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Brendan Dekora is an engineer and mixer with credits with artists such as Trent Reznor, Foo Fighters, Steven Wilson, and Muse.
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Credits:
Guest: Brendan Dekora
Host: Travis Ference
Editor: Stephen Boyd
Theme Music: inter.ference
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The ultimate goal is for your clients to become your friends,
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to work on projects that you would listen to their music whether
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you worked with them or not. That's engineer and mixer Brendan Decora. Brendan's worked with
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some of the biggest names in rock, including artists like Trent Reznor, Foo
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Fighters, Stephen Wilson, and muse. Since Brendan and I both started
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our careers at iconic Los Angeles studios and have since moved to be
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freelance, I thought that could be a great topic for discussion. So this one
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is about everything. Freelance, from finding clients to remote
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collaboration. We get into stuff like why big credits don't matter as much as you
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might think. Credits don't matter big, you know, stuff you've worked
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on. At the end of the day, doesn't matter because there's still going to be
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a mountain of people that want to work with you because you are who. You
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are, when to consider what types of gigs are actually in line with your
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goals. There's so many projects that I took on in the past
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that, you know, I did because it was a great opportunity. But
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looking back, it wasn't a great career choice. And why it's important to have
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clear communication and understand expectations when working remotely. If
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you're expecting the mixer to add doubles or create harmonies
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or change arrangements or those, like, those things are
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production choices. If you're a freelance engineer or producer or want to make the move
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to become a freelancer, then you're definitely going to want to stick around for my
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interview with Brendan Decora.
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So there are a lot of people that want to transition to engineering production full
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time. You and I both worked in major studios and now are lucky enough to
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do that. What's your advice for someone that has a job? Maybe
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it's music related, maybe it's not. And how to, you know,
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become a full time freelance engineer. I mean,
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it's kind of an ongoing process, honestly.
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Okay, fair enough. I agree. I. The biggest thing that I've learned
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recently is it's about the relationships.
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It's about your personality. You know, you think about, you know, oh,
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I wanna. I wanna niche down on a genre, which is very important,
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but a lot of times people forget that it's about niching down on a
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certain personality type as well. And that the idea that, you
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know, the ultimate goal is for your clients to
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become your friends. Yeah. To work on projects that you would
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listen to their music whether you worked with them or not. Yeah. You know,
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that's the ultimate dream of every ideal client is
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that. And so it's figuring out how you
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can show that to the world, how you can
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show your personality, show your
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preferences, your musical tastes, that kind of thing. Because
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it's similar to, like, a session drummer, for example.
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There's a thousand session drummers out there that can do the job.
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Right. Why would they hire this guy? Because they're cool.
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Because they're a good hang in the room. Because they have cool ideas, they have
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unique perspectives, that kind of thing. It's all those pieces that
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really set it apart from the rest. Niching down on a
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personality type is like, I've never heard anybody phrase that
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that way. That's so true, because there's a
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lot of great situations where I've been where you just, like, don't want to work
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with the person. Right. You know, and the music was cool and it came out
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good, but everybody knows that, like, once we walk out the door, we're not gonna
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work together. We didn't really like each other. Right. Obviously, that can't
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be every gig, of course. How do you approach trying
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to tap into finding people that
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you relate with? It's something that I've been working on
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myself even recently, to be honest.
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But I think that a lot of it is
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in about the content that you put out, and
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showing that side of you to the world will attract those people
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anyway. I agree with that, you know, and so, you know, it's
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difficult, especially if you are working at, as an assistant in a big
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studio. You're the fly on the wall. Often you don't even
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allow to talk to people. Like, it's the engineer and the producer that are the
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main interface for the artists. Making that
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change of, you know, becoming the fly of being the fly on the wall
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to being the engineer producer, or whatever it is.
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It's a, it's a personality change as well. So it's a lot about, you know,
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everyone says this business is about psychology, but the more I've
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learned about psychology, the more I realize that that's actually true, you
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know, so it's interesting I drifted from your
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question, but, yeah, no, it's funny. I just had a conversation
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with some, uh, with somebody else who also has a podcast. We should tell people
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that you have a podcast. Uh, and we'll talk about that more later. And,
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uh, we were talking about the advantages of making
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content as, like, a music producer engineer. And you, like, really tapped into
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something about putting your real, authentic self out there,
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which is something that I've, like, pushed on the podcast for a long time.
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But I think that's super valuable now, because
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in our coming up, I would walk out the door. Capitol and
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Studio B, and walk into studio C and say, hi, you were at east west
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Glenwood place. You could do the same. Now you don't
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have that. Everybody's working at home. If people can find a way to
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understand who you are and if they click with you, I think that's just
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a really powerful, I hate to say marketing tool, but it's a
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marketing tool, and if you're authentic, it should be fun. I'm
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sure you enjoy doing your podcast. Exactly. Because they're hard. If you didn't enjoy
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it, you wouldn't do it. Yeah, for sure. Going
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freelance. Is there something that caught you off guard
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about being freelance? Like something that you didn't expect to be a big
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responsibility or a big challenge? I mean,
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other than finding a gig? Cause everybody would answer that. Yeah, of
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course. I mean, it kind of goes back to that
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first topic of, you know, figuring out
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the personality match. Yeah. And seeing,
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you know, and really kind of discovering what their vision is for the
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song and talking to the clients and figuring out how much
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they like the rough mix, even, you know, like so many times,
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you know, I'll get a project and I'll send over the
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rough mix, and I think it sounds pretty good.
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And they're like, yeah, this is. I hate this. This is totally the wrong
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direction. We need to go in this other direction over here. Or the opposite. You
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know, there's no rhyme or reason. Yeah. So it's figuring out, you
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know, where their. Where their journey is, what their goals are,
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and really trying to align with that as well. Yeah. Communication is
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probably the. I mean, everybody says
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communication is important, but I don't think, like, when you're starting out, like, when you're
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a runner at the studio and you're just, like, getting coffee orders, I don't think
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you understand to what level. Right. Communication is important.
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It's like, might as well be, like,
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vibe in a room. Communication,
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then maybe skillset after that, maybe. I don't
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know, but vibe in a room. So your experiences working in the big
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studios, when did you kind of, like, connect
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the idea that being the best guitar player, the best drummer wasn't
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necessarily why those people were in the room? Well,
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as you know, people come through the door and they're
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frankly not great musicians, but they're the nicest people
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you've ever met. Yeah. You know, it's like, they're super cool. They're super
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nice. And sure, they get the job done on their
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instrument, but it's about the hang. It's about the
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feeling of it. It's about the friendship about it.
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So that's obvious. If this business was about your
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skillset, then it would be a completely different world,
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you know, so very different.
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Very different. And obviously, we're not talking about, like,
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the classic studio musicians. Of course, the session
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players are the exception. They have both these guys that used to play, like, three
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sessions a day all through the seventies. Like, they have such
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a chill vibe. Right. And are just absolutely
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ridiculous. And I don't know if you've ever had this. I had it with
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it with Dean Parks. Yeah. And he was doing a
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nylon part, and I was, you know, I was putting the mic over here,
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you know, like, around the 12th fret. He was like, on this one, we do
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it here. And I was like, okay,
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you know where it goes on this one. Done. Yeah.
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Well, okay. That's actually an accidental segue to another question I had, which
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is the importance of getting the production and the sonics
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right from the beginning. Right. That's something that
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you and I have experienced working in big studios.
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We've seen people go down the rabbit holes of trying even different
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strats, not different types of guitars, different versions
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of the same guitar. Do you have any thoughts that you can share with the
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bedroom producer about the importance of making those decisions
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early and how that benefits the process in the long run?
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I think part of it is just a lack of knowledge on
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certain techniques and that, you know, oftentimes
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bedroom producers will try things out because they don't know,
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you know, the different tactics. They've never been to studios. They haven't seen other people
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do it. And so they're just kind of figuring out based on what they're hearing
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on records. And, again, with music, there's no. There's
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no correct answer. You know, there's a lot of times
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really odd things can work really great. Yeah. But
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often what's tricky is when people
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will send me a mix and they say, oh, okay, cool. I want this to
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sound like x number band.
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That's huge. And they've spent six months in the studio, and they
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doubled and tripled everything and have harmonies and have all this production stuff going
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on, and they send me a track with one guitar on it. Right. It's like,
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well, I can't. You know, this is so not the same thing. Not the
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same. Yeah. And so it's. It's a little bit
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tricky because, you know, oftentimes those people
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don't understand that's what that was, because they've never seen
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that. They've never experienced that. Yeah. And so it's about learning. And,
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you know, obviously we'll have conversations. We'll talk about, like, okay, well, if you really
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want this, then put some doubles on there at least, you know? You
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know, so we can pan it out, whatever it is. But
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I hesitate to say YouTube, because YouTube is
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such a. I don't hesitate to say it. There's a lot of amazing
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information on YouTube. There is. And I've learned a lot. Yeah. But there's also
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a lot of information that I guess it's hard to
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always know what information is correct or not.
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So it's difficult to know who to listen
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to, who to not listen to, you know,
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because on the other extreme, I've gotten projects where, you
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know, it's clear they. They watch YouTube a lot or
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try to learn a lot themselves. And they've sent me things with, like, every trick
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in the book. You know, it's like all these different, you know,
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techniques. It's like, oh, okay, they saw this video on this, or
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they, you know, someone told them to do this, and. But it's
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like everything all combined, and so it's like, well, if you just
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got great sounds in a room with a great player and a great
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instrument with a good sounding room, that would
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be better than all these tricks. Right. So it's,
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you know, sometimes the basics are more. More easy to get great
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results than all the fancy stuff, you know? Yeah. There's a lot of
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things I want to say about what you just said. Oh, okay. I wanted to.
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Let's go back to the YouTube thing, because you're probably watching this on YouTube,
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not you, but you. Right. There's a difference
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between information that's regurgitated
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and put out versus information that's based on
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experience. Right. And I think that's where the disconnect
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is, because it's not like, there's not a. There is bad
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information, but there's not a lot of, when it comes to, like, eqing, there's bad
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tricks. Right. But you're talking about people that maybe just haven't
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made records for 20 years. Right. You know, and
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also, the people that made records for 20 years
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probably aren't that good at sharing that knowledge in a way that
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connects with a hungry, wanna learn
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audience. Meanwhile, there's somebody else that can regurgitate that information in a
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format that people enjoy. Right. And
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so, yeah, I mean, I love you, too. I've learned something. We were talking about
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cameras before we started. Like, I've gone so deep down the rabbit hole,
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you can learn so much stuff for free. But I also want to touch on
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the fact that I think it's our responsibility
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as engineers and mixers in the room to
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educate people on what they want, which is you were touching on.
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And that goes back to communication. Be like, well, I can't give you
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the vocal sound that you want, right. Because it's
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just not here. But if you want to jump back, go turn your computer on
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and put a couple more doubles down, that's going to get you what you want.
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And I think that's something that
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is really important to do as an engineer, is to share
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that back with people and bring everybody up along the way.
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Yeah. And I guess one thing I wanted to say, too, is with the
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misinformation on YouTube, I guess there was one example recently
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where this friend of mine sent me this clip on
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Instagram that was about getting great top
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end in your vocal. Right. Okay. And so they basically went
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through keying the, you know, like a dynamic EQ
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keyed with a. With all the top, all the bottom end rolled off. And
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it's like, well, he's just made a deesser. And, you know, then you
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boost it after. It's like, it's not. It's not that complicated. You just put a
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deesser on it and turn one knob and then do the same thing. So it's
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like, things like that where, like, people are trying to get sensational, you know, like,
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oh, this amazing, really cool trick. It's like, well, if you just knew a little
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bit about how things work, then you see that that's not really. You
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know, oh, yeah, that reminds me of, like, some of the things that would come
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up when I was in school. Cause I went to engineering
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school, and it's like, let's make a deesser on the SSL
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channel, right? You have to figure out how to do it. Or like, let's. We're
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gonna record this in Ms. And you need to decode it, right? And you're like,
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you know, you pass your test and then you realize, like, I don't need to
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know these things ever again. This is pointless
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information. Now we're kind of touching on this. And this
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is another question that I had. Do you think
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that newer artists overweight
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the result of a mix? Are their expectations?
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Because you and I both do a lot of remote mixing, do they put too
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much weight on what they believe is going to be the outcome of that mix,
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whether that be a sonic change or even a popularity
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change? I would say yes, absolutely.
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It all depends on how much experience the artist has. I agree with
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that. Newer artists that may not have been through the process that don't
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understand there is a lot of that expectation,
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and I've even considered doing
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more production work because I get those clients
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that want me to mix something, but really, they need a producer
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and not a mixer. Yeah. And so, you know, it's
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about learning. I mean, it all comes with
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experience, really. Once you go through the process and you get a mix done by
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a professional, you can see what they can and can't do. And,
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you know, sometimes, as you know, you can take a
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song very drastically in another direction with a mix. It can
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go a very, very long. Way, and it can be a miss. And it can
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be a miss. Yes, we've all done that. Yes. But at the same
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time, it's, you know, learning that
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how much you want to change it with the mix. And, you know,
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whether that's, you know, if you're expecting the mixer to
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add doubles or create harmonies or change arrangements
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or those. Like, those things are production choices. Yeah. You
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know, like, one client I had recently,
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you know, sent me a some. I've
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been working with them, kind of helping them with production
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choices and say, okay, well, you know, is this guitar sound cool? It's
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like, oh, it's a little bit darker. Let's. You know, why don't you try this,
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and then we can go from there. Okay, cool. I'll change that and rerecord a
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bunch of stuff. And then. But they asked me about
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this process where they were going to, you
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know, add doubles and harmonies on all the vocals, on
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all the songs of. I'm like, well, yeah, I do encourage
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doubles and harmonies, but not everywhere. For every note of the song, like,
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you know, choose the chorus or choose certain things you want to highlight. You know,
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make those production choices right before you send it to mix, instead of sending
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me everything with everything and expecting me to chop
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through and create what you want based on that, you
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know. Yeah, yeah. That goes back to the. To
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the communication. But I wanted to ask you about navigating
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that additional production. Like, when you feel like something needs
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a boost and you're willing
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and think that you're the right person for it, how do you navigate that with
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an artist to be like, I think we need an extra step in here. Are
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you open to working with me in this capacity? It's always a
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fine line because, you know, growing up in
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big studios like we have, we've seen producers and engineers,
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and there is a very distinct line between those two roles. There
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is. Or there was back in the day. Yes. Yeah. But now it's, you
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know, especially when people, like, we were just talking about with a mixer that they
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want to take the song further or whatever else, like, you
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know, there's ways where, you know, I'll always
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mention if I hear something that can
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help the song align with their vision a bit more, you know? Of
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course the artist always has veto power, right? It's like, hey, like, I have
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this idea. You said you wanted this reference, and you said you wanted it to
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sound like this. I think we need to do x, y, and z in order
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to get there. You know, do you want to go back and do this, or
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do you want to create this? Or how do you want to. Do you want
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to just not do it at all? It's all about how you phrase it and
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how you. How you walk that line with the artist. And if you
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say it in a way where, you know, you're just. Clearly, you're just trying to
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help the end result, you know, instead of like, okay, I'm just
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gonna do this, and then if you like it, cool. But if not,
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then I think it sucks, you know, like, obviously that's not the way to
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do it, but, you know,
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so there's. There's a fine line to walk. Yeah. Well, I think
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if. I guess for, for an artist or producer that's listening,
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I think if you're willing to share work in progress with somebody you're thinking
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about working with as a mixer and you're open to being like, hey, what do
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you think? Am I going to be able to get what I want? Right. That
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can be a really amazing way to split the difference. I know some people don't
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like to share unfinished work, but, I mean, would you agree that that can
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be a massive benefit to the final product if they're
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willing to have a conversation of, do you think anything's missing?
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Yeah, I mean, it's difficult, too, because, you know,
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people will do that, but then I'm still
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just the mixer role. Right. So it's like, well, are you
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asking me to my production choices? Cause they're working with a
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producer. I don't wanna step on their toes. That's true. That's true. So one
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thing that I've actually started to think about recently is that, you
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know, I'm happy to do, like, co production.
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You know, like, if there's something I hear that could take it a little bit
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further. Cool, I'll mention it. But I'm not trying to be your
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producer. I'm not trying to, you know, take over the whole project and
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start because obviously producers start before a note is recorded. You know,
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they go through the songs and, you know, choose keys and arrangements
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and all that stuff before anything's done. So I'm
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not trying to do that. But if it's already to the point
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where everyone's happy and then it's like, oh, well, what if you do this one
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thing or these two things? Cool. Like, that's an idea
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that may or may not work, but I, I'm open to
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my creative input as well, you know? Yeah, yeah, no, I. Yeah, you
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don't want to, you don't want to step on, on toes. I do. I do
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agree with that. Since we're kind of talking remote
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collaboration, do you have any
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tips for successful remote mixing? Like, if
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you're, you're living in Indiana and you want
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to up your mix game, like, do you have, whether it be a
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technical thing or a communication thing, anything that you would tell that. That
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person we talked about a little bit before, but I am all
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about actually talking to people. Yeah, you know, it's easy to
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do remote mixing and just all over emails and texting
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and things get lost. Yeah. You know, I think we were
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speaking before we started recording that. You know, sometimes
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there's projects where the artist will, you know, say, oh, you
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know, can you turn the kick drum down? And then it's like, yeah, cool.
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Here's the version of the kick drum down. Oh, that's better. And then three days
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later, oh, can you turn up the low end on the cake? Like, well,
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I just turned it down. Like, yes, I can turn the low end, but, and
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it's just a slight miscommunication where if you get on a call with someone,
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I'll often do, like, a video call with high definition
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audio. There's numerous platforms to do that
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so we can work together and actually stream my mixed and to their
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studio and I can explain, like, oh, well,
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you asked for more low end on the kick, but really it's, you know,
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because they were hearing it in their smaller car or their phone or something and
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they weren't cutting through. It was like, well, it's, you know, it's, I actually need
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to do this. And so this is the correct solution,
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you know, that I think you should do. And so it's easier to just talk
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through those things in five minutes instead of like, oh, but I did this. We're
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going in circles, like, why are you. And then that's a miscommunication.
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And people are upset. And it's so much easier to just talk to
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people in person. Yeah. And it's about
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understanding the intention. I'm sure you've done this, but.
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I. Used to send an email like, oh, here are the five things. This is
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how I addressed your notes. And I don't do that anymore. I'm
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just like, hey, I hit all your notes. And then I made this change that
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I thought, like, if somebody asked for the vocal up, it might not necessarily be
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that the vocal needs to be louder. It might be that, you know, the guitar
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needs to be a little darker and the vocal needs a little bit more top
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or something like that. Because we all know if you send a mix with vocal
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too loud, you're never going to turn it back down once
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it's already too loud. The singer's always going to love it loud. Yeah,
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yeah. No, I think that's great advice. I think using tools. What was the one
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that you, I. Like to use one called session wire. Which I'm not familiar
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with. It's kind of like audio movers and zoom put
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together in one platform. So you have video chat. There's a
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talkback channel, and there's a high definition channel. Cool. And there's
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like an auto mute thing for the talkback. And it's. It's
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their whole goal with it is making it as if, you know, like, you're in
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the studio and there's a piece of glass between. They're just standing right there. You're
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talking back and forth. Play the music. It's really seamless.
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Nice. So I've been liking it a lot. Nice. I use something similar called
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authentic audio. Okay. Basically, we're talking about the same product,
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more or less. I'm not. I haven't used session wire, but you just described the
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features of authentic audio. Awesome. So I want to backtrack
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back a few minutes to where we were talking about, you know,
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getting it right in the studio. Right. If I remember correctly, you
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are a drummer, as that's your. My first instrument, yeah. Okay.
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Do you jump in when you're recording and get into drum
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tuning? Like, what are your thoughts on drums? Is one of those things that has
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to be, if the instrument sounds fucking great, the recording sounds fucking great.
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Yeah. Tips for great drums. Do you, what do you think? Do you get in
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there in tune? I typically don't. I mean, I'm at this
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point, I'm probably 95% of my work is mixing, but when I was doing
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more engineering, I was working in big studios, and so
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I had the luxury of working with great drummers that often even brought drum
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texts and all that where you didn't have to, you know, on
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rare occasions, yes, I'll get someone that comes in with the crappy sounding
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kit and I'll try to tweak it a little bit
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if the drummer isn't willing or capable or whatever to do
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that. But even that's kind of walking a
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fine line because I don't want to insult the drummer. It's like,
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oh, can you tune this up a little? And then they try and it still
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sucks. I'm like, well, could I do it then?
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What do you, you know, so it's walking a fine balance.
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But obviously, if you can get great sounding
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drums tuned up well and drummers that can play
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them well, that's 90% of the battle. I
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mean, obviously we have the luxury of working in these amazing
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studios, and so you push up the fader and it sounds great. It's not always
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the case, but drums is a large topic, so it's hard
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to answer this question. No, totally. I set you up for a big one.
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Let me share a story real quick. Okay. So I was on this project
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where there was, it was a. It was an interesting project because it was
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like lots of different bands coming in and playing on the same backline.
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Okay. And it was like a project
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where it was a bunch of, like, newer artists
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and, you know, younger musicians, but it was
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with established producers. And so,
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you know, the whole day, you know, the producer and the engineer
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were trying to get it sounding great. The drums were
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not really that great sounding, and they keep cranking on the knobs and creep
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trying all these things and wasn't really that great. And then at
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1.1 of the producers that came in was a drummer,
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like a famous drummer. And just for fun, he sat down on the drum
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kit and started playing and it sounded amazing.
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So it's like, you know, like, well, that's the answer. Like,
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all these people were not playing hard or solid or
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it's, the player is a large part of the sound as
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well. And so that's, you know, I hate
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to turn it back on the artist, but at the same time,
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a large part of great sounding recordings is
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great performances. And yes, there is a lot we can
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do to fix things nowadays. We
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can tune things, we can time align things, we can do all that.
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But if the original source of the
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performance is not great, I mean, yeah, we can even put in samples if
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we have to, with drums. But even then, as a
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drummer, I honestly try to avoid using samples. Because
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to me, it starts to make it feel fake,
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you know? And obviously it's a balance. Like, if you keep them low enough, you
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can still, you know, have that natural sound, but then it doesn't
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quite. You can't quite change the sound enough if they're too low. Yeah. And
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so it's. It's always a balance. So I. You know, if I had to choose,
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it would be an amazing drummer in a great room, tuned well with,
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you know, obviously who wouldn't choose? Who
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wouldn't choose that tough, tough decision. It really is
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true that there is a lot, like when somebody is really
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honed in their craft, you know, the consistency that
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a great session drummer will hit the snare in the same
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place. Right. That's why, you know, you walk into a place like
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east, west, and somebody has, like, a U 67 on the
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snare and you're like, whoa, what's going on here?
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You have a session where the person's not going to hit a. That microphone, that
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drummer doesn't hit mics. You know what I mean? Yeah, but, yeah, the
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consistency that they hit with, or even guitars. Like, I've handed
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my guitar to a friend who's an amazing player,
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right. And I'm like, well, wait a minute, that
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sounds fucking amazing. Oh, wait, it's my
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fingers that aren't great. It's like, your fingers are different than
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mine. And the way that you hold those strings down is like. It just sounds
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so much better. Yeah. You know, there's so much. So much to just
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honing your craft. When did you come to Los
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Angeles? I came to LA in 2001. 2001?
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Okay. I came in 2006. Okay. Would you tell
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a young engineer in 2024 that it's a good idea
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or a bad idea to move to a major music hub like
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LA? When you look at the cost of laden and how
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tough it is to. Break in, I would say it's
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about where your career goals are. I like that answer.
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I think that there's a mountain of people out
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there that work in small towns, that have little
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studios, that work in their home studio or in their house
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or little local studios, and they all have great
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careers, frankly. And it's a different,
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different kind of life. You're probably not going to work with
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Beyonce or a super a list celebrity,
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right? That would be probably rare. But
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like I said, there's many people that have great careers, and
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so it's a little bit different because I would
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say it's different now as to early two thousands,
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because the prevalence of home studios has, you know,
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gone through the roof, exploded. Everyone has a home studio. Yeah. Or two.
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Or two. And quite frankly, you can get amazing results at home
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for a fraction of the cost of a big studio. Oh, yeah. And so
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that if anything has, you
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know, increased the argument for not doing this, you know,
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and just doing it in a small town and setting up a studio yourself and
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doing it. But the idea is that if you're doing it yourself
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and not working for a studio, you then have to learn all about business,
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because you're opening a business for yourself. Yeah. Marketing and everything
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else. And that's the same if you do it in LA or any of the
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big, big hubs, you know, because ultimately.
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