Remote Mixing & Mastering

Q: Analog or digital and why?

A: Digital, because analog is difficult, less flexible...and mostly just more expensive.

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

A: If they are not liking the work that I'm doing, I'll stop my work with no charge. No big deal, making music is personal and hard and I want you to be happy with what you get.

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

A: Trying to explain what mixing is to a layman can be tough. I see being a mixer as being the extra member of a band for that one album, and I have the utmost respect for professional mixers like Andy Wallace and Nigel Godrich. They are my rock stars.

Q: What questions do you ask prospective clients?

A: What do you want your tracks to sound like?

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

A: Don't do it! Just kidding.

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

A: Not including a computer? Takamine guitar, Rode NT1A Anniversary Vocal Condenser Microphone, Mogami cable, Focusrite Scarlett 2i2, great studio headphones. I would make acoustic songs the rest of my island life and just embrace the wave noise

Q: What's your typical work process?

A: I work when my girlfriend goes to sleep, a couple of hours per night. I like to listen to the stems or demo and get a sense of the momentum, the key emotional elements, and what the mix should be trying to accomplish. From there, I like to work fast. I read once that if you spend too long on a mix at a time, you'll lose the mix, and I believe that. Luckily I've been doing this long enough that i can work fast and well. I also will only work on a song up until the point of "ear fatigue", because I don't want to do myself or the artist a disservice. I will follow this process on a song until it's done, whether it takes one night or one week. I'll save automation for last, and then apply some mastering.

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

A: I have an entirely different career. This is a hobby, but one that I'm passionate about, and I've been doing it for five years (and listening to good mixes a lot longer, identifying what I like and why).

Q: How would you describe your style?

A: Fun, low-fi, hopefully different/unique.

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

A: Keith Zarriello, because he is a g d musical hero and mixing his stuff would be a blast.

Q: Can you share one music production tip?

A: Learn the mixing rules, break one or two per song to make it stand out.

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

A: Low-fi, indie singer-songwriter.

Q: What's your strongest skill?

A: Taking a recording and making a unique little sound out of that using plugins, applying that sound to add to the song. I only do that if I think the song needs something in a given moment and ultimately with the permission of the artist.

Q: What do you bring to a song?

A: I bring a focus on what keeps the song interesting, and what the song really needs at any given point. I like to figure out where the climax is, what it needs to built to that point from a grand perspective, and what it needs every 3 to 5 seconds to stay interesting and unique.

Q: Tell us about your studio setup.

A: I mix in the box with a pretty powerful computer, some great studio headphones and monitors, a DAW that I'm entirely comfortable with, and some powerful mixing and mastering plug-ins. Pretty simple really, but effective.

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

A: I have a list of mixing inspirations in my profile. I keep flac versions of all of these albums for reference and inspiration. From a songwriting standpoint...that list is pretty comprehensive too. Nick Cave and The Shivers are my favorite bands. I like something about their down-to-earth mixes.

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

A: I mostly do mixing for low-fi, singer-songwriter type genres (recorded by myself or by my friends). This will sometimes include fixing timing issues and mastering.