Wow, this is the 20th video! Hope these are getting better. This is one that I thought I would take advantage of a quiet dinner break at Oceanway A in Nashville and put some thoughts down on the computer. Since I recorded it, I’ve thought of a few other things I probably should have covered. So here we go.
1. If a engineer or a 2nd engineer comes into the room to adjust a mike or tweek something, for God sake, don’t slam the drums at 110db when his head is near the kit. Have mercy people, you’ve got headphones on! A really good friend of mine was adjusting the under snare mic, when the drummer, actually a very busy “A” team Nashville session drummer hauled off and smacked the living crap out of the snare. Oooooooooooh, 4k ring in the ear, for the rest of the day, that’s all he heard, the eardrum just shut down. Don’t be a creep and do that! I even go as far as when one of the other players walks into the room if I’m getting sounds, I’ll go immediately to a really quiet bossa groove, for a couple of reasons, 1. to not kill them, and 2. to give them a hint that they’d better get out of the line of fire!
2. I’d like to put an adjunct idea on the “screwing around” rule that I put out. If you ever come to a session that I’m on, there’s gonna be funny stuff happening, I’m gonna crack jokes, or do impressions, or anything to make people have fun. But here’s something to think about. If you do something at the beginning or end of the take, keep in mind that the engineer and the producer are gonna hear that about 6000 times. Don’t let it be something that by the time they mix it, they are gonna be saying, “Holy crap, I don’t want to ever hear this again!!!” Make them dig your playing and ask you back because you slammed the crap out of the tune. Don’t give them an excuse to not want you back!
Would love to hear some of your thoughts about stuff that has happened to you in the studio or on a gig, that you would consider bad “etiquette.”
