Producer, Songwriter, Engineer

Q: Tell us about a project you worked on you are especially proud of and why. What was your role?

A: If you read my interview, you'll know I don't have a large client roster. Although I would say that I am proud of my most current work, basically whatever I am working on in the moment. My role is to study frequencies.

Q: What are you working on at the moment?

A: I just released a collection of about 30 singles of my work. I am working on releasing another batch of 30 tracks at the moment.

Q: Is there anyone on SoundBetter you know and would recommend to your clients?

A: I think so, but how would I find them? Is there a search?

Q: Analog or digital and why?

A: if you study a waveform today, you can get pretty close with digital - I have a home studio and I constantly try to make big sounds from my tiny Brooklyn space. Digital is here to stay, analog is too! I don't miss splicing tape, but I do miss not being able to undo after every take so easily. Analog forced me to be conscious of time and money. Digital makes me be too critical and obsessive.

Q: What's your 'promise' to your clients?

A: I will always provide you with satisfaction. It's your music and it's yours. I am just a tool for you to shape and polish your sound.

Q: What do you like most about your job?

A: I like whatever current song I am making. Once it's released, I become critical. So, I combat this regret with making another track. Repeat....

Q: What questions do customers most commonly ask you? What's your answer?

A: How did you write, record and produce more songs than the Beatles? Because the Beatles were a band and I had no limits. No ego. No outside influence. No opinions. Just mini decisions I was able to make along each bar of the song.

Q: What's the biggest misconception about what you do?

A: Gear is not the end all be all

Q: What questions do you ask prospective clients?

A: Do you have reference tracks? What is your job? What is my job? Do we have the same goal? Are you okay with me cutting your distorted guitar tracks at 4-8k to let your voice cut through more? Do you know what fat, soft, thin, boom, bottom, etc is? If not, I will be your translator - we'll be fine! I got you!

Q: What advice do you have for a customer looking to hire a provider like you?

A: Be organized, professional, courteous, and open minded to feedback, criticism, direction, and ideas. There is no perfect anything in this business... we are just turning knobs until there's a consensus on the ideal sound. I will do the same and deliver my best work to you.

Q: If you were on a desert island and could take just 5 pieces of gear, what would they be?

A: Headphones I trust. Laptop. Guitar.... do I need 5 pieces? I could do everything with just three items...

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

A: I am a founder of a software company and well, a software engineer by day. I have never tried making music my career. Although, fun fact. I attended a recording school McNally Smith College of Music / Music Tech in Minneapolis / St. Paul, MN - dropped out twice. I basically was using Pro Tools for about a year and they were transitioning from analog to digital and deprecating analog at the time. There wasn't much value in learning something I was already using daily. I was also running an independent record label at the time.

Q: How would you describe your style?

A: Raw, clean, modern, nostalgic, radio friendly, underground

Q: Which artist would you like to work with and why?

A: I'd like to work with anyone who would like to work with me. I have been at this for many years, but I rarely work with others because I haven't had a need for anyone else's help in my songwriting process.

Q: Can you share one music production tip?

A: yes, always take breaks / rest your ears - and always mix check your mixes in mono. oh and a bonus, your gear is WAY overrated. You don't need all the gadgets, you need more knowledge and experience. that's where I come in.

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

A: When I first started out, I worked for a record label and recording studio making hip hop beats for rappers in Minneapolis on an MPC-2000. These days, I make a lot of folk songs, rock songs, indie songs, and random things for musical therapy / healing (binaural beats / sound experiments with frequencies)

Q: What's your strongest skill?

A: I am limitless.

Q: What do you bring to a song?

A: I bring absolute chaos, then we work on finding the beauty in the aftermath together.

Q: What's your typical work process?

A: I bang tracks out when things are fluid. Most of my best work took the least amount of time. I am quick to acknowledge when I am frustrated, exhausted, dealing with ear-fatigue, or just not feeling it. When this happens, I do other things until the inspiration, drive, and creativity sparks up again. I like to start fresh, not from a template. I tend to treat everything as new. I work like this... - Lay down the rough drum ideas first. Maybe just a kick and snare with a tone I am seeking. - Then some keys, synths, piano, guitar, noise, or something to start adding a melodic pattern - I may start to carve out a basic arrangement at this point - Next, I'll start routing tracks to busses and submixes - light mixing, gain staging, and balancing - Next, I may start working on instrument frequencies: Check out this tutorial I made on this topic: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p39JGgLhJB4&ab_channel=HowToRecordMusic - Then I may have some good ideas for scratch vocals. I'll grab a mic and make a fool out of myself by improvising what feels right in the moment (I've made tons of tracks this way, just free-styling) - Next, I would continue to tweak, balance, gain stage some more, and take a break. - Next, I'd listen to some reference tracks and get a sense for where the shape of my track is at. Is it too loud, too soft, too flat, over compressed, too dull, etc. I'll make some adjustments and continue on with the songwriting process. Next... well, come on, if you made it this far, just work with me already...

Q: Tell us about your studio setup.

A: I have been a bedroom musician for over two decades. My first setup was a Tascam 4 track cassette recorder. And then over the years was very much into all outboard analog gear. These days, I roll light and portable. Several SSD drives (sound libraries, plugins, sessions), MacBook Pros, Beyerdynamic Headphones, Adam A7X Monitors, Avantone Mixcube Monitors, a few mono speakers I picked up at a thrift store (laugh, but this is how we check our mixes), Pro Tools, Logic, and hundreds of my favorite plugins. Mainly metering, gain, and spacial shaping tools. I don't go plugin crazy these days. Only give the mix what it needs. My every action in the mix is with intention.

Q: What other musicians or music production professionals inspire you?

A: I remain extremely open minded when it comes to music. I am genre agnostic and often find that songs grow on me overtime, even if my initial reaction was to skip it - I tend to let it breathe. Everything I hear, see, smell, touch, and feel is an inspiration for me.

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

A: Mixing, mastering, arrangements, tuning, producing, sound design, music videos