Mixing & Recording Engineer

Q: Tell us about your studio setup.

A: Overall it's a very flexible hybrid setup: The front end is all analog from vintage tube microphones to old Neve Mic Pre's & EQ's. Outboard gear like Pultec tube EQs and all the different flavors of vintage Neve limiters. It's all about tone and definitely not about compromise here. Then for the digital side it's an HDX ProTools rig, with a 32-Fader D-Control ES, UAD Octo card, loads of plugins... particularly all things warm, saturating, or distorting. And on the backend I have summing options: a passive summing buss that can be used with different mic pre's for tone and color, the Neve BCM-10 sidecar summing, SSL mix buss cards that can be used to get a little of that flavor. It's entirely setup to be able to get all sorts of different sounds from the real actual old vintage good stuff... but still be able to move quickly like a modern setup.

Q: Describe the most common type of work you do for your clients.

A: Every record is different... so whether I'm tracking from scratch or mixing, I'm usually exploring a bit and finding out what the sound of THIS album wants to be. And then I figure out what gear, and techniques, and mindset this album needs to get there. And that's always different... every record get's its own sound and has it's own identity.

Q: What type of music do you usually work on?

A: I love anything with big Drums, Bass, Guitars, Vocals. I also love anything with Acoustic Guitars, Pianos, Strings, Horns, Choirs, VIbes, B3's. I've also spent a ton of time over the years doing pop with electronic sounds and lot's of layers of background vocals. It seems there are a lot of engineers recently who specialize in one genre. Which is cool. That's definitely not my experience and I think actually I've always wanted to be the sort of engineer who can jump around genres, spending the career building an understanding of music in general and the studio chops to do so.

Q: What are you working on at the moment?

A: Finishing up another (yet unreleased) Damien Jurado album as well as finishing remote mixing an album for a duo called Coyote Brother

Q: What do you bring to a song?

A: At mix: I think an objectivity and focus. I definitely spend a lot of time listening to what the artist has done and what's been recorded. And my aim is never to judge that, or try to change that, or put my stamp on it. I hope to take what's there and all the intent I can find... and make sense of it. To where you hear the mix and say "That's EXACTLY what that's supposed to sound like, I can't imagine it another way". And sometimes I nail that on the first try. Sometimes I'll do a second take on the first song to get that reaction from the client. But fingers crossed, we always seem to get there ;)

Q: What was your career path? How long have you been doing this?

A: Lifelong musician, I actually dropped out of conventional high school to take all the music theory and composition courses at the local community college instead. I attended CalArts for a couple years as a Music Composition major. But then I got access to their recording studio, aaaand that's where I found my real love. I've since dedicated myself to the studio for some 22 years since recording my first album for other people. And I've been so fortunate to spend that entire time in larger facilities using a silly amount of vintage and holy grail gear. I've been able to be a part of installing Neve consoles, and SSL consoles. I've gotten to learn from the techs. On top of the level of immersion of that life, I'm someone who doesn't take vacations, travel, or hang out with friends ;)... I am just obsessed with what I do. Music is my life, and my chosen place is on the studio side hoping to help artists create great music.