0:00

It doesn't matter how much you've spent

0:02

on the room if the position is

0:04

wrong. It doesn't matter how much you've

0:06

spent on your speakers if the position

0:08

in Rome. The easiest, cheapest thing you

0:10

can do to walk towards your goals

0:13

of a room in which it's easy

0:15

to make decisions and decisions translate is

0:17

position your speakers where they should god

0:19

damn should be and position yourself where

0:21

you then therefore have to be. That's

0:23

like 80% of the work. Welcome to

0:26

Bobby Osinsky's inner circle. I'm Bobby Osinsky

0:28

and this is a show all

0:30

about music, music production and the

0:32

music business. My guest today's

0:34

acoustician and studio designer Hush

0:36

Paws. Hush's company Sense and Sound

0:38

offers an exclusive studio in a

0:41

day service where the design, install

0:43

and calibrate your studio acoustics in

0:45

just one day. Among many clients that

0:48

have utilized this service include

0:50

mixer DJ Swivel, film composer

0:52

Sam Ewing, producer, producer Mike Woods, and

0:54

video game audio game audio. Hush

0:56

has also designed his own unique

0:58

acoustic panels as well as smart

1:00

legs for super simple installation. During

1:02

the interview we talked about how

1:04

studio in a day works, why

1:06

speaker placement in a room is so

1:08

important, how cable degradation

1:11

influences a sound, how he

1:13

developed his acoustic panels and much

1:15

more. I spoke with Hush from a studio

1:17

in Los Angeles. Let's start here

1:19

then. I think everybody wants to

1:21

know about the one, the studio

1:23

in a day. The general idea

1:25

started when I decided to piece

1:27

together a company and Acoustics is

1:29

when one of the directions I

1:31

went through, I won't go into

1:34

the back end at this point because

1:36

you're asking about studio today.

1:38

And I was just asking

1:40

myself, what would it look like

1:42

if this were easy? How could I

1:45

simplify the 10,000 hour headache and

1:47

100,000 decisions that go

1:49

into a project of assembling

1:51

a studio? That's the biggest pain

1:53

point both for the designer and for

1:55

the for the person who just wants

1:58

a studio and so as I said

2:00

what? look like if it were

2:02

easy and the answer to that

2:04

was always just like well it's

2:06

just there and there right there

2:08

in the same day right it

2:10

has to if you're if it's

2:12

in your room and you're like

2:14

this or this you'll go I

2:16

want that if you have to

2:19

read about it understand what they

2:21

mean visualize it imagine it and

2:23

then make a decision for every

2:25

decision then you know it's there's

2:27

now a varying degree of headache

2:29

that this is for the consumer

2:31

So I just like, okay, well,

2:33

the easiest form of studio design

2:35

is if it happens in your

2:37

home on the day, you know,

2:39

all decisions made for you, your

2:41

hand held as you walked through

2:43

the decisions for an easy buying

2:45

experience, but forget buying for an

2:48

easy decision-making experience for your needs.

2:50

And then I just reversed engineered

2:52

the entire company from there to

2:54

be able to do that. And

2:56

so the premise of it is,

2:58

you know, try before you buy.

3:00

It's... Instead of reading about things

3:02

and understanding and figuring out what

3:04

you need and consulting and getting

3:06

quotes and then revising the quotes

3:08

and then figuring out what the

3:10

fabric you need is because you're

3:12

ordering the thing they have to

3:14

make it, we show up with

3:16

the systems that's relevant for your

3:19

room, we bring it in, we

3:21

do a core speaker placement, we

3:23

demo the if needed, half the

3:25

times the clients are like, do

3:27

what you think, and then we

3:29

just get to it. But if

3:31

the client wants to hear and

3:33

make decisions, then... We demo we

3:35

set it up for them with

3:37

a core speaker placement say this

3:39

sounds like this and the panels

3:41

are over here and they look

3:43

this way and then the client

3:45

goes okay yeah good or okay

3:48

and how much is that it's

3:50

10 grand and they're like okay

3:52

what can we knock off out

3:54

of here and then I'll go

3:56

well the lowest priority panels are

3:58

these out out and then the

4:00

client goes well I didn't really

4:02

care about that difference so that's

4:04

fine and then Okay great what's

4:06

the next thing okay next panel

4:08

I'll remove is that one and

4:10

then we take that out and

4:12

the kind goes no no no

4:14

put that one back and then

4:16

and then you're making decisions with

4:19

certainty and you're making them there

4:21

on a stop on the spot

4:23

they're not tasking for you. And

4:25

then we agree with what we

4:27

want. The client says, fine, this

4:29

is what I'm getting. We commit

4:31

it to the wall, you know,

4:33

install it on the wall if

4:35

they want. If it's on legs,

4:37

it's on legs. And then we

4:39

get to, well, what fabrics do

4:41

you want? And then I essentially

4:43

pushed the fabric decision to the

4:45

end so that to remove it

4:48

from the manufacturing process. And the

4:50

way we did that is we

4:52

just created Vel. and you're not

4:54

dealing with the visuals at all,

4:56

you're just dealing with the sound,

4:58

the design, the objects, where they

5:00

stand, functionality. And then at the

5:02

end I go, if I could

5:04

put up an Arabic accent, I

5:06

would, but I can't, you know,

5:08

which fabrics do you want? And

5:10

usually I actually leave them for

5:12

a week with it because it

5:14

takes a while for, it's the

5:16

hardest decision for people to make

5:19

what they want the thing to

5:21

look. And then they tell us

5:23

and we order it, and we

5:25

order it, and we order it.

5:27

And in the meantime, I'm finishing

5:29

the speaker calibration. And collecting any

5:31

sort of details about other things

5:33

that need to do, need to

5:35

happen, or custom things that maybe

5:37

can't be done on the day,

5:39

and give the keys back to

5:41

the user and leave. Now, obviously

5:43

we're just talking about acoustic treatment

5:45

and not isolation. So what happens

5:48

with someone that wants isolation? Isolation

5:50

is not done in a day.

5:52

Isolation is construction. Isolation is highly

5:54

case specific assessments, whether it's the

5:56

case of what's the structure you're

5:58

starting with, to the case of

6:00

what are your actual needs. You

6:02

know, one guy with maybe very

6:04

base heavy speakers has one needs,

6:06

a drummer has a very different

6:08

need, and they don't have, I

6:10

wouldn't make the same decisions for

6:12

these two cases. It's just a

6:14

highly custom. advisory and design oriented

6:16

service and then a contractor is

6:19

needed to I am not a

6:21

contractor. I'm not legally allowed to

6:23

build anything, walls that is. And

6:25

now you're dealing with a third

6:27

party. I really try to stay

6:29

away from construction is better than

6:31

the plague apparently. But you know,

6:33

when construction is needed, it's needed.

6:35

Okay, so a lot of clients,

6:37

they'll have a bedroom or something

6:39

that's less than ideal to start

6:41

with. There'll be windows, like in

6:43

my room for instance, there's windows,

6:45

or there's doors or closets or

6:48

Suboptimal. So what do you do

6:50

then? I make the decisions as

6:52

best for the geometry. Sound is

6:54

a geometric function. And acoustics, or

6:56

the way I run this company,

6:58

or the way we kind of

7:00

are able to make such fast

7:02

decisions in a day, where your

7:04

picture froze, there we go, is

7:06

that I formalized positioning scheme. and

7:08

I've formalized kind of classes of

7:10

decisions for given cases. So there'll

7:12

be a custom case with a

7:14

weird shape or a closet somewhere.

7:17

Yeah, I'll need to be creative

7:19

in that decision and that's what

7:21

I'm there for. The rest of

7:23

the times it's like, well, speakers

7:25

need to be here. The geometry

7:27

of the room dictates the speakers

7:29

are going to be here. It

7:31

might be a little there, but

7:33

it's disorientation. That means we need

7:35

panels here and here and here

7:37

and here and the panels are...

7:39

The panel positions are I the

7:41

vitamin to three cases. You have

7:43

base balancing positions. You have modal

7:45

balancing the modal behavior of the

7:48

room. And then you have early

7:50

reflections or first reflections, if you

7:52

want to call them, positions. And

7:54

each of them have a function

7:56

that they serve. They somewhat overlap.

7:58

But based on this hierarchy of

8:00

classification, I can prioritize the decision

8:02

making. and go, okay, well, because

8:04

of the closet there, you know,

8:06

the only potential... for actual symmetry

8:08

in the room is going to

8:10

have to be here. And so

8:12

let's take the closet doors off

8:14

and now it's a strange shape

8:17

acoustically, but the reflection is really

8:19

only seeing the back of the

8:21

closet, etc., etc. etc. and kind

8:23

of look for the most ideal

8:25

decisions that would lead to the

8:27

most symmetrical shape with the best

8:29

response I can envision happening in

8:31

this room as the client's needs

8:33

dictate. And if the client's needs

8:35

are beyond what the room will

8:37

provide, I will then advise them.

8:39

this, you know, the best we

8:41

can do in this room is

8:43

probably under your needs. We should

8:45

look for a different room. If

8:48

that's the answer, that's the answer.

8:50

I know that and I see

8:52

it with my followers, my subscribers

8:54

that they have a room that's

8:56

basically put a workstation in a

8:58

couple of speakers and the placement

9:00

of everything is less than ideal

9:02

and I I'm telling him, look

9:04

at the very least, come out

9:06

from the wall and also be

9:08

equidistant from each wall if you

9:10

can, and push back, I'll get

9:12

sometimes, is, yeah, but this is

9:14

the only place I can put

9:17

it. Do you run into that?

9:19

I do, I disarm that very

9:21

quickly. I'd say any room I

9:23

walk into, whatever the caliber, could

9:25

be a mega corporation, doing, exporting,

9:27

you know, post-production production for Netflix.

9:29

It could be some guy in

9:31

his bedroom, it could be a

9:33

major studio. 80% of them, position

9:35

is wrong. Just wrong. It doesn't

9:37

matter how much you've spent on

9:39

the room, if the position is

9:41

wrong. It doesn't matter how much

9:43

you spent on your speakers, if

9:45

the position is position in Rome.

9:48

The easiest, cheapest thing you can

9:50

do to walk towards your goals

9:52

of a room in which it's

9:54

easy to make decisions and decisions

9:56

translate, is position your speakers where

9:58

they should be. and position yourself

10:00

where you then therefore have to

10:02

be. That's like 80% of the

10:04

work and you're $13,000. speakers are

10:06

absolutely meaningless in the wrong place,

10:08

they'll sound nice, they'll still be

10:10

very impressive, but they won't translate.

10:12

And so it's just having the

10:14

authority of a studio designer, I

10:17

find that people don't argue with

10:19

me unless it's important to them

10:21

over the results in which case

10:23

that's fine, that's the correct decision

10:25

for their needs. If they're like,

10:27

I will sacrifice these bunch of

10:29

poles in the base and the

10:31

wrong panning image. and the fact

10:33

that the balance of the midst

10:35

to the sides is going to

10:37

be wrong, because I need the

10:39

space for creatives. And what we're

10:41

really focusing here is, you know,

10:43

musical decisions and writing, and if

10:45

that stuff is not quite up

10:48

to par, not as crucial, like

10:50

that's what that room needs. I

10:52

just find I don't really get

10:54

off and called to those rooms,

10:56

because I'm not, unless it's a

10:58

friend and they just want a

11:00

word. But if I'm paid to

11:02

provide an opinion, usually somebody wants

11:04

the room to translate. Yeah, that

11:06

makes sense. Okay, let's talk about

11:08

speakers and do you recommend certain

11:10

speakers or does it matter to

11:12

you? I found that I've had

11:14

to update my opinions of speakers

11:17

throughout and I essentially find out

11:19

that I can't really bear much

11:21

of an opinion about a speaker

11:23

until I've got to place it

11:25

in the room. And so when

11:27

I go into a room and

11:29

then there's whatever speakers that the

11:31

customer has, and now I'm placing

11:33

the speaker, I'm doing speaker placement

11:35

and I put them here and

11:37

I move them there and they

11:39

move around a bit, I get

11:41

the averaging of the differences and

11:43

I'm able to put to one

11:45

side the difference, which is now

11:48

the room, and be left with

11:50

the speaker's actual response and actually

11:52

have an opinion about the speaker.

11:54

And I also get to, it

11:56

gives me an opportunity to see.

11:58

how the speakers dispersion interacts with

12:00

the room as you move it

12:02

in different places. More so if

12:04

I get to... place the same

12:06

speaker in different kind of rooms,

12:08

just as some of the speakers

12:10

repeat. Only then can I really

12:12

bear witness to what I think

12:14

about this speaker, and any opinion

12:17

I had before is just thrown

12:19

out the window immediately. And I

12:21

had the same experience for microphones,

12:23

as I felt I had a

12:25

strong opinion about this or that,

12:27

and then I discovered cable degradation,

12:29

which was invisible to me. and

12:31

mapped it out as part of

12:33

my attempt to formulize the fidelity

12:35

formula, everything that contributes to the

12:37

resulting sound. So I can actually

12:39

say, well, you know, these are

12:41

the factors. And then I discovered,

12:43

oh, I have no idea what

12:46

a Royer ribbon sounds, which before

12:48

I hated, thought it was awful,

12:50

didn't understand what the hype was

12:52

about. Like, oh yeah, but the

12:54

studio I had at the time

12:56

in London had just got awful

12:58

cables and a stutter console with

13:00

caps that... Couldn't be replaced sooner

13:02

and so in my opinion is

13:04

irrelevant. You know that I did

13:06

not hear the microphone And so

13:08

it's the same with speakers and

13:10

I have found That the differences

13:12

between speakers are shockingly smaller than

13:14

one one might think Generally if

13:17

you're buying a pro monitor Pro

13:19

audio level monitor these days you

13:21

can expect to get something within

13:23

the range of your expense You're

13:25

buying a thousand dollar-ish range pair

13:27

of monitors They'll be, there's betters

13:29

and worse, sure. None of them

13:31

suck. It's like, I used to

13:33

think rockets are not great. And

13:35

then I did a tiny ass

13:37

surround room for someone and had

13:39

a pair of rocket fives and

13:41

we placed them. And I'm like,

13:43

these things go down to 40.

13:46

The mid range resolution is consistent.

13:48

The trebbles nice, this is great!

13:50

I was completely surprised. This is

13:52

$150 speakers. Obviously it doesn't sound

13:54

like, you know, ATC 45s, but

13:56

placed correctly with the acoustics down,

13:58

I'm like, this room is now

14:00

easy. make decisions in, they would

14:02

translate, I still think you need a

14:04

sub, but if you didn't have a

14:06

sub, you could still work. And so

14:09

I would say more often than

14:11

not speakers are good. And the

14:13

differences between them from

14:15

a practical perspective of

14:18

what is practically contributing

14:20

to your ability to

14:22

do your job is a smaller

14:24

difference, like almost insignificant

14:27

difference compared to position and

14:29

acoustic response and room shape to

14:32

begin with even if the room

14:34

was naked just you can lose

14:36

with the wrong room shape or

14:38

win with the right room shape. That is

14:40

not to say, I love ATC's, I love

14:42

the new series of the PMC's and the

14:44

Ivy One S's, I just got to place

14:46

Dutch and Dutch for the first time, that

14:48

was an experience. There's

14:50

speakers I don't like. I'll not

14:52

mention them right now. There speakers

14:55

I literally hate. And that's more

14:57

to do with their functional

14:59

dispersion than anything else. But all

15:01

of them are workable. And there's

15:04

also surprising things like Cali

15:06

audio speakers, which are like

15:08

$400, and then, you know, two

15:10

three-way tops with a sub set you

15:12

back $1,300, and it's a very light

15:14

speaker, so if you fasten it to

15:16

the stand or put some stones on

15:18

it or whatever, just to add some

15:21

mass. It's shocking resolution for the

15:23

price point. It's it's I kind

15:25

of try to identify within each

15:27

price range who the stars are

15:29

and then that's what I keep

15:31

sending people to so in

15:34

the thousand-ish range of expense

15:36

like Cali audios to me

15:38

is beating beating things it doesn't

15:40

have some speakers have a more

15:42

luscious feel but I will take

15:45

a more consistent resolution across

15:47

the frequency range and

15:49

dynamic range Even if the

15:51

feel of the speaker is less

15:54

luscious over something that the mid

15:56

sound soft and luscious or whatever

15:58

but like the the and the mids

16:01

are different and the subs and

16:03

the mids are different or whatever

16:05

and then there's an inconsistency in

16:07

the in the way the speaker

16:09

spits out sound and I find

16:12

like I'd rather have a speaker

16:14

that doesn't feel quite as good

16:16

but just is just more consistent

16:18

and correct. So I would say

16:20

Kali audio in the thousand dollar

16:23

range is a is a wild

16:25

west of options and it's very

16:27

much a taste thing the character

16:29

of the sound the Each speaker

16:31

having its advantages, maintainability or durability

16:34

of the speaker. You know, you've

16:36

got speakers that are, the designed

16:38

are more to do with how

16:40

can you use the tool you

16:42

have more than, and if you

16:45

know it, use the tool you

16:47

have, more than anything, like, um,

16:49

amphibians. Amphians are a simple design.

16:51

There's no limiter. It's a passive

16:53

thing. It's... whatever you signal you

16:56

send to that speaker it's moving

16:58

according to that speaker and that's

17:00

dangerous because you have to know

17:02

how to use this tool it's

17:04

very easy to push that speaker

17:07

into compression and it won't tell

17:09

you you won't know the the

17:11

amp isn't protecting against it and

17:13

so if you don't know how

17:15

to use this tool you will

17:18

it will affect your translation, it

17:20

will make you make incorrect decisions

17:22

and the speaker didn't do anything

17:24

wrong, it's the user case. You

17:26

can't do that as easily with

17:29

an active speaker with limiters on

17:31

like the thing behind me or

17:33

most speakers really. So I say

17:35

in that range of, in the

17:37

1,000 to 8,000 dollar range of

17:40

expense you have a wild list

17:42

of options that is hard to

17:44

each have their own case, the

17:46

coactual designs of the ones by

17:48

Genelic. which as a point source

17:51

are really useful in a spatial

17:53

configuration. They do have a lot

17:55

of benefits from, it's just an

17:57

impressive speaker, but I've also found,

17:59

you know, putting mechanical statu- to

18:02

one side, I found it slightly

18:04

strange to work on having had

18:06

to mix on them in different

18:08

places. There's something I'm not a

18:10

huge fan about in this speaker.

18:13

It just hits a certain way.

18:15

There's something in the dynamics of

18:17

it, in the punch of it,

18:19

and I can't quite put my

18:21

finger on it. And my customers

18:24

who have this have no complaints.

18:26

They like the speaker, their work

18:28

translates. That's all you need to

18:30

know. That's just my personal preference.

18:32

It doesn't have the softness of

18:35

an ETC of an ETC. Great.

18:37

I can. masturbate to that as

18:39

much as I want. It doesn't

18:41

functionally mean anything. In the above

18:43

8,000 range, it's hard to go

18:46

wrong. Things don't stay around in

18:48

that market if no one's buying.

18:50

And you know, there's speakers I

18:52

don't like and they'll recommend, but

18:54

I don't think any of them

18:57

suck. Yeah, yeah, I get it.

18:59

Okay, I use anthions, by the

19:01

way. So there you go. Do

19:03

you have the larger ones or

19:05

the smaller ones? No, I have

19:08

the one 18s. The one 18s

19:10

with the sub? No, no sub.

19:12

I'm in a small room. And

19:14

you're not, you're not going too

19:16

loud. No, no, not at all.

19:19

But that being said, what's your

19:21

take on speaker cable for passive

19:23

speakers? Well, cables in general is,

19:25

let's call this the category of

19:27

degradation. It's probably the... is one

19:30

of the latest things I ended

19:32

up learning or mapping out. And

19:34

I wish I had mapped it

19:36

out sooner. I might have saved

19:38

myself a lot of headaches in

19:41

my, you know, production career, engineering

19:43

career. But I pay a lot

19:45

of attention at now. It's a

19:47

fast case-specific circumstance. degradation, but it's

19:49

in everything. It's in power, it's

19:52

in line level cables, it's in

19:54

mic level cables, it's in guitar

19:56

level, instrument level, it's in speaker

19:58

or headphone level cables, you know,

20:00

paying attention to degradation and design.

20:03

it to minimize it in your

20:05

system, you're winning so much. And

20:07

I found also that, you know,

20:09

we're in this, I guess we're

20:11

past the age of compression to

20:14

some extent, having backed off a

20:16

bit from the peak compression era.

20:18

But, you know, modern music loves

20:20

compression, and I have found that

20:22

a lot of compression is compensating

20:25

for degradation caused in somewhere in

20:27

the chain, probably in... you know,

20:29

serial sets of cables, that is,

20:31

one form of degradation that happens

20:33

in cables is that it, a

20:36

resonance is, very sharp resonance, is

20:38

accumulate in different places and they're

20:40

not musically correlated, they're just here,

20:42

here, here, here, here, here, here,

20:44

here. And so energy around that

20:47

tends to activate the resonance and

20:49

get stolen into it and create

20:51

an inconsistency in response between one

20:53

node or another or one range

20:55

of frequencies in another. and it

20:58

may be in the treble, a

21:00

lot of, instead of the treble

21:02

being easily spursed out, it concentrates

21:04

around 9K for some reason. It's

21:06

sharp resonance, it's too sharp for,

21:09

our hearing doesn't work that way,

21:11

it averages it out, but the

21:13

energy still gets altered, gets modified

21:15

from how it was, and then

21:17

you're like, oh, I'm not getting

21:19

the impact I need, and so

21:22

you're trying to compress it. If

21:24

you eliminate a lot of degradation,

21:26

oftentimes the signal as it was,

21:28

is good. And you're like, yeah,

21:30

fate it up, good, yeah, a

21:33

little bit of this, a little

21:35

bit of that, and you move

21:37

on. Speaker cables are the lowest,

21:39

are the place where it has

21:41

the smallest amount of potential to

21:44

happen. Every degradation that I've observed

21:46

with my ears in one project

21:48

or another on speaker cables was

21:50

definitely the smallest modification out of

21:52

all cables. But it's there. and

21:55

it's there the longer the run

21:57

the longer it's there from there

21:59

on it's also a matching of

22:01

you know the the the load

22:03

that it's attached to and the

22:06

amplifier it's coming to. So some

22:08

circumstances would prefer one cable, some

22:10

would wearing with another. A lot

22:12

of this from the cable manufacturers,

22:14

they treat it as voicing, they

22:17

treat it as taste more than

22:19

this is more correct, that is

22:21

less correct. That being said, there's

22:23

things that I would say are

22:25

technically less correct. It's all about

22:28

materials, surround materials, surprisingly not more

22:30

than the conductor. as I've found,

22:32

alter the behavior of the sound.

22:34

More than that I can't say,

22:36

it's too vague and random in

22:39

black magic. It's taking me, working

22:41

along a cable manufacturer named Ken

22:43

Gores, who's kind of introduced me

22:45

to cable degradation and with whom

22:47

I've researched a lot of this.

22:50

So it's taking me just trial

22:52

and error, hands-on experience and listening

22:54

tests, blind listening tests. done in

22:56

the most boring fashion to start

22:58

and map out what's the contributory

23:01

component that cables are doing. And

23:03

I didn't do enough about passive

23:05

speaker cables to have enough of

23:07

a concrete opinion to say that's

23:09

the cable and you want this

23:12

in this case. So I don't

23:14

want to say, I don't want

23:16

to talk out of my ass.

23:18

But I have found that the

23:20

PVC or surrounding materials of the

23:23

cable seem to affect the ability

23:25

of the electricity to flow. across

23:27

time, it affects the slurate, it

23:29

affects differently across different dynamics of

23:31

energy levels. And one, I can

23:34

tell you, one material can goer

23:36

specifically, absolutely detests, is PVC. Hi,

23:38

I'm Bobby Osinsky, and I'm a

23:40

best-selling author of several books on

23:42

recording, mixing, and mastering that are

23:45

considered the gold standard by many.

23:47

I recently created a new resource

23:49

for songwriters, artists, bands, and producers,

23:51

and anyone looking to fix common

23:53

mixing problems so they can get

23:56

a better result, stop wasting... time

23:58

experimenting and not get buried in

24:00

information overload. I'm calling it the

24:02

Mix Fix Playbook. 15 quick solutions

24:04

to common mix problems. These fixes

24:07

are well known among top mixing

24:09

pros, but you probably never knew

24:11

they existed. If you're looking to

24:13

create mixes to stand up to

24:15

what you hear on the radio,

24:18

Spotify, or TV, go to go.bobbiosinsky.com,

24:20

slash Mix Fix, to check it

24:22

out now. All right, get it,

24:24

I got it. Give me some

24:26

of your background. Tell me how

24:29

you developed into a studio designer.

24:31

Well I came into recording and

24:33

engineering. I was a pianist, a

24:35

little musician, you know, a teenager

24:37

kid, drawn to music, always very

24:40

technical, you know, took my dad's

24:42

stereo part, whatever, didn't piece it

24:44

back together. I was in Israel,

24:46

I'm from Israel originally, and at

24:48

the time, this is 2003, this

24:51

is just the beginning of the

24:53

oprise of the pro-consumer accessible interfaces

24:55

and, you know, Q-base 2. My

24:57

dad was a computer guy, so

24:59

he assembled computers in the house

25:02

from parts, and I had a

25:04

little 10 by 10 room with,

25:06

you know, carpets and egg cartons

25:08

on the wall. and two PA

25:10

speakers and a Beringer, uh, Mx-A,

25:13

uh, 8,000 that I bought from

25:15

Morappelbaum, if you know who that

25:17

is. Yeah, we do, yeah. Yeah,

25:19

so back in the day. And

25:21

I would record bands in there

25:24

and, and I kind of pieced

25:26

it together as a rehearsal studio

25:28

for some punk band I was

25:30

in and then suddenly I can

25:32

record and I had, you know,

25:35

four channels to record in. And

25:37

so I would record the band

25:39

live live into two and the

25:41

drums into two. And then, you

25:43

know, do the vocals after, like

25:46

a half-life circumstance. And suddenly I'm

25:48

in business. I did it for

25:50

my song one time and I

25:52

couldn't play everything quite well enough

25:54

and so I got other musicians

25:57

to replace my parts and then

25:59

they brought their bands and then

26:01

they brought there and suddenly I'm

26:03

in business and I didn't know

26:05

it at the time but it

26:08

was just me and maybe one

26:10

other guy in our town that

26:12

really had this circumstance with audio

26:14

interface and set up and so

26:16

I found myself. diving more and

26:19

more into sound and production and

26:21

you know had a crew of

26:23

musicians developed around me and they

26:25

bring their projects and and it

26:27

soared from there then I built

26:30

a second studio as as we

26:32

moved which was a larger facility

26:34

we had a control room a

26:36

live room and a dead room

26:38

and and the bomb shelter which

26:41

every house has in Israel was

26:43

the you know the amp room

26:45

and it was convenient and I

26:47

ran that for a couple years

26:49

I was an audio engineer in

26:52

the army. doing live sound. And

26:54

then, and I was kind of

26:56

just teaching myself, at this area

26:58

there wasn't, YouTube was around at

27:00

some point for this, but there

27:03

wasn't anything on it. You know,

27:05

I would try to search for

27:07

information. I didn't know about your

27:09

book about, until university. But I

27:11

couldn't find anything, so I'd had

27:14

to come up with experiments, conduct

27:16

them, learn something next. That was

27:18

kind of all the way up

27:20

to 2009. And then in 2009

27:22

I decided it was after the

27:25

army, I don't know how to

27:27

be better from here. Like I

27:29

don't know how to learn this

27:31

anymore. I need to go and

27:33

learn the actual fundamentals. And so

27:36

I took it apart, sold it

27:38

for parts, moved to England. In

27:40

England I did the Tonmice course,

27:42

if you know of it. Oh

27:44

yeah. And so I was there

27:47

interested in the theory. Everyone was

27:49

there interested in the hands-on. I'm

27:51

like, I don't care about the

27:53

hands-on. I want to know how

27:55

this works. So I'm, you know,

27:58

front row asking questions and and

28:00

So I did that course, I

28:02

focused, I was really interested in

28:04

acoustics because I've kind of built

28:06

two spaces by now and seems,

28:09

I guess I have spatial intelligence

28:11

and so I relate to space

28:13

a lot. And so in my

28:15

first rooms, you know, I would

28:17

drag stuff from the street and

28:20

just put it in the room,

28:22

this mattress or whatever. In England,

28:24

when I moved, I constantly moved

28:26

houses, I had to set up

28:28

a new room every time. I

28:31

had clients, I was already working.

28:33

I found myself as an engineer

28:35

in this studio or that studio

28:37

and I was trying to, at

28:39

some point, at the placement year

28:42

I was working at Dean Street

28:44

Studios out there until I got

28:46

fired. And then I found myself

28:48

with eight months left on my

28:50

placement here and I don't know

28:53

what to do myself. I was

28:55

living in London now waiting to

28:57

go back to the, to finish

28:59

the course. And so I thought,

29:01

okay, what's my weakest point? It's

29:04

mixing. So let's dedicate eight months

29:06

to learning how to mix. And

29:08

so I bought your book. and

29:10

I bought mixing with your mind

29:12

and one other that I don't

29:15

remember now and read anything I

29:17

could about mixing and engineering at

29:19

that time and took on, give

29:21

me projects, everyone gave me projects,

29:23

it kind of serendipously already arrived

29:26

and I just sat there to

29:28

establish my mixing philosophy, a lot

29:30

of which borrows from your book

29:32

and from the that... that meditation

29:34

list in mixing with your mind

29:37

and sat there for a month

29:39

to do that and was absolutely

29:41

astounded at how much when I

29:43

returned to university and went back

29:45

into recording how that completely changed

29:48

my approach as a recording engineer

29:50

made everything just work from the

29:52

start but As I moved back

29:54

to London, I'm just constantly moving

29:56

houses, building another spot for myself

29:59

to work in, another house, another

30:01

spot, another spot, helping that friend.

30:03

I was the guy who does

30:05

this. and so the people can

30:07

ask me questions. I tried to

30:10

suck as much information as I

30:12

could from the acoustics at the

30:14

Tom Eister course, but it's really

30:16

set for a certain level. I

30:18

read as much as I could

30:21

on papers on that. All of

30:23

that is very dry information. I

30:25

was trying to focus on my

30:27

engineering career. I was renting out

30:29

a studio later and back in

30:32

London, you know, producing bands recording

30:34

there. The one with the terrible

30:36

stooter that needed it. caps and

30:38

bad cables. That empty room at

30:40

some point, I just again went

30:43

to the street, dragged the homage

30:45

to create the fusion and it

30:47

was next to garages and had

30:49

them install wooden flooring which creaked,

30:51

which was a bad decision. But

30:54

it was all coming, you know,

30:56

I was working at small house

30:58

studios there and I wanted to

31:00

modify the acoustic one of the

31:02

rooms there. I was not quite

31:05

yet aware of speaker placement. which

31:07

I wish I did. I did

31:09

not know it at the time,

31:11

but the monitors I were using

31:13

were towards dying, and they had

31:16

moved a couple countries now, and

31:18

their base response was off, and

31:20

the surround was starting to come

31:22

off of one of the speakers,

31:24

which I didn't notice until I

31:27

moved to the states. And the

31:29

last room I had there was

31:31

terrible, which I understand now is

31:33

the geometry of it was terrible.

31:35

But I didn't understand that then.

31:38

I could not find where to

31:40

put the speakers. I could not

31:42

do anything to make that room

31:44

easy to work in. It was

31:46

the worst kind of room. It

31:49

was hard to make decisions in.

31:51

And finally, when you make the

31:53

decisions, it doesn't even translate. Every

31:55

mix took two weeks. And it

31:57

had a huge negative impact on

32:00

my career as a producer, as

32:02

someone's trying to make projects at

32:04

the door, you know. And then

32:06

my visa ran out. By that

32:08

point, I had extended it as

32:11

an entrepreneur visa. As an entrepreneur

32:13

visa. But it ran out. and

32:15

my green card for the states,

32:17

which I was working on for

32:19

like a decade, had opened up,

32:22

and they kind of tell you,

32:24

you know, come to the states

32:26

or go away, you have six

32:28

months. And so I did move

32:30

to LA without a plan in

32:33

a dead decade, industry-wise, didn't really

32:35

find myself, you know, I worked

32:37

a little bit here and there,

32:39

didn't really find myself, I didn't

32:41

have a mixing suite for the

32:44

first year and so I lost

32:46

all the clients that I had.

32:48

They had to find a different

32:50

arrangement. And so I was stuck

32:52

in Norland. And I had a

32:55

lot of sound skills to monetize

32:57

life engineering, whatever else. I went

32:59

on tours at some point. I

33:01

was a house engineer in the

33:03

Peppermint Club, whatever, different things like

33:06

that. I didn't quite find myself.

33:08

What I did very much notice

33:10

is the difference between my business

33:12

acumen and the average American musicians

33:14

business acumen. Americans are very business

33:17

oriented. And I think I lived

33:19

here in this room at some

33:21

point with a guy who was

33:23

a manager at TDE, Kendrick Lamar's

33:25

label, and like I could barely

33:28

participate in the conversation. I just

33:30

didn't know. I didn't know enough.

33:32

I was too focused on content

33:34

creation. And so I decided I

33:36

need to understand business and money.

33:39

I need to figure that out

33:41

and I decided, okay, I guess

33:43

I'm going to start a business.

33:45

I got tired of artists and

33:47

inconsistency of the music industry just

33:50

because of my own path and

33:52

decided to open a business as

33:54

I'm still working with an engineering.

33:56

At some point I was looking

33:58

for what is this business going

34:01

to be. And... I was on

34:03

tour and I was doing this

34:05

and then I went to an

34:07

acoustics lecture just because this is

34:09

something I'm interested in. And I

34:12

met Ken Gorse there and Bruce

34:14

Black who are both acousticians. I

34:16

would later come and attend the

34:18

Sapphire group if you know what

34:20

that is. Sure. Yeah. So I

34:23

am now a member. So I

34:25

attended the Sapphire group and hung

34:27

out there and started getting work

34:29

as hands, I guess, another able

34:31

body in the studio installations and...

34:34

acoustics field found it absolutely intuitive

34:36

for myself whether I'm just the

34:38

hands for you know for someone

34:40

building it in the garage because

34:42

acoustics is you know you have

34:45

to build it somewhere and most

34:47

acousticians are somewhat older or if

34:49

it's installing an atmos speaker system

34:51

for a Nickelodeon studio and you

34:53

know asking them okay what's the

34:56

tolerance of the positioning? Like what

34:58

do you mean? Where do you,

35:00

how accurate do you want me

35:02

to put the speaker in space

35:04

relative to the spec? Like I

35:07

don't know what you're asking me.

35:09

Should it be one cubic inch,

35:11

one cubic foot? Like one cubic

35:13

inch. Okay, so this calculated how

35:15

to position 22 speakers in a

35:18

non-strate space within one cubic inch

35:20

accuracy. And so I found that

35:22

this was a hungry field. where

35:24

there's a lot of need but

35:26

not a lot of supply. And

35:29

a friend was moving from London

35:31

to here and he's like, I

35:33

bought a house, I need someone

35:35

to look at it, I need

35:37

to put a studio to there,

35:40

he's a composer, a film composer,

35:42

can you go look? Sure. I

35:44

went look, can you piece together

35:46

a plan for me? Sure. And

35:48

so I'm scouring all the available

35:51

acoustic products, coming over the plan,

35:53

implementing the plan, great. Someone else

35:55

here said, hey, I heard you

35:57

just did. Can you do that?

35:59

Yeah, sure. And then another person,

36:02

another person, and... I think there's

36:04

like one holy rule in America,

36:06

which is thou shalt not argue

36:08

with supply and demand. And so

36:10

I gave it a name and

36:13

said, okay, I think I found

36:15

the business I'm going to do.

36:17

And I focused on that. And

36:19

as I'm asking myself, you know,

36:21

sitting in traffic in LA, what's

36:24

the thing I'm going to create?

36:26

How do I solve a problem

36:28

that someone hasn't solved? It just

36:30

kept coming back around to... how

36:32

the available products on the market

36:35

weren't doing the thing that I

36:37

need them to do. They weren't

36:39

quite shaped for what I have

36:41

kept finding that I'm orienting towards

36:43

in my designs. I learned a

36:46

lot from Ken Gores implementing his

36:48

designs. In starting to build panels,

36:50

I was using his garage. I

36:52

also found, I started discovering things

36:54

like... This is the thing that

36:57

helped me get into the software

36:59

group is I discovered 703 sheets

37:01

resonate. And so if you just

37:03

put them there, they resonate. They

37:05

have a sound. And if you

37:08

cut them up, because it's a

37:10

membrane, if you cut them up,

37:12

they don't resonate. And it changes

37:14

the sound of the absorption. is

37:16

in line for me. I wrote

37:19

my technical project on drum tuning

37:21

mechanics. So I extensively researched membranes

37:23

and membrane behavior and radiance. And

37:25

so I guess that, you know,

37:27

it kind of preloaded my brain

37:30

to that way of thinking. But

37:32

I think I was placing, I

37:34

was using off-cut pieces of 7-0-3

37:36

to put into a panel that

37:38

I built, trying to be used

37:41

material. I'm like, this panel sounds

37:43

better. Why does it sound better?

37:45

And then I started doing experiments

37:47

and discovered that if you... slice

37:49

up the sheet a certain way,

37:52

it actually equalizes its frequency response

37:54

a little bit. Get rid of

37:56

that low-made oomf that... you would

37:58

hear if you, if a whole

38:00

room is down with 703 and

38:02

you, it's just a while to while and you

38:05

walk in, it corner, whole group. And if you

38:07

cut them up, it balances out quite a

38:09

lot. I didn't coin the term, but Ken

38:11

called it pacification. After my last name, my

38:13

last name being, Paz. And so I

38:15

went and presented it to the Sapphire group,

38:18

talked about it for 20 minutes, everyone's

38:20

like skeptical faces, yeah, sure, whatever, and then

38:22

I took a sheet of 703, put a

38:24

mic to it, drummed to it, drummed on

38:26

it, drummed on it, drummed on it, drummed

38:28

on it, drummed on it. took another

38:31

one sliced up drum don't

38:33

it boom boom and everyone's

38:35

like oh yeah responding to the

38:37

to the difference at this point

38:39

I started building panels designing

38:42

my own panels and really

38:44

going after how like like

38:46

I said before how do I make

38:48

this simple and so I need

38:50

something that can be done in the

38:52

day I need something where I need

38:54

to streamline the efficiency

38:56

of both manufacturing on the

38:59

back end but also the

39:01

installation process you know something

39:03

that takes 15 minutes needs

39:05

to take 30 seconds decision-making

39:07

about where things should be

39:09

needs to be kind of

39:11

essentially AB or C not how do

39:13

I do this now and starting to

39:15

do sketches and and and now I

39:17

think we're sort of caught up. Wow that's

39:19

quite a story. Sorry if I if

39:22

I was too elaborate. That's good you

39:24

know you mentioned along the way here about

39:26

business and getting your

39:28

business chops together. So this

39:31

is my last question for

39:33

you. What's the best piece of

39:35

advice? And it could be

39:37

about business or it could

39:39

be about anything, could be

39:42

about acoustics that you've either

39:44

learned along the way or

39:46

maybe someone imparted to you.

39:48

Well a good piece of advice

39:50

I see consistently around me

39:53

is it's easy to get stuck

39:55

in... loops that are kind of

39:57

like a distraction and

40:00

This answer is very unsatisfying don't

40:02

get stuck in the scratchions. That's

40:04

not what I'm saying It's easy

40:06

to get stuck in loops. They're

40:08

like leave it alone. Do the

40:10

thing you want it to do

40:12

Like something I see often right

40:14

I implement the studio and you

40:16

know beyond the acoustics We also

40:18

dive into all the other decisions

40:20

of the studio what task you

40:22

should get you know, let's design

40:24

your signal flow so that it

40:26

serves your workflow and removes tasks

40:29

on the moment or removes the

40:31

gradation or whatever else that I

40:33

can make better. And we'll go

40:35

through this process and make the

40:37

studio, like cater it to the

40:39

workflow of the person, the producer,

40:41

and now it's easy for them

40:43

to work, and it sounds great,

40:45

and the decisions translate, and now

40:47

a mix that took three days

40:49

takes one day or one sitting.

40:51

Great, fantastic advancement. And then after

40:53

that, they're still adding things, and

40:55

they're still exploring new gear. And

40:57

what if I change the cables

40:59

here to this? And what about

41:01

these new sets? It's like, leave

41:03

it alone. Make music. You wanted

41:05

to make music. Don't make a

41:07

studio. I make a studio. I

41:09

barely make music these days. I

41:11

keep my Saturdays with one client

41:13

that became a friend that I

41:15

engineer and produce. And you know,

41:18

that's something I like. It's for

41:20

me. Obviously, there's business involved, but

41:22

it's for me. But other than

41:24

that my day today is building

41:26

a company and figuring out marketing

41:28

and How to how to handle

41:30

the ups and downs and waves

41:32

and payroll and how do I

41:34

make sure we don't lose money

41:36

in this manufacturing process? How do

41:38

I make take something it took

41:40

an hour and a half and

41:42

cut it down to a minute

41:44

and a whole bunch of how

41:46

do I make the brand communicate

41:48

where needs to and all these

41:50

things are not making music? And

41:52

that's fine, I chose this path.

41:54

But a customer for me or

41:56

a producer engineer who works under

41:58

studio and then achieves... a space

42:00

that enables them to do what

42:02

they want to do. Put it

42:04

aside now and do what you

42:06

came to do. It takes a

42:09

lot of mental effort to switch

42:11

modes off of I could, off

42:13

of one day thinking, it's like

42:15

my studio is not good enough,

42:17

I need to work on the

42:19

work environment into this is good,

42:21

this is the time, this is

42:23

the place now, let's go back

42:25

into actually why I started. And

42:27

so I guess my one piece

42:29

of advice is Keep your eye

42:31

on the prize and discern what

42:33

is necessary and contributory and what

42:35

is now just habit. I'm still

42:37

dealing with something out of habit.

42:39

Is that a good answer? That's

42:41

great. That's a good place to

42:43

stop, I think. Thank you so

42:45

much. Hush. Thanks for listening and

42:47

being in my inner circle. Remember

42:49

if you have any questions or

42:51

comments you can send into questions

42:53

at Bobby Osenski.com. We also learn

42:55

all about the latest in music,

42:58

audio and production news. and find

43:00

out about openings from my latest

43:02

online classes at babiosinski.com. This is

43:04

babiosinski. I will see you next

43:06

time.