The Self-Recording Band
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The Self-Recording Band
313: How Legendary Rock Records Are Made - Kyle Hoffmann (NRG Recording Studios)
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What separates good audio engineers and producers from great ones?
In this episode, we sit down with Kyle Hoffmann, Chief Engineer at the legendary NRG Recording Studios in Los Angeles, to talk about the iconic NRG sound and the skills that matter most. Both in the studio and throughout your career.
Kyle shares his journey from intern to Chief Engineer, what he learned at Berklee College of Music, and why mentorship, attitude and relationships have shaped his career far more than gear ever could.
We also talk about:
- Why attitude matters more than technical skill
- The difference between producing and engineering
- Building trust with artists in the studio
- Learning from mentors instead of relying on tutorials
- What aspiring engineers get wrong about professional studios
- Whether audio school is worth it
- Why legendary studios like NRG still matter
- How to build a long-term career in audio
This conversation is packed with practical lessons that go far beyond equipment and recording techniques.
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For links to everything we've mentioned in this episode, as well as full show notes go to:
NRG / Kyle:
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Our guest today is Kyle Hoffman, Chief Engineer and Studio Manager at NRG Recording. In case you don't know what NRG Recording is, I mean you probably know, but in case you don't, it's a studio where pretty much everyone you've ever heard of has made a record there. If you look at the credits, it's pretty remarkable. And also if you look at Kyle's credits, it's very impressive as well. I just went to the usual places like Muso and did some research and I found credits that include Youngblood, Bruce Springsteen, Earth, Wind and Fire, Steve Redhead, Bush, Beyonce, Rob Zombie, Escape the Fate. It goes on and on. It's a very impressive list. And then if you look at the at the people who have recorded the NRG with different people, it's just it's even crazier. So I'm super excited to welcome Kyle to the show today. We have a lot of questions for you, Kyle, and I'm very, very grateful that you took the time to be here and let us pick your brain a little bit. And uh yeah, so welcome. Welcome to the Self-Recording Band Podcast. Of course, yeah. Thanks for having me. Absolutely. And I'm I'm as always not here by myself. I'm doing this with my friend and co-host, Manel Espinosa Berenguer from Spain. Hello, Manel, how are you doing?
SPEAKER_01Hello, Benedict. I'm doing great. And as I always say, I'm really happy to be back here one more week.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, for sure. Uh me too. And we had a little bit of a break before we switched this to an interview-only format. So we're really, really excited. If you're new to this show, this is the Self Recording Band Podcast. My name is Benedict Hein. I'm a mixing engineer. And uh I also run this this platform, theselfrecordingband.com, where we offer coaching and we do this podcast. And uh yeah, we have amazing guests that are very gracious and with their time and like share their knowledge with our audience. So hopefully you can learn a thing or two here today from Kyle. I'm pretty sure you can. So, Kyle, um beyond the credits. We'll see, yeah. Beyond the credits that I just mentioned, which is a really impressive list that was not not at all complete. Um, can you tell us a little bit about your background? Like what are you doing? What does it mean to be like a studio manager and also the chief engineer, just for people to get some context of of what your day-to-day looks like?
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Um it's a lot of work. It's a lot of work. Um I would just say, you know, wearing a lot of different hats at the same time. Um, you know, I I kind of came up uh I I started here, let's I'll just start at the beginning. I started here in 2008. I moved out to LA and I started here as an intern. Um mopping floors, scrubbing toilets for free, uh traditional intern stuff, um hazing, you know, we got got beat up a little bit. Uh after about I would say six months of that, it was only supposed to be three. But after six months of that, uh I got hired as a runner. Um like totally traditional studio route. Uh I was a runner for about a year and a half to two years or so, and then I started transitioning into like becoming an assistant engineer, um, working with the owner, um, mixer, producer Jay Baumgartner. Uh he's produced and mixed a lot of the stuff that's on the walls here uh at NRG. And so I was his uh mix assistant for a while, and I was also assisting on bigger sessions. Um, and then after that, it just kind of you know snowballed into I became Jay's engineer. We started working together on a lot of different stuff. Um that was the Bush album. Um, we did a bunch of other uh things too together. And uh after that, you know, I was still working as an assistant for other producers that came through the studio and started to build my own independent career. And then after that, you know, just kind of went freelance a little bit, engineering, mixing, um, production, and then eventually um the our original chief engineer, Wade Norton, he helped build this place. Um he kind of semi-retired, and I took over all the technical maintenance from him. So I started maintaining the knees and all the gear, all the amps, and you know, we have a crazy guitar amp collection here. Um, so if the console works, you know, it's because I pay attention to it. And if it's broken, it's because I didn't pay attention to it. Um then I started doing that, and then eventually, you know, it just kind of took over the whole place as needed. Um and so I've been, you know, handling bookings and managing the studio for the last year and a half or so.
SPEAKER_02While it's still engineering.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. I actually just um Jay and I are working on an album together right now. Um and then I just finished mixing a project a few months ago. Um so Yeah. Uh I have to pinch myself sometimes, but also, you know, I gotta stay busy and kind of keep things flowing, you know.
SPEAKER_02Totally, totally, yeah. Um what thank you for the for the background information. Also interesting to hear that you had the typical sort of, or maybe what would used to be the typical kind of path of like intern to assistant to engineer kind of thing. It it seems to be a little less common these days, mainly because I think big studios, big commercial facilities are a little less common, or unfortunately there's not too many out there anymore. Um but yeah, you went through that that path. But you also I saw, and correct me if that's if that's wrong, but I saw that you went to Berkeley College of Music.
SPEAKER_00I did, yeah, yeah. Um I left that detail out. So yeah. Um I met a lot of really great people there too. In fact, one of the reasons why I'm here in the first place is because of uh one of my mentors at Berkeley, uh Bert Price, he is the head of, he's the chief engineer there and he's the head of the maintenance department, does all the studio uh like technical stuff. And, you know, when I told him I was moving out, I I worked for him in the on the Berkeley Tech Crew, uh, which is a really cool gig at the school. It's like a work study job, um, where I learned how to like calibrate tape machines and work on gear, and you know, it was like little things here and there, but it was a a good primer into like the real world.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00And I told him I was coming out here, and he was like, Oh man, you gotta go to NRG. They have the best parties. So that's that's kind of why I it's one of the reasons why I came here. I mean, obviously the studio kind of speaks for itself too, but yeah. Um but yeah, I just thought that was kind of a fun little anecdote.
SPEAKER_02Totally, totally. And it's interesting you say that this is a great primer like for the the real world, because this is precisely, and I don't want to talk shit about like traditional music education, uh, but this is precisely what a lot of people that went that route, like that path, uh are complaining about that there's sometimes not really this there's a lot of theory and a lot of stuff you learn, but they're lacking like the the they're not working with people sometimes that have actually made records or are actively making records, and that there's this missing, there's this disconnect between what happens at school versus what happens in the real world. So it's interesting to me that you say it was different in this case. And of course, Berkeley has a great uh reputation and all of that, but yeah, still interesting to hear because I hear I don't have an opinion because I never went to any of these schools, but I hear polar opposite opinions from people. Like some are absolutely happy and glad that they did it and they got their introduction through the school, and others say, well, I learned a lot, but it had nothing to do with what I was doing later, you know. So that was interesting to hear.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, for me, it was more uh I mean, Berkeley was amazing. Uh I had a great experience there, and and I still keep in touch with a lot of my friends and and stuff, students that were there when I went there, and then my professors too, and a lot of the people working out here in LA are Berkeley alum as well. So like we have a pretty good community. Yeah, Berkeley was great. I obviously it doesn't prepare you for everything. I think one of the one of the things about schools like that is they they tend to kind of, you know, when you're 21 and you're going through this program, they kind of tend to like be like, oh yeah, once you graduate, you're gonna be producing Grammy winning records, you know what I mean? And it's just not the case, unless you're just a badass and you're doing it all by yourself, you know, which a lot of people do. Um so I think that might be more of the disconnect where you know you you start working professionally and you realize like, oh, there's like a long climb to the top. And you know, you have to form relationships and you have to really work on your craft. Like you don't just come out of school knowing how to really make a record. You know, I learned 90% of what I know from the different producers and engineers that I've worked with over the years, um, including Jay. Like I've learned so much from that guy, um, and still do every day, you know. So I think it's easy to come out of school thinking you know everything and and wonder why you're not getting the gigs, you know. Absolutely.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, I totally, I totally get that. And and it's like I never I don't know anything else personally because all I've learned was all through mentors and like people working in studios showing me how it's done and all that because I'm not in a major music city, I'm in the middle of nowhere, built my my my little audio business here and and I all I had was like mentors and people in studios that I traveled to and learn from. So that's really all I know. Uh but also what I hear a lot from from people is that and I actually did the same when I hired my first employee who started as an intern here as well, is like that they would much rather have someone with the right mindset and of course musical talent and like willingness to to learn and to and just that drive, but without the knowledge and the skills yet, they would rather hire someone like that than compared to someone who has a lot of knowledge, but also they have to unlearn a bunch of things and learn completely new ways, or maybe are too too arrogant or not open enough to just learn new approaches. I've heard that a lot of times, and I did the same thing. I mean, Thomas, when he came here, he didn't know nothing, he he knew something, but what was much more important was his attitude and his just the way he made himself useful from day one and just he showed me that like I knew immediately that if I hire this guy like this is gonna be valuable, valuable for both of us, it's a win-win scenario, and I didn't care about the skills really at this point when I hired him.
SPEAKER_00And so Yeah, I I 100% agree with that. Uh when I look for your when I look for people to to bring onto the team too, like you know, it's all about attitude and drive and um personality and just like nobody cares how great your snare drum tone is. Like, you know, as a runner, as an intern, as an assistant, like you need to be able to um, you know, interface with the clients and make sure they're comfortable, make sure they're taken care of. You know, it's a it's a service industry. So um if you come into a studio like this, you know, thinking that you're just gonna jump into the engineer chair and and start doing that, like um as an employee, it doesn't really make any sense. So I I agree with you. Yeah, you you definitely look for people that like have drive and they wanna learn and they're eager, they kind of take care of themselves a little bit, you know.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Figure stuff out on their own. Like I love that, man. That's so nice when somebody's just like, hey, I uh I've I figured out this thing I didn't know how to do like an hour ago. It's great. So yeah. That's so cool.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, totally. It's the best when they do that. Yep. Um has it and I we're gonna switch topic soon, but like the just one more thing on this. Um has this traditional path that you went through, has this changed a little bit now? Like, do you still have that where interns come in and they like you set mop the floors, do the typical runner intern stuff and then they work their way up? Is it still the same or has this changed a bit in recent years?
SPEAKER_00Um it's only really changed in the sense that you know, we do a first school credit. So we work with a lot of the schools around. Um and you know, a lot of them have internship requirements in order to graduate. So um we do it that way. But apart from that, traditionally, like it really hasn't changed too much the um the path. It's just the business in general has kind of changed a little bit. So the things that were happening when I came up as an intern are just different now. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Sure.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, that was one thing I wanted to get into as well because to me it's like fascinating. I'm super glad to see that places like NRG still exist and and uh from the outside, at least apparently also still thrive and work out and all that. But also it's fascinating to me from from the perspective of someone who's running like one small room, little, very little overhead, you know, and all that kind of stuff, how it's possible to keep something like NRG afloat and like you know, keep it booked, keep, you know, that it still works in 2026. And maybe you've changed the model or you do different things now. I have no idea, but like it's it's fascinating and also really cool to see that it's still possible to run a studio like that. That is actually something I wanted to ask about, anyways. Like, what's your opinion on that? And you have seen change in the past, you know, almost 20 years.
SPEAKER_00I've seen a lot of change. Um yeah, things are just different now. Um, it is still possible to do it, it's way more difficult, I think, than it used to be. Um for one, budgets have shrank quite significantly. It's pretty uncommon to have like a long-term lockout session back in the day. They used to last three, two, three, four months, uh sometimes a year, you know. Um and so that's becoming less and less common. Mostly people will come in for a day or two, um, and then kind of go maybe finish stuff at home or go to a smaller studio once uh they got their drums tracked, or you know, kind of the stuff that we're really known for are our drum rooms and our guitar collection and our amp collection. That stuff has been here since day one. And I personally think we have the best sounding drum rooms in town.
SPEAKER_02Um, no, you know, of course not. Anyone who's ever used drum samples probably has heard, or most people have heard these rooms in some way just because of the late samples. You know what I mean?
SPEAKER_00It's built into trigger, yeah. So if you use trigger, you use Studio A all the time.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. I I I knew what that sounded like and heard this before I even knew what energy really was. I for me in the beginning, energy when I started like yeah, when was it 2009 or 2008 or something? When I got I think I got the samples on CD still. Yeah. Um and you know, for me it was just of the the part of the file name that it's like energy before I even knew what that was. But like, yeah, that pro many people have heard the rooms for sure. Oh yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's it's built if you look in um any of the trigger presets. If you see a fader that says I think it just says NRG A. Yeah. Um or it says NRG room or something like that. So it has something like that. Yeah, yeah. And that's where those samples were recorded.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, totally. No, and and and that's the big advantage, and the one of the many advantages of like a proper studio, but like those rooms is really something that there is there's no real substitute for like a really great studio room. Yes, it's like so invaluable. And even like you said, I I'm not surprised to hear that. And I I've done that before a lot of times on pr on records that I've worked on, is that you go specifically for the drums, you go to a room like that, track the drums there, and then maybe do the rest elsewhere. But that is just it just makes such a big difference, especially with drums.
SPEAKER_00So Yeah, I I agree. I mean, I think I think it's best to do especially if you're doing live recording, I think it's best to do it in a big room like this. Again, I may be a little biased, but I think it's just you know, the experience of playing together. Um, I think a lot of other producers would agree too. Like, you know, the experience of playing together in a in a room and getting like the raw energy of the band actually reacting to each other, which happens less and less these days, too. Um but I think that's really valuable and it's definitely a sound. It's definitely a different sound than you know, recording things one at a time in a small room.
SPEAKER_02Um also requires a different level of skill in many cases.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, in a lot of cases. But um but even still, yeah, drums in a big room like this, there's really no substitute for it. You can try to add reverbs and stuff all day, but if you really want the big room sound, like there's only one way to get it, you know.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02The closest you can get to maybe is is like adding adding room samples, maybe instead of like artificial reverb, but still it affects everything. It also affects how the close mic sound, not just the additional rooms. Oh, absolutely.
SPEAKER_00I mean, and that's not to knock smaller rooms. Like if you if you want a small room sound, then like obviously do that. But you know, all the records that kind of came out of here back in the the heyday, uh, you know, they all have that big room sound. Uh the drums are massive, uh the guitars are massive, and a lot of that has to do with um our specific guitars and our specific amps and our specific room, you know.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, no, totally. And and if you if you look at like the when you say back in the heyday, I mean I'm not sure how you would diff define that, but if I look at some of the records that most of like the bands that m many people will be familiar with, you know, it's like especially in the rock world. Like if you look at the website credits there, you know, you find um Lincoln Park, Red Hot Chili Peppers, The Offspring, um you know, there's all kinds of like Papa Roach, Slayer, Smashing Pumpkins, there's like Bon Jovi, all these like rock, the motorhead. Like there's rock history has been made in these, in these rooms, in this, in these, in this studio.
SPEAKER_00So oh yeah, absolutely. Um, I mean, even going back further than that, we did Hootie and the Blowfish, their big crack rearview, uh, their big album, Tracy Chapman, uh Fiona Apple did Win the Pawn here. So, you know, there's a lot of stuff that doesn't really fit into the kind of like new metal thing that we're more mostly famous for. Um but going back before that was really a thing, yeah, there there were a lot of great other great records done here.
SPEAKER_03Sure.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. But yeah, Manel, you want to see something.
SPEAKER_01Talking about that, um, because like you basically just said that like the studio went through a golden era in in those years, probably, right? Sure. Um so my question is um how do you manage like keeping the fire, like the motivation after all those uh years and how the music industry is changing?
SPEAKER_00Um don't take no for an answer, I guess. Uh you know, I think you know, things always go through cycles, right? So, you know, right now we're actually entering into a new kind of rock era, which is really cool. Um we just did the Youngblood Aerosmith project here. We did some of that here. We also did some of that with um his thing with smashing pumpkins. And noticed after that, kind of like a lot of people started reaching out specifically for our brand of rock, which is kind of making a little bit of a resurgence at the moment, which is great for us. But before that, you know, it's like it's all relationships, right? So you work with um different labels and ARs, and uh it might be hip hop, it might be RB, it might be orchestra dates, it might be uh it could be anything. Um people come here to film a lot, people come here to um shoot music videos and stuff like that, because Studio B specifically like has that Moroccan look to it. Uh it's dressed up really nice. Um so we do a lot of that as well. So it's just about kind of being able to do anything and be be more diverse, you know. That being said, the kind of specific brand of rock that we've been known for here, like it's it's a really specific sound that you kind of have to know how to do it, you know. And I just over the years had the chance to learn from the best people that have done it. Um Jay is probably the best, if not, you know, top three. You know, you have to use certain things in certain ways, and there's certain techniques that don't really exist in other styles of music, right? So uh yeah. It's kind of just keeping that alive. A lot of the sound of this place came through the engineers that worked here over the years, and a lot of in house guys that were they were working on a lot of those records back in the day. You know, producers would use the in house engineer sometimes. Um so you know, a lot of those guys had a lot to do with the way that those records sound.
SPEAKER_01Yeah. And so how would you define that that Sound that you just mentioned.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it's kind of tough, but it's like I mean if you're talking specifically about the the core sort of like heavy new metal y kind of thing that we do.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00A lot of it is obviously our our rooms. The big giant drums. Kind of the way that they're recorded too. It's it's pretty specific. Um with the the mic setup and the way the room is laid out and things like that, it's uh it's pretty specific. And then the other really big one was uh our modded JCM 800s, specifically with our black Les Paul custom. Uh that was a big part of the sound. And we still have it and we still use it every day, you know. That's in my opinion, the only real way to get the authentic guitar sound from that era. Um and uh yeah, I mean there's obviously ways you can emulate it and get close to it, but that's that's it. You plug that thing in and it's just like, oh yeah, that's that's the sound. So you kind of have to come here to do it, is my point.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, totally. Yeah, totally, totally. No, that's that's great. Thank you for sharing that. Um speaking of new metal, by the way, I've never I I completely missed that in my in my introduction here. Uh, I got introduced to you, like a new NRG, but I got I heard your name from uh our friends in Steppo, who they are a new metal band from uh close to uh LA, not directly LA, I think, uh, but like yeah, I I've been working with them for for a couple of years now, and they made their debut the debut record, I think 25 years ago or something, like early 2000s at MR.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I I um I think it was around 2001 or two or something like that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, and so and they said like multiple times actually. So thank you, shout out to Steppa. Thank you guys for that recommendation. Multiple times actually, they were like, You gotta contact Kyle, like you gotta bring him on to the podcast. They're listeners of the show and they wanted you on, and I I thought it was a great idea. So uh yeah, like how do you do you know those guys personally or like how was that? Really no connection.
SPEAKER_00It's it's funny, like I kind of when I took over the uh the Instagram here a few years ago, yeah. It they just started liking all of our you know, all my stuff, and then we just started chatting and and uh that's kind of how it all all happened. But um, but yeah, their their stuff is exactly that sound.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Like, you know, in fact, if you just probably talk to them, you probably use that guitar and that amp, you know.
SPEAKER_02Could be, could could very well be, yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, totally. Yeah, interest, very interesting.
SPEAKER_02And you know, definitely.
SPEAKER_00Sorry to interrupt, but yeah, back back then too, you know, before my time. So back then there were uh some different people around um yeah, 2000 was gonna be that would have been like hybrid theory, Lincoln Park's first album. Um what else would have been happening around that time? Papa Roach was a little bit earlier, corn was about a year before that, maybe. So yeah, they were right in there.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Yeah, and speaking of the kind of resurgence or like rock coming back and and new metal in and of itself also has kind of this resurgence there a little bit. Um, but do you feel like the I have I don't know if if that's true, it's just my my feeling that I get from the artists I work with and the people I talk to who listen to music. It's like it's almost like the pendulum is swinging back a little bit after like a decade of two of quote unquote perfection, and now with AI even worse, and like all of that. And it seems like more people want to hear a band, and not so much what happens after the recording and all the additional stuff. And I find that pretty fascinating and also cool because that's that's what I'm all about and what I how I grew up. And like I'm not against super polished records, there's there's cool things in all kinds of genres, but but I feel like there's almost like this, yeah, it's kind of swinging the other way now, and and people crave the connection with artists and hearing a real band and the little imperfections, and like even at live shows, I watched uh the the the Foo Fighters at a big stadium two weeks ago where what happened on that stage was pretty much exactly what would happen in the small club. It's like it was an amp and a and a cab and a mic in front of it, and like no no backing tracks, no nothing, and like just turned up loud in the big stadium. But it was very simple and people seem to really enjoy that again, which I think is great.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I think I think it's making a little bit of a comeback. Um, in my opinion, I think people maybe are just kind of getting sick of hearing the same thing over and over again, you know? Yeah, like I said, it comes in cycles. Yeah. Uh but yeah, I'm I'm noticing that too. It is a little bit difficult to kind of unlearn some of those things too. Like, you know, how much imperfection do you leave in at, you know, at what point is it sloppy and is at what at what point is it like, you know what I mean? So as a producer, you kind of have to have that um, you know, you have to have that taste to kind of have the right amount, you know.
SPEAKER_02Many people use that as an excuse for not playing properly, or like, you know, like where like there's a line, there's like, yeah, like you said, at some point it becomes a distraction or an obvious mistake, or like the feel is not right anymore. But a little bit of that might be cool, and like, yeah, that produces trauma is to have that taste.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and the the big big thing for for us is like when you're making a a a record like something that was typically to come out of here, like you spend more time tuning the guitar than you do playing it. Yeah. So you know, if your playing's not tight, then you're still spending, you know, you're still tuning in between every take. So it's uh you know, it's a lot of work.
SPEAKER_02You guys have the evertune bridges on your guitars?
SPEAKER_00Uh I don't actually, but you know, they have their they have their thing. There is a little bit of, how do I say, like, you know, obviously a little bit of beauty in the slight imperfection. Um the one time I've used an Evertune guitar, it it felt too perfect. And so like maybe for modern metal bands, like that's cool, but for for kind of like more grungy, heavier rock stuff, I don't I don't think it's really in my opinion, I don't think it's really the best way to go. But yeah, it's still a lot of work. So I think it's it's good that you know young kids and are are getting back into guitars and getting back into rock music and stuff like that. Because it's definitely um, you know, it's definitely a becoming a lost art, and it's cool that they're getting excited about it because we need it, you know. We need to keep it. We absolutely need it, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, the way you just um talked about like how how much time you spent tuning guitars and stuff like that, with everyone who's ever been to a professional recording session in rock like knows what why you're saying that and what that means. But like, do you put is it the same kind of or even more, maybe the same amount of effort that goes into setting up drums, picking the drum skins, tuning them and all that kind of stuff? Because I feel like both of those things and the DIY world are things that people totally miss or like ignore, and you can tell, and it makes it so hard to mix these things. If like I couldn't care less about mics as long as they as long as they have a setup that just sounds good, like the player, of course, and the room, but also just the the tuning of the drums, the the the choice of drum heads, and and just a lot of people don't put enough thought into that, I feel like. So I I'm wondering how what your take is on that because I've also seen sessions where it's like super quick and still sounds good, but like yeah, I was just curious about how you guys approach that.
SPEAKER_00Um yeah, I mean it really depends on if you're talking specifically specifically about drums, um it really depends on the drummer first. Yeah. Um, are they able to hit consistently how hard did they hit? Um that tells you a lot about what kind of head you're gonna choose. Yeah. Um obviously you have different tones between coated and clear heads, uh different drum sizes, different compositions. You know, we have a couple of drum kits here that one that we've been using for the last 10, 15 years, which is uh a mid 60s Ludwig 24-inch bass drum, like 13, 14, 16, 18 inch, like big drums, you know, from the 60s, and they sound amazing. But they're a little bit cranky, like they're hard to tune. So recently for this last project, we actually just uh another reason to come here. We just got a new DW Collector Series kit uh that's fantastic 2022, um 12, 13, 14 or 12, 10, 12, 14, 16, I believe. Uh great amazing drum kit. That more like modern maple sound. You so we have like the vintage thing and now we have the modern thing. So that's a big part of it. Drum tuning is a huge part of it. Uh that's why we work with whenever possible, we work with professional drum techs. Fantastic. Yeah. Like some of the best guys are are here in LA. Uh shout out to Mike Fassano, he's the man. We use him all the time. Um and he actually has been working with us for the last 30, 35 years since the beginning. He may have actually done the first session here, too, as a drum tech. So uh maybe he can correct me if I'm wrong. But uh but yeah, he's been working here forever. He's one of the best in the business, and we still use him to this day. So that's a big part of it, too. What else? Like there's so much that goes into it before you even think about a microphone. And I think that like a lot of young engineers get this idea that you know they they get kind of like locked into the gear thing, which is obviously important, but you know, you obviously start at your source material, right? So if your drums don't sound good, your mics aren't gonna sound good.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Right. So for the young engineers out there that are trying to figure it out, like just get an SM57. Don't worry about the gear. Make sure your drums sound good, you know.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Coming from the man who's right now on a podcast speaking into a vintage Use 47 and two of vintage Nive and two in the LA2A.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, well, but you're totally right, but you're totally right.
SPEAKER_00You know, if you smoke 'em if you got 'em, right? So like uh Yeah, like we we've got all that stuff too, and and it really does make a difference. I'm not trying to I'm a gearhead. I'm a gear nerd through and through. So like I'll always be advocating for cool stuff.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, but I I totally hear you. No, but it's an important message. So uh yeah, you're totally right. That's an important message to prioritize the source, the the the song and the playing more than anything, and then what happens in front of the mic in terms of the instruments, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I mean, everything after that is just an aesthetic choice, right? So if you're good at what you do, you can make those choices. Um, you know, you can make your drums sound however you want them to sound. You move your room mics around, or you dead in the room, or you liven it up, depending on what you want uh sonically, you know. So you can make a lot of different choices that way. The other thing I'll do too is like don't sleep on changing your symbols. Like if you, you know, you want to make sure your symbol sound is right going into the the microphone. Like, I don't care what mic you use. Yeah. You know, you mics are so good now that you know you could use just 414s as overheads. They're not crazy expensive, they sound great, but like your symbols are gonna make way more of a difference, in my opinion, than like a 414 versus like a U67 or something like that. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Um also it's the one thing you can't replace with samples later, or like not not easily. You know, it's it's it's another thing where like if all else fail fails, there's always ways to work around little like weird sounding shells, even though it's not ideal. But the symbols and the entire image of the kit and and you know, that that stuff just that's that becomes part of the drum sound.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. Yeah, it's it's uh it's definitely one of the more I don't want to say difficult, but it's it's one of the more difficult things to get right.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_02You know? And difficult to fix in the mix as well. Like if the symbols sound crappy and like you got a bunch of harsh top end or just not the right symbols for the job. A lot of times in the heavy stuff that I work on, people choose symbols that are way too small, but like then super thick, and you end up with this like yeah, it's it's so hard to make them work in the mix and like well plus one of the one of the big parts of of our sound too is um is using wide-spaced pair overheads.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um for different genres of music, you know, sometimes I like a stereo mic in the middle, sometimes it's mono, sometimes it it is what it is. But for like the heavy kind of energy rock sound that we do, you know, it's a wide spaced pair that are like over the symbols. So they're more like symbol mics than they are uh overheads, if that makes sense.
SPEAKER_02That's an interesting topic. So yeah, interesting you say that.
SPEAKER_00Just kind of a part of the sound, you know. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Interesting you say that because that's also debate that I'm not a like a black or white person when it comes to anything audio, because there's always it always depends on the song, and there's always so many ways to do it. But like this debate between like are the overheads like kit mics that capture everything, like in including the shells, and like is the entire image of the kit really that important, or is it are they really symbol mics, and you get the majority of the rest from the close mics, and like so it's interesting you say that in your approach they're primarily symbol mics, but I mean still the rest matters, but yeah, just your your thoughts on that? And it it's probably it it depends, is the answer, probably.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, oh yeah, it totally depends on the genre um and the style of music that you're doing. Like I would say for you know, for jazz or something country, you know, you probably don't want a super wide spaced pair of uh cymbal mics. You know, you'd probably want something tighter that picks up the whole image of the kit. But yeah, for for like rock and metal, at least in my experience, I think the cymbal mic thing is more the way to go. Because you get you know in a metal band or something, you don't really necessarily need that perfect picture of the drum kit because you got ten guitars and people screaming, and you know, it's like your your natural drum kit sound is gonna go away anyway.
SPEAKER_02So and and also if the drum is hitting hard and the the kit is tuned in a way that it that you would typically do it for something like that, yeah, you're gonna have a shit ton of snare and stuff anyways in the overheads. And it so it's still it still matters to have that kind of somewhat in the center of the image, I guess, and like making sure the phase is correct and all that. And you're gonna have it's it's not that they're gonna just pick up symbols, it's gonna become part of the sound in some way, anyways. And there's also this little bit of delay, it's part of the depth that comes from that, it's part of the sound too. So yeah, it's not that that it's there's gonna be no snare in the overheads, right? Yeah, of course.
SPEAKER_00I mean, yeah, your snare is right next to it. So you know, but it's a little bit less important to have that total like perfect image, if that makes sense. Yeah, totally makes sense.
SPEAKER_02Cool. Um one thing that you touched on that I have a follow-up question on is um you you kept saying you know, the energy sound or the the kind of rock sound we do and all that, and and yeah, there there is this thing that energy is kind of known for. Um but how do you personally feel about as a producer or engineer about like your sound or the sound of the studio or the sound of the producer, whatever, versus like being more invisible and not having a signature sound and trying to like you know be really transparent and just you know do it differently for every artist? Because there's these two types of producers and mixes out there. There's some that have such a clear signature sound that I can immediately tell that's probably done by this person. And then sometimes I'm not that sure. There are some out there who are more like invisible. So what's what's your take on that? Is it an advantage to have a signature sound kind of as a producer?
SPEAKER_00I guess I have to keep saying the same thing. Like it really depends, right? Like I expected that. You know, I I like to think of myself as a little bit of a Swiss Army knife. Like I've had I've worked on stuff in pretty much every genre. Um, you know, I just recorded and mixed a jazz album. Um, I just did an old school kind of hip-hop RB thing. Um, I've worked one of my uh big clients, Kareem Riggins. He's an amazing jazz drummer and hip-hop producer. And like I've done a bunch of records with him and common. And so like that's that kind of old school Detroit style hip-hop thing. Uh and his he definitely has a signature for sure as a producer. But I don't know. For me, I feel like I don't really tend to uh stay within one genre, if that makes sense. So um I don't know. I just guess I guess being adaptable and using your ears really it's like I don't know if that answers your question.
SPEAKER_02Was yeah, like yeah, it kind of does. It I this there's two angles here. The one is like just if you have a signature sound, if you're if you think that, or if you're trying actively to not have that, you know, there's these different extremes, of course. And and it's funny to me is like um uh you know, I I I was or I am a big like Steve Albini fan, and and when he one of his things was always, you know, I'm not trying to have a sound and I do whatever the artist wants, and he's like the service provider, you know, trying to stay away and like out of the way. And and yet, in my opinion, his records definitely had a sound, you know, and like even though he tried hard not to. So I'm like kind of interesting. That's the one angle. And then the other thing is from a perspective.
SPEAKER_00Like he he had his signature sound was more to do with his engineering, really. Yeah, and the rooms also. Yeah, and the rooms. So like but yeah, I I I guess I I get what you're saying, you know, stay out of the way, but he's still that was more his engineering, his engineering style, if you know, in my opinion.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and and and you can't help I mean, you just have a taste and everybody hears things differently, and everybody everything goes through that unique filter that only you have, and so naturally there will be some sort of thing that you do. Um but then the other angle is like from a from a business perspective, I wonder sometimes, is it is it an advantage to like fully focus on just one thing and also develop your signature sound and then try to attract these types of bands, or is it more is it a bet is it better to be able to do all kinds of things and like not have that? You know, it's and and obviously again there are yeah, it there are people who are successful with with both of these things.
SPEAKER_00So totally. I I mean I think for me it's more valuable to be diverse and like adaptable. Um but you know, as an as an engineer, I'd like to think that I have a signature sound, maybe. Um but I don't really try to do that. It's sort of just for me, it's more like serve the band, serve the artist. You know, if somebody hires me to engineer something, like I want to make sure that I'm doing that right by the artist or the producer in that sense, as an engineer, you know, get what they want. And obviously I'll have my opinion, but at the end of the day, it's like if they want something to sound a certain way, I think it's it's important to be able to adapt to that and like make it how they want it, right? Yeah, as a producer I try to maybe take the same approach where you know, I want to help the artists kind of make their vision, but also you have to be you know, you have to kind of guide them and make sure that it's done well. And you know, a lot of times uh with bands, you know, they don't have a whole lot of experience in the studio. And so you kind of have to help them through that process. Um, you know, I think as a producer that's pretty important. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, interesting. Th this is also something I'm glad you meant you you you mentioned this as well, because in the DIY kind of self-recording world that we are also in with this podcast, the difference between producer and engineer is sometimes also not that clear to people, where we kind of you know often have to explain that because in in in many modern, like smaller budget scenarios, the producer and the engineer are kind of one. They're the same. So and sometimes even the artist. Yeah. Yeah. And and and but traditionally it's not. And so when you say, you know, there's you as the engineer, you do you are trying to get the producer's vision across, and or the artist or whoever is involved. That's interest that's important for people to understand that there is a difference. And then, you know, when you're engineering doesn't mean you're producing the record necessarily.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I I tend to do both too. So sometimes I'm doing both on a project. Uh sometimes I'm just the engineer. Uh, I think it's really important to recognize the difference in those situations, you know. And as the engineer, you want to make sure you you're helping the producer, not like uh interjecting your opinions. Into the mix too much, you know what I mean?
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Uh you kind of have to know when to shut up and know when to speak. You know, yeah, it's a it's a it's an important skill that I I don't think enough people have, you know. Um it's just, you know, sometimes you gotta know when to stay out of the way and know when to speak up if that's if you see something happening and you're like, oh, maybe this is kind of going sideways a little bit, you can kind of, you know, maybe get it back on track and guide things. Yeah. Just without being overbearing, I guess, is the yeah.
SPEAKER_02Being able to read a room and like know know your your your place and your role and like yeah.
SPEAKER_04Yeah.
SPEAKER_00That's an important part of it. Yeah. I mean, I think that's probably something that home recording um artists don't really get. They don't really understand it because they don't experience it.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, exactly. And I'm not I'm not blaming them. Like, that's why I keep repeating these things. It's it's not that I think our audience is stupid, quite the opposite. No, no. It's just if you've never experienced it, like you how would you know? And I remember when I started out without that professional experience, I didn't know so many things and I had no no clue how how professional records were made. And so yeah, it's just yeah. And and even and I think it's even valuable to separate the two, like producing and engineering, even if you're doing it all yourself, because I feel like you have to wear these different hats and like switch perspectives. It's it's kind of hard to do. It's one of the biggest challenges if you do it yourself, I feel like that you have this technical side, and then you have the big picture producer creative vision side of things. And and you gotta those are different jobs. And and if you wear all these hats at the same time, sometimes things can be a little yeah, it can be a little difficult. And and it's I think it's even if you do it yourself, it there's benef there's value in separating the two a little bit to a degree, or maybe if you do it with a group of people, maybe one is more the producer type and someone else is more the technical kind of engineer, whatever. I think, yeah, it's just important to know the difference, I feel like.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I think so. Um you know, you tend to lose perspective if you're doing everything. That's why like if I'm engineering a record, I don't always want to be producing it. I don't always want to be, and if I'm doing both of those things, I definitely don't want to mix it. You know, and I know there's some people that are very successful at that. I mean, the you know, Andy Wallace was like one of the best. Yeah. But, you know, there's like two of those people in the world. You know, and I'm not one of those people. Like I being able to mix a record that I've both produced and engineered is like insane to me. Because you do, you lose perspective and and it's like you you gotta get a separate, you gotta get another set of ears on it, you know. Yeah, in my opinion. Um and that, you know, that also being said, you know, I I would really encourage people to get out of the bedroom. And you know, I mean, yeah I know obviously fun funding is limited for a lot of people too, but you're gonna spend three grand on that interface that you want, right? You know, get your friends together, find a studio, spend that money on the studio, go in, have the experience, even if you do it once, you know.
SPEAKER_02Just for the learning experience.
SPEAKER_00Like just do it. It's it's money well spent um to get an idea of what it's like to work in a big room with a big console and a bunch of mics live open on the floor, you know. It's just an experience you can't get any other way. And uh, you know, I think that'll help people, you know, when they go back into the home studio and they are doing things, you know, piecemeal one at a time or whatever, self-producing, self-engineering. Like I think you'll take a lot away from that experience to bring back into your world. So I know studio time is expensive, but it's totally worth it to just at least do it once, you know. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02I I completely agree. That was part of the reason why, or the main reason why, and I know it's not the same than being in the room and going to an actual studio, but this is this is the main reason why we stopped with this platform. Um, a while ago, we stopped like selling video courses, although I still think you can learn a lot from that. But like what we do is this personal coaching thing where even if you can't be in the room, you can still work directly with people who can offer that second pair of ears, who can listen to your stuff, who can tell you find out the best spots in the room uh for your microphones and like all that kind of stuff. And so much more valuable than just watching a video and then trying to make sense of it. It's like and and even better if you have the experience and go to a real studio. And I actually encourage people to do that all the time. Like, I wouldn't have learned um a lot of things if I hadn't had that experience. And like, yeah, I'm I'm totally with you there. And and on that topic, real quick. Oh, yeah, cool.
SPEAKER_00I was just gonna chime in really quick there too. It's like, you know, you talked about this chain that I'm talking into right now. Like, you know, I see a lot of people out there commenting on the internet, and they're like, I don't need that. That, you know. And it's it's one of those things where, you know, yeah, we know that this mic is like 30 grand and most people can't afford it, but that doesn't mean that it's bad. And it doesn't mean that you only have to ever use an SM7 because it's the best mic in the world, and yada, yada, yada. You know what I mean? So that's another reason why I encourage people to do that is because you know, places like this, we have all that equipment, and there, you know, there may not be another way for you to hear it. Yeah. And you should at least hear something before you maybe pass judgment on it.
SPEAKER_02Absolutely.
SPEAKER_00Uh, you know, and and I know there's a lot of opinions like that uh mic preamp thing that just happened a little bit. Oh yeah. Uh yeah, no. So there's a lot, you know, there's a lot of like weird information out there, and people tend to like believe what they're uh what they're told. And you know, I think until you've recorded through a Eve in a room with a bunch of vintage mics, like you don't get to have an opinion on that.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, tot totally. And yeah, it's this weird man, this this whole preamp thing. But like, yeah, though the the difficulty is if you're trying to educate people in any way, shape, or form, be it through content or like a coaching or like sharing your knowledge or whatever, it's so hard. Because if you tell the truth, it's rarely black and white. And that, but that is not really sexy or like polarizing, and it does it's not like the stuff that really takes off on the internet, but it's still the truth. So it's much easier to be like all preempts aren't the same, or to say you have to have this expensive thing because otherwise you'll never be able to make great music. Those are statements that are you're gonna have more success with those types of statements, but they're both wrong. And the boring middle ground is where the truth is in the whole it depends kind of thing. That's that's the truth, but that's also not what what people find interesting online. That's what makes it so difficult, you know? Yeah.
SPEAKER_00It's like we're maybe I should start a YouTube channel called it depends. Uh yeah, yeah, but it's like it's like that.
SPEAKER_02And and we are often, and I ignore this this advice a lot, but we're often told like that sometimes some advice we offer is like too vanilla or like we need to be more polarizing and more clickbait or whatever. But I don't want to do that because that's not the reality of making records. And I I of course we we encourage people that they can good make good records even if they don't have the money for expensive gear, because it's true you can do that. But that doesn't mean that the expensive gear is not good or better, and it doesn't like you know, it's yeah.
SPEAKER_00I I know it's like you could talk about this for yeah 10 years, you know. Um again, we all have our taste, right? So I happen to, you know, have a particular chain that I like for certain things, and that may never change, you know. Um it's kind of hard to beat a 57 on a Marshall cab, you know, through a Neve. It's just there's a reason why that works. And you know, you can try different different stuff, different mics and and whatever, they're just different sounds, but you know, there there's a reason why people tend to use the the common things that work. Um and it's good that in that sense, if you're a guitar player and you're recording yourself at home, like just you have to spend a hundred bucks on a mic. It's awesome. You know, you don't really you don't you don't need a really expensive microphone. You know, if you're a singer, it might be different. I personally think, you know, there is no right mic for, you know, there is no like holy grail mic for everything. You're a singer, you need to find the mic that works for you. Yeah. Um and so even now, like I know how this 47 sounds, I know how our 251 sounds, and but if I get a vocalist in, you know, I still put up a couple different things because you don't know how their voice is gonna react to the specific microphone.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00You know, same thing with compressors and you know, all that. Like in my opinion, there's no better compressor than the 1176. It's like it's my favorite. I'll use it on everything. But that doesn't mean that you have to do that. I think everybody should try different stuff, you know. Yeah. And form their own opinions. Yeah. Maybe I'm just yeah, yeah, that's my it depends, I guess.
SPEAKER_02It's like yeah, I completely completely agree. And I'm I'm very grateful that you you see like that and then share it because and honestly, everyone who who we've talked to who really knows what they're doing in they're making actual records, they have that kind of opinion. It's very rare that you see these, like, you know, yeah. Yeah, it's like that period. Like, you know, if you know what you're doing, you know that there's not this one way to do things. Yeah. And there's a difference between a content creator is doing it for the sake of content or someone who's serious about making records, yeah. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00You know, I like I like to do a lot of things in the analog world too, you know. Uh in I think distortion is best done analog. Yep, agree. It doesn't mean that you can't do it the other way, but yeah, I I like to have to work harder to make it work sometimes. Yeah, I I like to, you know, I like to put um crush stuff through different, you know, guitar pedals and create sounds that way, or just completely cave the console in sometimes. Uh, you know, one of one of the really cool uh sounds is like a bass DI just through a knee turned up all the way. And then you turn your fader down, and it's like a really cool fuzz tone, you know. And if that's the sound you want, like it's it's pretty great. And I don't know that you can really do that with a plug-in. Maybe you can get close, but it's not as easy. You can't just plug it in and turn the knob up.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, what I feel like, and that might be my personal opinion or taste, but like when I compare my actual 1073s with like plug-in versions of that, it's like there's a gradual saturation, and the uh I can like and it's like it's I can push it much harder and it still sounds smooth. Whereas the plug-in at some point pretty suddenly craps out and just starts farting in a way, you know. It's like it's like this this weird farty kind of low end and crackling, and it just craps out and it's a pretty sudden like transition where yeah, same with the distressor. I I love the the UAD distressor and other emulations of that, but like if I push my real distressor, it almost it can almost sound like a guitar amp in a way. The plugin doesn't, you know.
SPEAKER_00Well, it's another reason why I think it's important for you know people to actually get into a studio at some point. Yeah. Because if you never really if you never hear the real thing and use it in person, then you don't know what your plugin really is doing, right? Yep. Because I mean, how many different NiV plugins are there out there? It's like crazy.
SPEAKER_02Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Uh same thing with like the 1176. You know, there's like 10 different versions of it, and they all sound a little different.
SPEAKER_02But just like the hardware does.
SPEAKER_00Unless you've unless you've, you know, used the hardware, you don't know which one sounds right, you know? And yeah.
unknownI don't know.
SPEAKER_02I just think if you have 10 different hardware 1176s, they will also sound a little different.
SPEAKER_00But I don't know. I just think that's kind of important to get in front of the gear that your plugins are emulating just to hear them, you know. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02I agree. And and I just want to add, like, just for people because I I I'm not saying that everyone now needs to spend a ton of money and and have and buy all the stuff, but what we're saying is if you really want to know what it's supposed to do and like what it could sound in the real world, like that is the experience is worth it. And then also there are ways to do it in the box. I'm primarily in the box now and I can get those sounds, but I have to work a little harder, or I cannot assume that if I just put the same plugin on, it will sound the same. I might have to do a couple extra steps or do another way, find another way to make it work. It's possible, but it's different. And you know, um, and like I don't want to discourage people from making records in the box, of course. Like you can totally do it, but it's it's not the same as the analog thing. And there's a lot of education to be to be had and a lot of lessons to be learned if you heard the real thing.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Yeah. I think that's that you know hits the nail in the head. It's like the the experience, the learning experience of doing it, even if you're not in a position to be at a place like this every day, you know, you can still take some stuff away from that experience.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, agreed. Manil, you wanted to say something.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I've got a couple of questions, one of them related to this topic. Um, and is that uh Kyle, you mentioned that you have, you know, some go-to's for certain things like the overheads uh placement. You mentioned like the guitar you use for certain things and whatever. But you also mentioned that you like to uh try different microphones and stuff like that, depending on the singer. And also you mentioned previously that uh back in the day bands could spend like months in the studio, so that makes me guess that probably back in those days there was more room to experimentation, right? Um so what I want to ask you is nowadays in your productions, how much room is there for experimentation versus using your go-to's?
SPEAKER_00Again, it depends on the amount of time you have, it depends on how cool the producer is, or if the artists have patience or not. Some some artists are very patient, some artists are not. So um I think that's another one of the things about being adaptable um and kind of reading the room. You know, um, I've been in the room with artists that just want everything to work yesterday and nothing could be fast enough. Like you could be, you know, lightning fast and it's still not fast enough. Or I've been in the room with people that are the polar opposite where they're like, we just want you to do whatever you want to do. You know, we want to we want you to make it sound the way that you want it to sound. And then there's everything in between, right? So the quick one-day sessions where people are coming in to cut vocals or whatever, um you tend to just throw up whatever you know is gonna sound good no no matter what. And whatever's gonna be quick and whatever's gonna be kind of like, you know, solid. It's not gonna go down in the middle of the session. Maybe don't pick something vintage for a session like that, you know. I love this mic, but the tube is 70 years old, and at some point it could just die. Uh hopefully not, but you know, it does happen. Like the vintage equipment does go down once in a while, and you gotta deal with it. So maybe in that situation I wouldn't do something like that. But yeah, if you got a week, two weeks in the studio and you're gonna cut drums or whatever, and you have you have time to experiment. I think it's really just about time, right? So if you have enough time, I think people are a lot more open to it. If you're on a time crunch and you only have a day, then you know, you you don't really have time to experiment with stuff. You just gotta get it and it's gotta sound good right off the bat. So so I guess back then there was more experimentation. I would say I would yeah, I would say probably that's accurate. Um I mean, those a lot of those producers are still around. I mean, they would be able to tell you maybe better than I. But um, but yeah, I think you know, there was a lot more time to mess around with different things, different drum sounds. You maybe had two different kits. You uh, you know, I love to do that when I get the chance. You know, I'll put like a small little trap kit, like Kick Snare hat in the in the booth that'll be dead, mono, you know, maybe old school compress it that way, and then have the big kit in the room uh with the big giant drum sounds and stuff like that. Sometimes, you know, I'll I'll go out on a limb and be like, ah, you know what? I've never heard this thing before. It sounds like it won't work. Let's try it, you know. I love trying stuff that I don't think is gonna work. Like, for example, I did this was years ago now, but um, I tried like the coffee can trick where I put a I put a coffee can in front of like a kick drum and then ran the uh the string through the the like tube pass through from the live room into the ISO booth and then you know stuck a mic in the other coffee can on the end on the other end of it, and it was a pretty cool sound, but I I thought it was gonna sound like crap, you know, and it it did, but it was really cool. You know, so I just like every once in a while try to do weird stuff like that. I like resonators, I like things that have a tone. Um, you know, metal buckets or glass jars or you know, anything that kind of has like a ring to it, you can get some really unique sounds that way. Um I don't know, I just say play around.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00You know, if you if you can, if you have the time.
SPEAKER_02Oh, that's that's that's the best part of it. Like Manel, before you joined the team, we were um at an audio event in in Hamburg in Germany, and we were they were putting us like um our instead of a hotel, they were putting us on a on a boat, and that boat had a a studio on it, like it was a yeah, floating studio on a houseboat, and actually a pretty decent one. And that the first thing we did there, like we recorded a bunch of drum samples there and did a little bit of experimentation. And the first thing we did is we put a mic everywhere, and every, like you said, everything that would resonate, every weird thing that was on this boat, we tried putting a mic there and then we were just corners and stuff, just because you know that that that's the fun the fun part, you know. Yeah. Like yeah.
SPEAKER_00Um I I love doing stuff like that, and I think that's kind of where you well, you said experimentation, but yeah, if you have the time, you gotta get weird. Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And uh the other question that I have uh also related to what you just said, that you know, you've worked with a lot of different people, like different artists, different producers with uh a lot of experience and not that much of not that much experience. So the question here would be more like after years and years of working with different people, do you notice you know little things that straight away tell you if, for example, the guitar player is experienced or not, or if the singer is experienced or not, or the producer?
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah. Um yeah, I mean you can kind of tell uh a lot of things right away. I think one of the well, I mean, everybody's different, obviously, but there are some indicators. Like if your guitar player isn't playing guitar all the time, you know, they might be a little nervous or they might not, you know, be uh the best guitar player, let me put it that way. Um all the best musicians that I work with that I've been around, like they they play all the time. You know so I think that's a pretty good indicator of experience level. I'm not sure how to answer the rest of your question.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, I mean it though I mean those kind of things, like whenever a singer comes into your room and you see something like uh no, singers that actually warm up. Yeah. Or stuff like that.
SPEAKER_00Mm-hmm. Well, there's different there's different ways to like to go about it too, because some singers don't really need to warm up. I've been around some singers that just they open their mouth and what comes out is incredible. Um and then there's other people that need to warm up for an hour before they can do it uh properly. I would say m probably more so in the rock world, because if you're you're singing at a high level. Like volume-wise. And also like some people scream. If you're doing that kind of stuff, like you have a pretty limited amount of takes you can do before your voice is just kind of trashed. Unless you're really well trained and you really know what you're doing. Um yeah, you just kind of have a limited window. So maybe you know, that's something to consider when you're working with different artists is like what kind of music is it? You know, is it like screaming metal or is it like soft jazz? Like they both have different the musicians take different approaches, right? Yeah.
SPEAKER_01And what about like the way they behave uh in the studio? Like as you said before, um you also need to learn when not to talk and where not when not to um like try to sort of introduce your own ideas. Um is there any experience you can tell us about uh about you know about a situation where it got weird?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, uh I mean these are tough. Like I I I don't, you know, obviously can't name any names or anything. Um But yeah, there are there are situations where you kind of you feel like you're more welcome than others, if that makes sense. Like certain Again, I kind of feel like you can tell right away whether your opinion is wanted or not. And you can just kind of tell from how people introduce themselves to you and whether they look you in the eye or whether they look away, or whether they're like, you know, they shake your hand and ask for a water immediately, you know, or something like that. It just again, you just gotta read the room. And yeah, I mean, there's been some situations that where where I kind of felt like I was just running the computer, you know. Those aren't my favorite situations to be in. I like I like being more part of the team and I like being, you know, that's why I tend to like working with rock bands. Because you feel like you're more part of the sound, you feel like you're more part of the, you know, part of the band, part of the team while you're making a record. Um as opposed to like, you know, say like a pop vocal session or something where you're just kind of running the you're just running pro tools at that point. Um and it's not everybody, it's just like in general, I feel like that's kind of more the thing.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, so I think that's probably like part of the skill you also mentioned before about being able to adapt to every situation. And that's also something that uh it's really interesting because you never get taught stuff like that at school. You you really need to live it to like uh learn it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, you just have to experience it. And you know, for me too, like that's not something that I feel like I'm particularly good at. I like working with live musicians, I like working with bands. I love making jazz records, they're super fun to work on. The musicianship is usually outstanding, um, and everybody's always really cool. And then in other situations, you know, if it's more of just like a vocal pop session or something like that, like sometimes it's really cool. Other times I feel like I'm not really the right guy for the job. So it's also part of knowing when to maybe just say no and be like, you know, there's probably a better person for this. And uh you know, I know some people don't really have that luxury and they just kind of have to take whatever, take whatever comes. But if you can and you feel like you're not the best guy for the job, like poor girl, you know, maybe uh maybe you're right. I don't know. So yeah, I don't know. That kind of answers your your question about that.
SPEAKER_01Yeah, yeah, totally. I think uh it's also a very important skill to know when to say no to whatever.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I mean you're not gonna be good at everything, right? So I'd rather focus on the things that I'm good at and put my energy there than you know kind of take some work away from somebody else that might be better at it than I am. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02And at the end of the day, you want to serve the artist or the producer or whoever is coming to you. And and sometimes that means letting someone else do the job so that they can get the better result. That's also serving people. And it it it can it can backfire if you don't do that, or it can benefit you if you do that. So yeah. Yeah, totally. One thing you m mentioned in in answering these questions, or in the beginning, when you talked about experimentation thing and more time at the studio, I get I guess part of more uh of the more time at the studio thing was also not just tone experiments, but like being able to do not just the actual tracking session, but you know, pre-production or creating the songs themselves in the studio more than than these days. And like pre-pro is another one of those things that is so important in my opinion, and that we do a lot with the artists that we work with, and we try to help them not just with the coaching, but also even if I'm I'm purely mixing these days, with the exception of like one or two projects um a year that I'm I'm co-producing or so. But like I when whenever I feel like there's no proper pre-production being done or people are just not prepared, we always like help people a lot with that. Be yeah, it's one thing that in the DIY world just gets ignored a lot as well. And I and I guess having the luxury and and the time and the budget to do that with really great people at a good studio is like such a it's it makes such makes such a big difference. Yeah. Um I guess that was part of it, right? When there was more time at the studio that that happened as well.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, totally. I mean, a lot of people would back in the day, they would come in and write the whole record here. Um that doesn't happen as much. Um, but like to your point about it being overlooked more in the home recording situation, I think it's mainly because the line between demo and record has been blurred so much over the last, let's say, 10 to 15 years. Um whereas back then you would you made demos and then you would use those demos to make the record, right? To shape the record. Um now a lot of people just use the demo, and that becomes the record.
SPEAKER_02Uh and they hear stories of like great artists who told something like said something like, We we, you know, that track from the demo ended up being on the record, and it that was a thing, of course, every once in a while, but they hear this and then they think, well, if that artist did it, then I can use all the ticks from my demos and just turn them into the record, which is not always the best idea, you know.
SPEAKER_00It's like Right. It's probably not always I mean, you know, but you can the the thing about music is that you really can do whatever you want. Um so you know, it's just how how accessible it's gonna be to people when they listen, right? So maybe your demo track you think is really cool, but when people hear it, they're like, they don't care. So that's that's a big part of like you know, having that distinction. That's why it is good to have an outside engineer or an outside producer, another set of ears, because like you know, you may think your demo guitar is awesome and it's really garbage, and you need three other people to tell you that because otherwise that's gonna be your record, you know. Yeah. Um going back to like blurring the line, I do think it's it's really important to do the pre-production still. And maybe uh, you know, maybe make your demos old school. Maybe don't make your demo in a DA. You know, maybe just go on eBay and buy a tape recorder, you know, a little crappy voice memo thing or whatever, and make your demos that way. And that way you have two separate things instead of like, okay, you know, I have Pro Tools or Papleton or whatever, and I just made my song that way, and that's the demo, and now we're gonna make the record, and you're just gonna keep working off of that. Like maybe that works for some people, but I don't know. I kind of think it's it's worth having a separate demo that you've kind of worked out with your band. Especially if you're a band, I would hope you're working stuff out together. Um it's one of the things that I encourage people to do is like work stuff out in a room with your band. Like get your drummer into a garage or something, and like stand there in front of them and stare at them while you're playing, you know. Uh technology's great, but there's some things, especially in rock music, like uh there's some things that you kind of that doesn't translate, right? So working stuff out as a band together, recording yourself, videotape yourself, watch your rehearsal back, like try to become self-editor, try to, you know, recognize when you suck and when you don't, and uh, you know, work that stuff out. I'm sure there are a lot of people that still do that, but just yeah, for like the younger, for the younger generation that are like kind of just getting into it, I think that's like really important to think about.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, thank you so much for saying that. Honestly, it's the number one thing, the number one problem that we're dealing with when we with with the artists that we the DIY artists that we work with, that they that it becomes this one and I'm and I'm not saying it it's not possible. Like some people it works for some people, but in general, the idea that you start with a with a demo with an idea of a song and then you this project turns into the final thing, it very rarely works for people because when they're in the purely creative mode in the beginning, they get all they get way too soon, they get all caught up in all the options and possibilities in the doll where instead of focusing on the song and how they're playing it and all that kind of stuff. So that goes back to your argument about like maybe buy a multi-track recorder or just a voice memo thing or whatever. Um because then you don't have these options and the distractions. And then the other and then on the other hand, once they get into like the the crafts phase or whatever you want to call it, when it like it gets a little more technical and you want to get the engineering right and then let alone the mixing and all of that, they they then they go back too much again to the original idea and they keep it tweaking the song. Yeah, exactly. Demo it is or they they keep tweaking the song forever when they should actually like they're never really what I'm trying to say, I guess, is they never really focused on one part of the process fully. Like when they're supposed to be mixing, they're still editing. When they're editing, they're still changing the song, and then when it's almost done, they go back and swap out a part. And there's always room for a little bit of that if you have a fantastic idea, but being able to constantly do everything at all times is not it's not not always good. It's oftentimes a distraction and and and it's what makes people never finish their projects and never really focus on anything. And so I'm I'm absolutely with you there on that the separation is important. And it sounds the difficulty is that when someone hears that, to them it sounds like this unnecessary, tedious extra step where I have to create a new session for this, or I have to use a different tool, or why can't I just go with the flow and stay in the thing that I started? But the reality is that it oftentimes most of the time actually it takes them longer to do this the seemingly easier thing compared to just separating out the steps and fully focusing.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Well, I mean, also you can. You can do whatever you want. Yeah, yeah, right. Exactly. That's what I'm saying.
SPEAKER_02It works for some people, and you can, but yeah.
SPEAKER_00But yeah, I don't I don't think it's always the best idea. Um you know, there's no wrong answers, obviously. Yeah. What works for you know, like MacDamarco isn't gonna work for somebody else. Um so like I said, everybody's different. If you're if you know, I I feel like if if you know yourself as an artist, if you're you know your habits, right? So like try to break out of your habits where if you know you're gonna start writing a song and then an hour into it you're obsessing over the snare drum tone. Like just try to recognize that, you know, and and maybe walk about or maybe s get up and walk away, you know. But again, you know, maybe that's really important for the song. I I it's so different for everybody. Um I just think specifically for rock bands and younger rock bands that are that are getting into it now, like just play together. Like get your guitar out, get into a garage somewhere, and you know, play physically in the same room. I think with technology now the way it is, people tend to like sit in their own bedroom and then they do a Zoom call like this, you know? Yeah. And uh it's like, hey, what about this idea? And they uh, you know, it's like there's some uh the drummer playing on like a a a pad or something, you know what I mean? Yeah. Um or maybe they don't even do that. Maybe it's yeah, like the guitar player that writes everything and programs all the drums, and then they try to go into the studio and then it's like, well, the drummer doesn't know the song. Because they never played it together. Right. And so Yeah. Anyway, you can kind of get around that, I think is a good idea.
SPEAKER_02Oh man, totally totally. The amount of times when I was still doing full production at my small studio, the amount of times that the band would come here before I kind of enforced the the pre-production thing more heavily, like the amount of times that they would start to record and then then it would be a situation like, what do you mean we're we're land on the one here? Like, I always played this a little earlier, and like why is that kick drum hit there? Don't we play it like this and then everybody's drums a little differently? And I'm like, how did that not come up in band practice? Well, the answer is oftentimes because they don't hear themselves properly, and if they don't record it, sometimes things slip through the cracks or whatever. But the answer is they didn't do pre-production and they didn't record a demo.
SPEAKER_00A lot of times the answer is they don't know how to listen to each other, too. Oh, that yeah. You know, it's like if you spend most of your time practicing in in your room by yourself, you don't really know how to listen properly, right? So you're I see it all the time with like drum patterns that don't go with the vocals, guitars and bass aren't playing together, you know, they're all kind of feel like they're doing their own thing. Um another thing I I kind of notice a lot is um people writing in the wrong key for the vocalist.
SPEAKER_01Oh that's Manel's topic.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Like if you're if your song is like too low, then you can't get the right amount of power out. If it's too high, you can't hit the notes. And then specifically in metal and like heavy rock and stuff, people feel the idea that they feel the need to tune down as low as possible to be heavy, which doesn't really make any sense. Um you know, a lot of Nirvana was in E. Uh, you know, and uh so like you don't have to tune your guitar to B flat, you know, you don't have to like it it doesn't make your music any heavier if your vocal isn't right, you know? So that's a big part of it, you know, finding the right key for each song. Vocalists tend to get married to their uh melodies as well. Sometimes the verse melody is the same as the chorus melody, and you're like, well, you don't have a chorus. So you gotta go back and write a chorus. Or the chorus, I don't know. Like I said, there's no rules really, but there kinda are. You know, sometimes they'll write the chorus lower than the verse, and it's like when the chorus hits, it it feels like it drops off a cliff. Um Yeah, I just think those are really important pre-production things that don't really get addressed a lot now because of the the way people make music. They tend to just do what is comfortable or do whatever somebody else did because that's what they were told.
SPEAKER_02Or what seems to be a great idea, but then turns out it's not, and they don't realize. You know, it's like one of my favorite things is when they go into the chorus and then they feel like because they want to make it more exciting or give it a lift, and then they go on the bass guitar, they go an octave up or something, and then the chorus loses the entire weight of the low end, and you know, it it's it seems like a good idea, but maybe it's not. And like those are things you figure out in pre-production, like you said.
SPEAKER_00And yeah. Yeah, I think the key, the key of the song is really important. I mean, that's that's the biggest one. You gotta find the right key for the vocalist. If your vocalist doesn't sound good, then you know, you probably should play jazz. You know, yeah. It's it's yeah. If your voice isn't in the right key, then your song's not gonna hit. It's not gonna hit hard, you know.
SPEAKER_01Like what do you think about the tempo?
SPEAKER_00Tempo, I mean, yeah, obviously tempo is a big part of it too. Um I feel like you can get away with a little bit more tempo-wise, but play with it, you know? That's another one of the reasons why it's like it's kind of important to maybe not make a demo in a da. Like, maybe make your demo free, and then you go back and you listen to it and you go, oh, it felt really good here. And you like tap that tempo out. And you're like, oh, okay, cool. Like this is this is the tempo for the song. The chorus feels really good here. And then when you do your record, you want to do it to a click, like use that tempo. You know, it all seems kind of obvious, really, but when you start doing computer computer music, really, um a lot of that stuff just kind of doesn't get addressed. It doesn't pop into your head, really.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00Default is 120 when you open your docs and you're like, yeah, all your songs are at 120. Um Yeah.
SPEAKER_02I love all of that. Like one of my favorite things to do was with the band um to put them in the room together before we start recording, and then let them play the song a couple of times as a band free. And like you said, and then we were listening back to if they hadn't done that before, uh, and then we were listening back to those takes, and then we would pick the one that felt felt the best, and then I would just create a tempo map based off of that, and like you know, just smooth it out a little bit and leave the butt like in you know, because again, some people are not aware that you can have tempo changes and you can have you know all these things, but like yeah, it also goes back to pre-production. So I love, love, love everything about you saying there.
SPEAKER_00I mean, that's a lot of work, but yeah, if you want to do it, yeah, it's um you know, I go back and analyze songs uh that you know came out of our studio too. Um like sometimes the chorus bumps up one BPM.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00And then when the verse comes back in, it drops back down to like you know, 91 to 92. And like that's that's definitely something that people used to do a lot. Yeah, just that one extra thing uh can really you know change the way a song feels. Um people don't really tend to do that much now. Nah, that not that much, yeah.
SPEAKER_02Manel's favorite favorite feedback that I always see in our coaching portal is when someone wants feedback on their demo or their their pre-pro before they start tracking. Uh most of the time when I see Manel's feedback there, he starts with like, have you tried a different key? It's like it's so funny you mentioned that because it's so often the case. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And and like sometimes you need somebody else to tell you, like, hey, have you tried another key? This isn't really working, you know? Yeah.
SPEAKER_02So yeah, I love that. Yeah, it's great. And after all this this talk about like, you know, the differences or the challenges with like self-production and all that. And I mean, obviously, we call it the self-recording event podcast. And and I come from a DIY background. I was, I was, uh, grew up in the punk rock hardcore kind of scene. And we learned it a lot ourselves, and that's how I I never had a job in my life. I didn't go the path that you went through. I just started it at some point after learning from from mentors. And but like I obviously believe in the DIY thing, or it's like it's important to me. And I know that it's you can't compare like a DIY home recording situation to something like energy, of course, and all the things we talked about. But my question here for you, Kyle, and this is kind of maybe a little bit of a loaded question almost, but to what extent do you actually believe in self-recording? Like, do you do you believe in that concept at all? And if so, to what extent or under which circumstances? And a lot of it has already been answered, I guess. But I I really want an honest, like honest take on this because not everybody thinks it's a good idea ever to record your your own record at home. And and that's a fair opinion, you know. So I'm I'm just interested in hearing your thoughts on this. I would tend to disagree with that.
SPEAKER_00Um I mean, a lot of great records were made that way. Yeah. But I think they were also made by very specific types of people, you know. Yeah. You know, that being said, like Prince was famous for recording his own vocal. You know, there were probably a lot of other people that did that. Pretty sure Ray Charles used to do it too.
SPEAKER_02I never heard of that, but yeah, it could be. Yeah.
SPEAKER_00There's a good story uh that Jay, the the owner, tells when he he was working with Ray back in the eighties, and he came in and he's like, Hey, show me where the tape machine is, you know. And he like took him by the hand and like showed him where all the buttons were, and he was like, Cool, I'm gonna do this myself. So Wow. He might be able to confirm or deny that, but um, I seem to remember that story. And uh so it's not to say that like you shouldn't do it. Um I think everybody should do it. I mean, I do it at home. Um I have a little like task M388 on my desk, and that's whenever I'm sitting at home just you know banging away on something, that's what I'm recording it with. I tend to make your own music? I I sorry to interrupt. I do for myself, yeah. I mean, I I just I keep that for me because like every aspect of my life is is based around doing this professionally. And so like, you know, who knows? Maybe I'll put something out at some point, but like I just do it for myself, really, because it's like it keeps music fun. Very interesting.
SPEAKER_02You you do that um and you still have the energy and uh and you d just want to make music.
SPEAKER_00Maybe that's why I never do it fully, because like, you know, my energy is pretty limited. Yeah. But yeah, like when I'm just messing around at home, I'll I'll do it that way. And uh, you know, I think there's there's definitely merit to to both ways. Maybe I'm a little biased about being in the big studio too, but personally I think it's a better way of recording. That being said, you know, you can combine the two in any way, shape, or form that you want. So that's why I would, like I said earlier, I'd encourage people who are recording themselves to go find a studio and book a day. You know, and if you got four or five guys in your band, like you can all scrape together a couple hundred bucks and split it. You know, it's not like I don't think it's gonna make you go broke. And, you know, maybe go cut your drums in a good room and then go home and finish everything else. You know, I know a lot of people that do that.
SPEAKER_02But but just you make people like realistic expectations too. When you say a couple of hundred bucks, you can't make like a full-length album in like at a big studio for a couple hundred bucks or so. Just just you know, that's all something people aren't doing yeah, yeah. Yeah, but it's important to say because uh that again, if you never experienced this, people might not have any idea of what it costs to make a record. But maybe you can get in for a day and do drums, you know.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, exactly. That's what I'm saying. So uh yeah, get in for a day, cut some drums or whatever else it may be. Like you may want to, you know, experiment with some gear, you may want to use some stuff that your studio around, you know. Obviously, I'm assuming people are not just in Los Angeles, right? They're all over the world doing this. So um, you know, there's a lot of different levels of studio. There's some really big ones, there's some smaller ones, there's some ones that are kind of in between. There's like, I know there's budget places around here. I mean, I want everybody to come record here, right? Sure. But um, you know, if you can't afford it, there's there are smaller rooms that you can go to.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00And yeah, so if you are recording yourself at home, then great. But like maybe book a day of studio time somewhere and go cut some drums and just see how that feels. Like you might dig it. Um find a good engineer, find somebody that's like, you know, can kind of help you elevate your your sound, you know. Yeah. That's one of the nice things about the technology now is that you can do that. Like back in the day, you I guess if you're recording to two inch, you know, it's like you gotta take your reel everywhere. So, you know, unless you have a two-inch reel uh two-inch uh machine at home, you can't really, you know.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. And even if you had that, you would have to maintain it and all that kind of stuff.
SPEAKER_00And like, yeah, it's crazy. So but yeah, now I I think that's a really good way to to go about it. Like, or if you're the opposite, maybe you program all your drums and you want to come in to a studio and like have a giant collection of guitar amps to play through. Like, you know, I mean, I've lost count how many we have at this point. Um or do vocals in a really inspiring environment, yeah. Which might get better takes out of it. Yeah, the vibe, I mean, that's another thing we haven't really touched on, but the vibe is everything. Like there's a reason why the room behind me looks the way it does. Um they're really inspiring places to be. Some people get really nervous around stuff like that. So maybe that's not for you. But um, you know, get in front of a really nice microphone, see what that's like, get in, you know, a vibed-out studio. You may find you get better, yeah, like you said, better takes, or you may have different ideas. You may be in the middle of it and go, like, oh man, I have an idea for like a totally new song. So yeah, mix and match, right? Like combine everything.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. We had Ken Lewis on the podcast before. Um, and he had this thing where he has this projectors in his room where he can project pretty much anything onto the walls and like in a 360 kind of degrees environment. Like for and he would put singers in all kinds of different moods with that, which I think is so such a great idea as well. That's really cool.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Uh super cool.
SPEAKER_03So, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Uh also, like if you're a singer too, I know um a lot of vocalists that I've worked with, like, they like to sing in the dark. So one thing that I think is another merit of working in a studio with an engineer, even if it's not a big studio, um, is that you know, you don't have a computer screen glowing in your face the whole time. Yeah. I don't think everybody realizes how important that the visual part of it is, you know, and how how distracting it can be. Like I know for me, if I in mixing, I turn the lights off in the studio, like I hear things differently.
SPEAKER_03Yeah.
SPEAKER_00Or if you're if you're singing on a mic and you're in a dark room and you it's just, you know, you and the sound, you know, it's it's different. So some people like candles, some people like scents. Like different smells around, like that's that's a big part of it too. Um and that's a big part of the like experience when you come here is you know, we'll we'll cater to that. So like if you want your booth to be decked out with candles, we'll do it. If you want a specific, you know, scent or a certain kind of snack or whatever's around, you know, it's like to make you comfortable, you know, we'll we'll do that for you. So um I think a lot of that kind of stuff does get lost in a home studio environment because it's like who's gonna do it? Right? You. So if you're gonna set up your you gotta set up your room, you gotta set up the vibe, you gotta do it all, and then an hour later, by the time you're done setting up, you like probably don't want to record anymore. Yeah. You know.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Yeah, just having that it's it's an experience. Like just having that that experience and and doing that once, like it's such first of all, you're gonna have a great time. Second of all, you're gonna probably leave with like pretty good results. And then third, it's like it's a learning experience as well. So yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. I yeah, totally agree. Really cool. Like, I have one more question um before we get to do like we always finish up with like a little bit of a rapid fire round with like quicker questions. Okay. Um but yeah, uh, but so what was the one thing that I wanted to ask before that though? So um speaking of like of that whole like how we we've mentioned a couple times like how valuable it is for most people to to go to a studio like that and experience it. Um how can can like smaller bands get into like energy? Do they just contact you through the website? Can they just book it like everyone else? Is there some sort of barrier to entry? Is it because again, it's you know, some people might think, well, I I I will never get the chance to do this, and maybe it's totally doable for most people and very easy to do, you know.
SPEAKER_00So I tend to think it is. Um I think there's a lot of sort of like, you know, uh, how do I put it? Like people might be scared or like they think that they're not worthy or whatever it is. Yeah. I'd just say like, if you want to come record here, like you can come record here. It's just a matter of like, you know, a lot of times it's money, you know, working in a studio like this isn't exactly cheap. But um, you know, that also being said, like you can always come to me with a budget and say, like, hey, I have we have this much. Like, what can we do? Yeah, you know, I'm always willing to like at least entertain something like that. Um, I also always tell people like, you know, if you book one day and you want to try to cram everything in, you know, then it's that day is gonna be a little bit more expensive than if you if you decide you want to book a full week, you know, I can be more flexible on the rates and stuff like that too. So but you know, there's all different ways to do it. And I would just say, like, you know, don't hesitate to reach out, but yeah, you can just go to the website or call the studio or email me, you know, don't spam me. But uh but yeah, we work with indie artists all the time, um producers as well. Like a lot of times the producer will be the one to book the studio and they'll bring the bands in or the but they'll bring the artist in, you know.
SPEAKER_02I think it's also really cool that you are handling this honestly, because from my experience working in different studios, it's not always the st the chief engineer or someone actually making records there who handles you know the booking or does the studio management. Oftentimes you have a studio manager of some sort. And sometimes they're great people, of course, but sometimes I also wish like I would have more personal contact with you know the engineer there that I might be working together with. Or sometimes it depends on how good the manager is and how much they really know. But sometimes I feel like I'm talking to someone who doesn't really know much about the studio. Yeah. It's like not often, but but anyway, like I I I think it's great actually that and pretty uncommon, in at least in my experience, that the chief engineer and studio manager are kind of the same. I think that's extremely uncommon. Uh yeah, yeah. Yeah. I but it's cool. Uh to me, that sounds like a really good idea. Or like I would love to talk to to someone like that when I book the studio.
SPEAKER_00I mean, it's like again, it's a double-edged sword, right? Because like you know, sure you have to switch gears all the time and you have to like wear a bunch of different hats. But um, from that standpoint, yeah, if you call and you have specific questions about like the microphones and you know, the gear, the consoles, or which room might be best for your project. Like I talk to people about that stuff all the time. Like, in fact, I just had a call the other day about somebody potentially wanting to book for like a jazz quartet with a vocalist and you know, talking to them about the project. The piano needs to be isolated in the booth. And, you know, they're like, which room do you think would be best? And there kind of are, you know, I feel like there aren't a lot of studio managers that would be able to like accurately answer that question. They'd be like, Exactly. Well, just go look at the website and figure it out, you know. But yeah, like as a working engineer and and having done a lot of live recording stuff like that, I can, you know, kind of recommend stuff and point you in the right direction, at least. You know. So yeah, I think I think that's it's a benefit, but super valuable in our opinion.
SPEAKER_02I I I believe you, but it's super valuable because you I mean, why not listen to the people who have spent so much time in these rooms? And I I as an outside producer or engineer, I wouldn't assume that I know better where certain what certain things things sound like in certain spots in the room, you know. Like that I've heard this great piece of uh I think it was Joe Gicarelli, like one of the best to ever do it. And he said, and I wasn't I'm not sure about which studio it was. It might have been even energy, but I I'm not sure. But he was like, when I go into the studio, um and he mentioned a specific story in in this piece of in this interview, and he said, like, I ask the staff engineer or the assistant or the the chief engineer, whoever is there, I ask them where to set up the drums and how they typically do it because like they know the place. And I thought that was so cool because like he obviously knows what he's doing. He's one of the best to ever do it. And he could have he could be like, Well, I know what I'm doing, but he will ask the people operating the studio because they know the place, you know.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I tend to do the same thing. I mean, I've I've been here for a really long time, but I've also freelanced around. I've worked at just about every studio in town um and other places. New York, uh we did a record in Milan. Um, so like I've been in I've been in a lot of big studios, I've been in a lot of uh places, and yeah, I tend to kind of do the same thing. It's like where would you stick it? Because, you know, I don't necessarily have a month to like learn a new room. So yeah, it's a good, it's a good way to do it. Cool. For our rooms, it's pretty obvious where the drums go because the floor is all messed up. So you can just look at the floor and you put the drums there because there's a bunch of like you know, gouges from the spikes. Yeah. But you know, that's part of the charm too. Like, we're you know, it's a kind of lived in space. Again, there's no wrong way to do it, but when you kind of come here, you can you can kind of figure out like, okay, this is how I do stuff. But always happy to like recommend mics or things like that people want to know. Um, I'm a gear nerd too, so let me know. Awesome.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, we'll put the the website and all that in the show notes. I mean, in this case, people will find it, but we'll still put all the stuff in the show notes, of course, so people can reach out or check the the website out and then um yeah, contact you if they're interested in going there. Yeah, Manel, any anything you want to add before we go to the before we wrap it up with the rapid fire round at the end?
SPEAKER_01No, not really. I have no more questions.
SPEAKER_00I will just say I will just add to that. If you're a Neve fan, like this is a place to be. I think we're the only studio in town that has three Neves.
SPEAKER_02Is it three? Is it in all three rooms? Yeah, I don't even remember. Ah, yeah. Oh yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Studio B also was a Neve. We have no shortage of Neve here if you're a Neve fan. Yeah. Yeah, especially for tracking. I mean, I mean you can also mix on a Neve, but like, you know, there was a time when like Neves were the tracking consoles and SSL is the mixing console thing.
SPEAKER_00Originally it was built around a 9000 J. Oh. And uh that was Jay's mixing console for for years and years, and then um kind of when people started mixing more in the box, we uh took that out and put this little Neve in behind me. So Yeah, such a great front end. This room is a little bit more of like a production kind of overdub room now than a straight mixing room for that reason.
SPEAKER_02And mixing in the box works a lot better if you have a great front end as well. Not again, not saying people need to buy expensive stuff, but as a mixer, I can say that stuff that has been tracked well with decisions made on the front end and people willing to make bold decisions with cool gear.
SPEAKER_00Oh yeah. It's easier to mix those. 100%. So yeah. It's it's a every time I get a record to mix and I open it up and it it feels like people really like put in the work to get it to sound good is amazing. I don't like fixing stuff if I can help it. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02I feel like sometimes I have to produce while I was while I'm mixing because people just, you know, when they when they don't make any decision and like they just send you DIs and MIDI drums, and like that's the worst case, of course. But it happens, it happens. You'll get a session where there's uh I'm basically like, I could take this in all kinds of different directions. I have no idea what this is, yeah, what this wants to sound like.
SPEAKER_00So that's like send that shit back and be like, yeah, finish your album. Uh yeah. But yeah, no, it's a it's it's always a treat when you get a a session that's really well done and you're just like, oh, this is fun. Like you get to you just get to make it sound cool. That's my favorite thing.
SPEAKER_02Totally, totally agreed. Cool. Cool. So quick questions. And for these, just try to answer them as quickly as possible um without putting too much thought into it. I'm really interested in like the spontaneous like um answers to these. I'll do my best. Cool. Some are like obvious questions, but still interesting to me, and some maybe you didn't expect. So let's see. Your favorite piece of gear at NRG. Ooh.
SPEAKER_00Oh man. Uh Cooper Time Cube.
SPEAKER_02Oh, I didn't expect that. Cool. Um, a technique or a spot you found in one of your rooms that is unconventional but totally works and sounds cool to you.
SPEAKER_00Uh yeah. I like uh Studio A. Uh, this is something that I did uh I'll give away all my secrets, but something I did with uh with Kareem years ago where I would put the put the drums in the large ISO booth in Studio A and then leave the door open and then mic the room that way. Um instead of putting it in the normal corner where everything is live, I would do like a dead booth and then mic the room. So you could close the door, open the door, could be as dead or as live as you want. Awesome.
SPEAKER_02Cool. If you were to start out again making records, what would you do? Like a quick, I don't know, give me three, five, or ten bullet points, like an order of things. Like how would you approach? You know nothing, you want to be a record maker. What would you do? Man, quit. No, I'm just gonna quit get a job.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, get a job. Well, first of all, yeah, maybe get a job. Um yeah, figure out figure out how to survive first and foremost. Um, after that, I would say, like, and whatever that job may be, I highly recommend it being related to what you want to do if you have to have a second job. Like maybe get a job working at a luthier shop or maybe, you know, something. Something related. Don't work at Starbucks, you know. Um so there's that. And then I would say next is start just like studying records. Like listen to your favorite records and like start to train your ears. Because that is probably the most valuable. Your ears are the most valuable thing, right? So start to do that. Then after that, I would say, you know, start if if you're not already a musician, like learn an instrument. Uh I guess we're talking about like engineering and producing, right? So yeah.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Um or it could be a self-recording artist, but like, yeah, let's say someone who wants to make records and that involves engineering, producing, whatever.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. Yeah. Um and then yeah, so I think obviously if you don't already play, like learn an instrument. And then on top of that, I would just say start figuring out what sounds you kind of like and start researching stuff. Maybe it's uh maybe you're a synth guy, maybe you're you know, you like guitar pedals, like just start collecting stuff over time. Like even if you're just buying one thing and selling it the next day, like like start listening to different sounds and just start understanding what different things sound like. You know, there's a lot of it good information out there, but also like don't rely on YouTube videos and stuff to tell you what to do. Like, you there's a reason why you can like demo just about every plugin on the planet for 14 days. Um, do it, you know? Listen to different stuff, play around with it, and then yeah, I guess if if that all of those things were in place, uh I probably still wouldn't do it any differently. I probably would still try to get into a studio, even if it's a small studio, like get around the people that are doing the thing that you want to do. And surround yourself by those people that are better than you at it. Like you never want to be, in my opinion, you never want to be the best guy in the room, right?
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00So yeah, try to surround yourself by people that are better than you and that you can you can learn from, you know. That might be the biggest one. Like, get into a place, you know, maybe it's the opposite of the home recording thing, but I would say, yeah, if I had to do it all over again, I would still get into a place where I would be surrounded by people that I could learn from and and just be in the room and do it, you know. 100% agreed. Man, I was sorry, one more thing. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Learn how to solder a damn XLR cable. Oh man. Like, please just get a soldering iron. Learn how to fix your own cables. Because if you come to work. At a studio, it's a good uh good skill to have.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, we didn't talk about the purely technical side of things that much. You mentioned it in the beginning as part of your path and your job there. But like, yeah, a lot of people can't do that anymore, I think.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. No, no, it's that's becoming a lost art too. That's why I said, you know, maybe if you're trying to get into it, um, go find find a job in a related field. Like go work for somebody who is a technician, somebody who builds studios, somebody who does wiring, somebody who does like gear repair, an amp shop or whatever. You know, learn some of the technical side of things because it's just gonna make you more valuable in every situation as an engineer. Oh man. So that's so many good. Long-winded.
SPEAKER_02No, those are super great answers. I can't believe we even we talked about we didn't really talk about the whole listening thing because that is such an important part of it where like, you know, you gotta like you said, train your ears, analyze, study your favorite records. That's such an important thing. So thank you for saying that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. And yeah. Yeah, I know we mo probably mostly talked about things from sort of the big studio perspective, but um but yeah, that's which is great because that's a perspective that our audience really hears on this podcast, and so that's that's why I wanted to do it. So yeah. But yeah, if you ever want to do a short one about technical stuff, let me know. Because I think that's a that's a cool thing that a lot of people really could benefit from, like, build your own gear. You know. I love the big gear manufacturers and stuff, but like, you know, start building your own stuff, right? Like, why give um a company four grand for something you probably could figure out on your own? Take a lot of work, but you can save a lot of money. And you'll learn stuff along the way about the gear. Yeah. Yeah, totally, totally. Yeah, go on go online and just Google like distortion pedal kit and just buy yourself a kit for 50 bucks, get your soldering iron out, and just build something. It'll make you it'll give you this like sense of accomplishment too. You'd be like, hey, I made that. And totally.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Yeah. There's like one of my favorite engineers producers of all time, Kirk Belou. I don't know if you know who he is. He like the heavy music world. Um, and he he has um business cards that are PCBs that he gives out to people just so they can build small pedals from stuff.
SPEAKER_00I've heard about that. That's pretty that's pretty great. Yeah, I love that. Yeah. I gotta get my hands on one of those at some point.
SPEAKER_02Yeah, and then um the other thing is uh what I also wanna just say thank you again for mentioning that is the whole with surrounding yourself with with other people and try not to be the smartest in the room or the best in the room. Um the only person in the room, yeah. Yeah, no, absolutely. And I I wanna I I I really want people to hear this. And and I'm I'm I'm also living proof of that. When I started to try and figure things out on my own here alone in the room in the middle of nowhere, like I tried for five years figuring this out, making demos for my band, whatever. And then in the one year after that, that I decided to go to studios, travel to places, rent studios, hire people, you know, pick people's brains, pay them for their time, and like ask questions and get mentors and all that. Once I started doing that, in that one year after, I learned like m 10 times as much as I did in the five years prior where I tried to figure it out on my own. And so it's like, yeah, it sounds obvious, but so yeah, we spend so much time in front of the computer and trying to figure it out with YouTube and like I sick.
SPEAKER_00I'm not a huge fan of that. I mean it's it's good for it's good for getting your feet wet with something, I guess. Like there's a lot of I I would say actually, if you're gonna go that route, there's a lot of like companies that put their official like gear tutorials or whatever on their own YouTube channels, so you're actually like you know, learning from the people that make the thing that you're trying to learn. So like that's probably the best resource for that type of stuff. But yeah, I'm I'm not a huge fan of the you know, learn everything online and I don't know. I'm sure some people are great at it, but uh to me that just it doesn't sound like that much fun. Like I like people, I like being around people. So, you know, any day I can not sit in my my room and stare at my computer is a good one, you know.
unknownYeah.
SPEAKER_00I agree. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Cool. And now final in the final no, two final questions. Next one is the most important lesson you've learned in your career. One lesson, the most important one.
SPEAKER_00Okay, this might be a slightly two-part answer. Number the first one is learn your um client's coffee order. Oh you know, or whatever that may be. Like find the one thing and like learn that and make sure it's there every time without asking. So there's a little bit of of that. Like learn how to preempt things and kind of like already have them going by the time your client shows up. Um so that's one. And then the other one I would say is you know, learn from as many different people as you possibly can. Because you're gonna like take something away from everybody. Um and that's kind of how you build your toolbox of things, and that's how you kind of create your own sound is like variety, you know. So like at least in my opinion, I think. Pick the gems that you like from different things and kind of like combine them all and make your your own soup. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Thanks. Perfect. That's why you're here. That's why we bring in people on to the show that are way smarter than us and that we can learn all learn from.
SPEAKER_00Well, I don't know about that, but okay.
SPEAKER_02And then final question. Uh, we're keeping kind of the stats on this, and we'll see where this goes after a year or so. Um, burger or pizza?
SPEAKER_00Oh, pizza 100%. Damn, it's a third in a row, I think. Yeah. Specifically pizza in Italy. Yeah. Yeah. We don't have good pizza here. Well, we do, but it's harder to find.
SPEAKER_02Yeah. Yeah. There you go. Perfect. Thank you so much. Awesome. Well, Kyle, did is there anything you want to add, like things where we should peop send people to, things you want to tell people? I mean, we got to put all the the links in the show notes and all that. We talked about how to contact you or NRG. But um, yeah, anything else you want to tell the audience or anything we should send them to?
SPEAKER_00Um, yeah, I mean, obviously check out our website, um, NRGrecording.com. We're still here. Still doing it. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, I don't know. Check out, check out our music, check out the stuff that's come out of here. Like, I think a lot of people may not realize how much uh how much stuff has really been done here. Um we don't have the luxury of having a history that goes back to the 60s, like some other places, but like it's pretty it's pretty awesome. Been a lot of great records done here. So yeah, I guess I guess that's it.
SPEAKER_02Cool. Man, thank you so much for your time. Um this is a long one and a good one, a really, really good one. So we might have to do a shorter technical one at some point if you're if you're open for that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, sorry. I mean, yeah. Hopefully that was hopefully that was cool. I I I do tend to ramble sometimes. So if you can if you can cut things down, feel free.
SPEAKER_01No, that was totally awesome. I don't think that technical one's gonna be short.
SPEAKER_00No, it may not be. Um, I mean, you know, for for what that's worth, like I had some mentors and stuff, but like um I taught myself a lot of that to so uh you know I definitely had some good teachers along the way, but I think the main reason why I'm able to maintain this place and keep it up and kind of like keep it going is because I had to teach myself how to do all that out of necessity. The console went down, I had to fix it. I there was nobody else to do it. So it's like, okay, you know, you make a couple phone calls and uh you know, I have people that I can call and ask questions and stuff, but at the end of the day, it's like I'm the one doing it. So yeah. Anyway. Again, important skill you say. Get your feet, yeah, get your feet. Figure it out. Get your hands dirty. Yeah, maybe I should have said that. Yeah, get get your hands dirty. Like you know? Yeah. Shock yourself a couple of times with like, you know, 300 volts inside of a guitar amp. That's always fun. Please don't do it on purpose. Yeah. But fortunately it only happened to me once, and then I I think uh it'll probably probably won't happen again. Yeah.
SPEAKER_02Was it unplucked and you still got sh got shocked? The typical thing.
SPEAKER_00Oh no, it was on when I did it. It was on. Oh, even better. I was measuring things and my hand slipped. But always keep when you're doing that, the big one is always keep one hand in your pocket. Oh, there you go. Yeah, don't use both hands. Yeah. Because you don't want to complete that circuit through your heart. Yeah. Yeah. Um anyway. Yeah there's the thanks.
SPEAKER_02That's a great, a great survival tip here at the end. The survival tip. Um, cool. Are we are we good? Are we done? Yeah, we're done. So thank you, thank you for your time. Thank you for listening to this show. Um, as always, you can find both the video and the audio version of this. So if you're if you're discovering this on your podcast app, there's a video version on YouTube and vice versa. So if you want to not just hear us, but also see us and see the beautiful room behind Kyle, then go to YouTube and check it out there. And uh yeah, we'll talk to you next week. And Kyle, thank you again. It's been a pleasure, it's been awesome.
SPEAKER_00And um I of course hopefully there was some useful crap in there.
SPEAKER_02Cool. There was there was thanks, Vanilla. Also, there's gonna be so crap. Yeah, thanks, Vanilla, also, for for your time, as always. And so, yeah, bye-bye. All right, goodbye. Take care. Take care.