stupidest things you have ever heard during a session.

[PRobb]

I LOVE THIS THREAD!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Keep em coming.

[heinz]

A few I've witnessed from behind the drums....

Singer: So I only do vocals with a Sony C2 mic. (?!)

Engineer: A C2 huh? Ya got one?

Singer: Nope, but Judy (?) told me that it's exactly suited for my voice. It's super high-end, like three thousand dollars or something. That's the mic I use now.

Engineer: Um, ok. But I only break out the C2 for the big deal vocalists. Consider yourself lucky (puts up a U87).

Singer: Now we're talkin.

- - -

I walk into a session and start setting up my kit in the obvious place. Singer (another nutball, why is it always the singers?) walks over to me.

Singer: Dude you can't setup there.

Me (looking around at about 30 feet of clear floor): um, why's that?

Singer: I'm getting bad energy man, there was a tree growing here once. (he's serious)

Me: Come again?

Singer: A tree, a really old tree was growing in that spot once. The energy is severely bad dude. If you setup there it'll kill your output resonance peak.

[max cooper]

A tree, a really old tree was growing in that spot once. The energy is severely bad dude. If you setup there it'll kill your output resonance peak.

C'mon, Heinz! You didn't know that?


A band I was playing with for a while was recording at Track in No. Hollywood and the drummer had been going on about what a veteran of recording studios he was and "no problem, I can play to a click like nobody's business" (which he couldn't) but my favorite thing was that immediately at the end of EVERY take he'd take his headphones off and set them on the snare drum thus getting SUPER LOUD CLICK TRACK all over the cymbal tails. Like fifteen times. No amount of coaxing or sticky notes on the kit could rectify the situation, we had to punch the last bar on EVERY SONG!

A week goes by and the singer turns up with the Data DVDs...As I load the data in, we listen to the board mixes and i open up my text edit doc to read my notes...the singer is reading them also......Track 12. "this is possibly the worst song I've ever heard"

I'm rolling on the floor!!! You are SO the greatest for that!

[GearHunter]

"wow ey, incredible amount of leds and pots and buttons, HOW (the intonation lies on this word) can you know to use them all?"

Well, that's the #1 FAQ of all time, ain't it?

So I respond this way:

Them: How do you know what all those buttons and switches do?

Me: I DON'T!

Them: a bit stunned

Me, pointing to a randomly chosen pot somewhere way in the upper left corner of the desk: I know what THIS one does! Just figured it out this morning!

Then I point to any prominent button in the center section and say, "Now that's the "BIG" button. It makes your mixes sound HUGE! I push that for an extra $100 per song, cash up front."

Finally, pointing to another button, usually a red one or an illuminated one, I say, "Now this is the HIT RECORD SWITCH. Pressing this button guarantees a gold-record hit for the artist. This button, sadly, is NOT in your budget. I'd need at least another ten grand to press this one."

Hopefully, by now, the client is laughing, realizing he's being totally screwed with.

Unfortunately, and often if it's a bassist or drummer, the sarcastic engineer humor just shoots right over their heads!

NARF!

[rainsinvelvet]

Originally posted by GearHunter
Well, that's the #1 FAQ of all time, ain't it?

So I respond this way:

Them: How do you know what all those buttons and switches do?

Me: I DON'T!

Them: a bit stunned

Me, pointing to a randomly chosen pot somewhere way in the upper left corner of the desk: I know what THIS one does! Just figured it out this morning!

Then I point to any prominent button in the center section and say, "Now that's the "BIG" button. It makes your mixes sound HUGE! I push that for an extra $100 per song, cash up front."

Finally, pointing to another button, usually a red one or an illuminated one, I say, "Now this is the HIT RECORD SWITCH. Pressing this button guarantees a gold-record hit for the artist. This button, sadly, is NOT in your budget. I'd need at least another ten grand to press this one."

Hopefully, by now, the client is laughing, realizing he's being totally screwed with.

Unfortunately, and often if it's a bassist or drummer, the sarcastic engineer humor just shoots right over their heads!

NARF!

Thanks Sooooo Awsome!! I'm going to try that one next time it comes up..

ERic

[raal]

producer's instruction to guitar player:

blue... i want blue...

a little while later to the singer:

orange... give me orange...

not making this up - i was the guitar player and singer.

oh yeah!

another producer aked me for 'youth' once on vocals.

sex i can live with, but youth?

[zimv20]

from an indie grrl band: "these mixes sound too good." we remixed them kinda badly and they were happy.

[copal]

Originally posted by EngineEars

The stupidest thing I've heard in a mix session:

"Can you make the guitars a more greenish glow."

could be funny, but this sounds like a classic case of synaesthesia...hell, mozart had it

[Tim Halligan]

Classical music story...from a while ago...

Famous concert pianist's new album session...schedules sorted, orchestra/conductor hired, producer chosen, engineer chosen,venue arranged...all good so far...

On the tracking day (live to stereo) everything is going fine...great sounds, the balances are great etc, but piano player is not happy with his performance. Many (MANY!) takes later they get what he deems to be a good performance. Thanks and handshakes all round, and off he flies to his next concert date...
Producer and engineer then reconvene later for editing. This is a long, challenging piece from the repertoire...so there is quite a few edits...well, thousands. Days of editing, frustration and exasperation, and finally they have this piece knocked into shape.
The great man is invited to the editing room to listen to his new masterwork.
He arrives, listens, and announces to all what a fantastic job they've all done, and wasn't it worth doing the extra takes to get that perfect performance...at which point the engineer says...

"Yes...and don't you just wish you could play like that?"
_______________________________

"Greatest" practical "joke"?

Some years ago, a studio in Hong Kong bought an SSL, the first one in that city. Money changes hands, the console is shipped, and an install/commissioning tech is sent from the factory to do the job.

At the factory, the roadcase that is to accompany the tech is loaded (by the other techs) with all the necessary bits and pieces required to do the job, then sealed ready for airfreight. The tech will be on the same flight, and he'll collect his bags then go to the freight terminal to pick up the roadcase...
He gets to Heathrow, checks the freight in, checks himself in, and off he goes...14 hrs of boredom to Hong Kong...
Arrives Hong Kong, gets his bag, clears customs then heads for the freight area to retrieve the roadcase. HK customs want him to open the case, which he does. Laying in the top of the case are some plastic bags containing white powder! Customs go nuts...this is Asia after all, where drug offenses are harshly dealt with...
Tech held in jail pending analysis of powder...fingerprints, mugshots...the whole nine yards.
Turns out to be castor sugar...
I'm guessing there may have been some words said on the tech's return to the factory...

Cheers,
Tim

[maskedman72]

Originally posted by GearHunter
Holy Shite Maskedman!

That Mr. Metal story is really true?

Was there really anything wrong with the tracks? I mean, even if you did wind the reels heads-out, one or two week's time is not going to cause print-through.

What did they do to the tapes?

drew,

100% true story indeed! the whole thing was insane. what was wrong with the tapes? my theory is that the studio they went to for the overdubbs wanted more money and made something up or they screwed the reels up somehow. i made rough copies for the band right from the tapes than they took the tapes and left, so i know that the band knew the tapes were fine when they walked out of the studio with them.

[e-cue]

Not really stupidest thing said but...

I showed up for a mix session and my assistant was frantically setting up a Studer 820 and 827. Apparently, they had a D827 hooked up the night before and the session ran late or something. Anyway, I waited in the lounge till the second said we were ready. I noticed the tape machines were sticking out crooked a bit as I walked by the machine room. I told him to load up a song on the tape machines, I hit play, and immediately it sounded way off.

"Did you align the machines?" e-cue
"Yeah." 2nd
"Lemme check them out." e-cue

We walk into the machine room and the 2nd goes "See? I pushed them right next to each other."

Guess I should have been more specific.

[maskedman72]

i had a band hire what they told me was the "baddest guitar player youll ever hear" to do ONE lead solo on their rock album that we had tracked.

well the day comes up and we are in the studio waiting for this great god of solos to show up so i can record this solo and an hour goes by...............nothing. than finally an hour and a half late he walks in.......with no equipment at all. the guy that hired him to do this solo asks "where is your marshall stack and your guitar?" the player says "i traded it all last night for heroin"

so at this point im thinking "great". so at our studio we have a nice selection of guitars and amps for clients to choose from so i inform them of this and we begin getting a rig together to get some sounds going.......mr. heroin dosent like ANY of the amps or guitars we have at all..."everything sounds like shit" he says.

"i have to have my tone" he says. "i have to sound like pantera" he says.

so, several hours later mr heroin comes to the conclusion that he cannot do his solo with these shitty amps and guitars so the guy that hired him takes him up to guitar center and lets him pick out whatever mr heroin wants and returns to the studio hours later(this whole time i am charging them for the studio time)

so they show up with an ibenez gtr and a marshall stack and head. we get everything going and miced up. finally it is time to record this ONE solo and we can move on.

he tunes up and gets warmed up and he tells me he is ready and this will take only one take and he will be finished. i roll tape and his lead comes up, he hits the first note and ****s up and i stop tape..

he now does something i have never seen before.....as soon as he screws up and tape stops rolling he clinches both of his fists as hard as he can and begins shaking violently than he screams as loud as he can at the top of his lungs as if he is being totured in hell by satan himself. AAAAAAAAGGGGGGGHHHHHHHHHAAAAAA!@#@!$$%^%$#$#@@)(*&^%$#@!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

i give him a minute..............take 2......roll tape..first note again AAAGGGHHHHHHHDDDDDLKJHGFWTJY)(*&^$#@$%HH*(&^%$#!!!

he looks like he is having a sizeure each time he has this tantrum. it was the most bizzare thing i have seen.

i spent the next 3 hours watching this over and over.

he never got past the first 1/4 of this one solo he was brought in to do and it never got recorded. he gave up. and it took the entire day to do.

that day i got paid to record nothing.

[Killahurts]

Great story!

You know maskedman, as I was reading your post, I thought maybe when we got to the end, we'd find out after all that he (Mr. Heroin) was the absolute sh*t and nailed his God-like solo on the first take- but no, he really did suck

Only goes to show, when it looks like a duck, and walks like a duck...

[jonnyclueless]

Originally posted by deft_bonz
i hear several times when clients come in the first time in a studio. don't know why, maybe i look incompetent

"wow ey, incredible amount of leds and pots and buttons, HOW (the intonation lies on this word) can you know to use them all?"

I always telll them that only one button is used and that the rest are in case it breaks.

[De chromium cob]

Originally posted by maskedman72
"i have to have my tone" he says. "i have to sound like pantera" he says.

Sounds like he needed more junk rather than a new guitar setup....
People like that make me watch my gear like a hawk....

[Waylon]

the next time you get asked " how do you know what all this does?"...

Just drop your glasses, or just stare at them and say the following....

" I am a Genius", "what is it about you that should make me need to hear your voice?"

[Watersound]

O.K, so about a year ago I'm recording this dim wit artist...crazy as a loon, and I get her in the vocal room, start getting sounds, eq, etc. and she warms up singing through the tune 2-3 times. Then we begin recording and she says to stop because she hears someone else singing in the headphones. I figure maybe it's latency and check buffer settings...everything looks fine. We resume and she does it again..."There's someone else singing in my headphones" I go into the room, put the cans on, sing in the mic with the track- nothing. This chick was hearing voices in her head...we wound up recording with her taking the phones almost completely off. Even that doesn't work for her until finally she demands, "I'm doing my vocals with the headphones turned off." She kills the volume, I hit play, and she says "I can't hear anything!!"

[Dot]

I was working at a major studio in NYC around '87. One of the clients showed me a bill from a producer who'd worked with them on some sessions. The client was a little confused about the bill. It had the usual list of shit itemized...session musician costs, studio costs, tape costs....

And at the bottom was this one little item:

SMPTE: $100

The producer tried to charge the client an extra $100 for using SMPTE code!

[deft_bonz]

Originally posted by jonnyclueless
I always telll them that only one button is used and that the rest are in case it breaks.

sometimes i answer:"oh, i just try, sometimes i hit the right one and it happens something"

[deft_bonz]

Originally posted by GearHunter
Well, that's the #1 FAQ of all time, ain't it?

So I respond this way:

Them: How do you know what all those buttons and switches do?

Me: I DON'T!

Them: a bit stunned

Me, pointing to a randomly chosen pot somewhere way in the upper left corner of the desk: I know what THIS one does! Just figured it out this morning!

Then I point to any prominent button in the center section and say, "Now that's the "BIG" button. It makes your mixes sound HUGE! I push that for an extra $100 per song, cash up front."

Finally, pointing to another button, usually a red one or an illuminated one, I say, "Now this is the HIT RECORD SWITCH. Pressing this button guarantees a gold-record hit for the artist. This button, sadly, is NOT in your budget. I'd need at least another ten grand to press this one."

Hopefully, by now, the client is laughing, realizing he's being totally screwed with.

Unfortunately, and often if it's a bassist or drummer, the sarcastic engineer humor just shoots right over their heads!

NARF!

that's a good one, i'm going to try this one out

i'm going to make a little survey with my new girlfriend, she hasn't seen my studio until now because i was moving. at the same time iv'e got a lot of new high end gear. i wonder if she can distinct them from "normal" gear without knowing anything about gear at all.

[deft_bonz]

just remembered another i lived... probably everyone of you pros have already lived that.

it was my very first recording in a big studio with a neve with a very good classical singer. she sings at operas, concerts, etc. she is a pro. therefore i tried to be "nice" tutt

she: could i have please some reverb on my voice

me: for sure... no problem...

put on mid sized reverb preset on the m5000

she: hmmm... sounds too long

me: uhm... ok...

took the next preset, a shorter one of course

she: that's too much wood

me: ??? ehm yes

next preset, and you now realize how this was going on. from halls to rooms to garages, from wood to stone to bathrooms, from 7 seconds reverbs to short dry gated reverbs. she was never satisfied with the sound. i tried to be nice and polite and not to question her demands. but after 30-40 minutes of trying out i lost my patience and turned off the m5000

she: hey that one is great, sounds perfect

[Ted Nightshade]

Originally posted by deft_bonz

she: could i have please some reverb on my voice

...from halls to rooms to garages, from wood to stone to bathrooms, from 7 seconds reverbs to short dry gated reverbs. she was never satisfied with the sound. i tried to be nice and polite and not to question her demands. but after 30-40 minutes of trying out i lost my patience and turned off the m5000

she: hey that one is great, sounds perfect

Hey, that would have been my favorite too!

Hell, she's a classical singer, she's probably used to REAL ROOMS

[deft_bonz]

yes, but she insisted to have a reverb

[maskedman72]

i dont even know where to begin on this one but here we go.

what you are about to read is the truth,the whole truth and nothing but the truth.


a few years back i was recording a rock band called ritual(band name has been changed for the story). we were close to the finishing stages and the singer approaches me and says he is the singer for another band also and he would like to book time and do their full length with me also(for this story we will call this second band "toys"). great, i get another gig from him...cool.

so,toys come in and begin recording,we get everything down on tape and all we have to do is mix. we spent a few weeks tracking the lp. so at mix time the singer and gtr player of toys get into a big arguement and begin fighting (with fists) over some stupid crap. so now the singer for "toys" has been kicked out of the band after we have cut his vocal so now the gtr player books the time to come in and erase the vox and he is going to do them himself.......no problem.

we spend a week cutting his vocal and all of that so we finish them and book time for the following week to do the final mix.

the next night i have some mixing sessions with ritual.(remember that the singer of ritual is also the singer for toys who just got booted out of toys)
so i get the reels out and get the mix going and we are fully into the mix. the singer of ritual is hanging out as we mix and hanging in the lounge. we finish the mixing for the night and i am getting their bill togther and i look over and the singer has taken a sharpie and blacked out the band name on all 3 of their reels cases and he has now wrote "slim shady" on all 3 of the reels. i say to him totally puzzled "what the hell are you doing that for?" he says "i dont want anyone to know what reels are ours"......
i think nothing of it (he is an odd person aside from this) and give them their bill and collect the cash.

a week goes by and now it is time to mix the toys lp. the band all show up and i am getting it all togther and i go into the tape storage room and look for the toys reels.......i cant find them. the studio sees a lot of use so i figure they have been moved so i keep looking....nothing. i look again....nothing. by this time the band is wondering what i am doing and what is taking me so long. i look again...nothing. i get the owner and ask him to look hoping my eyes are just not seeing them...still nothing. at this point i am freaking out about this. now i have to go out and tell the entire band that the reels they have spent several grand working on are now gone. so i tell them. they didnt even know what i was saying. the look they gave me really sucked for me. what do you say in this situation to a client??? so they begin freaking out with me. than they begin blaming me for the reels missing. than i remember.......i remember that when i had ritual in the week before the singer was acting very strange and he totally took the band name off of all of their reels as to disguise them.......BINGO! the bastard stole the toys reels cause he was all pissed at the gtr player cause they got in a fight and they kicked him out and replaced all of his vocals. so it all hits me and i explain all of this to the band and i dont know if they thought i was making it all up to cover up something that they though i had done or what but than they said they were going to take the studio to court and sue over it all (this is at the same time "mr.metal" from my other story was suing also)

so i call up the gtr player from ritual and question him about the possable theft of the toys tapes and he says he dosent know anything about it but it sounds like something the singer would do.

in the meantime toys now want to steal the ritual reels until they get their reels back. i stop this from happening and they decide to leave and get their laywers.

a few weeks go by and it turns out that the singer of ritual did indeed steal the toys reels and he admitted it to the toys gtr player.....the best part of it is that not only did he steal them......he booked time at another studio,erased the gtr players vocals and re-recorded his vocals and mixed it all and had it printed and pressed under the band name "doubting thomas"...that is no bullshit.

i never heard from the toys lawyer or the band after that. nor did i finish the mixes for ritual. i will never work with any of those guys again.

[deft_bonz]

maskedman, it seems that you have an magnetically attraction to such guys

your astral karma made a lot of fun with you at this time of your life

[maskedman72]

Originally posted by deft_bonz
maskedman, it seems that you have an magnetically attraction to such guys

i dont know why either. just my luck i guess. i have more stories to tell later but it got so bad that i considered just quitting engineering altogther. it was just becoming to much of a hassle and not worth it to me...but i hung in there to have more crazy things happen to me.

i can say with confidance that i am the un-luckiest engineer on this whole forum.

[deft_bonz]

think positive: it can get only better

do you remember the story about the engineer who had thought that he had seen almost everything until a client put off his pants to show his rings in his dick. that was also in this thread.

so maybe it can get also worse

[maskedman72]

Originally posted by deft_bonz
think positive: it can get only better

do you remember the story about the engineer who had thought that he had seen almost everything until a client put off his pants to show his rings in his dick. that was also in this thread.

so maybe it can get also worse

that would be far better...and comical.

[mac black]

I work with a singer that always tells me her sexual experiences in the middle of vocal takes (usually verses).
Yesterday she goes " I took my vibrator to dinner last night... the bastard, just like everyone else, never called " So I said "thats because you were moaning too much as usual" .... .

[gilson]

...hahahaha.....briliant thread


more !!! i need more !!!!!