SR - 06 - Stages to Recording - HD 1080p-MP3 for Audio Podcasting
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[00:00:00] Jon Con: Hello and welcome to the Session Record Podcast. Today, on today's episode, what we wanna talk about. Is just think talking about like there's different stages to production. So we're thinking about talking about, was that a fly, ?
[00:00:25] Brino: It was a fly, yeah. Flew into the camera. It's my mate. He's been here all day with me.
[00:00:29] Jon Con: So just talking about like different stages of production and listing them out. How would you describe the stages to recording a song? Initial,
[00:00:36] Brino: the initial idea of writing to the process. You go through what, however you do that. To write a song and demo in the. Not everybody wants to do demos. To some people the demo is them sitting and playing it on a piano, on acoustic guitar or the band getting into a rehearsal room, not wanting to record it as a demo because of demo I and things like that.
[00:00:59] And wanting, not wanting to kind of get too attached to something. But I would say doing a demo of it is a, is a good idea so that you can work on the song a bit more and then you go into pre-product. How you're gonna record it in a studio, what you're gonna need to do on it, you know, all the different elements to the track.
[00:01:19] I, I suppose possibly before that you're looking at what studio you're gonna go to and who's gonna produce and engineer it. You might have even, so research, yeah. You might have even done that before you started writing the songs or you know, or you've written the songs and as you're writing you start to think, well this is gonna really suit that studio and that producer.
[00:01:38] and we really work liking with so and so. I think this would be great cuz it's more live instruments or whatever. Yeah. So then go into pre-production and then production in the studio. So yeah, research is a big part of it as well. I think in your, it's not always about the, the music elements to it. It's about how are we gonna get this track to sound the best it can for whatever budget you've got.
[00:02:00] Yeah. Assembling the access is the same person gonna mix it. I guess you should think about all of that before. Before you. Booking studios really. And what, you know, when you're working at your budget, you need planning, you need
[00:02:11] Jon Con: budgets. Yeah. Cause I think one of the things that we notice, well, I've noticed quite a bit, is sometimes, and a lot of bands think about, okay, we've got X amount of money and it all goes in towards like the recording process.
[00:02:23] Okay. Right. We've got this amount, we've got this amount of money, and we wanna spend it on recording. Sometimes what happens is when we're talking to bands in the studio, they go, well, what. You go, what's your plan after the recording process? What do you wanna do next? So is
[00:02:35] Brino: that's, we was hoping you would help us with that, Nick and John
[00:02:38] Jon Con: And so I think, I think one of the things, especially when we're thinking about planning for recording us, the thing is when your planning is thinking about how can we take every single stage into account and go, right, we're gonna spend a bit of money on recording, we're gonna spend a bit of time, obviously songwriting, practicing and rehearsing.
[00:02:53] Obviously you've mentioned a little bit about pre-production. What would you say for like for, for a new artist thinking about releasing a track? Would that differ from like more established acts when it comes to promoting their music or their work? Yeah,
[00:03:06] Brino: it would be because I think established artists ha have a focus on existing fan bases, whereas a new artist doesn't have that existing fan base, so they have to build that.
[00:03:15] So a lot of focus is building that fan base, first of all. Whereas I think when you established artists, you want to build a new fan base, but you also want to really sell to your existing fan base cuz they're the people who like the band and are gonna buy. Putting out. So it is a slightly different approach.
[00:03:30] The kind of platform's the same. You want to get to radio, you want to get on good playlists, get radio play. But obviously an established act might be going for national radio or as a new act, might concentrate on regional radio to start with. So the elements are the same, but the approach is slightly different and it is slightly different for every artist, no matter how established you are anyway.
[00:03:49] Every campaign should be a bespoke campaign for that kind of
[00:03:52] Jon Con: artist. I suppose like one of the benefits, I think, one thing I try to tell bands is, Kay, what's your. , what do you wanna get out of this? At the start of the set of the process, so we're thinking about like the recording and thinking, like we wanna go into the studio and say, well, what do you wanna do at the end of it?
[00:04:04] One of the bands you have in recently. I said, well what, where do you see yourself in about a year's time? Oh, I dunno. Maybe some gigs. It's like, well try and be a bit more unfi. You'd be a bit,
[00:04:12] Brino: yeah, you get, you Do you get, so we just say, oh, we'd like to get some bigger shows and that's. They're not spending too much on recording.
[00:04:18] They're getting some better quality music together so they can send to promoters, get on some support slots, or get on an event like a this feeling event or something like that. So, and that's literally it. Let's get into the studio. Let's not spend too much money. Let's not make an album. Let's just do two or three tracks and we use it cause we get better gigs.
[00:04:34] We do more, better gigs. We get build our fan base when they just say, oh, you know, maybe get some old gigs. Yeah, you need to be a bit more ambitious than that. But I think if that's your plan, that's your. We want to be playing to 200 people in our local area, whatever, and building that fan base, and we need some better tracks to get on those builds, then that's a plan.
[00:04:50] That's a good plan, I think, saying, oh yeah, I don't really know, you know? We'll just maybe get some gigs this year. You've gotta be a bit more ambitious. Yeah, timings are important. I like putting a business plan together for all of this is a really good. Move, obviously that's something that we do 18 month business plan together for people.
[00:05:04] Yeah, because you need to think as well as all the musical stuff that's going on, you need to think, well, when are you gonna release this? When is a good time to release it? When have you got some good shows coming up that it, it'd be good to release the first SI single around that show because you're gonna be supporting a band who's maybe playing to 1500 people or something, or you're on a.
[00:05:22] And then so once you know that that's your date, this is gonna be released. When does it need to be finished by? When do the promotions people need it. How? It always takes longer than you think. Oh, we're gonna go in the studio, bash it out. Yeah, the mix will be done. Well, no, cuz you know, three weeks later you're still arguing over the snare drum sign.
[00:05:38] So, And then promotion campaigns can't always start and you might think they want two weeks and they actually want six weeks promotion before it, depending on what you're spending. So I think having that timeline, which is basically a business plan, is really important at the beginning as well. So you know when you're going, when you're gonna be finished.
[00:05:54] Some people like start booking the studio and they haven't even written the songs yet.
[00:05:57] Jon Con: It's turning up. Tohidu about songs were probably, was probably alright back in like the seventies where budgets were much. You had a much longer period of time and you could allow for that time to kind of be creative in the studio.
[00:06:09] But I think, I suppose that's where like, if we go back to the stages, the, the having the ideas, the song really comes in, like the songwriting and the demo stage. Like the practicing stage every, like, everyone works definitely don't they? And when it comes to like songwriting Yeah. I know bands where like you've got a single focus point focus where like the lead singer or someone would go write, I've got the songs, this is the core structure, and he shows everyone else.
[00:06:32] And then there's other ones where everyone gets in the room together and they just jam it out and gets ideas. The band you in, dragon Flies. What was the way that you guys worked for songwriting?
[00:06:39] Brino: I wrote, I wrote all the material, so I would always be walking around. I'd have my acoustic guitar with me all the time.
[00:06:46] I'd come up with ideas. Sometimes it would, it was the riff or the, or the chord would come first. And sometimes I had a little lyric book, so I was always writing things down. Observations or, that was an interesting story. So sometimes it was the lyrics that came first. And I would sit and write and I had tons of songs.
[00:07:01] Yeah. And I was always writing songs. And then I would start to condense them. Into, yeah, let's, let's do that one. Let's work on that one. And then I'd take 'em into the rehearsal room, play 'em to the guys, and they would come up with air bits and try this and try that. And we'd pull the arrangement about a bit.
[00:07:15] And then they'd say, I'm not really feeding that song, or whatever, but the chorus is great. And then we might steal a verse from one song and a chorus from another song, and we'd kind of do all that in a studio together, which is, I see that as kind of songwriting and pre-production. So we would do all that and then I would record the track in our rehearsal room just on a back then on before track on my task scam.
[00:07:35] Yeah. We'd record that. So we had a demo of it and everyone could start learning and I could start working on harmony parts for backing vocals cuz I'd be doing all the backing vocals. Like Johnny could really. Learn vocal melodies and timing and then me and him might get together with an acoustic guitar and mess around with the timing a little bit.
[00:07:51] So that was kind of how we did it most of the time. But other times, cuz we had a lot of studio time, we had our own studio as well. After a, we would we had a lot of studio time in Rockfield cause we were assigned to the Rockford label. So I guess when we had all that studio time, we started to write in the studio.
[00:08:06] But there were still ideas that I'd came up with Yeah. Outside of the studio. But I would bring them in in their raw form, just an acoustic and a vocal. , and then we would build them and set up and arrange them, do the pre-production and record them all at the same time then. But we had a luxury, we had the studio there and we had plenty of studio time, but when we didn't Yeah.
[00:08:24] It was getting, yeah. Yeah. As much of it done so we could then go in. And just bash it out. Everybody knew their parts. Everybody had rehearsed. We rehearsed the songs. We might even do it a few of the new ones at some gigs as well, just to get feel for them at the live shows. Things changed in the studio.
[00:08:39] We all had strong ideas in that band. And obviously being a producer, I would be like, no, we need to try this. We need to try that. I would even start to think about where the drums should be, what Guitar Amster is gonna use. What, and a lot of bands don't do that. I just do that cuz it comes. So I was kind of doing write in pre-production demos, all in that we was always read ready at the time.
[00:08:59] We would go to the studio unless of course we had lo loads of studio time to write. But that was more like booking a studio to write as opposed to booking a studio to record. And bands would go there and they'd spend a month, and that was pre-production, but it was kind of writing and pre-production.
[00:09:13] And then they'd do that for a month before they came to Rockfield. So they were really prepared. And they'd still come to Rockfield for like six weeks, but they'd done a month of writing beforehand. But yeah, that's that luxury. And now bands can't really afford to start writing when they get to the studio.
[00:09:27] The time's just not there to do.
[00:09:29] Jon Con: No, but I think one of the things, obviously like the luxury might have gone in terms obviously the time, but I think in a way like the technology's got a lot more accessible. One of the things that I think what I've said to bands as well is like, just record your practices.
[00:09:40] You use your phone because the phone, the cam, like the mic on the phone's, great. And it'll pick up everything that you kind of need to hear it. So if you can just balance the recordings in a practice room, say like music boxing Cardiff, or like Pirate Studios, anywhere. Like if the room's treated and like everything, you can kind of hear everything pretty well, as long as it's not too loud, like, and you don't send up with like just white noise.
[00:09:59] That can be good enough to send us demos. Yeah. Yeah. I think one of the things I think people worry about is that they think, right, for my demos, I'm gonna produce everything at home. I'm gonna record it in Logic or SOAR or Pros. It doesn't always need to be that. And we, I, I know that there's a lot of musicians.
[00:10:13] The technical side of the, you know, the computer side of things they may not be up to speed on. So just using your phone and recording the demo and just having everyone play together can be just as important. And like sometimes, like some of the best songs have actually, we've recorded, have been demos.
[00:10:26] And one of the things I think the benefits from doing that is you don't get too attached to parts or structures or sounds and stuff. So you, you've mentioned, you touched on a little bit already about like pre-production. Is pre-production always vital? Not
[00:10:38] Brino: always vital. Bands like Thunder, it's, it's all done.
[00:10:43] You know, they, it's written, demoed. There's no point going in and doing pre-production. The pre-production has been done by Luke in his own studio writing, and there's other bands that just haven't got the budget for it. And you have to decide, have we got budget for pre-production or do we need to use that budget for recording?
[00:10:59] Otherwise there's just not enough time and you do pre-production. So how I would do that then is I was get the band set up, get the sounds, would've heard a. And then sort of know what kind of sounds I want to go for. And then we would do pre-production. I would get 'em to run through the song. And over the first few run throughs, I would be changing tempos.
[00:11:16] Yeah. Maybe saying, let's try this. Let's cut that bit out. Or you need to add this in here. Change that chord for that chord. Getting the drummer to play less symbols, getting the drummer to do less fills. getting the drummer to play with a bit more dynamics. Getting the drummer to , not go too, too mental too soon.
[00:11:33] Getting the drummer to maybe get rid of some bass drums. Getting the drummer to maybe get, yeah, it's a lot of work with the drums.
[00:11:40] Jon Con: it. It's one of those things though, isn't it? Like the drums become the foundation of like, it's normally where you, it's normally at the main starting point, isn't it? And like you've gotta get a solid foundation to the.
[00:11:49] and if the drums are wrong, it can
[00:11:51] Brino: throw everything off. Tom, if they're in a rehearsal room and it's all very loud and no one can really hear themselves, they don't really hear that the bass drums maybe not fallen in the right place or that they're playing too much bass. Nobody's really heard that until you're in a studio and you're like, oh yeah, that bass drum shouldn't fall there.
[00:12:06] Yeah, or there's too many bass drums going on, or, Why could we, should have tried this, you know, and, and making sure there's the dynamics, whether you're gonna go to the crash symbol for every chorus. I mean, that's in a rehearsal. When everything's loud and everyone's competing, that's fine. But in a studio environment it doesn't necessarily need to do that because there's ever things that you can use for the dynamics and doesn't have to fight so much.
[00:12:27] So yeah, I'm doing all of that while we're recording. Na naturally, if I hear something then we, we work on it doesn't always, you try it, you don't know if it's gonna work out and you try it and you're not saying how you. It should go. It has to be the way it goes. It's a democracy, so everyone kind of gets to try it and hear it in the studio.
[00:12:44] Maybe come into the control, listen back, and if everyone else doesn't agree and doesn't like it, then we don't go with it. If we're split 50 50, then we get the final say. Cuz someone has to always, you'd be there going round in circles forever. Yeah, we're going back to the demos. Yeah. Like say, sometimes on the phone is, is enough.
[00:12:59] Cause we're only listening for the song and the arrangement really. And the melodies. And the hooks. And when we get these demos that are done by maybe bedroom producers, no, I'm not saying that. They're not good producers or good bedroom producers recorded all the demos at home. The drums are program, everything's there and it's all pristine and it's all, and then you're saying, oh, how long did it take you to like put that together?
[00:13:18] And they're like, oh, about three weeks. And then, you know, I spent a couple of weeks mix. And you're like, right, well, you spent five weeks on the demo and then you've booked half a day to record it in a studio and like all. By recording the demo, they've ironed out, they've done the pre-production. So a lot of the parts are right and the arrangements right, and we know what guitar sound and everybody knows what they're gonna play, which speeds the whole process up.
[00:13:39] You're trying to compete with something that's taken five weeks in five hours, and it's hard sometimes to kind of match the sounds and you know, you get all this singer, ah, the snare doesn't quite punch as much as on the demo kind of thing. It's like, well, You spend two weeks mixing it on the demo. Now you want to spend 20 minutes on the drum sound.
[00:13:57] You know, it's not always magic like that. Yeah. So yeah, those demo, the demo thing, yeah. Can be a curse sometimes as well as a lot of help. . Yeah. Cuz
[00:14:07] Jon Con: sometimes when the demos do what you've got, arrangements like mapped out or like there's like a tempo map done, ready to go, which you can import using midi or like they've got like pads or something which can just be dropped in and go Right.
[00:14:18] Just explore that out for me and I'll use that. There's no point wasting time. So it can be great for time saving because it came up maybe like the next. Stage with my band and stuff, what we used to do is, like, I used to record the demos at home, but I was very aware that like I wasn't great at what I was doing, but it was enough to go right here's the guide tracks, here's the tempos.
[00:14:34] If like, if there are any changes that go right, the chorus is t bpm faster. The, the verses maybe one bpm slower and then here's like we, we got slow down at the end. It was really just to save time with like guy tracks cuz I couldn't be bothered. because there's been loads of times in the past where what we were recording and what we thought we practiced, we ended up being completely different in the studio.
[00:14:53] So it was like trying to avoid that. So I was just thinking about like a time saving element. Yeah. I suppose what we've really covered so far is that we talked a little bit about songwriting, getting the ideas and stuff, talked about demos and like the pre-production stage. One of the things I remember working with Gil Norton, I, we did like the, the band from Liverpool in Vale, and I think we had three days in total and the first day was just dedicated to pre-product.
[00:15:15] He was right. We'll get all the sounds up, as you said. Get all the recordings. So we like the sound checking and stuff. And then what, what he always does is he always just makes sure, like even if it's like a short session, it's like he'll sit in the room with the band and everyone plays live together and he listens to the song.
[00:15:28] Yeah. And then he'll make suggestions about what he thinks should change and everything. So like it's having that
[00:15:33] Brino: communication. Yeah. . I like to go in the room as well. I think it's just better, isn't it? Like when you're in the room and that's why I quite like an actual pre-production session where you're not in a control room when the band are in a studio.
[00:15:43] Maybe you are just in a rehearsal room. It's communication. It's, yeah, it's immediate. Because even when we're in the studio, you see me? Yeah. You don't have to press a button. Yeah. We're in the studio and I, what I tend to do is, even though I could talk to them through the talk, like I tend to run into the studio and talk to them about the ideas.
[00:15:57] Come on, bro. Ron's getting down now, John. You had enough talk in pre-production, you
[00:16:01] Jon Con: run. There's sometimes, I suppose like there's three stages to recording that we can kind of talk about, which is recording, mixing, and mastering. Yeah. Can they all happen in one session or do you like to like switch stuff up or they can, how do you normally approach?
[00:16:15] Yeah, they
[00:16:16] Brino: can, and obviously we do. If bands only come in for, you know, they've got four days off work or whatever and they're doing a couple of songs and they want to be there for the mixes and there's no budget format matching, then yeah, of course we have done that many a time, aren't we? I would prefer not to.
[00:16:30] I prefer to. And then I prefer to mix by myself actually and have a maybe a week or few days in between the recording process just to step away from it. Yeah. Cause I don't mind then if the band come in on the last day of mixing and we go through it or towards the end. But all the kind of, when I'm doing the editing and the working on effects bands soon get really bored.
[00:16:49] When you are, they listen to a vocal nonstop over and over. Yeah. And they all start talking and they're all, it's kind of, you can't concentrate. And everyone's shouting, oh yeah, I'm not happy. That should be louder. And it's like, you haven't even got to that yet. You know, and there's all these suggestions coming when you haven't even got to that point.
[00:17:04] So it's easier to get, even when the bands are there for the entire mix session, it's nice to kick them out for, say, we're doing, I mean, a luxury of one mix a day. It's nice to kick the band out or tell 'em if you're in Rockford or whatever. Stay in, go and do whatever you want. Stay in the accommodation and bring them in later on when you're ready to play it back to them.
[00:17:21] Yeah. You mentioned about
[00:17:22] Jon Con: that, like the beater band, and you said like they'd go off and they'd come back into the end and make a couple of tweaks to just leave it to it. Yeah. Cause there was a lot
[00:17:27] Brino: of stuff to sort out and a lot of. Housekeeping as we, as we call it. So there was a lot of that to go on.
[00:17:32] Does bands need to sit through that? Or if you Yeah, now if you're tuning vocals and things like that, do they need to hear that going over and over and or you might still be doing a bit of comping at that point in the mix time. Good thing they don't need to hear any of that really. I mean, there's certain people who, artists who are.
[00:17:46] No producing it with you and they want to mix with you and they know what they're doing, so they're there for the whole mix process really. Even then, they probably wouldn't stay if you're editing, they just let you get on with the editing and then they'd come back when that's done cuz it's so boring.
[00:17:58] If you're not, you're not involved in it. Yeah, I would prefer to have a separate mix session and then I would prefer to master it or send it off for mastering. Do it as well. I'd prefer to spit the sessions up.
[00:18:08] Jon Con: In terms of mastering, how would you describe what, what is the, what is happening in the
[00:18:13] Brino: mastering process?
[00:18:13] Nobody knows John. It's a dark artist. It's magic. Nobody knows all we can, all we can do is make something up and hope that that's right .
[00:18:22] Jon Con: You send it to a person and he has a button and he presses it and it becomes mastered. Yes. That's what happened. That's what
[00:18:26] Brino: I know. You don't even know if that person's real anymore.
[00:18:28] Back in the day in, when I was in my ute, when I was able to attend mastering, when they would fly you to New York for mastering back in those days, so you would attend, you'd take the tapes with you, you knew that person was was there, they existed. Well, now you have no idea if that person's mastering it.
[00:18:43] If that person exists, who's actually mastering it? Who is master? Is it them, is it, or is it, you know, or is it the new, the new guy who just started last week, who's, who's mastering it? No, so the mastering process, really important part. I like to send like most of my bigger productions go off to for mastering.
[00:19:01] Usually with Pete Mayer, who's amazing. But yeah, we use other, other guys as well, but mainly Pete. So sometimes we may be too heavily involved in a project that we don't wanna mash it that fresh set of ears. Someone like Pete, who can just instantly hear what's wrong with the mix or what's, what it needs or what it doesn't.
[00:19:16] Affirmation that it's all, it's all as it should be, you know? So nice. Sometimes it's nice to send it away and not have that respons responsibility. Yeah. I kind of see the two, two elements for me of mastering is the musical side of it, where you're listening to it and going, oh, this could do with punching a bit more.
[00:19:30] It needs to, I dunno, hit harder, or it's really bright, or there's some really annoying frequencies, or there's some sub stuff that doesn't need to be in there. It's, it's a bit muddy, so sometimes it's a bit fault finding. You're kind of fixing. Other times there's nothing wrong with the mix. It sounds great.
[00:19:45] So then you, you're kind of not really doing anything musically then you're going into the technical aspect of it. What, what level is the mix at? What does it need to be at, or the codes, the coding on there, the labeling. The PQ sheet, all that stuff. So there's like two elements to there. Music died and then the technical housekeeping side of it, piling the song.
[00:20:05] Yeah. So sometimes there's a lot of stuff to do, will master stuff and sometimes you'll spend the whole time fixing something musically, making it better and fixing the problems within the mix. And then you'll do all the stuff that you need to do the compiling, put it in order, making sure the gaps are right, making sure it's labeled, the codes are in there, creating the ddp.
[00:20:25] Yeah. And other times we're doing very little musically and literally just compiling a dd D D P and making sure that info is correct, making sure you've got all the right info, all the labelings correct. So for an album, obviously that side of it takes a a lot longer compiling it, getting the gaps right, making sure the flow of the album is right.
[00:20:41] The levels between the track. So there's, there's a musical aspect and there's that technical aspect. So I don't know, like your preferred method, whether you do it tra whether you are kind of mix those two or whether you do all the. side of things and then do the kind of technical side of it
[00:20:55] Jon Con: afterwards.
[00:20:56] The way I kind of describe it to people is mixing is like, you look at one song at a time and you're bringing, like, say you've got like 40, 50, 60 individual tracks and you're bringing them down to a stereo file. The mastering stage is like, you go in, right? Here's the 10 mixes, and we're trying to make that one coherent.
[00:21:13] Body of work. So you're trying to make sure they're all the same, similar loudness level. And I think Bobcats in his book says in mastering like the, the, the goal for mastering is that the listen doesn't have to re this reach for the volume kn and turn things up or down. , and that's part of it. And that's like, yeah, the dark art is like, it's obviously they're focusing on the stereo image.
[00:21:33] Oh, sorry. The stereo, the musical file and making sure everything's kind of consistent. Yeah. And so you're not like, and it's almost like quality control, isn't it? Where like, it's, it's quite nice, as you say, sending stuff to Pete or someone else to pick up on stuff that you might have missed out on the Oh yeah.
[00:21:46] There's a, there's a buildup in this song. In like two 20 cuz you're playing in the key of C and it's a minor or something, or there's a buildup of a certain frequency and then they can kind of fix that because they're fresh to it.
[00:21:57] Brino: Yeah, yeah. And they have, you know, a master studio is more equipped to deal with those issues than, than a mixed studio or recording studio.
[00:22:04] You know, they have, they have the tools to, yeah, the, the monitoring, the ears, the tools, the, the outboard to deal with that. You know, if you go into a decent master in place, they've got amazing compressors, amazing EQs. Mastering software they're using. So yeah, you hope you're not trying to fix a mix, but sometimes the mix is right, but the band have decided last minute that the vocal needs to pop out a bit more and all that can be done on master, you know, when you are using the stereo width and you can EQ it in there and bring up the center, things like that.
[00:22:32] Or maybe it's the guitars need to pump a bit more and they're in stereo, so that's nice. Need, you can bring up the sides. There's, there's things you can do. Yeah, obviously in the mix that's a lot easier cuz you, you've got everything as you say, stemmed out. So, It's a lot easier to do, but that's, that kind of stuff still can be done in mastering, but we are hoping not to do that.
[00:22:50] We're hoping to get a nice balance mix that we are just checking. The overall frequencies are kind of where, where they should be. You know, does it, does it hit where it needs to hit? That kind of thing. And then, like you say, making it sound uniform. So it's a body of work. At times though, with that, it's a collection of singles.
[00:23:08] You're still trying to get the levels the same on the singles, but they're not gonna be on ever, they're never gonna be on the. CD or anything, but they might be on the same playlist, obviously. So there'll be one after another. So you still need to kind of make them uniform. Yeah. But an album, I always like to switch between tracks, go back and forth after I've mastered them and go back and go and just kind of get a feel for how the overall album's sounding.
[00:23:30] And then when you're doing gaps, you're listening to things like tempo. So that you get the gaps right? Whether it's a fast song coming next or a slow song coming next, and whether you've had a big epic track that you just need that little extra breather before you hit the next one. Or whether it needs to come straight in and smack you in the face straight away.
[00:23:49] But obviously as we know John, all this is just made up Steph. Yeah. Cause no one really knows what it is.
[00:23:54] Jon Con: There is a whole sage, I think now, like, especially with like, like streaming platforms, isn't it? Where like you don't really. that end of the work where like we, you're listening to the end of the song and the start of the next one, and then you're thinking, right, when's the, when's the next song starting?
[00:24:08] And like with the CDs, you see a countdown, didn't you? Yeah. Like the, the minus one minus or minus two minus one. It might always be different. That was something that like, I think does get lost a little bit now people don't really think about it. I remember like going, when I used to go 10 mastering, it was one of the things that we do is like, right, when do we think it's gonna end?
[00:24:24] Everyone? Like kind of tap or
[00:24:26] Brino: like say, I love all that. And I still do that when I do albums, even though like, It's not necessarily gonna be listened to as a body of work. And people have, they can change the settings of how they listen to music, where the tracks fade in and out, whether they set as two second gap themselves.
[00:24:38] So all your little work into making sure those gaps are right, really a lot of the time have no, you know, have no benefit at all the work you've put into that unless someone's sitting there listening to an entire album. But yeah, I like, I like putting work into that cuz you never know when it's gonna end up on a cd.
[00:24:54] And obviously if you're doing a DDP master, you want that to be, want that to be right. I like to listen. The whole album. Yeah, that'd be right. Yeah. How annoying is the drill? That, how annoying is my drill? That's just started the man over, there's, I think he's doing hedges. It's
[00:25:08] Jon Con: just, yeah, it's there, but it's, it's
[00:25:10] Brino: not, it's natural.
[00:25:11] It's normal though, isn't it? Outside? It's normal. Just chilling. John. I sat outside having a, having a squash, having a black coat squash. It's, is
[00:25:19] Jon Con: that
[00:25:19] Brino: what it is? Black coat squash, not snake, not.
[00:25:24] Jon Con: So just to recap, like what we've really kind of covered today, very briefly, I suppose, like we looked at songwriting, like the stages is, we're starting off with songwriting. Demos talked a little bit about like in that stage, researching the studios you wanna go to. pre-production that could happen before the session and getting prepared.
[00:25:43] Talked a little bit about recording mixing and then mastering. And I suppose the final section I really want to like cover, we've talked a little bit at the start, was just about releasing and promotion. This is something I think that people, as we mentioned earlier, it's like people sometimes overlook.
[00:25:59] I've definitely had a couple of bands where they've recorded like five or six songs and they've released everything in one go. And I remember a band did something similar that they release a song. for 10 weeks and it's like, great. What happens now when you are working with bands? What do you, what do you advise bands like, what do you try to tell them to kind of help 'em
[00:26:15] Brino: here?
[00:26:15] Well, you need to look at the band, look at their fan base, look at how many songs have they got, what's their goals, and it's really putting a bespoke business plan together for that. I mean, you wouldn't go into any other business that you invest in money into and not kind of have it mapped out and not create a business.
[00:26:32] Can look at it and go, well, it's just, you know, I'm an artist and it's all about the music and I don't care. It can, it can organically grow into whatever it does. And that people used to be able to do that more. Cause there was a full team behind them. But now actually the bands are more often than not the team and they are the importance and they're in charge of all that.
[00:26:50] So I think you have to have a plan. And that's kind of individually, that's where like we come in kind of looking at all these different aspects and going, no, this is how you should do it. And we get asked this all the time, don't we? How do you think we should do this? They're putting an actual plan together for an artist is something that we are, we are used to doing, is something that we, we, we do.
[00:27:07] And I think it's individual, I think. And now it's different to how it used to be because before we never had to worry about Spotify algorithms and how often you release tracks cuz that all comes into play now cuz you need to, you need to release every, so, On those platforms to kind of tap into to the growth that it creates, you know, which we didn't have to worry about that when it was just CDs.
[00:27:28] It was like, how long does the radio plugin need? How long does the PR team need? When's our tour happening? So you need to look at things like this. If you've got gigs booked for November, then you've gotta get some songs out before the tour and you've gotta get something out after the tour. You, you need to, you need to really map that.
[00:27:42] Obviously things can change cuz you might get offered a really big tour that you didn't know you were gonna get offered. So you might hold something back for that to promote on that tour. Get, you know, we going through picking which of the singles, releasing a couple of singles, how, you know, deciding on how many that's gonna be, how often it's gonna be, who's gonna.
[00:28:02] or whether it's the artist, how, how, how that campaign's gonna look on social media. Who's gonna be in charge of it? Or are you getting someone in, is that the responsibility of someone in the band? Are you gonna delegate that to each band member has their own role and then you release those singles and then you follow up with the EP or the album dependent on what you're doing?
[00:28:22] Obviously then you can book shows around that or you can tailor, tailor that release to shows you've already got. You know it, you might start getting radio play and doing really well. So things, things can change. It's a business plan, but it can change. It's like, well, we've earned some money from this radio play.
[00:28:37] Let's get a, a plugger in. Now for the next one, who can to maybe take us to national radio? Get us bigger. , bigger stations. Yeah, I just think it's just important to plan it and just come in and, you know, start to think about singles when you are, when you're recording as well. Start to think about put putting your plan together.
[00:28:54] The songs that you think maybe might be the singles don't always end up being the singles after you've recorded them anyway. Yeah. And sometimes
[00:28:59] Jon Con: it's like the song I present itself and then normally they like. , whoever you're in the studio with, it's always good to get like gage their opinion as well.
[00:29:05] Because bands, I always find that, like bands sometimes get attached to the newest song. The newest song they've written, oh, this is the best one. But sometimes it's like, there might be another song there at the end just kind of presents themselves. Like everything kind of comes together. Yeah. And it just sounds great.
[00:29:17] Yeah. And it's like that's, that's the one I I suggest over the other one. Yeah. And sometimes it's like fans or like people that are like, they might have a favorite song. I remember, I remember a band I worked with, I. We did that pre-production thing where we were like, right, we're gonna set up and record.
[00:29:31] And I said, right, let's just play through all the songs so I can hear 'em. Yeah. And then we went through 'em and said, okay, I think we got three of the songs. We've got one more we're gonna do, but I don't think the ones, we've got this, this room for something else. And then one of them went, well, all our friends, all our fans like this song.
[00:29:45] And they played it. It was like, Why haven't you done that one? Yeah. . That's like the best one. That's the one that became, it's always one of those.
[00:29:51] Brino: Oh, we hate that song. We've been playing it years, you know, and it's yeah, we hate that one. Our new songs are much better. And you're like, no, they're not.
[00:29:56] That's, that's the one now.
[00:29:58] Jon Con: Yeah. That is Sometimes. I've seen it so many times. Well, like those people gone. That's the song. It's like, why, why have you, why have you got rid of it? And it's, and
[00:30:04] Brino: have the new, the latest song that they've written is their best song. The new song that they've written is their best song all the time.
[00:30:10] When bands say they have, we have 20 songs, but we know which 10 we're gonna do, I'd, I'd quite like to hear the other. , I like to hear all 20. Yeah. Cause you know they need an objective view to it. Yeah. So then, yeah, like you're saying, and that might become a single out of nowhere, but budget, the, like, the budget side of it.
[00:30:25] You have to figure out are you gonna do videos? Who's gonna do the videos? You know, don't just have one single or one video ready to go. Have, have the next one ready to go. Cause if you get some really good radio play on a single, you want the next one ready to go. You want the artwork done, you want it mixed, it's mastered.
[00:30:39] There's a videos done so that you can throw that. And capitalize on that promotion you've already had. You might end up getting got, you know, pulled onto a TV show last minute, getting offered it, and you've gone on. You need a follow up. The radio want a follow up, you know, the people want a follow up.
[00:30:57] They wanna buy into the band, they want to develop with the band. . So yeah, you need to make sure you've got all these things. Who's gonna be doing the videos? How much they gonna cost?
[00:31:06] Jon Con: I think if having the foundation's having a plan, I remember going like being to like loads of conferences and stuff. You talk to promoters and one of the things he always says that they're not really too worried about a press release.
[00:31:13] They're more interested in hearing about the band and what's their plan for the next year. Cause all they wanna see is they wanna support a band who are coming up that they can then put 'em on a higher billing next year. Yeah. The promote, we see the, like sometimes they. They go, we see these as the headliner in a year's time or two years' time.
[00:31:27] We want to see the ones. And it's like if you are, if you're prepared, if you're driven, if you've got everything organized and you're really easy to get on with. Yeah. Then the likelihood is if you're low stress and the band like promoters are gonna go, yeah, wicked
[00:31:37] Brino: pick them. And producers at the state radio stations think the same as, well, we want to buy into the band they want, you know, obviously if it's a great song, they'll play it, but they want to know what's next, what's what they doing, what, you know, they wanted to buy into the band, like you say, and the promoters wanna do the same thing.
[00:31:50] Having that plan and having those target dates and those budgets, Because like you've gone through now, you've done a couple of songs, it's builded nicely, and then you've got no budget left to get a plugger in, no budget left to promote it, no budget for the video. So you end up doing all, all yourselves and the one single then before the album gets released.
[00:32:06] Absolutely. Bombs does nothing, doesn't build because you left nothing back for it. So yeah, trying to, and it's hard sometimes to, I mean, what, what you do, Joe? I know when you've got a really small budget, do you make the best record you possibly can with all the money or do you make a record that's not quite as good as it could be?
[00:32:22] Didn't spend as much money on the recording and mixing and mastering cuz you saved some back for promoting it. You know, it's a, it's a, it is a tough one because you're compromising your art there for what you're gonna do with your art. But I think you just have to figure out whether that's coming to somewhere like us and working out payment plans saying, well we know we've got festivals in six months time, so can we do this, this, and this?
[00:32:44] And from those festivals we pay you X amount of money. So we do payment plans for these artists and. Or whether that's, you know, you have to go and get some extra work in or, or, or whatever. Or you do a pledge campaign or not pledge anymore. Thank God, you know, whether you do, whether you do a campaign to kind of get it fund or you're doing, doing pre-orders with your fan base.
[00:33:07] I think you just have to bring all that into your business plan about how you can do it. I think it is a tough one, compromising that art to leave money for that. Try not to compromise the art and try and find other ways that you can raise the budget. Well, I mean, what's your thoughts on that? It's a catch 22, isn't
[00:33:23] Jon Con: it?
[00:33:23] One of the label managers I work with in Brighton, he says like, you only ever, like your first release has gotta have an impact. . So you're only ever as good as your first release. So if it means that you take a bit of time, you don't, I think there, there's, there's a tendency of bands kind of rushing things out or like jumping ahead of the guns.
[00:33:41] Like actually no. If you, if you take the time to go, this is a plan, this is what we're gonna do. Yeah. So I like, a good example of the moment, I'd probably say would be like a bank called Cardinal Black. Yeah. We've been working with them on demos for like two years and they, they finally came out and they had like the music video ready to go.
[00:33:55] They had the demos and stuff. They had an EP ready to go, so they had everything in. And I suppose it's like, don't rush. , like releasing stuff and it's making sure you've got everything in place. Yeah. And if that means it takes a couple of months or like six months to get everything, yeah. It's worth it. That's, that could be, that could be far more important.
[00:34:13] Yeah. And then if the budget does come into it, is then, like, if we think about like bands like Burning Crows where you've got. Each band member had had their own like assigned role, didn't they? Yeah. So like someone was in charge of touring, someone was in charge of social media, someone was in charge of the bookings.
[00:34:29] So then it's thinking, okay, well what can each band member do that can help? So there might be one person who's really good at design, there might be someone person who's right, you are just in charge of booking gigs and stuff. Yeah. And then someone else will be in charge of the social media and figuring out the
[00:34:42] Brino: campaigns.
[00:34:42] Yeah. And that it is, that helps keep momentum going, isn't it? Defining those roles. You've got the staff there already. If you, if you can do it. Some people just can't do any of those things and they have no, you know, inclination to want to, want to do any of that anyway. Although that's, that's, you know, that's when you have to look at how are we gonna do it then, then
[00:35:00] Jon Con: that would be then thinking about, right.
[00:35:01] We just need to think about, okay, we need to get, we need to get a team around ourselves. . Okay. Right. Who do we need? How can we get that to, okay, well this is what I'm strong at. Who can I get to help me with the next bit and pieces? If it's just someone that goes Right, you need to do this at this point, or here's, here's a plan that you need to follow.
[00:35:16] Yeah. And then that might be,
[00:35:17] Brino: and I mean really early on, it might be something as simple as saying to that, like, we might say to the band, don't do an album. You've not really got 10 or 12 strong, strong enough songs and you haven't really got the budget to do an album and then promote an album. So do an ep.
[00:35:31] Do a four or five track ep, cuz you've got four or five. Great. You can spend a little bit longer recording them and getting them right and then you've got budget to promote them and to see it through, which will then in turn maybe bring you that income and that revenue you need to then go make a great album rather than trying to rush an album.
[00:35:48] Cuz even though a lot of bands think they've got 10 or 12 amazing songs, in reality there might only be three or four on that album. You know? And there's only so much we can do to kind of make it a great album. So maybe suggesting that it's an EP rather than an album to start. generate some income from that ep.
[00:36:04] Yeah. And use that to record a decent album with a decent campaign.
[00:36:07] Jon Con: That's probably a good place to kind of leave it there for this episode. Yeah. One of the things that we do have for anyone starting out is we do have a band checklist for people starting out which can get a session.
[00:36:17] record.com/band checklist is completely free. Or we ask is like an email address. If any, if you have any questions for us, please email [email protected]. Brian, thank you very much. You're welcome, and we will see you all again next time. See you later. Bye-bye.
