When the pay is bananas they treat you like monkeys

[pucho812]

this has been more common these days in studio land, band with outside engineer doing the project for free. Band begging for less then rate on books because it’s self funded. Not sure why or how but it’s been getting more and more common.
I wouldn’t care about their arrangements so much except that those deals and those engineers tend to come in with attitude not fit for a studio, berating the staff,being ridiculous and over all making a stink about everything while at the same time not understanding things. They treat the place like their little sex toys, abuse it, fuck it and then leave it in shambles.

my only guess is it’s middleman syndrom. When working with guys at the top, they are usually the nicest. The same goes for guys at the bottom. The top guys are not worried about you, they know the deal. The bottom guys want all the help they can get so they charm it up so they can get all the help. But it’s the guys in the middle, the ones afraid of losing their gig, even if they are making zero are the ones who act like jerks. Anyone can put them out of a job while at the same time think they know it all so they act like jackasses thinking that’s how it should be. It’s not but being afraid of losing a gig can make people do strange things.

 

[ruffrecords]

I have always thought there is no shortage of idiots in the world (Covid has provided ample proof of that) but now it seems there is no shortage of assholes either. Is this an "arty" thing?

What irks me personally is that most people sitting behind a mixer are not "engineers" any more than the guys who empty the trash are "refuse engineers".

Cheers

Ian

 

[crazydoc]

Here's a guy I was in the Peace Corps with in Africa (1960's), returning home with a buddy he brought back with him and had a flat. I think bananas were fine.
Oh, and I know it's a chimp, not a monkey - probably smarter than many humans whose posts appear on social media.

 

[pucho812]

I have always thought there is no shortage of idiots in the world (Covid has provided ample proof of that) but now it seems there is no shortage of assholes either. Is this an "arty" thing?

What irks me personally is that most people sitting behind a mixer are not "engineers" any more than the guys who empty the trash are "refuse engineers".

Cheers

Ian

In the interest of their art, their engineer working for free managed to have some 20 mics on a drum kit no larger then what ringo would use and managed to get sounds so useable that they are replacing them with samples. Upwards of 4 mics on a kick drum alone. While we all hear differently no one could hear anything good in his setup. Again I wouldn’t care as the studio chief except in placing those 4 kick mics, our staff moved an over head mic by a hair and in doing got screamed at so badly I would not have been mad or reprimanded staff if they punched him.
Oh and did I mention that at every conversation, he made it a point to tell us he is a good engineer.

I don’t judge but the moment you berate staff, you are now in my crosshairs.

 

[Tubetec]

I heard a story of someone who tried to keep a baby chimp in a New York apartment, all fine and dandy until it reached puberty and figured out how to masturbate in front of guests , it would also pick poop from its rear end and flick balls of it at people it didnt like , eventually it started to become seriously aggressive and had to go to the safari park .

There are a lot of sound engineers who seem to use the same formulaic approach automatically , but even an engineer with a ropey sound tecnique that has innate people skills will get through , then you get jumped up coked up fuckwits who couldnt wire a mains plug and think the sun shines out of their arseholes .
I think competition factor in the bigger recording metropolicis' like London NY LA tends to force feed the egotistical middle ground nowhere men , I concur though the guys on the first step of the ladder are hungry enough to make the effort , they guys up towards the top generally know what their doing , its the 'mid range' Smithy the experts you have to watch out for .

I remember some of the nicest people I worked with along the way , producer/engineers , encouragement was the methodology they used to get the best out of people , then even the simple jobs like bringing in the teas and coffees were done with enthusiasm . I think what were talking about here isnt by any means unique to studios or sound work , it helps make any kind of work less of a chore .

 

[groselicain]

Oh and did I mention that at every conversation, he made it a point to tell us he is a good engineer.

Show me, don't tell me. If someone makes a point of telling me something like that, I typically doubt them from the start. Sort of when people preface a statement with "I'm not even going to lie."

This is all speculation on my part, but I'd guess these folks you're dealing with are my age or younger. I wish it could be chalked up to a pandemic, or scarcity of cash... but we both know it's a symptom of a much larger, older problem.

And one other thing while I'm speculating—I'd love to know if you think this engineer has been in a studio before. There are obviously exceptions, but it seems that the worst offenders have either never been in a studio and have based their act on what they assume it's like or are wash-ups that haven't worked in a long time but still think they have the cache to behave badly.

 

[pucho812]

Show me, don't tell me. If someone makes a point of telling me something like that, I typically doubt them from the start. Sort of when people preface a statement with "I'm not even going to lie."

This is all speculation on my part, but I'd guess these folks you're dealing with are my age or younger. I wish it could be chalked up to a pandemic, or scarcity of cash... but we both know it's a symptom of a much larger, older problem.

And one other thing while I'm speculating—I'd love to know if you think this engineer has been in a studio before. There are obviously exceptions, but it seems that the worst offenders have either never been in a studio and have based their act on what they assume it's like or are wash-ups that haven't worked in a long time but still think they have the cache to behave badly.

His verbal resume included being an assistant for the last 7 years at another studio in town, a much larger one. I would like to think in 7 years he learned not get into the artists headspace and try and sabotage things. The Onus is on the artist who was not clear when booking. He said we have a pro tools guy, that usually means we a guy running pro tools and that the studio has an engineer.

 

[groselicain]

His verbal resume included being an assistant for the last 7 years at another studio in town, a much larger one. I would like to think in 7 years he learned not get into the artists headspace and try and sabotage things. The Onus is on the artist who was not clear when booking. He said we have a pro tools guy, that usually means we a guy running pro tools and that the studio has an engineer.

Woof. I would totally agree that anyone who lasted that long as an assistant—not a runner, but an actual assistant, which seems to be lost on a lot of guys my age—had been well schooled on how quickly you can ruin the mood by pitching a fit. I keep re-reading what you said about a mic getting moved and it sounds so incredibly amateur that I have the hardest time believing seven years were spent in any one room. I can't imagine anyone that's getting consistent work would have acted that way to make an impression on an assistant, let alone have kept an assistant around who had that kind of demeanor.

You've done this way longer than me, so I'm sure you've seen this before—even if an assistant is clueless, he's much more likely to be kept around if he's got a good attitude and will do the work. I supplemented my income a couple years working for PBS and the A2 I always got stuck with would make all the camera operators uncomfortable by flipping out if they ran a cable anywhere near our audio lines—as if we couldn't just come back and move things a minute later. Everything you're saying reminds me of that kid.

And you're right on the money about "a Pro Tools guy." If that's what the artist thinks is worth mentioning, someone doesn't have a clue about what goes on in a studio.

 

[pucho812]

Well being around the block longer, just means I learned from my mistakes.
number 1 and I can't stress this enough, is we are a service industry. It does a disservice to blow the vibe of a session for any reason. maybe it was the thought of out of chaos and drama comes beautiful art? I don't know. I also don't believe it to be an age related issue, I have seen young kids behave great, it's a person to person thing and some get it some don't.

 

[Brian Roth]

Kinda reminds me of suppositions I've made while living here in "flyover county" for decades.....

The guy with the huge, loud pickup truck has a small d!ck! LOL!

Bri

 

[groselicain]

Well being around the block longer, just means I learned from my mistakes.
number 1 and I can't stress this enough, is we are a service industry. It does a disservice to blow the vibe of a session for any reason. maybe it was the thought of out of chaos and drama comes beautiful art? I don't know. I also don't believe it to be an age related issue, I have seen young kids behave great, it's a person to person thing and some get it some don't.

You're not wrong at all. I have this knee-jerk reaction to guys around or below my age—34—who embody the entitled attitude that I've come up witnessing that I probably need to get over. You're completely right about it being a service industry, though. 100%.

Kinda reminds me of suppositions I've made while living here in "flyover county" for decades.....

The guy with the huge, loud pickup truck has a small d!ck! LOL!

Bri

Oh Brian... you ain't just whistlin' Dixie. I don't know if Salina KS and Celina TN are sister-cities, but you and me have a few suppositions in common.

 

[Gold]

For the independent audio equipment operator, lesson number one should be don't work for free. It's an invitation to be taken advantage of. There are of course exceptions but I sure wouldn't tell anyone who doesn't need to know that I'm working for free. Poop rolls downhill and since the studio is getting paid they have the best chance of not throwing the poop back. I worked at the Buffalo Zoo for a couple of summers and I know Chimps like to throw poop at people. I don't like poop thrown at me.

 

[pucho812]

For the independent audio equipment operator, lesson number one should be don't work for free. It's an invitation to be taken advantage of. There are of course exceptions but I sure wouldn't tell anyone who doesn't need to know that I'm working for free. Poop rolls downhill and since the studio is getting paid they have the best chance of not throwing the poop back. I worked at the Buffalo Zoo for a couple of summers and I know Chimps like to throw poop at people. I don't like poop thrown at me.

Me either.