Auld Lang Syne - 2005 Recap

Another amazing year is about to pass, and my eyes and thoughts are looking ahead now to 2006 with all the excitement of Christmas morning.
2005 was a building year for me. Yes, with as far along in my career as i am, I am no where near as far as i will go. I spent alot of this year building my pop and rock mixing clientel. Urban mixing is typically what I'm known for, and I love mixing hip hop, but about half of my time is spent working on pop and rock, and I love those genre's too. Some pop artists I've gotten to mix for this year are Jeannie Ortega, Nick lachey, O.A.R., Jason Mraz, Samantha Jade, Jeannie B, JC Chasez, and I even mixed a Christmas song for the Cheetah Girls. 2006 will see much more pop mixing.
2005 has also been a production laden year. E-dro has been the main focus, and will wrap up soon in January. Small Town Sleeper has seen some great opportunities this year and will hopefully have a label release out in 2006. Its been a long road, with alot more pavement in front of us, but Small Town Sleeper has the talent to go all the way, keep an eye out.
Grammy's were a big part of 2005. At the 2005 Grammy Awards, i was nominated by name for 2 of the 5 "Album of the Year" nominations, (Usher & Kanye West), but the award went to Ray Charles. ugh. I did win Grammy's in 2 other categories, not a bad year at all. The 2006 nominations just came out and i caught 7 nominations this year. (4 with Kanye, 1 with Common, 2 with CeCe Winans). My role on the Kanye album was small, but i was on there. I'll take my nominations with a smile. CeCe Winans is probably the most rewarding. I've worked on 8 Grammy Nominated and winning albums out of my own studio, but this year was the first time a single that I mixed out of my own studio got a Grammy Nomination (CeCe Winans "Pray"). That feels like a landmark.
2005 saw a TON of equipment upgrades at the studio. I now have three rooms. 2 for programming and production, and my main room for mixing. I did a full HD Accel 4 upgrade this year, with more plugins than anyone should be allowed to own. All three systems run Logic and Pro Tools, and i invested heavily in sounds and virtual synth's this year as well. My most recent upgrade is the SPL Mix Dream, and analog summing box for digital mixing, and I've got a Lexicon 960 on long term loan, as well as my old EMT 140 plate. One of the most important "equipment" upgrades has been in staff. I have the best staff in the world, bar none.
2005 saw LOTS of travel. London 3 times, Italy twice, and the Cayman Islands, Los Angeles, and several other US destinations. Most was work related, but i did take some time to enjoy the year. 2006 looks like another big travel year as well, though I dont yet know where I'll take a vacation. Thinking about Estonia, Poland, and Russia, but who knows.
It was another good year for album releases. The Game, Kanye West, CeCe Winans, Common, Cassidy, Memphis Bleek, Rhymefest, and Cheetah Girls to name a few. I'm sure 2006 will be another rewarding year. Speaking of rewards, my alma mater, Berklee College of Music, chose me as their "Distinguished Alumni of the Year" this year, geeez, talk about an honor. So many talented people have attended that school, its a little unreal to be singled out.
I've now got to prepare for my New Years eve, and I'll continue to reflect on how lucky I am to have the career I do, how fortunate I am to have the team of people i have surrounding me. I have an incredible manager, great staff, a deeply talented pool of songwriters and beatmakers to collaborate with, and last but not least a wonderful client list spanning 6 continents.
In 2005, I mixed for clients from South Africa, Columbia, Germany, France, England, Austria, Wales, Switzerland, Canada, Japan, United Arab Emirates, Isreal, Cayman Islands, New Zealand, and Australia. I know i'm forgetting someone, sorry about that!! What a great year.

I'll be thoughfully considering what my new years resolutions are and i'll probably post some of them soon. I hope all of you across the world have a very Happy New Year, and I wish all of you a very successful and musical 2006!
-Ken Lewis

Christmas Party

Well, i wouldnt call it a party per se. I took the staff here at Protoolsmixing.com, and my staff at indietunes.com out for Christmas dinner tonight. Very good italian restaurant, great food great service, atmosphere, etc... We had a great time. I remember my early days in New York the Christmas parties were so over the top. I started in New York City on staff at Soundtrack Studios. Soundtrack used to throw THE NYC Christmas party, the hottest ticket in town. Every year it was packed full with people, Tito Puente and his band performed all night, it was the blowout party of the year. By the mid 90's they had alreadys caled that back to only a staff Christmas party, which, while still nice, just wasnt the same.

Going back even further to my college days at Berklee College of Music, I was interning at Soundtrack Studios in Boston (NYC's sister studio-see how internships launch careers) Soundtrack Boston had a pretty darn good Christmas party. Me and another intern were the bartenders for the night, and it wasa whole lot of "one beer for you, one beer for me". Funniest thing was i was serving drinks to my engineering instructor, Carl Beatty, and i had his final exam the next morning. I remember him kind of laughing that night knowing i'd be in pain the next day. I was. The next morning the exam paper was spinning, and whenever i'd hold it still the room would spin, but i must have done ok, cause i got an A in the class. those were the days, actually, these are the days. I'm so happy with where my career currently is, has been, and where its heading. No complaints here, just more big goals and dreams.

SSL used to throw insane Christmas parties, i dont remember how my first one ended, but what i do remember of it was off the hook. Seems big industry Christmas parties are becoming a thing of the past. Oh well. I would throw a big Christmas party for all of my clients in a heartbeat if they weren't strewn across 6 continents. Sorry everyone, your just too spread out, but i'm thinking of you. Anyway, i had fun tonight, now i'm back to work. Is anyone out there having insane Christmas parties still? At least i have some crazy Grammy parties to look forward to in February, I can't wait!!! Back to work.
-Ken Lewis

Mix Dream - ing

Its late late Sunday night, most people in America will begin waking up for work in an hour or two, I'm just winding down for the night. I tried to relax a bit this weekend, but you know, work always calls me like a fix for an addiction. I worked a bit this weekend on the Reggae Riddim that Ben Hud and I are collaborating on (Mostly Ben with me contributing), also put the final nails in the coffin for the Young Heff/ Joe Budden radio mix. They mastered it Friday night, but came back Saturday wanting a couple small changes so I did those.

The big news of the weekend is yet another studio upgrade. I just bought an SPL Mix Dream, which is an analog summing box for digital mixing systems. Without getting too technical, its kinda sorta like mixing a pro tools session through an analog console, but not really. However, it does (supposedly) bring an analog element back into digital mixing. I havent taken delivery of it yet, but when i do, I'll give ya'll the pro's and con's of the box from my point of view. The basic concept is that instead of having your computer do all the calculations necessary to sum several dozen separate 24 bit audio streams together, you instead do alot of your individual track processing with plugins, most of your effects with plugins, etc.... but then send mix stems out to your analog summing box (The SPL has 16 analog inputs so imagine maybe 6 mono inputs and 5 stereo inputs) coming from your digital outputs. allegedly this can add a touch more depth and dimension to your mix. I'll let you know. Then the Mix Dream will sum all of these stems together into an analog stereo mix buss which will then go thru a high quality stereo A/D convertor and be stored at 96K on my Masterlink and ready for mastering. Have i lost everyone yet? If your not a mix engineer, this is probably a bit hard to follow.

Anyway, I am a BIG fan of all digital mixing, but i figure since I'm going head to head with some of the biggest mixers in the world lately, anything that might give me an extra 1 or 2 percent is worth the astronomical investment in the long run. Oh, by the way, I'm also a BIG fan of analog mixing, as I've done countless mixes on SSL and NEVE consoles and many other types as well. Plus, with the Mix Dream, its a bit easier to use my outboard analog EQ's, compressors, my EMT 140 Plate, Lex 960, etc... I use all of this stuff now mixing digitally without the Mix Dream, its just gonna be a bit easier to interface once the Mix Dream is fully wired. I'm also most likely getting an Apogee DA16x for my digital outputs. I love the sound of the Digi 192, but again, if i can get an extra percent or two out of the Apogee, then hopefully it'll be worth the investment.

I'll be writing here about the Mix Dream and the Apogee from time to time I'm sure, and giving you the real scoop on whether its worth the price tag, and whats really cool and not cool about it. Stay tuned.
-Ken

Early Christmas

What a crazy week. I mixed a song for Young Heff featuring Joe Budden which should be hitting the radio waves by this weekend. Hot hot hot track. I did a sample recreation for Sam Scarfo on Def Jam, another blazing song, and I'm mixing 3 more songs for Swiss rockers "My Play". Tomorrow I'll be working on a carribean reggae riddim that i'm collaborating on with my favorite Cayman Islands producer Ben Hud. Allegedly, there will be an "A List" of Jamaican rappers each doing their own thing on this riddim. Cant wait to hear the finished songs.

So, as the blog title might indicate, Christmas came early for me this year. I got my big present tonight. Anyone who's read my blog for any length of time knows I love art, and my favorite living painter is a man named Paul Gantner. I vowed to own an original Gantner work before I died, and tonight i was given a Gantner painting for Christmas.

This is it.



This is a picture of it in the gallery it was purchased from, but dont let the small picture fool you, this thing is 3 feet wide by 4 feet tall, its REALLY big, (oil on canvas) and it looks so beautiful on my wall. It is hands down the best present anyone has ever given me. So Christmas came early for me this year. And now that i've figured out how to post pictures on my blog, i might do more of it. I have a great picture of Ben Hud in the Caymans holding a sting ray, anyone wanna see it? I bet Ben doesnt. I've also got some great Italy pictures. Maybe one will find its way here. Back to mixing for me, the night is not over just yet.
-Ken

2006 GRAMMY Award nominations - Seven for me!

Wow. Let me restate that. WOW. I just woke up and saw the 2006 Grammy nominations in the news. I really didn't have high expecations for the Grammy's this year. Well, maybe more accurately, i was trying not to get my hopes up TOO high. I figured Kanye would definitely catch something, probably several, but you never know which categories, and I didn't know if any of my other projects would get nods. Well, this year definitely topped all expectations. i caught SEVEN nominations, including (as soon as they get the credits fixed) two nominations by name for "Song of the Year" and "Album of the Year" with Kanye West.

I also shared in two more Kanye nominations, for "Best Rap Solo Performance" (Gold Digger), and Best Rap Album (Late Registration). Common's album caught a nomination for Best Rap Album, and CeCe Winans was recognized for her single "Pray" (i mixed "Pray") in the "Best Gospel Performance" category as well as for her album in the "Best Contemporary Soul Gospel Album" category.

So, I'm a part of seven nominations, coming off of eight nominations last year, which totals 20 career nominations and two career Grammy's. If anybody thinks this ever gets old, it doesn't for me, not for a moment, and i somehow doubt it ever will. These are the moments that i will remember when I'm lying on my death bed.

At the end of 2004, I was really wondering if my career had peaked, if it was all down hill from here. 2004 was such an over the top amazing year for me, and i think 2005 has just out done it. I'm gonna go pinch myself a few more times then get back to the business of making records. I'm working with E-dro today, another very rewarding project to be a part of.
-Ken Lewis

Sea and Stars

So i'm now on the Cayman Islands. Got in this afternoon and met with all the artists I'm workign with down here. I listened to some stuff, rested a bit and went to a great dinner. Coconut crusted grouper over Cuban sweet potatos. The food was delicious, then off to some drinks and finally a solitary stroll to the beach by myself to put my feet in the water and look up at the hundreds of stars showing in the sky.

I had the good fortune of seeing two shooting stars, sorry but I cant divulge the wishes, but if Coldplay calls me for a mix, I'll know at least one of them came true. I'm exhausted and tomorrow wil be a long day, starting with Stingray City in the morning. Jazz fest at night.

On another note, I'm wrapping up writing for an article for REMIX Magazine. I'll be posting all of my ideas and writings for it here, as i wrote far more than they needed. Stay tuned.
-Ken

Traveling Again and other adventures

Yep, I'm traveling again, only 4 days after returning from my vacation in Italy, I'm back on a plane to the Cayman Islands, for a working vacation. This weekend is Cayman Islands Jazz Fest and two artists I've been mixing for are performing, and an extremely talented artist/producer is also there, who's been a steady client of mine for many years. check out www.BenJHudson.com my absolute favorite song of his, one of my favorite songs period is called "Found A Girl". Anyway, it should be a good weekend of music, meetings and hopefully some sunshine. I also LOVE snorkling and the Caymans offer some of the best snorkling on Earth (i've been there before). I would love to scuba dive, but the remote risk of hearing damage negates any chance of me ever taking that risk, and speaking of pressure, I seem to be at the leading edge of catching a cold, and the decent into Houston, Texas to catch my connector i honestly thought my head might explode. I'm now in the air over the Carribean, and with some good cold drugs in my system, the flight is fine so far. I'm not looking forward to the decent though. thats the hard part.

Anyway, I'm also running on 45 minutes of sleep (more like rest), meaning, I havent been alseep in about 24 hours how, and i'm surprisingly wide awake. All this traveling gave me the rare opportunity to find time to read a book. I love reading books, (i just finished "The Rule of Four"...very good) but I rarely do because its such a time drain, and a good book has a hypnotic quality about it capable of distracting you from all else you know you should be doing (like getting some rest on the plane or mixing a record), so you can read "just one more chapter" which always turns into just four more chapters. So, i avoid books mostly. Kind of like video games. too addicting. I think i wear lack of sleep like some twisted badge of honor, like its an accomplishment or great feat of endurance instead of a feat of stupidity. Its certainly been like that many times throughout my career doing marathon sessions. The longest I've gone without even a cat nap was 67 hours STRAIGHT. I was mixing Public Enemy at the time and was so energized by the privledge of working with such a legendary group that the hours easily melted away. In fact my favorite mix on the album was the one I printed at the very end of the 67 hour stretch. If i tried to stay awake that long now I would end up in the hospital. 35 years old is MUCH different than 25. Especially when you've pushed your body to its limits over and over for years on end. I still quite often work insane hours, still often work 100+ hour weeks, but i'm trying to taper them off. Its hard. When i was working on The College Dropout, I barely slept for about ten days straight, i finally passed out from exhaustion, literally, when the final song was complete, and I have a Grammy to show for it. It was worth it. When it was over I think i slept for about 14 hours straight, dead to the world.

Well, this has been quite a rambling, fairly pointless entry, except i guess to show you young folk who want careers in this business how demanding the job actually is. It can and often does completely consume your whole life from the moment you wake up from too little sleep to the moment you pass out again from a very long work day. 3 days in the Caymans will do me wonders, even though i've just been on vacation. This should happen more often. More updates to come.
-Ken