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What happens when you start writing, producing, and mixing like the forest, not the trees, and you leave your worries behind?

My guest today is Micah Tawlks – producer, mixer, songwriter, and artist based in Nashville, working out of his home studio in Whites Creek. Micah first joined us back on RSR324, and he’s back to go even deeper into the intersection of writing, recording, and mixing. He’s known for work with COIN, Hayley Williams, Louis Prince, Judah & the Lion, The Lone Bellow, Stephen Day, Ben Rector, and many more, including immersive Atmos mixes with Matt Wallace.

In this episode, we dig into how writing sessions actually unfold when they happen in your studio – the unexpected ways a simple co-write can turn into full production, vocal sessions weeks later, or a finished track if the artist or publisher decides to cut it. Micah describes the different roles he shifts between: offering lyric help when invited, contributing chords and melody, arranging on the fly, or simply running a fast demo session when that’s what the artist wants.

We also talk about the balance between paid studio work and free co-writes, how he and his manager evaluate opportunities, and why some ideas need months to find their artist, while others get cut immediately. He explains what co-writing in pairs vs. groups actually feels like, why some writers don’t want lyrical collaboration at all, and how recording the first 20 minutes of small talk often captures the best emotional ideas of the day.

Micah walks us through his recent engineering day at Blackbird, choosing from huge mic lockers (multiple U47s, C12s, 67s on toms, etc.), working quickly on the console, and how “fast in a big studio” still relies on the same preparation habits as working fast at home.
In the writing room, we get into why clicks can kill a session, how he builds musical rhythmic loops as “human clicks,” when he performs his own time feel into a mic so the grid follows a human instead of the other way around, and how artists respond differently to tempo when the groove feels alive.

Finally, we talk mixing: keeping rough mix intent intact, charging a flat rate, when to recommend another mixer, and how honoring an artist’s stylistic world guides the whole process. Micah’s advice to his younger self? Be a better listener – in the room, at the console, everywhere.