Pass on the Music

Tool Thursday w/ Jed Hackett.

Just about every time I contact a prospective client I can sense the fear and hesitation in their voice about editing and tuning. It is usually an up hill battle just to get that first job with them. To tell you the truth I can’t blame them. The underlying problem is a lack of trust in editors, brought about by years of inexperienced, unmusical work. I have had new clients assume that they will have to sit with me while I tune a vocal to tell me when things are sharp or flat based on their past experiences. Others are afraid that if they have a song “tightened” it will come back stiff as a board, with all traces of musicality removed from the performance. A stigma has developed with editing and it is a real shame.
How have we gotten to this point? I think we got here because most engineers would rather have their fingernails pulled out one by one with a pair of pliers, a la Syriana, than sit and tune a vocal or tweak a track. Thus the birth of the “Pro Tools Engineer”. Young engineers figured out that a great way to escape assisting was to learn Pro Tools. The older, more experienced engineers gladly handed off the mind numbing Pro Tools work to the new guys. The problem is that until engineers gain enough musical experience, they tend to edit with their eyes, not their ears.
Now let me stop here and say that I was an inexperienced new guy at one point as well. So don’t be sending me any hate mail because you think I’m looking down my nose at the new guys. What I am trying to say is that even though editing may seem simple and mindless, it takes time and experience for an engineer to develop the musicality needed not to mess things up.
I was really fortunate to work for many years with a great producer/ engineer. When I started editing for him I didn’t know my head from a whole in the ground. I would edit a bass part, send it to him, and he would send it right back and say “ It’s a little too laid back, it needs to stay aggressive. I want it to feel like a band”...or I would tighten a drum kit and he would point out parts that seemed stiff or could push or pull more. And the rules changed as we jumped from genre to genre.
The point is that if we are going to sub out editing work to newer engineers we need to oversee things and guide them in the more musical fine points of editing, just as someone did for me. It took years before I got to the point that I was editing with my ears instead of my eyes. Let’s not forget to pass on the musical knowledge needed to be a great editor as we pass on the workload.

Until next time, take care.

Jed