Carl Beatty, a veteran engineer and Professor of Production and Engineering at Berklee College of Music, shares some valuable advice on setting up and running a home studio – how to keep costs down, how to get the most out of what you buy, how to manage your time and workload, and more.
TuneCorner
Be your own record label!
September 20, 2010
August 27, 2009
Get Your Music Ready for the Holidays! by Jake Smith
Jake Smith is a TuneCore Customer Support representative and editor of the weekly newsletter
I'll come right out and say it - I love Christmas music. People like me are the reason soft rock radio stations play "Santa Clause is Coming to Town" October 31st through New Years Day. Yet, in my adoration of these songs there lies jealous anger. All around the world, radio stations have "All I Want For Christmas" and "Baby Please Come Home" on rotation 10-20 times a day for 2 straight months, EVERY YEAR. Add in direct sales, TV and movie placements, features on compilations, and royalties from cover versions and we're talking some serious cash. It's hard to imagine why the songwriters behind these classics would do anything but swim in their coins like Scrooge McDuck.
What's to keep us from using our talents to cash in on the Holidays?It may seem a bit strange to discuss Christmas songs in August, but I mention it for a few reasons.
- I just read an article from Billboard News confirming that Bob Dylan will release his first ever Christmas album this October to raise money for Feeding America. If Bob Dylan was able to get himself in a Christmas state of mind while recording in hot summer months, so can you!
- Writing, producing, mixing, mastering, uploading and delivering a track can take time so you should always think ahead.
- Holiday songs are not limited to Christmas - patriotic song sales spike around the Fourth of July, spooky songs get a big boost around Halloween, and tunes about poultry and mashed potatoes go through the roof on Thanksgiving (that may not be true... but you never know).
1. Mix covers and originals. You'll often see holiday records where established artists will perform standards but also include one or two songs they wrote themselves. I'll listen to anybody's version of "Have Yourself A Merry Little Christmas" at least once - This might lead me the other songs on their album, which might lead me to other non-holiday songs they've released.
2. If you plan to write an original holiday song, spend some time studying the ones that have stood the test of time. You may notice certain chord changes, riffs, or key phrases that pop up in a number of holiday tunes.
3. Look for a fresh angle. Understanding what makes other songs
popular does not mean you need to rip them off do what's been done
1,000 times before. Maybe you should try the exact opposite. Flip a
classic on its head with a unique instrumentation, write an album of
Hanukkah Hip-Hop songs, combine different holidays within a single EP
or a single track, whatever! Hit people with something they've never
heard before and you could end up tapping a market no one has before.
Who of you out there already has holiday tunes online? Do any of you plan on writing or covering a holiday song this year? Does anyone think they have a unique approach to holiday music, the likes of which the world has never seen? Share your thoughts here on the TuneCore blog.
August 20, 2009
Nashville vs. NYC Songwriting by Cliff Goldmacher
Cliff Goldmacher is a songwriter, producer, engineer and the owner of recording studios
in Nashville and New York City. When he’s not writing songs, Cliff is
also a regular contributor to EQ Magazine and Pro Sound News as well as
a number of online blogs. He can be reached at [email protected]
Finding the Songwriters:
One difference between the two songwriting communities is how easy they are to locate. Because Nashville’s artistic community is predominantly made up of singers, songwriters and musicians, it’s much easier to find the music/songwriting community there. New York, on the other hand, has a wonderful songwriter population, but it’s mixed in with the countless other artists and creative types that live there and is thus less obvious. In other words, it takes a little more effort to find the songwriters in New York, but believe me, they’re there.
Before moving from Nashville to New York, I’d taken several writing trips a year up to New York and, by a process or trial and error, I found a core group of NYC songwriters that became my go to people on every trip. This way, when I eventually moved to New York, I felt like I was instantly part of the community even though I had to discover it little by little. I highly recommend this approach for anyone considering a move to New York as it eases the transition and makes the entire process much less overwhelming.
Cowriting:
Although both New York and Nashville have large numbers of songwriters, cowriting is much more a part of the day to day routine in Nashville. It’s not unusual for a Nashville writer to have five cowriting appointments in a week where they meet with a different cowriter every day in a publishing company office on Music Row. This happens for several reasons. First of all, as a hired staff songwriter for a Nashville publishing company, you are given a yearly quota of songs that you need to fulfill. The more songs you write, the more quickly you’ll fulfill your quota. Publishers make a real effort to connect songwriters they think will work well together and go as far as to set up cowriting appointments for their writers. As a result, it’s fairly common in Nashville to be set up on a “blind date” cowrite. Secondly, even though you’re only credited with half a song for a cowrite, it’s easier to motivate yourself to write if you’ve got someone to collaborate with. The act of scheduling appointments and being expected to show up significantly eases the stress of having to create on a schedule. This approach seems odd to a lot of New York writers who are either artists themselves and used to writing with their own bands or are songwriters used to working with artists whose schedules are much less predictable.
Lyrics:
Staying with the generality that you’re writing country in Nashville and pop or rock in New York, I’ve noticed that the rules of lyric-writing between these genres and cities differ significantly. In Nashville, the story is king. This means that the lyric has to make perfect sense, the images are concrete and the story has a logical flow from beginning to end. There’s not a lot of room for poetic, impressionistic lyrics that don’t have the arc of a story. New York, on the other hand, while it certainly has its share of great songwriter/storytellers, has a broader tolerance in its pop and rock genres for words that “feel” and “sound” good together. Please don’t misunderstand. It takes just as much skill to write a great pop lyric where the words convey the emotion of the song and carry the nuances of the melody as it does to write a great story in a country song, but it’s a different skill set. I’ve found that switching from one approach to the other can be creatively liberating and quite a bit of fun. Also, it’s interesting to see how one city’s lyrical approach can bleed into the other’s. In this way, you can end up with country lyrics where the words in the story sound good next to each other or pop lyrics with the arc of a story to them.
Labels:
Speaking of artists, another similarity in the two cities is that they are both home to major record labels and their signed artists. This alone attracts a huge number of songwriters to both cities. The difference here is that country music artists are still largely dependent upon outside songs for their projects. In New York, bands tend to write their own material and it is less common for these artists to go looking for outside songs. Occasionally songwriters will be paired with these bands/artists in New York allowing the writers to end up with cuts on these acts. Of course, all of these distinctions are lessening as more country artists write and cowrite their albums as well.
You Can’t Lose:
As
a transplanted songwriter from Nashville to New York City, I’ve had the
chance to observe, up close, the approaches to songwriting and the
songwriting communities in both cities. While there are of course many
similarities, there are also quite a few differences. By the way, I
feel I should mention that the following observations are really more
my impressions than hard facts.
Differences Within the Similarities:
In this article, I’ll start with a similarity between New York and Nashville as it’s readily apparent and then explain how, within that similarity, one city differs from the other. One of the first similarities is that both cities have huge songwriting populations. The depth and breadth of talent in both places encompass many more genres that the obvious country music for Nashville and pop and rock music for New York. There are great pop writers in the suburbs of Nashville and extremely accomplished country songwriters living in Greenwich Village.
Differences Within the Similarities:
In this article, I’ll start with a similarity between New York and Nashville as it’s readily apparent and then explain how, within that similarity, one city differs from the other. One of the first similarities is that both cities have huge songwriting populations. The depth and breadth of talent in both places encompass many more genres that the obvious country music for Nashville and pop and rock music for New York. There are great pop writers in the suburbs of Nashville and extremely accomplished country songwriters living in Greenwich Village.
Finding the Songwriters:
One difference between the two songwriting communities is how easy they are to locate. Because Nashville’s artistic community is predominantly made up of singers, songwriters and musicians, it’s much easier to find the music/songwriting community there. New York, on the other hand, has a wonderful songwriter population, but it’s mixed in with the countless other artists and creative types that live there and is thus less obvious. In other words, it takes a little more effort to find the songwriters in New York, but believe me, they’re there.
Before moving from Nashville to New York, I’d taken several writing trips a year up to New York and, by a process or trial and error, I found a core group of NYC songwriters that became my go to people on every trip. This way, when I eventually moved to New York, I felt like I was instantly part of the community even though I had to discover it little by little. I highly recommend this approach for anyone considering a move to New York as it eases the transition and makes the entire process much less overwhelming.
Cowriting:
Although both New York and Nashville have large numbers of songwriters, cowriting is much more a part of the day to day routine in Nashville. It’s not unusual for a Nashville writer to have five cowriting appointments in a week where they meet with a different cowriter every day in a publishing company office on Music Row. This happens for several reasons. First of all, as a hired staff songwriter for a Nashville publishing company, you are given a yearly quota of songs that you need to fulfill. The more songs you write, the more quickly you’ll fulfill your quota. Publishers make a real effort to connect songwriters they think will work well together and go as far as to set up cowriting appointments for their writers. As a result, it’s fairly common in Nashville to be set up on a “blind date” cowrite. Secondly, even though you’re only credited with half a song for a cowrite, it’s easier to motivate yourself to write if you’ve got someone to collaborate with. The act of scheduling appointments and being expected to show up significantly eases the stress of having to create on a schedule. This approach seems odd to a lot of New York writers who are either artists themselves and used to writing with their own bands or are songwriters used to working with artists whose schedules are much less predictable.
Lyrics:
Staying with the generality that you’re writing country in Nashville and pop or rock in New York, I’ve noticed that the rules of lyric-writing between these genres and cities differ significantly. In Nashville, the story is king. This means that the lyric has to make perfect sense, the images are concrete and the story has a logical flow from beginning to end. There’s not a lot of room for poetic, impressionistic lyrics that don’t have the arc of a story. New York, on the other hand, while it certainly has its share of great songwriter/storytellers, has a broader tolerance in its pop and rock genres for words that “feel” and “sound” good together. Please don’t misunderstand. It takes just as much skill to write a great pop lyric where the words convey the emotion of the song and carry the nuances of the melody as it does to write a great story in a country song, but it’s a different skill set. I’ve found that switching from one approach to the other can be creatively liberating and quite a bit of fun. Also, it’s interesting to see how one city’s lyrical approach can bleed into the other’s. In this way, you can end up with country lyrics where the words in the story sound good next to each other or pop lyrics with the arc of a story to them.
Labels:
Speaking of artists, another similarity in the two cities is that they are both home to major record labels and their signed artists. This alone attracts a huge number of songwriters to both cities. The difference here is that country music artists are still largely dependent upon outside songs for their projects. In New York, bands tend to write their own material and it is less common for these artists to go looking for outside songs. Occasionally songwriters will be paired with these bands/artists in New York allowing the writers to end up with cuts on these acts. Of course, all of these distinctions are lessening as more country artists write and cowrite their albums as well.
You Can’t Lose:
At the end of the day, both communities are great places to work and
create. Ironically, after living in Nashville, working as a staff
songwriter and writing for the country market for twelve years, my
first cut was with a New York writer and was recorded by an Irish tenor
on Universal Records named Ronan Tynan. In my opinion, it was the
blend of our New York and Nashville songwriting sensibilities that came
together to create that song. What I mean by this is that somewhere
between the soaring melody more suited to pop and the lyric that had
more of a country attention to detail, we came up with a classical
crossover song. So, if you’re a Nashville writer thinking about
working in New York (or vice versa) I’d highly recommend it. Sometimes
it’s the differences that create the best art.
Questions or comments? Share them here on the TuneCore Blog!
April 16, 2009
A DIY Acoustic Guitar Recording Primer (Part II)
Cliff Goldmacher is a songwriter, producer, engineer and the owner of recording studios in both NashvilleNew York City. Cliff is also a regular contributor to EQ Magazine and Pro Sound News. He can be reached at [email protected].
Read Part I of this article.
For the second half of this article, I’m going to get a bit more technical. After covering your set up, the room and mic choice/placement in the first half, it’s time to get into the more technical issues of the actual tracking and subsequent use of EQ and effects.
Click Track Bleed
OK, now that your room is ready and your mic is placed, you’re going to want to take additional precautions to avoid the bleed of the click track sound from your headphones and into the mic. This is one of the most common mistakes people make when recording acoustic guitar to a live mic. My recommendation is to avoid high frequency tones like shaker or woodblock and consider a low tone like a sampled kick drum. Low frequencies don’t have the same piercing effect through headphones that most click sounds do. Also, once you’ve played the song through the first time, you can actually automate the volume of the click sound to lower in soft passages and drop out at the end of the song if there’s a ritard or a long sustain on the last note. There’s nothing that kills the mood of a song like the sound of a click track peeking through over the final chord.
Front End EQ/Compression
If you’re using a preamp and/or compressor between your condenser mic and DAW, there are a couple of things to bear in mind. If the mic pre has a high pass filter, setting the frequency to between 60hz and 80hz will go a long way towards minimizing control room noise. Also, while heavy front-end compression on acoustics can give the guitar a very present, powerful sound, I tend to avoid it in this scenario because it amplifies to a great degree the noise of the room we’ve worked so hard to minimize. I will, however, use a very light front end compression at a 3:1 ratio just to take the edge (two or three dB tops) of off the loudest parts of the track which then allows me to make the overall recording level hotter.
Back End EQ/Compression
Once you’ve recorded your acoustic, there are a few EQ and compression tricks I tend to use to help get the best sound possible. My EQ approach changes depending on whether the recording I’m making is a simple guitar/vocal or one where I’m planning to overdub additional instruments. For a guitar/vocal, I’ll be more sparing in my EQ. I tend to use 125hz as a place to pull a few dB if the recorded acoustic sound is slightly muddy or diffuse and 5000hz as the place to boost if I need a bit more brightness (see fig. 1). When it comes to integrating an acoustic into a fuller mix, especially one with drums and bass, I have a more dramatic approach that involves setting a high pass filter to effectively remove all frequencies below 120hz. This allows the proper sonic space for bass and kick drum while leaving the meat of the acoustic sound untouched. The approach to adding brightness is the same as above and can be added by boosting a few dB at 5000hz (see fig. 2). I tend not to compress the acoustic in the mix on guitar/vocals but when it comes to a band mix, it can really help the guitar to maintain its presence. I will generally compress at a 2.5:1 ratio with a fast attack/slower release approach (see fig. 3). Finally, given how easy it is to store settings, you might want to create acoustic guitar EQ and compression settings in your favorite plug-ins to speed up the process.
Wrapping Up
I happen to be a big fan of control room recording. It brings a great combination of casual and intimate to your session. So although it takes a bit more preparation and a little more care in the process, you can get great-sounding control room acoustic guitar parts without having to rely on anyone but yourself. Good luck!
March 26, 2009
iTunes Going DRM Free: What does it mean for you?
Jake Smith is a TuneCore customer support representative and editor of the TuneCore Newsletter
After 6 years, iTunes has announced that they will begin selling their entire catalog without DRM protection. This raises a number of questions, and it is important to start discussing now what these changes could mean for all of us in the music industry.
DRM, or "Digital Rights Management", is proprietary code encoded in certain types of files to control where and how they can be used. If you've ever purchased a song on iTunes before and tried to play it on a different computer, a message will come up saying that the computer is not authorized to play the file. iTunes currently allows 5 computers to be authorized for any one iTunes account. DRM protection reaches much further than just iTunes and digital music. Movies, computer software, and video games often incorporate some types of digital rights protection. For example, DRM stops (or attempts to stop) you from ripping DVD movies to you computer or by requiring you to enter a serial number before using a new program you've installed.
From the stand point of the music consumer, there is really no downside to iTunes removing DRM protection. In addition to being able to move music more freely from computer to computer, music purchased in the iTunes store will no longer be limited to the iTunes library or iPods. Files will be compatible with Windows Media Player, non-Apple based MP3 players, video game consoles and more. From the label/artist stand point, the loss of DRM may seem good or bad depending on your personal philosophy. Does it help your career in the long run by making it easier for fans to share, or is it simply less money coming to you for your hard work?
Realizing that the decision to drop DRM protection would be a controversial decision, and in an effort keep ahead of the rapidly growing Amazon store, iTunes announced they would sweeten the deal for labels by finally allowing labels to set price tiers for individual tracks. We are waiting on iTunes to give us more specific information about this and we will make the details known as we receive them.
If you're looking for a more in depth look at these changes, I'd recommend this article from the staff of Macworld (http://www.macworld.com/article/138000/2009/01/drm_faq.html). Some highlights include:
- iTunes DRM free files vs. Amazon MP3, which has always been DRM Free
- What happens to music purchased before the DRM change?
- Will the change affect TV Shows and Movies?
Reports say that this change will be taking place by June. What do you think about this? Was the DRM drop inevitable or is iTunes biting the hand that feeds it? Let us know your thoughts.
March 05, 2009
Who "Killed" the Music Industry?
Justin Mitchell is a TuneCore customer support representative and liaison for TuneCore mixing and mastering services.
The music industry is changing rapidly, almost daily. As both a musician and music consumer, these changes have affected me two fold. It’s a scary and exciting time, like the California gold rush or the dotcom explosion in the 1990’s.
Personally, I think artists are more empowered today than ever before. You can record an album at your house, and in a matter of weeks it can be sold on the largest digital retailers in the world. That’s huge. Social networking sites have allowed for direct access to fans, online blogs are replacing magazines and newspapers, and more and more can be accomplished using mobile devices. So why, with all these great tools at our disposal, do we still hear so many doom and gloom stories about the end of music as we know it?
I came across an interesting article titled “How to Kill the Music Industry” by blogger Jens Roland. It discusses major points on what has caused the demise of the “good ol” days of the major labels and the subsequent changes in the music industry. Industry big wigs have blamed music piracy alone, but what other factors have caused this shift?
February 11, 2009
Help! I Have 24 Hours to Save a Horrible Mix, Part II
Cliff Goldmacher is a songwriter, producer, engineer and the owner of recording studios in both Nashville and New York City. Cliff is also a regular contributor to EQ Magazine and Pro Sound News. He can be reached at [email protected].
Part 2
Too Late! I’ve Only Got 24 Hours To Fix My Horrible Mix
OK, so you didn’t have a chance to read the first part of this article before you made the mistake of promising your mix to someone in the music industry and, as it stands, the mix just isn’t going to cut it. What do you do? Well, there are a variety of options and, as with almost everything in life, it’s only a matter of money. After explaining a bit about why a mix may be horrible, I’m going to give you three financial scenarios and how you can repair your mix in each of them. By the way, no matter what the scenario, be clear with the engineer up front that you’re under a considerable time crunch and give them an exact deadline. This way, there can be no misunderstanding about when you need your mix.
Why Does My Mix Sound Horrible?!?
For the sake of this article, we’re going to limit ourselves to the mix itself as the culprit. Often, especially early in one’s recording career, the bigger issues of a mix go back to the actual recorded performances. Unless the players/singers involved have a decent amount of studio experience, their performances tend towards the tentative or worse. But as I said, we’re going to assume the performances are solid and it really is a mix issue. Mixes can sound bad for a variety of reasons and this article is not really the venue for a technical explanation so I’ll keep the following descriptions brief. If you’re a beginning sound engineer here are a few things to think about. With the instruments, it generally comes down to a lack of each instrument having its own place in a mix whether for reasons of volume, panning, EQ or compression. With vocals, the issue is usually clarity (level, EQ & compression) and effects (reverb, delay, etc.). When a mix sounds dull and unexciting, it’s generally because things are over-compressed. If you’re not a sound engineer and you’ve gotten your mix back from someone who is (or claimed to be) and you’re not happy, the above descriptions are a good place to start when describing your problems to your new mix engineer.
Scenario #1 – Money Is No Object
For obvious reasons, this is the best position to be in with a bad mix and very little time to fix it. There are some real miracle workers out there who can take a crummy mix and bring the whole thing to life in relatively short order. Also, even though these folks are busy, it’s likely that not every one of the projects they’re working on is urgent. Your best bet would be to come in, explain the urgency of your situation and bring the mix (and mix files) with you so the engineer in question can give it a look/listen on the spot. Without necessarily saying you’ve got all the money in the world to throw at this mix, simply say that you understand this is last minute and you need their best work right away. Ask them what their fee would be (they ought to be able to give you a very close estimate) and accept. This is not the time to haggle as you’re asking for a lot from someone who is probably busy enough to say “thanks but no thanks” if you start to negotiate. By the way, whether you have the money right now or not, it’s in your best interest to familiarize yourself with the best engineers/studios in your area. You might not need them now but some day you might. It’s generally free to go visit a studio and talk to the owner or engineer and get a sense of their capabilities and rates.
Scenario #2 – You’ve Got A Few Hundred Bucks
You’ve got a couple of options here. First, you might want to ask a top engineer if they know of anyone who’d be willing to work for less. Often, top engineers have assistants who do good work and would love a chance to work on something at a more reasonable rate. A second-and perhaps better-option is to consider the world of independent producer/engineers who are in every town especially the music towns of Nashville, New York and LA. These guys might not have the reputations of the big engineers but will still do excellent work at reasonable rates.
Scenario #3 – You’re Out of Money
Not to put too fine a point on it, but you’re kind of screwed. You can pass up whatever opportunity was 24 hours away and hope that when your finances are a bit more flush you can go in and repair what’s wrong. Or you can turn the mix in as is. In this scenario, I’d almost always opt for passing on the opportunity. In the music industry, it’s very easy to poison the well by turning in something that isn’t ready for prime time. It’s better to make up an excuse and pass than to turn in something half-baked.
However, there are a few other options. First, the same top engineer that has assistants might also have interns. These guys might get the use of the studio from 2am to 8am and would be willing to work for nothing to gain experience and your loyalty. It’s certainly worth asking the top engineer if there are any interns who’d like to do the mix. The downside, of course, is that you’ll be working with an intern and there’s no guarantee you’ll get something better than what you’ve already got. Then again, you might. Second, if you’re really creative, talented, and lucky as all hell, there may be another way. Let’s assume you’ve got a terrific song and an almost “sure thing” to get it placed. You can always offer an engineer a significant piece of the pie if/when the song gets placed. Let’s assume the engineer loves the song and understands that there’s real potential. In a best-case scenario, the song does generate income and you end up giving half or more to the engineer. Be aware that this could end up being much more money for the engineer than the original mix would have cost you had you paid directly. You’ll have to chalk it up to experience and look at the placement as more of a resume builder than an income generator. I feel the need to say that this scenario is extremely rare. Most talented mix engineers are making a living by being paid for their work and not by taking chances on songs that are brought to them by unknown clients at the last minute. I don’t mean to sound harsh, but I’m a firm believer that if you want to earn income from your music, you have to treat it like a well-run business.
Your Best Bet
No matter which of the above scenarios you find yourself in, you’ll have sacrificed the one thing that music has to offer over most other businesses…fun. By adding a tight deadline, you’ve just introduced stress into the equation that, in most cases, could have been avoided. As I mentioned in the first part of this article, when it comes to mixing, your best bet is to be methodical, patient and sure you’ve got a mix you’re proud of before you start finding uses for it. After all, this is music we’re talking about and enjoying the process of making it is one of the best things a career in music has to offer.
February 05, 2009
Help! I Have 24 Hours to Save a Horrible Mix
Cliff Goldmacher is a songwriter, producer, engineer and the owner of recording studios in both Nashville and New York City. Cliff is also a regular contributor to EQ Magazine and Pro Sound News. He can be reached at [email protected].
Part I
Well, I suppose I’ve got your attention now at any rate. Given what an emotional medium music is to begin with, it’s not surprising to me that songwriters and artists (myself included at some point in the murky days of my early career) find themselves panicking when they’ve committed to something that requires a finished product before they have it. In the old days, this used to be situations like planning a CD release party/show before you had the finished, shrink-wrapped CD in your physical possession. These days, it’s more likely that you’ve committed to getting a finished mix to a film/TV music supervisor or radio station by a specific date and after playing your mix for a few trusted friends or fellow musicians, your worst fears are confirmed. The mix is horrible. As this article will come in two parts, I’m going to spend the part one of this article giving you ways to completely avoid this situation to begin with. Then, in part two, I’m going to give you ways to salvage a desperate situation based on three different budget scenarios.
How To Avoid the Above Situation in the First Place
I understand how exciting it can be when you’re nearing the end of a recording project. You can almost count the money you’re going to make from sales or royalties. Stop! You’ve spent years perfecting your craft. You’ve taken your time and learned to sing, write songs, play instruments and, in some cases, even to engineer your own material in your home studio. Why would you try and rush one of the most critical stages of the game? A mix is the culmination of all your effort and should be handled precisely and patiently. My sincere recommendation is that you never promise a song to anyone in the industry for any reason until you’re dead certain you have a finished mix you can submit with confidence. By avoiding situations where you’ve promised something you don’t have, you won’t run the risk of not delivering and appearing undependable or, worse yet, turning in something that’s sub par. Set yourself apart from the stereotype of the flaky musician by delivering what you say you’re going to when you say you will. It might help to remember that at a certain level in the music world talent is a given. You have a better chance of differentiating yourself by being a professional in all senses of the word.
The Mix Process
Whether you’re mixing the song yourself in your home studio or working with a professional mix engineer, take your time. Listen to the mix on the speakers in the studio, in your car, on a boom box and, Steve Jobs help us all, on those crappy $30 ear buds that come with every iPod. Of course your mix won’t sound as good on a boom box or through ear buds, but it should still sound clear. You should be able to hear the vocal and distinguish the individual instruments without, for example, the bass making the speakers rattle so much that nothing else is audible. Also, it’s been my experience that singers tend to want their own vocals too low in the mix because they’re either self-conscious or they think because they already know the words that the lyric is clear enough…or both. My recommendation is to bring in one or two friends (ideally not musicians) to listen to your mix and give you their honest opinion. Musicians, as a rule, tend to listen to the wrong things in a mix. The average listener will give you valuable feedback like “I can’t hear the guitar because the drums are too loud” or “I can’t hear what you’re singing.” Musicians tend to get into the nitty gritty and often can’t keep the big picture in perspective. The one exception would be if you’re a relatively new engineer and you’re uncertain about how your mix sounds. In this case it might be worth your while to talk to an experienced mix engineer and even hire them to give you detailed criticism about things you can do to improve your mix.
Working With A Mix Engineer
For non-engineers, the main thing to remember when giving your mix to a professional mix engineer is to let them mix. My recommendation would be for you to explain to the engineer that you’re going to leave the mix to them and you’d like them to let you know when your mix is ready to review. Then take the mix home, listen to it on various sound systems (as I mentioned above) and take detailed notes about what you’d like to go over with them when you see them again. For example, instead of saying that there are some words in the song that aren’t loud enough, you’d do better to say “in the second chorus, the word “aardvark” is a little too low.” It is infinitely easier for an engineer to go over a checklist of things to review in a mix than it is for you to have them stop playback every time you think you hear something. In other words, do your homework and use your studio time with the mix engineer to methodically tweak whatever needs tweaking.
When It’s Done, It’s Done
By following the approach I’ve mentioned above, you’ll avoid the gut-wrenching feeling that you’ve got an opportunity you’re going to miss or screw up if your mix isn’t ready in twenty-four hours. My final piece of advice for this section of the article is to remember that once you’ve signed off on a mix, it’s in your best interest to let it go. Like songs, mixes can be tweaked and tweaked ad infinitum but my hope for you is that you’ve got enough else on your plate to know when to say when. Do your best and move on. The more you go through the process, the easier the “letting go” will become.
Stay tuned for Part II of this article, coming soon.
January 29, 2009
Viral Marketing–What’s Really “Real” About It?
Cliff Goldmacher is a songwriter, producer, engineer and the owner of recording studios in both Nashville and New York City. Cliff is also a regular contributor to EQ Magazine and Pro Sound News. He can be reached at [email protected].
The Bad News
In my 15 years of making a full-time living in the music world, one thing has become more and more clear to me. It’s work. The romantic image of the starving artist being so incredibly talented that one day he or she gets “discovered” and becomes rich and famous is a dangerous myth. I say “dangerous” because the more you as an artist believe it, the less inclined you’ll be to do any work on your own behalf. The gritty reality is that if you don’t do the necessary (and daily) work promoting yourself and your music, it’s highly unlikely anything will ever happen.
The Good News
There has NEVER been a better time to spread the word about yourself and music. The internet, with its downloadable digital music files, social networking sites and countless other advances that we can’t even begin to imagine yet, has leveled the playing field in a way that will make the “work” you have to do infinitely more effective.
Gather Your Fans
The more you can identify and reach out to your fans the better off you’ll be. Whether it’s your friends on MySpace or Facebook or the email addresses you’ve been collecting at gigs or online, it’s these people who you need to be able to reach effectively to spread the word about what you’re doing. Treat your list of email addresses like the gold that it is. It’s these people who will not only consider buying your music when it comes out, but more importantly, will also help spread (“viral” get it?) the word about you and your music. Once you’ve got a network of fans that you can reach out to, you’ve dramatically increased your potential to spread the word about what you’re doing.
Be Creative
The fact that the playing field has been leveled and almost anyone can get their music out worldwide is both a blessing and a true challenge. Instead of fans knowing that the local Tower Records is where they should go to find new music, the internet, with its infinite musical venues, has become the new (and overwhelming) place to find what’s new and great. The more creative you are in your presentation, the more likely a fan of yours will be to forward a YouTube link with your video or any one of a thousand other ways you can create to present yourself and your music. Again, the plan is that by putting something out there that’s unique enough to rise above the typical internet fare, it will take on a life of its own and appeal not only your current fans but also to new fans in ways you’ve never imagined.
Stay Current
The outlets for music and ways of marketing online change and advance almost hourly. Taking time out of your day to be aware of the next MySpace, Facebook or Twitter will pay huge dividends going forward. It’s not enough to find one way of reaching people and stubbornly stick to it. If that were the case, bands would still be mailing postcards to let people know about their gigs. Did I just date myself?
Give It Away
Don’t be afraid to give something to get something. A free download of a song in exchange for an email address is the best deal out there these days. Make it worth someone’s while to give you his or her email address and you’ll be amazed at what happens. Let your music speak for itself. If fans like their free download, there’s a much higher likelihood they’ll come back and buy the rest. You don’t have to reinvent the wheel to do this either. Take a peek at a simple and effective example by clicking here.
Make Sure Your Music Is Available
I can’t think of anything more depressing than the artist who comes up with an amazing vehicle to promote his or her music, watches it go “viral” and generate huge web traffic to their site only to have nothing readily available for sale. Don’t expect most people to wait around or check back with iTunes every few days until your music is up. Make sure that before you go about promoting your music, you’ve taken the necessary steps to insure that if and when people want to buy your music, they can do it easily. Companies like Tunecore make this essential step both simple and cost effective. Don’t wait around for people to start asking how they can get your music. By then, it’s too late. Do it first.
Trust Me, It’s Real
Be patient. Not every online marketing attempt you make will result in thousands of downloads and new fans. However, every effort you make to get the word out about your music (even if it’s fifteen minutes a day) becomes part of the bigger picture of reaching new fans. The more fans you have, the greater the potential for any one thing you do going viral and bringing in not only more fans but income. All of a sudden your “friends” on MySpace and Facebook just became a whole lot friendlier. Think of your work as a series of base hits that will get you ready for your shot at a home run. Good luck!
January 22, 2009
The Value of a Good Mix, Part II
The Instruments
Getting great instrument sounds in a mix is a combination of many factors. Finding space in the mix for each individual instrument is essential. This is often achieved through judicious use of EQ, compression, volume and panning. For example, the skill it takes to get great drum sounds, marry the kick drum to the bass while also giving the electric guitars rooms to breathe and sparkle is developed over time and repetition…a lot of repetition. When this is done properly, the instruments are exciting to listen to. Each has its place and role to play and when they come together, the song takes on a life of its own.
Vocals
A great mix engineer always makes the treatment and placement of the vocal a priority. Once the instrumental mix is generally where it needs to be, it’s time to make certain that the vocalist is running the show. A combination of EQ, compression, tuning (if necessary), effects and volume fader automation should all serve the ultimate goal of making it sound like the singer is in charge. There are several risks associated with improper vocal placement. If the final mix has too much vocal, then the instruments end up sounding small and weak. However, if the vocal is too soft in the mix, it loses its ability to communicate the emotion of the song. Every genre has its preferred vocal level. In general, pop music has the vocal more integrated into the instruments whereas country music (with its emphasis on the lyric) generally puts the vocal higher in the mix. There are, of course, exceptions to every rule but a good mix engineer will know the genre he or she is mixing in and do the right thing for the song.
On a related note, one of the best reasons to bring in an experienced mix engineer even if you’ve recorded the song yourself is a fresh, objective set of ears. It’s been my experience that if the singer mixes their own project, they tend to keep the vocals too low for a couple of reasons. One is that most singers tend to get uncomfortable with their vocals up in a mix. There are precious few singers I’ve ever worked with who genuinely love the sound of their own voices. By keeping the vocal low in the mix, the vocalist/engineer won’t have to their comfort zone but the mix suffers. The second reason has to do with the fact that the singer already knows the words and assumes that they’re hearing the words when, in fact, they may be too low for someone who doesn’t know the song to understand.
Mastering a Good Mix
Mastering a mixed recording is a separate skill altogether. While this isn’t an article about mastering, I’d recommend using a dedicated mastering engineer (not your mix engineer) when it comes time for this step. More to the point, the value of a good mix is that the mastering engineer will spend much less time (their hourly rates are generally higher than mix engineer rates) getting the finished master together. In other words, money you spend on a good mix will end up saving you money on a final mastered recording.
Doing It Yourself
If you’re still intent on doing your own mixing, consider hiring an expert to mix a song or two for you and then ask them for the session files back. Assuming you’re using the same recording software (i.e. ProTools, Nuendo, Logic), you’ll be able to examine every detail of how the mix was done and use the finished mix files as a kind of tutorial so you can ultimately learn to do them yourself.
Cliff Goldmacher is a songwriter, producer, engineer and the owner of recording studios in both Nashville and New York City. Cliff is also a regular contributor to EQ Magazine and Pro Sound News. He can be reached at [email protected].
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