Recording - December 2015 - 57

Continued from page 54
A: Which seems weird, because, look it, Selena is
amazing and she's worked a lot on her live performance, because she wasn't a great live performer in
person, and we all know that. But she has a quality
and a tone to her voice that's really radio. And this
is important to know. Like, "Does this sound radio?
Does this sound cool? Does this make it better?"
Because, just having a pretty voice and doing the
melody isn't enough.
T: No, you need to have something, and she has that
something.

Millian, audience member: I work with a nonprofit called Reaching Youth Through Music
Opportunities and these students are 14 to 24. They
come from underprivileged, underserved communities, and a lot of them are super-talented. My
boss converts the studio once a week into these
classrooms for the students, which by the way it
would be an honor if you guys could come and
speak to them sometime. We have guest speakers.
So one of their main questions is always how do they
know when to jump? You know they're talented; people tell them they are talented, but they're kind of
either scared, or should they stick to that nine-tofive-work-at-the-movie-theater kind of thing?
A: Well, I 100% know the answer to that. Because I
was raised where no one thought the music business would be good. My dad always told me to get a

real job; my brother's a lawyer; the other brother's a
doctor. And there was nothing anyone could tell me
that would divert my heart from doing what I do.
You have to be a lifer; it has to be this or die, basically. Otherwise, you're in the wrong business,
because you really do. You die a little bit every day,
but you also come to life every day. So you have to
be able to sort of go back and forth with that. But
you can't ever, ever give up. [applause]
T: The only failure is quitting.
I cannot thank the two of you enough. This was far
better than even I hoped for, and I had really high
expectations. Thank you so much. Ladies and gentlemen, Antonina Armato and Tim James, Rock
Mafia!
A: Thank you, guys! [Standing ovation]

A: And Tim has that. Sometimes artists would listen to Tim in their headphones and trace the way he
sings when they cut their vocal, which is fine as
well. I mean, if you don't want to be the artist, but
you're a producer and you sing great, you can use
how great you are as a singer or how you lay in the
pocket to get somebody that fits the star vibe. There
are lots of tricks; it's not just all one thing. If you
want to be a writer/producer, find a star, man. Find
somebody that can translate your songs.
T: And you know what a star feels like. There's a
star in every small town, what did they make you
feel like? You know what it feels like when you meet
a star, so use that feeling when you're looking for
talent. If you're drawn to it in a star-like way, then
there's something there.
Real drums or...?
T: Depends on what year it is. Now we're going
back to real drums. Wahoo.
So you'll actually cut a track with a bass player, guitar player, keyboard player, and a real drummer
listening to click track?
T: I get to listen to the best musicians in the world,
and they're playing on all our records.
A: Oh, you're so cool. [laughter]
T: No, it's so much fun though. But it's also hard
aesthetically when you go, "Okay, it's going into
these kind of electronic digital drum sounds. I'm a
musician guy at heart. That's what I love to do, but
I've also adapted, staying [cutting edge]. You know,
it's great. We had Dorian Crozier, an amazing
drummer, and when it went to electronic drums, he
would do drum programming.
A: And you can mix them too.
T: Yeah, any real drummer can still go on a program and make a good beat, because they
understand drums. It's good.
All right, one more question.
57

http://www.kiqproductions.com

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Recording - December 2015