Production Hurts

Now, I have not really been involved in music, other than as a listener, since about 1981 (perhaps late 1980) when I quit violin and my voice started to break, forcing my departure from my minor involvement in the Northwest Boychoir. Hand me a violin today, and I might be able to tune in. Ask me to sing, and you will regret it. Nonetheless, my friend Britt asked me to come in as her producer.

It's an odd thing, really, to listen to this part or that of a piece and decide that it needs something more or something less, whether it is only a little panning or volume or something like an entire track. And while Britt is putting down the basic rhythms and beats (it is her music, after all), I find myself nudging her aside every now and then, sometimes with good ideas and sometimes not.

This may all sound relatively pain-free, but believe me it isn't, and I suddenly have a great deal more respect for those people who do this for a living. I have no illusions that I am now or ever will be much more than a pair of ears and a mind, giving voice to personal musical prejudices. Trevor Horn will never fear me, or even hear of me for that matter. Still, I can't help but think that both the process and the product are quite something different than I ever would have expected—and in no small way surprising.

I am not sure when Britt and I will get some final vocals down (I think that what we have is fine for the internet, but it is far from what it could be) and finish tweaking the levels, but one way or another we should be seeing "Unanswerable Questions" up at her MySpace account within a couple weeks. I'll make note of it when that takes place. In the meantime, she has four others up for anyone interested in hearing what she has already got up. Five down, five to go.