Recording - November 2015 - 54

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OK, well, here's the money." They don't develop
things anymore like they used to.
But you do.
T: But that's the opportunity. I mean, the fact
that they don't do that is why we've been
successful.
So that dovetails beautifully into my next
question, which is, how do you find talent? Is it all
in-house referrals that you're working with and
they hear somebody and bring it to you and you
like it or you don't?
T: Talent finds us. We don't find it.
A: Oh, God.
T: OK, what I mean by that... No, but it's true.
Every week on Monday at 11:30 a.m. at Rock Mafia,
we sit down. We're not allowed to play what we're
doing, we have to play what's going on, and we go
deep on SoundCloud; we'll go deep on YouTube
finding voices and then watching that voice get
signed. We're seeing everything from a pretty cool
point. We make a point every week to look at it. If
your stuff is resonating, we're gonna hear about it. I

"You have to be nimble enough to
change. It's like anything else; everyone starts off in a different place."
-Antonina Armato
can't tell you how many times new artists have
walked into the studio who have just a little bit of a
buzz and they think they're meeting and they're
going to tell me [what they're doing], and I already
know what they're doing. That's why they are there.
A: Well, I'm going to answer that a little bit differently, because...
T: Of course, because we are totally different.
[laughter]

A: Sometimes I feel like... OK, like all of you guys
out there, maybe there's like four or five like frickin'
geniuses out there that we would love to meet that
are super-talented. But we can meet you, because
luckily you have TAXI, and TAXI's creating this
beautiful bridge. But the truth is that I'm always
thinking that, God, it's such a shame, because there
are people everywhere that probably have this... I
mean, I know that talent is rare, but I know that
there are people that we don't know about and we
can't get to, that we would be privileged and grateful to hear and to know and to see. And that's why
TAXI and... I don't know of any other....
T: I actually don't know really many [companies]
that do this. [TAXI] is pretty awesome, if you think
about it! It's true. And then a lot of the peeps that
you have at TAXI are people I know, or have known,
and I'm gonna take that call way quicker than I'm
gonna take one from somebody else.
You mentioned vocals before, and I want to get
into that because so much of a hit record is the performance. The day after we had lunch together, I
was in the car with my 14-year-old daughter, and
she said, "Dad, you need to listen to 104.3 (a radio
station in Los Angeles). I haven't turned it off since.
Yes, there's a fair amount of homogeneity, but in
my personal opinion, I think that radio is going
through a bit of a renaissance period right now-
it's better than it's been for a while. But on a vocal
performance level, people are so reliant on effects
and compressing the hell out of everything, that
it's pretty obvious that the vocal performance is
lacking. Where's the next Neil Young?
T: It's coming. Listen, we go through cycles. This is
so 1950s you can't even stand it. It's "Splish splash,
I'm takin' a bath," or whatever. There are parallels
to that era in this. And Spotify, and why I embrace
streaming so much, guys, because it changes the
conversation in music. It becomes about, "Did you
hear that? Did you hear this cool song?" It's a little
different. That's going to be good for artists; it's
going to be good for music...
A: They just have to pay artists more then.

T: That will happen, guys. It'll scale, I have no
doubt. But this is where we're different too. When
piracy started happening I said,
"Great, music's for free, we'll figure it out." I just embrace it. I
embrace the reality and try and
turn something into it. But I
think Spotify will pay more. I
guarantee you in three years they
will pay 25% more. After that
there will be a multiple attached;
there will be renegotiations.
We've got good people at ASCAP
and BMI, and Irving's (Azoff )
new thing (Global Music Rights).
There are just great minds out
Rock Mafia's Tim James, spent some quality with TAXI members after his interview was there fighting for our rights.
over. He also took home a ton of music!

Nobody will ever accuse Rock Mafia's Antonina Armato of
being dull while being interviewed. She was passionate and
more than enthusiastic, to say the least!

A: Aloe Blacc just blogged this really great thing
about how everyone is working on trying to get
everyone paid more. I mean, it's kind of ridiculous.
Just a basic songwriter used to be able to make a
living and now they can't, blah, blah, blah. But seriously, they are now implementing changes that will
affect everyone in this room in a really substantial
way in the next couple years. I think the worst is
definitely over, and I think there is going to be a
renaissance, not only creatively, but financially.
T: For independent artists who have an audience
that really cares, streaming is the best thing that
could ever happen to you. I mean, if you look at it
like, yes, as songwriters we're going to increase, but
we own masters too, and it's amazing what they're
paying every month. It's just growing every month.
Songs that are four years old are up 30% every
month in royalties from Spotify. So it's happening;
it's slow. I get where Aloe [Blacc] is coming from; I
know what it's like to be able to buy pizza with 100
million views. I know what that's like. But I think
it's changing, and we have to be patient and just let
business do what it's gonna do.
Going back to vocal performance, what is the best
advice you can give? What advice can you give
these guys about being 30% better than good?
T: No Auto-Tune. Don't use it; throw it away.
That's the first thing you should do.
Years ago, one of our regulars here at the Road
Rally, a friend of mine named Marshall Altman,
who was an A&R person, stood right there on that
floor and said, "The floor is bad, the ceiling is good,
and the sun is great. You need to be on the sun." I
hear a lot of stuff that's really good, it's competent.
The singers are competent, but they're missing
that special thing that makes the hair on your arms
stand up. How do you guys get that performance
out of an artist in the studio?
A: I can tell you that, I think...maybe not. OK, I produce the vocals, and I would do whatever it takes to
get a great vocal. We started off working with all
the young guys. They kind of enlisted us because
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