At what point do you turn it off?

[øøøøøøø]

In those cases it can sometimes work well to appoint someone in the band as “producer,” just so that someone can make decisions and establish musical priorities from a focused artistic point of view. Its logical for this to be the person who writes most of the material—that way at least you know the interests of the song will be more likely served first (It’s also perhaps not a coincidence that so many bands have had a lot of artistic steering done by the bass player, but that’s navel-gazing for another time…)

What doesn’t usually tend to work as well, from my experience, is to try and have a quasi-democratic situation in which each member’s agendas are juggled, compromises made, balances struck, etc.

Unless you’ve got a band full of producers, mix engineers (or really good session players), most band members will be accustomed to focusing on the presentation and execution of their own part rather than the whole. If everyone’s mix notes mostly concern their own part (or things that occupy similar registers that might “compete” for arrangement space), that’s a pretty good clue that those notes might not be particularly useful for making the record an artistic success.

[marqueemoon]

In those cases it can sometimes work well to appoint someone in the band as “producer,” just so that someone can make decisions and establish musical priorities from a focused artistic point of view. Its logical for this to be the person who writes most of the material—that way at least you know the interests of the song will be more likely served first (It’s also perhaps not a coincidence that so many bands have had a lot of artistic steering done by the bass player, but that’s navel-gazing for another time…)

What doesn’t usually tend to work as well, from my experience, is to try and have a quasi-democratic situation in which each member’s agendas are juggled, compromises made, balances struck, etc.

Unless you’ve got a band full of producers, mix engineers (or really good session players), most band members will be accustomed to focusing on the presentation and execution of their own part rather than the whole. If everyone’s mix notes mostly concern their own part (or things that occupy similar registers that might “compete” for arrangement space), that’s a pretty good clue that those notes might not be particularly useful for making the record an artistic success.

Yeah, I think next time I will just ask to have a more formalized role in this area if we end up working without a dedicated producer again, which unless a label is paying seems unlikely. I'm very much the "big picture" person in the band.

[Kent]

I listened to a podcast yesterday with Jonny Greenwood and Thom Yorke…

Link to podcast, please?

SmartLess feat. Jonny Greenwood and Thom Yorke

Dankeshön.

[Telliot]

Bitteschön!

[mgeek]

I've been down a hole with this sort of thing before, spent more than a year on and off tweaking and re-recording bits of certain tracks...other day i listened back to a rough that had a vocal I wasn't happy with, and it was... fine. Easily as good as what I put out.

[marqueemoon]

I've been down a hole with this sort of thing before, spent more than a year on and off tweaking and re-recording bits of certain tracks...other day i listened back to a rough that had a vocal I wasn't happy with, and it was... fine. Easily as good as what I put out.

Yeah. Time has a way of giving you some perspective back.

I’m glad we have a deadline on this. At this point I’m trying to keep any notes to things I think will make a meaningful and positive change.

Now that this is at the mastering stage certain things are highly subjective and some important decisions must be left to the professionals IMO.

For example on one song I was feeling like ride cymbal was poking out in an annoying way that it was not in the final approved mixes. That was a first impression formed from listening in the car. After listening on a ton of other speakers and headphones I realized that not only does my car have a little bump in that frequency range, but also that the sound I was hearing has a lot of compressed room mic in it. That’s a sound I’m particularly attuned to because it’s unnatural to me. That sound is the right creative choice for this song. Nothing needs to change with it just because of the way I’m hearing it on one system and my own biases.

[mgeek]

Yeah it's worth remembering too when you listen to other people's music, those things are there, and you don't notice them.

I got a copy of Lola Versus The Powerman etc by The Kinks this week, and when listening thought 'the vocal on Apeman is practically inaudible'...if it had been my own record I'd have been gutted, but you just kind of... accept things when you're not involved.

I also had a recording deadline recently and it worked so well. Finished it in the early hours the day before it was getting mastered, gave the master a once over then didn't listen to it for two weeks, and when I did I was like 'yep, this is great, a finished record'

[øøøøøøø]

I really do feel that having one listening environment that’s pretty trustworthy to which you’re very accustomed is a lot better (for me) than the old “listen on a jillion sub-optimal systems and try and infer the truth from the combination of all of those impressions.”

To me, that’s always been confusing. I never do the “car test” or the “AirPods test” or anything like that. Too confusing.

I trust my monitoring environment above all of those systems, so for me there’s nothing meaningful to be gained from referencing them

[marqueemoon]

Well, we're on to what I hope is the final round.

Re: the car test, I'm glad I listened on my living room system first because something that's bugging someone else a lot was completely imperceptible to me there. It still isn't bugging me all that much and I don't think heroic measures should be taken to change it, but I could at least hear it at home.

I listen to a ton of music on earbuds walking my dog and I find that having my body in motion like that and keeping an eye on whatever he's up to calms down the analytical part of my brain. It's the only way I can really listen with anything close to objectivity about if the music part is working.

[øøøøøøø]

I’m back in my NYC studio this week mixing, and one of my studio partners has a new set of very nice nearfields on the meter bridge that he loves.

I clicked over to them a few times on each day, and every day I clicked them right off.

Finally, after about three days of doing that I could manage to not be entirely confused by them, but I’m still not sure I could draw meaningful conclusions that would make my mixes better based on them.

I’m just funny about monitoring.

[sessylU]

Sort of related, but one of my favourite books about composition is the book that Ableton put out a few years ago. It's sort of about electronic music, but it makes the point (time and again) that these are compositional process issues, rather than electronic or production issues. Composition was the main focus of my degree, and the way that the book presents these problems with possible solutions is something I wish I had when I was starting. It's the best representation of that approach that I think I've seen.

It breaks things down to problems of starting, problems of progressing, and problems of finishing.

My wife gifted me a copy of it a few years ago, then Ableton sent me one anyway because I'd ordered a stack of licenses for my school. Then they made it free online:

https://makingmusic.ableton.com/

[Larry Mal]

Sort of related, but one of my favourite books about composition is the book that Ableton put out a few years ago. It's sort of about electronic music, but it makes the point (time and again) that these are compositional process issues, rather than electronic or production issues. Composition was the main focus of my degree, and the way that the book presents these problems with possible solutions is something I wish I had when I was starting. It's the best representation of that approach that I think I've seen.

Thanks for sharing that- you have a physical copy?

[sessylU]

I now have 2! One from my wife and one that Ableton sent me.

[cpeck]

2 things that have helped me:

I always punch above my weight class when choosing recording/mixing/mastering engineers. This helps me with the mental gymnastics of “is this good enough?”

I always work on new stuff before the old stuff is “finished” (could just be demos, etc). The “never finished, only abandoned” thing is Pinterest-true and IRL-true, but having new stuff simmering makes letting go of the old stuff even easier in my experience.

[øøøøøøø]

I always punch above my weight class when choosing recording/mixing/mastering engineers.

Excellent advice; always worth it

I always work on new stuff before the old stuff is “finished” (could just be demos, etc). The “never finished, only abandoned” thing is Pinterest-true and IRL-true, but having new stuff simmering makes letting go of the new stuff even easier in my experience.

More great advice