I completed one of the most taxing projects for an artist last year. After the track was recorded, we went back and forth with the mixing. He asked for delay when he meant reverb (common mistake in hip hop), he asked for more "wetness" on the vocals, but later complained that they had too much echo and effects on them and he even asked me to add "dynamic range" because the vocal sounded too "tinny". We went back and forth adding things and removing those very same additions.
Look, I'm all for input but let's keep it reasonable. Learning a few terms on a YouTube video doesn't mean that one should start using them to sound more knowledgeable. In fact you're more likely to get the opposite effect if you aren't careful. I can't take you seriously if you're confidently asking for things that don't make sense. Musicians find themselves in an industry where there is unfortunately no minimum barrier for entry. Anyone with a copy of FL studio and a microphone is a producer and anyone who can write lyrics and get a hold of autotune is a vocalist. It's frustrating because this comes with so many false resources on good platforms like YouTube and so much misinformation because of broken telephone between people in the industry just because one person wants to look intelligent or gain a following.
My solution is to ask questions and try and learn more instead of taking everything that's on the net as gospel. I used to watch a lot of youtube tutorials on how to mix and master and every single one was different. I didnt get it until I realised that an engineer needs to know WHY they're manipulating the audio in a particular way. After that, the process becomes a lot more logical. When I analyse project files these days I like spending time looking at EQs because it let's me know what the composer was trying to achieve. These days the number one piece of advice I give colleagues is to ask WHY they want to add something to the mix. If it doesn't need to be there, why is it being added? It's that simple act of asking questions that takes us from being music technicians to being music practitioners. No disrespect to sound engineers who went to school to learn their craft, but I find a lot of new engineers go by-the-book and this has disastrous results.
Asking WHY also goes for brand management, marketing and everything else related to the musician.
Are you releasing physical copies of >your single?
Why?
Does it make sense?
No?
What else should you be doing?
That thought process saves time and makes sure you innovate instead of blindly copy someone else because that's what you assume has to happen.
I have an old client who (I assume) paid for 20K twitter followers over the period of 2017. The followers trickled in slow enough but I saw that the accounts that were following had zero posts and almost zero engagement and all the accounts had South American and Eastern European names. He is based in South Africa and unless he is popping in those countries there was nothing logical about what was happening. He received zero engagement from his new followers when posting and I think it disappointed him. I think he saw other big accounts an attributed their success to sheer numbers. Had he asked I would have happily told him that number of followers doesn't mean anything if the true engagement isn't there (I say true because people are buying comments these days as well).
In conclusion, it's way better to ask and look silly for that moment, but know the reason behind something for the rest of your life. Don't worry about how you feel when you ask the question, the feeling will pass and the knowledge will remain.
