Kurt/Brian
I completely agree with you yet I believe that if folks are going to go out there and take a stab at making a life out of a recording studio they need to stay in tune with the cold hard facts. Customer requirments and the checkbook balance.

Some may have bean counters to keep there artistic perspective in tact but sooner or later the bean counter is going to have an opinoin that touches your juggler. They may have ruined it in the artist eyes but like any business sooner or later the party is over and captialistic forces take control.

I made a choice 20 some years ago to find a more stable job than music. I have watched the music industry from the sidelines and know why its changing. Its simple, once what you sell is a commodity its all about margin. With the availability of higher and higher quality recording equipment at cheap prices and customers satisifed lower quality end products (Compressed to shit, Mp3, Ipods, etc) your only competive advantage is cost.

My posts have gone overboard on this but it drives me nuts seeing all these people setting themselves up for failure. Maybe in the future all the recording "artists" will have a day job to pay for the awesome websites and equipment that the bottom line just can't seem to cover. Its going to be tough to make a "living" keeping up with $20 per hour rate producing respectable results - (as far as the consumer can tell with their mp3s)

That's it for me
Mark

Points can also be your best friend. When I set a price for a client (which I set my prices on a case by case basis), I think about what I would be willing to pay if I was in their shoes. Sometimes, I'll end up discussing points with them and we'll agree that for a largely discounted price, I'll get a small amount of points for every copy sold and everytime the song is played on radio (but not performance points, since I don't have anything to do with the live production). I find that 9 times out of 10, I break even after a year, and I've got a couple of lucky ones that are buying the groceries right now (not quite paying the bills yet). I almost always get a higher profit margin with points than I do by giving them "$XXXX.XX is your price". You have to look for talent though, when you go for points. For me, I just trust my gut. What I learned in the business classes I took at college tell me to never do that, never go with points. But if I get a feeling, I trust it. These are local artists in a rural area anyway, I know the market here and how they are accepted (or rejected) better than my Otari 24-track. If I don't feel that they are going to succeed in making themselves more than a mediocre profit, I set a hard price. If I feel that they are going to turnover a large profit, I'll cut the price by half (more or less depending on how strong that feeling is) and ask if we can compensate with points.

But anyway, the accountant gets paid to keep the business in business, I get paid to keep the clients coming (back) to the business.

the color of that studio gives me stress!!

i could never relax in that....

ok, hands up. Who here on this forum is looking to buy/rent studio time anyway? I thought we were all (or mostly) a group of recording/mixing/mastering engineers (or want to be) with our own studio (large or small).
I think he directed his SPAM at the wrong audience even if he had the best studio in the world.

Chuck

i have a extreamly small studio, and amount of gear. but i still prefer working here. if however we got 10k to find a 'real' studio to record in i would do that. i would expect that there where quite a few free lace producers/engineers.

and no kurt unless this is bogging the server, i think this is a good discution.

when i was in highschool studying visual art (painting animation ect...) my art teacher told me something that has stuck with me and will always stick with me. he said the
"first step in becoming a sucseful artist is, to get a real job to suport you being an artist."

it's too bad that teacher didn't teach you how to spell as well...

:oops:

frob wrote: "first step in becoming a sucseful artist is, to get a real job to suport you being an artist."

AMEN! That's why I also work nights at Wal-Mart. Stackers and Stingers (made by Stacker) are the best thing ever!

If it were up to me, I'd vote for medicinal crack, but it would never be up to me, so I guess the stuff from Stacker will have to do.

Anyway, I'd love to go to a "real" studio around here, but none of them do analog. I don't feel like hauling my Otari 100 miles one way and then back daily (I don't trust the "insurance" that these places have...). Besides, 75% of my clients have said they came to me first because of gas prices, then when they saw my small studio they had second thoughts, but when they saw the 2" and NO COMPUTER they were sold. And the small business development center here thought I should not include 2" analog tape as a potential selling point in my business plan... HA! I LAUGH IN THEIR FACES!

yodermr1 wrote: Mp3

yeah gotta remember how SMALL mp3s are. space > quality since you gotta remember the best people will be listening out of is a mid range 3 piece stereo system. usually it is either a bass/treb HEAVY computer set or shitty computer speakers. youll never tell the difference with those (unless its wayyy compressed).

My 2 cents...

I have been reading this and I have just now decided to throw something into the mix for everyone to contemplate...

Vienna sausages aren't sausages, nor are they exclusively from Vienna, Austria, so I need an explanation as to why I should bother calling them by their given name. I say they should be renamed to "Canned Meat Sticks"...

Just something to think about.

PS: What about Boston Baked Beans? Eff boston baked beans...

fool, i know you where trying to make a point but i cant for the life of me see what that is.

and freelight mabey my problem is that an ART teacher did teach me for to spell, lysdexia is a bitch.

cleamon wrote: ok, hands up. Who here on this forum is looking to buy/rent studio time anyway? I thought we were all (or mostly) a group of recording/mixing/mastering engineers (or want to be) with our own studio (large or small).
I think he directed his SPAM at the wrong audience even if he had the best studio in the world.

Chuck

true story. I wonder if the originator has come back to see the mess he made :D

freelight wrote: it's too bad that teacher didn't teach you how to spell as well...

:oops:

you're not a nice man!