Had another productive night at redzone with the guys working on Justin Beiber, 14 year old R&B prodigy who just signed on With La Reid and Ush. Hes really amazing, probably the most talented person Ive ever worked with. Hes 14 but carries himself like a star. The record we did tonight is crazy, we had a good time recording and just chilling.
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So another night of work, back at it with AJ now that hitland is once again consumed by water, were up at Triangle studios working on another project. We are gonna be here for the next 3 days working on demo's and maybe cutting with said artist on Sat. Here's some pics of the nights work. Enjoy.
Shifted gears and slid over to Doppler today. Worked with another one of my clients today on his artist, Sweet Rush
....well this is half of Sweet Rush. Iman and her dog Chuck. Siham was there too, but she was too cool for school to be on Gridlock, maybe next time. Doppler is probably one of the only studio that hasn't bumped up the main rig to an intel based mac, so I wasn't able to rock off my boot drive (which is only intel compatible...I may set up a PPC one, but this is LITERALLY the only studio in town without intel, so it kind of pointless)....so unfortuanatley, no killface appearance today. Boo....just me....
Double Boo. As usual, I brought my gear for my mic chain...because I love the way it sounds paired with my mic, and in addition to that, it's nice to be comfortable using your piece, knowing exactly what settings work with whatever vocal performance, and just being familiar in general....also to have the gloomy bears on the defense tip, in case someone trys to fuck with your settings. Boosh!
We got it going good today, and finished up a joint.....hope they like it....and more to come.....
Okay...well, maybe it isn't that, but this is a shot of the writing room my client and I sometimes work when we aren't in Silent or PWR...
This is a small PT based rig that I put togther so we could do some demo song ideas. Kinda hard to tell from the garbage pic, but the studio is equipped with my mic, mic pre, compressor, converters, candle, cup of coffee, but most important is visible....Killface.
LOL at goes to the nearest Sonoco. Funny as hell. Another night at PWR.
Yessir...the work up here continues...as it's been going well writing and getting some ideas together. I'm still slipping on getting my camera game up to par, so please forgive me for now....
This was our set up when writing with Eric Hudson. Dude is crazy talented, and is fun to record, because he doesn't sequence anything, he plays it all live...the closest thing you're going to get to rocking with a live band these days! He doesn't use any software synths (which I tried to help him get up on, cuz he travels a lot and his rental bill is SUBSTANTIAL), but uses the Fantom for a lot of horns, and the motif for a lot of stings and stuff. It was a good hang, and got some cool ideas put down. 
I'm not going off on a rant here, but to all the folks out there recording...PLEASE keep those sessions well organized and labeled. There is nothing worse than working on a session somebody else recorded and see the tracks labels audio 1-97. Come on man....we are professionals here, this is our science. Scientist label shit. End of story.
Stopped by the office the other day for a nice biz transaction with Ben Allen...results to be posted shortly during my gear extravaganza post...and saw Monica and Brad and the Milk Money mascots Juno and Coltrane!
Well....that's what's been up for a few days....I'm working up that nice gear post....but will probably hit up some ridiculous topic like favorite studio foods first to balance out my nerdom. Hollertreezaleeezy 9000.
Mixing classics like the ones Tony's done in his career should be of topic whenever he does a mix related interview. Fantasy by Mariah Carey? come on that mix is incredible. Here in this part 2 of 4 series as he speaks on his influences and mixing back in the day.
Another night at Patchwerk, but what makes this night different is the fact I actually got a picture with me, Les and Mike in it. And it only took 4 years and some change but hey, it happened lol. Ima look back at this pic and wonder what the hell we were actually doing but as always pretty much nothing. Me and les are a lil out of focus but still cool, peep my hoodie...fresh
Gotta say shout out to Leslie for letting me get a few days in 9K....Always happy to work over there (and I dropped the Master Trim on the 2 Bus so my client can't beat up on the mains quite so much!). We've just been steady in here writing songs for various heads the past few days....it's been going really well. I'm actually very happy with how well my boot drive has been performing. Handy to have my version of ProTools up and roaring just like the home rig.
Snotty was also getting it in over in 995 working on some hot beats for the streets....making a hot hook too, shit should be my ringtone....here's me trying to jump in the chair so I can get some credit when it becomes a #1 smash world wide...
Working lots of places is one of my favorite things about being an engineer. I don't wanna get to lame sounding with it, but I think different studios have different vibes and different energy and can make creativity come in different forms. For a writer it could be new melodies, for a producer a new keyboard sound, and for engineers maybe different tracking or mix ideas. With all of that said, I like to have a few things that are always the same. (IE my boot drive and rack gear). I'll do another post soon about my choice outboard...but I also meant like having a vibe set up. Something I like doing is having my little collection of stuff around at different studios....BEHOLD!
I'm always bringing stuff like this around and setting it up....Not really for anybody other than me. Some clients kinda like them...some are freaked out by them....but its just my thing I like doing when I'm working. Well, that's about it for now...more to come soon. Shout out to Obama, like him, i'm trying to get mine in the '09
Being back in The ATL is great. Kinda missed being around and seeing my friends and all. But Im back lounging and what not till we get back on it later this week, hopefully here in Atlanta.
I get asked all the time whats my GO TO vocal chain. Well as of late Ive had the urge to kinda change it up so to speak, I picture myself as a minimalist, if thats even a word. I try not to impede or impact the source signal too much, if I dont have to. I love the way things sound natural, without any coloring, unless it needs it. Ive worked for the same person for almost 2 years now. I know his voice pretty well. I can tell when he has had the right amount of rest, or when he hasnt slept at all. I can hear when hes coming down with a cold or if his voice has been worked too hard with rehearsals and late sessions. Ive stopped him before to let give him a break because hes not sounding his absolute best, thats what Im there for ya know? He has such an awesome tone he doesnt really need much help in that department. What i use i consider a very clean and transparent Mic Pre and Compressor.
Alllllright! Legit Engineering post! (but only cuz J was trying to one up me with the Tony post....shout outs to Tony to, I know he's a regular to the blog). Got it in the other day up at Patchwerk 9000 working on some song ideas for a few peeps out there....Here's some low rent pics (you guys are just gonna have to get your deal with it on, J dropped a gem on a fly camera to make his post crispy cream, I dropped a jem on software that i'm using in the super lowfi iphone pic...)
...a bit hard to see in the pic, but I"m actually running ProTools 8 as I was talking about in my previous post. Most all studios (at least in ATL right now) aren't on 8, but i've gotten used to it, and have all my plugins are presets save on my home computer....so what I did was actually CLONE my internal hard drive from my rig, and carry that cloned drive to studios and boot off that. So in essenece, i'm only using their work rig for processing....all the software (OSX 10.5.6, ProTools 8, ALL MY PLUGINS, Logic, my personal itunes, etc...) is all off on my boot drive. So that's pretty cool...and handy.
Here's another in action:
this one you can also see something new i'm trying out...I'm having all the artists we work with sign my gear rack...only a few on there now...when it gets respectable I'll hit a proper pic then....
Alright team....that's about it for now...but I'll holler back with more soon......let's goooooooooo!
Finding the focus when it comes to mixing is something im sure every engineer struggles with from time to time. Here Mr. Maserati talks about what is or will peak his interest during mixing and what he thinks will be the most compelling part of a track hes mixing. Great series on youtube that I will post the entire 4 series episode in the next few days. Heres part 1, enjoy!
Aight...another lenient post about engineering...but I was hanging out with engineers all night!! My homie J got back in town, so tonight we had to kick it up at 6 feet under and get our scrimps on. After that is the obligatory return to patchwerk to hang out and watch a game of madden between Leslie and Snotty pop off....the proceedings:
yeah...sorry J, ya boy isn't rocking the Nikon D90 mark II beta lense phase omotoper camera....straight iphone status. Which adds the hot mysterious effect, no extra charge. Shit was proper. Well....that's about it, but more to follow. Actual work post tomorrow. Ya boy is back on the blog tip J! Only took 6 months! But we're back Mortamer, we're back!
(am I more like randolph in this pic?)
aight....so this is REALLY a studio based topic, but it's important to be able to let your mind relax after hours of hard work in the studio (or at least that's the bullshit reason i'm using to post this on the blog)....
And when doing so, you know it's all about iphone apps/games. Here's my personal favorite:
Tap defense.....what can you say other than this game is completely ill. Like, utterly and insanely awesome. You build towers and smite demons from getting into heaven. SMITE DEMONS SON. After a good round, I feel like silent Bob in Dogma...."holy shit, Silent Bob is an instrument of god?!?"
Not to be left out, is my homie's favorite game...
Crazy Penguin. I'm not gonna front...I don't have this one....so I can't comment too much, but I did see Jay rocking it one day and it looked pretty fresh....shout outs to the polar bear on the far right in the helmet making a face like he just dropped a hot one.
Well...I'm curious to see what everyone else does to pass time in the studio before cranking out the next hit. Let ya boy know! Hollertreezy.
Was the studio, and working with P and Chad. Great people = great times. Had so much fun hanging with the assistants and staff at The Palms. Also I wanna shout out Mick for hooking us up with some BBC and Ice Cream gear. Definately had a great work experience meeting guys I really respect and look up to, and getting to actually work side by side was the shit. Heres some pics of the randomness that occurred. 
So....first off, let me say, J I know this took way to long to come up with, but I hope it's up to par. I know you doing ya thing out in vegas...just like my dude here:
To everyone else, what's really good....this is Miles Walker. I'm also an engineer based out Atlanta, GA. I'm a self proclaimed gear head and full on studio rat too, and have been given the opportunity to share on my biggest homie's blog, so I hope I do it all justice. For those that don't know me, I think an ichat convo between me and my homie AJ pretty much describe how J and I are linked in the universe...
I've felt the key to a good blog is to keep it short and sweet, and have a lot of pics. I hope I can meet those requirements....
So i decided i should put up a lil update of my trip here in vegas. I absolutely love the studio here at the palms casino. I cant stress how cool the assistants and studio staff are here. The funniest guys ever work here and they stay on top of orders and client demands. I dont care for vegas the city as much but I havent really had a chance to get out and see what it has to offer. If failure or broken dreams had an Olympic games, lets just say vegas would be the front runner to host the event. Other than that ive had a pretty good time hanging with Drew, pharrell and chads engineer, and getting to know P himself who is just about the most humble and down to earth guy ever. Super funny and talented at that, a rarity in this industry. Weve tracked several songs at this point and I dumped my regular setup as far as pre amp and compressor's go, and opted to use The avalon 737, which is what Drew uses from time to time on P. We still rented a M1 and the studio has 2 tube tech CL1B's which I used to cut the first days record with. We have 2 Sony C800's setup just in case we cut vocals in seperate rooms. This is pretty much what i use as far as vocal chain when I work with Ush, on the road or back in Atlanta. About the coolest part so far has been watching the guys make beats and them writing songs together. This week will be no different, 2 very huge artists are on there way here as we speak to do songs with Ush, stay tuned for updates!
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