Quote:
Originally Posted by blackened  Most recording engineers are failed musicians. As a musician, I have very little respect for recording engineers. The field of audio engineering is a field that should have no ego. That is a job for musicians. A matter of fact, engineering is a job well suited for a musician. I am both an engineer and musician, and being a musician gives my ear the musical training that most engineers would only dream to have.
The problem here is that engineers charge a lot of money merely to do something they enjoy, and most engineers deliver less than satisfactory results. This is the reason for the explosion of everybody and their mother having a Pro Tools rig. What musician would want to deal with some screwball engineer when for the most part, we would be better off just doing it ourselves?
The job of the engineer is to record the musician, and in the mixdown, enhance the vision of the musician in the recorded medium. As a musician, dealing with audio engineers is almost always a waste of time and money. The prices studios charge are outrageous. If most studios could deliver a great product at a reasonable price, then that would be one thing, but the truth is most studios can't.
I offer up a scenario. Band X goes into Studio Waste A Lot to record said album. Band X spends five thousand dollars in studio time tracking, and after mixdown they are unhappy with the results. Studio Waste A Lot says the mix is great, and the recording is great. What recourse does band X have. Court? Na probably not.
So, bands need to be very weary of all studios and flakey engineers. Most engineers suffer from extreme OCD. I'm saying that seriously. Also, I believe that after all is said and done, musicians should never assume that just because a studio has an SSL or Neve that they will get good results. Why do I say this? Well let's just say i've lived it.
Blackened |
Well, I know alot of you here were offended by this post; but I have to admit that some of his points are valid and likely come from having 1 or more bad experiences with studios and engineers. Look at the thread title again, he says "why do MOST engineers suck ?" IMO this is actually a truthful statement; most people who call themselves engineers today, when compared to the top dogs in the biz, do indeed suck. There are countless thousands (maybe more, hopefully not) people who consider themselves to be qualified audio engineers/producers today -- yet on the whole frickin planet there are probably under 100 people who have earned the status as "exceptional". This is why you will continually see the same names repeated again and again on countless records of different artists, people like Andy Wallace or Bernie Grundman for example. If most audio engineers did not lack something as the poster suggests, then why would this be the case ?
Actually, the main reason I got into engineering/mixing/producing myself 10 years ago was for this very reason. Here in New Orleans some of the shittiest studios and engineers on the planet you will find, most with $10,000 curtains and the big SSL but completely clueless engineers (mostly interns) who could care less about your band's music and are watching their watch the whole time the session is going on. Why ? Because the primary motive for being there and working for free (in most cases) is to get free tracking and mixing time for their own band's music in the wee wee hours. I can't count the number of clients I have had who played for me absolutely dreadful sounding recordings from studios with the plush atmosphere and big price tag; and i can tell all of you straight up that most of these clients were very talented artists who had their stuff well rehearsed and were good performers. The simple fact was that their projects were absolutely mangled by inexperienced or uncaring engineers, and sadly I believe this is a very common experience --especially here in the dirty south.
Also, I have heard some studio recordings done by some VERY talented bands whose musicianship and passion most here would only dream of possessing, and it was absolutely pitiful and for the bands completely depressing. The studios that are the real culprits are the ones who place the "bang" factor above the quality of the engineer running the studio. Many of them are just business ventures planned by owners who know absolutely nothing about producing/engineering music themselves. They buy all the big name expensive gear, put many thousands into studio "aesthetics" to make it look professional, and then have a frickin Full Sail intern running the sessions. They spend ALOT of money on fancy advertising that talks about how great the studio is and how much money they have invested, because all they really care about is running a recording "mill" and booking as many clients as possible. And the reason they can stay in business is because there is always (every year) a fresh new wave of clueless rockstar wannabee bands (some with real talent) who will be easily fooled by the $10,000 curtains and big SSL.
So I'm not really defending "Blackened" because some of the stuff he said was indeed inflammatory; but it just sounds like he had some bad experiences which naturally makes one very suspicious and non-trusting of engineers in general.