Well, as long as y'all are talkin' 'bout me...
Hey, Alan! I always wanted to get flamed by a gen-u-wine celebrity.
But seriously, I did read the thread in it's entirety, but I did somehow miss the point that you were trying to give him an "instant" solution in case he needed to finish his recording immediately. And I guess maybe i should have said: "or just go buy a pad
as many other fine people have already suggested", so that I wouldn't be accused of trying to take credit for the idea as an original thought. But i thought it was self-evident, though apparently not to everyone.
The fact is, i was not making "drummer jokes" either, and the confusion is probably from me being not specific enough about referencing the context of my remarks ("This is getting to be an epidemic...") I realize you are a busy guy and probably aren't always able to read all the other threads in all the other forums on this site. I certainly don't myself - i just pick a half-dozen to skim through.
But if you had been in some other threads and rooms recently on Homerec, you would have seen an epidemic of advice that, unfortunately, yours sounded remarkably in the same vein. For instance, recently you would have seen:
•Don't even try to let the vocalist record her voice and guitar simultaneously. It's too hard to get a good sound. It's up to you to be able to convince her to record each part seperately, after all, you're the engineer, and what does she know?
•If you are getting too much cymbals in your drum mix, tell the drummer to use lighter gauge sticks with wood tips.
•If you are going to record a band, you should record one instrument at a time. That way you'll have the most control of the sound.
...and a bunch of other similar advice.
Unfortunately, the "lighten up on your foot" remark came right after I had just read a bunch of that other stuff, so you can see the context of how I was reacting.
Naturally, Alan, I'm not lumping you in with the folks who made some of the above remarks. But rather I was trying to make the point to some of the newer impressionable readers that it should NOT be the primary solution to a recording problem to tell the artist to change their performance style for the convenience of the engineer. (Unfortunately your remarks COULD be interpreted as advocacy of that by someone who maybe didn't know you well. Hence my response, the sarcasm of which was being directed at the whole context of similar posts, not at you personally.)
Obviously, I'm sure we both agree the engineer should serve the musical performance, not the other way around. While we can all come up with extreme examples where performance compromises have to be made in order to have any chance of capturing it on tape, the first thought that occurs to the engineer should NOT be to disrupt the creative process by forcing the artists to think about stuff that will distract them from focusing on the music.
So, in reality, I was defending the drummers of the world, by saying they have every right to kick the ass of an engineer who thinks he/she has the right to tell them to "play with lighter sticks" or "lighten up on the right foot."
But anyway, you may not have noticed, but I've also been one of your (and Stephen's) biggest defenders around here when i thought you were being treated shabbily. I'm very excited about some of your current projects. And you're going to have to do a much better job of trying to pick a fight with me to get me to stop respecting both you and your work! Right now, you ain't even close!
