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RSR044 – Jim Reilley – How To Write A Song For Music Row (Or Not)

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RSR007 - David Glenn - The Mix Academy

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RSR044 – Jim Reilley - How To Write A Song For Music Row (Or Not)

My guest today is Jim Reilley, a songwriter, producer, and recording artist from Nashville TN. I’ve known Jim for years as an incredibly prolific songwriter, and have been Jim’s recording engineer when he was producing for the artist Stephanie Quayle.


Jim’s band The New Dylans with Reese Campbell started back to 1986 when they recorded with the rhythm section of 10,000 maniacs and landed critical acclaim for their “folk rock” sound. Michael Stipe of REM called them one of his top ten bands for 1986. The New Dylans continued through breakups and makeups over the decades that follow, and have more recently released a new album called Meta, with Robert Reynolds of The Mavericks, and Ken Coomer of Wilco.

The New Dylans - [Can't Go Home] Again


Jim moved to Nashville in 1998 and landed a publishing deal with Curb Publishing where he wrote songs for nearly a decade. Over 45 of Jim’s songs were recorded by artists including Vince Gill, Hal Ketchum, Jack Ingram, Tim O’Brien, Sam Bush, and many others.


I know Jim from the studio as a producer, where he is also very prolific, and is often producing sessions back to back. He has a no bullshit fast and fearless production style that demands great performances from the musicians, and might track more than 10 songs in a single day.


I split my personality in half where I’m partially writing songs, partially producing songs, and partially perform and make records on my own”

Jim Reilley

Songwriting

The words on some of the songs that really inspired me, it’s amazing that there’s only like two verses and a small chorus. Here in Nashville everyone’s like, “You got to have a bridge and the second chorus has to be different...” Not really. Some of the songs are so small and brevity is really important. I also feel like in the studio, knocking them out quick doesn’t always work. You don’t always have the luxury of having a great engineer or great players or great artist. I've always admired and studied the work of Brian Wilson (Beach Boys), George Martin and Geoff Emerick (Beatles). 

"Everyone that wants to get in this business should see this!" - Jim 

What Do You Do When You Produce A Record?

That’s a good question and a lot of artists want to know that too when it comes to money. It’s different for every artist and every production I do is different in one sense and that is that I kind of look at the artist I’m working with and decide how much influence or intervention there should be on my part. Typically an artist that I produce usually I’m a fan of, most always now. A lot of times I’ll just let things happen and then arrest something that isn’t working too well as opposed to getting too heavy handed and oppressive about it. I’ve seen where producers have been that way and it works sometimes, but I don’t like to be that guy. My whole philosophy when I produce somebody is I always say... What I’d like for you to do is have a record where you can meet a random stranger in an airport and after they ask, “Well what do you do, what are you all about?” You just hand them the cd and you don’t have to say anything else. This is the kind of music I do. I don’t have to say, ‘Eh it’s kind of folky poppy, but it’s blues and it’s cajun.. The music will speak for itself. If I did my job right, then they are proud enough to give that without having to say, “Well the producer wanted me to do this, but I didn’t want to.” I’ve had so many people give me projects that they’ve done where they’ve had to qualify virtually every song on the record. I just want to listen to it. It does me no good to produce something for someone that they aren’t happy with because ultimately I want them to be proud of it and give them what they ask me for in the first place.

What About Your Internal Process of Inspiration, How Do You Approach That?

I don’t like to script a lot of stuff so much because then I feel like I’m kind of tethered to that, but it does help when you’re trying to move fast. Sometimes you do need to hear it to know it’s wrong. I’ll be the first one to do an experiment and say, “this probably isn’t going to work, but for me can you just take two minutes and try this.” I’ll never be a guy who says, “No, absolutely not, we can’t do that.” After I hear it and it’s terrible well then I’ll say that, but until then I always like to try. 

“I’ll never be a guy who says, “No, absolutely not, we can’t do that” - Jim Reilley @BuddyCruel

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What are the Basics of Copyright?

That’s a tricky thing. So much music is so easy to get to now. That even trickles down here in Nashville to even playing the songs live. A publisher will tell a songwriter, “well don’t play that at the Bluebird because someone else will hear it and rip it off.” Half of me is like, well maybe. That does happen, it’s happened to me! But at the same time where are you going to play? What are you going to do? Just be careful. As a writer you have to have this sort of attitude that well if they want to take it and do it better, let them try. For Youtube, I would try it as long as it’s copyrighted. There’s form PA and form SR. From PA is the actual copyright of the song. So you write the words and the music, that is a copyright for that song. Form SR is the form of the sound recording. It copyrights the recording, not the song. You can do multiple songs so basically if you do a record you copyright the whole record on form SR for one price. Whereas form PA you send a recording of the words and music with a lyric sheet. Some people will mail it to themselves so they have the postmark on it, but it’s just safer to do through the copyright office (You can do all of this online) Then your song is copy written! If you have some crazy mojo on this vocal or crazy guitar sounds you came up with that's really exclusive to your song, use copyright form SR so the sound of the song is copy written. A lot of times there’s so much music going on that just getting noticed is a success story these days

What Makes a Great Song?

That really depends on a lot of factors. I don't really think anyone knows, maybe paul mccartney might know. I think everyone knows when they hear one. To me a great song can be the riff, it could be the hook, it could be the melody, it could be the drum part. When I produce artists I ask them to make me a list of songs either for spotify or on a CD of what songs they love and why. What about that song do you love? Is it the vibe, is it the mood, is it the drum pattern, is it the vocal? So it helps me do shorthand. So we go into the studio together and make a record without having to explore all those options (we do sometimes), but this way I know what you do and do not like going in.

“If I get writer's block, I’ll go back and look at the things that influenced me” - Jim Reilley @BuddyCruel

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Jam Session 

Q - What was holding you back at the start?
A - Probably my lack of knowledge or my insecurity. I was kinda like I don’t really know what’s going on. The only thing I learned was that no one knows what’s going on, so just go for it.

Q- What was some of the best advice you got early on?

A- Musically as a songwriter. Roger Sovereign who was at the time the head of BMI. When I first got here 20 years ago, I met with him and he loved what I was doing he said, “There’s two kinds of songwriters that come to Nashville. One that comes here and looks around and says, ‘Oh Shit!’ and goes back home. And the other looks around and says, ‘Yeah, I can do this.’” After that, there’s two decisions you have to make. You either become a songwriter that writes for the market and is a co-writer and writes specific songs for a specific type of role, or you just write songs. Chances are the writer that writes for that specific need is probably going to be a lot richer and a lot better off monetarily, but not necessarily as a fulfilled artist. So you kind of have to decide are you going to be the writer that writes for the market and notices all the trends and not necessarily writing a lot from the heart, or do you just write songs and hope they get home.

“I think getting cuts in Nashville is tough and it’s getting harder and harder” -Jim Reilley @BuddyCruel

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Q- Share with us a recording tip, hack, or secret sauce.
A -  Doubled vocals, old school. I love a doubled chorus. I love little ear tricks, ear candy, so it’s not so much about you must always use this converter or this microphone. That being said an SM7 goes a long way for a vocal mic. There’s also no replacement for a well tuned drum set. There’s a lot of great records that sound like hell because the drums aren’t tuned right. You know there’s some great drummers in town that know how to tune a kit and its magic when it’s tuned right.

Q - Share a favorite hardware tool for the studio
A-
 The SM7 is one of my favorite mics. There’s so many people that do mic shoot outs. You know who didn’t do those? The Beatles, The Rolling Stones. I think its kind of silly in a way, just sing into the microphone that’s there and make it work. That being said, the SM7 is pretty rugged and a universal mic so is a U87, but you can’t really go wrong on that on vocals for almost everybody.


Q - Share a favorite software tool for the studio

A -I guess I would say Abbey Road Samples on Reason. Those are amazing and they sound great and fit into a track really well. Its funny a lot of times those fit better into a track than a real piano.

“Being a people person is really an important qualification to being a producer” - Jim Reilley @BuddyCruel

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Q - What are some tools that are part of the writing and creative process that are really useful to you?

A - It’s really hard to get away from the iphone. There’s a thing called music memos with drums and everything. It doesn’t lock in all the time, but I love it! I also use the guitar toolkit app, it’s like $10. I use a lot of open tunings and it allows me to list and catalog every open tuning I have. Basically you just write in the notes and you can hear the strum.

Q - Whats a process for you for capturing a song?

A - It’s difficult for me because I can’t read music, so I can’t write down notation and stuff like that and I don’t read number charts. I just memorize the songs. That requires a lot of mind work on my part, but it’s the only way I know how to do it.

“Sometimes that’s what makes the great song, the wrongness of it” - Jim Reilley @BuddyCruel

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Q - If you had to start over what gear would you need? How would you find people to record? And how would you make ends meet while you got started?

A - It wouldn’t probably be much different. I would have to find a studio that I could work with and camp at. I don’t really have the mind to find a rig. I guess I’m not a studio rockstar just more of a pretender. I admire it, I appreciate it, and I know enough. But I would have to find a good place that I would be comfortable in to create. If I did have to get something that I would have to have at home, I would get a good laptop and someone to show me how to use ProTools.

Q - What is the single most important thing a listener can do to become a rockstar of the recording studio?

A - Listen a lot. So much time is spent on creating and that’s really important too, but make your music. Make it so you like it. Please yourself. It’s not really about anything other than pleasing yourself at this point. But at the same time I think it’s really important to listen to what has come before. So you know what not to do, or what to violate, or what to emulate, because you’re not the first one doing this. It’ll inform you in a lot of ways.

Contact:
TheNewDylans.com
New Dylans Facebook
Jim Reilley Facebook
Check Out Jim's Solo Album!!

Big Thanks to Tyler Cuidon & Merissa Marx for this week's episode!!

RSR031 – Dave Tough – Producer’s Room

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RSR007 - David Glenn - The Mix Academy

If you dig the show I would be honored if you would subscribe, and leave a rating, & review in iTunes.

RSR031 - Dave Tough - The Producer's Room

My guest today is Dave Tough, a Dove award-winning producer, engineer, and songwriter based here in Nashville, TN. He is also a music industry educator at Belmont University, and an active voting member of the Recording Academy (Grammy Awards).


Dave has won the Grand Prize in the John Lennon songwriting contest twice...in 2013 (Electronica Category) and in 2009 (Country Category). He has written and produced over 150 songs for major motion pictures and television including Pretty Little Liars, Empire, Glee, Nashville, and CSI.


And Rockstars, you may also enjoy his television show called Producer’s Room with Dave Tough, featuring interviews with music industry creators, and studio tours.

"The focus of the show is a little different, we talk more about the creative process rather than focusing on the technical side"

“It's not our job as engineers to judge the lyrics, we’re judging the tonal qualities of the recording” @DaveTough

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Songwriting

Writing for TV and Film

"Film is more emotion based meaning the texture and temporal quality of the recording has as much to do as the lyrical content. It's the antithesis of Nashville. In Nashville it's all about the lyrics. We are gonna look at the floor and say that's a red rug with purple flowers on it and we're really going to describe everything about it. In film and tv we leave it more ambiguous. We’d say that rug makes me feel delicious. It’s more of a John Lennon approach. It evokes an emotion, not only the lyric but the texture of the song."

Writing Tips for Electronica Pop:
"My wife and I have a band called Xavier & Ophelia. Our song “Falling Down” won the John Lennon Songwriting Contest in 2013. For this song we wanted to do a Hall and Oates chord progression to a dance beat. So when I sat down to record it, I used references, I like this high hit on this song and this drum beat on this song.. As far as tonality there aren’t any rules besides managing the low end. Side-chaining the bass to the kick."

Mixing Tips for Country Music: 
"The first thing is the lyric. Lyric’s got to be heard and cut through so vocal intelligibility is number one. Clearing out the low end besides for bass and drums. Making the others crosshatch together and finding little places in the spectrum that they’ll work together."

“If you’re going to record music.. you should understand music” @DaveTough

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Jam Session 

Q - What was holding you back at the start?
A - Two things, one I started from a musical perspective. But when I first said I’m going to be an engineer I thought it was a science. I thought man I can do a calculation to get from point A to point B if I once again do this compression ratio, but the more you live you realize it’s more of an art. The second thing was I had gear acquisition syndrome. I realized after a long time that you don’t have to have all of that.

Q- What was some of the best advice you got early on?

A- It’s all about the song and the arrangement and all of that… With my students I’ll play them a really good song, and a really bad produced song and ask them which one they want to listen to. It really depends on their frame of mind, but they see that the production is not what it’s all about. So if you don’t start with a good song, good arrangement, good players, you’re not going to get too far in the engineering world.

“If you want to eat in this town, you’re going to be working on other genres that you may not be a huge fan of” @DaveTough

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Q- Share with us a recording tip, hack, or secret sauce.

A - I would say a really solid signal chain on the front end. I’m all about the pre-production, good tones, good arrangement. If I’m speaking for producing I would say also keep a rolodex of musicians. What I typically like to do is if I go out and see a show I take a note on my iphone this drummer is good at rock. Being able to cast players for different kinds of records.

Q - Share a favorite hardware tool for the studio
A- 
Favorite hardware would be a good instrument, and then my signal chain of choice would be something simple like a U87 a solid state condenser mic that has a flat response so I can tweak it later and a nice preamp.


“Engineering was only a function of composition for me” @DaveTough

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Q - Share a favorite software tool for the studio

A - Believe it or not, I actually dig the CLA bundles the Waves OneKnob. Everyone’s like you have the be a beginner engineer to use those. I think one of the most important things as an engineer is to capture your initial gut reaction and if I’m going through plugins and tweaking stuff for 30 min to get a bass sound.. I lost my gut reaction, I lost my initial impression. So with those types of tools the general CLAs, JJPs, Waves Bundle, that kind of stuff that has little pre-sets and their signal chain is built in, I can capture 90% of what I’m hearing within 3 minutes. Other stuff I was thinking about, I use Waves RVox I use a lot, of course everyone uses the UAD stuff. Another tool that changed my mixing was the oxford bundle by Sonnox's. The oxford limiter on the master bus, the oxford eq… One other piece is gear is the warm audio 1176. For $500 it’s pretty nice!

Q - Share with us a tip for the business side of the recording studio

A - The problem with engineers, is they only want to hang with engineers. That’s totally the opposite of what you need to do if you are trying to start a business! You need to go hang out with the people that need you. So like here in Nashville you need to go to NSAI where all the songwriters hang out and they don’t have any technical chops. And those are the people you need to hang with because then it's a win win. They can use what you do, you can use what they do or their money.. Either way.

“That’s what I love about engineering and music in general.. There’s something to learn everyday” @DaveTough

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Q - If you had to start over what gear would you need? How would you find people to record? And how would you make ends meet while you got started?

A - First of all I would go out to the clubs and meet some of the musicians and pick their brains. After that, as far as a setup, when I worked with Bruce Swedien (Michael Jackson’s Engineer) one of his ten commandments was always mic in stereo. So maybe two U87’s, two LA 610’s and maybe some apogee converters and a laptop. As far as making ends meet, I heard a good piece of advice from a songwriter once to get a job at night so you can use all your fruitful energy during the day for your craft and then when you’re sleepy you go to work.


Q - What is the single most important thing a listener can do to become a rockstar of the recording studio?

A - Find what your deep driving desire is and find your unique voice, I think that’s so important. It may take you not 10,000 hours but 20-40,000 hours to find your unique voice. If you think about all the great artists, Miles Davis, Jaco Pastorius, George Massenburg, they all have a unique voice in their genre. On the flip side always try to work with an artist with a unique voice. When you can start becoming selective, dont record that guy that sounds like John Mayer, because we already have John Mayer. The label doesn’t need him, society doesn’t need him. You need to find someone with a unique voice that’s saying something unique lyrically but also sounds different and that’s where you’re going to have your best chance at success.

“You will become what you are...whatever’s in your heart, it will manifest itself” @DaveTough

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Nick Bullock

RSR030 – Nick Bullock – 52 in 52

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RSR007 - David Glenn - The Mix Academy

If you dig the show I would be honored if you would subscribe, and leave a rating, & review in iTunes.

RSR030 - Nick Bullock - 52 in 52

My guest today is Nick Bullock, a musician, teacher, producer, songwriter and music blogger. Nick has been an educator in music as well, founding a successful music school in Ithaca NY while playing and recording music with his band, The Sound Awake. And after years of running his business, playing in a band, and producing both his own records and others, he made a leap of faith and moved to Nashville TN to pursue his larger vision for songwriting and recording.


With his move to Nashville, Nick decided to focus on his own music. He built his home studio, and began to rehearse, write and record with a passion. In 2015 he launched an intense studio project with his band called 52 in 52 where he committed to writing and recording 52 songs in 52 weeks.


Nick’s intense journey has produced some stellar recordings, a blog, and also led to new productions with new artists. I am psyched to be here at Awake Studios to speak with Nick and learn more about the process of creating on such a high level.

What is 52 in 52?

52 songs written, recorded, and released in 52 weeks. Inevitably by the end I wasn’t able to release one song a week for a variety of reasons, but by the end of the 52nd week all of the songs were done and released on my SoundCloud page. Everything that I released, I’m not necessarily happy with it all, but there's at least one thing in each song that I really like. I view songwriting as a craft, so not everything that I write has to be great, not everything that I write has to be done, you just have to do it. Big thanks to Kevin Harper, Tom Elefante, Greg Herndon, Brain Cox, and Clark Singleton who supported and participated in the project. 

Check out Nick's 52 in 52 Blog!! 

“I guarantee you every single person no matter how brilliant they are has felt the fool before” 

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Nick Bullock - On Goal Setting - 

Holding yourself accountable is one of the hardest things, but also one of the most important things to do. If an idea comes to me more than once, then I have to do it. Setting and reaching goals builds confidence and self esteem. You learn from the trials and tribulations as much as the successes if not more. For me, it’s part of my everyday life. I’ve always been self-employed so goals are just part of who I am. Advice on completing goals is number one break it down to a bottom tear goal as you possibly can. If your goal is to write, record, and release a song, it’s really about breaking those goals down into a really easy digestible pattern of behavior that you know you can complete.

Jam Session 

Q - What was holding you back at the start?
A - I would say what was holding me back was confidence and lack of experience. [As far as starting 52 in 52] stress was holding me back. Just the overall overwhelmed feeling of trying to be a human being and make enough income for the family of now three and trying to finish all of this at once. I don’t know if it held me back, but I definitely have more grey hair on my head then needs to be.

Q- How did you get past that initial fear?
A - The courage part is the biggest factor. I’d be the guy that went first, just get it over with. I have no problem making myself look like a fool. Whether it was asking questions of engineers that were mixing my songs about equipment or tape hiss or whatever. I guarantee you every single person no matter how brilliant they are has felt the fool before. It’s just a universal thing that’s a part of life and the quicker you can get over that, the better you’ll be.

“Imagination is where the genius lies in all of us”

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Q- What was some of the best advice you got early on?

A- I think how to stay organized is probably the biggest ones, and my wife was really good at talking me down. Just having somebody in your corner, whether it's your mom or wife or whatever. Having a brotherhood and sisterhood out there to just give you support is a huge thing. In every creative process an idea that is born that’s new and different has the potential to be great. But if there's no support system for that idea, it's just going to wither on the vine and die. Surround yourself with people who support you and have your back. From Steve Jobs to Einstein to Mozart to John Lennon. Every kernel of new idea they had was new to the world at the time. I guarantee if they had been in a different position, there would have been somebody that said this is a terrible idea and a waste of time! Look what the world would have lost out on. Surround yourself with love, man.

Q- Share with us a recording tip, hack, or secret sauce.

A - One of the more fun ones for getting a good vocal sound is using clip gain (gaining down the actual wav file before it ever hits the plugins in your mix) instead of a D-esser of some kind. I’ll go through and highlight the section in protools and cut it out (apple + E) and use clip gain to really adjust the breaths or consonants. I’m pretty sure you can use that in logic too.

“I think there’s huge value to be learned from other people’s mistakes, experiences, and knowledge”

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Q - Share a favorite hardware tool for the studio
A-
Probably my 335 or my 65 Twin. I do everything in the box, but all of my investments all kind of stem from instruments first. It goes from instruments to microphone to preamp.. All that sexy stuff comes after. But it's really those first three that are most important in capturing a great sound. So the bulk of my career has been investing the those. My Wurlitzer is a beautiful piece of vintage gear. My piano, I know exactly what it does, but my 335 is probably my favorite.


“I’m more of a melody and chord guy” 

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Q - Share a favorite software tool for the studio

A - The UAD stuff is amazing. The Apollo Quad is my interface and I use ProTools. Some of the Waves stuff is decent too!

“Holding yourself accountable is one of the hardest things, but also one of the most important things to do”

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Q - Share with us a tip for the business side of the recording studio

A - I just downloaded this app called invoice2go that's very handy. One important lesson I’ve learned is when you’re cutting a record talk to who’s cutting the check.

Q - If you had to start over what gear would you need? How would you find people to record? And how would you make ends meet while you got started?

A - If they want to make a full time living maybe that’s a different set of parameters. For me, since I did it directly. I was lucky with the selling of my previous business to give myself some buffer. As far as something practical, I like to spend my money on the front of the chain rather than the back of the chain. Don’t spend money you don’t have to. Settle for a laptop and interface of some kind. The Apollo is really great. Then you have this library of plugins that come with that and all you need is a guitar and a mic!


“I’m just not interested in playing it safe”

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Q - What is the single most important thing a listener can do to become a rockstar of the recording studio?

A - Always be open to learning from anybody and everybody. Always have a mind of curiosity. Be generous with your presence.