 02:08:11,543 --> 02:08:24,594 And because that gave me the repetition and the time and the lessons to recognize the patterns to more quickly uh achieve the goal. 1571 02:08:24,635 --> 02:08:27,917 So, and to learn what the goal is, you know? 1572 02:08:28,038 --> 02:08:30,259 So that's what it requires. 1573 02:08:30,580 --> 02:08:33,332 So we just have to become as good as we can. 1574 02:08:33,344 --> 02:08:36,807 at those things and become the best that we can at the things that are the most important. 1575 02:08:36,807 --> 02:08:41,119 And if you're an artist, it's most important you're best at being an artist. 1576 02:08:41,340 --> 02:08:47,044 And if you're a producer, it's most important that you're best at being a producer, not an engineer. 1577 02:08:47,044 --> 02:08:55,730 The engineering, we just kind of want to get out of our way the best that we can so that we can be as effective a producer as we want to be. 1578 02:08:56,174 --> 02:08:56,934 Hmm. 1579 02:08:58,335 --> 02:08:59,615 Sounds good. 1580 02:08:59,996 --> 02:09:00,996 Okay. 1581 02:09:00,996 --> 02:09:03,417 Hey, thank you so much. 1582 02:09:04,218 --> 02:09:11,100 Mixerman.net for everyone and check out the book Mixerman's Ultimate Guide to Producing Records, Music and Songs. 1583 02:09:12,641 --> 02:09:14,702 Thank you everyone for listening. 1584 02:09:14,894 --> 02:09:15,836 Thank you. 1585 02:09:17,134 --> 02:09:18,310 Oh 1586 02:09:21,528 --> 02:09:24,781 Thank you for listening to the music production podcast. 1587 02:09:24,781 --> 02:09:30,046 If you want to help support the show, the best thing you can do is tell a friend, someone you think that would enjoy the show. 1588 02:09:30,046 --> 02:09:34,070 I'd also love it if you could leave a review wherever you get your podcasts. 1589 02:09:34,070 --> 02:09:37,333 And if you want to support my work, you can go to brianfunk.com. 1590 02:09:37,333 --> 02:09:41,237 I've got tons of Ableton Live packs, tutorials, samples. 1591 02:09:41,237 --> 02:09:46,804 You can check out my book, The 5-Minute Music Producer, which gives you 365... 1592 02:09:46,804 --> 02:09:52,336 short music making activities to help you get started, stay inspired and finish more music. 1593 02:09:52,337 --> 02:09:57,539 And there's also the Music Production Club, where you get my latest releases as soon as they're finished. 1594 02:09:57,539 --> 02:10:02,582 It gives you access to a community of like-minded people who are making music and sharing ideas. 1595 02:10:02,582 --> 02:10:10,726 You can share your music, find new collaborators and participate in our live meetings where we set up some kind of musical challenge and then make music together and share our 1596 02:10:10,726 --> 02:10:12,034 results at the end. 1597 02:10:12,034 --> 02:10:13,407 That's the music production club. 1598 02:10:13,407 --> 02:10:14,279 It's a lot of fun. 1599 02:10:14,279 --> 02:10:17,828 And you can find that and everything that I do at brianfunk.com. 1600 02:10:17,828 --> 02:10:21,034 Thanks again for listening to the show and have a great day.