2008
1. "Hey, could we get that reverse reverb effect on the vocals in this one part?" Bands that were used to recording on ADAT, when suddenly presented with a 2" machine, magically recalled everything they ever read about Rodger Bain, and had to have at least one Stupid Tape Trick. This is usually the first that came to mind. No problem, except you have most of a mix up by the time this idea comes out, and you need spool the whole roll twice (because, naturally, it was on the first song of the three that would fit on a roll of 2" at 30 ips.) Then SMPTE comes blaring out the foot channel, and, well, whee....
2. "Hey, let's do a reverse guitar solo on this." Okay, forget Rodger Bain. Now we're getting in to Chas Chandler country. (Or was that Eddie Kramer? I forget.) Anyways, Stupid Tape Trick #2, see above. Nowadays it's easier, if you can get it through the dumb-ass guitarist's head that they have to start big, end small.
3. "Hey, can I double this vocal track?" It's far easier to get a thick vocal sound from a bad singer with an H3000 than it is to get an Eminem double from 'em that is anything approaching usable. This is the sort of thing that makes the studio manager's eyes light up. (And the engineer, if he's hourly.) I think John Lennon should be heartily thanked by every studio owner in the world, since his ability to double his own vocals is singlehandedly responsible for more wasted studio time than probably any other factor.
4. "Hey, I think this track needs some percussion." Sigh. Nobody but percussionists can actually play percussion worth a shit. See #3. If you own a studio, and you want to increase your hourly billing, just leave some maracas and a tambo lying about the control room.
5. The various "I know everything about my instrument" comments, which we'll lump in to one category, else I'll go on all fuckin' day. "I replaced the heads less than 10 shows ago!" "These strings are broken in now!" "Can someone hit an E?" "Does anyone have a pick/pair of sticks/tuner?" Etc. ad nauseum.
6. I'm not sure how to word this one in a simple catch-all phrase, but my personal biggest pet peeve is The Part That Can't Change. This is invariably the foot, but it could be just about anything. I'm a fairly heavy-handed producer, and I could give a shit about any part at the expense of the song; very few musicians feel that way about individual parts, so this is usually the biggest struggle I'll have. Back when I was producing shit industrial bands, after we spent three days turning their Master Tracks Pro Atari ST files driving their Zoom Samplemaster or whatever in to something that everyone else in the world could deal with, the arguments about the kick drum parts would start. "You know, you don't really need to put a foot on every 16th note, dude...." And away we go.
posted January 29, 2008 by Dave McAnally
posted January 29, 2008 by americanjunky
But no, I was all about "hey, let's see how this track actually works in Eb, why don't we?" That was dumb. Butcher Bros. High Speed Mixing To The Rescue.
-CR
posted January 29, 2008 by Chris Randall
As a measure of how common it is, a few years ago, when I was playing professionally (god am I glad I went back to school and got a "real" job, of sorts) , I was surprised to find that some folks I sometimes worked with were scared to tell me, say, that they wanted me to play something in an entirely different style. Apparently they had run into so many egos who had trouble dealing with something that simple that they were scared to even bring up the issue, and were dumbfounded when they finally did and I was like "sure, OK." I mean, if it matters enough to someone you're working with to bring it up, they almost aways have a more objective perspective about your playing than you do, so it seems pretty fucking obvious that you ought to listen to them.
posted January 30, 2008 by space_monkey
Percussion is a *lot* harder than it looks. Even a shaker is tricky, and they should require certification to use a tambourine.
posted February 1, 2008 by Scodiddly
I played for years with a guy who wouldn't change parts. And he had the worst rhythm a white guy could have, so a lot of his rhythm guitar parts (guitar/singer) didn't jive with the beat and/or wasn't tight at all. He could reasonably fake all this on stage cos he was a pretty boy and nobody really cares anyway. Plus he seemed to always write stuff with really dissonant things and anytime somebody brought this up, he'd throw up the typical bullshit excuses of "trying to create a mood" and "wanting to make it interesting" (interesting how? That this song is unknowingly written out of tune with itself?). To that end, he could never tell if his instrument was in tune or not. We had one guy who managed to get through to him (through various methods you'd expect to hear in Mixerman's diary...up to and including using made-up phrases like "I'd like to hear more concrete in this part"....concrete could be achieved by playing a relative chord). Most of the time, we just waited until he wasn't around and re-recorded his parts, and blame the sudden tightness and pitch on some bullshit mixing or plugin (and this was before Mixerman!). Years later, I really think he must have been tone deaf in the worst order.
It's one thing when people have a problem with rejection and/or criticism when they are like, 15...but fuck I don't see how anybody would choose to stay in an activity where "paying your dues" basically means having nobody like you for a (lengthy) period of time.
posted January 29, 2008 by Dave McAnally