Small Town Sleeper signs management deal

So, its been a long time coming, but a great management company finally stepped to the plate and scooped up Small Town Sleeper. the band is now represented by Union Entertainment Group, who's management roster also includes Nickelback, Default, and Oleander to name a few. We are thrilled with the announcement! We'll see how the label situation plays out in the next few months. There has been a truly awesome team behind this band so far (small pat on my own back) and Union is a wonderful addition to that team. Now if we can secure a label with the power and desire to break them, you'll be hearing ALOT from this band.

For those of you who know me, you know i almost never use the word "Hit record" unless i REALLY believe i'm working on one, and usually i'm right. I've been developing Small Town Sleeper for a while now, and I am absolutely convinced we have at least two very big hits, and possibly more than that. (actually i believe we have three big hits but thats just being cocky :-)

Eventually the record labels will catch up and figure it out and then the rest of the world. By the way, if you'd like to check out what i think is one of those two big singles, listen to the "Small Town Sleeper" link on my main page under the "Listen" section. The song is called "Backseat". Listen to the song 2 times straight thru and give me an opinion. i can take it. And we have another song called "Candy" that we're only shopping, not releasing until we have a label deal, which is to my ears, and to about everybody that hears it, a big breakout single. Hopefully you'll hear it on the radio this year.
-Ken Lewis

The Blog Police!!!!

So about an hour ago, someone was actually both bored and pompous enough to post this as a comment on one of my posts.....

"Learn to type and learn to spell."
-Anonymous

I've officially been sited by the Blog Police, god help us all. By the way, you can read the comment for yourself at the bottom of my "question 2 Answered" blog. Let me just direct two short statements to the person who posted this comment.

First, if you read this blog, and thats what you come away feeling like saying, I'm obviously not writing for you. You must already know it all.

Second, grow a pair please. If you are going to criticize me, at least have the balls to leave your name so everyone knows who the idiot comment was left by. I'll never hide behind an anonymous post. If i have something stupid to say, then you bet i'm gonna sign my name to it and take full credit. Oh geeez, there i go misspelling "gonna"

Anyway, thought all but one of you might just get a little laugh at this. I sure did. 4:38am, time to get back to work.
signed......
-Ken Lewis

Not enough Hours in the Day

Just when i think i'm going to have a light week, HA!!! I dont think thats possible, I long ago came to the realization that the only time I will have a day off is when i force myself to have one. I'm not complaining, I love making records and i feel very fortunate to always have work, but right now its not just raining work, its a hail storm of work. I was kind of on top of things, then Def Jam dropped a whopper of a sample recreation in my lap today. this one is really challenging, but then i guess if it was easy they'd be calling someone else. So, a day or two behind on my schedule now, but i'll make that up over the weekend. I've got really fun production projects in the works with Pearl from Cali, Xtortya from Australia, and Seloria from the Cayman Islands, and always my prerequisite mixing schedule, lots of really good artists coming thru there too. My good friends the SupaFlya's (who hired me for the CeCe Winans mix that garnished me 2 Grammy nom's this year) are back with a few label mixes, and it looks like the Sullee record from Boston could jump off at any moment. When it rains it floods around here. Very good problmes to have. I love making records, and right now i have to get back to making this Def Jam record. Hope your all having a great night!
-Ken

Question 2 Answered

Keep those questions coming. I'll answer what i can. This question comes in anonymously....

"Ken,
in your experience, what is the best converters can use? i use apogees and love them but am always looking for the best especially for final mixes when i cant to half inch."


Well, I guess this all depends on budget and fanaticism. when your talking about high end convertors you are talking a major money investment for a minor improvement. I've posed this question to several mastering engineers in the past and done some of my own listening, though I've never really gotten too hung up on the issue.

In fact, one of my favorite mixes that I've ever done was printed ONLY to 16 bit DAT, thru an Apogee PSX 100. That mix was Usher's "Throwback" on the Confessions album. This mix might be my favorite radio mix I've ever done, and we printed at 16 bit!!! (this was Just Blaze's choice, not mine, and there was no half inch machine in the room.) I did print 24 bit stems back into pro tools, but the mastering was done off the 16 bit dat. So, although i fully endorse the use of high quality convertors and 24 bit mixdowns, you see i think people sometimes get too caught up in the quality of the convertor and not caught up enough in the quality of the mix itself.

Truth be told, the most important piece of equipment during any mix is the mix engineer, period. this one piece of "Gear" will have an astronomically greater impact on the outcome (good or bad) of your mix than all the rest of the gear combined. Choose wisely. :-)

After that, yes i personally think its important to have great gear to mix if you want to come out with a great mix, however, the best mix gear in untrained hands is usually pretty worthless.

Back to convertors. DAC gets very high marks from both Emily Lazar and Andy Vandette. I've never used DAC, my favorite that i've used is the Prism convertors. Having said that, even being a top pro mixer, i cant bring myself to spend that kind of money on 2 channels of A/D. Apogee has always been the industry standard, and while they aren't the best out there, i think they probably offer the best price for performance, and they sound great to my ears. I've never used Lucid, but people tell me they are good. For recording, I still use the Digidesign 192 interface, which i think sounds great. I'll be moving to 16 in/out of Apogee just as soon as i want to drop another huge chunk of dough on the never ending pursuit of gear, but for now, my 192's are rockin.

I really love mixing to half inch, but i dont own a half inch machine, and fewer studios i go to have them or maintain them well. And with the uncontrollable urge of labels to do recalls, especially with as easy as it is to recall with digital, you can really eat up alot of your budget on half inch tape.

One thing to possibly consider instead of upgrading from your already great sounding Apogee, is an analog summing box. I just bought the SPL Mix Dream. The summing box, in a nutshell, is an analog mix buss for a pro tools style mix, and is supposed to give you more depth and width and clarity in your mixes. I have not begun using my box yet, I'll keep you posted on whether i think it makes a difference.

Now, I'm not advocating that we go technologically backwards, however, i do have to point out one thing that the race for sonic perfection has seemingly forgotten. the end user will most likely be listening to your mix as a degraded quality MP3. I'm not saying we dumb down the sonic quality of mixing due to the dumbing down of the end user format, however, i think we need to stay focused on whats most important, great feeling mixes. a super high quality A/D isnt, in my opinion, going to change the perception of the end user for 99 percent of listeners, and these things cost big bucks. in a perfect world, i would own all the best gear, in the real world, i own far more gear than any one person should probably be allowed to, but there will always be something new to buy. choose wisely where you spend your money and make sure your spending on what will most enhance the musicality and creativity of your mixing (like spending money to hire a great mix engineer, there i said it :-)
goodnight

-Ken Lewis

The New World Sucks

Literally. I went to the movies tonight to see "The New World" starring Collin Farrell. What a big steaming pile of..... OK, the cinematography was amazing, but it was a 2 and a half hour movie, and less than an hour and a half in, i thought it had been three hours. The slowest moving and most pointless big budget movie of all time. I walked out after an hour and a half. I'm usually very easily entertained, and it takes ALOT for me to walk out of a movie, but this one was just that bad. So much for a saturday night movie. I came back and mixed, and enjoyed that way better than the movie. Anybody seen anything really good lately?
-Ken

indieTunes.com has 1,059 Artists and growing!

OK, I passed a small milestone and didn't even realize it until tonight. About 1 year ago, a started a website called indieTunes.com which i envisioned as being the best place on the internet for independent artists to sell and stream their downloadable music on a secure platform, and the best part of it all is, that my business model (as crazy as it may be) pays the artist 100% of the profits from every song sold. Lets see ya beat that!!! The only thing that gets deducted from the sale are visa/MasterCard/ and paypal fees (which dont go to indietunes anyway) and the rest gets paid to the artist. The only thing indieTunes.com charges is a $9.99 a month membership fee for a Premium membership which allows you to sell your downloadable music and stream your music videos. Basic memberships are FREE, and you can stream your music and alot of other stuff with a Basic. So if you can sell one album a month, you can virtually break even, and everything after that is pure profit. Not bad huh?

OK, for anyone who thinks I'm getting rich off the backs of indie artists, think again. building this site has practically put me in the poor house and I am no where near break-even point on monthly expenses let alone my full investment. However, I have confidence that someday this will be one of the cornerstone sites for independent artists on the internet, and I will continue to build and upgrade and promote the site to ensure its success. So far in the first year, with very little promotion, we've gotten 1,059 artists on the site to date. I'm ramping up to do national PR (anybody know an insanely talented web PR person?) and I'll be much happier when the site has 10,000 artists, which I'd like to say is my goal for this time next year.

So hey, spread the word. indieTunes.com is a great site, and we're finishing up a very substantial upgrade right now that will add to each artists page (yes every artist gets their own page), the upgrade will add a photo gallery, artist blog, and a reviews section to every page. So, do me a favor, go spend some time surfing indietunes, get a feel for it, give me some feedback, positive or negative (i'm a big boy i can take it), and spread the word. Me and the indieTunes staff are working very hard every day to make this a successful site!!
-Ken Lewis

Pushing Me Away

WOW! I just finished production and mixing on a Small Town Sleeper song called "Pushing Me Away". Its not a single, but i think its one of those songs that when fans hear it they are going to lose their minds. Totally rockin with tons of energy and angst. Really shows a side of the band that probably not a ton of people know exist unless you've seen em play live at a heavier show.
Anyway, we're gearing up to release yet another Small Town Sleeper EP next week, but this one will only be available in one place, and only as MP3 downloads, no CD's. And the only place anybody will be able to even listen to any of the new songs is at indieTunes.com

Rock on Small Town Sleeper!!!
-Ken Lewis

PS. Keep those questions coming.

Question 1 answered

Keep the questions coming, I'll answer as many as i can - Ken

This question comes from Dimitar from Bulgaria.....

"How can you work on, or mix a song, when you don't like it or you see that this song has no potential (polite for a bad musicianship in a particular peace)"

Thanks Dimitar, thats a very easy one for me to answer as I've had to answer this question to myself hundreds of times. I'll speak only from my personal beliefs and not try to preach toooo much.

The first issue is whether this is a professional gig (in other words are you being hired to do a job), or is this a personal session. If your working on a song just to help out a friend, or in school or in some circumstance other than a professional environment. If the song you are working on falls into this more personal category, then i think you need to ask yourself if your time is better spent doing other things, working on other songs, or working on the song at hand. Only you have the answer to that question.

However, speaking as a professional who is hired to work on a different song every day, obviously some songs are better than others, some musicians are better than others, and everybody is in a different stage of their development. For instance, i helped Just Blaze mix a few of his beats when he was just getting started, and also showed him alot of engineering techniques. He was an intern at the studio I was doing a project out of, and had no industry placements and no credits yet. I just helped him out because he always helped me on my sessions. I could have easily said to myself "I'm not wasting my time helping some intern mix some beats that i dont care about", but i helped him because i love to make music, and he had always helped me. Little did i know that he would go on to become "THE" Just Blaze and hire me to do artists like Usher, Lenny Kravitz, and the Beastie Boys. I took him seriously when he was learning and developing his craft, and that good karma came back to reward me in ways i could have never forseen.

But as a professional hired to sometimes produce, sometimes mix, sometimes record or perform, quite often on songs i dont initially think are very good, I realize that I am not being hired to dislike their music. I am being hired to help that person make the most amazing representation of that song that can be made, and they are paying me to do it. I dont get the luxury of doing a bad job because i have a bad first impression of the music. Do you know how many long term clients I've earned because i took a song that they had a vision for but not the skills to turn it into a great song, and I took it under my wing and worked it until it sounded like what they envisioned. The "bad" songs are often the most fun for me to mix because it really tests my skills both technically and creatively. Its much easier to make a great song sound good than a not so great song, but as a professional, I love to constantly challenge myself to get better, improve, find new techniques, new ideas. How else really am i going to get better? Sure i get better every time i mix a great song too, they certainly pose their own set of challenges.

Lets face it, nobody loves their job every day. But that doesnt mean that you do a bad job on the days your not inspired. The truly great people in this business (and i hope to be one someday) find inspiration not from what they are given, but inspiration from within, to always give 100% of their ability, to always strive to do the best work they can do regardless of the circumstance, because at the end of the day, i want to look in the mirror and know I've done my best work. I strive to treat every client equally from Mariah Carey to Kanye West to the smallest unsigned artist.

One last note. Keep in mind that keeping your musical skills sharp is crucial. If i only bring out my "A Game" for my big clients, then maybe my A Game wont be as razor sharp as if i bring my A Game to work with me every single day. Every day is a job but every day is also practice and preparation so that you are ready when the career changing opportunities present themselves. And again, you never know when you'll stumble upon that big opportunity. ALOT of the biggest selling records I've ever worked on, i had no idea they were going to be big when i was actually doing the work. Maybe the fact that i cared enough to do my best work on those records helped make a difference in how well those records were recieved in the marketplace. Something to think about.
Next Question?
-Ken Lewis

MySpace

OK, I FINALLY joined myspace. I guess its about time, i held out as long as i could. Anyway, my url is:

www.myspace.com/protoolsmixing

visit me, add me as a friend, do whatever your supposed to do on myspace, and of course, tell all your friends about protoolsmixing.com!
Thanks
-Ken

Any Questions?

Well, I can't think of a damn thing to blog about tonight, so i figured I would open the floor to discussion. Does anyone have any audio, studio, recording, mixing, production, musician, etc.... questions they want to ask me? I'll answer what i can.

One word of note, I get alot of email questions asking me about my opinions on budget gear, low cost recording gear, etc... Please don't ask me these questions. I simply don't use that stuff, so i am not in a position to answer questions about that kind of gear. this is my profession and I invest heavily in my profession which means the quality of gear i use stays very high. I do however have some mid level gear that i think is fantastic. It definitely doesn't have to cost a fortune to sound amazing, but it often helps.

Having said that, I do get recordings in from all over the world with people who have used all kinds of different gear, and I have been pleasantly surprised many times at how good low budget gear can sound in the right hands.

Also, keep it to one question please, and keep the questions to the point. I'll get to as many as i can.
-Ken

What a crazy day

I have just had the craziest day. Still going actually, as I'm in mid mix and will resume mixing after this post. Mixing is the only slightly sane thing thats happened today really. Have you ever had one of those days where it seems like all the drama comes to a head from several different directions independent of each other, all at once. Welcome to my day. It wasn't necessarily a bad day, just hectic. I think tomorrow will be better.

I did get an AWESOME song in to mix today from Adam Anders (www.andersmusic.com), Adam is an amazing producer and songwriter, and he hired me to mix the CeCe Winans single "Pray" for him this year. "Pray" got a Grammy nomination for "Best Gospel Single", and CeCe's album got a Grammy nom for Best Gospel Album. Adam and his production partner, Ras, were the main producers on the song, but unfortunately, the record label shafted them and left their names completely off the record. How does this happen you ask? I wish i knew, but i mixed the song, and they produced it, and it garnished two Grammy nominations. Congrats to Adam and Ras, they are two super talented cats. I cant wait to mix the song from them i got today.

E-dro's project is on hold indefinitely. This business never ceases to amaze me. Its truly an amazing album, and its almost finished, and about everyone who hears it, hip hop fan or not, is floored. And the album is on hold. I hope one day to finish it, but nothing surprises me anymore. In the course of 2 years, I personally witnessed Atlantic Records shelf 4 different albums from 4 different artists after spending over a million dollars each on all four projects. Figure that one out? I gotta tell you, it really sucks to work for months on a record only to see it never come out, especially knowing its a great record and could be big. Its happened to me many times over the course of fifteen years. Yeah, i got paid for my work, but i had to endure watching an artists budding career end, as well as watching months of my life and months of my own career development evaporate. Credits are everything tin this business and its a shame how nonchalantly alot of record company people treat them. Just ask Adam Anders. or me. Enough negative stuff. It really wasn't a bad day, just a dramatic one.

I finally finished mixes for a longstanding UK client named Pete Deveraux. I dont know what his artist name will be, but i LOVE the songs. Definitely UK stuff, not made for America, but tailor made to blow up in the UK, i wish him all the luck as he masters today. I'm also ramping up for some production with Australian rockers Xtortya. Yeah, great stuff from down under. The "My Play" album should be out soon (Indie label rockers from Switzerland). Sullee, a hip hop artist from boston could turn into a big project for me this year. I mixed a radio single for him just before Christmas featuring Joe Budden, and his album could be keeping me busy for some time to come. Really talented artist with a bright future. I've got plenty of other stuff coming up, but always looking for great projects to take on. Got one?

Welp, back to my mix, my ears are once again fresh and my mind is re-focused.
-Ken Lewis

Goals - New Years Resolutions

Goals and 2006 Resolutions

I'd rather not call them New Years resolutions, i feel like it implies a "get out of your resolution free card". In no particular order, here are some, not all of my resolutions and goals for 2006

- Find a way to top 2004 and 2005 (quite possibly my loftiest goal of all)

- keep building my other company indieTunes.com into a juggernaut of an independent music site

- Produce and write music alot more this year. I do quite a bit of it already, but i have many good things on the horizon that could keep me busy producing and writing for alot of 2006 if i stay focused on it.

- do more print writing for Scratch Magazine and Remix Magazine, and whatever other publications might come along that I feel i can contribute my knowledge and experience to. I've really enjoyed writing for both publications in 2005 (the Remix article i contributed to is coming out soon). I might get the opportunity to write for EQ magazine as well. I hope so. Also, some more internet writing for sites like BeatTalk.com

- Would somebody fly me to Japan to mix a record already!!!!! I'm dying to go there but hoping to find a nice Japanese client to bring me over. Any takers?

- Definitely building my pop/rock credentials is high on the list. Most people see my credits and immediately think "Oh, he's an urban music guy", and I am, but i am so much more. About half my workload is pop and rock. In fact, true story, Kanye West started hiring me to do music for him because he needed someone who could understand and play rock music for a production project of his. Since then, I've done every kind of music under the sun for Kanye, but it started with rock. True story. Also, I've worked with plenty of REALLY big rock names, they are all in the credits, artists and producers as well. You indie rockers out there. I want to mix your record.

- Man do i have some big ideas brewing. I've been pulling them into shape for quite some time now, but 2006 might be the year when i go full guns with a few big new ideas.

- Small Town Sleeper (the band i produce from Ohio) has got some really big things brewing that could really jump off this year. I have worked with this band for a long time and I believe deeply that they are going to be an enormously successful band. You just wait and see. More announcements as things solidify.

- build my team. I have a stellar team of people around me. And as my career progresses I always try to ensure that their careers follow suit. Big things await.

Anyway. I have a few more goals for 2006, but I won't bore you with them just yet. Trust me, if and when they are achieved, you'll know. I'm feeling so good about this year.

-Ken Lewis

Grammy New Year

Happy New Year everybody. I've been very lax on posting recently, but i'm back on the grind. Been traveling alot which often means no internet hook up, or no time to type. Anyway, for those who care, check out this link, and you can see my name in lights under the Grammy nominations for Record of the Year and Album of the Year ("Gold Digger" and "Late Registration" respectively).

http://grammy.com/awards/grammy/48Awards.aspx

Pretty cool huh? I'm also a part of 5 more nominations this year, however, engineers and producers only get nominated by name for those two categories. I cannot wait to get to LA again this year! I even bought a really slick new pair of shoes today that just might be on my feet that night. I usually dont get worked up over shoes, but then I usually dont go to Grammy awards as a nominee. 2005 was my first trip ever to attend the awards. I've been a part of many nominations before, but i always said "I'm not going to the Grammy's until i'm nominated by name". Quite frankly i really thought that meant i was probably never gonna go, but if your going to dream, dream REALLY BIG. I do, and sometimes dreams come true.

So, its the new year. 2006. Is anybody excited? I am absolutely electrified this year with excitement. I really feel like 2006 is going to be a HUGE year in my career and I'm a very firm believer that if you believe in something powerfully enough, AND you are willing to put the time and energy into working toward it, it can and usually will happen. I BELIEVE IN 2006!!!! Watch out.

I was planning to sit down and make a bunch of New Year's resolutions. I'm also a big believer in setting goals, both short term and long term goals, then writing them down, and visualizing how and when I will accomplish those goals. I choose only goals i REALLY want to work hard for, that I'm passionate about. I have some personal goals in mind this year, and some professional goals too. I think i'll list a few in another post. This one is getting a bit long, and I want to post them where i can easily go back and find them again thoughout the year, reflect again on what it will take to get me there, and then refocus. there you have it.

I wish all of you temendous success in 2006. Its gonna be a great year.
-Ken Lewis