The Healthier Home Studio Podcast

The Opposite of Hustle Culture is PLAY

• Chris Graham • Season 1 • Episode 7

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Muse Meditation Headband: 
https://amzn.to/4gcVF7R

For all things vintage keyboards and pianos:
Https://www.VintageVibe.com

UAD Dream Pedal:
https://amzn.to/47e3dDd



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One of the biggest realizations that I've had in the past couple years. Is I've learned that I often tend to get obsessed with tools. whether it's a piece of software or it's a microphone, or it's a pair of headphones. It's something we're all just get obsessed with a tool. It's something I'm working through. but it's something that's been really challenging for me. And I want to teach you guys a little bit more about, how tools can actually get in the way. Of your mission. as audio engineers, as producers, as people that work. In and around recording studios, we want to be like Neo from the matrix. We're going to go in and we're going to save Morpheus and we've got like 47 different guns, all strapped to us. And we have every single tool that we might need. And we go in and it's oh, we're, we're engineering session. We're producing this artist and we've got this and we've got that. And we could use this and we could use that. What I have learned. All of those options. Often. Limit the creative process. And frequently when you limit yourself to a smaller number of tools, it forces you to have a more creative mindset. And what I have found that's been surprising to me is I process the past couple years of, I was this. Six-figure home studio, business, audio influencer, and then I quit. And then I started going to their house state house and it changed a couple of laws. I didn't really use any tools. It was just me. I would just show up at the state house and I would talk to people and it was all soft skills. I tried using the CRM a couple of different times to manage. all the different contacts. legislators and whatnot. But what I found is if I just focused on the relational piece and I just focus on having great conversations and building lifelong friendships, that was all I needed to do. And so I focused on that and I started to move away from. this sort of mindset that if I just have the right tool, then I'll be able to do anything. I don't agree with that. Anymore. And, but it's something that's still kind of haunts me. And so this podcast and a lot of ways, it's just been me trying to figure out. how do I free myself up creatively to talk about the things and to share the ideas that I want to talk about and share. And what I have found is that just limiting myself to the simplest kit, I possibly can means that I show up. With my personality and social skills and storytelling ability and and all of these things that are just so much more effective. Then tweaking the gate on my microphone for like 20 minutes before I podcast to make sure that all the background noise. It's just so in perf. Whatever, but that means said. Tools, AKA toys are still something that are a big part of my life and figuring out how to use these tools and how to use technology without getting in my own way. I have found that that is one of the most important skills that I can develop as a human and also in the studio. And so while there is still a piece of me that wants to be Neo with all these different tools strapped to me and, I've got every possible thing that I might need to beat. The ops. I think you can look at Neo and the scene where him and Trinity go to rescue Morpheus in the first matrix movie. And they have just every thing ever, all of the tools. And I think you can compare that to Indiana Jones. in Raiders of the lost Ark. When Indiana is trying to escape he's in this dusty desert marketplace and this giant dude with a sword. stops Indiana and challenges him to this crazy sword fight. And it looks like it's going to be this epic battle and it's going to be amazing. And then all of a sudden, Indiana Jones pulls out his gun, pulls the trigger one time shoots the bad guy and he turns around and walks away. I would so much rather. Have the calm and cool collected vibe of Indiana Jones, then the, I have everything. Version of Neo. And I think we can take this even one further. Let's go into the star wars universe. As we talk about tools. in star wars. What's the ultimate tool. It's a lightsaber, right? And a lightsaber is it's, An elegant weapon for the most civilized time. but the problem with the lightsaber, is when you see a younger character that bases all of their abilities. On using a lightsaber. Inevitably, they get beaten by another force wielder who only uses the force. And, I've got strong feelings about the newer star wars movies, but they do. I think. Add an amazing element to the story. when you see Luke Skywalker facing Kylo Ren, Luke doesn't have his lightsaber, He doesn't use it. And Kylo Ren and him fight, and he stalling Kyler. And while everybody else escapes and he's saving the resistance, right? But it turns out. It looks Skywalker wasn't even there. He was meditating light years away and projecting himself. With no lightsaber and he ends up beating the bad guy by using. The soft skills, And the movie is it's not about technology. It's about mastering these internal things. It's about mastering yourself. And I'll tell you what I have found in my own life, That storyline, this idea that you are enough. You don't need the tools, if you got them and you're using them. Great. But don't make them the primary focus of what you're doing. You are enough. And so I think it's important to look at tools. A little bit more like toys. And so when you're using them, you're seeing it more like play than you are like work. As I am seeing my tools more like toys. It allows me to dig down into. Oh, gee, Chris Graham, not just me from 15 years ago, but me from like 35 years ago. And when I think about all of the skills that I've worked on, that I've grown over the years. The most important one. The thing that I'm the best at that I have the most experience with. It's actually play. I've been playing since I was like 10 months old. So I have a lot of experience when it comes to play and my brain is much more developed. In the area of play than it is an, any of the other skills or any of the other talents that I've got. I've been playing my whole life. And so what I have found is that I'm much better at work. When I look through the lens of play. And so a big part of that for me, has been seen my tools as toys. And so I'm going to list off just a couple toys that I've been playing with that have been super duper fun and that have made work more enjoyable, more fun, more exciting. And it's just been, it's been a great journey. So I'm going to list off just a couple of things I'm not affiliated with any of these companies. None of them are sponsoring or paying me. Let's start with number one. the first toy. Is a guitar pedal. So, let me tell you guys a story. When I was a sophomore in college. I was over to buddy's house and I saw in his basement, this old dusty broken fender amplifier. I knew it had tubes in it. That's about all I knew and I knew it didn't work too. And I decided to take a risk and I asked the guy that owned it. If he'd be willing to sell it to me. And I told him, I was like, look, it might not ever work. I have no idea what's wrong with it, but I'm willing to take a gamble to see if I can fix it. Cause when I was a kid. I used to play with tube amps a lot. I used to fix two BAMS. And I was electrocuted. Types I can count. I frankly, feel like I'm lucky to be alive with how many times I got electrocuted by some tube amplifier. when I was a kid and I was, modifying it to, give it a hotter gain stage. So it would break up more or something like that. this was like one of the things I would do as a kid is take a tube amp apart and modify it. Weird hobby, but, Anyways, my sophomore year of college, I found this fender amplifier. I made an offer 150 bucks to this guy. To get home. And this is there weren't a whole lot of communities. where you could learn about vintage gear online and the vintage gear craze hadn't started yet. But I didn't realize the great deal I had come across. You see, it was a 1966 fender Princeton reverb. Literally one of the finest, most desirable guitar amps in recording history. And as luck would have it. It just had a burned out pilot light. So when I put new tubes in it and flipped it on, it lit right up and it was so exciting. And this amp has been a constant companion for me. I've recapped it myself. I've made a few small tasteful modifications so I can bias the amp myself. I run, nos. tube's in it. I've got literally black plate RCAs is the finest power tube you could possibly put in a Princeton. I run a Weber speaker. I'm a nerd with this thing, man. But. Not so long ago. I bought a farm in the country. And down the street from this farm is perhaps. My new favorite guitar store on planet earth. It's in Heath, Ohio. It has no business being in Heath, Ohio. It's called guitar guys, LLC. And when I bought my farm, I found this place. It's like, oh, I'm a guitar store. Local. I'll go check it out. I'm sure it's going to be. Not amazing because very rarely do you come across a really good guitar store. And so I drive, it's like 17 minutes away. I pull up, I opened the door, I walk in and I'm like, all right, let's see I'm sure they've got at least one good guitar in here. I walk in the front door and there is a wall. Of top of the line Gibson guitars, top of the line fender, and all kinds of other high end brands. But most importantly, They've got fender custom shop and Gibson Murphy labs. And for any guitar players out there, it is like unheard of to walk into a guitar store and see a$6,000 Les Paul hanging on the wall. with other guitars that are comparable in value. And so I walked in and realized like, I'm home. That will feed her home. Studio requires an instrument shop that you go to and you buy things directly from them. And you're friendly with the staff and you're just. You're a part of the guitar store community. My ideal life is that I am a short drive away from a great guitar store. And this was completely accidental. guitar guys, LLC blew my mind. So I'm over there frequently. Just trying to support what they're doing, because it is a blast to be able to walk into a store. I play a bunch of different instruments and find something that's going to be important. on your journey, moving forward, maybe it's a guitar or in my case, A guitar pedal, a UAD dream. Guitar amp simulator. So I had heard about these pedals. I went down to guitar guys couple of months ago. They had one that had just come in. I plugged it in. I've never, ever listened to an amp SIM and thought, oh, wow. I don't need my amp anymore. This sounds so much better than my fender Princeton reverb. I was never, even anywhere close to that. And I plugged in this UAD dream pedal And my God, it smokes. My real vintage amp, And I am just obsessed with this. I took it to a session the other day when I was playing with a band and, the engineer, John fennel, saw my pedal and was like, I don't know. Hmm. Alright. And emulators and everybody was skeptical. But man, when we heard the playback, from this pedal, everybody in the room, just their jaw dropped and it's funny, my boy lid Shaw he's the band leader. he does the recording studio, rockstars podcast. Great show. Great guy. Check him out. And he was playing a fender Princeton reverb. our amps just went together really well were the two guitar players in the band that day. as far as toys, things that are really changing. how I make decisions in the studio. And have simplified my life and made things easier and more fun. The UAD dream pedal from universal audio is. Absolutely nuts. It is the best emulation of any fender amplifier I've ever heard. And I actually prefer it to the real thing. So that's my first item on the, Chris grams toys. section of this show. the second item. So let's see here. What would the second item be? Oh, You know what. I'm holding it right now in my hand, the second item, is the microphone I've been using for. I think every podcast episode so far It's this little Apogee hype mic. It's a USB microphone with a built-in analog compressor. And it sounds ridiculous. It was a gift to me from Betty. the CEO of Apogee and, just an absolute, amazing human being. I was out there maybe a year and a half or so.

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for Nam and Apogee was hosting this party. at apogees headquarters

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and I'm just kinda taking it all in and all of a sudden. Betty, the CEO of Apogee walks in with two of her friends. And I hadn't met her yet, but she just sort of on a whim, turned to me and she said, hi, I'm giving my friends a tour And I was wondering if you could tell me what Apogee means to you. And I was like, bet. So I go like full presentation mode and I start telling her friends about when I was coming up an audio. My first significant purchase was an Apogee mini me. It was two preamps with two built-in, very simple compressors and absolutely fantastic digital conversion. It was the floor model at guitar center here in Columbus and the guy working at guitar center that day, who sold me, the Apogee mini me. his name is Josh Dunn. Now he's the drummer for 21 pilots. he was in pro working in pro audio back in the day. This is a long time ago and all I remember, so clearly. Making the decision to buy this thing. And it really defined my career as a producer. In my early twenties. It was like all of a sudden my recording sounded ridiculous. And so I'm telling this story to her friends and I'm like, Apogee is the top shelf. when it comes to digital, to analog conversion and analog to digital conversion, Apogee has a sound. And for me, that sound has been a big part of my career and it always has been a benchmark. and Betty, the CEO is just sitting there beaming and her friends are like, oh, cool. Oh, so it's a, not just an audio company, but, one of the best audio companies. Betty ends up inviting me. to her office and we walk in and she's she has all this stuff. laid out in her office, like different Apogee interfaces in microphones. And she's like, that was great. Love the presentation that you did on a dime. You can have apogee gear you want you want. And I was like, yo, can I have a pair of these height mikes to, start a new podcast with? And she was like, absolutely. And so she gave them to me. and then betty gave me probably one of the best pitches. I've ever heard for an audio related product. And she said. To me. my friend, Courtney Cox, you know, Monica from friends, she has a hight mic. I gave her one and she's been working on this movie lately. Courtney Cox and I were at a party the other day. And all of a sudden she gets a text message and he says, oh, one second. It's my producer. He needs me to do a line of voiceover for the movie. And so Courtney leaves, the party gets into her car, gets out her Apogee height mic plugs it into her iPhone. Does the voiceover and texts the file to the producer. And that's how they've done the voiceover for this feature film. And I'm like, oh my God, that's the best pitch I've ever heard. And this is what the MC does. it's a absolutely ridiculously high quality microphone. That's portable and you can use it anywhere. So cool. So this toy. Has been helpful for me because it sounds great. It's easy to use, but it frees me up to focus on play. Rather than tweaking a bunch of knobs. It gets me more in a producer mindset. Then it does in an engineer mindset. And that is why I love it. Okay guys, let's talk about another thing that has been just amazing for me, as far as Chris's favorite toys. back in the day. Back when I was a very young producer, I put a wanted ad on Craigslist for a Wurlitzer 200 day easily, the most classic beautiful, amazing of all the electric keyboards in the history of the world. Clearly have an opinion. I put a wanted ad up on Craigslist. And then a couple days later I got an email from someone that said, hi, Mike. And I, I just got one of them, digital Casio keyboards. And I got this here world for 200 a day. And it's obsolete now because I've got the digital version of it. I'll sell it to you for, I don't know,$400. And I was like, woo. And I drove down and I got the keyboard. And I have. Been working on it ever since. this was probably 15 years ago. And so this keyboard, this piano, I have taken it apart down to the nubbin. You. Every single hammer I've had out. I've reconditioned, I've put back together. I've upgraded it with a vintage vibe, amplifier, shout out to vintage vibe. if you guys have vintage keyboards, Of any kind that need any kind of work or spare parts, vintage vibe.com is the shit. They have all the things. And then make a newer better amp. for this keyboard. And so recently I put that amplifier in my Wurlitzer 200 a and. It's amazing. It's absolutely amazing. And so that I've been using the heck out of that. It's pretty normal for me to just sit in my living room and play this Wurlitzer. I'd say probably at least 30 minutes a day. It's something that just I'm drawn to. it's much easier to get the sounds I'm looking for in the dynamics. I'm looking for. With the vintage vitamin amplifier and I'm. Really guys I'm partial to buying. Toys in kit form that require, like maybe some soldering. some putting together of things. And, kits have always been a big part of my story in the studio of buying kits or parts putting them together myself, and then using them to make music. there's just something really romantic and beautiful about that. And then the last toy. The last thing that I want to talk to you guys about, Is a device that, probably is the most useful, tool. that I have as far as how it's actually impacted my life. it's also a tool that is very easy for you guys to get ahold of yourself. It's not very expensive. and it can teach you how to master meditation. It's called a muse headband. And for those of you have been following me for a few years. You know that I've gotten interested in these before. what it does. is you put your AirPods or your headphones in and you put on the muse headband it looks like an exercise headband. It's got elastic on it. And then there's a little electronic device in the front of it. And what this thing does, is it scans your brain to pick up and measure your brain signals. what it's used for is something called neurofeedback. Neurofeedback is a very old, very trusted, very well-known very safe. Thing to do that can help with meditation. PTSD add, it's like a video game with no screen.

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And the way it works is

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you select an environment in this iPhone app that you want to pretend that you are meditating in.

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It could be a beach, it could be a rainforest. And you will hear in your air pods that environment, and you'll hear the weather that's related to that environment. So it could be wind or waves or leaves that are rustling. And the environment gets more chaotic, but you hear more intense weather As you lose focus while your meditation. as you dig deeper, as you calm down you start to hear the weather calm down the waves, calm down. It's really cool. But one of my favorite programs to do with this muse neurofeedback device. Is to choose the ambient music option. And what happens with that is it allows you to create this. ambient music environment. Using only your brainwaves. Pretty cool. Right?

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after the device calibrates to your brain. You begin to hear this. Theorial synthy background. music. And what happens is as your brain waves, get more excited, less meditative. You hear a little bit more dissonance in the music. But as you begin to calm down and meditate and drop into deeper parts of yourself. The music becomes more gentle. more, droney and what you start to hear in the background are birds chirping. And The birds chirping. R like points in this video game. So if you meditate and you drop deep down into yourself and you become very calm and your heart rate starts to slow down and your thoughts start to slow down, your breathing starts to slow down. You hear a bird? And it's in stereo. So it sounds like there's a bird somewhere around you and it intersperses with the music or the environmental sounds that you're hearing in this app. And so you meditate for, could be five minutes, could be 10 minutes and you'll hear, a number of birds if you're doing a good job. And each of these birds is, a point in this video game. And what gets so rad. Is once the meditation session is over. You can go back. And the number of birds that you heard is the number of points that you scored in this meditation video game. And what is so wild about it is. the feedback starts to teach you when you're actually meditating properly. And so here's the thing that's so challenging about meditation. you've got the act of trying to meditate, right? The practice of meditation. And then you've got your ability to monitor how meditation is going in your own mind. And what I found when I first got into meditation, I was absolutely dog shit at it. what the muse headband did for me was it started to teach me what it feels like. To have a great meditation session. And so what would happen is I would do these sessions. I'd meditate. And I go from oh man, I scored. 17 birds to I scored 400 birds And this was a process that took a number of months for me, but it was fun. It was relaxing. And after I would play with this muse headband, I'd have a better day. I would. feel much more grounded and centered just the noise in my mind, had turned down a little bit. there's links to all of this stuff, except for the Wurlitzer keyboard. in the show notes to this podcast to check all those out, I am going to, I haven't figured out how to do it yet, but I'm going to put an affiliate link in there so that if you do buy Any of these things that I'm talking about, that a little bit of money gets kicked back to the podcast to support the show. and hopefully go to, paying for some plane tickets so that I can be flying out and doing in-person interviews, with some of the best, most amazing creatives that we have here in recording studio land. And so as we close out the show today, I'm going to demonstrate the muse headband. I'm going to show you guys what it's like and what it sounds like to meditate with this thing. I'm going to make you guys some music live in real time only using my brainwaves. I will not be using my hands in any way, I will only be generating the sounds that you were about to hear by using my brain. And so if you guys want to meditate with me, that would be great. We'll do this for a couple of minutes and it's just going to kind of be a chill opportunity to. get an idea of what it would feel like if you got one of these muse headbands. because I really do think if you want to supercharge your meditation practice, I know of no better tool.

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Okay. I have the muse headband on and, I'm going to let you guys in my head here. So let's begin. So I'm going to continue to record my breath. So I've got five minutes of this muse video game that I'm going to play. if you're lucky, if I'm lucky, If we're both lucky, you'll hear kind of some like synthy birds in the background. That's me scoring points. in the game. And so. Okay. This is awesome. Here we go. Ooh, that was hard. Much harder than usual. It's weird making. A podcast for all of you I get a lot of positive reinforcement. for doing stuff like this. And that feeds my ego and, It makes me want to, Use it as evidence. And sort of my own internal dialogue about whether or not I'm worthy. And what's wild about that is Moments where, you guys would be able to hear a lot of birds But then I'll hear the birds and be like, all right. They can hear the power of my mind. Oh, yeah. And then you start to hear that dissonant. The thing that starts to come up. that's the sound of my ego. That's literally the sound of me. Thinking about whether this is going to make me look cool to you guys or not. And. Wow. I've not had that experience with the muse headband before. because it's always just been me. I opened the app here, I can go through and oh, wow. Guys. I was freaking out. My average heart rate was. 87. Okay. Yikes. So you get this score of how calm you were through the process of the whole thing. And I was 44% calm, That's my all time. worst score. Oh, man. Okay. This was very educational. For me. yet another example of how we can use tools. Like the muse headband, like meditation to discover new things about ourselves. And for me, the, performance Nerves that I've got for you guys, I'm so glad I recorded this because I grew in real time, and you guys were, were listening to that. You were hearing that. And, man, it's weird. Cause I like want to be like, trust me. I'm way better. Then what you guys just start. But. Ah, man. Weird. Okay. Well guys, um, that's the muse headband for you? I hope you enjoyed hearing my ego. And, I hope you guys have a great day. Stay tuned, new episode coming. Next Tuesday at 6:00 AM. Eastern standard time. And, I just wanted to say I've gotten tons of emails and direct messages and even just I'll be commenting on people's Instagram posts sometimes. And the response back is like, Hey, I love the new podcast. Keep going. So I'm just, I'm stoked and really encouraged. but one of the things I think I am. I'm struggling with, I'm trying to figure out is how much hippity Dippity. Shit. Do I talk about and how much like hard business skills. Do I teach. and and then what percentage of that is interviews as well? So I'm still figuring out the recipe and figuring out, what's fun. Like I said on this episode, what's the most fun for me. Boy. what we did today was fun. That was really fun. That was hard. That was the hardest pockets episode I've ever recorded. Life. Oh, okay. I'm going to go. Take a nap. You guys have a great day. I'll see you next week.