Make a decision.

Not sure if the intro is too long? Cut it in half.

Wondering if the vocal seems to drag? Raise the tempo.

Does the song seem too long? Get rid of all the turn-arounds, and cut the bridge in half.

Does the song seem too monotonous? Change one of the choruses into a bridge, or add a bridge as an extra section to the song.

Every alternative you have tried for the ending does not seem to work? Leave it exactly as the band (or you) wrote it.

It does not matter what you do, just stop debating over what to do and make a decision. Because making a decision and creating a recording sounds way better than a song that is stuck at a dead end, and heard by no one.

//Jon
Website: jonstinson.com
Twitter: @stsn

Always have one.

A few scenarios for you:

1) You plan to record vocals using a specific chain of gear, but one piece in that chain is broken completely. It can’t be used until it gets fixed, and no one knows when that will be right now.

2) You’ve done three weeks worth of pre-production with a band, and booked some studio time at a rather pricey studio in town. One week before your scheduled recording date, a member of the band quits.

3) You’re juggling several projects at once. Today you’re recording some publishing demos for a songwriter at his studio, but tomorrow you’re planning to record vocals for a rock band at your own studio. Except you’re going to need to move some gear around for that to happen, and you’ve simply run out of time.

I’d speculate that a majority the time I end up having to come up with some form of a Plan B a few times (at least) on any given recording day.

Sometimes this could be a small Plan B: “Ok, let’s plan to show up to the studio at 10:30am instead of 10am.”

Sometimes this could be a big Plan B: “Well, we’re going to have to come up with our own funding for the project now, because the label just dropped the band.”

Always have a Plan B (and be agile enough to come up with a few on the spot). Because it’s not a matter of if you’re going to need it. It IS going to happen.

Also, be wise enough and brave enough to know when the best Plan B is to call the whole thing off entirely.

//Jon
Website: jonstinson.com
Twitter: @stsn

A very significant percentage of the songs I produce, I drop the click out (mute) within the first four bars of the recording. I’ve found that most of the time this pushes people into a frame of mind that gets them outside their own head – outside the calculations of the song – and into the heart and soul of it all. Granted, there are also a fair amount of recordings in which I don’t drop the click, but it is something I do quite regularly, and even when recording genres that you would think rely heavily on the click (like dance-rock).

Typically, there’s some resistance from the group about this. It’s an initial bump of fear in reaction to someone messing with their comfort zone. But with a little gentle persuasion I can win the confidence of the room. Most of the time, once the musicians try it, it’s a liberating feeling for the band to be cut loose from the click.

But then once we are free from the click, the song’s tempo begins to speed up and slow down constantly throughout the recording. The mere thought of that happening might make you cringe. Look through that initial jab of hesitation.

Tempo fluctuations are one of the most humanizing factors in a recording.

• Instead of forcing the tempo to a constant rate all the way through the song, the tempo will organically fluctuate to it’s natural place.
• Typically, you want to elevate the energy at the chorus. This will happen naturally as the musicians will speed up slightly as they reach the chorus.
• Each musician will listen to one another more closely, focusing on the performance of the song, and playing together as a unit.

It’s all kind of like getting in tune with the energy of the song, and feeling what will best serve that song (actually, it’s exactly like that).

Pull out some of those old records from the 60′s and 70′s you’ve got in your collection. I bet what you will notice (as I did) is that A) the songs speed up and slow down throughout the recording, and B) the songs don’t always end at the same tempo they began.

There’s a reason we keep going back to these records as reference points and as something to aspire to – those folks were on to something. One of the things they were onto was the humanizing factor of letting the tempo dictate itself.

Don’t be afraid of dropping the click, take advantage of the humanizing factors it creates.

//Jon
Twitter: @stsn

Doubling a vocal (singer sings a second pass in unison with themselves) is one of the easiest and most straightforward ways you can bring up the intensity to a section of a song in which you’re trying elevate the energy (typically the chorus). The end result is often very subtle to the listener. Most of the time, a doubled vocal is rarely an effect that music fans consciously are aware of-they simply feel the emotional shift of a raised energy level.

A little while back I came across some video interviews on YouTube of Butch Vig breaking down some of the production techniques used to record Nirvana’s Nevermind record.

In one of the videos Butch dissects the song “In Bloom”, and how they doubled Kurt Cobain’s lead vocal, as well as Dave Grohl’s harmony vocal in the choruses. Butch pulls up each part one at a time, so you can clearly hear how this technique filled out the arrangement in a powerful way.

I’m currently in the studio with the band Kink Ador. On Monday we singled out one of the songs we’re working on, and focused on recording some background vocal and additional guitar parts for it. One of the first things we did was double the lead vocal in all the choruses.

But in the middle of recording the vocal double, I began to think back to that Butch Vig interview, and I got inspired with another idea. I liked the approach Butch took of having a different voice sing and double the harmony vocals. So I basically copied the essence of that idea, but with a bit of a spin on it.

Kink Ador is a band made up of one female lead vocalist-Sharon. The rest of the band is guys. Nick, the lead guitar player, also sings background vocals. In the middle of tracking Sharon’s lead vocal double, I got the wild idea to go back and triple the lead vocal in the choruses-but with Nick singing the tripled part.

I was a bit hesitant with the idea, but we tried it and it turned out awesome. It added another layer of just the right amount of texture and intensity to Sharon’s vocal in the choruses. The end result is very subtle-you can’t tell that there’s a male vocal layered underneath. In the end, it simply imparts a sort of gruffness to Sharon’s lead vocal, which is perfect for adding energy to the choruses.

So next time you’re looking for ways to add intensity to certain sections of a song, it may be as simple as doubling the lead vocal, or even tripling the part with another member of the band.

Here’s the Butch Vig interview that inspired this idea in the first place:

//Jon
Twitter: @stsn

Throughout the years recording technology has undergone some astonishing developments. With these developments record makers have been afforded an array of inexpensive tools with which they can pretty much do anything they can imagine.

But this progression brought about a side effect-the danger of overproducing, getting bogged down in the record making process, and concentrating too hard on the technology itself and not the music.

Here’s Dave Stewart, co-founder of the Eurythmics, in an Artists House video sharing his take on the role of technology in music production, and how that has evolved over the decades.

Record the music. Don’t use the technology.