{ "schemaVersion": "v1", "slug": "joe-carra", "title": "Pockets Of Presence with Joe Carra (Hiatus Kaiyote, Middle Kids, Pond)", "kind": "interview", "listenUrl": "https://podcasters.spotify.com/pod/show/lovemusicmore/episodes/Pockets-Of-Presence-with-Joe-Carra-Hiatus-Kaiyote--Middle-Kids--Pond-e3n6a4t", "publishedAt": "2026-10-14", "source": { "provider": "openai", "model": "gpt-4o-transcribe-diarize", "normalizedSchema": "v1", "transcribedAt": "2026-08-16T19:11:14.272Z" }, "paragraphs": [ { "startSec": 0, "endSec": 10.350000000000001, "text": "It's really important to tell your own story and set the record straight and AI is trawling and trying to make up all this information so just help it, you know.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 14.292, "endSec": 39.692, "text": "Everybody just had a great conversation with Joe Carra, who's worked with some of my favorite artists as a mastering engineer. I'm going to list off some of my favorite ones with some crazy names. King Gizzard and the Lizard Wizard, Hiatus Kaiyote, and of course Pond. But incredible guy, incredible wisdom. We talked all about the history of mastering, what it looks like now, AI, students coming up.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 39.692, "endSec": 65.886, "text": "up building your career just a wonderful conversation up and down before we get into it I want to introduce DistroKid our title sponsor DistroKid makes music distribution fun and easy with unlimited uploads and artists get to keep 100% of royalties and earnings and with our code you can get 30% off at DistroKid.com slash VIP slash love music more all one word a million plus artists rely on DistroKid to get their music onto Spotify", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 66.26, "endSec": 93.502, "text": "Buy Apple Music, YouTube, TikTok, Tidal, Instagram, and all of the major streaming services. Get started today at districtid.com slash VIP slash love music more and enjoy the episode. What's good, everybody? Welcome back to Love Music More. I am Scoobert Doobert joined by Joe Carra. Welcome to the show.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 95.402, "endSec": 96.252, "text": "Thanks, Scoobert.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 96.402, "endSec": 102.252, "text": "How are you? How's your day going? How is the life of a mastering engineer in 2026?", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 103.852, "endSec": 117.20599999999999, "text": "Oh, it's good. You know, it's always challenging working in the industry itself, but... I've been doing it for a while now, so things get easier the more you are in the industry.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 117.972, "endSec": 134.81467605633804, "text": "You know, but that doesn't mean you can get complacent or anything like that because things are always changing and moving and there's all kinds of technologies and things happening so you have to keep abreast of it all. But generally speaking, I enjoy a pretty good amount of work coming through the studios.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 134.81467605633804, "endSec": 143.022, "text": "Now, having done this for like over 30 years, I'm not a beginner so I've got that advantage of just having it established.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 143.022, "endSec": 163.796, "text": "clientele worked with lots of artists have mastered thousands of albums so I feel like I'm at a nice point in the career where the work comes in but that once again I wouldn't say that you can't you don't stop working on the business that's an extremely important part of what", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 164.404, "endSec": 175.504, "text": "You have to do regardless how long you're in the business for you have to network you always have to put yourself out there and pitch for work and stuff like that It just gets a little bit easier though when you do have", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 176.372, "endSec": 200.27200000000002, "text": "a track record and um you've got a discography backing you it's a little bit easier but um yeah it's always you know you're always grinding away and hustling and stuff like that you can't stop that ever and i think the day that you stop that you're in you're in trouble and there might be a select few engineers that don't have to do that but most of us in the real world have to kind of hustle all the time and work at it yeah", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 200.622, "endSec": 220.18264233576642, "text": "Absolutely. I mean, and... I think the idea of discography, I think a lot of people look at that and go, hey, once I am working with my heroes or working with some big band, everything's just going to come to me. And I think that's a really great point. You're an entrepreneur in this industry and you're trying to figure out your next moves and look at all the technology behind you.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 220.18264233576642, "endSec": 227.408, "text": "I can't wait to dive into, for those that are watching on video, all of the incredible speaker array that you have surrounding you right now.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 227.796, "endSec": 251.446, "text": "Yeah, yeah. I mean, you're right. I'm just a business owner, an entrepreneur, so to speak. So I think one of the biggest mistakes a lot of people in our industry make is thinking that they're different from other businesses just because we do something that we love and it's really cool working with music. I think a lot of people make the mistake thinking that we're not the same as...", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 251.446, "endSec": 277.45799999999997, "text": "a headdress or a cafe or a restaurant owner or something like we're the same like we are not immune to market forces and pressures and things like you have to think of yourself as a small business owner whereas a lot of people think i'm in the i'm a studio guy i'm a creative you know it's it's a different realm a different dimension to other businesses and it's like nah you have failed right there if you think like that", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 277.972, "endSec": 294.772, "text": "You have to think of yourself as just a corner store trying to put yourself out there. I find that mentality quite common in our industry. People thinking that we're a unique business and we're not. You're not unique at all. You're the same as every other business out there.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 295.222, "endSec": 302.272, "text": "And I think that mastering is a unique vantage point just based on the sheer amount of music that you work on.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 302.676, "endSec": 324.526, "text": "I feel like there are some producers that will have like one artist that will get big and they'll work with that one artist and that'll be the majority of their time and then to have the breadth of thousands of records that's uh that's incredible but I think it also makes it feel a little more like lunch pail you need a lot of clients you have a high throughput and I think that is even if you are a producer that's looking for the one artist that's a lot of eggs in one basket", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 324.726, "endSec": 348.988, "text": "Yeah, a mastering business really... I think you kind of pointed it out correctly. It's very different to production and recording. When I say different, it's just a little bit amped up from that business model where we need to have a lot of clients because you're mixing or recording an album and you might be there for days or weeks.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 348.988, "endSec": 370.838, "text": "I master an album in a day or so and then I need a new job so if your business skills aren't quite up to snuff mastering is not for you because it's not for the faint-hearted like there is a high volume I was discussing this with a client the other day, a colleague, and he's saying, he said to me, I did a thousand jobs last year. And I'm like, yeah,", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 370.838, "endSec": 392.154, "text": "Wow. I probably did the same when you consider singles, EPs, like in one day, sometimes I could do eight or nine singles. That's a lot of work that you, that's eight or nine clients I dealt with in one day. So. It's a high amount of clients that you need to sustain a mastering business.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 392.154, "endSec": 417.712, "text": "um so that's why i'm saying yeah it's not for the faint-hearted you you need to really hustle and get a lot of work through the door so you won't survive or you'll eke out a very very kind of poor existence and you know you know eating is good we need food we need shelter you know so you've got to make a bit of an income there and then when you're factoring raising a family", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 418.196, "endSec": 445.04600000000005, "text": "sending kids to school all that stuff you need to earn an income akin to someone in an office you know getting a standard wage or something like that so yeah it's it's hard the business stuff is hard and it's taken me i was not a natural business person i i needed to learn all this stuff on the go it's something i advocate a lot when i'm talking to i'm on some advisory boards for universities and stuff like that you", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 444.788, "endSec": 475.46, "text": "that in their music programs and I very rarely talk about EQ and compression i'm always like teach the kids marketing teach the kids accounting bookkeeping uh social media all that like for me i'm like set them up for success don't they're going to get good at recording they're going to get good at mixing or mastering if they love it that's just going to come but they're not going to be really that enthusiastic about the business stuff so you gotta ram that home and", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 475.476, "endSec": 500.196, "text": "Let them know that's important. Because most people coming out of audio colleges are going to be self-employed. They're not going to a big studio saying, can I be an intern? 1% might be, but 99% of them are going to be, you know, self-made business people. So for me, I'm always going on about it. I'm a bit of a broken record when it comes to that stuff. I think it's really important.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 500.446, "endSec": 504.99600000000004, "text": "I think it's also really important to hear from someone like you that's dealing with nine clients.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 504.99600000000004, "endSec": 523.016, "text": "clients a day so I don't think I've ever because I'm mostly on the production and mixing side I don't think I've ever worked with more than four artists at any given time and even that was a lot like a lot of communications and personalities and invoicing and making sure that everything's moving forward I can only imagine what it's like to be on your side of things", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 523.466, "endSec": 550.73, "text": "I have about a hundred emails ongoing in my inbox at any point 50 would be pretty what I'd call hot emails like jobs on the go things that I'm liaising and 50 are probably cold just inquiries and things I've got to get back to and just kind of nurturing that stuff but I probably have about yeah 40 or 50 hot emails that I've just got to keep circulating and keeping on top of so yeah it's a", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 551.188, "endSec": 568.3919999999999, "text": "It's a lot of admin and stuff and my morning, the first hour of my day is. Just maintaining emails and making sure everything is happening and particularly projects with a lot of moving parts, yeah, it's just you've got to keep on top of that.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 568.592, "endSec": 582.5419999999999, "text": "Makes total sense. And also, I'd be really curious, too, from your perspective of the ways that releases are happening now, where it's kind of like get it out the door as quickly as possible, you're feeding the beast, the machine, and you release the single and then maybe you release the EP.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 582.5419999999999, "endSec": 595.8380000000001, "text": "the ep then maybe release it a third time on the album um how does that affect your workflow or your the way that you think about mastering when it's like a single versus maybe reimagined that single now on a larger work um are", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 595.8380000000001, "endSec": 599.738, "text": "Yeah, you trying it's to anchor the rest of the work are you rethinking it how do you how do you approach it", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 600.638, "endSec": 608.438, "text": "a it's a tricky one because you often are doing singles before albums. I like to do the whole album at once personally", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 608.788, "endSec": 635.788, "text": "Totally. um and then that the artist or the label release the singles after the fact but the reality is particularly with major labels uh this in such a hurry to get stuff out the door that they're like we've got a single now the album's coming next week and it's like okay i'll do the single now um the problem with that is once they release it to the digital distributors and it's been approved and stamped and there's metadata and all that stuff", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 636.916, "endSec": 644.816, "text": "It's kind of a tricky situation to go. Oh, well, here's the album. I'm going to rethink the single now and maybe do this It's like you kind of stuck", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 645.396, "endSec": 669.846, "text": "with that so look that's not that difficult but once i master a single and everyone signs off on that it is riskier to then change that so i just generally work around that and to be honest i generally make it you can make it work i don't think i've been in a situation where i've gone oh my gosh i messed that single up because now the album is like that you just make it work um", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 670.228, "endSec": 693.478, "text": "It's rare that you get the single and then the album is really diverse from that. It might happen occasionally, but you still make it work. And if I feel I do need to change the single, I'll just liaise with the artist or label and say, look, in lieu of the album, we need to make the single a little bit like this or like that. But generally, I just stick with that because that's generally better than.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 693.478, "endSec": 714.034, "text": "everyone has signed off on it and you don't want to shock anyone or you just want to kind of keep the momentum going but I don't find that too hard I just reference against that so what's important is that when I master the rest of the album I basically open up the existing project and I am just", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 714.804, "endSec": 739.6039999999999, "text": "referencing closely to that and making sure that we can keep in the same spirit doesn't mean you've got to match that like mastering isn't about matching every single song the same way to have a template and just make sure everything's the same but you just want to keep that spirit if nothing else volumes have to be the same as that single you don't want that to be louder or softer and in regards to the eq and tonality", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 739.988, "endSec": 761.4380000000001, "text": "You want to be in the ballpark, but my mastering style is not such that I want every single song to be the same. Some songs sound good warmer, some sounds good brighter or darker or... So, you know, you have to respect the mix for what it is as well. I definitely don't like to flatline the whole album and make everything exactly the same.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 761.638, "endSec": 764.6880000000001, "text": "Yes. Very, very interesting. I was really curious about that.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 764.724, "endSec": 779.8240000000001, "text": "And then when you are, say, mastering from just the album, you're starting where you have all of these tracks, does the artist typically tell you like, hey, these are what we're anticipating being the single and then you kind of work on those, lock something there and then zoom out for the rest of the record?", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 779.874, "endSec": 782.874, "text": "Or are you kind of sampling throughout the record and mastering as you go?", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 782.874, "endSec": 791.694, "text": "Yeah, I'm just looking at the work as a whole. I generally don't get that information about what they're thinking the single might or might not be. or might not", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 791.694, "endSec": 791.794, "text": "Interesting.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 791.794, "endSec": 810.5939999999999, "text": "be if Cool. they're attending the session they might verbalize that and say oh by the way this is going to be the single on the album and you go okay i don't pay any more importance to that to be honest i so to me it's that information is not that useful because i'm just going to treat every song the way that it should be treated", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 811.444, "endSec": 823.8439999999999, "text": "just because it's a single doesn't mean I'm going to concentrate harder on that song it's just you know I'm just going to take it for what it is and work on the whole album but I do like working on an album as a whole it's much more fun for me yeah", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 824.144, "endSec": 841.514, "text": "Makes total sense. So when Dolby Atmos came out, I remember reading the blogs and watching the videos and they were kind of saying like mastering is not necessary for this. It's quieter, etc. And then I look behind you and I'm like clearly that problem. The prophecy did not come to be. Can you talk a little bit about atmosphere and", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 841.514, "endSec": 849.2139999999999, "text": "That drove me nuts. It drove me nuts. And there are still people today that are preaching that.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 849.2139999999999, "endSec": 867.368, "text": "It's And I ridiculous. just don't understand it. No. The real basic point is... And I try to relay this to people who don't understand it. You go through all this effort to master your stereo. Just say your stereo master was extremely dull and didn't have a lot of presence.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 867.66402725, "endSec": 889.33602725, "text": "The mastering engineer, you would encourage them to make it a bit brighter, wind in some presence on the album, make it more vibey, all that kind of stuff. You are using those exact same parts for the Dolby Atmos master. So what makes you think that just because it's in Dolby Atmos it's going to sound the way it should? Like, of course it's going to need the same treatment.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 889.33602725, "endSec": 907.3860272500001, "text": "You know, it's a really naive attitude to say, oh, it's got to be at minus 18 LKFS, so it doesn't need to be mastered. I mean, really? Is that your interpretation of mastering that it just makes things loud? Like, I'm sorry, mastering, there are so many other things in mastering.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 907.3860272500001, "endSec": 934.1760272500001, "text": "And I know that loudness has been such a publicized thing about mastering and it's been so connected to mastering over the past 20 years. But... Man, there's more to it. There's tasteful compression. There's tasteful harmonics. There's EQ. There's so much more. So you're really throwing the baby out with the bathwater there if you're thinking that mastering is just about Max. And I know a lot of people do.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 934.1760272500001, "endSec": 939.2974570745615, "text": "To this day, I know a lot of people just think, isn't it just maximizing? You bring the level up.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 939.2974570745615, "endSec": 966.4640272500001, "text": "But they're really forgetting about all of that careful tonal treatment and dynamic treatment that that you can do on an album and I wouldn't be in a job if mastering was just about getting it loud because everyone can do that it's really easy just buy your favorite limiter you can make it as loud as you want but people come to me because I think you know they want all of that other tasteful stuff built into the mastering process volume for me is just", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 966.96002725, "endSec": 993.91002725, "text": "an easy thing at the end that you kind of judge and get a handle on but before i even consider volume it's all about eq and as i said if i need to compress something or change the dynamics or the micro dynamics or even expand it a lot of stuff comes in way too compressed and they've hit it way too loud so i my challenge in the last 10 15 years has to be how can i uncompress master sometimes and give that", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 993.6800272500001, "endSec": 1013.98002725, "text": "give that illusion that and i love that when an engineer calls me back and says how did you make it louder but it sounds more dynamic and punchy now so there's so many tricks that i've had to develop to make a really squashed master sound more energetic and lively and it takes work to do that i can spend two days mastering an album that's", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1014.64002725, "endSec": 1031.27202725, "text": "over compressed that you have to uncompress and I know technically there's no uncompression tool but there are techniques to give that perception that it's more lively and energetic again And don't ask me what that is because it's a trade secret.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1031.27202725, "endSec": 1045.27202725, "text": "I won't. I won't. What I will ask you, this is a, I think a natural follow-up. So I was talking to Andrew Schepps and he, a lot of the people that I've worked with that are disciples of him mix and master their own work as kind of one because they, and they kind of think of", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1045.27202725, "endSec": 1045.32202725, "text": "it Yeah.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1045.32202725, "endSec": 1056.07202725, "text": "as one process. I personally don't like that. I like, I love it when somebody else can bring their own artistry, especially for the micro stuff, the stuff that I probably am blind to, you're blind to at the end.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1056.07202725, "endSec": 1067.49202725, "text": "to at the end of producing and mixing something um what do you think about those schools of thought uh do you find it threatening do you find it interesting do you think it's just kind of the different ways that people work what do you think", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1067.49202725, "endSec": 1076.6920272500001, "text": "yeah i find it really interesting and i find most people can't do it and i find the people that can do it really well like there are some people that", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1077.42402725, "endSec": 1089.42402725, "text": "probably don't need mastering it's fair to say that they have just got it down pat their mixing and their bus processing is just locked in and I have some of those clients and", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1089.42402725, "endSec": 1102.62402725, "text": "Yeah. I kind of go man why are you coming to me your your stuff sounds so good and they're like because we appreciate the one percent that you might bring to it and they feel really comforted that", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1102.6720272500002, "endSec": 1118.77202725, "text": "that an experienced engineer is giving at the once over before it goes out into the world having said that that's one percent of my clientele i feel a lot of people don't do it really well and i know kudos to those that can do it and i respect it and that's great", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1119.69602725, "endSec": 1144.29602725, "text": "unfortunately a lot of really high profile engineers that promote that style my only concern with that stuff is they're playing at expert level and they've been doing this for decades and decades and i often feel that the guy that's just been doing this for a few years all of a sudden holds that engineer up in highest esteem and goes oh well he's doing it so i should be doing it because he's my hero", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1144.43202725, "endSec": 1165.03202725, "text": "but they probably don't understand the decades that this guy spent sending mixes out to get mastered and it really needed it so I often tell people to take it with a grain of salt and just understand where their capabilities are but a lot of guys that send me stuff that's mastered", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1165.96802725, "endSec": 1182.71802725, "text": "I guess I very regularly get a folder that says pre-masters or what would they reference masters and then the unmastered version and I always am very interested to hear what the reference masters sound like and", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1183.6640272500001, "endSec": 1203.1640272500001, "text": "most of the time they it's a fair effort but I always find I get a better result from it and that's why I mean I work with a lot of fussy engineers and they're always trying to push me they're always like Joe the client really loves the masters I've done but I want you to do your thing on it and it's often just recreating what they've done but", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1203.79202725, "endSec": 1227.54202725, "text": "with my spin on it and they keep coming back saying how did you do it how did you make my master sound better you know and it's just a taste thing and it's just experience you know this is all I do all I do is I've got an unfair advantage over most people I practice this all the time every day five six days a week so but look I appreciate all kinds of workflows I have to admit", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1228.62402725, "endSec": 1247.62402725, "text": "The workflow that puzzles me a lot is what's called top-down mixing when people are mixing into like half a dozen plugins. I personally, I wouldn't do that. I don't like that style. I like the more traditional bottom-up mixing and, you know, mixing into a little bit of compression at the end, that's quite.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1247.62402725, "endSec": 1273.79602725, "text": "traditional that's not a problem like you know people on ssl consoles did that all the time just pushing the mix into a little but i'm talking about that stacked um processing where they've got a dozen plugins and they're fighting against it and trying to make it work and then they push one fader up and all of a sudden that doesn't correspond and that i find why are you fighting stuff downstream or upstream where where", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1273.7120272500001, "endSec": 1297.06202725, "text": "you've got it all at your fingertips right there I find it a very confusing way and every time someone tells me they do up-down mixing my head straight away goes to the sound and I know what sound it's going to be like and most of the time not all of the time granted but most of the time it's a very smeared undefined", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1297.9040272500001, "endSec": 1320.70402725, "text": "kind of sound because it sounds like they've been pushing against half a dozen tape saturators and compressors and i only find a small percentage of people get it right and i know michael brower is one of those people that you know really promotes all of that stuff about mixing into all of this and he does it so good but there's only one michael brower you know i don't", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1320.70402725, "endSec": 1320.95402725, "text": "Right,", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1320.95402725, "endSec": 1321.35402725, "text": "know man um", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1321.35402725, "endSec": 1321.60402725, "text": "right.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1321.60402725, "endSec": 1332.47802725, "text": "but look I think it's challenging and I think for a newcomer, I think doing the traditional bottom-up mixing is", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1333.29602725, "endSec": 1358.64602725, "text": "ideal I think that's where you learn the craft and then you can develop things later on because it is tricky to incorporate bus processing as you're mixing but that's just my taken it from what I've heard over the years and and often I find people's mixes when they give me just their mix against their reference master their mix sounds so good and then I get really confused as to what they did with them it's like they", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1358.60802725, "endSec": 1382.3080272500001, "text": "they over process so much and then when i do it i don't i feel like when they say that they get amazed at how open the master is i'm like it's probably because i did a lot less than you did i probably worked less than you did and and you're thinking that i did something amazing but i just switched off all the stuff that you put on there and now the mix is breathing and i've done what i felt is appropriate", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1383.2480272500002, "endSec": 1398.39802725, "text": "and necessary but sometimes i think when people are so locked into a mix they habitually put on all this stuff because they they run out of ideas they're like i mixed it to the best of my ability this is how i liked it and so now this mastering process comes along and they're like", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1399.5360272500002, "endSec": 1422.5560272500002, "text": "let's just chuck a tape simulator this compressor I heard that this guy does that so I'll do that and I saw it on YouTube this guy does that so I'll do that and then all of a sudden their mix sounds kind of quite skewed from what they had because And I've had engineers tell me that exact phrase. I run out of ideas at the mastering stage, so I just slap all this stuff on hoping it's going to be all right.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1422.5560272500002, "endSec": 1435.0560272500002, "text": "And I'm like, man, your mix sounds awesome. I just used one EQ on the whole album and they're like, what? And I'm like, yeah, and maybe a little bit of compression, but nothing like, and then they give me their plug-in chain and I'm like.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1435.0560272500002, "endSec": 1461.52402725, "text": "what the hell did you do that for you know your mix is so good you know all about communicating with clients trying to get the best result not being a lazy mastering engineer and just saying well I'll just do what they did like I I don't mind pushing back on the engineer and saying you know what I'm going to use the unmastered mixes because I feel that we can get a better result and and I think that's just the way I've nurtured and got my clients they know that I'm not going to take that", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1461.48802725, "endSec": 1472.13802725, "text": "the easy way out and just use their master and do a little bit on top I will rework it from the start if I feel it's really got to go down that way geez that was a long answer", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1472.13802725, "endSec": 1472.23802725, "text": "I", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1472.23802725, "endSec": 1472.38802725, "text": "to", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1472.38802725, "endSec": 1472.4380272500002, "text": "liked", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1472.4380272500002, "endSec": 1472.73802725, "text": "a very short", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1472.73802725, "endSec": 1472.9380272500002, "text": "it.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1472.9380272500002, "endSec": 1474.4380272500002, "text": "question man sorry", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1474.4380272500002, "endSec": 1488.3660272500001, "text": "No, I liked it. I liked it. But I think it's a really good example of the specialist mindset in that when you don't know, you go, okay, I need like ozone presets. We got to widen this thing. We need tape. We need it. It's", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1488.3660272500001, "endSec": 1489.26602725, "text": "why do", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1489.26602725, "endSec": 1489.41602725, "text": "so natural.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1489.41602725, "endSec": 1513.51602725, "text": "you use this thing where i barely do that and it seems to be such a cliche thing in the in the online mastering world that mastering engineers make everything wider i don't and i often get that but i often get the comment in email when people are following up on a session they're like oh we love how you've made it wider and i get it i know what they're hearing they're just hearing maybe more clarity", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1513.77602725, "endSec": 1540.67602725, "text": "and maybe the EQ that I've put on and it has now opened up the mix but they perceive it to be wider so I know how that myth has kind of perpetuated but I very rarely actually widen the image I do a lot of MSE EQing but that doesn't mean that I'm widening stuff but be honest most of the time I'm bringing mono stuff in and punching up the mono channel and my manly compressor is great at that if you just", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1540.49602725, "endSec": 1557.44602725, "text": "If you just put the link function on, all of a sudden the mono channel just gets kind of quite up front and it really toughens it up. And I love the manly for that. It's a really beautiful tool to solidify the center channel. It's really good at that.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1558.0960272500001, "endSec": 1568.05202725, "text": "really really love manly too uh and ivana is amazing such an interesting thing too about the kind of cliches the internet folk wisdom versus the reality of veterans", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1568.05202725, "endSec": 1583.1520272500002, "text": "Yeah. i wonder if part of that is a gear sluts gear space like forum style and then i wonder if part of it's kind of LANDR and ai mastering what people because LANDR's been around for longer than i knew of ai um that's", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1583.1520272500002, "endSec": 1588.10202725, "text": "14 years. crazy i didn't know it was that long i I should be out of a job, honestly, didn't", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1588.10202725, "endSec": 1589.93602725, "text": "but it's just not that good. Good.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1589.93602725, "endSec": 1594.13602725, "text": "no it's not they've been trying they've been trying but have", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1594.13602725, "endSec": 1594.33602725, "text": "They've", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1594.33602725, "endSec": 1594.38602725, "text": "you", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1594.38602725, "endSec": 1596.18602725, "text": "been learning off my records.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1596.18602725, "endSec": 1610.71802725, "text": "exactly exactly their ap testing have you found that it altered like artist tastes at all like are you getting people that are kind of liking the LANDR sound and trying to get you to do it or is that yeah", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1610.71802725, "endSec": 1630.95002725, "text": "uh not really it's probably won me more fans and lost me fans um i've had many an album come in where the artist has said oh look this is the LANDR version we think it's okay what do you think you can make it better and then i do a sample for them and they're like oh my gosh okay Yes. And that just happens a lot. It's", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1630.95002725, "endSec": 1650.0000272500001, "text": "Yeah. pretty easy to beat LANDR. If I was an engineer and my client couldn't afford a mastering engineer, I would not use LANDR. I would just use my favorite plugins and do that. LANDR is not doing anything special that a semi-experienced engineer could do better.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1650.0000272500001, "endSec": 1672.10802725, "text": "You're much better off just doing it yourself and figuring it out I think LANDR is pretty crap to be honest and as I I'm not really that scared of it It might it might get a lot better You know AI and that whole world seems to be progressing all the time, but I have eyes a type I bought it for a rebalance function which can sometimes is a little bit of a get me out of jail", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1672.78402725, "endSec": 1695.6340272500001, "text": "scenario on some masters i definitely it's not a routine thing for me like i might use it once every few months or something but it's got this really cool rebalance feature that we're all aware of that stem rebalancing thing you know sometimes a mix is just mastering just traditional mastering can't fix it and that rebalance thing has really saved some stuff i did a punk album a and the drums were just so way back", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1696.2080272500002, "endSec": 1720.3080272500001, "text": "but they couldn't go back to remixer because they had destroyed their files or i think they i think they had a falling out with their mix engineer and he wouldn't give them anything else and it was a really comical situation so i pushed the drums up a couple of dbs with the rebalance and it totally totally fixed the album they were freaking out so it's good for that stuff but the reason i brought isotop up", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1737.9880545, "endSec": 1743.5880545, "text": "Constantly is obsessed with top end. All it wants to do is make things brighter.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1743.5880545, "endSec": 1769.5560545, "text": "it's kind of almost incapable of doing that delicate rebalancing of the mid-range or the lower mids that you do it either boosts the top end and scoops all the low mids out and it's just it's like it's a one trick pony that's all it can do so i don't know i think it's got a long way to go before it scares me at all there are some cool ai tools like that stem splitting stuff and that that", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1769.6040545, "endSec": 1771.5040545000002, "text": "That can be a bit of a lifesaver, yeah.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1771.5040545000002, "endSec": 1795.9760545000001, "text": "Yeah, exactly. And I feel like that's the ultimate and best way is give the great people tools to solve specific problems, let them keep doing what they do, especially because music. If it was able to be templated, we would do that more. If there was a one-size-fits-all solution that you were able to do on most masters, you'd put more of that on and be able to go, but that's not the way the music works.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1796.8260545, "endSec": 1796.8760545, "text": "Yeah,", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1796.8760545, "endSec": 1797.3260545, "text": "It's new,", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1797.3260545, "endSec": 1797.8760545, "text": "yeah,", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1797.8760545, "endSec": 1807.4760545000001, "text": "even the same singer, same band, same room, same microphones, different songs can be wildly different just based on intention, mood, whatever anyone's I spirits.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1807.4760545000001, "endSec": 1833.9180545000002, "text": "don't think that I don't think AI is good at, well not good, it doesn't, it can't contextualize the human experience yet without sounding too metaphysical there, but it doesn't understand music or context. Like I mastered something a few weeks ago and it was a very dark album. But the vocal carried all the brightness so", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1833.9180545000002, "endSec": 1834.0680545, "text": "Mm", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1834.0680545, "endSec": 1834.3680545000002, "text": "that it", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1834.3680545000002, "endSec": 1834.5680545, "text": "-hmm.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1834.5680545, "endSec": 1836.5180545, "text": "was very airy", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1836.5180545, "endSec": 1836.6680545000002, "text": "And", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1836.6680545000002, "endSec": 1836.8180545, "text": "and bright", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1836.8180545, "endSec": 1837.1180545000002, "text": "a lot.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1837.1180545000002, "endSec": 1837.3180545, "text": "and", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1837.3180545, "endSec": 1837.7680545, "text": "Yeah.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1837.7680545, "endSec": 1856.1340545, "text": "I was like man I can't add any more brightness because the vocal is carrying all the brightness It's as bright as it can be and it's cool that the production is darker As a little bit of a shit stir, I put that into Isotope to see what it would do.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1856.1340545, "endSec": 1879.1920545, "text": "And man, it heard that dark backing and he wanted to make everything so bright, you know, and so consequently the vocal was just so ear bleedingly bright. And this is what I say to people, it doesn't understand context. It doesn't understand music like we understand music. And until it does, I think we're all. Pretty safe for now.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1879.2920545000002, "endSec": 1881.3420545000001, "text": "Sorry to interrupt this very important broadcast,", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1881.3420545000001, "endSec": 1881.6420545, "text": "What I'm", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1881.6420545, "endSec": 1896.9319136549298, "text": "but what I'm asking for is for you to rate it five stars, share it with your friends. This is like the most important thing for this podcast to grow. So if you want to do this, you go into the podcast screen, right? You click on the dot dot dot on Spotify. Under there it says rate show and you go and you click it five stars.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1896.9319136549298, "endSec": 1911.7707046093074, "text": "If you could do that for me, that's the best way for the algorithms and all this stuff to share it out with the world. I know that it's a lot to ask. But if you could please please please just please just hit those three dots and a five star It would really help us out and helps us, you know, get the get the word out and spread the love of music So thank you.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1911.7707046093074, "endSec": 1929.6485866947005, "text": "If you're listening on YouTube, you know what to do like subscribe all that good stuff Thank you so much. And here's the rest of the episode Well, I think it's very similar to what we were talking about with mastering and Atmos is there can be a technical standard there can be A bunch of engineers that decide something.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1929.6485866947005, "endSec": 1954.5320545000002, "text": "There could be a bunch of training data, but all of those are only capturing certain biases, they're capturing certain moments, and in something that is as crazy as music, where you're actively trying to help genres be created. Like something like that, that sounds like something that a bunch of bands could want to do, and you could mess that up and make an entire subgenre go away.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1954.5320545000002, "endSec": 1958.1580545000002, "text": "If you use the isotope plug-ins and just normalized it.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1958.4080545000002, "endSec": 1966.6540545, "text": "Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, absolutely. Yeah, so something like that, you need to have a very delicate touch. It was a little bit... too dark you", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1966.6540545, "endSec": 1967.2040545, "text": "Mm-hmm.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1967.2040545, "endSec": 1981.2540545000002, "text": "know i had to work out what pockets of presence i could wind in even if it was just like half a db or a db just to encourage a little bit more presence overall because it just felt a little bit too muffled but", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1981.2540545000002, "endSec": 1981.7040545, "text": "Yes.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 1981.7040545, "endSec": 1992.4040545, "text": "you have to be really careful and like i spent hours just trying to figure out which pocket worked just right and the producer was in the studio with me and we tried all", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 1992.3240545, "endSec": 2009.6740545000002, "text": "all kinds of things until we landed on the right area and stuff like that I just love it's like figuring out a puzzle and spending hours working out the right EQ on something like that that's my happy place I love doing that stuff you know it's really good", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2010.1800545, "endSec": 2016.9800545, "text": "Do you like having the producer mix engineer in the room or do you prefer alone or is it project project project?", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 2017.4800545, "endSec": 2037.0800545000002, "text": "Yeah, I think it would be taxing every day and it used to be early on in my career because there was no internet and people had to literally come to the studio with the tape in hand, whether it was an analog tape or a digital tape or something. So I'm pretty well seasoned at people attending sessions. It doesn't.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2037.0800545000002, "endSec": 2050.3000545, "text": "doesn't freak me out like a lot of people but over the last 10-15 years it probably has been less and less so these days I almost enjoy it because it's a novelty like most of the time I'm working on my own", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2051.0760545000003, "endSec": 2076.2760545, "text": "and the industry's become so fast-paced that the whole Dropbox thing is just like bang done like people are mixing up until the hour before mastering and they're like here it is we can't attend because you know we just finished the mix kind of thing and I'm doing a lot I do a lot of international work so obviously they're not attending I don't mind when people attend I think it's okay a lot of people attend just out of curiosity and don't really", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2076.4520545, "endSec": 2101.7020545, "text": "i guess add value to the session but that doesn't bother me because they're getting value just from the experience and they enjoy it but you know i work with some producers who will attend every session because they they just love the process and they are very specific about what they want from something but over time the more trust you get with a producer the more they're happy to miss the odd session and go you know what you're doing that's fine and a lot of these guys just love hanging out", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2101.7320545000002, "endSec": 2105.6320545, "text": "Now, they just love hanging for the day and I make good coffee and it's all good. Yeah.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2105.6320545, "endSec": 2116.8320545, "text": "Love good coffee. Speaking of community, Yeah. founding member of music producer and engineer's Guild. Can you talk about kind of your work there, how important it is to be able to, yeah.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2116.8320545, "endSec": 2144.5460545, "text": "Yeah. Well, that was an honor and given to me that I didn't ask for is really nice. So Anna Laverty, a really great female producer here in Australia. took the initiative to create the guild because We were just a bunch of rogues, just without a home forever. So Anna did this great thing and made the Music Producers Guild and I can't speak highly enough of it.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2144.5460545, "endSec": 2150.9460545, "text": "The sense of community that we've gotten from that is amazing. We had Andrew Sheps talking this week.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2151.0460545, "endSec": 2161.6340545000003, "text": "Oh, We we Andrew. have like a monthly control room meeting where we have great guests like that pop in. share their thoughts i've hosted a couple of those one was on dolby atmos one", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2161.6340545000003, "endSec": 2167.3840545000003, "text": "Cool. was on mastering so there's a lot of guest engineers that'll pop in and do stuff we just had a whole two-day", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2168.1000545, "endSec": 2192.9500545, "text": "community event where there were people breaking down master classes so that they were doing master classes breaking down sessions and talking about stuff and there was some amazing you know Grammy nominated producers and engineers and not only that you just get to see everyone in the industry and say hello and have a beer and and just talk to people I love it it's been a beautiful thing to happen to our industry", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2193.3480545, "endSec": 2208.7400545, "text": "I've been in the industry for over three decades and it's just landed here. I know America and Europe and people like that, countries like that have had this for a long time and we've been slow. on this side of things.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2208.7400545, "endSec": 2233.8600545, "text": "So my role in it has just been A, as a supporter and an advocate and I tell people about it and occasionally I'll help out formally and give a host a meeting or do something like that or my part's I guess minor in that aspect but I'm happy to help wherever I can. I did a little bit of a background project for the Guild where I kind of checked on credits, the whole credit situation. Facebook,", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2233.8600545, "endSec": 2249.4100545, "text": "Oh, nice. Spotify and online and what happens and we traced the project from its inception from when the metadata was given to the label and traced it through the digital distributors to see where it got lost and who which digital distributor", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2250.2440545, "endSec": 2258.2940545, "text": "populated the metadata well who didn't and no surprises most digital distributors suck at the metadata stuff", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2258.2940545, "endSec": 2275.7440545, "text": "Yes. Yes. you know we had one album where there was like 20 to 30 credits it was a really thorough and when it ended up on spotify there was like two credits left by the end of it all it's like what happened to everyone else so there were little projects like that that i've been helping or assisting with", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2275.9080545, "endSec": 2302.1080545, "text": "but the guild's awesome i love it and i have a very warm spot for all involved in it and constantly trying to promote and tell people of it because so many people don't know about it like in australia you know i mentioned this to people all the time and they're like we've never heard of it so it's still a baby it's only like two or three years old we're trying to get it more popular and there's some really great benefits i mean to have someone like andrew shepherds", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2302.0520545, "endSec": 2308.6020545, "text": "show up at a meeting and just say hey man let's talk about mixing shit who doesn't want to be part of that like", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2308.6020545, "endSec": 2318.1020545, "text": "exactly it's so cool i so i used to work at the NAMM show and uh we would talk to the aussies there and they'd be like yeah we don't hang out in our own country we have to come all the way to anaheim to see each other what", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2318.1020545, "endSec": 2320.5020545, "text": "I went a to strange NAMM thing this year and for the i first just that time in my", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2320.5020545, "endSec": 2325.3020545, "text": "is career such a yeah I great loved it I great absolutely i'm loved it yeah it a big fan", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2325.3020545, "endSec": 2334.0220545, "text": "was great it really heightened that sense of community and a And a lot of Aussies were there. I went with a colleague and there was a whole bunch of Aussies there.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2334.0220545, "endSec": 2342.2220545, "text": "Very So I think cool. more and more people will go there. But when we came back to Australia, we spoke to our colleagues and we said, we need to try and harness this now.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2342.3220545, "endSec": 2349.6720545, "text": "Naturally. Try and get some of that NAMM spirit back in Melbourne and do that. So, yeah, we're trying. We're trying.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2349.9720545, "endSec": 2364.8600545, "text": "That's good. It's so important. And I also think about it too. for people that spend so much time alone in a room with music which is wonderful but still you're alone in a room like where you gotta get around the people we're social creatures", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2365.3100545, "endSec": 2383.5520545, "text": "yeah we are trapped in this cave and we are here so often and that's i think that's one of the best parts about it is that once in a while we just step out and it's like wow there are other people that do this too There are other people that are crazy like me. This is awesome. So it's good.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2383.8520545, "endSec": 2403.0520545, "text": "it is good it is good no it's it's such a fascinating fascinating life and i i always think it's so interesting to open the door especially to the listeners of the show that are not musicians have never been in a studio say they might have like this hollywood kind of view of what it looks like but in reality it's people we're kind of can be mole people sometimes just", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2403.0520545, "endSec": 2422.2560545, "text": "Yeah Yeah, yeah, Her medically sealed. no, I it's just it's a job, you know, I mean, I love what I do, but I clock on every morning at about 730, 8 o'clock, I'm here and then I clock off at 530 and go home to the kids and it's work, you know, as I said, I love it, but it's a job and I'm very grateful that I've had.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2423.2040545, "endSec": 2438.1040545, "text": "continuous employment for the past 30 years. I started off as a cassette mastering engineer for another company. I wanted to do mixing and recording and it was always hard to get into the studio because so many people wanted to do that and there was limited work.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2438.1040545, "endSec": 2464.6540545, "text": "they kept saying can you help us out in mastering though there's no one to do that they were busy doing mastering so I was like I'll do this mastering thing you know for now but I want to be a real engineer one day and then I just ended up loving it and there was a lot of work doing it and I thought well this is cool I still get to use all these toys that I really love and I get a cool studio and some great speakers and so I just", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2464.8360545, "endSec": 2472.2360545, "text": "ended up developing a real strong love for the craft and never left. So I feel very lucky in that aspect.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2472.8360545, "endSec": 2488.4360545, "text": "Well, I'm jealous just by the sheer impact and reach that you can have in terms of the amount of songs that you can work on. I will never, ever, ever get close. And I think that's so cool. And I'm so jealous about that. Yeah, I love that about mastering. I'm", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2488.4360545, "endSec": 2492.5860545, "text": "Do actually you know, yeah, do you know please. Muzo AI or Yes, AI? I do. Yeah. I do. Yes.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2492.5860545, "endSec": 2504.2680545000003, "text": "So it's only got my stats for the past. For half of my career because Okay. it can't go back to like There was so much I did before metadata and stuff like", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2504.2680545000003, "endSec": 2521.5180545000003, "text": "Yeah, that and yeah. it told me the other day I'd done over four There was four billion streams of my masters and so I'm kind of thinking that's probably more like ten billion really if you go back to the 91 or whatever like that. So yeah, it is a lot of tracks a lot of tracks I've worked on", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2521.5180545000003, "endSec": 2530.5600545, "text": "It's amazing. And the metadata thing is really interesting to me too, because Because so I, you know, just try some things, go into ChatGPT, ask about yourself.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2530.5600545, "endSec": 2553.2240545, "text": "it will be like oh it didn't work on that like yes i did i was there i i produced that it's me playing guitar the metadata can be really hard for things like an ai or even google to know and to give you credit and that that can really hurt people in terms of getting more work getting more exposure getting credit and um and attention for the work that they did do that's really really great", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2553.2240545, "endSec": 2584.2900545, "text": "Yeah. Yep. And look, the AI gets it wrong. I googled. something yesterday i was trying to figure out some credits on my website and i said to um ai who mixed the babe rainbow album and it came up with my name and i'm like no i mastered it man and it's like it said no Joe Carra mixed the babe rainbow and i'm like damn it really stuffed that up so yeah it's not it's not it's still an infant ai is still an infant you know we can't leave it unattended", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2584.2600545, "endSec": 2602.48608175, "text": "ended for now you know it needs to be supervised constantly yeah that's a reclamation and saying like I'm going to tell my own story so that whoever's", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2602.48608175, "endSec": 2605.43608175, "text": "Yeah, finding yeah, it on the internet they can hear from the source it's good yeah", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2605.43608175, "endSec": 2616.28608175, "text": "yeah, yeah and and I actually think that that's a thing that makes engineers master engineers artists big-time artists don't they might not think it's cool but it's like be your own librarian a little bit", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2617.30408175, "endSec": 2624.30408175, "text": "No one else will be and then someone else will tell your story or mix up your credits and you'll kill me on", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2624.30408175, "endSec": 2648.52208175, "text": "I IMDb agree. or something else. I almost feel social media pages have taken over from a website, but I tell engineers all the time, get your own website. It's like for all the points that you just said, it's really important to tell your own story and set the record straight. And AI is trawling and trying to make up all this information. So just help it. You", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2648.52208175, "endSec": 2651.57208175, "text": "Yeah. know, we need to help AI a little bit and give them the right information.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2652.22208175, "endSec": 2656.82208175, "text": "Right. Otherwise somebody might give it the wrong information and you don't want that.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2657.49608175, "endSec": 2667.04608175, "text": "Apparently I mixed the Babe Rainbow album, so, you know. exactly exactly i also i i was the um i did the movie scoring for et yeah just uh yep", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2667.04608175, "endSec": 2689.51808175, "text": "Oh, I thought I recognized your work. yep exactly Scoobert Doobert so i'd love i'd love to talk about um yeah you you briefly mentioned working with universities and and boards and kind of helping with curriculum and what is that like is that frustrating is that exciting Is it something that motivates you? How do you see the state of kind of training the next generation?", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 2690.06808175, "endSec": 2714.84408175, "text": "Um, probably frustrating is a good word, a little bit, not with the people involved, but the systems. Like universities are a slow moving machine. I had lecturers come to my studio like three or four years ago to look at the app I set up because they wanted me to advise them on how I'd set my room up and what they thought about Atmos.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2714.84408175, "endSec": 2737.199679515363, "text": "And so we did all that and they had to put a plan together that took nearly three years before the university decided to invest in an Atmos. And sometimes you just feel like stuff you say doesn't get carried along. But once again, not to do with the people involved. It's just the systems and the processes are so slow and that's a bit frustrating.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2737.199679515363, "endSec": 2755.9520251304616, "text": "But look, it's an honour to be on these boards and try and advise and give your opinion. So I'm on these boards as what they call an industry person. So I respect that they do that. They're not just looking in-house, they're trying to go out to the industry and get a feel of what's happening.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2755.9520251304616, "endSec": 2770.55008175, "text": "So I do that a couple of times a year and look, it's really great and sometimes your points of view are carried across in some aspect and sometimes I gather they're just shelved. whatever but you know you try i'm trying yeah", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2770.55008175, "endSec": 2790.7440173935643, "text": "That's good. And that's the point. We got to keep trying for this kind of stuff. And it is frustrating, though, where you're like, Atmos is happening right now. This is not a wait 10 years and get around to it. It's like you want to grow alongside it and you can define what it sounds like, too. I think that's a really interesting thing for the people that are working on it. It is a blank slate.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2790.7440173935643, "endSec": 2802.32208175, "text": "And it It is an opportunity to just like early digital recording to help set a course that the industry can feel proud about and not cringe in 20 years when they listen", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2802.32208175, "endSec": 2818.12208175, "text": "Yeah, back. yeah. Yeah, look, it's a format that is still growing. I think a lot of people are still on the fence about it. Is it going to take over the music industry? I don't know. It's too early. I think people are very attached to stereo format.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2818.12208175, "endSec": 2837.03208175, "text": "and I think there needs to be the next tier of consumer playback available before it kicks into the next level so I would say it's still kind of niche even though there are lots of releases out there and it's such a beautiful format the fact that it's compatible with", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2837.65608175, "endSec": 2863.40608175, "text": "traditional 5.1 systems and things like that makes it super powerful i mean the day we ditched channel-based audio and now it's all metadata is that's a game changer that's just the future really um so i don't think it's going anywhere it's just going to grow slowly but i was at NAMM and i sat in this really high end i think it was a chevy and it had like 48 akg speakers", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2864.02408175, "endSec": 2864.02408175, "text": "Cool.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 2864.02408175, "endSec": 2889.37408175, "text": "in there and it was amazing i loved it and when that starts to trickle down into all vehicles that's going to be great and i know all the major car manufacturers have signed up to adopt atmos they're all going to do it it's just going to take time and i think that's probably going to be the first place where people hear a discrete speaker system in surround because up until now it's going to be very", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2889.62408175, "endSec": 2900.57408175, "text": "It's going to be a binaural experience, but when people sit in their car and they have stuff flying around and it sounds immersive, it's going to be great. So I enjoy working on it. It's really cool.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2901.20808175, "endSec": 2915.15808175, "text": "totally agreed and that was that was the moment that did it for me too was i did one of those demo cars and i was like okay i get it i Yeah. get it because it because it put it in a place of i know my commute i don't like it it is very long there's a lot of traffic would this be a lot easier", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2915.45808175, "endSec": 2921.30808175, "text": "Yeah, yeah, oh yeah, for sure. Imagine when they start broadcasting in Atmos, yes yes", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2921.30808175, "endSec": 2927.10808175, "text": "you know, that'll be great. But yeah, I think there are a lot of positives going forward.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2927.10808175, "endSec": 2952.68808175, "text": "and as I said it's not going anywhere it's been here for a long time so yeah it's it's not something I work on every week but every two to three weeks an Atmos project comes in so it keeps me in check and it you know I love working on it it's definitely breaks up the average working month for me where I do an Atmos project it's something different and I really enjoy it and I get to practice mastering in that format", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2953.20808175, "endSec": 2975.00808175, "text": "A lot more because believe it or not you can master in Atmos I love it and I think there was a little moment that we kind of glossed over but just in case anybody missed it 5.1 where there were fixed speakers and you were basically turning knobs like panning left right into the different speakers and then Atmos it's what do they call it object oriented or object based where", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2975.00808175, "endSec": 2980.6020817500003, "text": "Yes, you're kind of dragging balls around and then it can collapse all the way down to headphones or up to the amount of", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 2980.6020817500003, "endSec": 3001.28208175, "text": "Yeah, speakers and down so it to some can expand and contract depending like you could have a thousand speakers and it will still populate those speakers in exactly the same position that when you put them in the studio because it's object-based and it's think of it as a sphere and if you put something there If you have a thousand speakers,", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3001.43208175, "endSec": 3024.13208175, "text": "it means it's just going to be more pinpoint accurate, whereas if you have six speakers, it might be somewhere around there, but it will be still pretty close. So the more speakers, the more resolution in the, I guess, the placement, whereas the traditional 5.1 home theater kind of thing, it was fixed left, center, right, like...", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3024.13208175, "endSec": 3046.77408175, "text": "If you didn't have that speaker there, there was no audio kind of thing, you know, so it was very fixed and rigid, whereas Dolby Atmos is very fluid and I think that's the beauty of it because it's got that smart capability built in. Yeah, it can't go anywhere. It's a really solid format.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3047.32008175, "endSec": 3057.3700817500003, "text": "Yeah, it reminds me of when I'd be in school, I'd be listening to music with a cute girl or something. We'd share earbuds, but we'd be listening to the Beatles, so all I would have is tambourine.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3060.22008175, "endSec": 3069.1200817500003, "text": "yep yep You got the good one, but Atmos helps with some version of that. yeah yeah you got McCartney", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3069.1200817500003, "endSec": 3073.05808175, "text": "I Yeah, got Ringo damn exactly. Damn, got the Ringo side this time. Yeah, yeah.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3073.80808175, "endSec": 3082.95808175, "text": "So, Joe, I end the podcast the same way for everybody. This show is called Love Music More, and I have just one question for you. Joe,", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 3083.10808175, "endSec": 3084.10808175, "text": "why do you love music?", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 3087.00808175, "endSec": 3088.61, "text": "Why is that so hard to answer?", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 3088.61, "endSec": 3089.86, "text": "I know, right?", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3089.86, "endSec": 3090.56, "text": "Why?", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 3090.56, "endSec": 3091.26, "text": "We I don't know.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3091.26, "endSec": 3094.00808175, "text": "should be able to answer this really well.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 3096.44008175, "endSec": 3117.69008175, "text": "Just because it's such an ingrained part of your life, it's hard to almost separate it. Like, why do I like breathing? It's like, I don't know, it's good for me. Music's just very enjoyable to me. It makes me happy. Like, when I listen to it, it's like some people like reading a book, going for a run.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3117.69008175, "endSec": 3128.2380817499998, "text": "this to me makes me happy like I listen to music when I go if I put a Miles Davis record on it makes me happy you know and if I have coffee at the same time it", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3128.2380817499998, "endSec": 3148.55932232971, "text": "Hmm. doesn't get any better than that you know a weekend ritual for me is I make a coffee and I'll put a Miles Davis record on always you know that's just It just sets me up. It sets my energy up the right way. I feel great. And I've had different experiences with music.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3148.55932232971, "endSec": 3171.64608175, "text": "Like when I was growing up, learning to play music was more of an exploration, a challenge. I just wanted to know how to, I mean, I loved playing the piano, but I... Well, I was really nerding out and I want like everyone playing an instrument. You want to get as good as you can. You want to play as fast as you can. You know, it's all that kind of stuff.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3171.64608175, "endSec": 3187.19608175, "text": "Yes. So I loved music because it was that sense of exploration and adventure. And I'd go into my bedroom for like eight hours and practice a piece and just get completely lost and immersed to the point where my parents are yelling, get downstairs and, you know.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3187.19608175, "endSec": 3207.46608175, "text": "get some sunlight you know like I I lost track of time I remember getting up and sitting on the piano in my pajamas saying to my mom yeah I'll go to I'm going to uni today I'll see you tonight and getting so lost in practice that the next sound I heard was the front gate squealing open.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3207.46608175, "endSec": 3229.76608175, "text": "It was my mum coming home from work and I had forgotten to go to uni because I was so, I was in this state of, and I'd lost track of time, you know, and when that happens to you, I think you must love it that much, you know, and today I love working on it. I love nerding out technically on it. I love mastering it.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3229.76608175, "endSec": 3257.61208175, "text": "I get paid every day to listen to music I better fucking love it you know I you know I I love it that much and I don't get sick of it the first thing I do when I get in the car is I put a CD on and I still have a CD player in my car it's getting old but so I don't get sick of it it just makes me very happy I find it such a wholesome experience and a very I don't know if I'm eloquent enough to really word what it means to me but it does something", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3257.43208175, "endSec": 3283.07808175, "text": "something very spiritual to me too it transports me somewhere when I listen to something that I love particularly I've got a soft spot for jazz and you listen to a Chick Corea album or a Bill Evans album and it's like I just lose all sense of reality, you know, and part of it is frustration too because I hear it and I'm like, how are they doing this, you know.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3283.47808175, "endSec": 3296.4280817500003, "text": "Yes. I love it that much that sometimes it makes me upset, you know. I went to a Chick Corea and Herbie Hancock gig about, I don't know, eight, nine years ago, maybe ten years ago.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3296.4280817500003, "endSec": 3323.15208175, "text": "I remember going home and just closing the piano lid and going okay we're done it's there's nothing I it affected me so much I'm like don't even bother going back to it you know and a year later I started playing again and then I went and saw Ahmad Jamal at another concert and thought no just forget about that so just you were right the first time Joe just close the lid and walk away you're like you", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3323.19208175, "endSec": 3334.19208175, "text": "You can't do anything better. So, you know, it's a very powerful emotion music, you know, for good and bad. But no, I love it. I don't know. Has that answered the question?", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3334.24208175, "endSec": 3337.19208175, "text": "Absolutely. That's a beautiful Oh, answer. cool. Good. That's a beautiful answer.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 3337.34208175, "endSec": 3339.94208175, "text": "So where can people get in touch, listen to your catalog,", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 3340.14208175, "endSec": 3341.99208175, "text": "hire you, your website?", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 3342.7760817500002, "endSec": 3359.42608175, "text": "The website is probably the best thing thecrystalmastering.com. That's, you know, people can find me there. There's a discography and contact details. And I always say to people, you know, don't choose your mastering engineer based on what, you know, you love about what they've done.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3359.42608175, "endSec": 3377.44808175, "text": "You know, I mean, it's really nice when people get recommended and it's a word of mouth thing and then engineers says you should use my mate Joe. That's great. But if you don't have that recommendation, I often say to people just if you're confused about mastering, just see what they've done, get a feel for it. And I think if a mastering engineer doesn't have.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3377.44808175, "endSec": 3401.65408175, "text": "a good discography and an easy way of listening to their playlists and stuff I think they should do it it's a really good thing I mean I've got playlists on all of the platforms I think I've got an embedded Apple player on my website and every engineer mastering producing you should have an embedded player in your website", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3402.4880817499998, "endSec": 3429.43808175, "text": "That makes it so easy for people to know what your work is like because we deal with sound and music. Don't worry about an album cover. That tells me nothing unless I really know the album well. You want people to play your music and listen because this is the business we're in. We're in the audio game, so you should have audio on your website. And I tell this to so many people, so many great people.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3429.43808175, "endSec": 3447.80808175, "text": "The great engineers here in Australia that I work with are like, you don't have a playlist on your website. Like everyone should be listening to this straight away. And it just makes it so easy for people to understand you as a professional and what you're doing and what you're about. So yeah, it's all on the website. So yeah, lovely,", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3447.80808175, "endSec": 3448.60808175, "text": "Well said.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" }, { "startSec": 3448.70808175, "endSec": 3449.55808175, "text": "Well, thank you, Joe.", "speaker": "Luke F. Walton" }, { "startSec": 3449.65808175, "endSec": 3453.45808175, "text": "I really appreciate the conversation. lovely speaking to you.", "speaker": "Joe Carra" } ], "correctionsApplied": [] }