Eestbound on Producing for Travis Scott, Vocal Chains & Mixing Philosophy

In this episode, we sit down with Eestbound to talk about producing for Travis Scott, the story behind “Antidote,” his mixing philosophy, vocal chains, recording techniques, studio gear, and the workflow behind creating better records.

Transcript

SPEAKER_00 0:00

What's going on, guys? Welcome back to another episode of Behind the Console. As usual, I'm Derek. And today we have another very special guest with us, Eastbound, multi-platinum producer from Toronto, or Niagara, I guess, like she's saying. No, no, yeah, yeah, yeah. Appreciate y'all, man. Yeah, bro. Thank you for pulling up. Of course, man. Yeah, 100%. Thanks for having me. Of course, of course. So the first thing we usually start with all our guests is if you could just give us a brief background of how you started in music as a producer, as an audio engineer, and how like what you're doing today.

SPEAKER_03 0:30

Uh always been a music kid, like since I was young. That was kind of my uh something that I recognized kind of was my my thing from very young. And um growing up, I was playing instruments, I was playing in church with my uh with my pops, and that's kind of where I had access to different instruments, and that was pretty cool. Uh but when I made the move to Canada in 2011, that's when I was introduced to uh Kanye, you know, Drake, uh Jay-Z, all the like that kind of scene. And I was just really inspired by uh the production and the sound, and that's what led my interests into production, right? And just started off like messing around, seeing what I can do. Um and that very quickly, you know, led to some success with Travis. And that's obviously there's a huge gaps, but you know, trying to keep trying to keep it short. Um and uh yeah, but uh I've always just had a natural knack in like sonics and you know, more so, you know, trying to make things sound good uh on top of just the because like I heard other people's beats and I would compare them to my beats, and I'm like, man, like why does their shit like knock like that? You know what I mean? Like it just sounded so uh thick and the bass was good and everything was clean and crisp uh and so effortless. Like I would be pushing my limiters and clippers as much as I can, and it's just like I'm not even it's still dull, and I wasn't even close. And um, I thought it must have been some sort of secret plug-in or something, uh some sort of thing. And uh I was trying to you know figure it out. And the more I looked into it, I'm like, okay, there's levels to this, there's like techniques, and you know, each own thing had like EQ, like you can literally have a whole course on just EQ on its own. And um, I just decided to take the plunge into generally learning each step, and um that's how I eventually got into audio audio engineering, but I didn't want to conflate the the production and audio engineering uh to new clients, like the fact that I have a huge hit with Travis on production means nothing for your record as a country singer and me mixing it for you, you know what I mean? So I had to like really start from the ground up and you know charge like you know laughable numbers for uh mixing and mastering and um kind of just work my way up like from from the get, even though I already had like success in the production space, that was fairly new. So that's that's pretty much like the okay, the breakdown.

SPEAKER_00 2:44

Yeah. So when it came to even production engineering, were you are you completely self-taught, just like messing around, or did you do some courses?

SPEAKER_03 2:51

I mean, look, like self-thought for the most part, but there's definitely like along the way, you know, you learn things from you know your peers. And I I did go to Metalworks for a bit, okay, dropped out. Um it was just it was just I'm like, why am I learning about you know music history? Like I can, you know, Google this stuff. Definitely. Um, you know, no disrespect to whoever went through the program. It's just it wasn't it just it just wasn't my thing.

SPEAKER_00 3:15

No, I'm a graduate and I completely understand. It just wasn't my thing.

SPEAKER_03 3:19

Like the whole like setting up the studio ten minutes they time you, like all that stuff. Like, it just wasn't my thing.

SPEAKER_01 3:24

Yeah, you know it's funny. I was supposed to go to Metaworks. I paid like the what do they call that thing when you pay not the tuition, but like advanced or whatever. Yeah, deposit? Yeah, deposit. You have to pay like a like a deposit before you apply. So I paid it. I was about to go in two weeks before the the thing was about to start. I'm like, no, I'm not doing this. Yeah, yeah. You was there for a little bit.

SPEAKER_03 3:49

Yeah, man. But but I mean, I honestly, I actually did learn a couple of things there though. Like I was that I was very interested in the acoustics class because that I was like, I was interested in like how sound really works, like from a you know, nature perspective. But for the most part, just YouTube university. But the thing is, I feel like when people say that, it kind of gets conflated. So you need to know what to look for because there's just so much information. Yes. Um, when I started my journey in that, it wasn't as we're we're just in such a different space now. Every everyone is a genius, everyone is a guru. Um, and it's cool. Look, I I respect people wanting to like share their gems, uh, but so often I just hear completely incorrect information. Yeah. And because I've been in this space for so long, I know it's incorrect. But someone coming up, you know, won't know it's incorrect. And obviously, yes, for you know, in the music industry, what's incorrect? Nothing is incorrect technically. But to certain extent, like there is like some objective truth in terms of um efficient processes that you can apply to your workflow that get you the results that you want, right? So, you know, when I started out, you know, I wanted my shit to knock, you know. But then I go on YouTube and it's just like, hey, this is how I make this country song sound good. I'm like, yeah, well, that doesn't apply to me, but you still learn things from it, right? Um, so that was that was cool, but you really need to know what what you're looking for. And my approach was um, I need to know one thing and understand it to the point I can explain it to someone until I can do that, I move on to the next thing.

SPEAKER_04 5:22

Right.

SPEAKER_03 5:22

So I'm like looking up, I'm like, okay, phase. I'm like, what's phase? Okay, I need to learn that. Okay, what's that? And then it it kind of I kind of kept going down all these rabbit holes, and you know, you get a little like obsessed with all these, you know, compressors and EQs and all these things. Uh, and then you kind of, you know, after you learn all those things, you take a step back and realize, okay, you know, those are all tools, and you can like kind of pick and choose when you want to use what. Um, so but it was a really cool journey, and I would definitely recommend for anyone starting out right now um to take an approach that works for you, but like know what you're looking for. Don't look for shortcuts, you're not gonna get it. It doesn't exist. Yes, you know, there's definitely plugins that get you there faster, but if you don't even understand what's going on, what the process is actually like, it you you're shooting yourself in the foot ultimately. Because at some point a client is gonna ask you, like, hey, that's cool, but you know, I don't want to use that or don't want this, and now you don't really know what to do because you're kind of relying on tools to do the work for you.

SPEAKER_01 6:18

You know, I think what you said too, as an engineer, you have to understand what the artist wants. You can't just kind of do your own thing and expect the artist to like it. Of course, yeah. You know, you have to you have to understand where their state of state of mind is and what you can provide to get them to that point.

SPEAKER_03 6:35

Yeah, and I mean very often you may even think that you know what they want, and then you give them something back, and they're like, dude, this is actually not at all what I was going for.

SPEAKER_01 6:43

You know, just follow the reference, follow the reference, match the demo, match the demo. Yeah, oh man, the demo.

SPEAKER_03 6:51

Yeah, yeah, that's definitely a thing. That's definitely a thing. Yeah, yeah. I I seen I seen a funny story about that, actually, how um you know why demos have that magic, you know, and because it's kind of like flatter and uh you know it's less perfect and polished, and you know, people listen to it a million times. But that's the thing, like at the point that someone comes to you saying, like, hey, I want this song mixed and mastered, it's because they love the demo so much. They love the demo so much that they think to themselves like this can be better, right? You know, and I'll trust you to make it better. But they love the demo. So there's there's something in the demo that they love, and it's like you have to kind of identify what that is. Like, what's in the demo that they love so much that I need to like not fuck up. Yes, you know.

SPEAKER_01 7:33

I I think with us too, when we hear the demo, we don't automatically hear what they love is good about it. We hear all the mistakes first. Immediately, immediately. So we're like, we gotta fix this, this, this, this, this, you know, and then we might take away something that they liked through the process, right?

SPEAKER_03 7:49

So that that's that's kind of like that that magic or or demo it is as people love to call it, which is so real because even I have it, you know, with my own shit and even with my own mixes, where sometimes I spend so much time on one mix that by the time that they say, like, hey, you know, I actually want to change this around, and I keep referencing from the reference mix one, and then now the new version, like fuck. You know, like I like I see now. The reference is almost sounding better than everything. Yeah, you know what I mean? And you kind of go back and forth, but yeah, it's it's part of the process and it's part of the art. And sometimes we do too much. Yeah, like that's one thing. Like when I first started out, I was doing way too much.

SPEAKER_00 8:27

I think we were all doing way too much. We're all just trying to prove ourselves, like I did all this, I did all this, like this was all me. Like, I put all that work into the mix, you know? Yeah, sometimes less is more, and it's hard sometimes to just be okay with that.

SPEAKER_01 8:39

I think for us because we want to justify the price that we were getting paid for. Yes. So in my in our minds, we like, oh, we gotta put this amount of hours in the work to make it sound a certain way, but sometimes it's like an hour and two, and the client is already happy. It's us, we like, oh no, no, you gotta be this, this, and that, and that, right?

SPEAKER_03 8:56

So there's a really cool story about have you ever heard this the metaphor of the the guy that fixed the cargo ship? No, I don't think so. So it's a story about a guy that came in, they had to fix a cargo ship, there was something wrong with the engine, and he asked all the questions like what's wrong with it, whatever, whatever, and then he's like, okay, cool. He he goes up a ladder, he has a hammer, and he hits like a specific part of the boat really hard, and they're like, let's try it again, and it worked. It's like, okay, that'll be 25 grand. And they're like, Why are we gonna pay 25 grand? You just walked up there and hit with a hammer. It's like, yeah, but you didn't know how to do it. You know, I done spent X amount of years figuring out it's just that little thing. That's true, that's true. You know, and you didn't know, so you're not paying me for me hitting the hammer, you're paying me for all the time that it took for me to figure out that that's what all I have to do. Exactly. So with mixing, it's it's pretty much the same concept. Very often it's like, does it even need compression? Why do you even why are you compressing it? Is the dynamics all the way off? Because then, yeah, compress it. But even then, can you automate it? Is there ways that you can do without phase or whatever, whatever? Like, does it even need anything? Or is it already good? Because sometimes uh one thing that I really ran into is I start you know adjusting all the individual things, and then by the time it gets to the the master bus, I want to do all these things on the master bus, but I I kind of already did it in the mix, right? So now the master bus don't really need much, you know what I mean? So now I take the opposite approach where like I kind of like try to leave everything alone and essentially let the master bus do the heavy lifting, and then I go in individually if I identify a problem. I thought I found that a better approach nowadays.

SPEAKER_01 10:25

So for your master bus, that means that you don't mix into your master bus?

SPEAKER_03 10:29

You add it after it's like both, like I kind of build if that makes sense. So like I I would start off with just like overall balance, gain staging, blah blah blah, like huge, huge red flags that I need to address immediately, you know, like a vocal has like weight, like there was like a fan going on in the background of a vocal, whatever. Like I just fix all the things that are very obvious, yeah, and then I kind of just get like a volume balance, try to match the demo. Um, and then I would immediately go to the to the mix slash master bus and start kind of like building that out. When I have like and but I don't immediately go for like loudness and punch and I kind of just like get the level competitive, you know, minus eight, minus seven, whatever, kind of get to that level, uh, make things like a little bit cleaner, whatever. And um, then I go back to individual again. Gotcha. And I kind of go back and forth. And you know, as I add more bass, I'm like, oh well, now I don't really need as much on the master channel, and then I turn that down and back and forth kind of a thing. Yeah. Some people they really like set and forget. And again, everyone has their own approach. Um, but it's cool to sometimes um switch it up, you know, like even like the whole Brouwer technique. Uh I was like, yo, let me let me try that for a bit. Like, why not? You know what I mean? It's cool to like experiment rather than got particle and no disrespect, Jason. No disrespect, bro. I love the goth particle. I use it, but you know, some people just like got particle and just like it's mixed and mastered now. Yeah, you know what I mean? And trust me, you really can get a lot with that thing. You really can, but then fix the damn limiter. I'm sorry. Fix the limiter. It's just um I I don't like the limiter, man. I don't know what they did with that, but they I don't like the limiter.

SPEAKER_01 12:07

I I think the craziest part about Goth Particle is that if it's on the demo and then you have to match your mix to that, you're cooked if you don't have it at your mix. Looking at the levels, it's like, how am I supposed to push my mix to that level? Yeah, yeah, yeah. Clients don't understand that you know there's already limiting, whatever it is on the demo, there is there, right? They just when they hear it, they're just gonna play the demo, play your stuff, and they're just gonna hear the loudness first. Yes, 100%. If your thing is not as loud, forget about it. They already don't like it.

SPEAKER_03 12:33

100%. Yep. And and that's and sometimes I have to like really explain this to clients where I'm like, okay, look, you know you have a volume button, right? Everyone does, you know, and things get plenty loud nowadays. So um you don't have to be loud. The issue is is the competitive field that we're in. The loudness war is over and loud one. That that's unfortunately just a reality. And it's not necessarily that the volume one, it's the crunch that you get when you get that loud that wins. Because even now, when I listen to Sharon, like even like the new, new, new stuff, like the young kids, the sound like a lot. Um it's like overly distorted. Yeah, yeah. Because TikTok made this whole like overly distorted thing, yeah, like a sound, like listen to Two Hollis, is like on the brink of absolute digital clipping and distortion. But that's the sound. The Aids hit and it just makes everything rattle and then the vocals are all fucking crunched up, but yeah, but that's the sound. And you know, if if you if you want to compete with that, you need to know how to do that tastefully, and that's that's difficult.

SPEAKER_01 13:36

But the question is when you hear those songs like um, I always say too slimy because his stuff is his like sound is that that sound of that distortion. Yeah, how do you make it tasteful as an engineer when you have like specific background of understanding things and how they sound, you know?

SPEAKER_03 13:54

I would say that my approach, and it's kind of like also built on my template, is that I have different uh stages of um clipping. So like every bus goes to a bus which goes to an aux. And the only reason I do that, obviously it can get very complicated very quickly, but the reason I do that is because I want to be able to have the ability to either clip drums and bass, drums, bass, and melody, drums or just just drums, or just bass, or just bass and melody. That's the thing. Because when I when I listen, when you listen to two Hollis, like I was really like studying it for a minute because I'm like, I love how close they are to it being like straight up just like bad, but it's just not there. It's like per it's it's perfectly distorted, you know, in that sense. And I could hear that like his vocal is distorted, and it gets even more distorted when the bass hits, but when the bass is gone, it's still distorted. So the clearly the vocal on the vocal track there is distortion there, there's distortion on the bass, and both of them are also distorting. And it's kind of like the stages of how you go about that. So if you just if you're like, oh, you know, my client wants to distort it, let me just put a clipper, let me put a hard clipper on it and just smash it, it could work. Um, but the issue that you get is like as soon as the bass is gone, that that that crispiness is gone. You know what I mean? You now you now rely on the 808 to like break things up to get that distortion. So you need to do it in like stages. You need to like have aux and buses, and this is where the old school routing and everything comes back into play because you need to know how to do that. And you know, it's not as simple as just like slapping a distortion, you know, on everything. And you know what I mean? How do you? I'm curious, how do you because like you got all this analog gear, you know, and you know, analog is very sensitive to you know how much gain you feed it. Like, so how do you go about um like if a client says like yo, I want my shit fucking crank, like I need this like to distort, I want it to break up, I want my shit like too hollows.

SPEAKER_01 15:41

Like so I would say like this. I'll I use analog for most time, but there's certain times when I would still run it through it, but I would bypass stuff.

SPEAKER_04 15:51

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 15:51

Because I got a lot of tubes and all that stuff, so especially tubes are very sensitive to how you drive them, how you push them. If uh if I'm working on like uh Punjabi music and these guys love their stuff loud, bro. These guys love when everything is just knocking. As much as I would love to use, you know, all the tools that I have, I just have to bypass it. There's like no threshold on the on the compressor, nothing, because as soon as I start hitting those levels, I just hear like that tube saturation I don't want. Yeah, you know, it's too much. So it's like, you know, I I think it's like what you said before when it comes to uh when it comes to Master Bus, it's like don't always use the same thing for every single mix. You kind of gotta pick and choose, you know, 100% what works for which songs.

SPEAKER_03 16:32

Yeah, I I I always tell people, you know, um, when it comes to the tools that you use in recording, mixing, and mastering, it's like it's like construction, you know? It's like if you're working on a wood table, you're not gonna need none of the metal drills and whatever, right? So you need to use the tools that are applicable to the job that needs to get done. And it's identifying what tools you need when you need them. If you even need any tools, you know what I'm saying? That's what really separates, I would say, like the pros from the amateur people kind of starting up because they feel like they have to do something, or like, oh, everyone's using GAP, I gotta use Ga Particle. Like, brother, you're working on a country record. Like, you want open, you want open, you don't want you know, compression and limiting and saturated, you want the the openness, you know. Um, so it's really knowing when, if you even need to use a tool, and then and then to use it because I was going through um, I think I think every engineer has seen this video at this point. The uh the breakdown of the uh diamonds by Rihanna, the engineer he was breaking down the mix. Uh and yo, just like the base most basic EQs, and like if he uses compression, it's just like our comp and shit. Like it's just like the or even the stock one in Pro Tools. Yeah, like the man barely did anything, and it just sounded fantastic. Obviously, huge disclaimer that I feel like this doesn't get talked about enough. Um, the production is already at like such a high level, recorded on SSLs and like real MOOCs and you know, Juno's and all kinds of stuff. So the production that they get, you know, already has so much you know, color and flavor that you don't really need that much uh after the fact, but still, you know, it's it it goes to show that sometimes you don't have to do anything, it's just a little EQ. Like sometimes you look at the EQ, he just dips a little bit of 200, yeah, yeah, and that's all he did.

SPEAKER_01 18:17

Yeah, that's all he did. Sometimes I remember I remember watching that video. One thing I remember, even when you look at the the channels, there's like one, maybe two plugins per channel. A whole bunch of plugins that a whole bunch of channels didn't even have anything on it, it was just balance. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 18:31

Game staging is a big part of the mix to begin with. I think people confuse, like they get their game staging wrong, and then they think to fix everything, they need to EQ it or compress it. But it's like you can literally just turn it down or turn it up. Yeah, probably solved 50% of the time. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 18:46

What would you say was like your biggest challenge when you when you were learning game staging? Like, what's something that you kind of kept running in?

SPEAKER_01 18:55

I don't think it was just it was mainly just understanding what the hell is happening. And I feel like game staging back then was very different from game staging right now because back then we all worked in like 44.124 or like 48.24, right? So it's like just the headroom itself. Like if you're working in 32-bit, you have so much headroom. Practically unlimited, yes. Yeah, you know what I mean? So it's like I remember like back in the day, you have to kind of watch the levels more because it's so much easier to distort. Where nowadays it's like sometimes I look at things and I'm like, I can't believe that I'm sitting at like minus five lefts already. And like I cannot feel that I'm sitting there, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_03 19:34

It feels completely normal, it has dynamics, it has everything, and you're already there. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 19:38

Exactly. So I don't know, it's just like you know, it's a trial and error type of type of situation. You do something, and you know, I remember the the first time when I was when I was mixing, I would have files that are like literally touching zero, and every single file is touching zero, and I'm just like working around it, but I don't know any better. I'm just like working with what I have, right? But then it's like I see somebody, oh, gang stage. I'm like, what the hell is gang staging? I never heard about this thing, you know. I mean, so I do this research, it's kind of like what you said before. You hear a word, you try to, you you you start to learn about this, then you see something else, so you gotta hop in there, and it's just like this one big rabbit hole of like game staging. And even though it sounds very, very simple, once you actually understand it, you're like, oh, it's like every game staging is different. If you if you're using like a clip game, it's very different than when you do in your fader game, you know what I mean? And if you're doing like a gain on your analog gear, it's gonna be very different. So it's like there's so many different ways how you can game stage, but you have to understand every single piece because at the end of the day, when you work in the mix that you want it to sound a certain way, you have to understand every single one of them and what they do and how they affect the sound.

SPEAKER_03 20:46

Yeah, like I think that the the the thing that gets confused the most for people, like it's like even when I explain it to people, because sometimes you know people would see my sessions and they they would ask me, like, yo, like how do you like how do you like how do you start like when you start out? Like, what do you even like identify? Like, how do you even go about it? I usually just turn everything down immediately. Like, I just select all the files, turn everything down until I hit like around minus 12. And again, it doesn't have to be exactly like minus it's just like a ri I've I've just over the years I figured like minus 12 is usually enough space to do things because I love to you know add something and then crank shit.

SPEAKER_01 21:22

You just drop all the faders down, right?

SPEAKER_03 21:24

Pretty much everything, yeah. Well clip gain, like the the the first gain, if that makes sense, right? Because like that that's the thing, is like people like you have to understand where the the the volume knob starts and then where that goes into because that's the issue. Like if you, for example, like if you've already added plugins and then you bring the fader down, yeah, you have good level, but the issue is that plugins in themselves can clip too. Yeah, so it's it's better to start out like before you add any plugins, before you do anything, uh just bring everything down and you're like, oh, it's so quiet. Yeah, turn it up. Like you know, you have a volume knob, you know, interfaces usually get plenty loud nowadays, so just turn it up. And then as you go, as you put the the the master chain on, you can like bring that loudness back because it's digital. There's no noise floor, you don't have to worry about that. You just bring it back up. Um but I like to do that because I want to be safe in um doing certain EQ moves or certain compression moves. I like to just like really crank shit and then back off. That I mean, that's just my approach. Like if I have a pull tech or whatever, um, I just like to crank the fucking bass all the way up so I can really hear, like, okay, this is the frequency I'm affecting right now, and then I just kind of like back it off. The issue is if you if you have your whole mix peaking at minus six or minus three or whatever, minus three is crazy though.

SPEAKER_01 22:35

I know it's insane.

SPEAKER_03 22:36

Like the moment you crank it like 2 dB, you're starting to clip, so you can't actually, and and then you feel like oh it's too much, even though you could have actually added way more if you just gave yourself a little bit of room because zero is zero ultimately, yeah, and you can't go further than that. So just turn your shit down, you know what I mean? Turn your shit down, bring the volume up, make your changes, get your balance right. You and now you know you have more than enough room. It's kind of like being in a Maybach, you can just kick your feet around, you know what I mean? You have all the room to do what you what you want to do. Um, give yourself that room, and then on the master chain, just bring the volume back up and then you know, turn the volume down so you don't like blow your speakers. But that's just how I would go about it. And um, you know, game staging is definitely like something that everyone has their own method, but it's just understanding level and where zero is compared to where you are currently at. Yeah, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 23:26

So what's your current setup? Um, because you said you have a studio at your crib, right? Yeah, do you are you fully digital? You analog hybrid?

SPEAKER_03 23:33

I am I I used I used to be hybrid, I am now pretty much fully in the box. Okay. Yeah. Like I would say that the only analog is my uh my vocal chain, which I mean it has to be analog. Um, but the reason for that is just because I found that the recording is really like the most important thing, honestly. Um it's for me to make a beat sound good or an instrumental sound good, it takes me like 15 minutes. It really doesn't take me long uh because I'm just so used to kind of like how to set it up and how I want things to hit. But the vocal is everything, and it's something that I explain to my clients all the time that I can only make your mix sound as good as the vocal fidelity allows me to. Right. And what I mean by that is that the example I always give is like if I record something on a 1080p thing, I can't make it 4K. It's it it's it's just that that that detail and that information just isn't there. So if I now have a 4K beat uh essentially, and then I add a 1080p vocal, it's just gonna sound off. So now I purposely have to bring the beat down to 1080p to make your 1080p full vocal like blend and and match. I hope that makes sense. But like that that's kind of essentially what it is. So I knew that if I have my vocal chain on 10, and like I seen in the video that you guys posted before that, you know, your chain is only as good as your weakest link. Yes. I tried to really make sure that like every part of every down to the cables is like as good as it gets. Um so that my vocal, you know, has all the information and fidelity that I need. So now I don't really struggle with making the beat sound good because I can make the beat 8k if I want, because my vocal has that same information, so I now I can make it blend. Um and I found that you know plugins give me quite literally anything I need. And if I don't, if I really need some analog flavor, it's usually because the production was just like too digital, and I just and I need that like flavor and life. And I just go to like Access Analog, and they have amazing converters, they use like the Lynx Auroras and Antelope Galaxies and shit, and like their converters are like amazing, and um, I don't have to worry about maintaining tubes and recall and all that. I just like print it. Um, you know, I just need it need some internet, uh, some stable internet connection, print it, and I have my flavor, and I just move on.

SPEAKER_00 25:47

What is this uh access audio theme you're mentioning?

SPEAKER_03 25:49

Uh it's so it's pretty much you you send your audio to their server, yeah. They run it through their gear there, through their converters, back to the server, back to me. So there is a bit of a delay. Interesting, but it is real analog, and they have like everything.

SPEAKER_01 26:04

Do you do you run it in real time or? Yeah. Because for me, I tried it in real time, bro. I'm getting so much latency I cannot do it. Yeah, you you need 20,000 samples of latency and only as the right.

SPEAKER_03 26:15

I had to call Bell, I had to tell him what's the fastest Wi-Fi y'all got. Like the fastest. Like, you know what I mean? They're like, yeah, so um, yeah, you definitely there there is a bit of a delay, but usually when I use it, I don't really use it like, for example, like on my master channel, whatever. Like, if I would, if I would, then it's like a mastering session.

SPEAKER_02 26:32

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 26:33

You know, but mainly it's like, oh, this synth just sounds dead. Like it has no life, and like I can add as many. Now I'm gonna have to add like eight plugins and add all kinds of phase and aliasing just to get some flavor. Right. So I'm like, yo, let me just go to Access Analog, put some Pultex on it, or put like a 1170 or whatever I I find that I that I need on it to give it the flavor that I need, uh, print it and move on. Yeah, and um, and usually that does everything that I needed to do because look, analogs look when people talk about digital versus analog, it's it's just different, it's not like you know better or worse, and both of them have their strength and weaknesses, but sometimes analog just has like a life, like a breath to it that digital just can't quite get yet yet. And um sometimes I find myself needing it, but like less and less, honestly. Uh I've really found that um for almost any kind of flavor, I would have like a plugin that I would reach for. And uh if they just don't do it, then but like I've I've been using even Axis Analog less and less because the plugins are really getting good now.

SPEAKER_01 27:37

Do you still have the the Burl?

SPEAKER_03 27:39

Still have the Burl, yeah, yeah, yeah. The Burl is is definitely uh it's just the can the the A to D conversion is so important because that's like the that's like the sensor to the camera, you know what I'm saying? It's it's like the it's like the it's like the mirror between the real world versus the digital world. So it's it's like the portal. So that is so important, you know. When people have you know, I remember when I I used to have this like I went along McQuaid, I was like, yo, I have a hundred bucks, give me an interface, you know what I mean? Um they gave me some like some Steinberg or some shit.

SPEAKER_01 28:09

Oh, the the white one or the gray one, the gray one, the gray one, yeah. I know it, bro. Yeah, keep going, keep going, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 28:16

And bro, and then my homie, I remember at the time he was like, yo, we just got this like Neumann U87, and I was like, yo, this is sick, and you know, and I plugged it in, and we we thought we're like, yo, this is it, this is amazing, this is great. Um, but now looking back, I'm like, man, what was I thinking? Because like that Neumann is nothing, it's like having the the it's like having like an amazing camera, but you're shooting in the dark. Yeah, like it it made it don't make a difference. It's like, you know, it's only the mic is only as good as your converter. Yeah, you know what I mean? And the mic and the converter is only as good as the person that's in front of the mic. And it's like that, the whole thing you were saying, like it's only as good as your weakest link. Yes. And it's so true. So when people are like, oh, well, what mic do you use? I'm like, you shouldn't even ask what mic I use. It's more about like what's the whole chain. Yes, and then the acoustics.

SPEAKER_01 29:01

Yes. But I think it's like everything you're saying, I agree with you 100%. Every time when people I remember I had people specifically calling me and asking what mic I have. They didn't ask about anything else. Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's like, what mic do you have? I'm like, manly. I'm like, this is exactly the mic that I was looking for. I'm like, okay, cool. But like, there's so much more than just the microphones. Yes. You know what I mean? And I was watching um, I don't know who who he was, some some uh guy on the on Instagram, I guess it was an interview, and he said that there was a question, what is the biggest waste of money at the studio?

SPEAKER_00 29:33

Oh, is is uh and he said microphones, right? Yeah, and he said microphones.

SPEAKER_01 29:36

He said that all of the microphones, most of them use the same uh capsules and the same parts. And I was like, what is all from China? Yeah, it's like and he had like uh he had he made a video and he was showing the parts that you know this part comes from China, this part comes from China, blah blah and all that stuff. But you said a lot of things that this guy probably never even thought about is the fidelity of the microphone, is the resolution. Yep, people don't think about those things, they always see like oh parts from China, this and that. The parts are important, but like look, it's China 2026, this is not China 71. You know what I mean? Most of the things come from China, yeah. And I think they stepped their game up when it comes to the quality itself.

SPEAKER_03 30:15

But that's what I'm saying. Like, people like like okay, China and what? Exactly. Like, what about it? Like, I don't know, like why why why do we have that idea that something from China is like bad? Yeah, you know, because I I think have you seen the Chinese cars, bro? Yes, no, that's what I'm saying.

SPEAKER_00 30:28

They had cars that jump, bro. These guys are cooking. I don't know what these guys are on. If the Chinese car entered Canada, it would be game over. It'd be game over. I think they did already, no. Yeah, they're coming. Okay, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 30:37

It's game over for everyone here, man. That's what I'm saying. So it's like when people talk about parts from are from China and blah blah blah blah blah, it's like, dude, yeah, of course, but they they're doing that so it's cheaper for you. Because if you if you if you have your transformers manufactured in the United States or Germany, yeah, you're gonna pray pen pretty penny, but like it's iron at the end of the day. It's just iron and copper and nickel and like wound together. It's like you know what I mean? So it it it really don't matter. I I wouldn't say that a mic I actually fully disagree. I would say it's the opposite. I would say it's the most important thing to invest in in your studio. Don't don't invest in like if you want to invest in something in your studio, if you're an artist, just but if you like do it all dolo yourself, invest in a good preamp and a good microphone. 100% your converter look, converters are now nowadays, they're all okay, they're all acceptable. You know, if you have a scarlet, I'm sorry.

SPEAKER_04 31:32

I'm sorry, it's just not it's just not cutting it.

SPEAKER_03 31:35

I I get it, but like look, there's a price to entry at the end of the day if you want that quality, it's like you know, can't go into the booth, sound like a dying squirrel and be like, yo, make me sound like Post Malone, you know what I mean? You put some auto tune on it. Like it's not, it's just not that simple. You know, you need to like I can't use my iPhone and expect it to look like a DSLR, it's just not gonna happen, you know what I mean? So there's definitely tricks you can use, but it's it's not gonna happen. So invest in a good microphone and in a good preamp, that already is gonna give you so much like flavor and sound that like your converter is gonna be less of an uh issue. Because like I would say the converters that that last like five percent, five to ten percent, you know what I mean? But the mic is definitely like a good 30, and then you know the your preamp is another good 40. Yep. So that that last little percent is less of an issue, I would say, than the mic and the the preamp. Like if you have an amazing converter but a cheap mic, you know what I'm saying?

SPEAKER_01 32:30

You know, very high quality, very high fidelity, you're gonna hear all that cheapness, you know what I mean? But I think everything should be like within the same price range when it comes to like you know, microphone preamp and all that stuff, because then it's like you're getting the full experience of what things are supposed to be. If you have like, you know, Audio Technica 2020 and the 1073, I mean, you're gonna have Audio Technica 2023. That's hilarious. That's a funny competition. You're gonna have NT1 and then a two-tech. Yeah, yeah, you know what I mean. You're still gonna have NT1 or 2020 with a two-tech. Yeah, you know what I mean? So it's like, is it gonna be a little bit better? Maybe a little bit, but you know, you're not really gonna get that top of the line sound that most likely you're looking for, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 33:14

Yeah. I think that when if if you're Googling, like, oh, best mic to buy on a budget, you're not even thinking about it the right way. 100%. You know, it's it's it's something to look. If you're gonna spend a large sum of money on something, don't cheap out. That that's like that's clearly not the part to cheap out because you have to ask yourself, right? If a $500 mic could outperform you know a uh $251 or whatever, right? The ELAM. That's the mic, okay? Like that's literally the mic.

SPEAKER_01 33:42

We just we just clip that so people get loud on online.

SPEAKER_03 33:45

You know what I mean? So if if a $500 mic could beat a uh ELM, why would the Elam even be for sale? Yep, it's true for that type of price. But it's still for sale and it still costs exactly if not more now. Yeah, why? Because people are buying it. Exactly. And if people are buying it, it means that it clearly has some sort of a value, value worth that price. Yeah, yeah, because it's it's like no one because you know what it is? Ultimately, no one cares what you used. No one can like no one cares about none of this gear. They what they care about is if they click play, do I feel something? Exactly. And that's just a means to an end. Like the gear helps you get that feeling for people. That mic gives you the feeling and the the the energy that the artist had when they were standing in front of the mic.

SPEAKER_01 34:27

It's 100.

SPEAKER_03 34:28

You know, no one's gonna be like, click, oh, that was a 250. Like you know, like no, they just want to feel like a vibe, they want to feel something good, and you know, and because like majority of the music is is heard on TikTok and AirPods nowadays, anyways, it's not that big of a deal anymore, you know. Like sometimes you're actually better off using cheaper gear for the vibe that it is that you're going for. There's been there's been times where I had access to certain equipment, but I'm like, nope, we're going straight into the Apollo, we're not even using a 1073 emulation, we're using a cheaper mic because this fits better.

SPEAKER_00 35:01

Truly, yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_03 35:03

Definitely.

SPEAKER_00 35:03

So, what is the uh vocal chain you currently have at your studio?

SPEAKER_03 35:06

Uh I um tracking through a uh U67 Neumann. Nice uh put an NOS tube in it from like 56 or some shit. That's the thing right there. It just has a it just has a a crispiness that I really like. Um I'm going into the Rupert Neve Shelford as as my preamp EQ compression and saturation, um, and then into the bro for uh for AD conversion and then through AES connects to my uh Apollo.

SPEAKER_00 35:36

Nice.

SPEAKER_03 35:37

But yeah, the the bro's doing the conversion and um the shelf, in my opinion, is like the Bugatti of channel strips. It's just I I I just I can just get every sound that I need. If I want pop, if I want hip hop, if I want transparent, crunched, anything in and in between I can get. The only sound I can get out of it is that like squashy 1176 vibe, which I can just do with a plug-in after the fact. So I would just do like light compression and then crank it after the fact with a plug-in. Uh, but anything else I I can get out of it just by setting it up differently. So um I yeah, that's the vocal, and mind you, I've been obsessed with vocal chains for quite some time, and that's the one that I landed up on uh ended up with and um still love until this day.

SPEAKER_00 36:21

Were you uh trying out different mics, or did you just always know the 67 was the mic that you always wanted?

SPEAKER_03 36:26

Um I have tried different mics, I really didn't want to spend that much money on the mic. I trust me, I didn't. Um, but whenever I heard the difference between the 87 versus the 67, I just I couldn't ignore it. Yeah, you know, um and when you listen to them dry side by side, a lot of people are like, I don't even hear a difference at all. But it's when you start EQing and doing other things, that's when you start to really like bro. I can the kind of EQ moves I can make with like a tube mic versus like a non-tube mic is insane. Like it's a really that's when the difference is really noticeable when you start to add plugins and it really holds together, you know. Um I tried the you I tried the U47 like clone um fleet. Really good, really good. Actually, actually goes really well with the um the the shelf, but I was missing a little bit of just that like you know what I noticed mics, the more expensive to get, it's not really the the low mids and everything, it's the high end. Yeah, the way it handles the it has like a natural DSer built in. That's that's like the the more expensive the mic mic gets, the better the DSer of the mic itself.

SPEAKER_00 37:35

I agree. That's really it. It's like the TLM, man. I don't for some reason whenever I get vocals with the TLM. S's are always so it's like you have to use like three DSers like throughout your chain. Plus manual DSing. Like, yeah, plus yeah, yeah, it's insane.

SPEAKER_01 37:50

Oh, it's just too much, bro. 103 plus focus, right? Oh my god. Have fun mixing, guys. Take care. See you in 20 hours.

SPEAKER_03 38:00

Yeah, that should have me rage quit, bro. Yeah, bro. I'm sorry to anyone that uses that mic, bro. You know, like considering what it costs, bro, there's so many, so much better options out there. Even bro, I would even say sell it and get the warm audio 67.

SPEAKER_01 38:14

I never tried the warm audio microphone, so I cannot speak.

SPEAKER_03 38:18

Bro, the 67. Watch the YouTube videos. The 67 is shocking. Like I it shocked me. I was low key like, damn. I spent a lot on my mic, and it's like kind of right there. It uses the EF86, transformer only has one transformer, but still, uh quite literally the same capsule, its own power supply, it's it's all there. You know, yes, the parts are you know not the you know uh uh OEM Neumann, whatever, but it's there, bro. It's it's it's right, you know what you're arguing about is like five, like maybe like three percent in terms of like fidelity difference. You know, it's it's really it's really up there. So and it's maybe a couple bills more than TLM. TLM sucks, I'm sorry. It doesn't so it sucks.

SPEAKER_01 39:03

But the thing is like you can get a used TLM for like five, six bills. Yeah, I don't I just don't think it's like brand new. I think they're like 1400 or something like that. Brand new? Yeah. 1400 for TLM is kind of criminal, I'm not gonna lie. Yeah, it's it's terrible. But if you yeah, if you're gonna get a use one for like five, six bills and there's like nothing else that you can get, okay. Let it be, you know.

SPEAKER_03 39:23

Yeah, you need to like, I don't know, like run it through a preamp and then like crank the the high end down or something. It's just the S it's just so bright and it's so bad.

SPEAKER_00 39:32

It's a smooth brightness, it's like a harsh brightness, very harsh brightness, it has no body either, like has no like like the mids.

SPEAKER_03 39:39

The mids is where the life is at, you know.

SPEAKER_01 39:41

But there's like two microphones, in my opinion. I feel like two microphones have the advantage over uh you know, fets and all that stuff because the mid-range with two microphones is like you just cannot get it anywhere else. Nope.

SPEAKER_03 39:53

Definitely nope. If you if you're gonna get yourself a mic, I would I would definitely say uh like unless you're going for like a specific sound, like no, you need you need a tube in that in that shit. You need a tube in your mic, yeah, for sure. And its own power supply makes a huge difference as well. More voltage, more headroom, you know. Yeah, for sure.

SPEAKER_00 40:11

So um so Antidote by Travis Scott. Yeah. Can you run us through the the day that that beat was made, how that beat was made?

SPEAKER_03 40:18

Uh the day was uh me and Wanda Girl, we were at a restaurant and um we literally just heard that sample play. Right. Like the song. Uh we heard it play like on the on the radio, and we're like, yeah, this is pretty cool. She sounded it. And later that day we went to um it was actually a really funny studio. It was like a guy who had like a studio like on a pickup truck. On a pickup truck? Yeah, so he had a pickup truck and then he had like um like a trailer behind it. Yeah. And he turned it into like a mobile studio. That was like his thing. That's pretty sick. Yeah.

SPEAKER_04 40:49

Oh, interesting.

SPEAKER_03 40:50

Yeah, honestly, I forgot the name. Uh, I I would totally mention it if I if I remember it. But I probably even remember he had like the HS8s like strapped up so they don't fall and shit. Like it was like actually like a mobile studio. Um, and I was just cooking up. Like I just like loaded up the sample, just like I swear, bro, I made the beat in like 15-20 minutes. Not trying to brag, I'm just I'm generally like it was a quick, it wasn't even like I didn't even think twice about it, it was just like another day, it was another beat, you know what I mean? And then at some point, um Wonder Girl was just like stop working on it. Like it's it's good. I'm like, okay, cool. And she's like, oh, I think Travis, it was it was so casual. I don't know, it was so casual. She's like, oh, I think Travis would like it. And then I'm like, okay, cool, I'll send it to her. And then like two weeks later, it's when I seen it like all over Twitter. That's that's kind of how that went.

SPEAKER_01 41:35

How did you feel in that moment?

SPEAKER_03 41:38

Um at first I didn't even think it was my at first. I was like, man, someone took the same shit, you know, someone made someone used the same sample, like, oh, they beat me too. That's crazy. Um, but then I'm like, wait, and I I swear, like I listened to it, I'm like, huh? Wait, hold on. And then I went back to it, like, you know, it's the same key, everything is the same. Like, it's so she didn't even tell you that. I didn't even think she knew. Oh, that's crazy. I I don't know, but like I don't even think she like at the time when it like you know I mean Travis is notorious for just like you know, drop dropping it because it was just SoundCloud. He didn't even like drop it for real. Like it was SoundCloud was kind of like a oh, this is for the fans, like before rodeo kind of a thing. Yeah, yeah. Uh and then it became like front page SoundCloud, it like blew up like organically, and then he's like, Oh, I have to put it on the put it on the album. So um, but you know what's even crazier? That was the first time Travis even you know uh did that high-pitched singing voice like that. I thought it was Ray Schemmerd.

SPEAKER_00 42:28

Oh, interesting.

SPEAKER_03 42:29

I thought it was like Ray Shremard featuring, or like and some people even at the time, like the tweets were like, Oh, party next door featuring Travis, like uh Ray Shremmer featuring Travis, no one thought it was Travis. Like, yeah, and even me, I was like, Oh shit, party next door. You know, I was like, oh cool, you know, I didn't even know. Um, and then it was like just like Travis Scott antidote, and I'm like, oh, it was just Travis, and it's just like that's him singing like that. I'm like, oh, I didn't even know, but yeah, it felt very surreal, obviously. It was just, you know, it was a was a it was a really cool moment. I was like, oh shit, I did it. You know, it's possible, kind of a thing. And um then like as it just kept on blowing up, it it's very surreal. Like, I don't think you you really ever comprehend the the impact, especially when just like so many people have heard it. Um, but you're just you, you know what I mean? And like I remember at one point at OVO Fest, um, Drake brought Travis out, and then Travis brought Kanye out, and they're on stage going crazy performing antidote. I'm just like standing there, you know what I mean, and everyone's going crazy, and I'm just like, yeah, you you don't really like uh process that really. It's it's it's it's in even till the ill until today, it's still pretty surreal.

SPEAKER_01 43:35

So when you stand in there in a stadium and you hear your your song, you know that you made like is there any type of emotional reaction you have, or it's just like you can't believe that it's even happening.

SPEAKER_03 43:45

Yeah, it's more that it's more like what like what's happening right now, kind of a thing. Um I can't help but to in those moments to feel like uh it just brings me back to like me, like, you know, sitting in the front yard, like with my guitar, just like. Fucking around, you know what I mean? And then like here I am, like, you know, like where's the time gone? Kind of a thing. It's it's really it's just really surreal. You can't really process it because the impact is so huge, you know. And um, you know, you get all kinds of messages from people like, yo man, like that song got me through whatever, whatever. I'm like, antidote, like you know what I mean. Okay, you know, uh, but still, it's like, you know, like you realize the impact and like uh like uh eastbound type beats, and like you know, you it's really crazy because like I don't, you know, you don't feel like um a celebrity or when you just feel like you're still the same person, you know what I mean? So it it it kind of gives you a bit of a glimpse to into like I guess like famous people because they're just still them, you know what I mean? And but they have but they have so much impact because so many people seen it, heard it, whatever. Um, but it's a bit of a crazy feeling, you know. Like, y'all, y'all ever seen that video of Justin Bieber shopping for shoes, and he kept getting harassed by people like wanting to take pictures. He's like, yo, I'm just buying shoes, like I'm just trying to buy shoes. Like, I'm I'm a person, I'm a human being, I'm just trying to buy some shoes, you know what I mean? And it's like it's it's kind of like that feeling that like I'm still me, but I understand why that impact is so huge, and it's it's really surreal seeing that play out. But I but you know, besides that, obviously you get the emotions like wow, this is crazy. Like, you know, Kanye and Travis, you know, going crazy to my shit. Like it's it's it's it's it's insane, you know what I mean? So but it's something that you like, trust me, bro. Like, you don't really register that ever, really. It's something that you continuously like process because it's it's it's crazy.

SPEAKER_01 45:36

How old were you when uh when it dropped?

SPEAKER_03 45:38

Uh like 20, like 19, 20, 21, maybe like around that range, something like that. It was 2015, so that's like 10 years ago. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 45:47

20 years old, yeah. Did you know? So when you made the beat, like in the moment, you're with Wonder, did you know it was gonna be a hit? Or you're just like oh, it's just another beat I missed.

SPEAKER_03 45:55

No, it's it's it's I I actually think that you never know. That's the whole point, you know, because like so often I would send B packs out, I'm like, yeah, yo, this one and this one, they're gonna go crazy when they hear this one, and then they pick the one that I was like, eh, let me fill it up with like another one or whatever, and then they pick that one, and then they go crazy to that one.

SPEAKER_04 46:14

Right.

SPEAKER_03 46:15

Um, yeah, you you if you think it's gonna be a hit, probably it won't be a hit. Unless it's just like undeniable, you know what I mean? And it's just like crazy. But uh, I think that's kind of like part of it. You don't know that it's gonna. I didn't, I swear I didn't even think twice about it. It was just like it's cool.

SPEAKER_00 46:32

How about when it first came out? You heard the the song that the Travis I actually put up when you heard the song, were you like, okay, this is a hit. Or even was it even until later?

SPEAKER_03 46:40

Even then, no, like even then, I was like, it was cool. Yeah, I didn't even think he knew. I don't think anyone knew.

SPEAKER_00 46:47

I guess he just put on SoundCloud as just like a throwaway, yeah. So he probably didn't.

SPEAKER_03 46:51

And then it blew up like organically, and he was like, Oh fuck, I guess I'm gonna have to put on the album. So I don't think I don't think anyone knew. Wow, that's crazy. I I think that's kind of how that goes, right? Especially with songs that like organically turn into like hit records. Um, you know, like sometimes, you know, like for example, million dollar baby, right? Tommy, tell me, Rich Richman.

SPEAKER_04 47:10

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 47:10

I think he knew, like, yeah, this is this is, but it's also a different time, like you know, TikTok and it blew up and like all the likes and people like yo, drop it, whatever, whatever. Uh, I think he had at least a hunch, like, yo, this could be big. But did but was it gonna like number one though? I don't think he he knew. No one knows that. You don't know that, right? Because it's like once it's out and it's in the world and it starts to like have it have a life of its own, that's when you really uh see the results.

SPEAKER_01 47:36

That song came out like three years ago.

SPEAKER_00 47:38

Was it three years ago? I think it was two years ago. Tom Urshman? I think it was 2014. Something like that, yeah. 2044, 2024, you know. Oh, sorry, 2024, no. 2024.

SPEAKER_03 47:48

Yeah, but that was massive, massive.

SPEAKER_00 47:50

It's a great record though, amazing record.

SPEAKER_01 47:52

Yeah, yeah. I feel like in those two years, music industry changed so much already. It did. Since like then to what it is right now. It did, it did.

SPEAKER_03 48:00

Yeah, I remember um getting the remember when everyone was like, oh, Bitcoin, Bitcoin, Bitcoin. Like, oh, buy Bitcoin now, and you're like, whatever, and then later on you're like, fuck it. You know what I mean? I had the exact same thing with TikTok, bro. Because from remember, because at one point it was just Instagram, yeah, yeah. Like straight up, like nothing came even close, bro. Like, you know, it was just straight up Instagram. Uh like maybe Instagram and like Snapchat at that time. And I remember uh shout out Patrick. Um, this guy, he was like, yo, you need to download it now, bro. At the time it was called Musically, it was just like a bunch of like teenage girls doing like stupid dances, whatever, right? And I'm and I I downloaded it, I took his advice, I downloaded, I'm looking, I'm like, what the fuck is this? Like, this is gonna be instant, like no way, bro. It's like it's like me being like, yo, bro, like get the fucking Samsung, bro. I'm telling you, in like a couple years, no one's gonna use iPhones. You're like, you're bugging, bro. Like iMessage, airdrop, like iPhone's gonna be here forever. Yeah, and then yeah, bro, he was he was right all the way. Like, I never knew TikTok was gonna be like out of there like that. Cause like, bro, even now, Instagram is just like it barely even has any identity from back then.

SPEAKER_00 49:09

Yeah, the algorithm on Instagram sucks. You don't you never see any of your friends posts, it's all sponsorships, all businesses, all ads, like reels. I really don't know what the algorithm is saying.

SPEAKER_03 49:19

Yeah, it's it's just um it's just pretty much one big like advertisement attention hog, like you know what I mean. And uh that all came from like tick TikTok kind of figured that one out, man. You know, the the short form, you know, you don't even have to look up what you want to see, like just next scroll, like it just learns the algorithm, uh, which really f like ruined things, in my opinion. Um in some ways it it definitely benefits us, but I in way more ways do I think that it ruined things because uh I just feel like it it took a little bit of the like we're now not making really like we're making music for people, but the but the middleman is the algorithm. Yeah, you know, so essentially we're making music for the algorithm.

SPEAKER_00 50:02

Yes, 100%.

SPEAKER_03 50:03

You know, and yeah, the algorithm only you know goes based off of what humans like, but the it's so analytic it's anal analytical to the point where like the people that created the algorithms need to create algorithms to understand the algorithm. It's like it's really it's really messed up, and um you know, now we're not really creating music just to create and just to put it out there, we're creating music in hopes that it will go viral, and you know, and and the virality is because of the algorithm, you know, because it's but it's obviously like the the bottom line is people, um but yo, there's sometimes there's some song some songs that I'm like, yo, this is fire, you know what I mean? Like this this could be a hit, but the wrong post, not the right lighting, it didn't have a hook or whatever, whatever. Um yeah, it's it's it's changed.

SPEAKER_00 50:52

Yeah, yeah, big time. So so you've been in the industry for over a decade. What would you say is like one of the most important business lessons that you've learned throughout your career?

SPEAKER_03 51:02

I mean, uh you know, to be very obvious, like you know, contracts, understanding contracts, yeah, understanding uh where money goes, like and how how to collect it. I think a lot of people I generally don't even know that. Right. Like they start out, they make some music. Look, if you're an engineer, very different. It's a transaction. You know, you get a client, you know, they have this stems, here's the money, here's your song, we're both happy. But if you're making a song, a lot of people don't even understand the difference between like masters versus pub versus writing shares, lit sync licensing, all that kind of stuff. They don't they don't understand legal language, sunset clauses, yada yada yada. Um, and then you know it's it's so funny. It's like the same stories on repeat. At some point, you know, them and the manager, them and the AR, they get into it or the label, and then then all of a sudden they read the contracts, they're like, This is fucked up. I'm like, dude, you signed it. Like, you know what I mean? And I'm a victim of it myself, you know what I mean? So like I learned the hard way for sure.

SPEAKER_04 52:01

Right.

SPEAKER_03 52:02

Um, but yeah, definitely just like understanding where the money flows, right? Because someone opened their wallet, you know what I'm saying? And the money went somewhere. Because now the money's in your pocket. Like, that's that's money, that's value, that's that that people are working for this, right? So, like, it's real money, but where where does it flow? How does it go from me clicking play to money in your pocket? Yeah, understanding those steps, bro. Now there's chat GPT and all that kind of like just just just like just chat GPT it. You know, it's it's it's all there, you know. But you do need to understand it. Otherwise, you're you're you're like, oh I'm you know, I'm a starving artist. I'm like, yeah, because you don't even know where your money is.

SPEAKER_04 52:41

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 52:42

Bro, the each year, I forgot the number, but like a huge number goes through what's called the black box, which is just uncollected royalties, which gets distributed amongst all the highest earning people for me enough. It's so backward, it's like it should be like the opposite. Yeah, you know, like, dude, you make two dollars from your music this year, hold this, like, you know, three bills. You know what I mean? Like it should go that way. But yeah, so there's like a black box, which you know, all the uncollected royalties go towards. Um, and then by the time you come knocking, um, they're like, Yeah, well, you know, you took too long. And there's actually there's like a time, I forgot, I think it's like five years or 15 years, I forgot the number, but like there's a certain amount of years that you need to like go and collect your money. Yeah, uh, and another thing, business-wise, I would say, is people they're so focused on streaming, you're not even realizing radio still pays like upwards to like $40 per play. Yeah, so serious and all that.

SPEAKER_01 53:33

Oh, if you can make yeah, yeah. Some exchange is where the real money is.

SPEAKER_03 53:38

Yeah, bro. Like, like, you know, bro, like go take a trip to Mexico. You none of these guys have fucking Spotify. They're construction workers with a big ass fucking radio with an antenna listening to radio, bro. You know what I mean? And these advertisers, you know, they pay where the ears are, right? So yeah, you can you can make serious money, no pun intended, um, with uh radio streams. 100%. So if you make radio records, bro, push for radio. You know what I mean? Streams is like 0.006 cents per stream.

SPEAKER_01 54:09

100%. I I feel like too, when it comes to a lot of artists, everybody's pushing for the, you know, everybody's complaining, I don't make enough money from Spotify, this and that. But it's like, as an artist, there's so many different ways. Streaming is just one avenue. You know, I mean, there's a whole bunch of other things. As you're saying, radio, I mean, merch and all that stuff. Like, you gotta think about it like it's business at the end of the day.

SPEAKER_03 54:32

It is a business, it is a business. And look, it's it's I break it down to like t-shirt business. If I have a t-shirt that I spent $10 on and I sell it for $30, I made $20. You know what I mean? If I have a t-shirt that I spent $50 on and I sell it for $10, I lost $40. So the same goes for any business, man. Like we're in the music business. Exactly. Yes, there's a magic of like the creation and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, but ultimately, like, if you are not paying rent, there's not really a lot of magic happening anyways, right? So you you need to make some money. And ideally, you you can find a balance between, you know, you know, keeping the the fun and the magic alive in the music whilst you know actually like earning from it, but you're not gonna earn from it if you don't have like financial discipline and understanding how to even earn, like where to sign up, how these portals work, and like how you get paid for all these things. Um, and now more than ever, is it easier to like figure that out? Like the thing, the things that managers are doing or whoever is doing it for you. Um, you you can do it yourself. It just takes a little bit more know-how and a little bit more effort to like actually learn it. Uh, but it it's so important. Like, I like how how are you complaining about not making money, but you're not putting in the effort to like actually learn where the money flows, like how it goes from the click to the you know, check. That that's it. You you gotta figure that out as a musician for sure, you know. As an artist, gotta figure that out. And like you're saying, the different streams of income. You know, it's not just streams, you know what I mean? Streams is good, but it's uh so much more competitive now because I think now the numbers are north of a million, right? Per day. Yes. On on Spotify, something like that, which is crazy. Obviously, a huge chunk of it is just absolute garbage, it's just ass, you know.

SPEAKER_01 56:12

Because a whole bunch of that is AI too, right?

SPEAKER_03 56:14

Yeah, bots. Oh, yeah. Bro, the other day, I was mom, I love you. I was in the I was in the car with my mom, and she was playing like all these songs, and I'm like, because I know the artifacts, and I'm an engineer, like I can hear that stuff. I'm like, this is AI. I'm like, who's this artist? And she's like, oh, whatever the name was. And I'm like, so let me see, let me see, let me see the cover art. AI. I'm like, bro. Yeah, my mother was listening to AI music, bro, in the car, like and vibing, yeah, like singing along, bro. Like, I was like, oh my god, like we're there now for real. Like, yeah, uh, yeah, crazy, crazy, man. AI music is like, uh, uh, I don't know, man. That's a whole conversation of its own. Yeah, 100%.

SPEAKER_00 56:58

That's why they came out now with the uh check marks, right? On Spotify. You have to uh get yourself verified as a real artist. They have that these days now.

SPEAKER_03 57:05

That's insane.

SPEAKER_00 57:05

So if you're AI, you don't got the check mark, most likely you're AI.

SPEAKER_03 57:08

That's insane to me, man. I I just think that like um we we technologically we were advanced enough at Google. I think we could have stopped there. You know, that was enough. Like, you know, like when people are talking now about AI and like uh, you know, the arts, it's such a it's a very sensitive topic topic, obviously. And it's very very um confusing because it's very difficult to draw the line. When is it like when is it when when does it go from a tool to a replacement of the actual thing?

SPEAKER_04 57:42

For sure, you know?

SPEAKER_03 57:44

Like if I if I made the whole song, I made like everything, but then I'm like, oh, I just I just need like a little saxophone. So no, give me a little saxophone, 130 bpm, blah blah blah, this key. I load it in. Yeah, you you made almost everything of it, you know. But then your homie's like, yo, that's sacks at the end, though? That shit was crazy. How'd you do that? Uh MIDI, like you know what I mean? Like you, you know, and okay, now, but now you just did the sacks and the bass line. Okay, fine, I also did the drums. Okay, fine, okay, yeah, that synth was also AI. Okay, sure, the whole instrumental was AI, but who cares? It's a good song. Like, like, where where does it go from a tool to you didn't even do nothing? You know what I mean? And then some people are like, well, who cares if the song is good? And then I'm like, yeah, I don't know, who cares? I I do, but some people don't.

SPEAKER_01 58:33

I I think we care more than everybody else. We definitely do care more than everybody else.

SPEAKER_03 58:37

Well, because we feel the bottom line, yeah, right? Like if if if if this prompt thing could just fully replace something that I spent hours of blood, swelling tears on. Not even hours, years and years. Yeah, to learn how to do it. Yeah, that's what I'm saying. Like it and and the AI does it perfectly every time. And sometimes I I've actually been shocked by the nuance and the the the reality, like how how realistic it's becoming. And um I don't know. I I'm very against it personally, but but like I I've still haven't really quite figured out for myself why I'm actually even against it. It's a very difficult thing for me to even like figure out for myself because some people don't give a fuck. Yeah, like they're like, dude, I like it. I don't know. I click play, it's a vibe, who cares? Like, move on, like it's you know, whatever, whatever. And some people are like, no, this is wrong, and I'm like more steering towards that. Um, but more so because the AIs are learning from our shit. Yes, exactly without any competition, like they're making money, we're not, but you're learning from my shit. They're like, Yeah, well, it's readily available online. I guess so. Yeah. I don't know. How do you guys feel about it?

SPEAKER_00 59:53

Um where would you draw the line from like okay, it's a tool versus like okay, like this is like not okay or not acceptable or my my opinion on it is I think when producers or even like sometimes engineers they use AI as a tool, I think it's okay if it's contributing towards um your workflow, but it as long as it's not replacing your entire workflow. So if you have a producer that's what I mean.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:16

Like, where when does it become the entire? If if the if the AI, the synth, the drums, the bass, and all you did was a hi-hat.

SPEAKER_00 1:00:26

No, that's that's replacing it. That is replacing but where do you draw the line?

SPEAKER_03 1:00:29

When is it when is it where is the line?

SPEAKER_00 1:00:32

I guess it's hard to put like a percentage on it. It is true, it's hard to put a percentage on it. But my thing is like you have people who go on Suno, they make a beat, they send it to someone and be like, oh yo, I produce the beat. I'm a producer, I'm a real music producer. Sample makers and everything. But bro, my my freaking grandma could do that, you know? So are you really a producer or are you just a prompter?

SPEAKER_03 1:00:52

Right? But you know, but you know what's interesting that makes me think of, and and this is a bit of a sidetrack, but follow me, right? There's this show I I watched called The Food That Built America, and um one of the most impactful stories was Henry Hines, the guy that invented ketchup. This guy was a fucking dog, bro. The guy went to jail for bankruptcy like 13 times, came out, new business. He figured, anyways, he he did the whole ketchup thing. He had electricity in his um factory before the White House. He invented the conveyor belts. Oh, that's it, yeah. Like he he was very he was a pioneer in multiple spaces. Right. And the reason why I mentioned that is because electricity at the time was like kind of like how we're talking about 5G, like, oh, they're gonna fry us and you know, it's gonna like read our minds and whatever, whatever. They were talking about electricity back then as well. Right. Like, oh, they're gonna electrocute us, it's gonna kill us, whatever. But like now we're like not even blinking flies at any electrical pole that we see. But you know, think about living without it.

SPEAKER_04 1:01:46

Yeah, for real.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:48

Right. And um the same way that we're that they're talking about the phones now, like, oh, everyone's always looking at their phones, they were talking about newspapers back then. Like, oh, everyone's always loud looking, no one even talks to each other anymore. They were saying the same thing about newspapers, you know, and that cycle kind of keeps repeating. Like right when the we went went from the cusp of tape to digital, they were saying the same thing. Like, oh, it's not real, you know, it's it's not like actual music no more, it's a computer, da-da-da-da-da. And now we're oh, it's not real, it's AI, we're not even doing it no more. But the unique thing in this scenario is that the AI replaces the whole shebang, right? When we went from tape to digital, the only thing that changed was the tape machine.

SPEAKER_04 1:02:31

Yes.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:32

Because Pro Tools is the tape machine, yes, but now we have command Z. So rather than having to go in and cut it in the white tape and everything and reattach the fucking reel, now we can just like Command Z and whatever, whatever. That's that's kind of really the only thing that changed when we went from these things. Same thing with electricity. We went from having to like, you know, friction, make the fire to like click and then now, but it's still energy, it's still something real and physical. The the difference with AI is that like I can't buy a ticket to an AI artist, I can go see an AI live. Yes, you know what I mean. It's difficult to become a fan of an AI because it's it's it's it's not a human. And that's one thing AI will never uh be able to do is be a human. So like an AI singing about all these struggles and it says all the perfect bros and everything, it's like, but you haven't gone through that. I know what it's like to get my heart broken, I know what it's like to you know fall in love, I know what it's like to do all these things, and I and I I can when I sing about it, you relate to it because you're also human and you you know what that feeling is, and that's when that magical connection happens when when you fall in love with a song. But when an AI does it, you fall in love with it, but it's kind of like it's kind of like porn, you know what I'm saying? You get everything except the connection, you know, and and and that matters, I I believe, you know. I I think that matters. So like uh, and because it's so hard to identify where that line falls in terms of when it becomes a tool versus when it replaces the whole thing, that's when it kind of becomes like, okay, like I then I don't really know. You know what I mean? Like if something is poisonous but you can't really identify at what point it becomes deadly, you may as well just not use it, type shit. You know, like that's kind of how how how I've been like I haven't used AI at all when it comes to music. Um will I add some because some people are like, hey man, if you don't use it, you know, you're gonna get left behind the people by the people that do use it. Guess we shall see. You know? Yeah. So what about you guys? Do you guys use it? There's no judgment at all.

SPEAKER_01 1:04:27

No, I use it every now and then. Like I did use it. Like Suno? Uh no, Eureka. It's like the same thing as Suno, but like just different algorithm. So one time um I was working on this track. I was like co-producing it, and we had the situation where we couldn't get the sample clear, blah, blah, blah, and all that stuff. So I was like, guys are stressed, and they're like, yo, what are we gonna do? This and that. I'm like, yo, send me that. You know what I mean? So I take a sample, put it in the murika, and I'm like, let me see what I can like get. So I get the similar, not similar feel, but like the same progression in a sense, but like something within the space that the sample was, right? And I just typed the problem. I was like, uh, I think I did something like uh old school Houston sound, like DJ Screw, blah, blah. I was looking for a specific sound, and I got like 10 different versions of the sample that didn't sound nothing like the sample that it was being. But it was fitting that vibe? It was better. It was better. Like when we did that, nobody even cared about listening to the original demo because the demo was not even as good as the other one was. So we just took those 10 different samples, we just chopped chopped it up because everything is in the same key, but it's different variations of that. And we just took it up, chop it up, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, and then when you listen to it, it sounds like it feels good, you know what I mean. But again, it's like we used it as a as a sampling tool more than anything else, you know.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:56

I mean, so yeah, and you know, we we when When you frame it like that, it's kind of like you know, had you not been able to do that, that would have been money lost. Yeah, right. So it because that's the thing, like some because I I mean, I think as creatives, we run into that issue so often, clearance and that that kind of stuff. Um, and when you can't clear something, you know, it it it stops money from going into your pocket. So if you can use AI in in that sense to you know still put money in your pocket, yeah, that's that's that's that will really test your your morality and your integrity on how you feel on it.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:35

I think even originally with the sample that we they were trying to clear, the problem was that they wanted to clear it. The artist was willing to pay for it, but it's just the producer wanted ridiculous money just to clear the sample. It was like 10k to clear the sample. It's like, brother, the whole album project is like the budget's not 10k, you know what I mean?

SPEAKER_03 1:06:53

So people are very unrealistic. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:06:56

So it's like numbers, you know, sometimes you just gotta navigate and work through it. I mean, I feel like there's definitely use for AI in the space. I don't necessarily think it's bad. I don't think it's good. Like, it's not bad if you don't use it in the bad ways. It's not good if you don't use it in the the other way.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:13

So kind of like a knife kind of like the whole knife thing where it's like you can you can use a knife to stab someone, but you can use a knife to like slice bread and share with someone, kind of a thing.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:20

Exactly. Like, I don't personally, I I don't think I would ever use AI to like prompt this song and be like, you know, make me a song about this, this, this, those other things.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:28

Yeah, but what about like an artist, for example, doesn't have a budget for producers, says like, yo, I have a specific sound in mind that I want. Yeah, this AI made me a B. And now I'm gonna sing on it.

SPEAKER_01 1:07:38

I had the uh I had somebody that called me, I think, last week. He sent me a demo. It was a Suno, Suno uh version of the song. Yeah, Suno, like a whole song. And he was like, hey, I'm working on the song, this is what it was from Suno. I want you to recreate it. So he basically wanted to take the Suno, whatever Suno did, he would sing it just in his own voice, but he wanted to keep it instrumental, he was like, Yeah, can you like reproduce it? Still keep the same vibe as much as close to what it is, with like the same chord progression and all that stuff, but in like human way. So I guess people are doing it when they use where they use Suno to get the ideas, get the ideas, and then like reach out to other people is like, can you do this, you know, for me?

SPEAKER_02 1:08:29

That's yeah, it's interesting.

SPEAKER_03 1:08:30

How do you feel about that? I mean it's it's like if you go from the gut. Like if you answer from the gut, like how do you feel about it?

SPEAKER_00 1:08:38

I just feel like it just takes away the entire creative process of music because part of the enjoyment of music is the creation, getting the ideas out, like fucking it up, but then figuring it out afterwards. Right. Right. So now it's kind of like okay, you already have the product created for you, you're just copying the product. So it's like, are you really still doing anything at the end of the day?

SPEAKER_03 1:09:00

Yeah, I don't know. It's yeah, I I I agree. And it's it's kind of like the whole thing of like, you know, what's the point of dancing? It's not to finish the dance, it's to dance. Yeah, yeah. You know, like the whole point of like, like, man, we all know that one song that gives us goosebumps and that we we could just get lost in it. And like, wow, like I wonder what they were thinking while they were creating. How did they come up with that? Like, yeah, like that, you know, like all the artwork, and oh, like that little I didn't even know that thing wasn't the artwork reference. That and like just that that whole like it's like a universe on its own, like has like it's its own world, like you know, getting lost in the music like that and uh the cult falling that it creates now, it almost becomes like a like a product, you you know what I mean? And and it is, it always was, but it's just it's just different. And I can't I can't quite like I guess articulate exactly how I feel and why I feel like I guess like some negative feelings towards there. It's I mean, obviously I'm a creative, so of course I'm gonna have some sort of a you know, if a plu if you tell a plumber like, hey, did you know that there's this new robot that can completely take over your job and do it like 10 times better? Have you heard about that? It's like, oh that's great. No, I don't know how to feed my family anymore. Yeah, I love that. Obviously, there's there's gonna be negativity towards it, but on the consumer end, oh, there's a robot, you know, $25 a month, and I don't have to hire a plumber and deal with a real person and talk to them and offer them coffee and pay them I don't know what kind of money. So, but I don't I I just don't think that's long term, that's not sustainable. Yeah. When the focus only goes towards the consumer's benefit.

SPEAKER_01 1:10:30

Yeah. Well, it's consumers and the CEOs that really benefit from the whole thing and everything on the back end of the of the chain. Like, I mean, AI, they don't AI doesn't need to eat, AI doesn't need no money, AI doesn't need anything, right? So it's like you're cut off.

SPEAKER_03 1:10:44

I don't know about that one. AI need AI needs a shit ton of water to the point that like droughts are now becoming a real conversation. AI actually needs like a shit ton of power to the point that data centers are disrupting people's neighborhoods and they can't sleep. AI actually needs a lot, and and that's and that's the thing. It's actually a a way more hungry monster than I think we um are are realizing. You know what I mean? Like someone said like you use uh a gener like a person on average uses about a glass of water a day in terms of AI prompts.

SPEAKER_00 1:11:12

Really?

SPEAKER_03 1:11:13

Some shit like that. I possibly, yeah. Don't quote me, but something like that. But sorry, sorry, I I completely cut you off. I do want you to finish your thought in terms of like AI not needing anything or doesn't eat anything.

SPEAKER_01 1:11:24

You're saying like it's not a person, it's not a real it's not a person, but I also feel like I think AI as a tool, or not even as a tool, as a technology, it kind of portrays our society and what we have become. Because think about art itself or like all the creatives, right? There was time in a in a lifetime where for most of the time where to be a musician, be a producer, be somebody, you really need to know your shit. You have to be on top of your game, you have to study every day, like you have to be always outworking yourself, right? But then somewhere down the line in the past decade, I feel like we've hit that space where we got all these influencers, we got all these people that are famous for nothing. People started becoming famous without any type of talent. And I feel like AI kind of went to that space where right now you can just prompt stuff and you can pretend this is you and you can become famous, but without really putting in work to become famous or like become good if you if you guys know.

SPEAKER_03 1:12:36

No, I I get I get I get what you mean. And I mean ultimately would you look if you go to a gallery and there's a there's a beautiful painting there, right? Like gorgeous, it's stunning. Like, yeah, I want to hang this up in my house, like ASAP. And it costs four four grand, you're gonna ask questions, right? Like, okay, like who made it, you know, what's the story behind it? If someone's like, Yeah, it was a prompt, they're still gonna pay four grand. I don't think so. Yeah, I don't think so. I don't think so. Because you know that whoever made it paid twenty-five dollars a month if they didn't use the free version, you know, and they just put it on a canvas. So if anything, you're like, how much does the canvas cost? Because I'll pay that, you know, and if anything, I'll do the prompt myself and hang it up. But if I told you no, this is real ink, this is real paint, the painter actually went to this location and used this type of whatever, whatever, and like they spent like you know, 200 hours creating this, and now here it is. That for that four grand is all about it. Sounds like a good deal. So the only issue is is that uh you know you can see right, like like for now.

SPEAKER_04 1:13:42

Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:13:43

No, it's funny. I see I seen a post the other day, someone's like, Oh, I haven't seen a lot of AI images lately. They are AI images, but you don't recognize it no more because they're getting that good type shit. Like the the content that's out right now is so much of it is AI actually that you it's it's now outperforming humans. Like there's more AI content than there is human content. But we we don't even know, bro. I feel like everyone's grandma is always sending like AI videos. Like my grandma's sending me so much AI videos, and like I don't even think she knows it's AI because because they're older and shit, you know what I mean? So um, yeah, so in that in that sense, like we don't we can't identify. Well, now we still can, like, especially trained ears, we can identify when a song is AI, but very soon we're not gonna be able to anymore.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:31

Yeah, because it's moving at the pace that I mean, even if you compare like AI from last year to the AI right now.

SPEAKER_03 1:14:36

Remember the Will Smith eating spaghetti video? Bro, yeah, and now it now it's like photorealistic, it looks like an IMAX movie, man.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:44

Even that uh during the World Cup, the Haland video when he was like eating and he saw himself in the mirror, he like scared himself. Yeah, yeah. Bro, I I thought it was real at first. Yeah, 100%. It looks so real.

SPEAKER_01 1:14:54

Yeah, well, it was real, it was just they replaced the original guy with halans.

SPEAKER_00 1:14:59

But like even halan, like it looked like it was actually real, like he was in a restaurant that happened.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:04

You know, even during the Super Bowl, I seen like some AI in uh in in certain advertisements and stuff. Yeah, so using it everywhere.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:11

It's out here. We can't really look. We can't stop it.

SPEAKER_03 1:15:15

We're not gonna stop it, you know, 100% not. So they can't even regulate it, so time will tell. That's kind of that's kind of where we're at, you know what I mean? And um, you know, when it comes to like using it, it's a choice ultimately. It's just a choice. And whether the morality of behind it is is good or bad, it's up to the beholder, I guess. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_00 1:15:36

Definitely. Yeah, you got anything uh, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:15:39

Let's go back to the studio thing because we we spend quite a lot of time with AI. Yeah, it's cool. We can cut that out. Do you now we're definitely keeping the whole thing? Um do you have any horror studio stories? Or like industry horror stories that happen to you and you know horror stories. You definitely have some. You gotta have.

SPEAKER_03 1:16:00

Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah. Um, oh man, where did where do I start? I mean, um, okay, so I remember one time uh this client reached out, he wanted to get a mix and master done, and when he sent the demo, I thought he was trolling, bro. It was so bad. Like I wish I could play for you, I wish I could play for you, but like it's disrespectful to him. But man, it was so bad. I swear, I swear I thought he was trolling to the point I messaged him back. I'm like, yo, like there's no way you think this is good. He's like, Yeah, he's like, Yeah, I know I could work on a couple things and here and there, but I want to just see what we can do. And I'm like, oh, this guy is serious. So I was like, I you know what? It was so bad I didn't even know what to do.

SPEAKER_00 1:16:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 1:16:42

You know, so I just put auto-tune on it. I couldn't even really pick a key because he was just all over the place. Damn. And uh I put a limiter on it, and um, that was the probably the easiest couple hundred bucks that I made in my life. Um, but you know, when it comes to like a horror story, like in studio, um, I had uh a bit of a situation uh with some politics this one time, which uh got pretty uh pretty scary pretty quickly, um, you know, and which is why a lot of studios nowadays have cameras. So uh yeah, that definitely makes you think twice about who you work with, you know. For sure. Um I've had definitely a lot of um language barrier situations, uh but man, there's just been there's just been so many, you know. Or like, or like someone that, you know, oh actually, you know what? I got one for you. I got one. I won't say the name, but if he sees this, uh he knows I'm talking about. But it's all good, bro, because honestly, that that was insane. So there was this dude who was very particular about everything done on the engineer's end, yeah, to the point where he was like, okay, yo, let's go. Let's go. Like now, let's go. Is it loaded up? Why is it not loaded up yet? Let's go right now. Yo, was my auto-tune on? Is it on 12? Bro, no, you put it on nine. It's obviously nine, bro. Put it on nine. You know, it was a humanized 13. Put it at 20, bro. Okay, let's go. Back to 13. No, that's not 13, bro. 13. Let's go back to the bar 13. And bro, like, homie, I remember I was in LA. The engineer was sitting, I was like, because I was gonna engineer the session. He was like, No, I got it. I'm like, bro, when I see what's happening, I'm like, oh my god.

SPEAKER_02 1:18:21

That's crazy.

SPEAKER_03 1:18:21

Yeah, bro, he was super on it. And then at one point, um, my homie had a session with him, and um, there was a bit of a struggle in terms of getting the key right on the auto tune. It was him, he was a problem. He didn't hit the note at all. Usually they're all but he was blaming the auto-tune 100%. And bro, I'm musically trained, I have practically like perfect pitch. Like, really? Yeah, if you play like a certain note, I'm like, yeah, it's C or Wow, that's crazy, right? So um, I was like, bro, bro, it's in the right key. You know, you need to just like hit the note better. Like, I'm musically trained. He's like, Yeah, me too. I'm musically trained too. I'm like, okay, then you should know that you're not hitting the note, you know what I'm saying? And he's like, Man, you ruined my vibe. Okay, well, uh then the vibe is ruined, I guess. You know, then if you want to leave, you want to leave. And then um he accidentally spilled his drink all over the desk. No way. Yeah, this was my homie studio, and um like that's with the equipment on it? Yeah, bro. No way. Luckily he had his laptop in one of those like uh shell casings or whatever. Yeah, yeah. Um did he break anything or luckily no, but he was not even apologetic about it either. He was like, um, he's like, oh man, I'll buy like five of these studios. Whatever, whatever he's got here, I'll buy two of them. That was his like opposed to that was probably like the worst session. That was probably about the worst session. And uh I I wasn't even running this, I was just there observing and like helping him out at point points that that they were struggling. But mind you, he wasn't struggling because he didn't know what what he was doing. He was struggling because homie was just like so demanding and so uh, you know, on it for no reason. And like the songs weren't even like, you know, all that, you know what I mean. Uh I know you got some horror stories for sure. I mean, man, it's uh it was probably like the worst session. Like when you think about like the worst session you've ever had. Like one that you were like looking at the clock, like, bro, please, God save me.

SPEAKER_01 1:20:20

Man, I I don't know if it was like that. It was like back in the day. I had this one guy um that I was working with. He was like Jamaican. And uh it was like bro, it was like 17 years ago, if not more. Like it was a long time ago, like when I was starting. Yeah, and uh I think somebody gave him my number. One of the guys that I was working with at the time was like, yo, my homie wants to come record, blah, blah, blah, and all that stuff. So I was like, okay, cool, bet. So this guy comes to my to my place and it's like I'm like, yo, something's up with this guy, you know. But he's like, yo, this guy is like super polite. This guy is like, you look at him, you talk to him, it's like, yo, this guy is super nice, right? So I'm like, okay, cool. You know, he's giving me like some songs, this and that and that. He's like, yo, I want to record this and that with like Jamaican accent, right? And then, bro, this guy starts to starts the song, and this guy's talking about like killing people, knifing people, stabbing people, and stuff like that. I was like, yo, what's going on? And this whole entire catalog, this guy was talking about like Hitler, this guy was talking about like a whole bunch of shit. I was like, yo, what is even going on right now? But the crazy thing was that when you talk to him like one-on-one, he's such a nice, polite guy. And then when you hear the music, you're like, yo, how is that even possible? But I I think personally, I think he has some type of like schizophrenia or something like that.

SPEAKER_03 1:21:41

Yeah, man. Imagine he's like, yo, I'm gonna slit her throat. Yo, what do you think about that? Yeah, that was the take, man. I liked it when you said slit on this one better. That was that was a bit better. That's crazy though, bro. So what did what did you do what did you do when you were sitting there at photos on it?

SPEAKER_01 1:21:56

I just did what I had to do. I was like, you know, just put it together. And again, like that was so so you know, that was a long time ago.

SPEAKER_02 1:22:03

I think that's the funniest shit as an engineer. We have those like, you know, sessions where people are like saying like funny things or like you know, uh controversial things, and you're just sitting there like, yeah, they just said that, and I'm not even gonna react.

SPEAKER_03 1:22:15

And then they come back, like, yo, what'd you think of that take? You're like, yeah, that was good, that was the one.

SPEAKER_01 1:22:20

I mean, I I feel like for me, I don't want to say the worst sessions, but the sessions that always had the most difficulties with was when people were pulling up like 20 man, yeah. Don't even give me started. Like one person is recording and there's like 20 people, and that especially at scene. They all got opinions. When the room is small, the booth is small, you know, the lounge has limited uh capacity, and it's just fucking rowdy the whole entire time. You know, I mean it's just loud. Like it's like for me when I'm in sessions like this, I just can't focus. Yeah, I'm just doing what I'm doing, but like you can't even hear the music half the time.

SPEAKER_00 1:22:55

Yeah, yeah. There's like 10 people in the room, they're all talking behind you, drinking, and then there's like six people in the booth, everyone's fighting for the mic. You're just like, bro, what is going on? It's just a nightmare. Six people in the booth is insane.

SPEAKER_02 1:23:05

It's insane, bro. It's a nightmare. It's giving like the old school when it's like, you know, like the three black ladies in the booth singing together in front of one mic.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:13

Yeah. But then it's almost like, you know, those, like these type of guys, those are the regular sessions for them. It's not like they just pull up to you, do those sessions. Like, this is how they roll, this is what they do. They go to the studio like that, deep, and they just this is how they create music.

SPEAKER_03 1:23:30

You know, so it's yeah, I I don't like I couldn't do that. Like, as an artist, I don't know how you could sit there with like you know 20 opinions in the room and yeah, you know, they're all staring you towards one other shit.

SPEAKER_01 1:23:43

You know, too many cooks in the kitchen.

SPEAKER_03 1:23:44

Yeah, definitely. Hold on, let me check the parking real quick.

SPEAKER_00 1:23:47

Oh definitely, oh yeah, I have to renew it for sure. Take her time. Bro, you know what's crazy? You that story you were talking about just now reminds me of this bro. I had something so similar. So this girl pulls up right to the studio, and it's like a white girl, like the whitest girl you could ever imagine, you know, and she comes with a boyfriend, sits on the couch, like, yeah, it's my first time in the studio. I'm recording a song, I'm very excited. Oh, yeah, that's cool, whatever, blah blah blah. Bro, she sends me this beat, like the most like trapped, murderous sounding beat you could ever imagine in your life. Okay, load up the beat. I'm like, okay, say that's like hops in the booth. Bro, you know what she starts talking about? She starts talking about worshiping the devil. Worshiping the devil. She starts, she's like, I prayed to the devil, 666. Yeah, fuck all these guys. I'm gonna kill bro. I swear to you, I was in shock. I was in shock, bro. I was really in shock. I didn't even want to ask her about it. I I was just like, yeah, it's cool, like, yeah, yeah, you know. That's crazy. Bro, she left. I blocked her number. I was like, yo, never hit me, never call me ever again. Like, yeah, it's just like insane, bro. Yeah, okay, can't be.

SPEAKER_01 1:24:56

Um, I have one more question. I don't know how we looking with time.

SPEAKER_00 1:24:59

Uh we're about like an hour and a half right now.

SPEAKER_01 1:25:01

Damn, we've been talking. Yeah. Um, I have a question about because you you did drop some songs as an artist as well, right? Yep. Um, so how do you how do you collaborate with other artists? Because you you do it as a producer, right? And you work with artists. Like, can you elaborate a little bit on that process?

SPEAKER_03 1:25:20

Um, I mean, I consider myself an artist. You know, just because I I am not like, you know, singing on the mic doesn't really mean that the the contribution isn't significant. So I I feel like because of how significant the contribution is, um, you know, wanting to wanting to put it out as an artist, you know, makes sense. And um, you know, you have to kind of like, you know, uh how do you say like speak up for yourself in a sense. So like when you when you when you put yourself out there like as an artist, it's like, yeah, it's me, like I did this, because very often when you work on something and you don't get the adequate adequate uh credit or you know, um people just don't know you did it, right? And then you have to kind of like you know, post it and like, hey, look, I did this, you know, this is my work kind of a thing, whereas like you know, so much songs just like collect dust on a hard drive, man. And um, it's just it's just a waste. And um, that's why I want to, you know, put out music and just do it as an artist myself. And you know, at least I don't have to, you know, be like the one in front of the mic and like put myself out there in that sense, but it's it's I mean kind of the same thing, yeah. Um besides that little little detail. But it's cool though, you like you you get to just put out whatever you want to put out rapid and you know having to do what the other artists want. Like now I'm the artist, so now I get to kind of you know put out what I want to.

SPEAKER_01 1:26:35

So you produce and you also engineer those uh records, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:26:39

Yeah, I I I would kind of consider myself a bit of a chameleon, like wherever I need to, you know, because sometimes it's production by someone else and me or totally someone else, and then like I do the mixing and mastering and put it together anywhere in between. So um, but for the most part, yeah, I would be producing, recording, mixing, mastering, like from front to start start to finish.

SPEAKER_00 1:26:57

Do you prefer mixing the the same records you produce, or do you prefer actually sending it out for a different opinion?

SPEAKER_03 1:27:03

No, I definitely prefer uh mixing it myself just because like I'm I'm already kind of going, I already know what kind of vibe I'm going for. Um, and um it just happened too often that like I would entrust someone else with the mixing and mastering process, and they're just like way off in terms of what what I was aiming for. Which is part of the reason why I started to um you know you know dive into the mixing and mastering thing because there's been times where I truly feel that the other engineer that I sent the stems to um fumbled the bag because like they they love the beat, they love the vibe, they love everything, but then now the recording process happened and the engineer didn't like perform the way that they needed to. Yeah, and now they don't love the song as much anymore and they're next. When I'm like, man, like if I knew how to do this, I I like this would have been a uh a record that you would want to clear, and you know. So I'm like, yo, let me just do this shit myself. Yeah, you know what I mean. And it's very intimidating because when you look at all these knobs, you I'm sure you get the question you know what all these knobs do? Like, yes, I know what all these knobs do. It looks very intimidating, but you know, you need yeah, it's it's it's just one of one of those things. Like imagine like 40 years ago, someone saying, like, yo, you know you know what everything does on your phone? It's like, yeah, yeah, you learn it as you go, kind of a thing. You know, it's it's very similar. It's like you you just learn it.

SPEAKER_00 1:28:19

Yeah. One last thing I wanted to ask you as well. So, what is one plugin you could you couldn't live without and one plugin that you think is overrated?

SPEAKER_03 1:28:27

That I couldn't live without?

SPEAKER_00 1:28:29

Yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:28:31

One is kind of crazy. Give them like three, bro. Okay, top three plugins you couldn't live without.

SPEAKER_03 1:28:36

Um Fab filter, pro queue. I mean, it's it's it's like the most basic classic, but it's just it's it's like you know, one of those things that you could just trust and it just like performs every time. Um I would say just like uh colorful EQs in general. So like your APIs, your pull text, uh two BQs, like like things that give you color. Um, Ash. I couldn't live without Ash. It was my favorite clipper for sure by far. Um did you try the new one? The Ash 2? Yeah, it's insane. Love it. Yeah, yeah, love it, love it, love it. Um three. Oh, well, okay. Plugins that I think is overrated. I'll give you three. I truly think God Particle is overrated. You knew it was coming. I have to say it. Mind you, I use it, so I'm really I'm not a hater or anything. It's just like I I think that people like put a little make a little bit too much trust into it. And just like kind of like sit and forget it. And um, it's definitely a very good tool. It's also sometimes I just use it just to see if my balance is kind of like where it needs to be. Uh, another plug-in that's overrated, Sue. Really? Yeah, I think it's overrated. And the reason why I say that no, Soothe is great. I use Sooth on every single mix, but the reason why I say it's overrated is because I think people sometimes use it when you don't really need to or use too much of it because uh you you take a little bit away of the natural occurrence of of the sound. Like the sometimes those resonances are what makes it like real. Sometimes you it flattens flattens things out a little bit too much.

SPEAKER_04 1:30:08

Fair enough.

SPEAKER_03 1:30:08

Um another plugin that's overrated. I can't really think of another one, like overrated, like uh or overpriced. Overpriced? The mat, the matte. Have y'all seen that? That shit's like a thousand dollars or something. Matt EQ? Matt, yeah. M-A-A-T. I haven't heard of that. The orange. It's like it's literally like a digit. Actually, no, wait, hold on. I got it, I got it. Voice of God by Universal Audio. I don't give a f yeah, I hate I I'm so pissed at Universal Audio for the ultimate snake oil of a bullshit of a plug-in. It's literally a filter. It's just it's a digital filter. There's no harmonics, no non-linearities, no dynamic changes, nothing. It's just a filter with like a you know when you do like a like a high pass filter, yeah, yeah, and then you make it like really sharp so it has like a little bit of a bump. Yeah, yeah, yeah. That's what that is. Oh, and then you shift it and the bump goes bigger or smaller. Like, I've literally been like, just to prove a point, I went in on Fab Filter and literally copied over every single step of the of that plugin. It's literally, and I nulled it. It's a digital filter. But they sell it as like voice of God.

SPEAKER_00 1:31:13

I didn't know that. I thought it was adding harmonics.

SPEAKER_03 1:31:15

Nothing. Zero. Put it through put it through a uh a scope and everything, you see it, like nothing, adds nothing. I put it in through plugin doctor and everything. It adds nothing. Interesting. I'm not gonna lie, I have never used it in my life. I actually The reason why I'm pissed is because I bought it. I bought it. I thought like voice of God, like it sounded so like it's this cool plugin that's gonna do something for me, and then you know, mixed by Ali, you know, speaks so highly. She loves that plugin, yeah, yeah, yeah. Look, I mean, look, I have to I have to be honest though. Like, if a plugin gets you to the desired place quickly, that matters more than like what it's actually doing. But I guess like my issues, like the marketing behind the whole voice of God thing where it's like, oh, it's this magic thing that can do this, all this stuff for you. It's like at least be honest as to what it's really doing. Fair enough. Um, because you could essentially do the same thing with a fab filter. But yeah, like if you use it to like because you know, like, hey, if I do this, boom, boom, boom, move on, then sure. But I mean, you may as well do it in Fab filter and actually see what you're doing. But yeah, force of God, I would definitely say it's like overrated, overpriced, don't even buy it. Just like go get get yourself a fab filter and just like copy the curves and move on, you know. Yeah. What what would you say is like overrated?

SPEAKER_01 1:32:29

Overrated. I mean, got particle for sure. I don't even I I've had it, I used it maybe three times in my life, and I was like, I just don't like what it does to the sound. Everything just I just don't like the texture. It just doesn't appeal to me. But maybe it's because I got so much other stuff that's just like I'm already I already have so much going in my chain that adding it, it just it just kills everything. I I I didn't really like that. Um what was that plug-in? Um not not sooth, uh it like cleans up the frequencies of Golfus? Golfus. Oh that one. I feel like that one is uh overrated. I see uh I see a use of it, but I never like the sound of it personally. I kind of felt like if you add it, like yeah, I hear it that it cleans stuff up, but like it cleans too much. It kind of takes away the life of the of the the sound. Yeah, and uh the last and not least would be hmm, what would be the last one?

unknown 1:33:34

CLA vocals.

SPEAKER_00 1:33:36

Yo, I actually personally like CLA vocals.

SPEAKER_02 1:33:39

That's been like the the most controversial one ever. After Jason Jackson. Yeah, Jason, and then Mike Dean was like, fuck CLA vocals.

SPEAKER_01 1:33:47

Like, yeah, I don't know. Like, I I feel like there's with plugins, it's like, you know, sometimes they work on this, sometimes they don't, right? So it's just one of those things where you gotta pick and choose whatever you use when. It's not like use one plugin for one thing for every single mix, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:34:02

So Yeah. I just feel like there's also like too many of certain things. Like how many SSL uh channel strips do we need? How many 1073s do we need? How many, bro? I swear there's like at least like 20 1176 emulations out there.

SPEAKER_01 1:34:16

And there's a new one that just came out. Oh, yeah, Tsio. Tizio just dropped his 1176. No way.

SPEAKER_00 1:34:21

Yeah, he just made it in 1176, yeah.

SPEAKER_01 1:34:24

I mean, hey man. The thing is that they all sound different, right? So it's like it's just another tool in the box. Do we need another one? I don't think so, but the if the market is there for it, then there's gonna be flavors. It's good to have flavors.

SPEAKER_03 1:34:37

You know, it's like it's like your pantry, you know you want a little garlic, a little onion powder, a little whatever, whatever. It's good to have flavors, but if you have three kinds of garlic powder, yeah, do you really need another garlic powder? I know, I know. I don't I don't think like I feel like if you maybe have like three 1176s, you know, Universal Audio, have yourself a waves, and then like a other company that does it differently. Yeah, yeah. What's your favorite go-to besides your real joints? My favorite plugin? Yeah, 1176.

SPEAKER_01 1:35:03

Oh, 1176. Um I my favorite 1176 is MC77. Really? Yeah. Which technically is not 1176, but it's kind of based on that. Yeah, yeah, yeah. But I find it to be the most appealing to my ear. But I I do use 1176s as well. Um, the other ones, but like a lot of times I go with the MC77. Sometimes I would put the 1176 and I would like play with it. I'm like, uh, let me just go to MC77. Right. You know, what about you?

SPEAKER_03 1:35:32

What's your like what what's your compressor of choice for vocals overall?

SPEAKER_00 1:35:36

Man, my favorite compressor to use on vocals is our compressor. I love art compressor. I can't even lie. It's my favorite compressor, period. I love using it on everything, it's amazing. Master. No, not on the master list. I've seen that though. I saw that. Even Jason Joshua did that. He was uh mastering a song, and he bro, he was compressing the mix by like 6'7 dB on the art compressor. I was like, this is insane. Hey man, everybody gets sound good.

SPEAKER_03 1:36:06

You can sound good. What can you say? I've I've definitely I've over compressed bro. There's there's times where like compressing like way too much sounds so good though. You know, it happens sometimes, especially like with like in in house music and stuff. If you like really hit the kick super hard into the compressor, you get that like flunk of it sounds so nice, but then it's obviously too much, you have to parallel it, whatever, whatever.

SPEAKER_01 1:36:30

But I think it really depends on the compressor too, because there's like some compressors that I love the way how they compress and how they feel when they compress. And there's some compressors I'm like, I'm gonna just use it more like an effect more than like a compressor, compressor, right? So yeah, and like I mean, look, it's the good thing, the good problem to have is to have so many tools that we can choose from, but it's also a bad thing because then people like I guess we're anxiety, yeah. Yeah, we've been doing it for a long time, so for us it's kind of easier to be like, oh, this we're gonna use this for this and this for that. But like if somebody's like brand new to to mix in, they kind of can get confused with the amount of tools that they have, right?

SPEAKER_03 1:37:05

Because there's just so much. Yeah, sometimes you just gotta also just like pick one and be like, you know what? I don't care if there's a better one, this is the one that I'm using today.

SPEAKER_01 1:37:12

Exactly. Exactly.

SPEAKER_03 1:37:14

What about mixed bus in terms of compression?

SPEAKER_01 1:37:16

Um I mean I have the API 25, I got the 747, I got the Portico, but like I use them in on two different Mix buses, right? So I got Mix Bus A and Mix Bus B. And even when I compress on the Mix bus, I don't go over to 2DB of uh game reduction. I always try to keep it like you know pretty tight. Uh but I'm not gonna lie, I am trying to get the G bus back, uh the SSL G bus. I wouldn't use it on everything, but like certain things, especially country. I like how the G bus sounds in country. And right now I'm using the plug-in, which does the job, but I used to have the G bus. I read this is like one of the biggest regrets. Selling the G bus because it just sounds good. Like, I just like the way how it compresses and how it glues everything and like the transient response and all that stuff. Like it is just like one of the best compressors for that specific sound. I'm not gonna say it's like the best compressor ever. Even for like pop-in-house, it's really, really good if you just like tap it.

SPEAKER_03 1:38:19

Yeah, exactly.

SPEAKER_01 1:38:20

And it has the high pass on it too, so you can like let the low end do its thing and compress everything else after.

SPEAKER_00 1:38:25

So yeah, what about you? Uh personally, I don't actually do a lot of compression on my mixed bus. I feel like when I'm mixing, I do most of the compression there and like clip clipping as well. Yeah, so for me, really, I'm most like a DB or two on my portical, and then I do clipping on my mixed bus. More so than compression.

SPEAKER_03 1:38:44

Yeah, same here, actually. Yeah, yeah. Like if it's compression, it's mainly because like I'm looking for glue, not like I'm not actually trying to tame dynamics. Yes, because yeah, like you're saying, you can just do it in the mix, but yeah, I agree. Yeah, I missed my portico though, I'm not gonna lie to you. Man, particularly. Yeah, I missed the portico, but like I I can use uh uh access analog whenever I need it. Yeah, that's true. That's true. Have y'all tried n-fuse though? N Fuse, no, yeah. Yeah, by Kive Audio, try it.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:10

It's it's it's that's the master bus transformer though, you know?

SPEAKER_03 1:39:14

Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, but the silk function functionality and like the width knobs and stuff like that, it's it's pretty pretty convincing. I'll say that. It's pretty good. It's pretty similar to the porticle. Yeah, okay, nice.

SPEAKER_02 1:39:26

Yeah, I should give it a try. Nice.

SPEAKER_03 1:39:27

It it replaced it for me, like whenever I whenever I I want that kind of a vibe, you know, in the box. Like it's pretty much there. Sure.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:35

Okay, I think it's a good time to uh wrap it up. I think I think this is the longest episode we shot. It is, it is. Love the conversation though, man. Yeah, of course.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:43

I feel like we still got so we probably will be talking for like next five hours. Oh, yeah, oh yeah. We could talk forever, man.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:48

100%. Yeah, thank you, man, for pulling up. Absolutely, man. 100, bro. The show.

SPEAKER_01 1:39:54

We're gonna get we're gonna get you back again, you know. Yeah, bro, of course.

SPEAKER_00 1:39:56

100%. Anytime, bro. Anyways, thank you guys for listening. Thank you for watching, as always. Stay tuned for the next one.

SPEAKER_01 1:40:02

Peace out, peace, peace.