There’s an infinite amount of possibilities and detours and things that can distract you from actually just performing the song and having whatever emotion that’s invested into the song come through in the recording.
Eventually, if you’re experimenting with a sound that’s unfamiliar, it gets absorbed, and somebody comes and does it better, and it becomes part of a vocabulary.
I’m always working on my own music, too. I’ve been working on a record for a few years.
I know my own limitations. And if somebody says, “I need songs for a cartoon garage band – they look like this and they should sound like this,” it gives you a direction. I like having that kind of assignment.
Sometimes, I think the way the music business has been destructive and the way the fans are been put through it and try to navigate through it, so much is so foreign to what musicians would actually want to do or what would be natural to them.
With modern recording techniques, and living in the Pro Tools era, the process gets really drawn-out, and it can become painstaking.
Just out of curiosity, I wonder what makes music or culture or taste go in certain directions. Who knows what the forces are behind it.
I enjoy recording live better, but I think by the nature of it you are going to end up with something that’s a little bit more traditional.
When you use some of the more modern recording devices and Pro Tools, when you get into the technology, you are aching to get into some territory.
I remember you would record a guitar part, and we would have to sit there for 15 or 20 minutes waiting for the computer to process it. You’d see the little wheel spinning on the computer, and you’d be praying that the hard drive didn’t crash and you didn’t lose the performance.
Back then, Pro Tools only had four or eight tracks, so we couldn’t actually hear all the tracks. We could only hear eight at a time, so if a song had 25 or 30 tracks, we wouldn’t be able to hear it until we went into the studio an put it all on tape. The process was a little bit backwards.
When I did “Top of the Pops” for the first time, Ace of Base was one of the other bands, and I have a memory of them on a small stage next to me in the TV studio. A memory of their performance is burned into my mind. Seared.
I enjoy the collaboration. I always envied people in bands who got to have that interaction.
I don’t remember half of the new bands, though – and I think that’s kind of where we’re going. It’s turning into just a big derby of songs. May the best song win.
There’s more well-known artists who aren’t making as good songs as people who are just coming out of nowhere. That seems to be more typical in the last few years than ever.
There’s a perception that if an artist produces another artist, they’re going to imprint on them. But I’m the opposite.
Technology was something I avoided when I started out – I didn’t even have electric guitars. Only played acoustic.
I’m always looking for older equipment and ways of recording, but you can’t escape the fact that it’s all going to be digitized and reduced.
I do think music sounds better when it’s on tape and more simply recorded.
I’ve been arguing with people for 10 years about tape versus digital, and I believe tape is absolutely essential in getting the sound that’s conducive to the enjoyment of music.