Make music for you fans, not yourself.

Apologies up front because this is a rant…

Stop concerning yourself with the minutia in the mix and start thinking about what’s important. What might that be you ask? It’s the song.

Your fans don’t care if the hi-hat is a tad too low in the last bar of the third verse. They don’t care that the last note of an arpeggiated guitar run during the outro is a little too loud. Nobody hears this except for you, the artist. Let me, the mix engineer, make these calls. This is what I do. I MIX music so that it translates the best it can to all formats and to all audiences.

Some of the best advice I have ever received came from my mentor and engineer extraordinaire, Cliff “Cliffy” Zellman. During many, many mixing sessions when producers or artists were obsessing over the most finite of things he would turn to me and say “Lopes, it doesn’t really matter and nobody cares.” Meaning that your fans are not listening to those elements in the track. They are listening to two things, the melody and groove – that’s about it.

I understand that this is your art and that you want it to be perfect, but who are you making it for? Yourself or your fans? If you’re making it for yourself you may want to ask yourself one simple question. How many copies are YOU going to buy? My guess is that your answer is zero.

For about two years now I’ve been working with a fantastic LA based indie/pop band named The Monthlies. Over the past few weeks we’ve been putting the finishing touches on their upcoming EP titled “Horror Flick“, which will include a very cool version of Dexys Midnight Runner’s ‘Come on Eileen’. If you search YouTube for this song you will see that several groups have covered it, but most versions are similar to the original. Not this one!

The Monthlies, in doing what they do best, have put their own unique spin on this 80′s pop standard. I won’t say much about what you’re going to hear other than if you are expecting an updated rehashing of the Dexys version you’re in for a big surprise. We hope you enjoy The Monthlies version of ‘Come on Eileen‘ and please leave a comment below if you’d like to share your thoughts with the band.

[See post to listen to audio]

The Monthlies are…
Wes O’lee – Vocals, Rhythm Guitar
Jana Bonderman – Lead Guitar
Chris Hall – Bass, Backing Vocals
Nick Miller – Drums

If you like what you hear check out their MySpace page for more songs and a video of their last single, Hip Girl.

• Is this plug-in really necessary?

I guess this may work well in the broadcast world, but they’re pitching it as a mix tool for vocals. To me that means mixing, as in mixing music. Does anyone else feel that the engineer who uses this plug-in is just plain lazy?

Maybe I’m a little irked because a HUGE part of mixing a song with vocals, especially a lead vocal, is the human placement of the vocal within the track. That requires listening to all the parts of the arrangement and finding the best place for the vocal as the song progresses from beginning to end. That requires feel and emotion from the mix engineer. Can you get that from a plug-in?

Then again, maybe the real reason I so annoyed is because this could potentially put me out of a job. It’s like the Ronco Rotisserie of audio – “just set it and forget it”.

To me, I think this may be the laziest plug-in ever created. What do you all think? Feel free to leave a comment below.

You can read a description of Vocal Rider on the Electronic Musician web site.

(Side note: I actually have the Ronco Rotisserie and it is awesome! If this plug-in produces the same results I’m screwed.)

It may not be glaringly obvious, but my real mission right now is to help musical artists launch their careers. I want to help musicians who don’t have much experience or much money get a better handle on their sound. Since I’m not a manager or agent or record executive my role is to help you make higher quality sounding records. As I read the three sentences above I noticed one word that keeps popping up. That word is “help”. Musicians, I want to help you. Really. That’s it. So what am I getting at you ask?  I want to talk to you about the concept of FREE.

Chris Anderson, Editor In Chief at WIRED magazine, came out with a book this week titled Free! Why $0.00 Is the Future of Business. But that’s not what I’m writing about, yet it is what I’m writing about. Here’s my point.

I have offered my services to many, many people for free. FREE! And only a handful of people are willing to take advantage of this offer. Why is that?

I know I’m no Pensado, Maserati, Lord-Alge (Chris or Tom), Marroquin or Tan. But unless you’ve worked with me and had a really bad experience why wouldn’t you take advantage of a free offer? I have to admit that I’ve only offered this at my place of business – about 1,200 people – but there are A LOT of musicians there yet most do not reply to my ad. So I’m wondering, do most people see free as being synonymous with cheap? If I posted an ad for $75 mastering per song do you think I would get more replies?

What do you think?