How has it been working in a very music industry influenced city?
When I first moved here [Nashville], the first two years were hell cause all the clients I had in New York were like, "Well he split. I guess he doesn't want to work here anymore". And I came down here and didn't want to do country, so for two years I basically didn't work. I did a couple of little scattered things here and there. Then I got to do the Paula Cole record, and that kind of brought in other projects and a lot of traveling. I still didn't work here much, 'cause all my work was in LA. You know 8 months away out of the year? But, the saving grace was Yo La Tengo always had to come down here. They love it down here. Princes Hot Chicken and all that. [laughs]
I heard that place shut down?
Really? I don't know. They found some other soul-food truck off Charlotte Avenue. They would find places that I'd never heard of. But more and more projects since have started coming down here. And this year has been great. I really like living here. I've got two kids. It's been fantastic. I've found this studio, and besides right now this time of year [July], I dig it
Well, you've had your name attached to some of the finer albums in the indie-rock scene.
Yeah, and that's what I'd rather do personally. The Paula Cole record was cool and it's fun and exciting to see it doing so well and everything. But I made her second record and, you know, they slapped so much money at her and it was such a high expectation that this record has to be [makes big explosion sound]. And that kind of pressure makes it to where you can't perform well in the studio. Yo La Tengo, Sleater-Kinney, The Pierce Sisters (my latest record) — you try to keep the budget down. You don't have a lot of money so let's just DO a record. I prefer that. Let's just dig in and get it done.
You do a lot of your own engineering work as well.
I do. Lately though, I've been hiring an engineer. I like having the producing hands on and still stepping back to let somebody else do it.
Has it been more of a cost issue or control?
A little bit of both. And I still feel that, you know? That I can't really let the whole thing go.
You've started to dabble in the digital world as well. Why the addition of the Pro Tools set-up, and what was the progression from analog?
I will never leave analog. I won't. I will never leave it and it blew my mind when I heard that there are no more tape machines being produced. Studer ran their last production of analog tape machines. Otari does not make them anymore. There are no analog tape machines being produced right now. Then you go and you open up Mix and it's like one page after another... its digital, digital, digital. And I'm like, "What the hell is happening?" But with the whole Pro Tools thing, I would never use this as a stand- alone recorder. It's never going to be, "Okay turn on the Pro Tools and let's rock!" I've got it so that I can fly something over from analog, manipulate it, process it, flip it backwards, time stretch it, and then put it right back on tape. I've found that it just opens up a whole new palette of ink. I never overdo it, but I do a session now and if the artist says, a "I want this", or "I want that", I never have to say that we can't do that. It's like, "Great, yeah let's try it". But Pro Tools will never be my main thing. It's just that, a tool. I even went to a seminar on Pro Tools and I walked out. There's all these country guys going, "You mean I can get rid of amp noise?" you know. What the hell?
You've done a lot of work at Alex the Great and House of David, is there something there that keeps bringing you back?
I love House of David. They have this analog tape machine that they bought after the Yo La Tengo session for I Can Hear the Heart Beating as One. We did that whole record on ADATs. That's the only Yo La Tengo record that was ever recorded on ADATs. We wound up mixing to analog though. But I've done a lot of work at Alex the Great, and the greatest thing about that place is that anything you want, all the guitars, keyboard, organs, Acetones, vibes, piano... if you have an idea it's all there for you to use. The vibe is great and so is the rate. It's awesome. I wound up at House of David because Alex the Great was booked up. And that place has an API. I love APIs, and it's funky too. I like funky studios, where you feel like you can put your feet up or if an ash drops on the floor nobody's going to freak.
How do you usually start setting up? Say, with mic'ing the drums?
At House of David they had this drum set already set up, microphones placed, baffles set up, and I started tearing it all down and they flipped. Come to find out they haven't moved it in about 4 years. Like the mics even! Whenever I record Yo La Tengo it's pretty much no headphones. They can't do that. They're so used to rehearsing that way. So it's a real live situation.
How do you approach recording a band like Yo La Tengo?
We'll do it all live, sometimes with vocals that go flying in the room. And then we'll put a few things on it, put the song to bed and move on to the next one. One of the things I like about Yo La Tengo is that we never brought in people. There might have been a few guest appearances, but you know Georgia will play vibes. Georgia doesn't play vibes, but there's something beautiful about that. You don't have this guy that's just flowery on the vibes, you've got Georgia and she's just reaching for that C and is just an 8th note behind. And that's character and I love that. Spontaneous, and just flying by the seat of her pants. She's making it work somehow, but it's not pristine. In fact one time we did something really cool. I think that was the ...Heart Beating... record. We invited about 40 people toAlex the Great and set the band up, gave them monitor wedges and recorded them right in front of the people. I think we wound up using like 2 or 3 tracks from that session.
Just to get the vibe of a live show?
Yeah. Yo La Tengo is a really tense band. You know? And they work off that. If it's not tense then something's wrong. If they're having too much fun or things are going too well, then something's wrong. There always has to be a little tension. And it took me a couple of records to get into that. When I did Painful, I had no idea what was going on. I thought, "This record's going to fall apart any second", but we made it through and it was very appropriately named Painful. But since then I've realized what they go through making a record, and they realize what my thing is and it all kind of works out. But it's so cool to see that transition of recording their records.
