WEBVTT - Howard Benson 0:00:08.600 --> 0:00:12.520 Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Set's podcast. 0:00:12.760 --> 0:00:17.960 My guest today is producer Howard Benson. Howard, we had 0:00:18.000 --> 0:00:21.960 to delay this because of issues with the fire. So 0:00:22.000 --> 0:00:23.279 how did that work out for you? 0:00:24.400 --> 0:00:29.600 Well, we were in at fire ready set evacuation spots, 0:00:29.680 --> 0:00:31.880 so we didn't have to evacuate, but we had to 0:00:31.880 --> 0:00:35.840 get ready to evacuate. So we were as most people 0:00:35.840 --> 0:00:37.800 were running around the house trying to figure out what 0:00:37.840 --> 0:00:40.919 to do. I was tearing the studio apart, trying to 0:00:40.960 --> 0:00:43.800 get the microphones, like the Sony C eight hundred, which 0:00:43.840 --> 0:00:48.080 is irreplaceable. So yeah, most of my stuff is in 0:00:48.120 --> 0:00:51.120 the cloud, but there was a bunch of other things. 0:00:51.159 --> 0:00:53.800 And then we had the fire that broke out up 0:00:53.880 --> 0:00:57.880 north of us, the Kenneth Fire, so that we were 0:00:57.920 --> 0:01:00.920 just surrounded. Look, we're lucky. We're one of the lucky ones. 0:01:00.960 --> 0:01:02.440 All we had to do is just sit and wait. 0:01:03.120 --> 0:01:06.160 But you know, it's just terrible what happened to everybody else. 0:01:06.319 --> 0:01:08.679 Just you know, I was down in Santa Monica a 0:01:08.680 --> 0:01:11.600 few days ago and you could smell the it's just 0:01:11.720 --> 0:01:13.920 you know, the smoke still down there. 0:01:14.160 --> 0:01:17.080 So yeah, so you talk about your studio, you have 0:01:17.120 --> 0:01:18.240 a studio in the home. 0:01:19.640 --> 0:01:21.080 I have a studio here and I have a studio 0:01:21.080 --> 0:01:23.320 on Woodland Hills, and the actually studio in Woodland Hills is 0:01:23.319 --> 0:01:25.360 where we were going to evacuate too. That's where my 0:01:25.440 --> 0:01:28.200 daughter lives. And I owned that studio for about twelve years. 0:01:28.240 --> 0:01:30.080 I bought it from a guy that worked at Disney 0:01:30.160 --> 0:01:32.840 and it was at Disney Studio, so it wasn't very soundproof. 0:01:32.880 --> 0:01:35.319 We had to really we had to bring a console 0:01:35.360 --> 0:01:42.120 in from Scotland and refurbish it. So we rebuilt the 0:01:42.120 --> 0:01:44.039 studio and that's what I've done most of my records 0:01:44.040 --> 0:01:46.520 in the last twelve thirteen years. But the home studio 0:01:46.560 --> 0:01:49.000 here is where i do all my vocals, and the 0:01:49.080 --> 0:01:52.040 vocals I'm kind of known for vocals. That's like part 0:01:52.040 --> 0:01:55.200 of my you know, white people hire me. So I 0:01:55.200 --> 0:01:57.920 have a vocal booth back there and I have you know, 0:01:57.960 --> 0:02:00.240 we're all wired into the other studio with a curs 0:02:00.280 --> 0:02:03.240 and all that kind of stuff. So while I'm doing 0:02:03.240 --> 0:02:05.680 work here and the other studio, they're doing tracking and 0:02:05.760 --> 0:02:08.320 doing all the other stuff the guitars based drums. You know, 0:02:08.320 --> 0:02:12.080 we still are kind of a traditional recording business. You know, 0:02:12.160 --> 0:02:15.440 we still record with real instruments. That's not to say 0:02:15.440 --> 0:02:17.359 we don't usual you know, we still do a lot 0:02:17.360 --> 0:02:19.560 of you know, programming and all that, but people come 0:02:19.560 --> 0:02:21.760 to us because they like the sound of real things 0:02:21.880 --> 0:02:24.320 and they like the sound of humans in projects. So 0:02:24.880 --> 0:02:26.679 that's kind of like our you know, there was a 0:02:26.760 --> 0:02:29.000 moment there where were like, uh, oh, we're going to 0:02:29.000 --> 0:02:32.200 all be replaced by you know, an AI or something. 0:02:32.240 --> 0:02:34.080 But then we realize that there's actually more of a 0:02:34.120 --> 0:02:37.320 demand for real things than you know, there still is 0:02:37.360 --> 0:02:40.000 out there. So yeah, so all the vocals are done here. 0:02:40.240 --> 0:02:43.960 Okay, let's go back to the room. So the room 0:02:44.040 --> 0:02:47.080 you have in Woodland Hills, do you only use it 0:02:47.160 --> 0:02:51.000 yourself or do you have other people use the room? 0:02:52.280 --> 0:02:56.519 Right now, it's mostly my projects and my engineer Mike Plotnikoff, 0:02:56.680 --> 0:03:00.639 who is now a producer, and Joe Rickard. So these 0:03:00.680 --> 0:03:03.519 are guys that you know, back maybe ten years ago 0:03:03.520 --> 0:03:05.720 where my engineers and mostly doing that for me. But 0:03:05.760 --> 0:03:08.800 they've got their own clients now, so they leased the 0:03:08.800 --> 0:03:11.000 studio from me and I kind of give them a 0:03:11.040 --> 0:03:13.040 really good deal for that. I have another producer named 0:03:13.080 --> 0:03:16.440 Lenny Skolnick who works there, so we try to keep 0:03:16.440 --> 0:03:19.600 it within our group of people that we know, because 0:03:19.600 --> 0:03:20.840 you know, there's a lot of gear there, there's a 0:03:20.880 --> 0:03:24.280 lot of stuff. We don't really have a staff that 0:03:24.360 --> 0:03:30.560 can accommodate different producers with different types of methodologies of working, so, 0:03:31.000 --> 0:03:33.480 you know, and we're also really busy, honestly, like we 0:03:33.560 --> 0:03:35.560 are always booked, so we you know, I even have 0:03:35.600 --> 0:03:38.720 trouble with getting my projects in there. So it's mostly 0:03:38.760 --> 0:03:42.520 my stuff, Mike's stuff, Joe's stuff, and mostly honestly, in 0:03:42.560 --> 0:03:45.000 the last four years has been Judge and Jury, the 0:03:45.040 --> 0:03:47.640 record company that I own along with Neil Sanderson from 0:03:47.680 --> 0:03:50.760 Three Days Grace he's my partner, and my son Grady, 0:03:50.880 --> 0:03:53.560 who runs the company. So we use that studio to 0:03:53.600 --> 0:03:55.000 record most of our music there. 0:03:55.320 --> 0:03:59.040 And you know, okay, so most of the big studios 0:03:59.160 --> 0:04:03.640 closed to what degree is your studio Woodland Hill's equivalent, 0:04:04.320 --> 0:04:07.200 like with a big room and certain equipment, just that 0:04:07.280 --> 0:04:10.000 it's basically controlled by you and not used by outside 0:04:10.040 --> 0:04:13.800 sources or would you go to another studio maybe to 0:04:13.840 --> 0:04:14.840 cut basics. 0:04:15.280 --> 0:04:17.320 No, we can do it all there. We have it 0:04:17.320 --> 0:04:19.280 all worked out. I mean the room you know now 0:04:19.279 --> 0:04:21.760 that we've had the room for you know, you know, 0:04:21.839 --> 0:04:25.000 at thirteen twelve thirteen years. We know how to get 0:04:25.000 --> 0:04:27.080 a great drum sound out of that, so we don't 0:04:27.080 --> 0:04:29.159 have to go anywhere else. We can do strings there. 0:04:30.160 --> 0:04:33.880 Our console is an eighty fifty eight Knive, an original 0:04:34.080 --> 0:04:37.760 Rupert Neve console with twenty four inputs. We have all 0:04:37.800 --> 0:04:41.120 the analog year you want, amplifiers, everything. The only thing 0:04:41.160 --> 0:04:42.920 we have to do is when we switch from guitars 0:04:42.920 --> 0:04:44.719 and bass to drums, we have to tear it apart 0:04:44.760 --> 0:04:46.919 and rebuild put it together, you know, so we have 0:04:47.000 --> 0:04:48.560 the room with it, you know, like we're doing drums. 0:04:48.560 --> 0:04:50.040 We don't want to have the amps taking up the 0:04:50.120 --> 0:04:51.800 room space. So you have to do a lot of 0:04:51.839 --> 0:04:53.839 that kind of stuff. But we really don't have to 0:04:53.839 --> 0:04:56.640 go anywhere. The only place we go is to do vocals. 0:04:56.720 --> 0:04:59.240 And I like doing vocals in my home studio because 0:04:59.279 --> 0:05:00.839 I have a folk booth build here. 0:05:00.960 --> 0:05:04.400 Okay for that? So how big is the room in 0:05:04.440 --> 0:05:05.240 Woodland Hills. 0:05:07.680 --> 0:05:11.039 That's a really good question. It's I don't know, Like, 0:05:12.360 --> 0:05:15.120 can I ask my engineer. He's right here, sure, how 0:05:15.120 --> 0:05:19.960 big is it? It's Wooland Hills room, do you think, Yeah, 0:05:20.000 --> 0:05:22.960 it's like the size of two garage too. It's okay. 0:05:23.000 --> 0:05:25.200 So it was originally built for an RV, which I 0:05:25.279 --> 0:05:28.479 just found out. We found the original plans. So it's 0:05:28.480 --> 0:05:32.240 the size of like a two car garage, A big 0:05:32.279 --> 0:05:36.640 two car garage would be the live room right. Then 0:05:36.680 --> 0:05:40.600 the console room is about the same size, so that's 0:05:40.839 --> 0:05:43.440 you can and then there's a separate room for putting 0:05:43.440 --> 0:05:45.800 guitar amps. So there's a third room that you can 0:05:45.880 --> 0:05:48.400 use to isolate. Then there's a fourth room that was 0:05:48.400 --> 0:05:50.719 a bedroom that we use for all our pro tools 0:05:50.760 --> 0:05:54.160 work and you know, just a programming. It's kind of big, actually, 0:05:54.279 --> 0:05:57.800 and it's attached to the house. I'm not sure if 0:05:57.880 --> 0:06:00.960 it's legally attached or not. When I bought it, it 0:06:01.000 --> 0:06:02.880 was set up like that, so we just kind of 0:06:02.920 --> 0:06:06.560 kept it, and you know, it works for us. 0:06:06.760 --> 0:06:09.320 Well how about you know they've been cracked down on 0:06:09.400 --> 0:06:11.000 home studios, how about zoning? 0:06:12.800 --> 0:06:14.560 You wanted something. When we walked in there, we were 0:06:14.560 --> 0:06:16.800 actually very worried about that, and then we realized after 0:06:16.839 --> 0:06:19.840 the first we actually had all these plans to mitigate 0:06:19.880 --> 0:06:22.760 the sound. We realized the neighbors with the kids were 0:06:22.760 --> 0:06:25.920 louder than we were, so we actually are the quietest 0:06:25.960 --> 0:06:28.440 people on the block. We have it so soundproofed, and 0:06:28.480 --> 0:06:31.600 we make sure that our clients are very when they 0:06:31.640 --> 0:06:33.680 come into the It's a flag loot by the way, 0:06:33.720 --> 0:06:35.640 so it's in the back so you don't see it 0:06:35.680 --> 0:06:39.840 from the street. Everybody takes super care to make sure 0:06:39.839 --> 0:06:42.719 that we are the least obtrusive people on the block. 0:06:43.000 --> 0:06:45.359 So nobody's asked us any questions. We have had the 0:06:45.360 --> 0:06:48.120 city out there. They have filmed some stuff there because 0:06:48.120 --> 0:06:50.760 it's a pretty cool filming location, being a flag loot 0:06:50.760 --> 0:06:52.039 and having a lot of land. It's a half an 0:06:52.080 --> 0:06:55.400 acre of land actually, and so we won't run into anything. 0:06:55.560 --> 0:06:56.920 We haven't had any problems at all. 0:06:57.520 --> 0:07:01.680 Okay since the city was there. Technically is it legal? 0:07:02.560 --> 0:07:05.480 Yes, Okay, they've walked around it and we've you know, 0:07:05.720 --> 0:07:09.000 refinanced it and everything. So we just I know that 0:07:09.040 --> 0:07:11.120 there's some things I wouldn't want to dig into. Let's 0:07:11.160 --> 0:07:14.040 put it that way. You know, like there's some paperwork 0:07:14.080 --> 0:07:17.080 I can't find from the original owner. He basically didn't 0:07:17.080 --> 0:07:20.680 pay his property taxes and left fast. So we got 0:07:20.720 --> 0:07:23.000 a really good deal in the house. That's you know, 0:07:24.640 --> 0:07:25.440 kind of what happened. 0:07:25.800 --> 0:07:30.960 So how did you sound proof it? 0:07:30.960 --> 0:07:35.760 It's really interesting. We got a guy in there named 0:07:35.760 --> 0:07:38.400 Matt Ellingson and he was kind of built Bay seven 0:07:38.440 --> 0:07:41.360 Studios in North Hollywood. That's where I came from. I 0:07:41.440 --> 0:07:43.200 was there for about twelve years. That's where I made 0:07:43.240 --> 0:07:45.800 all these records, the Mike Camp stuff. Everything was done there, 0:07:46.400 --> 0:07:49.640 and we just kind of said, okay, this is okay 0:07:49.720 --> 0:07:54.040 for doing trumpets and violins and Disney stuff. But we 0:07:54.080 --> 0:07:56.760 put on an extra I would say, about two inches 0:07:56.800 --> 0:07:59.960 of insulation on the interior of the house all aroun 0:08:00.040 --> 0:08:03.040 round it. And it worked. You know, we were kind 0:08:03.080 --> 0:08:05.360 of estimating, honestly, we didn't really do it that technically. 0:08:05.400 --> 0:08:08.440 We figured, okay, if we point to guitar amps this direction, 0:08:08.640 --> 0:08:10.760 we do the drums that direction. We you know, we 0:08:10.800 --> 0:08:13.040 insulate the walls that are towards the outside of the 0:08:13.040 --> 0:08:16.880 studio very well. We also, the bigger problem wasn't this 0:08:17.120 --> 0:08:19.920 actually the sound going out to the neighbors. It was 0:08:19.960 --> 0:08:23.920 the sound coming into the control room. We couldn't even 0:08:24.600 --> 0:08:26.720 play a guitar without hearing it in the control room. 0:08:26.760 --> 0:08:28.120 That we had to do a lot of work to 0:08:28.200 --> 0:08:31.120 isolate that. You know, somebody said, I think it was 0:08:32.480 --> 0:08:34.559 you know, Massenberg or something that you have to look 0:08:34.600 --> 0:08:37.800 at sound as water. If there's a leak, it's going 0:08:37.880 --> 0:08:40.160 to come through. So we had to make sure that 0:08:40.240 --> 0:08:42.920 there were no leaks, like everything was plugged up. So 0:08:43.080 --> 0:08:45.160 it took us about two or three weeks. We actually 0:08:45.200 --> 0:08:46.400 went through a kind of a bit of a thing 0:08:46.400 --> 0:08:48.040 where we were thinking, maybe we'll put everything in the 0:08:48.080 --> 0:08:50.280 other garage on the other side of the house and 0:08:50.360 --> 0:08:52.720 run tie lines in so we don't have the sound. 0:08:53.120 --> 0:08:55.000 But that just turned into a bit of a nightmare. 0:08:55.360 --> 0:08:58.160 So we you know, hey, we can run these full 0:08:58.240 --> 0:09:02.280 on marshal amps at full blast and we don't have 0:09:02.400 --> 0:09:04.280 any problem with it at all. So we did it 0:09:04.320 --> 0:09:06.119 pretty you know, we had to do a few adjustments 0:09:06.160 --> 0:09:08.320 later on with it to make it work, but I 0:09:08.320 --> 0:09:10.040 think we have it pretty well now. It's been working 0:09:10.080 --> 0:09:11.959 pretty well and no complaints, you know. 0:09:12.760 --> 0:09:18.480 Okay, So why would you not cut vocals there and 0:09:18.600 --> 0:09:20.040 do the vocals in your house. 0:09:20.960 --> 0:09:23.400 That's a personal thing that I liked. I liked to 0:09:23.440 --> 0:09:26.400 be with the singer, with my engineer Hatch, who is 0:09:26.440 --> 0:09:31.640 here away from the There's so much going on at 0:09:31.640 --> 0:09:34.439 the studio, people coming in and out. It actually is distracting. 0:09:35.080 --> 0:09:37.679 And I've always kind of liked to do vocals one 0:09:37.679 --> 0:09:39.600 on one with singers. That's just something I like to do. 0:09:39.640 --> 0:09:42.400 I like to have a It's a very personal thing 0:09:42.440 --> 0:09:44.959 for singers to sing and when I can just talk 0:09:45.000 --> 0:09:46.840 to them. In fact, I don't even have a talkback. 0:09:47.120 --> 0:09:49.960 I use an open mic, so there's never me pushing 0:09:49.960 --> 0:09:52.920 a button. They can always hear what I'm saying, so 0:09:52.960 --> 0:09:55.520 there's never the thought that I'm saying something about them. 0:09:55.840 --> 0:09:57.880 I learned that early on when I worked with Al 0:09:58.000 --> 0:09:59.679 McKay from Earth withinin Fire. He was one of the 0:09:59.720 --> 0:10:01.760 first people I came out to LA and worked with 0:10:02.040 --> 0:10:04.959 and I did vocals with him, and I realized how 0:10:06.040 --> 0:10:09.240 the talkback button can get you in trouble if you 0:10:09.400 --> 0:10:11.560 say something you don't realize somebody pressed it or didn't 0:10:11.600 --> 0:10:13.320 press it. So I said, you know what, I'm not 0:10:13.320 --> 0:10:15.360 going to have a talkback, but I'm going to leave 0:10:15.360 --> 0:10:17.960 the mic open. So right here is a fifty seven 0:10:18.000 --> 0:10:20.600 that's always on. Singer is in the vocal booth. They 0:10:20.640 --> 0:10:22.760 can always hear what I'm thinking and saying. I could 0:10:22.760 --> 0:10:25.560 hear what they're thinking and saying, and it keeps it 0:10:25.640 --> 0:10:28.600 more honest. It doesn't it's not like they're thinking, oh, 0:10:28.679 --> 0:10:31.160 Howard doesn't like this, or he's saying something to the engineer, 0:10:31.280 --> 0:10:33.800 or he's you know. I think it just keeps more 0:10:33.840 --> 0:10:39.040 of an honest relationship between me and the singer. So yeah, 0:10:39.080 --> 0:10:40.959 and I just like a smaller room. The room in 0:10:41.000 --> 0:10:43.400 the studio is a little too big, honestly, the vocal 0:10:43.400 --> 0:10:45.560 booth is and even when we try and put like 0:10:45.640 --> 0:10:48.080 baffles around it still a little bit here. It's a 0:10:48.160 --> 0:10:50.280 dead room. It's actually a room, believe it or not. 0:10:50.320 --> 0:10:53.480 When we built this house, the contractor had an attic 0:10:53.600 --> 0:10:55.600 space that was nothing in it, and I kept saying 0:10:55.600 --> 0:10:58.560 to my wife Monica, what's in that attic space, Like, 0:10:58.600 --> 0:11:01.800 there's nothing. I don't know what's there. So had him 0:11:01.840 --> 0:11:03.480 come back and he knocked a hole in the wall. 0:11:03.720 --> 0:11:07.480 There's this big empty attic and I said, you know, 0:11:07.880 --> 0:11:11.800 being a producer, vocal booth. So I had the same guy, 0:11:11.880 --> 0:11:13.920 Matt who helped us at the studio, come in and 0:11:13.960 --> 0:11:19.000 build a soundproof vocal booth, hardwired microphones. There's a Leslie 0:11:19.080 --> 0:11:21.640 cabinet back there from my Ham and Oregon, all wired 0:11:21.720 --> 0:11:23.960 up ready to go. Because I love putting organ on stuff. 0:11:24.480 --> 0:11:27.520 And yeah, I have a good relationship with my singers 0:11:27.559 --> 0:11:30.640 they come here, they know it's by the way. They 0:11:30.679 --> 0:11:33.760 also sometimes don't like singing around their band members and 0:11:34.000 --> 0:11:36.360 that kind of takes them out of that place. So 0:11:36.400 --> 0:11:40.079 they can sing with me and you know, we can 0:11:40.120 --> 0:11:42.720 talk honestly about things or not having somebody say hey, 0:11:42.720 --> 0:11:44.760 try this or try that. You know, it doesn't interrupt 0:11:44.800 --> 0:11:46.600 the flow. So I got used to that. I've been 0:11:46.640 --> 0:11:48.400 doing it like that for twenty years. Even at Base 0:11:48.440 --> 0:11:50.880 seven when I was there, I had my own vocal 0:11:50.920 --> 0:11:53.720 booth area where it wasn't part of the studio. I 0:11:53.760 --> 0:11:57.760 had the owner build it in the attic there and 0:11:57.840 --> 0:12:00.760 we would have them climb up a staircase and it 0:12:00.760 --> 0:12:02.720 would just be me and the singer and my engineer, Hatch, 0:12:03.200 --> 0:12:06.040 and that was it. You know, that's that's the only 0:12:06.080 --> 0:12:06.680 people there. 0:12:07.240 --> 0:12:10.360 Okay, when someone's in the vocal booth working with you 0:12:10.400 --> 0:12:12.120 at home, can they see you? 0:12:12.160 --> 0:12:12.280 No? 0:12:12.840 --> 0:12:13.760 And I can't see them? 0:12:13.840 --> 0:12:16.400 And is that conscious or the way the room worked out? 0:12:16.440 --> 0:12:18.400 That's the way I like it. I like it like that. 0:12:18.559 --> 0:12:21.120 I don't care what they're doing in there, you know, 0:12:21.400 --> 0:12:24.520 they I just need great vocals so they can just 0:12:24.559 --> 0:12:26.080 do whatever they want, you know, as long as I 0:12:26.120 --> 0:12:28.160 can tell, you know, when they're not up on the 0:12:28.200 --> 0:12:31.319 mic and something's off. But in there they have they 0:12:31.320 --> 0:12:33.480 can adjust their own levels too, So we have a 0:12:33.480 --> 0:12:36.760 separate mixer in there where they can adjust their volume 0:12:36.800 --> 0:12:39.160 of their vocal. They can adjust the volume of the 0:12:39.240 --> 0:12:41.960 track so they don't have to talk to me about 0:12:41.960 --> 0:12:44.280 that stuff. They can just sit there with their hands 0:12:44.280 --> 0:12:46.599 on the thing, so they can go over it and 0:12:46.640 --> 0:12:49.040 they can adjust like you know, a lot of times 0:12:49.040 --> 0:12:50.760 the singer will go, oh, turn me up, turn me down. 0:12:50.840 --> 0:12:52.720 It's not this, there's not that here. They can just 0:12:52.760 --> 0:12:54.560 do it all on their own, and so they have 0:12:54.600 --> 0:12:58.200 more control over their own sound. You know, it works 0:12:58.200 --> 0:12:58.920 out really well. 0:12:59.120 --> 0:13:03.360 Okay, So you're saying you're known for your vocals, you're 0:13:03.400 --> 0:13:06.240 cutting them in your house. You know, you're keeping your 0:13:06.280 --> 0:13:09.720 mic live the whole time. What else is involved in 0:13:09.760 --> 0:13:10.920 your special sauce. 0:13:12.000 --> 0:13:14.120 We have a Sony C eight hundred mike that I 0:13:14.280 --> 0:13:17.160 got after I did the Hoobastank song The Reason, which 0:13:17.200 --> 0:13:20.160 was a pretty big song for me. I didn't like 0:13:20.200 --> 0:13:22.440 I heard the song on the radio when I was 0:13:22.520 --> 0:13:24.920 driving around, and I didn't like how it sounded. I 0:13:24.960 --> 0:13:27.200 was using an eighty seven or a sixty seven. I 0:13:27.200 --> 0:13:29.880 forget what mike it was. I remember said to my engineer, 0:13:29.960 --> 0:13:33.080 you know what, I think, this doesn't sound hyped enough 0:13:33.120 --> 0:13:37.760 for me. It just sounds too dull. So we he suggested, Hey, 0:13:37.840 --> 0:13:39.560 we should use this new mic. It just came out 0:13:39.600 --> 0:13:41.800 the Sony C eight hundred. It's a much more hyped 0:13:41.880 --> 0:13:45.560 up mic, much more top end, more strident. But we 0:13:45.640 --> 0:13:47.839 need to have a knave like ten eighty seven or 0:13:47.880 --> 0:13:50.520 something like that to calm it down a little bit. 0:13:50.559 --> 0:13:52.200 And then a compressor A tube in fact, is right 0:13:52.240 --> 0:13:53.760 in front of me, the kneve and the tube tech. 0:13:54.440 --> 0:13:56.520 It goes right from the mic to the kneve to 0:13:56.559 --> 0:13:59.240 the twuoe tech straight into pro tools. That's it. Nothing 0:13:59.240 --> 0:14:03.040 else is going on now to me. The special sauce 0:14:03.320 --> 0:14:06.760 is coming back to the singer's headphones. Is a much 0:14:06.800 --> 0:14:10.680 more compressed version of their vocal. We're not recording it compressed, 0:14:11.040 --> 0:14:13.959 but I have it slammed going into their headphones so 0:14:14.000 --> 0:14:16.200 they can get on the mic off the mic, and 0:14:16.280 --> 0:14:19.960 it's just like this, and they sound amazing in their headphones. 0:14:20.000 --> 0:14:22.480 And I've always believed that the headphone mix is a 0:14:22.560 --> 0:14:24.920 huge part of getting a good vocal out of a singer. 0:14:25.200 --> 0:14:27.000 If they don't sound good in their headphones, they don't 0:14:27.200 --> 0:14:28.160 think they're going to sound good. 0:14:28.480 --> 0:14:28.640 Now. 0:14:28.640 --> 0:14:30.160 I don't use auto tune. I know a lot of 0:14:30.160 --> 0:14:32.680 people do that. I don't do that, but I have 0:14:32.760 --> 0:14:35.480 it so that the level is not changing very much 0:14:35.480 --> 0:14:38.400 in their headphones. It's a very static level. I'll worry 0:14:38.400 --> 0:14:40.440 about it on my end, do you know what I mean? Right, 0:14:40.600 --> 0:14:43.600 they're not I'm not going to have them worry about it. So, yeah, 0:14:43.640 --> 0:14:45.600 that's part of my special sauce is that, you know, 0:14:45.640 --> 0:14:47.280 and if they want a little rever, a little rever, 0:14:47.560 --> 0:14:48.440 if they want some of that, you. 0:14:48.440 --> 0:14:51.160 Know, starting like forty five years ago, they started to 0:14:51.240 --> 0:14:54.640 com vocals, etc. What's your style in terms of cutting. 0:14:55.160 --> 0:14:57.160 I learned how to comp vocals from the greatest of 0:14:57.160 --> 0:15:01.720 all time to meet Keith Olsen. Keith was one of 0:15:01.720 --> 0:15:04.440 my mentors, and we would sit and do vocals on 0:15:04.520 --> 0:15:08.320 tape back then and have them graded, and every line 0:15:08.360 --> 0:15:11.080 had a grade on it, and you got a seven 0:15:11.200 --> 0:15:13.680 for just being in the vocal booth, and if it 0:15:13.720 --> 0:15:16.200 was a really good vocal, you got a nine. So 0:15:16.600 --> 0:15:18.800 and I always said to him, why is it seven 0:15:18.840 --> 0:15:21.880 to nine? And he goes, because you're here it's a 0:15:21.920 --> 0:15:24.880 seven because you're even in the studio, and nobody gets 0:15:24.880 --> 0:15:28.920 a ten because nobody's good enough. So basically we would 0:15:28.960 --> 0:15:30.920 go through every line and grade them seven, eight, nine, 0:15:31.400 --> 0:15:33.160 and there'd be three or four people grading it. Then 0:15:33.200 --> 0:15:34.920 we would take that give it to the engineer. They 0:15:34.920 --> 0:15:37.640 would comp the vocal like that. So I learned how 0:15:37.640 --> 0:15:40.800 to listen very critically through things with him. And he 0:15:40.880 --> 0:15:44.080 was a genius at doing vocals. He did all those Fleetwood, 0:15:44.120 --> 0:15:47.480 Mac and White Snake records. And you know, I can't 0:15:47.520 --> 0:15:49.720 credit him enough for teaching me how to be a 0:15:49.720 --> 0:15:52.560 real per, how to handle myself in the studio, and 0:15:52.760 --> 0:15:56.920 just you know how important vocals were because he cared 0:15:56.920 --> 0:15:59.120 about I mean, he was the rest of the track 0:15:59.240 --> 0:16:01.480 was important to him, But the vocals are when I 0:16:01.480 --> 0:16:04.440 could see his brain really click on, you know, where 0:16:04.560 --> 0:16:06.920 like this is the melody, this is the harmonies have 0:16:06.960 --> 0:16:08.680 to be here, this is where it fits in the track. 0:16:08.720 --> 0:16:11.440 We don't have enough space. There's all this kind of 0:16:11.440 --> 0:16:20.320 stuff that I picked up from him. 0:16:20.400 --> 0:16:23.200 Okay, Traditionally the vocals are cut last. Is that what 0:16:23.280 --> 0:16:23.600 you do? 0:16:24.160 --> 0:16:26.760 No, I cut them right away as soon as I 0:16:26.760 --> 0:16:30.480 have In fact, i'm cutting three days Grace. Today we're 0:16:30.520 --> 0:16:33.160 just working to demos. You know, they're going to cut 0:16:33.160 --> 0:16:35.840 the rest of the stuff in the studio, the bass, 0:16:35.880 --> 0:16:38.040 guitar and drums, following what the demo is. But I'm 0:16:38.040 --> 0:16:39.920 going to cut the vocals to the demo because I 0:16:39.960 --> 0:16:42.280 know it's close enough. I don't need the rest of 0:16:42.320 --> 0:16:44.080 the track for that. In fact, I think that's a 0:16:44.160 --> 0:16:47.280 huge mistake cutting them lost. I think that makes them 0:16:47.280 --> 0:16:49.800 sound like they're the least important thing. To me, they're 0:16:49.800 --> 0:16:51.880 the most important thing. I want to get the vocals 0:16:51.880 --> 0:16:54.480 done right away, because what if I have to redo them, 0:16:54.600 --> 0:16:57.000 you know, or I want to change them or something. 0:16:57.120 --> 0:17:00.360 So I think producers. I don't see producers making that steak, 0:17:01.400 --> 0:17:05.160 although I guess they do, because you know, you might 0:17:05.200 --> 0:17:07.320 be maybe they do, but I don't. I don't do that, 0:17:07.480 --> 0:17:10.280 like I think that's the number. To me, you're walking 0:17:10.320 --> 0:17:13.919 through CVS and you're hearing your song on that little speaker, 0:17:13.960 --> 0:17:18.000 what are you hearing vocals? That's it? So to me, 0:17:18.440 --> 0:17:21.760 that's what matters. I honestly, the rest of the stuff, 0:17:22.400 --> 0:17:24.359 I don't care if it's a strat or a less paul. 0:17:25.040 --> 0:17:27.080 I don't care what strings they're using. I don't care 0:17:27.080 --> 0:17:30.720 what you know, drumheads, because if the vocal isn't good 0:17:30.720 --> 0:17:32.880 and the song isn't good and the lyrics aren't good, 0:17:33.119 --> 0:17:36.240 it's not good to me. That's how I think about it, 0:17:36.320 --> 0:17:38.119 And that's kind of when I started having hits, by 0:17:38.119 --> 0:17:39.800 the way, it is when I started thinking that way, 0:17:40.640 --> 0:17:40.880 you know. 0:17:41.240 --> 0:17:47.240 Generally speaking, when someone's here cutting vocals with you, are 0:17:47.280 --> 0:17:49.840 you cutting song by song? Do you like the whole 0:17:49.880 --> 0:17:52.119 album written? What do you do? 0:17:52.840 --> 0:17:54.919 I do it song by song. But I'm still an 0:17:54.960 --> 0:17:58.000 album guy. I love albums. You know, a lot of 0:17:58.000 --> 0:18:00.800 the bands I produce still make albums, but the albums 0:18:00.840 --> 0:18:03.399 aren't made the way they used to be in a 0:18:03.480 --> 0:18:06.000 six week period. They're made over a lot of time 0:18:06.080 --> 0:18:08.800 in between bands touring schedules and everything else. You know, 0:18:08.800 --> 0:18:10.439 it's just a different business than it used to be. 0:18:10.880 --> 0:18:13.200 The bands don't make as much money from the music, 0:18:13.280 --> 0:18:15.639 so they're touring and taking gigs and taking you know, 0:18:15.720 --> 0:18:19.679 doing other things like the music is almost I always 0:18:19.840 --> 0:18:21.800 looked at it that the music was the most important 0:18:21.840 --> 0:18:24.600 thing in their lives. Now the touring is almost more 0:18:24.640 --> 0:18:27.399 important to them because they need to make money. So 0:18:27.560 --> 0:18:30.679 I'm there to accommodate their schedule a lot. You know, 0:18:30.920 --> 0:18:32.920 like a lot of times when I do an Inflames record, 0:18:32.960 --> 0:18:34.800 or I do even a three days Grace record, or 0:18:34.840 --> 0:18:36.960 I'm doing some Daughtry stuff in a couple of weeks, 0:18:37.359 --> 0:18:40.719 it's in between their touring schedule. You know, they'll fly in, 0:18:40.840 --> 0:18:43.600 we'll do some vocals, they'll fly out, so you know, 0:18:44.119 --> 0:18:46.320 and we have to nail it pretty much. 0:18:46.480 --> 0:18:49.920 You know. Okay, I'm coming in, I'm cutting a song. 0:18:50.960 --> 0:18:52.440 How many times are I going to have to sing 0:18:52.480 --> 0:18:52.920 it for you? 0:18:53.760 --> 0:18:56.600 Not that many. I'm not one of those guys that 0:18:56.680 --> 0:19:00.480 does an eight hours My My average vocals session for 0:19:00.560 --> 0:19:03.160 one song is about two hours. That's it. 0:19:03.720 --> 0:19:07.680 Okay, I'm in there singing. Are you ever going to 0:19:07.840 --> 0:19:11.240 change the lyrics or say you should absolutely tell me 0:19:11.280 --> 0:19:11.840 about really? 0:19:12.600 --> 0:19:17.760 Well, you know what, it's an interesting point about how 0:19:17.840 --> 0:19:21.119 you bring that up. If you tell an artist ahead 0:19:21.119 --> 0:19:22.879 of time that you need to change the lyrics, a 0:19:22.960 --> 0:19:25.480 lot of times you're going to get this response. Not 0:19:25.560 --> 0:19:28.600 a lot of times, but dude, that's my favorite part 0:19:28.600 --> 0:19:30.560 of the song. I can't believe you don't like it, 0:19:30.720 --> 0:19:32.840 and then they're going to obsess over it. Talk to 0:19:32.880 --> 0:19:35.359 the band, I like to have the artist in the 0:19:35.359 --> 0:19:37.479 studio on the mic, and then I'll say, you know what, 0:19:37.560 --> 0:19:40.040 I'm not sure I'm feeling that line, even though I've 0:19:40.080 --> 0:19:43.560 known about it for about a month, But right at 0:19:43.560 --> 0:19:45.639 that moment, I'm going to get more of a response 0:19:45.760 --> 0:19:47.680 of okay, Lee, let me give me a second. Let's 0:19:47.680 --> 0:19:49.360 try and work something now, and they'll bring out there 0:19:49.440 --> 0:19:53.320 you know, spelled you know, rhyming dictionaries or whatever you 0:19:53.359 --> 0:19:55.399 know they use and we can kind of do it. 0:19:55.520 --> 0:19:58.000 Or sometimes I'll call this the main writer on the 0:19:58.040 --> 0:20:00.840 phone and I'll say, hey, dude, we got rewrite this line. 0:20:01.000 --> 0:20:02.800 We're gonna move on. Can you come up with something? 0:20:03.240 --> 0:20:06.280 So yeah, I'm very I think that's huge. The lyrics, 0:20:06.320 --> 0:20:09.000 I mean, I've changed lyrics on lots of songs that 0:20:09.040 --> 0:20:11.280 have made a huge difference to me in the sales 0:20:11.680 --> 0:20:14.600 of the songs, you know, just because you know, we've 0:20:14.640 --> 0:20:17.359 known that that was a bad lyric. But we know 0:20:17.400 --> 0:20:18.920 if we bring it up at the wrong time, we're 0:20:18.960 --> 0:20:23.159 never gonna get it changed. There'll be an argument against 0:20:23.280 --> 0:20:25.840 us from the entire band that we can't overcome. So 0:20:25.920 --> 0:20:28.480 you have to just hold your powder to the right moment, 0:20:28.680 --> 0:20:30.320 you know, it's kind of like knowing when they run 0:20:30.320 --> 0:20:33.159 the Philly Special, you know what I mean, it's a 0:20:33.240 --> 0:20:34.240 joke for Philly fans. 0:20:34.960 --> 0:20:35.879 Oh okay. 0:20:36.720 --> 0:20:38.800 Do they tend to come up with the new line 0:20:38.840 --> 0:20:42.720 that fast? Well, that's my job is to push hard 0:20:42.760 --> 0:20:44.840 to do it. Yeah, Like, I know what I'm looking for. 0:20:44.920 --> 0:20:47.240 A lot of times it's a line. It's really bad. 0:20:47.320 --> 0:20:48.720 It's not a lined. It's not good. 0:20:49.200 --> 0:20:51.280 It's a lined. It's like a cul de sac where 0:20:51.440 --> 0:20:53.800 they wrote themselves into a like you know, you have 0:20:53.840 --> 0:20:58.080 this nice flow and then all of a sudden you're like, uh, people, 0:20:58.119 --> 0:21:01.159 places and things. I don't care. It's got to be 0:21:01.240 --> 0:21:04.920 something emotional. We're selling feelings here, that's what we are. 0:21:04.960 --> 0:21:09.400 That's our business, you know, selling like people, places and things. 0:21:09.560 --> 0:21:12.240 That doesn't do anything. So I'm usually looking for something 0:21:12.280 --> 0:21:15.320 that's going to connect on an emotional level. It's going 0:21:15.400 --> 0:21:18.520 to further the you know, the feeling I'm trying to 0:21:18.600 --> 0:21:21.480 or the artist is trying to get across. So it's 0:21:21.520 --> 0:21:24.720 not we're not talking about wholesale rewriting here. A lot 0:21:24.760 --> 0:21:26.760 of times it's just a line or two, or there's 0:21:26.800 --> 0:21:29.959 a word that doesn't rhyme correctly that maybe they missed, Uh, 0:21:30.080 --> 0:21:32.879 maybe there's a W instead of an I. That happens 0:21:32.920 --> 0:21:35.439 a lot where people switch tenses too much, you know, 0:21:35.560 --> 0:21:39.280 or not tenses, but you know, they'll say like you know, I, 0:21:39.320 --> 0:21:41.560 I you and then there's a W and then you go, well, 0:21:41.560 --> 0:21:44.280 wait a second, we you know, do we want to 0:21:44.320 --> 0:21:46.360 say that? Is that what we're trying to say? We're 0:21:46.359 --> 0:21:48.159 going to make a big message here and say we 0:21:48.840 --> 0:21:50.560 you know? Or is that do we want to keep 0:21:50.560 --> 0:21:52.760 it focused on the relationship between the two people. You know, 0:21:52.800 --> 0:21:55.119 those type of conversations come up a lot, you know. 0:21:56.440 --> 0:21:58.919 Okay, so let's assume I'm going to cut a vocal 0:21:59.000 --> 0:22:02.359 with you. Ay, how far in advance would I schedule it? 0:22:02.440 --> 0:22:02.520 Be? 0:22:02.720 --> 0:22:04.480 What do you want? You want a demo in a 0:22:04.560 --> 0:22:05.560 lyric sheet or. 0:22:05.400 --> 0:22:08.040 What I want? A lyric sheet? For sure? And a 0:22:08.080 --> 0:22:09.639 demo would be nice because I like to put the 0:22:09.640 --> 0:22:12.399 demo in the session because there's certain things on the 0:22:12.440 --> 0:22:15.719 demo that you can't reproduce the kind of you know, 0:22:15.800 --> 0:22:19.320 the inflections of the vocal or just the phrasing, and 0:22:19.560 --> 0:22:22.119 artists will misremember a lot of that stuff, like what 0:22:22.240 --> 0:22:23.760 did I do on the demo? So it's nice to 0:22:23.800 --> 0:22:27.280 have the reference there. You know, you know, I just 0:22:27.480 --> 0:22:30.800 would like you to warm up. Actually, warming up is 0:22:30.800 --> 0:22:33.000 a good thing. You know, when you're not warmed up, 0:22:33.000 --> 0:22:36.200 that means we have to do extra takes and extra 0:22:36.240 --> 0:22:40.080 takes or sometimes you know, it's that immediacy that you 0:22:40.200 --> 0:22:42.640 want to get out of a vocal. That's sometimes great. 0:22:42.760 --> 0:22:46.200 You know that the first shot at it is sometimes 0:22:46.240 --> 0:22:48.520 the truth. But if you're not warmed up, you know, 0:22:48.840 --> 0:22:50.960 so I'll sort of ask, hey, just do a few 0:22:50.960 --> 0:22:53.040 minutes of warming up. You don't have to go crazy here, 0:22:53.480 --> 0:22:53.679 you know. 0:22:54.760 --> 0:22:58.160 But let's assume I'm cutting the vocal. As you said 0:22:58.200 --> 0:23:02.159 with Keith Olson, nobody's perfect. What might you say to 0:23:02.240 --> 0:23:03.879 me to get the best vocal? 0:23:05.640 --> 0:23:08.960 I'm not. I don't. I'm not believing it right now, Bob. 0:23:09.280 --> 0:23:11.600 You got to sell You're just not selling it enough. 0:23:11.680 --> 0:23:14.560 Like I mean, it's cool and everything, but it's not 0:23:14.640 --> 0:23:19.520 changing my life. I'm not giving you exact things. I'm 0:23:19.520 --> 0:23:22.040 not saying sing it like this. Sing. I never do that, 0:23:22.440 --> 0:23:24.800 and people think I do that because they go, oh, 0:23:24.880 --> 0:23:27.480 look at these records. You must know. I want you 0:23:27.560 --> 0:23:29.200 to give me it the way you want to give 0:23:29.240 --> 0:23:31.159 it to me, But you have to give it to 0:23:31.160 --> 0:23:34.320 me with conviction. You have to sell it to me. 0:23:34.440 --> 0:23:36.719 You have to give it to me that I'm feeling something. 0:23:36.760 --> 0:23:39.040 And if I can't feel it, what are we doing here? 0:23:40.000 --> 0:23:40.199 You know? 0:23:40.680 --> 0:23:43.640 That's that's it. And I you know, I never get 0:23:45.000 --> 0:23:48.520 abusive in there with I mean, I've been with abusive producers, 0:23:48.560 --> 0:23:52.000 and I started my career working for some people I 0:23:52.040 --> 0:23:54.280 won't name who are just like, hey man, you know 0:23:54.359 --> 0:23:56.720 you just suck in there. You know you shouldn't even 0:23:56.720 --> 0:23:59.480 be in. I can't believe you're even like in this project. 0:23:59.480 --> 0:24:00.840 You know, I'm like, no, I'm never going to go 0:24:00.920 --> 0:24:03.280 that way. I'm gonna just be trying to give them 0:24:03.320 --> 0:24:07.399 positive reinforcement. But you have to make me happy right 0:24:07.440 --> 0:24:10.240 now and yourself, you know, or imagine you're in front 0:24:10.240 --> 0:24:12.240 of one hundred thousand kids right now, you got to act. 0:24:12.400 --> 0:24:15.399 We got to feel that right now. So you know, 0:24:15.520 --> 0:24:17.760 I'm sometimes at odds against the band too. Some of 0:24:17.800 --> 0:24:21.000 the band, the bands that come in, they don't really 0:24:21.040 --> 0:24:22.920 know what they're looking for either, and they'll say the 0:24:22.960 --> 0:24:24.879 wrong things to the singer. And that's sometimes why I 0:24:24.880 --> 0:24:27.199 don't want the bands in the studio with me. Like 0:24:27.280 --> 0:24:29.520 sometimes they'll just give them what their movie in their 0:24:29.560 --> 0:24:31.439 head is, you know, like I'm trying to get the 0:24:31.480 --> 0:24:33.920 singer to give me his movie what's in his head? 0:24:34.119 --> 0:24:36.480 So a lot of times you don't want the distractions 0:24:36.480 --> 0:24:39.040 of other people saying things, you know, to get some 0:24:39.160 --> 0:24:41.159 the you know, they can throw off your vocal. I 0:24:41.160 --> 0:24:43.919 trust myself enough at this point, you know, to know 0:24:43.960 --> 0:24:46.440 what I want, and then I do harmonies. I'm a 0:24:46.520 --> 0:24:49.840 very big harmony guy. I stick to bach. I'm a 0:24:49.880 --> 0:24:52.440 Bach guy. When I went to music school, I learned 0:24:52.440 --> 0:24:54.280 a lot. I mean, I have a degree in engineering 0:24:54.320 --> 0:24:56.879 and aerospace engineering from Drexel, but I took a year 0:24:56.920 --> 0:25:00.280 off and went to music school and studied real hardcore harmony. 0:25:00.400 --> 0:25:03.520 Arrangements hinder myth all that stuff. And when I do 0:25:03.600 --> 0:25:07.240 my arrangements, they're very traditional. Like all the arrangements I do. 0:25:07.320 --> 0:25:09.159 I try not. I stick away from parallel four its 0:25:09.200 --> 0:25:12.439 parallel fiss I. You know, I don't take the harmony 0:25:12.440 --> 0:25:15.160 and flip it over the vocal so the ear gets 0:25:15.320 --> 0:25:18.119 you know, mistakenly taken to the harmony, all that kind 0:25:18.160 --> 0:25:20.159 of stuff. But I do break the rules, you know, 0:25:20.280 --> 0:25:22.919 when I want to break them. So harmonies to me, 0:25:22.960 --> 0:25:25.320 are there to emphasize the lead vocal to make sure 0:25:25.320 --> 0:25:27.200 the lead you know you want to when you listen 0:25:27.200 --> 0:25:28.879 to the Beatles, they're the best at it. They know 0:25:28.960 --> 0:25:32.120 how to go from three part harmony to unisons, back 0:25:32.160 --> 0:25:35.240 to three part back to unisons, and it emphasizes certain 0:25:35.280 --> 0:25:37.240 lines and that also builds on the vocal. I'm thinking 0:25:37.280 --> 0:25:40.200 about that at exactly the same time we're doing the vocal. Hey, 0:25:40.200 --> 0:25:41.880 I'm going to put up a harmony here. Oh, I'm 0:25:41.880 --> 0:25:43.439 going to do a lower vocal here, I'm going to 0:25:43.440 --> 0:25:45.680 do a falsetto here, I'm gonna do a third above 0:25:45.680 --> 0:25:47.399 the vocal here, I'm gonna do a six below the 0:25:47.440 --> 0:25:49.920 vocal here. And then sometimes that guides me on about 0:25:49.920 --> 0:25:52.440 how I'm going to have you sing it. You know, 0:25:52.680 --> 0:25:54.240 there are certain things where I'm going to go, Okay, 0:25:54.280 --> 0:25:56.120 the energy is going to come from this high harmony 0:25:56.119 --> 0:25:58.440 part I'm going to put on there, and invariably i 0:25:58.480 --> 0:26:00.840 get well, if I can't sing above it s and 0:26:00.880 --> 0:26:04.520 I'm like, yeah, you can, you can, You're gonna you know, 0:26:04.760 --> 0:26:08.080 and they invariably do. So, you know, you just have 0:26:08.160 --> 0:26:10.399 to kind of get their heads positive about it, and 0:26:10.400 --> 0:26:12.280 all of a sudden you're hitting d's and then ease, 0:26:12.359 --> 0:26:13.720 and they're like, oh my god, I never sang that 0:26:13.800 --> 0:26:16.040 high in my life. Well, you only have to do 0:26:16.080 --> 0:26:19.960 it twice, so you know that in the double and 0:26:20.080 --> 0:26:22.280 I got it. Now, what am I gonna do live? 0:26:23.080 --> 0:26:26.080 That's your problem, you know, that's not my problem. 0:26:26.160 --> 0:26:30.240 Oh okay. You know you talk about the sixties, the Beatles, 0:26:30.280 --> 0:26:34.520 et cetera. You know you actually had backup singers, whether 0:26:34.640 --> 0:26:36.840 members of the band are external people. Then you hit 0:26:36.880 --> 0:26:41.040 the seventies, lead singers are doing their own backgrounds and 0:26:41.080 --> 0:26:43.720 their own Hartleys. What's your viewpoint on that? 0:26:44.400 --> 0:26:46.840 It's both are great. If I have a band member 0:26:46.840 --> 0:26:49.600 that can sing backgrounds, I'd rather have, and and they 0:26:49.640 --> 0:26:52.000 have been singing with the lead singer for a while, 0:26:52.920 --> 0:26:56.880 it's magic, absolutely, like you get this other thing happening. 0:26:56.960 --> 0:26:59.679 It's like Jagger and Richard's and stuff like that. You know, 0:26:59.720 --> 0:27:04.960 you know these other sounds that come out. But there's 0:27:04.960 --> 0:27:08.359 also something cool about having a singer that does their 0:27:08.400 --> 0:27:10.800 own vocals. Like when I do Daughtries record, for example, 0:27:10.800 --> 0:27:13.520 he sings his own vocal harmonies and he sounds great 0:27:13.560 --> 0:27:17.360 singing them together. You know, Kelly Clarkson, when I did her, 0:27:17.520 --> 0:27:20.480 I had Kara Diaguardi do the backgrounds because she's a 0:27:20.520 --> 0:27:24.879 great singer and she can sing with you know, Kelly 0:27:25.000 --> 0:27:27.679 very well. They match great. So I think it just 0:27:27.680 --> 0:27:29.600 depends on what's going on. You know, a lot of 0:27:29.600 --> 0:27:32.439 times in three days Grace, for example, Neil the drummer 0:27:32.520 --> 0:27:35.000 likes to sing the octaves, so I'll have him do it, 0:27:35.000 --> 0:27:36.399 and he does a great job at that. So I 0:27:36.400 --> 0:27:39.359 think it really depends on the song. You know, a 0:27:39.400 --> 0:27:41.160 lot of times the singer, by the way, cannot sing 0:27:41.200 --> 0:27:43.119 the super super high parts, so we do have to 0:27:43.119 --> 0:27:45.879 get somebody. If a band member can sing the super 0:27:45.880 --> 0:27:49.040 super high parts, thank god. Like I love it. I 0:27:49.040 --> 0:27:51.440 don't like generating harmonies that much. I'll do it once 0:27:51.440 --> 0:27:53.960 in a while, but you know, I like the real deal. 0:27:54.040 --> 0:27:55.280 The real thing adds to it. 0:27:55.800 --> 0:27:59.400 Okay, let's just shoom. You nailed the vocal. Now you're 0:27:59.440 --> 0:28:02.560 going to woo Hills in the big room. What happens next. 0:28:04.080 --> 0:28:07.640 Well, I usually get the track from the Woodland Hills 0:28:07.640 --> 0:28:09.600 and I put it together. Here, I'm the I'm the. 0:28:09.720 --> 0:28:12.880 No, I'm actually I'm not going that far. You say 0:28:12.920 --> 0:28:16.359 you cut the vocal first, Now you have to cut 0:28:16.400 --> 0:28:16.960 the track. 0:28:17.760 --> 0:28:20.600 Well, it's being cut alongside me doing the vocal at 0:28:20.600 --> 0:28:21.040 the same time. 0:28:21.040 --> 0:28:25.600 So okay. Traditionally, while you're cutting the vocal, somebody on 0:28:25.640 --> 0:28:27.879 your team is cutting the track. You're not even there. 0:28:28.440 --> 0:28:31.040 That's exactly right. I already know what I want. 0:28:31.320 --> 0:28:34.800 You trust your team enough to get what you want. 0:28:35.040 --> 0:28:39.680 Absolutely. I've been like that for I don't know twenty years, 0:28:39.680 --> 0:28:41.560 the same guys. I know they know what I like, 0:28:41.600 --> 0:28:44.200 and I know it what I want, you know. So 0:28:45.320 --> 0:28:46.920 a lot of times what they're cutting is just the 0:28:46.960 --> 0:28:50.560 meat potatoes anyway. It's the bass, guitar, drums, stereo guitars, 0:28:50.640 --> 0:28:53.280 guitar solos. I'll well, you can't see it here, but 0:28:53.400 --> 0:28:56.360 I'll add a whole bunch of keyboards and programming after 0:28:56.440 --> 0:28:58.120 I have that all put together, and I'll listen and 0:28:58.160 --> 0:29:00.600 I'll go, you know what, we need something here or this. 0:29:00.920 --> 0:29:03.560 I'm a big believer in space, so I feel like 0:29:03.600 --> 0:29:05.920 we always over record everything, like I like to take 0:29:05.960 --> 0:29:08.640 things out to me the space. If there's a four 0:29:08.680 --> 0:29:11.520 member band, the space is the fifth member of the band. 0:29:11.560 --> 0:29:13.840 If you look at scorers, those little swiggly lines, and 0:29:13.880 --> 0:29:17.040 the score means don't play, you know. So a lot 0:29:17.040 --> 0:29:19.720 of bands with pro tools now have a problem with 0:29:19.800 --> 0:29:22.360 that because they want to record every bar, every measure, 0:29:22.440 --> 0:29:27.120 every sixteenth note has something going on. I like space, 0:29:27.560 --> 0:29:30.400 you know, So when I get the music back, a 0:29:30.440 --> 0:29:33.680 lot of times I'm subtracting from things, not adding to it. 0:29:33.920 --> 0:29:36.200 I'll add things here and there, But like, I want 0:29:36.240 --> 0:29:38.600 it to sound bigger. I want the drums to be bigger, 0:29:38.640 --> 0:29:39.960 the guitar is to be I want to be able 0:29:40.000 --> 0:29:42.840 to hear everything, you know, so and I know what 0:29:42.880 --> 0:29:45.120 Mike's going to do. Mike's a great engineer. He's one 0:29:45.160 --> 0:29:47.640 of the great sort of like original guys that could 0:29:47.640 --> 0:29:50.200 still record live instruments, So I know what they're going 0:29:50.240 --> 0:29:51.840 to sound like. I kind of know the demo that 0:29:52.120 --> 0:29:53.520 if we don't have a good demo, by the way, 0:29:53.560 --> 0:29:56.080 we're not going to record it. So the demo has 0:29:56.120 --> 0:29:58.360 to be a pretty good guide. You know. That's a 0:29:58.400 --> 0:30:00.400 lot different than it was twenty years ago. We're in 0:30:00.440 --> 0:30:03.160 the rehearsal hall. I had to be okay with it 0:30:03.200 --> 0:30:05.920 in the rehearsal hall to go we're going to record it. 0:30:05.920 --> 0:30:08.640 And then I was on there more often in the 0:30:08.680 --> 0:30:12.320 studio directing traffic because we didn't have anything to follow. 0:30:12.640 --> 0:30:14.760 But now we have demos to follow, so I know 0:30:14.960 --> 0:30:18.040 kind of pretty much where we're going with it. So yeah, 0:30:18.080 --> 0:30:18.880 it's a bit different. 0:30:19.040 --> 0:30:22.880 Okay, just going You mentioned pro tools a couple of times. 0:30:23.320 --> 0:30:26.080 Do you have an opinion of analyg versus digital? 0:30:26.800 --> 0:30:29.760 Yeah? Yeah, I probably made my whole career when I 0:30:29.800 --> 0:30:32.520 switched to pro Tools. I switched to ninety six. I 0:30:32.560 --> 0:30:34.560 was one of the first rock guys to use it. 0:30:35.000 --> 0:30:38.120 I used it on Sepulteur record in nineteen ninety six 0:30:38.280 --> 0:30:41.640 ninety seven when it was called sound Designer, and I 0:30:41.720 --> 0:30:44.400 used I use it on a Less than Jake record 0:30:44.400 --> 0:30:46.440 back there, and I remember I bring this stuff into 0:30:46.480 --> 0:30:49.560 like Chris sod Algae and he would be like, what 0:30:49.600 --> 0:30:52.680 the hell's this stuff? You know, what's this computer? Like, 0:30:52.760 --> 0:30:54.360 I don't know what this? You get this thing out 0:30:54.360 --> 0:30:55.680 of here and who are you? 0:30:55.680 --> 0:30:55.880 You know? 0:30:56.480 --> 0:30:59.320 So, you know, we went through our growing phase back then, 0:31:00.080 --> 0:31:03.000 figuring out how to use all this stuff. But I 0:31:03.000 --> 0:31:05.000 don't think I could have made any of these records 0:31:05.040 --> 0:31:08.920 without the computer. I just wasn't I was I just 0:31:08.960 --> 0:31:11.239 couldn't connect my brain to the tape. Thing was too 0:31:11.320 --> 0:31:14.320 slow for me. Honestly, I just had all these ideas 0:31:14.360 --> 0:31:16.920 about what I wanted to do, and I was always 0:31:16.960 --> 0:31:20.600 weighed down by this slowness of tape and I just liked, 0:31:20.840 --> 0:31:25.600 you know, adding you know my vision. When the big, 0:31:25.640 --> 0:31:28.680 first big record I had was the pod record Fundamental 0:31:28.680 --> 0:31:31.520 Elements of Southtown, and if you listen to that record, 0:31:31.520 --> 0:31:33.840 there's a lot of really cool stuff going on in there. 0:31:34.440 --> 0:31:38.320 Which really made it work was having autotune, because you know, 0:31:38.640 --> 0:31:41.440 I remember in ninety six when I was doing Less 0:31:41.440 --> 0:31:45.480 than Jake's record, I had called Avid wasn't called Avid 0:31:45.480 --> 0:31:48.239 but pro tools back digit design. Back then, I used 0:31:48.240 --> 0:31:50.800 to answer the phones actually and I would calm up 0:31:50.800 --> 0:31:53.840 and say, hey, I'm having this problem. I'm getting IRQ errors. 0:31:53.880 --> 0:31:56.400 And you know, we were still on these powermats back then. 0:31:57.200 --> 0:31:58.600 And one guy said to me, Hen, I'm going to 0:31:58.640 --> 0:32:02.000 send you this floppy disc. I try this plugin out, 0:32:02.040 --> 0:32:03.680 and back then it was not that many plugins. But 0:32:03.720 --> 0:32:06.800 he said, it's a company called Antari's and they do 0:32:06.840 --> 0:32:09.320 stuff for the government or something. I don't remember exactly 0:32:09.360 --> 0:32:11.320 what the story was, but I got this plug in 0:32:11.320 --> 0:32:13.200 and I put it in and it was auto tuned, 0:32:13.280 --> 0:32:16.440 and I remember thinking, oh my god, this is going 0:32:16.480 --> 0:32:19.800 to change everything like this, like these singers and Less 0:32:19.840 --> 0:32:22.320 Than Jake are really good, but now they sound really 0:32:22.400 --> 0:32:24.959 good and they loved it. The band. They were like, man, 0:32:25.000 --> 0:32:28.479 I've never sounded that good in my life. So that 0:32:28.600 --> 0:32:31.640 made the performance more important, you know what I mean. 0:32:31.720 --> 0:32:35.520 Like I wasn't focusing on the tuning anymore. I was going, man, 0:32:35.560 --> 0:32:38.120 this performance is badass. It's a little flat right now, 0:32:38.160 --> 0:32:40.160 but I'm this is way better than the one that's 0:32:40.160 --> 0:32:43.640 in tune. So I think that sometimes people missing like 0:32:44.240 --> 0:32:47.640 I never used auto tuned to the point where people 0:32:47.680 --> 0:32:49.719 made fun of me or anything. I never had that problem. 0:32:49.760 --> 0:32:52.000 Nobody ever said to me, oh, you over auto tuned it. 0:32:52.280 --> 0:32:55.040 In fact, if anything, I got the opposite. The bands 0:32:55.040 --> 0:32:57.840 wanted more auto tune. My autotune guy, by the way, 0:32:57.880 --> 0:33:02.240 my protols guy, sorry, my editor in Texas, a guy 0:33:02.280 --> 0:33:05.560 named Paul Decarley. He does everything graphically, so we don't 0:33:05.760 --> 0:33:07.520 We don't just use the button, do you know what 0:33:07.560 --> 0:33:09.760 I mean? We just don't turn it on like the standard. 0:33:09.840 --> 0:33:11.560 You know, he draws it in, so we try to 0:33:11.640 --> 0:33:14.560 keep it natural. Nowadays, they don't want that, you know, 0:33:14.640 --> 0:33:17.920 the artists want they want it on stunt, you know. 0:33:18.520 --> 0:33:21.800 So I find myself double auto tuning things. Now it's crazy. 0:33:21.880 --> 0:33:24.280 Back then, we were trying not to make it sound autotuning. 0:33:24.320 --> 0:33:27.520 Now everybody wants it perfectly, you know. But by the way, 0:33:27.520 --> 0:33:30.840 when I did Lesson Jake, I auto tune the horns. 0:33:31.760 --> 0:33:32.880 That didn't work out very well. 0:33:33.000 --> 0:33:37.680 Okay, you know, I'll write about a record, Oh, auto tune, autotune. 0:33:37.920 --> 0:33:40.840 You're you're telling me that you can use auto tune. 0:33:40.960 --> 0:33:43.200 Let me put it in a different way. Can you 0:33:43.360 --> 0:33:47.360 employ auto tune such that people can't tell it's auto tune? 0:33:48.320 --> 0:33:51.560 You know, here's something really interesting. I have not used it, 0:33:51.600 --> 0:33:56.360 and people have accused me of using it because they say, oh, 0:33:56.800 --> 0:33:58.880 that sound has to be auto tuned. I'm like, no, 0:33:59.080 --> 0:34:01.880 that's actually the singer. Now, if I auto tuned it, 0:34:01.920 --> 0:34:05.360 you probably would think it's not auto tuned. So, you know, 0:34:05.600 --> 0:34:08.000 it's the opposite of what people And this is one 0:34:08.000 --> 0:34:10.200 of my theories about recording in the studio. It goes 0:34:10.200 --> 0:34:13.080 back to a bigger thing. The more accurate I have 0:34:13.160 --> 0:34:16.279 the music in the studio, the more detailed I get it, 0:34:16.320 --> 0:34:19.520 the more on, you know, everything being really locked in, 0:34:20.080 --> 0:34:22.960 the more live it sounds. Now when it's not done 0:34:23.040 --> 0:34:24.920 like that people listen to when I've done records that 0:34:24.960 --> 0:34:27.480 have been like loose and live, they go, oh my god, 0:34:27.560 --> 0:34:31.839 you you edited it terribly. No, that's the band. That's 0:34:31.880 --> 0:34:33.759 how they sound. Now when you're seeing a live show, 0:34:33.800 --> 0:34:36.279 you can't tell those things. You're in this big room. 0:34:36.560 --> 0:34:39.360 Everything's coming at you, this big assault of sound. You 0:34:39.400 --> 0:34:42.120 can't tell if the kick and the bass aren't married up, 0:34:42.440 --> 0:34:44.200 but you certainly can tell if I didn't do that 0:34:44.280 --> 0:34:47.920 in my production. So the more I made it perfect, 0:34:48.160 --> 0:34:52.000 you know, not perfect, but tied together like a great 0:34:52.040 --> 0:34:54.200 band was playing like the best session players in LA 0:34:54.280 --> 0:34:56.960 were playing it, the more people found it sounded live. 0:34:57.480 --> 0:34:59.120 So I was like, you know what, I think I'm 0:34:59.160 --> 0:35:01.759 onto something here. Actually, you know, I'm going to get 0:35:01.800 --> 0:35:04.920 it to sound great, and then it sounds, you know, 0:35:04.960 --> 0:35:07.200 as long as I mix it right. I never had 0:35:07.200 --> 0:35:10.080 anybody tell me my stuff sounded like, you know, like 0:35:10.440 --> 0:35:13.480 not as good. It's like the band. In fact, I 0:35:13.520 --> 0:35:15.560 always had the opposite. Oh the band sounds worse live. 0:35:15.880 --> 0:35:17.279 How did you do it? How did you make that 0:35:17.320 --> 0:35:18.040 record sound like that? 0:35:19.040 --> 0:35:19.160 Well? 0:35:19.200 --> 0:35:22.600 I use pro tools, you know, so I always leaned 0:35:22.600 --> 0:35:24.359 into it, Bob, do you know what I mean? I 0:35:24.480 --> 0:35:26.960 leaned into it. I didn't lean away from it. I 0:35:26.960 --> 0:35:30.840 figured it's it's something that's now part of the world. 0:35:30.880 --> 0:35:33.160 I'm going to use it. I didn't shy away from it. 0:35:33.560 --> 0:35:36.080 A lot of producers in the early middle nineties were 0:35:36.120 --> 0:35:38.759 not getting I wasn't getting projects because bands would not 0:35:38.800 --> 0:35:41.000 want to record in the computer. But once they did it, 0:35:41.000 --> 0:35:43.880 they were sold. They were like, Wow, we sound great. 0:35:44.040 --> 0:35:47.399 We never sounded that great. That's you know, that's how 0:35:47.400 --> 0:35:47.920 I learned it. 0:35:55.680 --> 0:36:00.239 Okay, just hammering this point. There are people who talk 0:36:00.239 --> 0:36:03.759 about an analog sound and a digital sound. What's your 0:36:03.800 --> 0:36:04.400 take there. 0:36:05.000 --> 0:36:08.240 I absolutely love the analog sound. We use the whatever 0:36:08.280 --> 0:36:10.360 we can use in pro tools. There's a couple of 0:36:11.880 --> 0:36:15.400 selections you can make. One of them's called heat that 0:36:15.640 --> 0:36:20.080 adds a compression sort of a fake well whatever their 0:36:20.200 --> 0:36:24.280 version of tape compression is to things. I think early 0:36:24.320 --> 0:36:27.279 on in pro tools they didn't have as good of converters, 0:36:27.280 --> 0:36:30.400 so things sounded squirrely. Back then, you couldn't get a 0:36:30.440 --> 0:36:34.680 really good you know, the resolution wasn't great. Nowadays, the 0:36:34.719 --> 0:36:36.879 resolution is really good in the computer. Like you can 0:36:36.960 --> 0:36:40.120 use all kinds of plug in tape emulators, all kinds 0:36:40.120 --> 0:36:43.400 of stuff like that. I have a whole record album collection, 0:36:43.760 --> 0:36:45.920 like I got rid of all my CDs, but I 0:36:45.960 --> 0:36:48.439 have all my albums and I have a record player, 0:36:48.440 --> 0:36:50.480 and when I put it on, I enjoy it for 0:36:50.520 --> 0:36:53.440 about ten minutes, and then I just go, oh my god, 0:36:53.480 --> 0:36:58.040 Like where's the fidelity? I mean the RIAA curve. It's 0:36:58.080 --> 0:36:59.160 a pretty brutal curve. 0:36:59.280 --> 0:36:59.520 You know. 0:37:00.120 --> 0:37:03.239 Further you get into that record towards the center, the 0:37:03.360 --> 0:37:06.879 less base you have, and you know what I mean, Like, yeah, 0:37:06.960 --> 0:37:08.799 I could to fall in love with that stuff, but 0:37:09.560 --> 0:37:13.640 I don't know. I just like the full fidelity of records, 0:37:13.640 --> 0:37:17.399 the big you know, once the digital sound got once 0:37:17.520 --> 0:37:20.319 when Clear Mountain came out with the Apogee stuff, that 0:37:20.440 --> 0:37:24.040 changed everything. Like his resolution was so much better than 0:37:24.080 --> 0:37:26.279 the pro tool stuff. And I remember we bought all 0:37:26.320 --> 0:37:28.799 that stuff and we were like, whoa, now it sounds great. 0:37:28.800 --> 0:37:31.200 Then we started doing stuff ninety six K and then 0:37:31.200 --> 0:37:33.759 we realized, wait a second, doesn't sound that different than 0:37:33.800 --> 0:37:36.080 forty eight, and our computers are starting to crash all 0:37:36.080 --> 0:37:38.320 the time. We actually had a big argument with Universal 0:37:38.360 --> 0:37:40.200 Records about this whole thing. We had to kind of 0:37:40.239 --> 0:37:43.239 like en mass me and a bunch of producers say 0:37:44.000 --> 0:37:47.520 we cannot record ninety six forty eight because we just 0:37:47.560 --> 0:37:50.000 can't run the computers like that, you know. They were like, no, 0:37:50.080 --> 0:37:52.839 it has to be at that resolution, like for rock 0:37:52.960 --> 0:37:57.200 music really, you know, maybe if you're doing a jazz record, 0:37:57.239 --> 0:37:59.560 I get it, you know, but for rock music, it's 0:37:59.640 --> 0:38:02.560 just killing us. So now the standard recording is like 0:38:02.600 --> 0:38:04.920 forty eight to twenty four. That's kind of where we're 0:38:04.960 --> 0:38:07.120 at right now. I don't see many records that are 0:38:07.120 --> 0:38:10.000 outside of that either direction, you know, I don't see 0:38:10.000 --> 0:38:11.160 any forty four or one stuff. 0:38:11.360 --> 0:38:16.120 Oh okay, but the computers continue to improve. Would the 0:38:16.160 --> 0:38:18.400 computers choke on ninety six today? 0:38:19.320 --> 0:38:22.480 You know, it still takes longer to process everything. It 0:38:22.600 --> 0:38:25.520 slows everything down. Probably is not as bad, it's funny. 0:38:25.600 --> 0:38:27.160 The only reason I bring it a up is we 0:38:27.160 --> 0:38:29.440 had to open up an old record that we're going 0:38:29.520 --> 0:38:32.000 to work on this week at ninety six, and then 0:38:32.040 --> 0:38:35.640 we realized how long it took us to like process stuff, 0:38:35.960 --> 0:38:38.040 you know, when we were just like like, oh my god, 0:38:38.080 --> 0:38:40.439 it's like, I know, it's not that much longer really 0:38:40.600 --> 0:38:43.120 in the world in the you know, maybe it's three 0:38:43.120 --> 0:38:45.680 minutes compared to like five minutes or something like that. 0:38:45.880 --> 0:38:49.200 It's shorter, but that just adds up over time, you know, 0:38:49.600 --> 0:38:52.680 and so there's not that much difference for a rock 0:38:52.880 --> 0:38:56.600 project to put to go through that. So I think 0:38:56.640 --> 0:39:00.400 we've all kind of I think it's a subconscious decision. 0:39:00.480 --> 0:39:02.680 All us rock producers that made that were sticking to 0:39:02.719 --> 0:39:05.600 this resolution. And I don't see anything else coming in 0:39:05.640 --> 0:39:08.120 that that. Like, I mean, Apple has their thing where 0:39:08.120 --> 0:39:10.520 I guess they have well, I'm not sure you have 0:39:10.560 --> 0:39:12.560 it anymore. I see most of the atmost stuff from them, 0:39:12.600 --> 0:39:17.960 but I don't know. I guess it's individual you know, preferences. 0:39:18.280 --> 0:39:20.760 Wait wait, wait, wait, wait, play that out with Apple. 0:39:20.920 --> 0:39:22.080 I'm not sure I caught your point. 0:39:22.160 --> 0:39:23.920 Oh well, we have to do what Apple used to do. 0:39:23.920 --> 0:39:26.280 They had that like super audio thing for a while, 0:39:26.400 --> 0:39:29.560 or I forget there was like these high resolution records 0:39:29.560 --> 0:39:31.239 we had to make for them. But now they really 0:39:31.280 --> 0:39:34.520 want are atmost mixes of everything. So we just have 0:39:34.560 --> 0:39:37.239 to deliver atmost mixes of every song now, or else 0:39:37.239 --> 0:39:39.200 we don't get the good play listening from them. That's 0:39:39.280 --> 0:39:41.719 kind of what you trade off, you know, like they 0:39:42.080 --> 0:39:44.040 sort of have you a little bit, you know, in 0:39:44.080 --> 0:39:47.040 that way, like if you don't give us the utmost mixes, 0:39:48.640 --> 0:39:50.160 we're not going to say what's going to happen, but 0:39:50.760 --> 0:39:52.040 you may not get all the goodies. 0:39:52.600 --> 0:39:55.600 You know, what's your take on outmost mixes. 0:39:57.400 --> 0:39:59.239 I don't make them. I have an engineer do that. 0:39:59.600 --> 0:40:04.120 But I've heard old records mixed and atmos and I look, 0:40:04.239 --> 0:40:07.120 I think it's just because I like my old album 0:40:07.160 --> 0:40:10.480 collection the way it sounded. I'm not a fan of it. 0:40:10.800 --> 0:40:12.760 I don't even like it when they redo that stuff. 0:40:12.800 --> 0:40:14.680 Like I've heard doors records where they put some of 0:40:14.719 --> 0:40:17.600 the vocals back in they weren't there. I don't like that. 0:40:18.080 --> 0:40:21.680 I don't know, well forget you know, redoing old records 0:40:21.680 --> 0:40:24.360 and at most they always fuck it up. But originally 0:40:24.680 --> 0:40:27.480 the ones Apple had the vocals weren't loud enough. But 0:40:27.520 --> 0:40:31.799 if you're starting from scratch, oh yeah, what's your viewpoint on? 0:40:33.040 --> 0:40:35.400 It's fine for some people. It's not something again that 0:40:35.440 --> 0:40:37.560 I pay that much attention to. We have a guy 0:40:37.600 --> 0:40:41.680 that doesn't. He sends them out. That's it, you know, 0:40:42.000 --> 0:40:44.919 it's not it's made for a certain Uh. I think 0:40:44.960 --> 0:40:47.319 my new car hasn't can handle it. I mean, my 0:40:47.400 --> 0:40:50.960 tesla said they could, but I couldn't hear any difference. Honestly, 0:40:51.280 --> 0:40:53.960 I think it's basically made for headphones, the app, the 0:40:53.960 --> 0:40:57.840 Apple earbuds. That's really why, you know, that's what I've heard, 0:40:58.320 --> 0:41:01.080 But I just don't Again, my focus is more on 0:41:01.160 --> 0:41:05.200 the production of the stereo mix the songs, the vocals, 0:41:05.480 --> 0:41:08.400 that stuff. You know, there's a whole group of autmost 0:41:08.480 --> 0:41:10.840 mixers out there that do a great job, I guess, 0:41:10.880 --> 0:41:14.279 and you know that's it. I really have not so 0:41:14.400 --> 0:41:15.160 much of an opinion. 0:41:15.200 --> 0:41:20.360 Okay, let's pull back from that. Yeah, so you don't 0:41:20.400 --> 0:41:23.680 believe there are people who believe we're cutting the band 0:41:23.719 --> 0:41:27.520 altogether live it adds and energy. You actually believe the reverse? 0:41:29.239 --> 0:41:31.080 Well, I do like to cut it live just to 0:41:31.080 --> 0:41:34.760 get the arrangement down, But yeah, I believe the reverse. Yeah, 0:41:34.800 --> 0:41:37.600 but I do believe that cutting the band live to 0:41:37.680 --> 0:41:40.839 get the original, to get to work the parts out, 0:41:40.920 --> 0:41:43.360 is important. Do you know what I mean? Because you 0:41:43.440 --> 0:41:45.840 can't like to work it out. But a lot of 0:41:45.880 --> 0:41:49.360 times when a guitar player is in there by themselves, 0:41:50.000 --> 0:41:52.640 they're coming up with parts as they're moving forward through 0:41:52.640 --> 0:41:54.359 the song, and a lot of times they don't even 0:41:54.360 --> 0:41:55.680 want to be in the studio with this. They want 0:41:55.719 --> 0:41:57.920 to take the song home with them and do it 0:41:57.960 --> 0:41:59.880 in the middle of the night in their underwear, and 0:42:00.120 --> 0:42:02.040 that's when they come up with their great guitar solo. 0:42:02.560 --> 0:42:05.360 So I think that's the pandemic has kind of changed 0:42:05.360 --> 0:42:07.600 the way we thought about that a lot. We just 0:42:07.719 --> 0:42:10.319 never conceived of doing a record without all the members there, 0:42:10.320 --> 0:42:11.680 and now all of a sudden, we're doing records with 0:42:11.719 --> 0:42:14.000 none of the members there. You know, we just had 0:42:14.000 --> 0:42:16.000 to make it work. It didn't work, by the way, 0:42:16.080 --> 0:42:17.840 using zoom or any of that. That stuff was just 0:42:17.880 --> 0:42:21.239 impossible to do. So we just had to like send 0:42:21.280 --> 0:42:23.200 it out, get it back, and if there was some problem, 0:42:23.239 --> 0:42:26.560 I call the guitar player. Hey, you know, you got 0:42:26.560 --> 0:42:28.360 to do it again, or it's not in tune. And 0:42:28.520 --> 0:42:30.239 that's one of the reasons we still have to have 0:42:30.280 --> 0:42:33.040 the guys come to my studio with Mike. The tuning 0:42:33.080 --> 0:42:36.880 issues with guitars. You can be good at it, but 0:42:36.920 --> 0:42:39.000 you need someone there to really help you with that. 0:42:39.560 --> 0:42:42.040 It's just too hard to get everything in tune all 0:42:42.080 --> 0:42:44.040 the time. You know, you spend most of your time 0:42:44.080 --> 0:42:46.280 tuning when you're doing guitar parts. 0:42:46.520 --> 0:42:50.920 Okay, you're here at home the Vocal studio. Your guys 0:42:50.960 --> 0:42:54.359 are in Woodland Hills. They're cutting a track. How long 0:42:54.400 --> 0:42:55.480 does it take them to do it? 0:42:57.560 --> 0:43:00.680 So they're cutting usually the okay, so let's just take it, 0:43:00.800 --> 0:43:02.880 for example, three days, Grace. I'll tell you the recording 0:43:02.880 --> 0:43:07.360 process for that. Neil has cut all the drums in Ontario, 0:43:08.120 --> 0:43:11.880 working off the demos, so the drums are now edited 0:43:11.920 --> 0:43:16.560 by my editor in Texas. The finished drum track is 0:43:16.719 --> 0:43:19.880 in Woodland Hills. The guitar player and the bass player 0:43:19.960 --> 0:43:23.359 in Woodland Hills from they came down flew in and 0:43:23.440 --> 0:43:27.240 Mike is recording. What we already know is the version 0:43:27.280 --> 0:43:28.600 that we're going to do because we have a really 0:43:28.600 --> 0:43:31.400 good demo that was made a couple months ago. We 0:43:31.480 --> 0:43:33.480 agreed that this was what the demo was. This is 0:43:33.520 --> 0:43:35.719 the guide. Now we're going to do it for real. 0:43:35.880 --> 0:43:38.440 So we're going to make sure those stereo guitar parts 0:43:38.440 --> 0:43:42.359 are in tune, the extra sweetening parts are the way 0:43:42.360 --> 0:43:45.359 we want them. They's just extra parts added, and that 0:43:46.160 --> 0:43:48.360 in some form is going to be sent to me 0:43:48.520 --> 0:43:51.439 to do vocals today with Adam. He's coming over here 0:43:51.600 --> 0:43:55.200 after we're done, so wherever the song is at, I'm 0:43:55.200 --> 0:43:56.920 going to start doing the vocals. At that point, it 0:43:56.960 --> 0:43:59.160 may not even be done. It may not even have 0:43:59.239 --> 0:44:01.920 the edited guitar as yet. But I know enough about 0:44:01.920 --> 0:44:03.920 working with Adam and Matt and this band that I 0:44:03.920 --> 0:44:05.960 can do it with even the demo guitars if I 0:44:06.000 --> 0:44:09.799 had to. So, you know, things are kind of We 0:44:09.920 --> 0:44:11.759 have a chart, by the way that we keep. When 0:44:11.760 --> 0:44:13.640 we're finished something, we check it off, so we're not 0:44:13.760 --> 0:44:16.080 it's not chaotic. We do know where we are in 0:44:16.120 --> 0:44:18.320 the project, but there are a lot of things happening 0:44:18.400 --> 0:44:21.399 at once, you know. In another part of the world 0:44:21.640 --> 0:44:23.799 is programming going on. We have a couple of programmers, 0:44:23.840 --> 0:44:26.800 one list in Dubai actually that we use that program 0:44:26.920 --> 0:44:29.480 strings and things, and we'll send him the track and say, hey, 0:44:30.120 --> 0:44:32.400 do some stuff, send it back and we'll see if 0:44:32.400 --> 0:44:33.759 we like it, and if we don't, we won't use 0:44:33.760 --> 0:44:36.480 any of it. Sometimes, so have an idea that I'll 0:44:36.520 --> 0:44:39.000 take and redo it over here in my stuff, you know, 0:44:39.400 --> 0:44:41.960 and I'll add a lot of the keyboards. After I've 0:44:42.000 --> 0:44:43.759 done with the vocals, I'll put some B three on 0:44:43.840 --> 0:44:45.360 it and things like that. I still like adding B 0:44:45.480 --> 0:44:49.160 three to these records. It's a anyway. 0:44:49.320 --> 0:44:52.000 Okay, wait a second, just going back to this three 0:44:52.160 --> 0:44:56.920 Day's Grace project. Yeah, you did say I'm trying to 0:44:57.000 --> 0:45:00.239 understand that you cut the vocals first, right, But in 0:45:00.239 --> 0:45:02.319 this case, it sounds did you cut the vocals first 0:45:02.360 --> 0:45:03.799 the way you were talking, or did the guy cut 0:45:03.840 --> 0:45:04.680 the drums first? 0:45:06.360 --> 0:45:08.600 I have to open the session up and let you know, actually, 0:45:09.200 --> 0:45:11.480 because I might be working with demo vokays. 0:45:12.200 --> 0:45:15.479 Let's not go there right now. Let's start with how 0:45:15.520 --> 0:45:19.880 does the guy cut the drums in Canada first? 0:45:20.880 --> 0:45:23.239 Because he's working from a demo that's been worked out, 0:45:23.640 --> 0:45:24.879 so he's playing to the demo. 0:45:26.080 --> 0:45:28.520 And what about do you send your engineer there? 0:45:29.239 --> 0:45:31.440 No, we have an engineer in Canada that we trust 0:45:31.520 --> 0:45:33.319 that we've been using a long time, and he has 0:45:33.320 --> 0:45:35.040 a room that he's going to record it. And since 0:45:35.040 --> 0:45:37.360 we're going to probably replace a lot of the drum 0:45:37.400 --> 0:45:43.040 sounds with samples, we're looking for a performance more than 0:45:43.080 --> 0:45:45.719 we are looking for drum sounds. So if we get 0:45:45.760 --> 0:45:47.760 a snare sound that a little squirrely, we can always 0:45:47.760 --> 0:45:48.279 replace it. 0:45:48.400 --> 0:45:51.880 Okay, let's stay there. He's cut the stuff. Tell me 0:45:51.920 --> 0:45:54.520 about replacing the drum sounds with samples. 0:45:55.000 --> 0:45:58.279 Okay, so he cuts it and say we don't like 0:45:58.320 --> 0:46:01.080 to kick and snare go And by the way, that 0:46:01.080 --> 0:46:04.040 happens ninety percent of the time. Okay, Like, it's not 0:46:04.239 --> 0:46:06.839 unusual to do this. In fact, if you look at 0:46:06.840 --> 0:46:09.480 the old Steely Dan documentaries, they were doing it back then. 0:46:10.000 --> 0:46:13.319 You know with the Wendel thing that you know, their 0:46:13.360 --> 0:46:17.200 engineer had Gary Katz and all those guys. So we 0:46:17.280 --> 0:46:21.960 will take the drum track, assign MIDI notes to the 0:46:22.040 --> 0:46:25.279 kick and snare that will trigger MIDI information that we 0:46:25.320 --> 0:46:27.960 can take any kick and snare anywhere in the world 0:46:28.520 --> 0:46:31.080 and have a trigger. We will print that underneath the 0:46:31.120 --> 0:46:34.239 snare drum track. They'll be samples of snares, there'll be 0:46:34.280 --> 0:46:37.520 samples of kicks, they'll be samples of Tom's. So then 0:46:37.560 --> 0:46:39.560 we have the choice when we mix of which ones 0:46:39.600 --> 0:46:41.800 we want to use, and that leads it up to 0:46:41.840 --> 0:46:43.920 the mixer. A lot of times as the mixers mixing, 0:46:44.239 --> 0:46:46.520 the mixer will go, you know what, I don't like 0:46:46.560 --> 0:46:49.080 this snare drum that was recorded. Look at that snare 0:46:49.160 --> 0:46:52.080 number three that fits into this mix much better. Now 0:46:52.080 --> 0:46:55.080 he doesn't have to go through the energy of replacing it. 0:46:55.120 --> 0:46:57.279 We've done it for him already. We've given him a 0:46:57.320 --> 0:47:00.279 menu of stuff that he can use. So you know, 0:47:01.040 --> 0:47:03.080 something we worked out with Chris ord Algaeback in the day, 0:47:03.120 --> 0:47:05.120 Chris liked to have all that stuff. You know, we 0:47:05.120 --> 0:47:07.720 would give him like samples of all kinds of stuff, 0:47:07.719 --> 0:47:09.680 and he would. In fact, we gave him his samples. 0:47:09.680 --> 0:47:12.400 He gave us our He gave us his samples, and 0:47:12.440 --> 0:47:14.720 we give them back to him put on the track. 0:47:15.120 --> 0:47:17.279 So then we get this drum track back that is, 0:47:17.400 --> 0:47:18.960 you know, it's not mixed or anything like that, but 0:47:19.000 --> 0:47:21.160 it's good enough. But we can work with it. And 0:47:21.400 --> 0:47:24.120 whatever case it is, it might get to me with 0:47:24.280 --> 0:47:27.720 note with guitars that are not finished, base that's not finished, 0:47:28.200 --> 0:47:30.080 but enough that I can cut the vocals. And while 0:47:30.120 --> 0:47:32.000 I'm cutting the vocals with at them, they're still cutting 0:47:32.000 --> 0:47:34.920 the guitars over there at the studio. But I know 0:47:35.280 --> 0:47:38.120 the arrangement because I already have it, the demo arrangement 0:47:38.160 --> 0:47:40.360 of it. You know. Now, the demo has to be 0:47:40.360 --> 0:47:43.440 in tune, obviously, and most of the time it is. 0:47:43.480 --> 0:47:45.239 But if it's squirrely, we'll let them know. But I 0:47:45.239 --> 0:47:47.800 don't really run into that at all. Honestly. The demos 0:47:47.840 --> 0:47:48.680 are pretty you know. 0:47:48.719 --> 0:47:51.520 And everybody's working to a click. How do you keep 0:47:51.520 --> 0:47:51.799 it all? 0:47:52.600 --> 0:47:54.760 Yes, everything's yeah, oh, yeah, it's metrono. 0:47:55.000 --> 0:47:55.239 Yeah. 0:47:55.600 --> 0:47:58.359 I don't think I've seen a non metrono, a tract 0:47:58.440 --> 0:48:00.440 not to a metronome in thirty years. 0:48:01.000 --> 0:48:05.360 You know, Okay, you always have a third party mix it. 0:48:05.480 --> 0:48:06.720 You never mix yourself. 0:48:07.560 --> 0:48:11.239 I tried once or twice. I'm always I'm you know what, 0:48:13.840 --> 0:48:17.680 I kind of am not as precious at that point. 0:48:18.160 --> 0:48:21.000 I used to be much more precious about it. What 0:48:21.080 --> 0:48:23.960 I do now with mixing is well. For example, in 0:48:23.960 --> 0:48:26.279 three days Grace, they're gonna have some out third party 0:48:26.320 --> 0:48:27.799 mix it that I'm not gonna have anything to do with. 0:48:28.080 --> 0:48:29.719 I will have a say though, when they send it 0:48:29.719 --> 0:48:31.319 to me, I'll say to them, hey, I don't think 0:48:31.360 --> 0:48:33.800 the harmonies are loud enough. I'll talk about the vocals, 0:48:33.840 --> 0:48:36.759 mostly because they have their own opinions about the rest 0:48:36.800 --> 0:48:39.520 of the track. My really focused on how the vocals 0:48:39.560 --> 0:48:42.560 sound on the records. I do that, like for example, 0:48:42.600 --> 0:48:46.719 for Judge and Jury or for Inflames, my mixer Joe 0:48:46.719 --> 0:48:48.960 will mix them. And this is a pretty cool system. 0:48:49.000 --> 0:48:51.680 We have my pro tools Rig and his pro tools 0:48:51.719 --> 0:48:55.200 Rig are identical down to the plugins, down to everything. 0:48:56.200 --> 0:48:58.560 I'll send it to him first. He will mix it 0:48:58.680 --> 0:49:01.960 about sixty to seven. He'll send it back to me. 0:49:02.440 --> 0:49:04.400 Then I will add all the vocals into it the 0:49:04.400 --> 0:49:06.640 way I want with the effects. I want the delays, 0:49:06.640 --> 0:49:09.160 I want the reverbs, I want the doubles, I want 0:49:09.320 --> 0:49:11.879 where the harmony should sit. All that. Then I will 0:49:11.880 --> 0:49:14.879 send it back to him and he will finish getting it. 0:49:15.400 --> 0:49:18.560 He'll bake it more, he'll get the bread to be 0:49:18.640 --> 0:49:20.520 baked more, and then he'll send it back to me, 0:49:20.600 --> 0:49:21.840 and then I'll mess with it a little bit. Then 0:49:21.840 --> 0:49:23.760 i'll send it back. He'll mess with it. He's pretty 0:49:23.840 --> 0:49:26.720 much mixing it. I'm really just making sure the vocals 0:49:26.719 --> 0:49:29.239 are right. So that's how that one works. It's just 0:49:29.280 --> 0:49:30.320 different on every project. 0:49:30.520 --> 0:49:34.120 Okay, let's go back to Three Days Grace. Why do 0:49:34.200 --> 0:49:36.960 they want to have a third party mix it without 0:49:37.000 --> 0:49:39.000 your input the same way you're talking about with the 0:49:39.040 --> 0:49:40.759 guy with the same pro tools. 0:49:40.480 --> 0:49:44.359 Rig Because there's some mixers like Dan Lancaster, and you 0:49:44.360 --> 0:49:48.120 know there's some A list mixers who you just trust 0:49:48.200 --> 0:49:51.360 more that you just go, you know what, these guys 0:49:51.400 --> 0:49:53.880 have it. This is the sound I want, you know. 0:49:55.520 --> 0:49:59.120 I know that anything I say in this situation with 0:49:59.160 --> 0:50:02.160 Three Days Grace that I've produced five albums of theirs. 0:50:02.840 --> 0:50:04.600 We all kind of know what's going on here, do 0:50:04.600 --> 0:50:06.719 you know. It's not like we're not going to drive 0:50:06.760 --> 0:50:08.839 the car off the cliff on this one. You know, 0:50:09.239 --> 0:50:11.600 if it's a new band, it's a different situation because 0:50:11.640 --> 0:50:15.279 then it we're creating something, a sound, something that's new. 0:50:15.760 --> 0:50:18.120 So therefore I'm way more involved in that. But on 0:50:18.160 --> 0:50:19.920 three Days Grace, I kind of know that I've been 0:50:19.960 --> 0:50:22.839 producing that band since two thousand and five. I kind 0:50:22.840 --> 0:50:25.160 of know, you know what I mean where the bodies 0:50:25.200 --> 0:50:25.759 are buried there? 0:50:25.800 --> 0:50:25.880 Oh? 0:50:25.920 --> 0:50:30.200 Okay, So they were working with Gavin before you, and 0:50:30.239 --> 0:50:32.200 then it seems like in the middle they went back 0:50:32.239 --> 0:50:37.200 to Gavin and then back to you. Yeah, what's that about? 0:50:41.280 --> 0:50:42.360 Should happen with Gavin? 0:50:44.200 --> 0:50:44.960 Should happen with that? 0:50:45.040 --> 0:50:45.239 You know? 0:50:45.400 --> 0:50:47.160 Personally? Or the way the record came out? 0:50:48.200 --> 0:50:50.600 I just don't think they liked the I think they 0:50:50.680 --> 0:50:54.760 wanted someone a little bit more. 0:50:54.680 --> 0:50:57.600 Organized, Okay, But they went back to him, right. 0:50:58.800 --> 0:51:01.640 They went back to him, Yeah, because I did two 0:51:01.680 --> 0:51:04.840 albums with them. Then they had Don Gilmour produce an album, 0:51:05.120 --> 0:51:08.560 which then Adam left the band. Then when they went 0:51:08.600 --> 0:51:12.080 to Matt, I think they you know, they'd moved on. 0:51:12.280 --> 0:51:14.560 I mean it's okay. You know, like I produce a 0:51:14.600 --> 0:51:16.799 lot of multiple records by bands. They've done like four 0:51:16.880 --> 0:51:20.120 Theory records and those would be my fifth you know. 0:51:20.239 --> 0:51:22.600 So I stayed with bands a lot, but I think 0:51:22.640 --> 0:51:25.239 they just wanted to change it up. And when they 0:51:25.239 --> 0:51:28.239 went back with Gavin, I think it fell into the 0:51:28.280 --> 0:51:31.640 same rhythm it did on the first couple before they 0:51:31.680 --> 0:51:34.200 brought me in on the second album, A lot wasn't 0:51:34.200 --> 0:51:38.279 getting done, you know, fast enough for them with the 0:51:38.440 --> 0:51:41.440 With I have a I have a real team of 0:51:41.520 --> 0:51:44.200 people that is like when you work with me, you're 0:51:44.239 --> 0:51:47.839 going you get the full treatment. You know we got 0:51:48.560 --> 0:51:51.200 you know, you could trust it. We have guitar texts, 0:51:51.200 --> 0:51:53.319 we have drum texts, we have editor We have a 0:51:53.360 --> 0:51:56.400 studio that works things. You plug things in they that 0:51:56.480 --> 0:51:59.719 they work, cables work. This is stuff bands like to have. 0:51:59.760 --> 0:52:00.760 They it's in the background. 0:52:00.800 --> 0:52:00.880 You know. 0:52:00.960 --> 0:52:02.759 It's like flying in an airplane. You don't want to 0:52:02.760 --> 0:52:04.920 think about the rudder control, or you don't want to 0:52:04.920 --> 0:52:09.040 think about the you know, whether the left engines. You know, 0:52:09.239 --> 0:52:12.120 got a fan blade. It's broke with us. You come 0:52:12.120 --> 0:52:14.040 in the studio, you don't think about any of that stuff. 0:52:14.040 --> 0:52:16.719 Everything works We pride ourselves for that. That's something we 0:52:16.800 --> 0:52:20.439 really when I made this team, I said, we want 0:52:20.440 --> 0:52:22.960 the passengers to have a great flight here man, you know. 0:52:23.280 --> 0:52:25.560 And we're not partying with them either. I don't care 0:52:25.560 --> 0:52:27.040 how much they want to hang out with us. We're 0:52:27.040 --> 0:52:29.160 not hanging out with them, you know. And you know, 0:52:29.440 --> 0:52:31.759 a lot of producers get sucked into that thing where 0:52:31.800 --> 0:52:33.160 they want to hang out with the band. They think 0:52:33.160 --> 0:52:35.719 they're part of the whole thing. No, we go home 0:52:35.760 --> 0:52:38.479 at night, we leave the band. They are the band 0:52:38.560 --> 0:52:42.560 where the producers they come in. It's very professional. That's 0:52:42.560 --> 0:52:44.360 how I like it, you know. And the band's really 0:52:44.400 --> 0:52:46.520 like that too, because it gives them a certain amount 0:52:46.520 --> 0:52:49.040 of time to be creative and we're not going into 0:52:49.040 --> 0:52:52.040 the middle of the night doing junk. Then you come 0:52:52.080 --> 0:52:53.719 back the next day and you just realize it's all 0:52:53.760 --> 0:52:56.640 garbage that you just did. You're sort of like focused 0:52:56.680 --> 0:52:58.719 on what you're doing. And we work really hard for 0:52:58.760 --> 0:53:02.719 eight hours, like we barely stop working. But you're exhausted 0:53:02.760 --> 0:53:05.400 after that, you know. So I think they liked I 0:53:05.440 --> 0:53:09.120 think they like our organization. We you know, I once 0:53:09.160 --> 0:53:13.319 had a band come to me some forty one or 0:53:14.239 --> 0:53:17.279 an artist they said, we need to take you out 0:53:17.280 --> 0:53:19.680 of your comfort zone and put you in another city 0:53:20.080 --> 0:53:22.600 so you get, you know, out of your comfort zone 0:53:22.640 --> 0:53:25.000 so we can make this record. I said, guys, that's 0:53:25.040 --> 0:53:27.239 the last thing you want me to do. You're the 0:53:27.360 --> 0:53:30.520 creative people, we're you know, you want me to be 0:53:30.640 --> 0:53:33.880 crazy too, you know, like that's what you want. Like, no, 0:53:34.040 --> 0:53:36.719 you want us to be the steadying influence. So you 0:53:36.760 --> 0:53:38.879 guys can go ahead and be as creative as you want. 0:53:39.440 --> 0:53:42.600 You know, we'll make sure the plane doesn't crash. You know, 0:53:43.120 --> 0:53:46.239 that's our job. So you know, my job is to 0:53:46.320 --> 0:53:48.920 land the plane safely, you know, and make sure we 0:53:48.960 --> 0:53:50.880 have delivered the record. The word of a producer it 0:53:50.920 --> 0:53:53.799 means to produce, you know, it doesn't mean to like 0:53:54.160 --> 0:53:57.440 screw it up. So like I take that really seriously. 0:53:57.480 --> 0:53:59.920 That's why I work a lot, because record companies know 0:54:00.000 --> 0:54:02.520 I'm going to produce for them, you know, and the 0:54:02.560 --> 0:54:04.000 bands know I'm going to hand in the record, and 0:54:04.040 --> 0:54:05.640 you know it's going to be on budget at on time. 0:54:06.160 --> 0:54:09.719 You know, I want to have hits too, you know. 0:54:09.920 --> 0:54:11.880 That's another thing. Like I don't hire me if you 0:54:11.880 --> 0:54:14.719 don't want hits. You know, I like having hits, and 0:54:14.760 --> 0:54:16.640 the bands like having hits. They may not say that, 0:54:16.680 --> 0:54:19.759 by the way, but they like it later on. Usually 0:54:19.800 --> 0:54:21.560 if I have a hit, I'm in the chair next time, 0:54:22.160 --> 0:54:25.160 you know. So you know that's how I look at it. 0:54:25.440 --> 0:54:28.719 I'm a working class kid from Philly, man how I 0:54:28.760 --> 0:54:29.200 look at it. 0:54:29.560 --> 0:54:40.719 You know. Three Days Grace is managed by qbe. 0:54:40.440 --> 0:54:42.240 Prime Great Manage. 0:54:42.280 --> 0:54:47.360 Okay, yeah, Cliff has opinions. To what degree is Cliff 0:54:47.520 --> 0:54:49.560 involved in the record. 0:54:49.560 --> 0:54:51.440 In my side of it, not at all, but in 0:54:51.520 --> 0:54:54.000 the bands side of it a ton. So the band 0:54:54.080 --> 0:54:56.880 uses him as their A and R guy absolutely, because 0:54:56.880 --> 0:54:58.480 there really isn't that A and R. There is no 0:54:58.520 --> 0:55:00.800 A and R from the label on these projects anymore. 0:55:01.200 --> 0:55:03.839 You know. They get the budget and the band has 0:55:03.880 --> 0:55:06.880 to kind of do it bouncing ideas off their producers 0:55:07.040 --> 0:55:10.479 or their management. So I give my opinion, Cliffs gives 0:55:10.800 --> 0:55:12.719 his opinion, and the bands make up their own mind 0:55:12.880 --> 0:55:15.960 at that point. Now, the singles being picked are usually 0:55:16.000 --> 0:55:18.160 being picked by the radio person over at q Prime 0:55:18.640 --> 0:55:22.439 who his name is escaping me Warren, But Warren, right, 0:55:22.560 --> 0:55:26.560 Warren is the He's amazing at picking singles. In fact, 0:55:26.719 --> 0:55:28.120 yesterday Neil said to me, what do you think the 0:55:28.160 --> 0:55:31.880 next single is. I'm like, don't ask me. You know, 0:55:32.080 --> 0:55:33.880 I'm just going to deliver you up to the plate 0:55:34.040 --> 0:55:36.319 and you'll get a nice swing. I'm not sure what 0:55:36.760 --> 0:55:38.919 ball we're throwing, but you're going to get a nice swing, 0:55:39.480 --> 0:55:39.680 you know. 0:55:40.000 --> 0:55:43.160 So okay, let's go back to the recording process. So 0:55:43.760 --> 0:55:49.680 you have all the instruments recorded, you have the vocals recorded. 0:55:50.280 --> 0:55:53.239 Now you're in your own house. What do you do 0:55:53.320 --> 0:55:53.600 to it? 0:55:54.120 --> 0:55:57.759 That's my fun time. I rearranged as much as I want. 0:55:57.840 --> 0:55:59.960 I changed chords around, and I sent it to the 0:56:00.160 --> 0:56:02.040 band and sometimes they go, Howard, what the fuck are 0:56:02.080 --> 0:56:04.680 you thinking? You know? And sometimes they go, oh, I 0:56:04.680 --> 0:56:08.759 love this. So it's that, you know. My manager used 0:56:08.760 --> 0:56:11.800 to always say, you need to give Howard a week 0:56:12.160 --> 0:56:15.160 to do his thing, and you know I would just 0:56:15.680 --> 0:56:18.000 It's that's where the to me, a lot of the 0:56:18.040 --> 0:56:20.400 record comes together. Like if there's like a chorus in 0:56:20.400 --> 0:56:22.279 the wrong place, or I need a double chorus here, 0:56:23.239 --> 0:56:26.160 the bridge is too long, we need a break here, 0:56:26.520 --> 0:56:30.719 the vocal is the second verse should have been the 0:56:30.719 --> 0:56:33.759 first verse. Those are things that I can now. I've 0:56:33.760 --> 0:56:37.280 got all the ingredients. I got kind of a cooked meal. 0:56:37.560 --> 0:56:41.000 It's not quite done yet. Now I can move the 0:56:41.040 --> 0:56:44.920 pieces around, you know, and bands really really like that 0:56:45.239 --> 0:56:46.880 for me. They want me to do that. You know. 0:56:47.000 --> 0:56:48.759 If I don't do that, I'm not doing my job 0:56:48.800 --> 0:56:50.840 for them. So I have to put that time aside, 0:56:51.080 --> 0:56:53.160 and I have to be has to be like sort 0:56:53.160 --> 0:56:54.960 of quiet, and I have to be able to be focused. 0:56:54.960 --> 0:56:58.480 And sometimes I'll work straight for like twenty minutes, take 0:56:58.480 --> 0:57:02.440 a break, watch Sports Center, come back, work twenty minutes, 0:57:02.719 --> 0:57:05.359 take a break, do something else, go for a hike, 0:57:05.440 --> 0:57:08.440 come back, look at it again in a different way angles, 0:57:08.520 --> 0:57:11.920 you know, try to envision it differently. And sometimes I 0:57:11.920 --> 0:57:14.440 think it's amazing and I'll send it and everybody hates it, 0:57:15.200 --> 0:57:17.400 and that's the that's you know, And I don't have 0:57:17.480 --> 0:57:20.360 any ego with that. If it's something that I feel 0:57:20.360 --> 0:57:22.600 super strong about, though, I'll make a stink about it. 0:57:22.840 --> 0:57:24.480 But a lot of times I'm just running stuff up 0:57:24.520 --> 0:57:27.840 the flagpole to see who salutes, you know, Like I'll 0:57:27.880 --> 0:57:30.200 just try things like that. And you know, it's a 0:57:30.200 --> 0:57:33.520 little bit more that the bands, because they all have 0:57:33.560 --> 0:57:36.560 pro tools now, they know how to talk to me 0:57:36.720 --> 0:57:39.560 directly about things, so it's a little bit more easier 0:57:39.600 --> 0:57:41.320 to do it Like a lot of times the band 0:57:41.360 --> 0:57:43.600 will say, hey, can you move this part a couple 0:57:43.600 --> 0:57:45.640 of bars over to this and move this thing? The 0:57:45.680 --> 0:57:47.560 few beats back and I know what they're talking about, 0:57:47.760 --> 0:57:51.240 so the you know, the communication is real smooth now. 0:57:51.360 --> 0:57:52.920 Used to not be that smooth because they didn't know 0:57:52.960 --> 0:57:55.360 what I was doing in the computer back then. But 0:57:55.440 --> 0:57:58.040 now everybody sort of works in pro tools are logic. 0:57:58.360 --> 0:58:02.240 We're all talking the same language much, you know. So yeah, 0:58:02.400 --> 0:58:03.440 that's okay. 0:58:03.680 --> 0:58:07.440 Just since you mentioned that, I was going to ask you, 0:58:07.560 --> 0:58:10.440 obviously a pro tools guy, what's your take on logic. 0:58:11.560 --> 0:58:13.480 I think it's great for writing. I just didn't let 0:58:13.560 --> 0:58:15.680 I never learned it, you know, I didn't need to. 0:58:16.360 --> 0:58:19.000 So we see a lot of projects come in on 0:58:19.040 --> 0:58:21.480 logic and we just transform into pro tools, you know. 0:58:22.000 --> 0:58:24.440 I think it's a much Pro Tools is really a 0:58:24.520 --> 0:58:28.240 the more professional to me medium to record in the 0:58:28.320 --> 0:58:30.480 problem with it is is that it's not easy to 0:58:30.600 --> 0:58:32.720 do a lot of MIDI stuff in it. The MIDI 0:58:32.720 --> 0:58:35.840 stuff is sort of clunky still, but I don't have to, 0:58:36.080 --> 0:58:38.080 you know, I'm not working in that medium that much. 0:58:38.080 --> 0:58:40.080 I'm working you know, if I do MIDI on it, 0:58:41.160 --> 0:58:43.920 you know, it's it's mostly using the instrument tracks and 0:58:44.080 --> 0:58:45.840 using virtual instruments, or if I have to do some 0:58:45.880 --> 0:58:48.919 real instruments, I just you know, play him live. Most 0:58:48.920 --> 0:58:50.440 of the time. All these stuff I do is live 0:58:50.520 --> 0:58:53.000 the work and stuff. I don't really you know, do 0:58:53.080 --> 0:58:54.080 any MIDI stuff with that. 0:58:54.960 --> 0:58:59.960 So yeah, okay, you're in your room. People can't see 0:59:00.040 --> 0:59:03.520 because this is audio only. There are multiple keyboards. You 0:59:03.680 --> 0:59:07.840 talked about the organ, to what degree do you add 0:59:07.920 --> 0:59:09.360 sounds a lot? 0:59:10.160 --> 0:59:12.480 Yeah, so you can't see all this stuff. But I 0:59:12.520 --> 0:59:16.320 have a collection of Vox continentals. I'm a big sixties organit. 0:59:16.160 --> 0:59:18.440 Wait wait wait, wait wait wait. If you have a 0:59:18.520 --> 0:59:22.080 collections of Vox continentals, is that because you know they're 0:59:22.080 --> 0:59:24.560 not making anymore or each one sounds different. 0:59:25.920 --> 0:59:29.000 They all sound different, and I love the sound. I 0:59:29.080 --> 0:59:32.280 just love it. And they the bass sound the bottom 0:59:32.360 --> 0:59:35.880 end you When I work with man Xeric on a 0:59:35.920 --> 0:59:37.760 few things, I was lucky enough to meet him, I 0:59:37.800 --> 0:59:41.240 was a huge fan. I learned how to properly hook 0:59:41.320 --> 0:59:43.880 up a Continental to a speaker so they sound like 0:59:44.200 --> 0:59:46.880 a door sound. So I sneak this stuff in on 0:59:47.000 --> 0:59:50.360 my own, you know, for my own purposes, Like I 0:59:50.520 --> 0:59:52.320 just you know, I'll put a B three in there 0:59:52.360 --> 0:59:54.680 and I'll be like, yeah, man, ask the Keith Emerson 0:59:54.720 --> 0:59:56.280 sound I snuck in on that record, you know, and 0:59:56.280 --> 0:59:58.120 the band's like that stuff. There's you know, you're paying 0:59:58.160 --> 1:00:02.000 homage to your you know, the greats, the great people, 1:00:02.120 --> 1:00:06.960 you know. So yeah, I use a lot of virtual keyboards, melotrons, 1:00:08.240 --> 1:00:10.440 all that stuff, whatever works, and sometimes just a lot 1:00:10.520 --> 1:00:14.040 of modern stuff just for like, you know, doubling bass, 1:00:14.040 --> 1:00:16.400 and sometimes we'll take the real bass out and just 1:00:16.480 --> 1:00:18.560 use a bass a mode base, you know, like an 1:00:18.560 --> 1:00:20.400 old style mode base or you know, I just got 1:00:20.400 --> 1:00:23.480 a d X seven actually because somebody had requested that 1:00:23.560 --> 1:00:26.320 old d X seven Toto sound, and I bought a 1:00:26.360 --> 1:00:28.600 d X seven online. Of course, it got here from Japan. 1:00:28.640 --> 1:00:32.560 It was destroyed in transit, you know, and I fixed it. 1:00:32.960 --> 1:00:35.600 So now I'm going to put that old base Base one. 1:00:35.800 --> 1:00:38.960 You know, Base one is the preset and we're going 1:00:39.040 --> 1:00:40.720 to put that on one of our records. So you know, 1:00:41.040 --> 1:00:43.960 it's amazing what some artists refer to, Like you wouldn't 1:00:43.960 --> 1:00:46.040 know that some of these guys know some of these records, 1:00:46.440 --> 1:00:49.320 but you know they'll be like, yeah, like that Rosanna sound, 1:00:49.320 --> 1:00:51.240 and like, oh, I don't even know you knew who 1:00:51.240 --> 1:00:54.360 that project was, you know, so we'll steal. We'll steal 1:00:54.400 --> 1:00:57.600 some shit from Steve per Caro, you know, things like that. 1:00:57.720 --> 1:01:02.480 You know, I'm a big music history fan, like I 1:01:02.520 --> 1:01:04.680 love to go back. Me and Pete Ambarger are always 1:01:04.680 --> 1:01:07.480 talking about music history all the time, just about you know, 1:01:07.560 --> 1:01:09.600 all the greats and the keyboards they played, and the 1:01:09.640 --> 1:01:12.520 guitars they used, and the songwriting. I just went and 1:01:12.560 --> 1:01:15.560 saw Jimmy Webb at the Canyon Club play all his 1:01:15.680 --> 1:01:19.840 songs on a piano. It was so amazing. I mean, 1:01:19.960 --> 1:01:22.440 I'm such a you know, I'm kind of a geek 1:01:22.520 --> 1:01:23.640 when it comes to that stuff. 1:01:24.080 --> 1:01:31.400 You know. Okay, so you finish. How long does it 1:01:31.440 --> 1:01:34.160 take you to work on a track in your room. 1:01:36.040 --> 1:01:38.640 Well, if it's a smooth one, it could be I 1:01:38.640 --> 1:01:42.680 don't know, maybe a day. But sometimes I'll have to 1:01:42.720 --> 1:01:46.800 go back and rethink it. So yeah, you know, the 1:01:46.840 --> 1:01:48.800 band says, well, we like it, but we don't like this, 1:01:49.000 --> 1:01:51.640 or they'll say, hey, great, let's send it to mixing. 1:01:52.080 --> 1:01:55.640 We're done, that's it, you know. But sometimes they'll just say, hey, 1:01:55.640 --> 1:01:58.400 you know, you took too much out. I'll hear that 1:01:58.440 --> 1:02:00.919 a lot. Actually, I like to short things and get 1:02:00.920 --> 1:02:02.160 to the meat of the bone. You know. 1:02:03.800 --> 1:02:07.560 Okay, how many times might it go back and forth? 1:02:08.160 --> 1:02:10.320 And to what degree do you stand up for your 1:02:10.440 --> 1:02:11.440 choices at the end. 1:02:12.920 --> 1:02:15.040 If I think it's a deal breaker when it comes 1:02:15.040 --> 1:02:18.000 to the commercial aspect of the music, I will I 1:02:18.000 --> 1:02:21.320 will absolutely put up a fight if it's something where hey, dude, 1:02:21.320 --> 1:02:23.320 the tambourine shouldn't have been in the third verse. It 1:02:23.320 --> 1:02:26.560 needs to be in the third B section. Okay, you know, 1:02:26.880 --> 1:02:29.439 like that's not something I'm going to start a fight over, 1:02:29.760 --> 1:02:32.280 you know. But if somebody says to me, and I've 1:02:32.280 --> 1:02:35.640 had this a bunch, hey, I don't like that double 1:02:35.720 --> 1:02:38.000 chorus at the end, and this song is like two 1:02:38.080 --> 1:02:40.800 minutes and thirty seconds long, and I'll say, not much 1:02:40.840 --> 1:02:43.520 of a song there, man, Like I think we should 1:02:43.560 --> 1:02:45.760 repeat the chorus. But I'll tell you what, instead of 1:02:45.800 --> 1:02:49.240 the chords going a minor FG, let's go a minor GF. 1:02:49.720 --> 1:02:51.960 It'll still work. The melody. We're in the same KEYSC, 1:02:52.640 --> 1:02:55.240 we're in the relative minor, the relative major melody of work. 1:02:55.280 --> 1:02:57.360 Let's mess around with the chords and we'll do the 1:02:57.360 --> 1:02:59.640 double chorus. But let's make the second chorus a little 1:02:59.640 --> 1:03:02.920 bit differ, and maybe made the drums halftime, and I'll 1:03:02.960 --> 1:03:05.680 add a little gifted the end, you know, like another 1:03:05.720 --> 1:03:08.360 part that comes in, you know, like a secondary hook. 1:03:08.760 --> 1:03:10.520 So those are the kind of things that you know 1:03:10.560 --> 1:03:11.640 you could do pretty quickly. 1:03:11.840 --> 1:03:15.800 Actually, you know, Okay, you've been around for a while, 1:03:16.400 --> 1:03:21.000 well before I get there. What's your take on mastering? Uh? 1:03:21.440 --> 1:03:25.280 Boy, that's really funny question. When I first got into 1:03:25.320 --> 1:03:27.360 the business, I hung out with a guy named Tony 1:03:27.400 --> 1:03:31.040 Ferguson who was mastering the No Doubt record, And I 1:03:31.080 --> 1:03:33.120 remember I went over to Interscope and he played it 1:03:33.160 --> 1:03:37.240 for me and he said, I saved this record in mastering. 1:03:37.920 --> 1:03:39.680 I said, and you know, I didn't know any better. 1:03:39.880 --> 1:03:43.240 Like I was like wow, because I mastered it seven 1:03:43.320 --> 1:03:48.160 times and this is the perfect mastering. And I was like, wow, Okay, 1:03:48.640 --> 1:03:52.680 now I go. No, he didn't. It was a good record, 1:03:52.840 --> 1:03:56.080 you know already, Like it was mastered sixteen different ways, 1:03:56.080 --> 1:03:58.960 it still would have been you know, tragic kingdom, you 1:03:58.960 --> 1:04:03.160 know what I mean. So I my feeling has gone 1:04:03.200 --> 1:04:06.000 one hundred and eighty degrees, like I don't want him 1:04:06.040 --> 1:04:08.680 to really mess with what I've got. I need him 1:04:08.720 --> 1:04:10.880 to do a few things for me, make sure the 1:04:10.960 --> 1:04:14.720 levels are all consistent throughout the project and if I 1:04:14.800 --> 1:04:16.959 miss something like I have too much boominess and base 1:04:17.040 --> 1:04:19.400 and things like that. But a lot of times you 1:04:19.480 --> 1:04:21.480 really need him just to make sure the codex are 1:04:21.480 --> 1:04:25.000 correct for the different formats you're delivering too. So you know, 1:04:25.600 --> 1:04:28.280 I have a guy who masters our stuff in Switz, Sweden, 1:04:28.880 --> 1:04:31.040 as we have this guy Niles Nielsen, who does all 1:04:31.080 --> 1:04:33.480 our stuff. He's the keyboard player for in Flames. He 1:04:33.520 --> 1:04:36.800 has a separate mastering business and he's he's amazing. He's 1:04:36.840 --> 1:04:39.480 really quick. The stuff comes back, it sounds great, it's 1:04:39.520 --> 1:04:40.360 not overly done. 1:04:41.440 --> 1:04:41.640 You know. 1:04:41.720 --> 1:04:45.440 I think Ted is probably the best, but sometimes we 1:04:45.480 --> 1:04:48.560 can't afford him to do some of his records. Ted Jensen, 1:04:49.000 --> 1:04:51.000 you know, we used him a lot of records, but 1:04:51.200 --> 1:04:54.000 you know, sometimes it's just easier to use some of 1:04:54.040 --> 1:04:56.040 these other guys. You know, some mixers just do their 1:04:56.080 --> 1:04:58.920 own mastering. So I think it's going on. It's it 1:04:59.040 --> 1:05:01.400 used to be something that is like an official meeting 1:05:01.400 --> 1:05:03.720 where you and the band and the management the label 1:05:03.760 --> 1:05:07.160 went to the mastering lab and Big Bear Tooth speakers, 1:05:07.200 --> 1:05:09.560 the whole bit big. I don't know what they were called, 1:05:09.800 --> 1:05:14.320 but everybody sat there and went through this whole thing. 1:05:14.480 --> 1:05:17.160 You know. Now it's something that you just go, hey, 1:05:17.160 --> 1:05:19.040 we need it mastered. The next day it comes back 1:05:19.040 --> 1:05:22.840 from the mastering guy. That's it, you know. So, yeah, 1:05:22.840 --> 1:05:25.000 it's a different business now. I wouldn't want to be 1:05:25.040 --> 1:05:25.760 in that business. 1:05:26.080 --> 1:05:28.280 No, No, I know people who are, and it ain't 1:05:28.320 --> 1:05:30.600 like it used to be. Speaking of ain't like it 1:05:30.720 --> 1:05:33.760 used to be. You've been around long enough. It's the Internet. 1:05:33.880 --> 1:05:36.640 How's that affected budgets? And how's that affected the way 1:05:36.680 --> 1:05:37.040 it work? 1:05:37.880 --> 1:05:41.280 Well, now that's why we have the label because honestly, 1:05:41.760 --> 1:05:45.280 three or four points being a record producer, it ain't 1:05:45.320 --> 1:05:48.720 there anymore. I mean you're dealing with one song. Basically, 1:05:49.160 --> 1:05:52.560 one single pays you the points. And instead of selling 1:05:52.600 --> 1:05:55.200 albums like we used to where we made three or 1:05:55.200 --> 1:05:57.880 four points on ten songs, now you're making it on 1:05:57.880 --> 1:06:00.480 one song and your rock business so you're not streaming 1:06:00.520 --> 1:06:03.240 at all what's used to stream. So the record company, 1:06:03.720 --> 1:06:05.880 Judge and jury, we own fifty percent of the master 1:06:06.040 --> 1:06:08.640 with the label with the artists owns fifty percent of it. 1:06:08.920 --> 1:06:11.760 We fund everything, but we're making more money, but we 1:06:11.840 --> 1:06:13.760 also have to fund it. But at this point in 1:06:13.800 --> 1:06:16.560 my career, I can fund it. So you know, wait, 1:06:16.760 --> 1:06:19.160 let's let's park Judge and Jury for a second. 1:06:19.920 --> 1:06:22.439 Okay, when you're dealing with Three Days Grace, you're dealing 1:06:22.480 --> 1:06:25.560 with another band where it's not your money. Right to 1:06:25.640 --> 1:06:28.240 what degree of the budget's going down? How do you 1:06:28.360 --> 1:06:30.360 compensate what goes on there? 1:06:31.080 --> 1:06:34.200 I think in Three Days Grace, it's not Look, our 1:06:34.200 --> 1:06:37.240 budgets used to be about, say, four hundred thousand per album. 1:06:37.520 --> 1:06:39.880 Now they're down to maybe two hundred thousand for this product, 1:06:39.920 --> 1:06:42.800 for this project. This is an this is an odd 1:06:42.840 --> 1:06:46.840 project because they're still signed to a major, which is 1:06:47.080 --> 1:06:50.520 very rare. You know, I can count on my one 1:06:50.560 --> 1:06:53.080 hand the band signed to majors. I think, so they 1:06:53.080 --> 1:06:58.040 still get a pretty good budget. And yeah, I mean 1:06:58.080 --> 1:07:01.360 it's not I mean, it's definitely different. Like I don't 1:07:01.480 --> 1:07:03.440 charge you know, my relationship with them is just a 1:07:03.480 --> 1:07:06.280 little bit different because I'm in partners. It's hard to say, 1:07:06.320 --> 1:07:08.520 you know, I have my own deal with them. It's 1:07:08.520 --> 1:07:11.360 really not fair to say what that is like. But 1:07:11.400 --> 1:07:13.320 I wouldn't want to be a producer, Bob right now, 1:07:13.560 --> 1:07:16.120 A rock producer. I think it's too hard. I think 1:07:16.120 --> 1:07:18.480 it's really a tough business to be in. It used 1:07:18.480 --> 1:07:21.040 to be a big, really really good lucrative business to 1:07:21.080 --> 1:07:24.160 be in, but I got in under the wire, honestly 1:07:24.640 --> 1:07:27.800 with it. You know, I had hit records when you 1:07:27.840 --> 1:07:31.000 were still selling albums and iTunes, downloads and things like 1:07:31.040 --> 1:07:35.120 that streaming. The only the reason I excuse me my 1:07:35.280 --> 1:07:38.520 career and I still do well is I produce so 1:07:38.680 --> 1:07:42.320 many records, you know, like one hundred and seventy of them, 1:07:42.480 --> 1:07:44.880 and so my catalog is really huge if you look 1:07:44.920 --> 1:07:47.960 at my resume, and so I get income on all 1:07:48.000 --> 1:07:51.320 those songs. So it's just, you know, not any one 1:07:51.320 --> 1:07:53.280 of them in their own would be able to like 1:07:53.280 --> 1:07:55.680 support a lifestyle that I have, but all of them 1:07:55.720 --> 1:07:59.520 together do. And I got that from I really, I 1:07:59.560 --> 1:08:01.880 really I what Chris SORDAUGI was doing, to be honest. 1:08:02.160 --> 1:08:05.400 Chris was just mixing records so fast. He was mixing 1:08:05.440 --> 1:08:07.640 like entire albums in three or four days, you know, 1:08:08.000 --> 1:08:11.960 And so every year he'd mix what fifty albums, sixty albums, 1:08:12.000 --> 1:08:15.320 seventy albums. His shot at hits was so much higher 1:08:15.320 --> 1:08:18.000 than everybody's because his odds were better. And I thought, 1:08:18.000 --> 1:08:19.600 you know what, as long as I can get the 1:08:19.640 --> 1:08:21.920 songs right and the bands and I sell records and 1:08:21.960 --> 1:08:24.559 I make great records, who cares how fast I work, 1:08:24.960 --> 1:08:27.200 you know. So I put a team together and I 1:08:27.240 --> 1:08:30.000 did it quickly so I could do ten albums a year. 1:08:30.160 --> 1:08:32.640 There were some years I did ten albums, you know, 1:08:32.760 --> 1:08:35.479 and if I'm batting three hundred like a baseball player, 1:08:35.960 --> 1:08:38.880 I'm in the Hall of Fame, you know. So you know, 1:08:39.600 --> 1:08:42.200 to me, it was more about that than it was 1:08:42.240 --> 1:08:44.200 about you know. I mean, I wanted to have a 1:08:44.200 --> 1:08:46.559 life after music. I have a family, I live in 1:08:46.800 --> 1:08:48.680 you know, I live in calabass have two kids. I 1:08:48.680 --> 1:08:51.960 sent him through college, and I worked my ass off 1:08:51.960 --> 1:08:54.160 for I still working. I don't even have to work. 1:08:54.200 --> 1:08:56.519 But I love doing this rec I love this business. 1:08:56.840 --> 1:08:58.800 You know, I'm kind of like never going to be 1:08:58.800 --> 1:09:02.400 able to. I look at and Clive just keeps working, 1:09:02.439 --> 1:09:04.639 you know, like I kind of want to be like him, 1:09:05.040 --> 1:09:07.200 you know, just keep going, you know. 1:09:07.760 --> 1:09:10.680 Okay, let's go back. Let's assume I'm not signed to 1:09:10.720 --> 1:09:14.240 a major label. It's basically my money or an investor. 1:09:14.760 --> 1:09:15.880 Are you gonna work with me? 1:09:19.040 --> 1:09:21.880 Uh? As far as a record label or. 1:09:21.880 --> 1:09:24.000 No, no, no, no, no, I want to make a record. 1:09:24.040 --> 1:09:28.400 I want to use your team, right, I personally will 1:09:28.400 --> 1:09:32.360 write the check. Not a label, not a traditional outfit. 1:09:32.960 --> 1:09:34.519 Are you open to that business? 1:09:35.080 --> 1:09:35.160 No? 1:09:35.800 --> 1:09:38.080 I give that to my other guys. It's too hard. 1:09:38.640 --> 1:09:40.640 And the reason is not because of the sales, but 1:09:40.680 --> 1:09:44.519 because a new artist with lots of money, they don't 1:09:44.560 --> 1:09:47.559 know the tempo of making records. So you end up 1:09:47.560 --> 1:09:52.120 in this endless cycle of redoing and redoing and expectations. 1:09:52.400 --> 1:09:55.160 How come it's not selling, Howard, how come's not selling? Well, 1:09:55.280 --> 1:09:58.719 you don't have any followers. Nobody's you know, following, there's 1:09:58.800 --> 1:10:00.720 you know, yeah, but you fucked the record, you know. 1:10:00.760 --> 1:10:02.720 Like all this stuff starts to happen with people that 1:10:02.760 --> 1:10:06.120 don't know what they're doing. The mature artists don't give 1:10:06.120 --> 1:10:08.840 you that stuff. They know the tempo of what we're 1:10:08.880 --> 1:10:12.759 working in the worldview of the music business new people. 1:10:13.520 --> 1:10:15.920 It's tough man working with I've done it before, I've 1:10:15.920 --> 1:10:18.800 done I'm not doing anything just for the money. I'll 1:10:18.800 --> 1:10:20.760 give that to my guys to do that. Oh, kills 1:10:20.800 --> 1:10:23.840 are called like puff pieces, puff projects. How many people 1:10:23.840 --> 1:10:27.040 are on the payroll, Well, they're not they're all ten 1:10:27.120 --> 1:10:27.799 ninety nine. 1:10:27.600 --> 1:10:30.120 S Okay, So that's the point. So let's assume you 1:10:30.160 --> 1:10:33.200 give it to one of your guys. You've taken a piece. No, 1:10:35.240 --> 1:10:39.719 so you own the physical plant. You might be doing 1:10:39.800 --> 1:10:42.719 work there. Somebody else might be doing work. Yeah. 1:10:42.880 --> 1:10:44.840 Yeah, And this is my way of giving back to 1:10:44.880 --> 1:10:47.720 my team. They've been loyal to me. They've been there 1:10:47.720 --> 1:10:50.800 for me every year, every year since two thousand and two, 1:10:51.360 --> 1:10:54.960 two thousand and one, and they have business worlds they 1:10:54.960 --> 1:10:58.240 want to grow. I'm fine my life, and so anything 1:10:58.280 --> 1:10:59.680 I don't want to do, I just give it to Mike, 1:10:59.760 --> 1:11:01.560 or give it to Patch, or I give it to 1:11:01.680 --> 1:11:04.240 Joe and or I give it to my son Grady, 1:11:04.240 --> 1:11:06.439 who will give it to somebody he knows. And if 1:11:06.439 --> 1:11:08.120 they he wants to commission him, fine. If they want 1:11:08.160 --> 1:11:09.760 to use the fine, if they want to use the studio, fine, 1:11:09.880 --> 1:11:12.599 it's okay with me. It's not worth it's life. It 1:11:12.640 --> 1:11:14.720 comes under the life is too short Moniker for me. 1:11:15.120 --> 1:11:16.880 Do you know, like I'm just not getting in the 1:11:16.880 --> 1:11:19.919 studio with some new artists that for money. 1:11:19.760 --> 1:11:22.679 Okay, just to dig ones. If someone of your guys 1:11:22.800 --> 1:11:25.720 is cutting in in the studio in your house, you're 1:11:25.720 --> 1:11:27.679 going to take a commission on that or just streen. 1:11:27.560 --> 1:11:29.880 Wellside of my house. It's in the studio. That's not 1:11:30.000 --> 1:11:32.800 my house. That's that's my other. 1:11:32.360 --> 1:11:35.519 The loose language by my part. They're working in your 1:11:35.560 --> 1:11:38.160 studio where you just charging them an hourly or daily 1:11:38.240 --> 1:11:39.799 or are you taking a piece of the project. 1:11:40.320 --> 1:11:43.599 Since they're leasing the studio from me, it keeps them working. 1:11:43.920 --> 1:11:47.040 That's where I'm getting something. So I know if they're 1:11:47.080 --> 1:11:49.599 not getting projects, they're not going to keep leasing the studio. 1:11:50.040 --> 1:11:52.559 So it behooves me to make sure there's projects there, 1:11:52.960 --> 1:11:55.519 you know, so they can skip paying the rent. So 1:11:55.680 --> 1:11:58.600 I'll give them stuff. Hey, hey, here's a project that 1:11:58.680 --> 1:12:01.360 came in. They have twenty thousand dollars to do two singles. Mike, 1:12:01.400 --> 1:12:01.680 do it. 1:12:02.560 --> 1:12:13.599 That's it, Okay, let's switch gears. Tell me about Judge and. 1:12:13.600 --> 1:12:18.639 Jury record company that me and Neil started about five 1:12:18.720 --> 1:12:25.800 years ago, and we sign new bands, established bands. We like. 1:12:26.360 --> 1:12:28.760 They come to us because they like working with me 1:12:28.840 --> 1:12:30.960 as a producer, or they like working with Neil as 1:12:30.960 --> 1:12:32.639 a songwriter because Neil has had a lot of hits 1:12:33.320 --> 1:12:35.479 and now they really like our team of We do 1:12:35.560 --> 1:12:38.240 have people on staff on the judge and jury, and 1:12:38.280 --> 1:12:40.360 they like our marketing department, which is run by my 1:12:40.400 --> 1:12:42.680 son Grady, who loves the music business. He's on the 1:12:42.800 --> 1:12:45.519 he's on the business side of it, collecting royalties and 1:12:45.560 --> 1:12:48.320 things like that. So it's a standalone label through the 1:12:48.439 --> 1:12:52.200 Orchard you Alan Becker signed us over there. It gave us, 1:12:52.240 --> 1:12:55.000 you know, a good deal, and uh, it's fun. I mean, 1:12:55.040 --> 1:12:57.320 I've never thought i'd actually own a record company, but 1:12:57.800 --> 1:13:00.640 I think I think it's only really worth doing if 1:13:00.680 --> 1:13:03.640 you're owning about half the master now. So you know, 1:13:03.760 --> 1:13:06.080 it's a lot of work to make these records sell anything. 1:13:06.479 --> 1:13:08.040 You have to promote them a lot. You have to 1:13:08.040 --> 1:13:09.519 put a lot of money. And I'm not talking about 1:13:09.600 --> 1:13:12.120 radio promotion, but even just the basic marketing and social 1:13:12.160 --> 1:13:14.320 media and all that stuff. I'm not involved in that 1:13:14.320 --> 1:13:16.200 stuff that much. I'm more involved than the sort of 1:13:16.240 --> 1:13:18.160 creed Like I said to them, I'll do this with 1:13:18.240 --> 1:13:19.800 you guys, but I still want to just do what 1:13:19.840 --> 1:13:22.439 I do well, which is produce records like I'll you know, 1:13:22.479 --> 1:13:23.880 and if they don't want to hire me, by the way, 1:13:23.920 --> 1:13:26.040 the artists, they don't have to, like sometimes we'll just 1:13:26.040 --> 1:13:28.759 buy finish masters from them. You know, we're not forcing 1:13:28.800 --> 1:13:31.320 anybody to work with us, you know, but some people 1:13:31.360 --> 1:13:34.479 like we'd signed this band Saliva that you know is 1:13:34.479 --> 1:13:37.320 a you know, hasn't made it, you know. They said, 1:13:37.360 --> 1:13:39.280 we've never made a record that sounded the way we wanted. 1:13:39.360 --> 1:13:40.920 We want to work with you guys, as we said 1:13:40.920 --> 1:13:43.080 to them, Okay, let's do a record together. We signed 1:13:43.080 --> 1:13:46.360 them for one album and you know, pretty easy deal 1:13:46.400 --> 1:13:49.000 to make. We have a record right now that Tommy 1:13:49.120 --> 1:13:52.080 de Benedict. This is working at radio for us and 1:13:52.640 --> 1:13:54.559 you know, being on the other side of the desk 1:13:54.600 --> 1:13:57.719 a little bit, so it's an interesting, you know, place 1:13:57.760 --> 1:13:58.400 to see things. 1:13:58.640 --> 1:14:02.559 Okay, let's pull back lens. Okay, what is funding this? 1:14:04.520 --> 1:14:07.000 We well, Neil and I pay for everything. 1:14:08.040 --> 1:14:11.839 Okay, it's not from an advance from Sony or anything 1:14:11.960 --> 1:14:15.960 like that. What do you mean? Sorry, But my point 1:14:16.000 --> 1:14:19.320 is you and your partner are paying for the whole thing. 1:14:19.360 --> 1:14:20.000 You're the bank. 1:14:20.680 --> 1:14:24.160 Yes, we're ok. We have not taken any money from anyone. 1:14:24.160 --> 1:14:27.920 Ok But there's no third party income other than if 1:14:27.920 --> 1:14:31.959 you're actually streaming something or whatever. So how many records 1:14:32.000 --> 1:14:34.360 have you signed or put out. 1:14:34.800 --> 1:14:37.320 We've put out That's a really good question. I'd have 1:14:37.360 --> 1:14:40.000 to look at the catalog. But with a lot of 1:14:40.040 --> 1:14:44.120 the singles and doubles, you know, one home run with 1:14:44.479 --> 1:14:46.800 Breaking Benjamin at Star Set. We went to number one 1:14:46.840 --> 1:14:51.920 with that one. I say, we've signed. This is our 1:14:51.960 --> 1:14:54.400 busiest year. We're putting out four albums in the next 1:14:54.400 --> 1:15:00.559 four months. Saliva album, a album by Dead Habits, which 1:15:00.600 --> 1:15:05.439 is the singer from Escape the Fate, his band, Caleb Piles, 1:15:05.479 --> 1:15:10.800 the Christian artists that we're working with, and god, who's 1:15:10.840 --> 1:15:13.920 the fourth one. I'm spacing out right now, but oh 1:15:14.000 --> 1:15:17.479 Ray Garrison Silo's project. So we have a publicist on 1:15:17.520 --> 1:15:20.680 board outside that we hired for that, and so it 1:15:20.760 --> 1:15:22.760 runs like a record real record company, and my job 1:15:22.800 --> 1:15:25.960 is mostly to be wheeled in to make some you know, 1:15:26.000 --> 1:15:29.000 the bigger decisions since I'm paying for it. Same with Neil. 1:15:29.120 --> 1:15:32.080 But we have like ten ninety nine employees as well 1:15:32.120 --> 1:15:34.160 for this one who work you know, with us, And 1:15:35.439 --> 1:15:37.280 once you get down to it, you're really looking at 1:15:37.280 --> 1:15:39.759 two or three people that can do the work because 1:15:39.800 --> 1:15:41.800 being with the Orchard gives us a big advantage. They 1:15:41.800 --> 1:15:43.599 have a good staff there, so they do a lot 1:15:43.640 --> 1:15:46.800 of that you know, royalty stuff for us. They pay 1:15:46.800 --> 1:15:49.439 the royalties and all they do, also do the marketing, 1:15:49.479 --> 1:15:51.400 they do the social media stuff for us. We do 1:15:51.439 --> 1:15:53.640 a lot of it too, but they augment that. So 1:15:53.680 --> 1:15:56.240 we're not just sitting here alone on the ocean by ourselves. 1:15:56.240 --> 1:15:59.640 We have a partner. We're paying them eighteen percent for that, 1:15:59.680 --> 1:16:02.120 though we do have to pay them a distribution fee. 1:16:02.479 --> 1:16:05.280 So yeah, I had to learn this from scratch, by 1:16:05.280 --> 1:16:08.680 the way, in twenty twenty. It was like learning a 1:16:08.720 --> 1:16:12.200 new business from It was like an upside down business 1:16:12.240 --> 1:16:14.080 to me because I was used to like, you know, here, 1:16:14.120 --> 1:16:16.439 we make full albums, we go to radio, you know 1:16:16.439 --> 1:16:18.760 what I mean, like the traditional record business. It wasn't 1:16:18.760 --> 1:16:20.840 like focused on social media or anything like that. Now 1:16:20.880 --> 1:16:23.280 it's all so it's so focused on that stuff. 1:16:23.640 --> 1:16:26.599 Okay, is this a vanity project? Are you guys making 1:16:26.680 --> 1:16:27.720 any money? 1:16:27.800 --> 1:16:29.400 Yeah, we're making money. Yeah. 1:16:29.600 --> 1:16:34.080 Okay, So you talked earlier about rock not streaming. What 1:16:34.240 --> 1:16:37.120 is the state of rock today? Well? 1:16:37.439 --> 1:16:40.960 Rock? Okay. The trick in our company just because I 1:16:41.040 --> 1:16:44.080 know the numbers keep the cost down, which is why 1:16:44.080 --> 1:16:45.840 the studio really has a lot to do with it. 1:16:45.960 --> 1:16:48.320 We don't have to pay those kind of things if 1:16:48.320 --> 1:16:52.000 I produce it I'm not charging. Neil's not charging. Our 1:16:52.040 --> 1:16:54.639 biggest expense is on putting a record out. Are really 1:16:54.720 --> 1:16:55.800 the marketing expenses. 1:16:55.840 --> 1:16:56.080 You know. 1:16:56.439 --> 1:16:59.400 The cost of doing the projects is not that much 1:16:59.439 --> 1:17:01.719 because we have all that. That's part of the reason 1:17:01.760 --> 1:17:04.920 we started it is we figured, Okay, we can defray 1:17:04.960 --> 1:17:07.280 a lot of these costs because we're the ones doing 1:17:07.280 --> 1:17:12.200 the albums. So if we stream, say, you know, twenty 1:17:12.240 --> 1:17:15.000 million streams, we can make enough money to make money 1:17:15.000 --> 1:17:17.840 on that project. Not every record does that, but once 1:17:17.840 --> 1:17:21.439 you start building the catalog up, the catalog becomes worth something. 1:17:21.720 --> 1:17:23.920 As you know, you can sell catalogs later for like 1:17:23.960 --> 1:17:26.800 ten times earnings. So the trick is to own the own, 1:17:27.120 --> 1:17:29.800 you know, to keep building up your you know, the 1:17:29.920 --> 1:17:33.360 value of your catalog, your your intellectual properties. And I 1:17:33.439 --> 1:17:35.200 learned that as a producer because I have a lot 1:17:35.240 --> 1:17:38.400 of that stuff in my you know, people are always 1:17:38.400 --> 1:17:41.080 trying to buy my catalog as a producer. So we 1:17:41.160 --> 1:17:42.240 just said, you know what, why don't we do it 1:17:42.240 --> 1:17:44.599 as a record company. Neil sees that from three days Grace, 1:17:45.040 --> 1:17:45.320 you know. 1:17:45.840 --> 1:17:50.600 So let's just go sideways for a second. Sure, have 1:17:50.760 --> 1:17:51.840 you sold any rights? 1:17:53.040 --> 1:17:53.120 No? 1:17:53.960 --> 1:17:58.880 Would you no? Give me your philosophy. 1:17:58.960 --> 1:18:02.760 It's you're dumb ast shit to sell them unless you 1:18:02.760 --> 1:18:04.559 you know, when you sell them, you have like four 1:18:04.600 --> 1:18:06.920 wives and seventeen kids. You have to split the money 1:18:06.960 --> 1:18:08.960 up with and you can't, you know what I mean. 1:18:09.000 --> 1:18:11.679 I'm lucky. I have the same wife of thirty five years, 1:18:12.400 --> 1:18:15.559 and my kid's great at royalties. I don't need. I 1:18:15.560 --> 1:18:17.640 don't have any of that stuff. Like Mike, you know, 1:18:17.720 --> 1:18:21.200 my son's great at finding sound exchange royalties that didn't exist, 1:18:21.320 --> 1:18:23.479 or you know, going to Sony and saying, hey this 1:18:23.680 --> 1:18:27.519 you know project this record you did blah blah blah. 1:18:28.400 --> 1:18:30.880 The point schedul didn't give the escalations or all the 1:18:31.200 --> 1:18:33.360 you know, the AFM after money is not coming in, 1:18:33.400 --> 1:18:35.439 where is it? He's listed as a keyboard. You know, 1:18:35.840 --> 1:18:38.599 you need somebody on staff to do that, and my kid, 1:18:38.840 --> 1:18:41.760 luckily is on staff, so he has made me a 1:18:41.800 --> 1:18:46.760 lot of money. Grady finding missing royalties. Not everybody's like that, 1:18:47.120 --> 1:18:50.960 but to me, it's an appreciating asset music, Like it's 1:18:51.000 --> 1:18:53.320 only going to go higher because you're gonna have more 1:18:53.360 --> 1:18:55.760 people getting Spotify. I mean, this is we're like in 1:18:55.800 --> 1:18:58.320 the second inning of this right now. So why would 1:18:58.360 --> 1:18:59.880 you sell it. You're not going to get that in 1:19:00.040 --> 1:19:03.519 come anywhere else. First of all, why do people want 1:19:03.560 --> 1:19:05.960 to buy it so badly? Do you know what I mean? 1:19:07.720 --> 1:19:12.080 You know, I'm not forcing people. They're coming to me 1:19:12.160 --> 1:19:12.679 all the time. 1:19:13.680 --> 1:19:16.240 It just cracks me up. You know, you're a musician. 1:19:16.280 --> 1:19:19.360 These people who are saying their business is money. The 1:19:19.439 --> 1:19:22.040 people who are buying it, they're not buying it if 1:19:22.040 --> 1:19:25.120 they're not making money. It's crazy. 1:19:25.240 --> 1:19:27.720 That's all you really have to think about. It's that 1:19:27.840 --> 1:19:30.120 part of it, you know. I mean, you're dying for 1:19:30.160 --> 1:19:33.200 these royalties. It's a cash machine. Think about it. Every 1:19:33.240 --> 1:19:36.519 It doesn't matter what's going on in the world. The 1:19:36.640 --> 1:19:39.679 reason why hoobastank is going to stream every day somewhere, 1:19:40.000 --> 1:19:44.400 and why would I give that away? 1:19:44.520 --> 1:19:47.080 You know, I'm with you totally on this. Let's go 1:19:47.200 --> 1:19:50.840 back though. You talked about Judge and jury, rock the 1:19:51.000 --> 1:19:53.240 rock world in general. Give me your take. 1:19:54.000 --> 1:19:57.679 You know, it's a This is one of those things 1:19:57.680 --> 1:20:00.400 that either I sleep well at night or keeps me night. 1:20:01.600 --> 1:20:03.240 But when I go to like Louder than Life and 1:20:03.280 --> 1:20:05.599 I go, oh my god, this is healthy. Look at 1:20:05.600 --> 1:20:09.120 all these kids. They're killing each other out there. It's awesome. 1:20:09.640 --> 1:20:12.719 And then you look at the streaming and you go, yikes. 1:20:13.120 --> 1:20:15.479 You know, like some half the bands are not streaming 1:20:15.479 --> 1:20:19.280 anything here. So I think it's like, look, it's not 1:20:19.320 --> 1:20:21.160 as lucrative as it used to be. But I think 1:20:21.160 --> 1:20:24.920 if you're smart about it and you don't overspend, and 1:20:25.000 --> 1:20:28.040 you have compelling material. I keep going back to this 1:20:28.120 --> 1:20:32.559 with my company. We need to have great material. A 1:20:32.600 --> 1:20:34.639 lot of the material or these rock bands are doing 1:20:35.200 --> 1:20:38.880 is not great. It's okay, you know, it's not where 1:20:38.880 --> 1:20:41.479 it used to be, where we were the forefront of 1:20:42.680 --> 1:20:45.840 you know, talking about things that nobody wanted to talk about. 1:20:46.160 --> 1:20:49.960 We were, you know, the bad boys. You know, we're 1:20:49.960 --> 1:20:53.320 no longer the bad boys anymore. It's just bland. So 1:20:53.960 --> 1:20:55.720 as much as I talk a good game, I'm still 1:20:55.760 --> 1:20:57.320 trying to get that to be in our music. But 1:20:57.360 --> 1:20:58.920 it's hard because some of the artists are just not 1:20:59.080 --> 1:21:02.080 like that anymore. You know, they're not saying anything that's 1:21:02.080 --> 1:21:05.680 that radical or anything. I mean, I just I don't know, 1:21:06.880 --> 1:21:08.679 I'm not really sure what to think about it. Sometimes. 1:21:08.680 --> 1:21:11.080 All I know is I love doing it, and that's 1:21:11.479 --> 1:21:12.920 you know. I just love the sound of a good 1:21:13.000 --> 1:21:16.080 rock song. I don't know, you know, maybe that's a 1:21:16.080 --> 1:21:18.559 bad explanation, you know, I don't know. 1:21:18.680 --> 1:21:23.200 Okay, in terms of the percentage of new music listening, 1:21:24.880 --> 1:21:30.000 is rock just not being promoted and marketed correctly or 1:21:30.240 --> 1:21:33.640 is the audience not listening to it? In the percentage 1:21:33.640 --> 1:21:36.519 it used to be a reflection of the music itself. 1:21:37.040 --> 1:21:38.799 I think it has to do with the star power 1:21:38.840 --> 1:21:41.040 of the of the artists. We're not I don't think 1:21:41.080 --> 1:21:44.439 that right now we're selling music anymore. We're selling brands, 1:21:44.520 --> 1:21:46.479 and the bands are just not good brand. They're not 1:21:46.920 --> 1:21:50.599 like branded. You compare the brand of Olivia Rodriguez to 1:21:50.600 --> 1:21:53.680 the brand of say, you know, a band like you know, 1:21:53.800 --> 1:21:56.639 bad Omens, which is a big band and bad Omens 1:21:56.680 --> 1:21:58.439 does pretty well, but they're never going to compete with 1:21:58.479 --> 1:22:01.439 a brand like that, with a or swift brand. You know, 1:22:01.680 --> 1:22:05.040 there's things are just massive, they connect more. You know, 1:22:05.120 --> 1:22:08.600 we just don't have that for whatever reason. And it 1:22:08.760 --> 1:22:11.719 comes down it's not I can't fix that. The artists 1:22:11.720 --> 1:22:13.960 have to do it. Like you know, I remember back 1:22:13.960 --> 1:22:16.960 when van Halen came out, nobody thought Van Halen would 1:22:16.960 --> 1:22:18.439 work back then, but you know what, they were so 1:22:18.560 --> 1:22:21.479 special and so great and so different that they came 1:22:21.479 --> 1:22:24.280 out of they came out and stuck out. They created 1:22:24.280 --> 1:22:26.840 something that wasn't there before. We're just not doing that. 1:22:27.760 --> 1:22:30.880 We're just not you know. So, I mean it's a 1:22:30.880 --> 1:22:31.880 really tricky question. 1:22:32.000 --> 1:22:34.160 I thought, well, well, but you're in the heart of it, 1:22:34.240 --> 1:22:37.559 So let's go so in what's called active rock as 1:22:37.600 --> 1:22:41.400 a radio for a bat Okay, let me put it 1:22:41.439 --> 1:22:46.519 this way. I remember when led Zeppelin was considered heavy 1:22:46.600 --> 1:22:50.559 metal and Black Sabbath was too far out. You listen 1:22:50.640 --> 1:22:53.880 to active rock a lot of these records. I feel 1:22:54.120 --> 1:22:56.679 if you haven't listened to the history of forty years 1:22:56.720 --> 1:22:58.760 worth of music, you don't know how they got there. 1:22:59.479 --> 1:23:01.960 So that the the average person who hears it the 1:23:02.000 --> 1:23:06.799 first time, they're not immediately into it. So the question 1:23:07.000 --> 1:23:10.920 becomes is it the music itself? Is it the acts? 1:23:11.439 --> 1:23:14.600 Is rock played out? Could it be shaken up? You 1:23:14.640 --> 1:23:18.040 talk about the Beatles doing harmonies the best whatever the 1:23:18.080 --> 1:23:24.360 Beatles did, harmony's choruses, bridges starting with the chorus versus 1:23:24.560 --> 1:23:26.479 you're not hearing an active rock. 1:23:26.960 --> 1:23:29.720 No you're not, And there's no story really Like you 1:23:29.760 --> 1:23:32.200 were just alluding to this a little bit that when 1:23:32.240 --> 1:23:35.360 you hear a led Zeppelin record, there's a story behind 1:23:35.400 --> 1:23:38.599 it and you're hearing you know, even a Who record, 1:23:38.600 --> 1:23:40.960 there's a story you can think of. I can't think 1:23:41.000 --> 1:23:44.200 of a story behind most of these bands, Like there 1:23:44.240 --> 1:23:47.000 isn't any story. You know, people like to have that 1:23:47.080 --> 1:23:48.759 kind of stuff. But when you think of Tyer Swift, 1:23:48.800 --> 1:23:50.559 you think of a story. I mean the kids, do 1:23:51.160 --> 1:23:54.120 you know when you think of you know, a lot 1:23:54.120 --> 1:23:56.479 of huge pop bands. You know, Billie Eilish is a 1:23:56.479 --> 1:23:58.519 great one, there's a story there. It's like, look at 1:23:58.520 --> 1:24:00.120 you know where she came from and her brother and 1:24:00.160 --> 1:24:02.040 all this stuff. And you know, we just don't. We're 1:24:02.040 --> 1:24:04.560 not good at telling stories anymore in our business. And 1:24:04.600 --> 1:24:06.920 I'm not really sure why, you know, I'm not sure 1:24:06.920 --> 1:24:09.320 where it's coming from. I think the active rock thing 1:24:09.400 --> 1:24:11.960 is a really we There's always been this problem with 1:24:12.040 --> 1:24:15.040 active rock where it just becomes its own worst enemy 1:24:15.200 --> 1:24:17.479 because it starts sounding like everything else. It sounds like 1:24:17.720 --> 1:24:20.000 everything else on there, and it just because like I 1:24:20.040 --> 1:24:22.160 was listening to Octane this morning and I was like, 1:24:22.240 --> 1:24:24.160 oh my god, I can't tell the difference between any 1:24:24.160 --> 1:24:27.200 of these projects. They all sound the same, and by 1:24:27.200 --> 1:24:30.760 the way, I'm one of them, you know, Like it's 1:24:30.840 --> 1:24:32.960 almost like if you don't get the texture. And al 1:24:32.960 --> 1:24:36.040 In Kovak, who you know is great at active rock, 1:24:36.720 --> 1:24:39.240 you know, he used to say this stuff in meetings. 1:24:39.240 --> 1:24:41.599 He would say, you need to get the texture right. 1:24:42.160 --> 1:24:44.519 In other words, it needs to sound like active rock 1:24:44.560 --> 1:24:47.320 to be on active rock. Who cares about the songs 1:24:47.640 --> 1:24:51.720 doesn't matter. What matters is the texture. I don't look. 1:24:51.800 --> 1:24:53.640 I wish it wasn't like that, because I think the 1:24:53.680 --> 1:24:56.960 songs matter, you know, but active rock has turned into 1:24:57.000 --> 1:24:59.400 a thing where it's a texture based thing. I think 1:24:59.600 --> 1:25:02.639 in pop music it's more the songs have to be great, 1:25:02.840 --> 1:25:04.800 you know, because you could hear pop music and it 1:25:04.840 --> 1:25:07.920 sounds like the old broadcasting where everything was different. You know, 1:25:08.080 --> 1:25:10.719 you could put on like a station, there'd be something 1:25:10.760 --> 1:25:12.559 like this, something like that, something like this, and active 1:25:12.640 --> 1:25:16.240 rockets all the same, you know. So I mean I 1:25:16.360 --> 1:25:18.200 joke with Three Days Grace. You guys could fart on 1:25:18.240 --> 1:25:19.519 the tape and it's going to go to number one, 1:25:19.520 --> 1:25:22.240 you know, you know. 1:25:22.280 --> 1:25:24.880 Okay, just Three Days Grace been around for a while, 1:25:24.920 --> 1:25:29.000 but you've been around even longer. The people coming across 1:25:29.080 --> 1:25:30.920 the transom, are they different today? 1:25:33.520 --> 1:25:40.400 As far as the artists, Yeah, you know, they try 1:25:40.439 --> 1:25:42.600 to be like, we have an artist we work with. 1:25:42.680 --> 1:25:44.160 It's a bit more of the DM side. 1:25:44.280 --> 1:25:49.320 And let me reframe my question. Okay, back in the 1:25:49.439 --> 1:25:52.800 days of the English rock stars of the sixties and seventies, 1:25:52.840 --> 1:25:56.120 they tended to be people who were not great socially 1:25:56.280 --> 1:25:59.320 did it to get laid? There was no social media. 1:25:59.360 --> 1:26:03.320 They practice, they practice, they practice, they got their notoriety. 1:26:03.360 --> 1:26:05.760 Today you have a lot of people, Oh I learned 1:26:05.800 --> 1:26:10.240 three chords, let me start promoting myself. So the people 1:26:10.280 --> 1:26:15.040 who come in as people as desire, as creativity, what 1:26:15.160 --> 1:26:16.560 have you seen change? 1:26:17.960 --> 1:26:20.280 It's so much more based on how many followers you have. 1:26:21.160 --> 1:26:23.880 That's the first thing they tell you when you meet 1:26:23.880 --> 1:26:27.479 a band is their social media following, you know, because 1:26:27.520 --> 1:26:29.800 they assume that that's what we want to hear about, 1:26:30.320 --> 1:26:33.759 do you know, And it's probably true, you know, because 1:26:33.840 --> 1:26:37.959 it's really hard to take something from zero to It's 1:26:38.000 --> 1:26:41.800 like we have this you know. Look, it's hard to 1:26:41.840 --> 1:26:44.280 get from the goal line to the twenty. It's a 1:26:44.320 --> 1:26:46.400 lot easier to get from the fifty to the goal 1:26:46.479 --> 1:26:48.559 you know what I mean. So it's really hard to 1:26:48.600 --> 1:26:51.880 start this up. So bands end up becoming you know, 1:26:52.880 --> 1:26:56.519 not only artists, but performers and videos and they do 1:26:56.560 --> 1:26:58.720 anything they can to get attention. It's less focused on 1:26:58.720 --> 1:27:01.680 the music and the songs actually focused more on the notoriety. 1:27:01.880 --> 1:27:04.559 But it's even hard to do that to break through that. 1:27:04.760 --> 1:27:07.920 You know, there's just so many people competing, you know. 1:27:08.000 --> 1:27:10.479 Craig Common once said to me, it's the dumbing down 1:27:10.560 --> 1:27:13.240 of art the Internet, Like there's just so much dumb 1:27:13.320 --> 1:27:15.599 art out there. It's really hard to get yourself noticed. 1:27:15.880 --> 1:27:18.080 And I think bands because they're working with two guitars, 1:27:18.120 --> 1:27:21.880 bass and drums, it's even harder. You know, you're you know, 1:27:21.880 --> 1:27:24.599 if you'ren't using those instruments, you're not considered a rock band. 1:27:25.120 --> 1:27:27.240 You know, well a courdy the well, the Grammys would 1:27:27.240 --> 1:27:29.680 maybe say it's differently because they put things in the 1:27:29.760 --> 1:27:31.000 rock category that are. 1:27:31.560 --> 1:27:35.160 Let's not get into the Grammys. You know that's coming. 1:27:35.200 --> 1:27:35.320 I was. 1:27:35.680 --> 1:27:39.320 I got my own issues there and that's but let's 1:27:39.400 --> 1:27:42.479 go back to the bands. Okay, I have a manager, 1:27:42.640 --> 1:27:45.760 ultra successful, you know who this person is, doesn't want 1:27:45.800 --> 1:27:49.400 to manage any band, say's too complicated, just wants to 1:27:49.439 --> 1:27:52.640 manage solo artists. Where that person's and maybe there is 1:27:52.680 --> 1:27:55.080 a band, but it's clear there's a leader. Do you 1:27:55.080 --> 1:27:56.040 have a take on that? 1:27:57.280 --> 1:27:59.599 Well, I totally see his point of view, because you 1:27:59.640 --> 1:28:02.000 can have a really good band that one guy is 1:28:02.080 --> 1:28:05.080 the I call it the tyranny of no. They're just 1:28:05.120 --> 1:28:07.960 saying no to everything and they have a vote and 1:28:08.000 --> 1:28:10.960 it's no, no, no, no no, and you're fucked. That's 1:28:11.000 --> 1:28:13.599 it there. And usually it's the guy who can't play, 1:28:14.760 --> 1:28:16.639 the worst guy in the band, and they use their 1:28:16.680 --> 1:28:19.640 no power to stay in the band. I see that 1:28:19.720 --> 1:28:21.360 a lot in band. It's like you have this really 1:28:21.360 --> 1:28:24.000 good band with three good guys and say the drummer 1:28:24.600 --> 1:28:26.840 can't play, and they you come up with these good 1:28:26.840 --> 1:28:29.760 ideas about baby, telling more of a story about this 1:28:29.840 --> 1:28:33.200 or that, and they're like, no, no, no, that's not us. No, no, no, 1:28:34.560 --> 1:28:37.320 what are you gonna do? You know, like, you know 1:28:38.680 --> 1:28:41.040 he's right. Probably, you know, we don't really have that 1:28:42.120 --> 1:28:44.479 ability to discern that stuff because we have to put 1:28:44.520 --> 1:28:46.559 out projects. We can't just say, well, there's one bad 1:28:46.600 --> 1:28:48.400 guy in the band. We can't do it. We have 1:28:48.439 --> 1:28:51.799 to work around that. But by the way, as a producer, 1:28:51.880 --> 1:28:54.000 my life is summer camp, do you know what I mean? 1:28:54.120 --> 1:28:57.679 Like they come in, they leave. As a manager, that's 1:28:57.720 --> 1:29:00.280 a way worse job he's got them, you know what 1:29:00.280 --> 1:29:03.360 I mean? Like, that's you're basically babysitting the whole time. 1:29:03.720 --> 1:29:05.639 You know, I don't only have to babysit for six 1:29:05.680 --> 1:29:07.040 weeks or something. You know. 1:29:07.439 --> 1:29:10.400 So you say you're a working class kid from Philly, 1:29:10.479 --> 1:29:11.000 Tell me. 1:29:11.880 --> 1:29:14.559 Well, I came up in a blue collar city. And 1:29:14.600 --> 1:29:16.639 I looked at myself as like, oh, well, well, since 1:29:16.640 --> 1:29:17.200 you're saying. 1:29:17.080 --> 1:29:19.000 You're working class kid, what did your parents do for 1:29:19.040 --> 1:29:19.439 a living. 1:29:19.960 --> 1:29:22.800 My did was an insurance salesman okay, and my mom 1:29:22.840 --> 1:29:23.599 was a school teacher. 1:29:23.720 --> 1:29:27.040 Okay, so straight middle class. How many kids in the family? 1:29:27.680 --> 1:29:31.160 One kid? My brother owns an accounting works as an. 1:29:31.040 --> 1:29:33.480 Accountant as a younger or older. 1:29:33.720 --> 1:29:36.160 Younger two years and he was in a band. 1:29:44.800 --> 1:29:47.439 So what kind of kid were you? You mentioned watching 1:29:47.439 --> 1:29:50.920 Sports Center? Were you an athlete? Were you good in school? 1:29:51.000 --> 1:29:52.840 Were you popular or unpopular? 1:29:53.479 --> 1:29:56.479 I was. I was in a band from when I can. 1:29:57.120 --> 1:30:00.680 I was kind of a chubby, fat kid. So my 1:30:00.840 --> 1:30:04.680 way of getting girls was being somehow. A kid came 1:30:04.720 --> 1:30:06.680 to my house one day with his band. It'say, could 1:30:06.680 --> 1:30:08.960 we use your basement? And I said, yeah, you could 1:30:09.000 --> 1:30:10.720 use my basement, but I have an organ down there 1:30:10.760 --> 1:30:13.280 I can play. I couldn't play, but I told him 1:30:13.320 --> 1:30:16.000 I could and it was a pipe pump organ, and 1:30:16.040 --> 1:30:18.720 that it caught me, you know what, I mean that 1:30:19.120 --> 1:30:22.639 I got the disease because like I could play stepping 1:30:22.680 --> 1:30:26.080 Stone by the Monkeys, there's only four notes, and all 1:30:26.080 --> 1:30:28.200 of a sudden, you girls would show up in the basement, 1:30:28.280 --> 1:30:30.280 you know. So you know how that is? One thing 1:30:30.360 --> 1:30:33.080 leads to another and I'm playing in bands all around 1:30:33.120 --> 1:30:34.360 Philly and I, uh. 1:30:34.640 --> 1:30:38.639 Well, let's slow down, wait to slow down. Yeah, did 1:30:38.680 --> 1:30:40.080 you ever take music lessons? 1:30:40.600 --> 1:30:43.519 Well, my mom was a music teacher, so I learned 1:30:43.520 --> 1:30:46.839 it from her naturally. I used to hear her play piano. 1:30:47.640 --> 1:30:49.200 It is a funny story. She used to play my 1:30:49.200 --> 1:30:52.080 favorite things downstairs. I would un her upstairs and the 1:30:52.120 --> 1:30:54.120 chord progression is the same as Light by Fire, and 1:30:54.160 --> 1:30:56.040 I remember how much I love Light by Fire. And 1:30:56.080 --> 1:30:58.960 only years later did I put together the two things, 1:30:59.200 --> 1:31:01.160 and I went, you know what, I think that's because 1:31:01.160 --> 1:31:05.679 she kept playing my favorite things downstairs, you know. So yeah, 1:31:05.680 --> 1:31:07.760 I just I used to be one of those guys 1:31:07.760 --> 1:31:09.640 that dropped the needle on things and just learned it 1:31:09.680 --> 1:31:12.120 by year I developed a really good ear. I can't 1:31:12.120 --> 1:31:14.479 read music that well. I'm good chord changes. I can 1:31:14.520 --> 1:31:17.360 read chord change. I can read like charts really well, 1:31:17.600 --> 1:31:20.479 but I can't read music, read music music like you know, 1:31:20.600 --> 1:31:22.120 you can't put chopin in front of me. 1:31:22.360 --> 1:31:28.840 Oh okay. So you're playing piano at what age? 1:31:29.000 --> 1:31:29.280 Organ? 1:31:30.080 --> 1:31:30.800 Oh? Organ? 1:31:31.600 --> 1:31:32.719 Like eleven twelve? 1:31:33.720 --> 1:31:38.679 Okay? And this interaction where they you're playing in the basement. 1:31:38.720 --> 1:31:39.439 How old are you then? 1:31:40.760 --> 1:31:44.240 Thirteen? Bar Mitzvah. I was getting bar Mitzvah about then. 1:31:45.080 --> 1:31:48.799 Okay, so they're playing in your basement. Did the bands 1:31:48.840 --> 1:31:51.040 whoever in play out play gigs? 1:31:51.560 --> 1:31:53.880 Yeah, we played bar Mitzvah's and you know what happened. 1:31:53.960 --> 1:31:57.080 I got really good, really fast, better than the rest 1:31:57.080 --> 1:32:00.559 of the guys. So I started to learn songs like 1:32:00.560 --> 1:32:02.920 in a Gotta Davida and the doors and things that day, 1:32:02.960 --> 1:32:06.479 didn't you know? They were like, what is this stuff? 1:32:06.520 --> 1:32:06.720 You know? 1:32:07.120 --> 1:32:10.160 We want to play you know, rolling Stones music? And 1:32:10.280 --> 1:32:13.040 I started gravitating more towards keyboard stuff and all, and 1:32:13.080 --> 1:32:15.240 then I you know, back then, you just played in 1:32:15.280 --> 1:32:17.439 any band that was around, you know, like you're there 1:32:17.479 --> 1:32:20.599 was another band they needed a keyboard player. I dragged 1:32:20.600 --> 1:32:24.200 my Vox organ you know RMI actually an RMI organ 1:32:24.240 --> 1:32:27.080 over to their house and play. So when I went 1:32:27.080 --> 1:32:28.200 to Drexel. 1:32:28.400 --> 1:32:31.480 Were okay, continue continue. 1:32:31.520 --> 1:32:33.360 Yeah, I mean I played in the high school bands. 1:32:33.400 --> 1:32:34.720 I still have all the notes, by the way, I 1:32:34.800 --> 1:32:37.360 kept everything. So we played like you know, bar Mitzvah's 1:32:37.439 --> 1:32:40.680 and I don't know, churches, just stupid stuff, you know, 1:32:40.760 --> 1:32:43.360 like with thirty people would show up. But I started 1:32:43.439 --> 1:32:46.920 learning songs, like learning how to play other people's music. 1:32:47.560 --> 1:32:49.280 So I play. I knew all the Stone songs, I 1:32:49.320 --> 1:32:51.040 knew the Door songs, I knew the Beatles songs. I 1:32:51.120 --> 1:32:54.920 learned all the songs of the moment. And when I 1:32:54.960 --> 1:32:58.759 turned seventeen or eighteen, I wanted to go to school Drexel. 1:32:58.840 --> 1:33:00.599 I wanted to get it. At that time, I wasn't 1:33:00.600 --> 1:33:03.200 thinking about being a music pro. I was good, and 1:33:03.360 --> 1:33:05.240 I'd liked math and science, so I wanted to be 1:33:05.280 --> 1:33:08.479 an engineer. So I went to Drexel University and enrolled 1:33:08.479 --> 1:33:12.280 in the materials engineering department. Of course, but then I 1:33:12.360 --> 1:33:15.519 dragged my Hammond dorgan down the Drexel with me, joined 1:33:15.520 --> 1:33:18.240 a fraternity, put it in the basement, started learning Emersus 1:33:18.280 --> 1:33:22.120 Lincoln Palmer on it Tarcas, and these people were hearing 1:33:22.160 --> 1:33:23.960 this through the neighborhood because I had it turned up 1:33:23.960 --> 1:33:26.040 at full blast and people would come around and watch 1:33:26.080 --> 1:33:30.479 me play Tarcas. And another band got together, a fraternity band. 1:33:30.479 --> 1:33:32.639 I joined that one, and then another band got together 1:33:32.640 --> 1:33:35.439 where I would play Amersus Lincoln Palmer, and you know, 1:33:37.000 --> 1:33:40.120 then something really interesting happened. A band came through with 1:33:40.240 --> 1:33:42.800 Lee Andrews and the Hearts. He was a Philly guy 1:33:43.439 --> 1:33:45.400 and he had a hit song back in this fifties. 1:33:46.040 --> 1:33:49.240 There was a seven piece band, a disco band with him. 1:33:50.040 --> 1:33:53.960 I was like the social chairman of the fraternity at 1:33:53.960 --> 1:33:57.360 the time, and these guys and I said, well, you 1:33:57.400 --> 1:33:59.639 don't have a keyboard player, and they said, well, we're 1:33:59.680 --> 1:34:01.080 not going to be with him anymore. Do you want 1:34:01.080 --> 1:34:03.840 to join the band? And I was like okay, and 1:34:03.880 --> 1:34:07.000 I joined the band and we started playing disco techs 1:34:07.080 --> 1:34:10.400 around South Jersey back in the day where the Penalty 1:34:10.400 --> 1:34:14.800 Box was someplace else, wild Wood, Cape, May, all those 1:34:14.880 --> 1:34:19.000 Jerseys shore towns, and that's where I really got good 1:34:19.000 --> 1:34:21.240 at it, because I had to learn how to arrange 1:34:21.240 --> 1:34:25.680 beg songs and Bowie songs and songs that were more sophisticated. 1:34:26.120 --> 1:34:28.439 So I started learning how to do horn arrangements, and 1:34:28.560 --> 1:34:30.400 this thing just started. But I was still going to 1:34:30.439 --> 1:34:33.479 Drexel and during my engineering degree, so I was like 1:34:33.720 --> 1:34:36.599 literally living twenty four hours at a time, you know, 1:34:37.400 --> 1:34:40.040 driving back and forth from the shore, playing in this 1:34:40.160 --> 1:34:44.879 disco band. And eventually I started writing our own material 1:34:44.960 --> 1:34:48.640 and it wasn't any good. I graduated from college. The 1:34:48.720 --> 1:34:50.600 band I was in wanted to come to La. We 1:34:50.640 --> 1:34:52.280 came out to LA. I got a job at Air 1:34:52.360 --> 1:34:55.960 Research at Garrett down in the South Bay as a 1:34:56.000 --> 1:34:58.880 mechanical engineer, and I worked there for four years. So 1:34:58.960 --> 1:35:01.840 I worked, you know, promoted a few times. I was 1:35:01.840 --> 1:35:04.160 a good engineer, Actually I liked it. I worked on 1:35:04.200 --> 1:35:06.599 the C five B. I worked on lead edge slat 1:35:06.640 --> 1:35:11.960 actuation systems for F eighteen's. I worked on the Space Shuttle, 1:35:12.479 --> 1:35:15.120 the orbital gimbo actuators. I worked on all that stuff. 1:35:15.160 --> 1:35:18.240 I was a mechanical engineer, so these are actuators that 1:35:18.400 --> 1:35:21.519 actually move the surfaces. But at nighttime, I was going 1:35:21.520 --> 1:35:24.040 to Sunset Sound because I knew the second engineer there 1:35:24.040 --> 1:35:28.799 who get free studio time, So you know, you're hustling, 1:35:28.880 --> 1:35:30.600 you know what I mean, that's what you're doing. So 1:35:30.680 --> 1:35:33.120 I was hustling studio time at night and getting bands 1:35:33.120 --> 1:35:35.240 that were local, like Jack Mack in the Heart Attack. 1:35:35.760 --> 1:35:38.840 I'd get them studio time, I met them somehow a band, 1:35:39.360 --> 1:35:42.280 and you know, I was learning how to I didn't 1:35:42.280 --> 1:35:44.000 really know what my job was yet, you know what 1:35:44.080 --> 1:35:45.439 I mean, Like, I didn't know there was a I 1:35:45.520 --> 1:35:48.719 knew the producers were producers, but I was just trying 1:35:48.720 --> 1:35:51.600 to make music. And then all of a sudden it 1:35:51.720 --> 1:35:53.439 clicked to me, like, wait a minute, I really don't 1:35:53.439 --> 1:35:55.040 want to be in any of these bands. I want 1:35:55.040 --> 1:35:57.120 to be the guy that calls the shots. First of all, 1:35:57.120 --> 1:35:59.040 I don't have to tour. I don't want to tour. 1:35:59.600 --> 1:36:05.200 A second, it combines engineering and music, and I'm kind 1:36:05.200 --> 1:36:07.960 of okay at both of those things. You know. I 1:36:07.960 --> 1:36:09.840 did take a year off from Drexel and went to 1:36:09.920 --> 1:36:12.320 music school. I went to Philadelphia College of Performing Arts. 1:36:12.640 --> 1:36:15.760 Wait, wait a little bit slong. Yeah, sorry, there's a 1:36:15.840 --> 1:36:20.640 scene in Philly. Okay, there's the whole black scene, but 1:36:20.760 --> 1:36:23.599 you also have Hall and Oates, you have the guys 1:36:23.640 --> 1:36:26.880 in the Hooters. Did you intersect with those people. 1:36:26.600 --> 1:36:31.880 At all zero. Never I was in this suburban Philly scene, 1:36:31.880 --> 1:36:35.160 whatever that was, you know, and the Northeast Philly scene. 1:36:35.200 --> 1:36:37.439 The guys in my band were all from Northeast Philly. 1:36:37.560 --> 1:36:40.439 They all went to Catholic schools and we played the proms, 1:36:40.760 --> 1:36:44.120 all the Catholic school proms. Their father Judge holy ghost. 1:36:44.600 --> 1:36:47.240 But even when you were in college, you did intersect 1:36:47.240 --> 1:36:47.679 with those. 1:36:47.560 --> 1:36:51.160 People though, the only time I met Gamble I met 1:36:51.200 --> 1:36:54.320 him at a fundraiser about ten years ago to raise 1:36:54.400 --> 1:36:57.479 money for Jefferson Hospital or something like that. So I 1:36:57.520 --> 1:36:59.280 met him, and I was really stoked to meet him 1:36:59.280 --> 1:37:01.960 because he wrote Expressway to Your Heart, which is one 1:37:01.960 --> 1:37:04.479 of my favorite songs because I drove on the Scoogle 1:37:04.479 --> 1:37:08.120 Expressway a lot. So I was stoked to meet him. 1:37:08.120 --> 1:37:09.720 And I love the Spinners, you know what I mean. 1:37:09.760 --> 1:37:11.760 I grew up listening to all that stuff, all the 1:37:11.760 --> 1:37:13.920 Philly soul stuff. But I never met them. I never interacted. 1:37:13.960 --> 1:37:17.360 Oh oh, okay, just to clear ups and data. You 1:37:17.400 --> 1:37:21.000 graduate from Drexel, you work in Long Beach or somewhere 1:37:21.000 --> 1:37:23.480 down there. The band comes. 1:37:23.200 --> 1:37:26.680 Out too, Yeah, and the drummer came out. 1:37:26.720 --> 1:37:27.799 What happened with the band? 1:37:28.439 --> 1:37:30.960 They were all college graduates. So they all school, they 1:37:30.960 --> 1:37:34.479 all had jobs, so one worked at Farmer's Insurance. 1:37:34.520 --> 1:37:37.280 Now I'm less worried, I'm less interested in what they 1:37:37.320 --> 1:37:39.599 did for jobs. What was going on with the band? 1:37:40.680 --> 1:37:45.320 Oh our band? Well, we got an invet Okay, the 1:37:45.400 --> 1:37:48.960 Dubin family from Philadelphia. They own a paper company, big 1:37:49.000 --> 1:37:52.040 paper company. They were friends with this guy, Edward Slockin. 1:37:52.760 --> 1:37:57.280 His father owned the Beverly Hills Hotel in nineteen eighty 1:37:57.320 --> 1:38:00.960 two before he sold it to Marvin Mill who sold 1:38:00.960 --> 1:38:03.680 it to the bar Nay. This guy had a lot 1:38:03.680 --> 1:38:06.640 of money, so one thing led to another and he 1:38:06.720 --> 1:38:11.240 became our investor. So we got it in the studio 1:38:12.160 --> 1:38:15.880 through Sunset Sound. The people I met with producers. One 1:38:15.920 --> 1:38:17.920 of the producers was Dennis Kirk, the other one was 1:38:18.000 --> 1:38:22.400 Chris Bond, And we tried to make demos. We were 1:38:22.400 --> 1:38:26.040 fucking horrible because we were This is kind of like 1:38:26.640 --> 1:38:30.080 comes into the rest of it. But at one point 1:38:30.080 --> 1:38:33.800 the producer said to me, you're unproducible. You're just such 1:38:33.800 --> 1:38:36.200 a jerk in there. You always won it your way. 1:38:36.760 --> 1:38:39.680 And finally I ended up producing the sessions, and you know, 1:38:39.720 --> 1:38:41.880 in the back of my mind, I'm going I kind 1:38:41.880 --> 1:38:43.680 of liked this gig better than the gig I have, 1:38:43.760 --> 1:38:46.120 which is just sitting here bounding on keyboards, you know. 1:38:47.080 --> 1:38:50.400 So you know, I think that's kind of how it 1:38:50.520 --> 1:38:53.360 led to that, because I just like everybody's career, it's 1:38:53.360 --> 1:38:55.400 like it fits and starts, you know what I mean, 1:38:55.479 --> 1:39:00.599 like things. I remember after we made our demo, Eddie 1:39:00.640 --> 1:39:04.759 said the manager, Oh, Clive Davis is in Bungalow four 1:39:05.000 --> 1:39:06.880 at the Beverly Hills Hotel. I'm going to take them 1:39:06.880 --> 1:39:10.599 the demo. You'll be signed by this time tomorrow, right, 1:39:11.320 --> 1:39:14.280 So you know, he goes into Clive's bungalow, which, by 1:39:14.320 --> 1:39:16.280 the way, thirty years later, I told Clive I have 1:39:16.320 --> 1:39:18.519 a bone to pick with you, and I called him out. 1:39:18.960 --> 1:39:21.760 So he goes to Clive and he goes, this is 1:39:21.800 --> 1:39:24.040 the band that I've been managing, and I paid for 1:39:24.080 --> 1:39:26.479 this demo, and Clive goes, he puts it on, and 1:39:26.479 --> 1:39:29.120 he goes tell them to stick with their day jobs. 1:39:30.680 --> 1:39:34.680 It was crushing moment. Crushing, right, I thought I was 1:39:34.680 --> 1:39:35.960 going to be able to quit my day job. 1:39:36.000 --> 1:39:36.200 You know. 1:39:36.560 --> 1:39:38.720 Say I worked another two years at Garrett This is 1:39:38.760 --> 1:39:41.400 now in nineteen eighty four or something like that, and 1:39:41.640 --> 1:39:43.880 Finally I said to my parents. I call my parents 1:39:43.960 --> 1:39:45.479 up and I was like, look, I know you you 1:39:45.520 --> 1:39:47.439 know suffered to get me through college, but I'm going 1:39:47.520 --> 1:39:50.000 to do this for I'm going to try this, you know. 1:39:50.080 --> 1:39:52.160 I'm going to move to the valley to Encino, to 1:39:52.200 --> 1:39:55.320 a little house and live in the garage. Was pretty 1:39:55.360 --> 1:39:57.320 much what I was doing. Set up my eight track 1:39:57.360 --> 1:39:59.639 FoST X and try it. 1:39:59.760 --> 1:39:59.920 You know. 1:40:00.400 --> 1:40:03.240 And the problem with leaving an aerospace job is once 1:40:03.280 --> 1:40:05.559 you leave your aerospace job, it's hard to get back 1:40:05.560 --> 1:40:09.640 into it because the technology takes off after that. So 1:40:09.880 --> 1:40:12.680 after about three or four months, I was kind of 1:40:12.680 --> 1:40:15.200 committed to it. So it took me two years to 1:40:15.200 --> 1:40:17.439 produce my first album. At that point, I got lucky 1:40:17.439 --> 1:40:21.240 and got a Tsol album that was on Enigma Records 1:40:21.600 --> 1:40:24.280 that they had not delivered and the band they were 1:40:24.439 --> 1:40:26.400 ready to get dropped, and a friend of mine knew them, 1:40:26.439 --> 1:40:27.920 and one thing led to another. I got him in 1:40:27.920 --> 1:40:29.559 the studio. I finished the album, I got my first 1:40:29.560 --> 1:40:32.600 producer credit, and then two years went by and I 1:40:32.600 --> 1:40:34.759 got my next producer credit, which was their next album. 1:40:35.280 --> 1:40:37.479 So you know, I wasn't producing very much, but I 1:40:37.560 --> 1:40:39.879 was learning along the way and then I got lucky. 1:40:40.439 --> 1:40:41.759 I met a band called Bang Tango. 1:40:41.840 --> 1:40:45.160 Wait before you get the Bang Tang, what were you 1:40:45.280 --> 1:40:45.760 living on? 1:40:46.760 --> 1:40:51.120 I was living on demos, and I had met my wife, Monica, 1:40:51.160 --> 1:40:53.559 who was and she was a publisher at the time. 1:40:53.640 --> 1:40:55.320 And she started giving me, by the way, a lot 1:40:55.320 --> 1:40:58.120 of grief because she said to me, all you care 1:40:58.120 --> 1:41:00.679 about her guitar sounds, that's it. You just care about guitars. 1:41:00.680 --> 1:41:02.680 You're not caring about the songs enough. I said, Ah, 1:41:02.680 --> 1:41:04.759 who guess the fuck about the songs. It's about the guitars, 1:41:05.160 --> 1:41:07.720 you know. And like she's hammering me about this, and 1:41:07.760 --> 1:41:09.840 I'm not listening to her because she's my wife, of course, 1:41:09.880 --> 1:41:12.760 you know. So I'm like, you know, this would come 1:41:12.800 --> 1:41:14.840 back later when I finally figured it out, you know 1:41:14.880 --> 1:41:16.800 what I mean, Like, Oh, she was right the whole time, 1:41:17.439 --> 1:41:21.479 you know. So you know, you know, I struggled a 1:41:21.479 --> 1:41:23.479 long time. I quit my job in eighty four and 1:41:23.520 --> 1:41:25.559 I didn't have a hit record, a real bonafid hit 1:41:25.640 --> 1:41:29.080 till nineteen ninety nine. It took me fifteen years kids 1:41:29.120 --> 1:41:33.639 in school, private school, doing demos, keeping my nose clean. 1:41:33.680 --> 1:41:36.519 I worked for Irving at Giant Records in nineteen ninety four. 1:41:36.640 --> 1:41:38.960 That was boot camp for me. I learned how to 1:41:39.080 --> 1:41:41.519 handle myself in the music business. I met Keith Olson 1:41:41.520 --> 1:41:44.920 about then, still didn't have any hits. It was like, 1:41:45.400 --> 1:41:46.800 I got to tell you something, man. I was ready 1:41:46.800 --> 1:41:49.840 to give up. I had really ready to get a 1:41:49.840 --> 1:41:50.799 real estate license. 1:41:51.640 --> 1:41:51.880 You know. 1:41:52.080 --> 1:41:54.800 There were times where I was making ten thousand bucks 1:41:54.840 --> 1:41:59.080 a year. We were living off savings I made. Sylvia wrote, 1:41:59.120 --> 1:42:01.240 you know when after I started having hits, Sylvia Rohane 1:42:01.280 --> 1:42:04.120 hired me and those were all good days. But I 1:42:04.160 --> 1:42:06.800 paid my dues man, Like, that's when I had my 1:42:06.880 --> 1:42:10.479 first hit. I remember thinking, I am not letting go 1:42:10.560 --> 1:42:14.640 of this not happening. Like this took too long, you know, 1:42:15.120 --> 1:42:19.479 like like you know it was. It was the weirdest 1:42:19.479 --> 1:42:21.479 thing because I didn't think it was ever going to happen. Actually, 1:42:21.560 --> 1:42:24.960 I really had kind of mentally almost given up that point, 1:42:25.080 --> 1:42:28.160 you know, but Pod gave me the chance to do it. 1:42:28.200 --> 1:42:29.320 And you know why. It was protest. 1:42:29.439 --> 1:42:31.719 Wait wait wait, wait, slow down. Tell me about bang 1:42:31.800 --> 1:42:32.559 Tango first. 1:42:33.240 --> 1:42:36.960 Well, bang Tang was a project I back then in 1:42:37.000 --> 1:42:40.160 the hairband days. Anytime you walked into a club in 1:42:40.280 --> 1:42:44.080 LA they were getting signed. So everybody was getting signed. 1:42:44.080 --> 1:42:46.880 If you had hair and you could play, you got signed. 1:42:46.880 --> 1:42:48.800 So I was on the every night I was at 1:42:48.800 --> 1:42:52.400 the Sunset Strip going looking for projects. The Gazari's, you know, 1:42:53.400 --> 1:42:56.160 Whiskey at the time, I think it was the Viper, 1:42:56.160 --> 1:42:59.639 remember the Central Filthy mcnasty's. I forget what it was called, 1:42:59.640 --> 1:43:05.400 but you know, and Brett Hartman over at MCA liked it. 1:43:05.439 --> 1:43:07.760 I was hanging out with the band a lot because 1:43:07.800 --> 1:43:09.920 I was trying to get in rehearsals, you know, I 1:43:09.960 --> 1:43:12.200 had to make myself useful. So I would go to 1:43:12.240 --> 1:43:14.200 rehearsals a lot with them, and I would start arranging 1:43:14.200 --> 1:43:17.160 their music. I had no contract or anything, and I 1:43:17.200 --> 1:43:19.680 got a lawyer who liked me, and one thing led 1:43:19.720 --> 1:43:21.360 to another and I got the project and then it 1:43:21.400 --> 1:43:24.000 did pretty well. But that was like, you know, few 1:43:24.040 --> 1:43:26.519 and far in between those projects at that time that 1:43:26.640 --> 1:43:29.759 did anything. There's no royalties or anything from that stuff. 1:43:30.360 --> 1:43:33.080 So then I did pretty boy flittle hair bands back then, 1:43:33.400 --> 1:43:34.880 you know, I was kind of at the end of 1:43:34.920 --> 1:43:37.439 the hair band era in a way, kind of got 1:43:37.479 --> 1:43:39.840 into it, you know, but I couldn't compete against the 1:43:39.840 --> 1:43:42.240 good guys. The guys were killing me, like Tom Worman 1:43:42.360 --> 1:43:47.760 and you know Michael Wagner, Bo Hill. These guys were 1:43:47.760 --> 1:43:48.599 like legendary to. 1:43:48.600 --> 1:43:49.120 Me back then. 1:43:49.320 --> 1:43:52.160 You know, they were the legends Bob Rock, you know 1:43:53.120 --> 1:43:54.240 those guys Fairburn. 1:43:55.040 --> 1:43:59.080 Okay, so the breakthrough was Pod Yeah, So how'd you 1:43:59.120 --> 1:43:59.840 get that gig? 1:44:01.600 --> 1:44:03.720 Well, they call it the The A and R. Guy 1:44:03.840 --> 1:44:06.519 actually liked my Bank Tango record. I can believe that. 1:44:07.400 --> 1:44:09.800 And Tsol he was a fan of those records, and 1:44:09.840 --> 1:44:11.640 he called me up and he said, this band is 1:44:11.640 --> 1:44:16.240 from San Diego. They're a Christian rock band, and we're 1:44:16.280 --> 1:44:19.479 going to break him in the real world, but we 1:44:19.520 --> 1:44:22.000 want to make a record that sort of straddles the line. 1:44:22.640 --> 1:44:25.240 And I like your record that you did with them, 1:44:25.280 --> 1:44:27.160 And I liked this last Lesson Jake record you did 1:44:27.160 --> 1:44:29.519 Hello Rockview, which actually became their biggest selling record. 1:44:29.600 --> 1:44:31.760 Wait wait, wait, just a little bit slower. How'd you 1:44:31.800 --> 1:44:33.360 get the less than Jake? Right? 1:44:34.640 --> 1:44:37.800 I did a single for the screen movie. They were 1:44:37.840 --> 1:44:41.519 in a screen movie that Wes craven I directed and 1:44:41.640 --> 1:44:44.960 their manager was friends with my little manager at the time, 1:44:45.040 --> 1:44:47.080 and they needed a producer really fast to go to 1:44:47.120 --> 1:44:49.719 Gainsville to do a cover of I Think We're Ala. 1:44:49.920 --> 1:44:52.240 I Think what's that Partcherd's Family song? 1:44:53.680 --> 1:44:56.200 Jesus not my area of expertise. 1:44:56.120 --> 1:44:58.760 But anyway, it was a Partrid's Family and we did 1:44:58.760 --> 1:45:00.600 a cover of it, and the band like working with me, 1:45:01.439 --> 1:45:04.080 so they asked me to come back, and I came 1:45:04.120 --> 1:45:06.840 back to Gainesville with pro tools in hand all the 1:45:06.840 --> 1:45:09.880 way to Gainesville and we started making the record and 1:45:10.000 --> 1:45:11.920 it came out really well, you know, but then it 1:45:11.960 --> 1:45:13.800 wasn't selling that much though, because it was still a 1:45:13.840 --> 1:45:17.040 ska band. It had a limited audience. Wasn't putting food 1:45:17.080 --> 1:45:20.240 on the table. Let's put it that way, right And anyhow, 1:45:20.320 --> 1:45:22.720 so this all comes together and John Rubi Lee, the 1:45:22.760 --> 1:45:26.120 A and R person for Pod and I said, listen, 1:45:26.160 --> 1:45:29.559 I'm gonna do this in the computer. And they had 1:45:29.560 --> 1:45:33.360 already hired Ed Stasium to do the record, and it's 1:45:33.360 --> 1:45:35.439 a great producer and everything, but he's an analog guy. 1:45:35.439 --> 1:45:38.560 He's in tape. Rubi Lee, in a flash of inspiration, 1:45:39.280 --> 1:45:42.240 calls me back and goes, listen, tell me more about 1:45:42.240 --> 1:45:46.000 this computer thing. And I said, well, I'll be honest 1:45:46.040 --> 1:45:49.720 with you. Your band really needs this computer. I'm being 1:45:49.760 --> 1:45:52.519 honest with you. They are going to benefit from me. 1:45:53.920 --> 1:45:56.640 The one thing I've realized being in a band. My 1:45:56.760 --> 1:45:59.320 band was the worst band in Hollywood. We had nothing 1:45:59.360 --> 1:46:02.280 to say to the youth of America. Nothing. I was 1:46:02.360 --> 1:46:05.280 raised a normal middle class kid. I'd have anything to say. 1:46:05.960 --> 1:46:08.200 That was the problem with my band. We had nothing. 1:46:08.240 --> 1:46:11.240 We were laughing at Motley Crew across the street, you know, 1:46:11.280 --> 1:46:14.639 because they were dressed up and shit pod though. When 1:46:14.640 --> 1:46:17.240 I saw them, I was like, these guys have everything 1:46:17.280 --> 1:46:20.839 I don't, which is a point of view. They have energy, 1:46:21.200 --> 1:46:26.000 they're intense. They just need my arrangement help. And he 1:46:26.040 --> 1:46:28.000 took a leap of faith on me, and we did 1:46:28.040 --> 1:46:30.960 it on the computer in pro Tools nineteen ninety eight. 1:46:31.720 --> 1:46:35.240 And I remember waking up one morning looking at TRL 1:46:36.120 --> 1:46:39.880 and there's Southtown and I literally could not believe it 1:46:40.439 --> 1:46:43.560 because it hadn't happened before, you know, for me, like 1:46:43.560 --> 1:46:46.920 like that, you know, And I kept doing double takes, 1:46:47.240 --> 1:46:49.800 you know, like, wait a minute, did I produce this? 1:46:49.880 --> 1:46:52.240 It can't be mine. I'm so used to not having 1:46:52.280 --> 1:46:55.439 anything sell at that point, you know. And then it 1:46:55.479 --> 1:46:57.640 was like holding off for dear life. After that, like 1:46:57.720 --> 1:47:00.360 all of a sudden, I'm getting hired by everyone, buddy, 1:47:00.960 --> 1:47:04.080 and my career just it took off so fast that 1:47:04.120 --> 1:47:06.400 it was like a blur. You know. I had to 1:47:06.479 --> 1:47:09.759 learn how to start turning projects down, which was another 1:47:10.080 --> 1:47:14.280 art itself, you know, you know, how to work quickly, 1:47:14.439 --> 1:47:17.960 how to keep producing hits, and you know, form a 1:47:18.000 --> 1:47:20.400 team around me get you know, the best engineer I 1:47:20.439 --> 1:47:23.080 could get, Mike from. Mike Platnikov was from Little Mountain 1:47:23.080 --> 1:47:26.280 Studios in Vancouver, and I loved the sound of those records. 1:47:26.280 --> 1:47:28.439 So I brought him down to do my engineering, and 1:47:28.760 --> 1:47:30.200 you know, one thing led to another, and it just 1:47:30.200 --> 1:47:34.080 started like I don't know what happened, honestly, it just 1:47:34.160 --> 1:47:36.439 was so quick, you know. So but I put in 1:47:36.520 --> 1:47:37.920 I used to I thought to myself, you know what 1:47:37.920 --> 1:47:41.080 I put in all this time doing this, you know, 1:47:41.640 --> 1:47:44.559 kind of like, you know, I appreciate this like a lot. 1:47:45.160 --> 1:47:47.200 You know. I didn't take it for granted at all. 1:47:47.720 --> 1:47:49.599 I wasn't a kid at that point. I was still thirty, 1:47:49.600 --> 1:47:51.960 you know, forty years old. I wasn't a kid, you know. 1:48:00.400 --> 1:48:02.880 Okay, tell me about the recording the Youth of the Nation. 1:48:04.680 --> 1:48:08.080 Well, that was probably the first time I had recorded 1:48:08.120 --> 1:48:10.439 anything that sounded exactly the way I wanted it to. 1:48:11.200 --> 1:48:15.760 Because it was a song that I had heard in 1:48:15.840 --> 1:48:19.080 rehearsal back when we rehearsed and rehearsed in Santia for 1:48:19.120 --> 1:48:23.120 that second album. There was a school shooting walk into 1:48:23.120 --> 1:48:25.800 the seven eleven. Sonny turns to me and he goes, 1:48:26.840 --> 1:48:29.160 Marcus has this lyric, we are the youth of the Nation. 1:48:29.280 --> 1:48:30.880 I wasn't sold on the lyric because I thought it 1:48:30.920 --> 1:48:33.760 was too big and I thought it was preachy. But 1:48:33.880 --> 1:48:36.880 Sonny goes, here's the opening line. It's the last day 1:48:36.880 --> 1:48:39.400 of the rest of my life. I wish I would 1:48:39.400 --> 1:48:41.799 have known, because I would have kissed my mama goodbye. 1:48:42.680 --> 1:48:45.680 And I went, oh my god, that's I mean, I 1:48:45.760 --> 1:48:47.680 could I almost get teared up thinking about it now. 1:48:48.120 --> 1:48:51.280 It hit me so hard, and I called my manager 1:48:51.560 --> 1:48:55.240 and I said, Aliyah, I can't even fuck this one up. 1:48:55.680 --> 1:48:58.479 You know, this is going to be a great song, 1:48:58.840 --> 1:49:02.800 you know. And we put it together and then I 1:49:02.840 --> 1:49:05.240 think Marcos and I were talking about a kid's choir 1:49:05.280 --> 1:49:08.479 and I love bob Ezrin's production of Another Brick in 1:49:08.520 --> 1:49:10.600 the Wall, and I said, you know what, this is 1:49:10.640 --> 1:49:13.000 the time, this is the moment I'm going to use them. 1:49:13.560 --> 1:49:16.639 And I made a huge error. I brought in the 1:49:16.680 --> 1:49:19.680 fans of the band to come sing the parts. And 1:49:19.720 --> 1:49:22.200 the lawyer calls me on the phone right when I'm 1:49:22.200 --> 1:49:24.000 about to hit record, and he goes, you. 1:49:23.960 --> 1:49:26.639 Can't record them. They're not lee. You better get them 1:49:26.640 --> 1:49:28.960 out of here as fast as possible. I said, why, 1:49:29.000 --> 1:49:30.360 they're just going to see the chorus. He goes, We're 1:49:30.360 --> 1:49:33.400 going it be sued so many ways. So I saw, 1:49:33.439 --> 1:49:35.200 I said, do you have any posters in the trunk 1:49:35.200 --> 1:49:37.400 of your cars? Just get the band, get the kids 1:49:37.400 --> 1:49:40.000 out to the parking lot. So I hired a Disney 1:49:40.080 --> 1:49:43.600 vocal arranger and got Disney Kids to come in legitimately 1:49:44.000 --> 1:49:48.400 with the contracts, you know what I mean, real kids schore. 1:49:48.280 --> 1:49:50.640 That was I dodged the bullet right there a little bit, 1:49:50.760 --> 1:49:53.400 but it was my naive diativity at that point, you know. 1:49:53.520 --> 1:49:56.840 So anyway, and the song came together and I just 1:49:57.040 --> 1:49:59.879 I remember when I was done the song, I thought, finally, 1:50:00.120 --> 1:50:01.840 this is the way I want it. This is kind 1:50:01.880 --> 1:50:04.679 of what I this is the feeling I want from 1:50:04.680 --> 1:50:08.200 this song, this big song with this big message, telling 1:50:08.320 --> 1:50:13.120 this intimate story verse by verse about a person you know, 1:50:13.120 --> 1:50:16.000 about little Susie and about you know, my you know, 1:50:16.040 --> 1:50:18.439 being taken two to the chest and just you know, 1:50:18.840 --> 1:50:21.120 all this kind of stuff. It's it's a very intimate 1:50:21.160 --> 1:50:24.720 story with a massive message, and it just kept, I 1:50:24.720 --> 1:50:26.200 don't know, it just got where it got. 1:50:26.280 --> 1:50:26.439 Then. 1:50:26.439 --> 1:50:28.439 I felt the same way about a song called move 1:50:28.479 --> 1:50:30.680 Along I did for the All American Rejects. It had 1:50:30.720 --> 1:50:33.760 the same idea to it, intimate story about trying to 1:50:33.760 --> 1:50:35.400 get through the day. And I brought the kids choir 1:50:35.439 --> 1:50:38.000 into that one too, you know, because I wanted to 1:50:38.040 --> 1:50:40.519 do the you know when you sing the chorus and 1:50:40.560 --> 1:50:43.759 the breakdown, same thing as you so, But I created 1:50:43.760 --> 1:50:46.479 Bob a lot because Bob, I think is brilliant and 1:50:46.880 --> 1:50:48.720 he did such a great job on those records. But 1:50:49.080 --> 1:50:51.800 you got to pay homage and respects, and the only 1:50:51.840 --> 1:50:53.720 way to really do that is through your work, you know. 1:50:54.360 --> 1:50:58.479 So, Okay, did you know the Reason was going to 1:50:58.520 --> 1:50:59.599 be as big as it was? 1:51:00.360 --> 1:51:00.439 No? 1:51:02.080 --> 1:51:05.560 It's second engineer in the studio. We were working on 1:51:05.600 --> 1:51:08.120 all these songs, and the second engineer, he's just some kid, 1:51:08.160 --> 1:51:11.080 and he goes, that song's going to be huge, And 1:51:11.120 --> 1:51:13.599 I said, what are you talking about? This love song? 1:51:13.680 --> 1:51:13.840 You know? 1:51:14.040 --> 1:51:14.439 Whatever? 1:51:14.600 --> 1:51:16.280 You know, like you know, you're in a in the 1:51:16.360 --> 1:51:18.599 middle of it. At that point, and he goes, I'm 1:51:18.600 --> 1:51:20.760 telling you, my my girlfriend's going to love that song. 1:51:21.000 --> 1:51:24.360 And then of course Lee or Cohen, who's running the 1:51:24.400 --> 1:51:26.240 label at the time, calls up and he goes, I 1:51:26.240 --> 1:51:28.320 think that song's going to be huge. And then somebody 1:51:28.360 --> 1:51:31.720 said it needs a bridge, and I went, you're right, 1:51:31.760 --> 1:51:35.240 it does need a bridge. And I thought again, I 1:51:35.320 --> 1:51:37.680 went back to the Beatles, and I said, how am 1:51:37.680 --> 1:51:39.280 I going to come up with a bridge? And so 1:51:39.560 --> 1:51:42.120 I took the little help from my friend's idea where 1:51:42.120 --> 1:51:47.439 it goes to when he goes, you know, I get 1:51:47.439 --> 1:51:48.840 by with the little help of my friends. It's the 1:51:48.840 --> 1:51:52.040 first time you hear the D chord, so it goes 1:51:52.280 --> 1:51:54.720 e ed a. You don't hear it the rest of 1:51:54.760 --> 1:51:56.360 the song. It's only in those spots. So in the 1:51:56.360 --> 1:51:59.479 bridge of the reason I put the dcord, I put 1:51:59.479 --> 1:52:02.439 the one that doesn't appear anywhere else in the song there. 1:52:03.360 --> 1:52:06.000 And you know, the reason is you is a D chord? 1:52:06.080 --> 1:52:09.360 Reason is you? Is it D chord? So there again 1:52:09.680 --> 1:52:12.200 you have to refer back to the stuff that's great, 1:52:12.680 --> 1:52:15.400 you know, And that's kind of how that worked out 1:52:15.479 --> 1:52:18.160 that one. And then the little piano intro part I 1:52:18.160 --> 1:52:20.639 put on. There was a reference to one note Samba 1:52:21.479 --> 1:52:25.639 by Sergio Mendez. It starts off the ding ding ding 1:52:25.720 --> 1:52:28.240 ding like that, and that was kind of a paying 1:52:28.280 --> 1:52:30.960 respects to that and Count Basie who always said you 1:52:30.960 --> 1:52:35.960 can get away with one note. So you know, that's 1:52:36.000 --> 1:52:37.040 just what was going through my head. 1:52:37.120 --> 1:52:40.479 Okay, let's go back. You went to music school in 1:52:40.520 --> 1:52:42.719 the middle of your tenure at Drexel. 1:52:43.560 --> 1:52:47.000 Yeah, and it's funny. I got my honorary doctorate from 1:52:47.080 --> 1:52:50.240 Drexel in twenty fifteen, and I told a funny story 1:52:50.320 --> 1:52:52.799 during the speech because my grade point average was terrible 1:52:53.600 --> 1:52:57.800 and I dropped that at Drexel. I went to PCPA 1:52:58.640 --> 1:53:00.960 and I had to reapply to Drexel, so I had 1:53:00.960 --> 1:53:04.320 to go to Dean Woodring and sit sheepishly in front 1:53:04.360 --> 1:53:07.840 of him and say, listen, my parents are really mad 1:53:07.880 --> 1:53:11.040 that I'm not finishing his degree, so can I reapply? 1:53:11.880 --> 1:53:14.240 And he let me back in right, And I did 1:53:14.240 --> 1:53:15.880 pretty well the rest of the time there because I 1:53:15.880 --> 1:53:19.360 focused on it. When I got my honorary doctor and 1:53:19.439 --> 1:53:21.080 he was there and I went up to him and 1:53:21.080 --> 1:53:23.800 I said, Dean, I really appreciate you letting me back in. 1:53:23.920 --> 1:53:25.880 I don't have no idea why you did, and they 1:53:25.960 --> 1:53:27.559 must not have looked at my great point average when 1:53:27.600 --> 1:53:30.200 they gave me this and he goes, you know why 1:53:30.200 --> 1:53:31.800 I let you back in? I said, why he goes 1:53:31.840 --> 1:53:34.679 because anybody who comes back who wants to be back 1:53:34.720 --> 1:53:37.320 in is usually a pretty good student after that, because 1:53:37.600 --> 1:53:40.479 you're not They're coming in of their own volition. And 1:53:41.280 --> 1:53:43.680 I was like, wow, okay, so it was kind of 1:53:43.680 --> 1:53:47.519 easy decision then, you know, like I was actually really 1:53:47.520 --> 1:53:49.400 thanked him up and down for that one, you know, 1:53:49.600 --> 1:53:51.240 because he didn't have to. I mean, I was not 1:53:51.960 --> 1:53:54.720 thinking about engineering back then. It was all music to 1:53:54.800 --> 1:53:55.840 me at that point. You know. 1:53:56.439 --> 1:54:00.519 Okay, but did you drop out to play music? Did 1:54:00.560 --> 1:54:02.879 you drop out to go to music school? 1:54:03.000 --> 1:54:05.040 Yeah? I dropped out to go to music school. I'd 1:54:05.040 --> 1:54:07.040 play music, yeah. 1:54:06.600 --> 1:54:08.600 And so what did you think you were going to 1:54:08.720 --> 1:54:10.880 learn at music school? And what did you learn? 1:54:11.479 --> 1:54:13.200 You know what? I didn't really know at the time, 1:54:13.680 --> 1:54:15.679 but I knew one thing that I was good at. 1:54:15.840 --> 1:54:18.840 Two things. I was really really good at soul fesh, 1:54:19.160 --> 1:54:22.680 which I means I could hear intervals easily, Like I 1:54:22.680 --> 1:54:24.439 could sit down as somebody plays a C and they 1:54:24.439 --> 1:54:26.960 play an F I know, it's a fourth. If somebody 1:54:26.960 --> 1:54:28.720 plays an A and plays an E, I know it's 1:54:28.720 --> 1:54:31.360 a fifth. I had a really good ear, but I 1:54:31.400 --> 1:54:34.640 couldn't put together harmonies. And a lot of this stuff 1:54:34.680 --> 1:54:37.080 in the bands was disco band I was in. They 1:54:37.080 --> 1:54:38.960 were asking for harmony arrangements and I was trying to 1:54:39.000 --> 1:54:41.320 I was guessing a little bit. But when I went 1:54:41.320 --> 1:54:44.160 in there there was a course in three part harmony arrangement. 1:54:44.160 --> 1:54:47.040 It's called Hindamoth. It's a book called Hindemith, and it's 1:54:47.040 --> 1:54:51.440 so basic, so basic, but it's basically called arranging for 1:54:51.480 --> 1:54:54.640 a four piece. That's it. That's the whole thing. All 1:54:54.680 --> 1:54:58.360 the stuff I learned in there still applies. All of it. 1:54:59.080 --> 1:55:01.879 Arranging for harmony, it's arranging for a small because basically 1:55:01.920 --> 1:55:04.160 these bands are they're really four piece bands. You know, 1:55:04.240 --> 1:55:07.560 bass drums, guitars, you know, vocals, that's it. The rest 1:55:07.560 --> 1:55:10.880 of it's sweetening, you know. So that was a big 1:55:11.160 --> 1:55:12.640 I'm so glad I went there. I a still learned 1:55:12.640 --> 1:55:14.760 a lot about music history, which I don't apply or 1:55:14.800 --> 1:55:18.840 anything like that, but you know, didn't do very well 1:55:18.840 --> 1:55:22.760 at site reading, that's for sure, you know. And I 1:55:22.800 --> 1:55:23.839 audited it to classes. 1:55:24.440 --> 1:55:26.720 You audited it right, so. 1:55:26.640 --> 1:55:30.840 Which means that the only ones I got transferred across 1:55:31.040 --> 1:55:34.160 were the ones that apply this humanities classes to Drexel. 1:55:34.600 --> 1:55:37.240 So I was able to apply my ear training course, 1:55:37.360 --> 1:55:41.600 my history course to my humanity's credits a Drexel. So 1:55:41.600 --> 1:55:43.560 it wasn't a total loss, you know what I mean. 1:55:43.600 --> 1:55:44.800 It wasn't like I dropped, you. 1:55:44.760 --> 1:55:47.160 Know, Okay, just a couple of things. It muses school. 1:55:47.160 --> 1:55:49.800 Why were you auditing as opposed to taking the courses 1:55:49.840 --> 1:55:50.240 for real? 1:55:50.760 --> 1:55:53.600 Because I couldn't take I couldn't play keyboards, That's the one. 1:55:53.720 --> 1:55:56.400 That's the one course I audited. It was the you know, 1:55:57.000 --> 1:55:59.960 sitting and playing site reading. I just the kids who 1:56:00.160 --> 1:56:03.000 to MUSA school were so far advanced than I was. 1:56:03.400 --> 1:56:04.280 They were kids playing. 1:56:04.360 --> 1:56:06.520 But that was the only that was the only class 1:56:06.560 --> 1:56:09.640 you took. It you as the only one. YEAHA was 1:56:09.680 --> 1:56:13.280 it a one year course? I just went for one 1:56:13.320 --> 1:56:16.280 year and then what was it? I went back to Drexel? 1:56:16.280 --> 1:56:18.800 You know, I mean what went through in your head that, hey, 1:56:18.880 --> 1:56:19.760 I'm going back. 1:56:20.600 --> 1:56:23.480 I felt like I learned enough. I just wanted to 1:56:23.560 --> 1:56:26.800 learn how to arrange and I knew that course existed, 1:56:26.880 --> 1:56:29.800 Doctor Chris Wiki. He ended up becoming the provost there. 1:56:30.960 --> 1:56:32.760 He taught the course and I had heard about this 1:56:32.840 --> 1:56:35.960 guy through somebody and he said, yeah, he's really good 1:56:36.000 --> 1:56:39.640 at arranging for small ensembles, and some reason in my mind, 1:56:39.680 --> 1:56:41.080 I just wanted to do it, you know what I mean. 1:56:41.080 --> 1:56:44.280 It was probably very reckless, honestly to drop out of 1:56:44.400 --> 1:56:48.360 three years of Drexel, you know, to do this. I 1:56:48.360 --> 1:56:49.560 didn't even know if they were going to let me 1:56:49.640 --> 1:56:52.120 back in or not. But that's where my life was 1:56:52.160 --> 1:56:55.200 going at the time. It was a bit little reckless, 1:56:55.480 --> 1:56:57.280 you know. But at the end, I realized, you know what, 1:56:57.320 --> 1:56:59.320 it's nothing else I can learn in this school because 1:56:59.360 --> 1:57:02.160 I'm not going to play concert piano. It's not where 1:57:02.160 --> 1:57:05.600 I'm heading, you know. So but what I could do 1:57:05.640 --> 1:57:07.960 that the other kids couldn't do. I could sit down 1:57:08.000 --> 1:57:10.840 and improvise. They couldn't do any of that. These kids. 1:57:10.880 --> 1:57:14.760 It was funny. They could sit and play box Italian concerto, 1:57:15.600 --> 1:57:18.600 say reading it, you know, but if I said play 1:57:18.640 --> 1:57:20.440 a minor D and the amprovised, they didn't even know 1:57:20.480 --> 1:57:22.800 what I was talking about, do you know. So it 1:57:22.880 --> 1:57:26.800 was weird how the two sides didn't you know what 1:57:26.800 --> 1:57:30.240 I mean of music? They were surely different to disciplines 1:57:30.240 --> 1:57:32.240 almost you know, Just to. 1:57:32.160 --> 1:57:35.680 Be clear, did you drop out to go to music 1:57:35.760 --> 1:57:39.320 school or did you drop out and then go to 1:57:39.400 --> 1:57:40.120 music school. 1:57:40.240 --> 1:57:42.240 I dropped out to go to music school. I applied 1:57:42.240 --> 1:57:43.160 to music school first. 1:57:43.480 --> 1:57:45.840 Okay, yeah, yeah. And at the time, you had no 1:57:45.920 --> 1:57:49.440 intention of going back to Drexel, no at all. So 1:57:49.600 --> 1:57:52.680 why did you go back to Drexel Other than parental pressure? 1:57:53.720 --> 1:57:56.640 I went back because I think I got you know, 1:57:56.720 --> 1:57:58.920 I started feeling kind of a little bit stupid about it. 1:57:58.960 --> 1:58:00.600 I was like, you know what I did three years 1:58:00.600 --> 1:58:04.480 at this Drexel. I'm going to get my degree at 1:58:04.520 --> 1:58:07.840 some point. Why am I like? I got Okay, I 1:58:07.920 --> 1:58:11.280 learned soulfege, I learned about arranging. I'm never going to 1:58:11.320 --> 1:58:14.760 be a concert pianist, you know. Let me finish the degree. 1:58:14.840 --> 1:58:16.800 I'll get a job. I'll go to LA And that 1:58:16.880 --> 1:58:21.600 all worked out pretty well. Got my job, had my degree, 1:58:21.640 --> 1:58:23.000 so I could get a job in LA and I'll 1:58:23.040 --> 1:58:24.920 live in LA and try the music business. But at 1:58:24.960 --> 1:58:27.080 least i'll have a job. If I didn't get my degree, 1:58:27.120 --> 1:58:28.840 I wouldn't have a job. I wouldn't know how I 1:58:28.880 --> 1:58:31.200 was going to support myself, so I had to have 1:58:31.240 --> 1:58:31.640 the job. 1:58:32.360 --> 1:58:38.680 You know, Okay, you literally scratched your way to where 1:58:38.720 --> 1:58:44.040 you are now, very admirably. You have all the success, 1:58:44.240 --> 1:58:48.200 you're busy, You've achieved so much. But is there something 1:58:48.240 --> 1:58:51.040 on the horizon? Is there still a dream? Walp you 1:58:51.080 --> 1:58:52.000 say I want to do that. 1:58:53.440 --> 1:58:58.480 No, I just want the label to be self sufficient, 1:58:59.200 --> 1:59:02.640 That's really it. I think if I could produce the Beatles, 1:59:02.640 --> 1:59:04.560 I would, but well. 1:59:04.480 --> 1:59:07.480 Needless to say, the Beatles you can't produce because two 1:59:07.480 --> 1:59:09.600 of them are not here. But is one of the 1:59:10.080 --> 1:59:14.840 one of the dreams to work with some hero, some. 1:59:15.240 --> 1:59:18.440 Icon, you know. I worked with two of my favorite 1:59:18.440 --> 1:59:22.080 heroes already, one with Santana. I produced a Santana record 1:59:22.200 --> 1:59:24.400 and I worked with Ray man Zeric on that record. 1:59:25.120 --> 1:59:27.240 So I got to work with people that I idolized, 1:59:27.280 --> 1:59:29.680 and I got to know Ray pretty well. I would 1:59:29.720 --> 1:59:31.400 say the one person I wish I had worked with 1:59:31.520 --> 1:59:34.280 was with Keith Emerson. I never got to really work 1:59:34.320 --> 1:59:37.320 with him. I was a huge prog rock fan growing up, 1:59:37.880 --> 1:59:40.720 and that didn't work, you know, it just didn't work out. 1:59:40.840 --> 1:59:45.360 I tried contacting them. I don't know. I'm sort of 1:59:45.560 --> 1:59:48.640 happy where I'm at right now. You know, my kids 1:59:48.640 --> 1:59:50.920 in the music business, which is good. I like that. 1:59:51.840 --> 1:59:55.160 My wife sort of is retired and she sold her 1:59:55.200 --> 1:59:58.560 publishing company, did really well with that, and we travel 1:59:58.600 --> 2:00:00.360 a lot. That's one thing I really liked doing as 2:00:00.400 --> 2:00:02.160 traveling because I like seeing the rest of the world. 2:00:02.440 --> 2:00:05.040 There's so much more to see than just living here, 2:00:05.200 --> 2:00:07.800 you know. I went to Vietnam earlier this year. I 2:00:07.840 --> 2:00:11.880 went to Cambodi at Laos and I think that you're 2:00:11.920 --> 2:00:16.880 not serving yourself, is my opinion, as a human when 2:00:16.920 --> 2:00:19.160 you don't see everything. You know, like you're only going 2:00:19.240 --> 2:00:20.800 to be on this earth a certain amount of time. 2:00:21.600 --> 2:00:23.720 And when I went to Vietnam, it was such an 2:00:23.720 --> 2:00:26.760 eye opening experience and all these different places. We're going 2:00:26.800 --> 2:00:29.440 to Australia in a few weeks. I just want to 2:00:29.440 --> 2:00:31.920 see it all. That's what I want to do, you know. 2:00:32.320 --> 2:00:34.320 So I'm lucky to be in that position where I 2:00:34.320 --> 2:00:35.280 can do things like that. 2:00:35.840 --> 2:00:37.520 How much of the year are you traveling? 2:00:38.560 --> 2:00:42.400 I would say probably a quarter of the year. 2:00:42.440 --> 2:00:44.520 Oh really a lot, a lot? 2:00:44.600 --> 2:00:47.879 Oh yeah, these is three week trips. Some of them, yeah, 2:00:47.960 --> 2:00:50.680 they're big trips. Some of them are just plan trips, 2:00:50.720 --> 2:00:52.600 like TALC tours, you know that you go on a 2:00:52.640 --> 2:00:54.640 trip with a bunch of people, and some of them 2:00:54.640 --> 2:00:57.680 are trips we do ourselves. I'm going in June to 2:00:57.880 --> 2:01:00.680 play I just learned how to play golf for some 2:01:00.720 --> 2:01:03.320 stupid reason. But I'm going to play golf with a 2:01:03.320 --> 2:01:05.840 friend of mine in Scotland later on this year, and 2:01:05.880 --> 2:01:07.800 then we might go to Morocco later in the year. 2:01:08.960 --> 2:01:11.400 I never thought about going to Morocco, but somebody said, hey, 2:01:11.400 --> 2:01:13.160 you should check it out. It's a new you know, 2:01:13.200 --> 2:01:16.240 it's sort of an interesting place. I'm a big World 2:01:16.240 --> 2:01:19.400 War Two. It's aanatic wheal. I love reading about that stuff, 2:01:19.400 --> 2:01:21.080 and they have I love to see sort of where 2:01:21.680 --> 2:01:23.800 you know, the battles were fought, the Kerosene Pass and 2:01:23.840 --> 2:01:24.440 all that stuff. 2:01:24.480 --> 2:01:24.680 You know. 2:01:25.120 --> 2:01:28.400 So you know, I love going to Normandy. That was 2:01:28.440 --> 2:01:30.280 a great trip to see the bat you know, the 2:01:30.320 --> 2:01:36.080 beaches and all. And went to you know, travel to Iceland. 2:01:36.320 --> 2:01:39.080 Great trip. Something that's like, you know, you don't see 2:01:39.120 --> 2:01:42.360 things like that that brings color into my life, you know, 2:01:42.840 --> 2:01:46.360 like it makes it more. It makes me appreciate living 2:01:46.400 --> 2:01:47.080 here more. 2:01:47.240 --> 2:01:51.000 Actually, you know, so we're we're a couple of places 2:01:51.040 --> 2:01:54.280 on your horizon. So called bucket list. 2:01:54.360 --> 2:01:56.840 You want to go to, Well, we're talking about going 2:01:56.880 --> 2:01:59.840 to India and that would have to be with a 2:02:00.080 --> 2:02:01.680 land trip, I think, because you need to have a 2:02:01.720 --> 2:02:04.680 guide for that one. Yeah, I like to try that, 2:02:04.880 --> 2:02:06.760 you know, not too long, Like some of the trips 2:02:06.760 --> 2:02:09.360 are too long for me, Like I don't like twenty days? 2:02:09.400 --> 2:02:11.240 Is it for me? Be it away from home? 2:02:11.800 --> 2:02:12.000 You know? 2:02:12.560 --> 2:02:16.920 So I'd like to try that, I think. I don't know. 2:02:17.360 --> 2:02:19.360 Australia was one of them. In New Zealand that's going 2:02:19.400 --> 2:02:23.880 to be checked off. But you know, we thought about Antarctica, 2:02:23.920 --> 2:02:28.360 but that's a whole other thing. Like sometimes you can't 2:02:28.360 --> 2:02:30.760 get there if the weather's bad, you've wasted the whole trip. 2:02:30.960 --> 2:02:32.840 I'm not sure I want to risk that. I don't know. 2:02:33.120 --> 2:02:35.240 I'm not no desire by the way to do a safari. 2:02:35.440 --> 2:02:38.320 So that's the bottom of the list. Okay, everybody says 2:02:38.320 --> 2:02:38.720 to do it. 2:02:38.800 --> 2:02:41.960 But you're on one of these trips it's twenty days long. 2:02:42.120 --> 2:02:43.360 Are you disconnected? 2:02:43.880 --> 2:02:44.080 No? 2:02:44.640 --> 2:02:47.560 Are you basically working while you're on the trip? 2:02:48.480 --> 2:02:51.040 I can't get away from the work. Yeah, I don't 2:02:51.040 --> 2:02:53.160 mind either because it breaks it up for me, do 2:02:53.200 --> 2:02:55.120 you know, Like I like sometimes it's in the middle 2:02:55.120 --> 2:02:57.000 of the night. My time usually at there are time 2:02:57.400 --> 2:02:58.920 you know what I mean, Like at the time is off, 2:02:59.160 --> 2:03:01.840 it's like eight o'clock. Night is usually like mid noon 2:03:01.880 --> 2:03:04.760 in LA or something. So you know, I'll set up 2:03:04.760 --> 2:03:06.640 a meeting or something like that, and you know, put 2:03:06.680 --> 2:03:08.760 my two cents and I can't do music from there. 2:03:08.880 --> 2:03:11.120 It's mostly the record label stuff I can do from there, 2:03:11.600 --> 2:03:13.920 so yeah, I don't try it. I'll listen to mixes, 2:03:14.560 --> 2:03:17.200 you know, okay mixes and things like that. 2:03:17.840 --> 2:03:22.640 So yeah, Okay, Howard, it's been great talking to you. 2:03:22.840 --> 2:03:26.400 Thanks for sharing your story and your insights with my audience. 2:03:27.200 --> 2:03:30.120 Oh well, thank you for having me. Absolutely, I'm a 2:03:30.120 --> 2:03:33.120 big fan. You know. We listen to you all the time. 2:03:33.120 --> 2:03:35.240 By the way, well, as I say, it's good to 2:03:35.320 --> 2:03:38.840 hear you know, your philosophies and to get into some 2:03:38.920 --> 2:03:42.920 of this nitty gritty, I mean cutting vocals. You really 2:03:43.000 --> 2:03:45.320 you made some good points, but there's still more points 2:03:45.360 --> 2:03:47.880 to make. You say, you work with Kelly Clarkson and 2:03:47.920 --> 2:03:52.600 some other people. But we're gonna leave it here for today, Okay, 2:03:53.520 --> 2:03:56.560 till next time. This is Bob left Stacks 2:04:18.280 --> 2:04:18.400 Sh