| Keef wrote on Tue, 21 September 2004 13:46 |
George has said in the past, having recall on digital mixers for eq, and effects is a big benifit.
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Not everyone views this as a benefit. Benefit also means advantage.
Having instant recall can be just as much a disadvantage as an advantage. If you have recall abilities, the client will undoubtedly want to use them. If your recall abilities are at the very least time consuming, it forces everyone involved to focus make decisions and go with those decisions.
Advantages and disadvantages are wholly personal. There is no such thing as a self-evident and inalienable advantage or benefit.
Many people don't understand that we choose our clients based on what we view as advantages and disadvantages. I know you're reaction before you've had it. "I don't choose my clients! People call me out of the blue."
Wrong.
You choose your clients. Your working methods, your bedside manner, your choice in gear, your pricing, etc.. will attract the right clients for you. A band that requires heavy editing is going to seek out a producer that prefers digital methods, and believes in heavy editing. I have precluded myself from this sort of work just by HOW I work. We all preclude ourselves from different clients by how we choose to work.
I have a certain comfort zone with having clients present and forcing them to make decisions. I do not have a comfort zone with allowing them to second guess themselves to the destruction of every amount of goodness there is in a mix. So I choose tools and methods that allow for my preferences. Given these preferences, the advantage of instant recall would be a very great disadvantage to me.
There are some mixers that are all too happy to recall a song as many times as they have to. Some mixers prefer the client to be as far away as possible. A mixer who likes to work in this manner will choose the tools and the situation to allow for this. Total and instant recall would be a must, and thus would be an advantage to this style of working.
Too often, positions are argued on audio internet boards based on a limited scope of reality. We tend to forget, it's a large world out there, and there are many ways of working. There are many of us that dislike how newer digital technologies are affecting music in general, let alone how it affects us personally.
Yes, I know. It's not the digital technologies that are responsible for abuse. It's the people who use them. It's the people that abuse editing and chromatic tuning; It's the people that choose to record 126 tracks and not make a decision. And I would point out that those people attract clients that appreciate these working methods. But let's also acknowledge that the effects of the "advantages" of digital working methods have had a seemingly negative effect on our pool of musicians. In my eyes, this has not been a benefit, but rather, a detriment, and on a very large scale.
It's great that we can now take an average singer and help them to compete in some ways with a fantastic one. I certainly understand why some people might view this as a personal advantage. And it's great that the price to get into the business of recording has fallen so dramatically in the past 25 years--yet another advantage, for some. But do you realize how many more average singers and average recordings we must endure because of these advantages?
Let's not even get INTO the advantages and disadvantages of easy file exchange!
My intention is not for this to become an argument, or even a discussion on the state of the music industry and the role of digital technologies in the whole debacle. I'm just trying to make the case that one man's advantage is another man's disadvantage. One man's benefit is another man's detriment. And we should be careful about proclaiming any given benefit or advantage as globally and uniformly true.
Eric Sarafin
