Weird session

[willgroove2]

Hey just got back from a weird session and thought I would share.A little background;Tuesday night I got a call from a engineer that I have worked with before inquiring about my availability for a session this week,as I have a home studio that is designed for doing tracks via the internet I offered to track my bass parts at home.These days most of the recording I do is a overdub situation anyway and i have all my bass's,pre-amps and effects already plugged up and ready to got but the client wanted me to come to them so whatever no problem.Because of thanksgiving they pushed the session back to today(Saturday)I grabbed a couple of bass's and went over there.They have a studio set up in a small strip mall,it's amazing where people can cram a studio with modern technology especially if their not doing live Drums.They had a Pro-tools HD rig with a C/24 mixer and some nice pre's so they have the right stuff so I'm like "cool this shouldn't be that hard" The studio is laid out like most urban/hiphop orientated rooms;big control room,real small iso booths.So the first thing I noticed was that there were like 8-9 people in the control room,now it was fairly large but it wasn't that big for all these people.There was the money guy(owner of the production company and studio)his girlfriend who told me she was there to check out the session because"she hoped to do some backgrounds on a track or 2",The artist(think Justin timberlake/robin thick type)his entourage of 3,the engineer and his second and myself in a 15x10 room full of gear.The first weird thing was that there was nowhere for me to even put my gear down much less for me to sit because NO ONE WOULD LET ME SIT DOWN finally after a few awkward minutes the engineer asked one of the entourage if he would give up his seat so I could get to work to which the guy replied "tell him to go in there"pointing to the vocal booth.At this point I started laughing and the artist finally told the dude to move.so they start playing down the track and the artist keeps asking for his vocals to be turned up,then he starts Dancing so we all kind of just watch him dance for a bit then the engineer says"ok let's get some bass going".So we start dialing in a bass sound and I start doing takes,the bassline is literally 4 notes so we mess around with placement to give it a live feel when the Girlfriend says to me;"I have never seen someone play bass sitting down before",I'm like "Ok?" then she says "you should stand up and play" So I had to ask "Why?" because it makes it seem your more into it,you never see someone sitting down at a concert"um ok this is officially weird now.The engineer and I make eye contact and he says "let's take a break" and grabs the money guy and the artist for a powow while I sit there with the entourage and the girlfriend.10 min later they come back and clear everybody out because "The Bass player can't concentrate".We knock out the 3 tunes they wanted, I get paid in cash and get a weird story to share;anybody else got weird session stories?

[Rick Auricchio]

If you broke those 556 words into separate paragraphs, it would be comprehensible.

As it is, I'm not bothering to slog through it.

[Rudreax]

tl;dr:

OP went into this really small room filled with weird people asking him weird questions while he laid down a four-note bassline for a couple tracks.

[WalterBush]

I acted as a human bongo stand, once. We couldn't find the actual bongo stand, so I just held them in place whilst the percussionist for the session hammered away.

It seemed pretty important that these tracks get done, at the time, but they ended up using samples at mixdown. Go figure.

[Craig_S]

I made a bunch 'o cash laying down tracks for a (millionaire) wanna be poet who was constantly high on ecstasy and weed and had no idea what rhythm meant in poetry. The guy was a complete space cadet. He payed a "hand selected" group of musicians to turn his poetry into songs.

[willgroove2]

Originally Posted by Rick Auricchio

If you broke those 556 words into separate paragraphs, it would be comprehensible.

As it is, I'm not bothering to slog through it.

but you bothered to comment?

[rezin]

so

did you record standing up?

[Jeff K]

Originally Posted by willgroove2

but you bothered to comment?

I can't speak for Rick, but I think he was just offering constructive criticism for future posts. He's right - paragraphs make for much easier reading. And at the risk of offending you further (which truly is not my intention), it's also a good idea to double-space between sentences. It just makes it easier to delineate the separate thoughts.

As for the session itself, you should have told "Stand-Up Girl" that she must not have ever been in a studio before. It's rather hard to find session musicians who DON'T do their thing while seated. Sounds like you kept your cool pretty well though...

[Munjibunga]

Originally Posted by Rick Auricchio

If you broke those 556 words into separate paragraphs, it would be comprehensible.

As it is, I'm not bothering to slog through it.

I slogged through it, and it was indeed weird, but handled in the end. I think I would have asked the girl if she had ever been to a session before.

[Munjibunga]

ooo. How about this: "I'm the bass player. You are hoping to be a backup singer. Why are you talking to me?"

Oh yeah ... paragraphs are good.

[willgroove2]

I was very distracted by my 1 year old when I was writing that original post,she hadn't seen daddy most of the day and was hanging on my leg sorry. I didn't stand up ,actually I thought it was funny that she said that. Later the engineer told me that the money guy had just put her through one of those motivational courses that teach you to be more assertive and that statements like that were par for the course with her. One of the reasons I'm being vague with names is because there are a lot of Chicago people on this site and you never know who knows who.

[Crazyeelboy]

Willgroove2 - I think you handled this very well. No need for confrontation and you got the gig done.

The post is a good illustration of why it is good not have extra people hanging around for recording sessions and rehearsals.

[ironrat]

you will see strange things at the end of times.....I HEAR THE VOICES....THEY TELL ME........ZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZZ

[azureblue]

But your session is typical of what happens when the producer does not control the session, and lets a bunch of idiots with mouths in the room. This doesn't happen just with small scale session, either- I had something very much like this happen to me at a big money session, except the control room was full of TV & ad company people who were all full of them selves & thought they would treat me like a peon. I'd track, then get at least three contradictory opinions, then sit there while the "experts" argued about what was to go down. But the part was basically me reading off a show tune type chart and then fluffing it up a little, per request by the producer. Whoever wrote the chart thankfully knew a good bass player could improve it, and he left room for that. The engineer got PO'd and ran everybody out but me and the producer. Just like you, then we got the work down.

Rule one in this situation: if you sense a case of too many cooks, stop tracking and ask who has the final say for approval. Then don't listen or respond to anyone else. This will take a lot of heat off of you.

Then I had one that was just the opposite: A guy and his posse, and bunch of girlfriends and the potential for a disaster. The artist asks me to play a few ideas for him, and I did. he says' man, I can't decide, I love them all- you pick. I almost hated charging him for it- it was one of the few session here I felt valued as an artist and not just as a "bass player"..

[agreatheight]

When I ran my studio for money, I had a musicians only plus manager/producer/whatever policy for tracking days. It made things go so much smoother. Mixing days were limited to band plus 3 including manager. If the group wanted an entourage they could record somewhere else.

[Wicked_Bassist7]

that's pretty funny that she thought all bass players have to stand to lay down a nice track. That's like star power

[willgroove2]

The funny thing is that i do stand up and play sometimes when I'm tracking at home by myself just to get my energy up. I actually talked to the engineer this morning and he said they dug what I did and want me to do some more stuff next week so thats good

[willgroove2]

Originally Posted by azureblue

But your session is typical of what happens when the producer does not control the session, and lets a bunch of idiots with mouths in the room. This doesn't happen just with small scale session, either- I had something very much like this happen to me at a big money session, except the control room was full of TV & ad company people who were all full of them selves & thought they would treat me like a peon. I'd track, then get at least three contradictory opinions, then sit there while the "experts" argued about what was to go down. But the part was basically me reading off a show tune type chart and then fluffing it up a little, per request by the producer. Whoever wrote the chart thankfully knew a good bass player could improve it, and he left room for that. The engineer got PO'd and ran everybody out but me and the producer. Just like you, then we got the work down.

Rule one in this situation: if you sense a case of too many cooks, stop tracking and ask who has the final say for approval. Then don't listen or respond to anyone else. This will take a lot of heat off of you.

Then I had one that was just the opposite: A guy and his posse, and bunch of girlfriends and the potential for a disaster. The artist asks me to play a few ideas for him, and I did. he says' man, I can't decide, I love them all- you pick. I almost hated charging him for it- it was one of the few session here I felt valued as an artist and not just as a "bass player"..

I have done jingle sessions like that,in fact I asked a studio owner who had just done a major cosmetic upgrade to his studio without upgrading any essential gear why he did that and he said"For the suits from the ad agencys,if I didn't they wouldn't think I was legit"

[agreatheight]

Originally Posted by Wicked_Bassist7

that's pretty funny that she thought all bass players have to stand to lay down a nice track. That's like star power

Actual lol!

[Rando McNally]

Originally Posted by willgroove2

but you bothered to comment?

How long did it take you to count the words?