Warren Huart: 0:00

They're looking for you all out there to be able to do everything, which means you need to learn how to mix classic rock, modern hip hop, everything in between. You need to have all of those things under your fingertips because if you want to make a living of this, the person that's going to walk through your door just wants you as a mixer.

Benedikt Hain: 0:16

This is the Self Recording Band Podcast, the show where we help you make exciting records on your own wherever you are DIY style, let's go. Hello and welcome to the Self Recording Band Podcast. I am your host, benedikt Hein. If you are already a listener, welcome back. If you are new to the show, welcome, so stoked you're hanging out with us Today. This is the show where we help you make exciting sounding records at your jam space or your home studio. So if you're looking to do that, you've come to the right place. Please know that this show is a podcast, but also available on YouTube. So if you're discovering this on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, you can go over to YouTube and actually watch the episodes there, and in this case, it's probably a good idea to do that, because we've got a special one for you. We're going to talk about that in a second. So podcast and both both podcast and YouTube. Also, as always, I'm not doing this by myself. I'm here with Malcolm Owen-Flood, my friend and co-host. How are you, malcolm?

Malcom Owen Flood: 1:13

Hey, benny, I'm great man. I'm back in Canada after a huge travel day yesterday and I made it, but none of my stuff did Really All my clothes, my doff kit, everything's all somewhere else.

Benedikt Hain: 1:27

Oh no, you didn't even tell me. You saved that for the banter. Wow, how is it? Are you going to get it?

Malcom Owen Flood: 1:33

Yeah, they said that I think it just got stuck in Frankfurt and so it's just kind of trailing behind me. It's making its way here.

Benedikt Hain: 1:42

Did you even travel? To Frankfurt Wasn't it direct from.

Malcom Owen Flood: 1:44

Did you even go?

Benedikt Hain: 1:44

to Frankfurt, wasn't it direct from Amsterdam? I?

Malcom Owen Flood: 1:47

flew from Hamburg to Amsterdam back into Germany for Frankfurt.

Benedikt Hain: 1:52

Oh really, I didn't even realize.

Malcom Owen Flood: 1:55

Frankfurt to Vancouver, by the way, is a big distance. That was like a 10-hour flight.

Benedikt Hain: 2:00

Oh shit, okay, but on your way over here it was direct like it was Vancouver to Amsterdam, right?

Malcom Owen Flood: 2:07

No, it was Victoria to Toronto, Toronto to Amsterdam. Oh, okay. All right, I thought it was okay At least that was all in the right direction, but it was almost kind of a zigzag.

Benedikt Hain: 2:17

Yeah, oh, I didn't even realize.

Malcom Owen Flood: 2:18

No, sorry, oh no, it was fine.

Benedikt Hain: 2:21

But it was still about the overall, the quickest sort of connection I could find.

Malcom Owen Flood: 2:25

Yeah, it was a very quick connection. Some of our long-time listeners will know that I work as a sound person on the Amazing Race Canada TV show. A lot of people probably have heard of it. But that requires running around airports a lot with giant backpacks and racing and I had to channel all of my skills in that at Frankfurt because I got up our first flight was delayed a little bit so I had like 10 minutes to make this connection and I just sprinted. I was like one of the last people on the plane, yeah.

Benedikt Hain: 2:55

Oh glad you made it, it was hilarious, but so I made it. But my bag did not Okay, too quick for that, probably. Okay, bomber, sorry. Oh, it's fine, it's fine, I can survive. Let's talk about why you actually were in Europe. So we spent the entire last week in Hamburg together with and also not just Malcolm and I, but Thomas and Wayne, so the whole self-recording band team at this point was there, and it was an incredible week. We've been to an event called Studio Szene In the English word would be Studio Zine which was an industry event. There was a trade show, there was master classes, there were live podcasts and a couple of like audio vendors showing up their latest gear, and we were there all week as media partners for the event. We documented everything. We created so much content, like hours and hours of video content, talking to so many exciting people. We did live podcasts there and we spent the entire week on a pretty cool boat, also on a houseboat with a built-in studio, so we did some cool things there as well, captured all of that, so there's going to be tons of content eventually being released soon. Hopefully, we'll have to go through all of this now, which I'm looking forward to, and also not, but yeah, so this is what happened last week. It was amazing, and Malcolm just got back, actually a few hours ago. Honestly, yeah, totally yeah. And so now we're here and we are. This is the first of these live episodes that we did at Studio Steen and that we're going to release and show to you now, and this, our guest on that Studio Sofa is what they call it. Our guest on that sofa here was Voron Hewart. We had him on the podcast before a few weeks ago and we met him in person in Hamburg and we had him on the Studio Sofa, talked to him, did a follow-up episode, which was great, and, yeah, this is what today's episode is going to be about.

Malcom Owen Flood: 4:38

Yeah, we had an amazing chat with him. Hopefully most of you already know that Voron is, you know, the founder of Produce. Like a Pro. He's an amazing engineer and mixer and producer in his own right. He's worked with bands like the Frey Aerosmith and just done all sorts of stuff. Very successful career and also a fantastic speaker and educator as well, he's also a published author at this point now too, yeah, so amazing guy who's just done a ton of stuff to help people like our audience learn and level up their skills and, you know, ultimately become professionals in their field. And, yeah, it was a really fun chat. We talked about, you know, voron's take on what mastering is, which is really fascinating because he's come up from a time when mastering was totally different than what it is now. Yeah, so that's really cool perspective on that. We talked about, you know, analog workflow, because, again, voron came up with that being the only option at the beginning of his career. So that's very different than somebody like that's starting now, where it's almost definitely going to start totally digital. So it's, yeah, fascinating, fascinating stuff. I was very grateful to get to chat with him Totally.

Benedikt Hain: 5:54

Also, it's so cool to see that, although he has come up in a certain period of time and has a certain approach and opinion on things, he's very open to other approaches and other people's opinions and way of working. So he shares his view Doesn't mean that's necessarily our opinion and vice versa, but we're both. You know, even Voron, at his level, still is learning every single day from other people and is very open to hearing these ideas and sharing them and sharing his own views. So this is really really cool. So all these interviews you're hearing here is basically the guests doing most of the talking, which is great, and yeah, they're sharing their takes on all these things. And you can view it as an advice buffet, because you will hear one person say they do X and then another person say they do the exact opposite, and both are right, because there's so many ways to do things and you can pick whatever you think works for your situation. But just be open to all these different approaches and don't think there is the one way to do it, because there's not.

Malcom Owen Flood: 6:51

And so this is yeah, you can always learn from the other way as well which is, I think, is something that the Warren's really proven just being able to adapt and stay one of the forefront professionals in this field over so many changes. You know he still has the ability to work with hardware, for example, but he's a master of the digital realm as well, and you just got to keep pivoting and adapting and, yeah, it's very cool chat.

Benedikt Hain: 7:18

Yeah, I really hope our, I really wish, wish our conversation with him outside of the official setting has would have somehow made it to the spot guests, because we had an additional chat with him, just to know hanging out and talking, and that was so, so great. Unfortunately not recorded, but that was so cool too. And, yeah, he's just a really, you know, just a normal person to and you can just talk to him like one and have a great conversation, which was really cool. So, yeah, anyway, looking forward to sharing this episode with you. We talked about mastering, like Malcolm said. We talked about analog gear, like you said, malcolm. I think that was an audience question, so these are included as well. Someone asked about how to like, if you should get an analog console and, if so, which one, and the benefits of that or the cons you know, and Warren gave his answer there. Then we talked about how to build a career, also as a producer and engineer these days, and his opinion on that, which is one of those examples where it's kind of like I mean, he's right, I think, but it's still a little different to my personal experience. So do with that info whatever you want, but his take on the opinion on how to build a career and what goes into being successful or becoming successful as a producer engineer these days. Also, his journey, his personal journey, from being a musician to becoming a producer to becoming an educator, how he balances all of that and how he ended up in America, you know, years or decades ago at this point. And so, yeah, this is all very inspiring, very fun to do, and you can just tell how much he loves this. That's one of the things I love most about Warren is like the passion he has for it. He just won't stop talking, but not in an annoying way. He's just so passionate and he, you know he loves sharing all of this over and over and over again. And you got to understand like everyone wants to talk to Warren at an event like this, like he's, you know, people approaching him all the time. Lots of them are obviously like asking similar question, but he seems to get to never get tired of that. He just loves to share it over and over again and, yeah, that's amazing, yeah yeah, huge Thanks to Warren Keija, his wife and business partner and their whole team.

Malcom Owen Flood: 9:24

They were forced to be reckoned with and hopefully we'll get them back on the podcast down the road as well. But yeah, I think you're gonna enjoy this episode totally alright.

Benedikt Hain: 9:33

Here's our conversation with Warren Hewitt from produce like a pro and pro mix Academy. Enjoy All right. Hello and welcome to the self recording band podcast, the show where we help you make exciting sounding records from your home Studio or your jam space. Today we are live here from the studio scene event in Hamburg, which is really fun, a really cool event, and so, yeah, we're here with Warren Hewitt live broadcasting today this podcast. How are you, warren?

Warren Huart: 10:02

I'm great I. I was just saying I've been to Hamburg I think three times. The problem is, when I came here in a band, I would pull up in a van at like eight o'clock at night. I'll upload my equipment you know, player show, get back in the van and drive away. So this is the most amount of time I've ever spent in Hamburg in daylight in my life.

Malcom Owen Flood: 10:24

That is beautiful, Exactly what I did last time. Yeah, you know.

Warren Huart: 10:27

I'm actually here in in in daylight yeah that's really cool.

Benedikt Hain: 10:31

Very good to have you. And also, as always, I'm here with my co-host, malcolm Owen Flood. So my name is Benny Ty and this is Malcolm. Glad that you're joining me over here. We're happy to be here over here from Canada, so really excited that we get to do this together. And so, yeah, and Warren, we did actually interview not too long ago, right, yeah, just a few weeks ago yeah it was, and we actually brought some follow-up questions and we hope that the audience here today also has some questions that we can get to later.

Warren Huart: 10:56

I've been enjoying this and are we live?

Benedikt Hain: 10:57

by the way we are, we are streaming to, I think, the studio scene or sound and recording YouTube channel or Twitch their Facebook our. Youtube channel Like it's like four or five different locations at least so this is great, so it's a wonderful turnout.

Warren Huart: 11:12

It's busy. There's lots of great companies here. I'm very happy, so come. If you're not, if you're thinking about coming, come and visit us. We're gonna be here all three days, so come and visit us. Tomorrow I'll be walking around the floor talking to people and, and, of course, thursday's the last day.

Benedikt Hain: 11:26

So oh, yeah, yeah, absolutely hey. So talking about a lot of cool like companies and gear here and everything, did you find something already that you get excited about, like any new piece of gear?

Warren Huart: 11:36

Well, check that yes, obviously we've only been open a couple of hours, but we did go and talk to a mark at dangerous for a bit. He was actually talking about. What is the name of those speakers? Ex machina.

Benedikt Hain: 11:51

I don't know how to pronounce them, but yeah, I think you're right, yeah, I think so, machina machine.

Warren Huart: 11:55

I don't know Machina machine yeah, I'm not sure I'll find out. He is waxing lyrically about them, so we're gonna go and give them and listen to. Obviously, we're talking about all the dangerous stuff Our friend Mikhail from Mikhail Khrush from Tagela has a booth there, elysia, we really love because that's Ruben's company, who you know. It's the original designer of Translate designer SPL. Yeah, so that's all we've done so far. Just talk to the three companies, all people we love that have great products yeah, awesome.

Benedikt Hain: 12:28

Really cool. Yeah, awesome. That sounds great and those speakers were on our agenda as well. Like yeah, a lot of people talk about them, so yeah, I assume the German.

Warren Huart: 12:35

If it's machina, I don't know to be honest, but like nobody knows we've got anybody know that's on the homework list.

Benedikt Hain: 12:42

Yeah, exactly so one I got one question that I totally not didn't ask on our last interview and so this was I mean, most people are like many people know you because it produced like a pro and like the online stuff you do, but also from your credits, obviously as a producer. But you got to the US with your band originally, right, yeah, and then to track a record and you kind of relocated the band, yeah, basically, and like how how did you end up, you know, becoming a producer from being a musician and then an educator from being a producer? Just a little bit of this back story, just because our A lot of people in our audience, they are musicians and some of them want to be producers, and like how you ended up becoming a producer after being a musician.

Warren Huart: 13:25

Well, it's sort of actually was always in tandem. Okay, because when I was a little kid well little, I was 15 when I first started playing guitar and what I would do is I would Take a tape cassette. My dad had a little Phillips. Anybody remember cassette players? Dating myself that, what the you know the Phillips one, that was like the classic one. And then he had a Sony hi-fi. So what I would do is I would record on like the little Phillips play like a you know Da, da, da, da, da da, kind of really bad, kind of pentatonic run really badly on my guitar, then take that out, put it in the 70s high-five. My old dad's ol¬enne oh set me so press play and do an overdub Back onto the other cassette player. So I was already Right from the get go of learning to play the first stuff recording. So while I was in bands I was still like engineering though, and I had. I had you. You know I like it, probably many people here. I worked in music stores so I worked in two. One of them is very famous, you all know, and it ends I worked at, and it ends Lee, and it ends Actually a very old friend of mine. So. So I worked there. But I also worked in a much more local store and it was close to me. There was another one called Kingfisher music and I was there. So what I would do is I'd sell PA and recording equipment so, and I also worked part-time at a recording studio that my friends had. So I was like doing everything. I was playing in club bands, going out, doing covers, writing songs, I was teaching guitar. I was just kind of a bit of everything. So I think I feel like I've said this many times before, but I don't mind repeating it I feel like my journey to Become a producer, an engineer and a mixer and become successful on it is basically what everybody has to do now.

Robert: 15:16

Yeah, you know there's no like.

Warren Huart: 15:17

There's no like. Oh I, you're an engineer and you're making. You know Six figures a year. You know engineering, massive records. It doesn't happen like that anymore even. I can name many, many famous engineers that are doing independent records At the same time as doing the occasional major label one. They're also educating. They're also designing gear, designing plugins. You know, it's what I do, is what all of you have to do now, which is like be little social media mavens and get yourself out there and get people find you so you can record. It's just the business you know, it's what we do so I felt like it was a really good opportunity to launch produce like a pro, because my way of coming up is the modern way, even though it happened 1520 years before yeah kind of the revolution and the internet. It still was exactly the way stuff. I'm lucky I have a lot of friends that work in music. But the strange thing was is it was just the the area I grew up in, because it had two incredible music stores. It bred a lot of that in the area. You know everybody wanted to do music. You know I'd go to a music store Kingfisher.

Lucas: 16:25

Yeah.

Warren Huart: 16:25

I worked there on the weekends when I was 16. I think and I went in there and they had a Well. John Deacon came in, the bass player from Queen with his son when I was a little kid. It comes in.

Benedikt Hain: 16:37

And I said to John Deacon son, I was a favorite band, right, my favorite band. And I said to John Deacon son.

Warren Huart: 16:43

I was like do you want to be a bass player when you're, when you grow up? And he's like, no, I want to be a drummer. It just those are the kinds of experiences, but to me it's like it's a blending of everything.

Benedikt Hain: 16:54

All right, all right, really cool. Like why do all kids want to be drummers anyway? Like my kids want to be drummers, and lots of my friends too. So I don't know why. Why is that?

Warren Huart: 17:01

Well, it's gonna. It's gonna sound terribly, terribly masculine to say this. So please forgive me for not being PC, but I remember all the girls like the drummers best. That's such a such a masculine thing to say so. Please, I apologize, but yeah, but I do remember. I think lots of guys like, yeah, I'm gonna be the drummer because it's masculine, and like, yeah, you know, yeah yeah. I just, I was all sort of bookish and I just wanted to be the guitar player that was playing with pedals, and you ended up being yeah yeah, I still think, you know, I think, being engineering Guitar play because, like the guitar players, some of the greatest guitar players I know I'm going on a tangent, I'm famous for it. But when you think of, like Jeff Beck and Danny Gatton, who these like, especially Danny Gatton anybody know who that is he was this really technical kind of telecaster player. They used to call him the master of the telecaster incredibly technical thing. Him and Jeff Beck and a number of other great guitar players are all really good Were. They're all dead now, unfortunately. All were really good mechanics. They used to love like pulling, pulling, you know, engines apart and rebuilding stuff and everything. Is it sort of that technical nerdy brain? Yeah, you know, yeah, sort of makes sense.

Robert: 18:17

And as.

Warren Huart: 18:17

I'm sure you all know, music is great for people that suffer from Alzheimer's and Parkinson's and stuff, because it hits the same part of your brain as mathematics, so it keeps your brain really really add, you know. So I think I think a lot of us are kind of, you know, we love that stuff because we're like tinkering, you know, we like opening up stuff, piece of equipment and like messing around and yeah.

Malcom Owen Flood: 18:37

So so I Want to circle back to please a deeper part of that question though, because you, you went over there, and, if our research was correct, to cut a record with your band, that's right, and did you intend to stay there because that became home correct?

Warren Huart: 18:52

Um, well, I think there was. The first of all is just out of necessity at first, because we went over there. We had done recordings in the UK which had done fairly well. We'd had a couple of tracks, couple of songs in the charts so and we were kind of a bubbling under. The enemy had featured us a few times. We've got a front cover, not like the full front cover, but we'd been on the front cover, little photo, a little blurb about us. So you know, we were in that sort of place. We were doing all the hip places like water at right. For anybody who knows the UK, kind of market played. We did played some shows with loco, we'd do one with loco on the commotions. When they got back together it was all like this it was a nice buzz. So when we went to America, the idea was to do the album out there to just sound a little bit more American, because we had an American girl singer and we were an indie band and it was a bigger market. Yeah, you know, let's be honest, american market is, I think, 42% of everything in music. Oh, wow, okay so you add all the rest of Europe together, we're we're any, you know, 58% there, like such a huge part of the music industry. So we went over there we did the album with and we'd had a list of different people. So what our publisher did, the publisher paid for us to go to anyone we wanted to make the record and then they sold the record to a record label and so so we went over there and that was a guy called Jeremy LaSalle's Don't. I don't suppose anybody will know who that is in in, in in Deutschland, but just a, not necessarily a mogul, but a very, very smart guy. Um, anyway, he had signed Porter's Head and XTC and all these kind of bands. So very, very great taste. So we were very excited. We went over there, we chose the guy we wanted and it was Don Smith. Now, don Smith had done especially he was famous for doing Tom Petty's big 80s stuff, like he had done Last Dance with Mary Jane and all that kind of stuff, and he was a world-class engineer. He was Don, was his right hand man. So he had done Rolling Stones records. He'd done the Keith Richards solo records, you know all these great records. But the thing that got me excited, as the geek was. He had done that Camper, van Beethoven, cracker, and he'd done that record, kerosene Hat, which had a massive hit in the mid-90s with the song. I feel so love, I feel like it was a great song and it sounded fantastic. But what got me interested was I was reading I don't remember what magazine it was, sound On Sound or something like that. I was reading the magazine and I'd read that he had, like shown up with a 24 track, a mini-neve console and they had set up a studio in a barn and just sort of like made the record totally punk rock in the mid-90s, when that was not what people did. Now it's what everybody does. And I remember just thinking that's my guy, that's the guy I want to make a record with. The guy like us, you know, somebody just like sets up, runs some cables and starts making a record. And everybody else was like you know, was just as cool and had great credits. But I remember thinking that's the reason why I want to work with him, because I know he's going to be somebody I'm going to learn from.

Malcom Owen Flood: 21:42

Yeah.

Warren Huart: 21:43

So we went and we made the record in in Los Angeles at his house and he had built a recording studio, you know, and actually in a double car or four car garage underneath a tennis court in his garden.

Malcom Owen Flood: 21:59

So, all very posh, life is good. Yeah, I mean, he was massively successful.

Warren Huart: 22:06

But it was an amazing experience. And he was, I remember, I remember like silly little thing, like he had a little Neve sidecar, so everything went through the Neve sidecar and he had a fair child. You know 670 and one channel had Mick written on it and the other channel had Keith written on it and he once, once he'd recorded the stones like that he never took that tape off?

Benedikt Hain: 22:28

I don't think any of us would know. It's probably like $200,000 at this point.

Warren Huart: 22:33

Yeah, whoever owns it now has probably still got Mick Probably. I have a photo of that somewhere.

Benedikt Hain: 22:39

Yeah, Speaking about having to do everything yourself or learning so many things yourself. Today, you've you've just released a book. We've talked about it on the other pockets.

Lucas: 22:47

Yes.

Benedikt Hain: 22:48

The home studio recording as the title of the book, and you were telling me that you're working already on more books, and one was on mastering.

Warren Huart: 22:54

I think you said mastering and mixing and so there's a two part question there, do you?

Benedikt Hain: 22:59

the first part is like do you get to do a lot of mastering to, or did you do a lot of mastering in the past? And the second part is like how do you even feel about that Like mastering your own music or music you've mixed, versus like hiring mastering engineers? What's your take on that? Is that also something you should have in your tool belt today?

Warren Huart: 23:13

Mastering is a very interesting discussion and we could sit back here.

Benedikt Hain: 23:17

Okay.

Warren Huart: 23:19

All right, the best mastering engineers I work with don't often get to work with kind of homemade stuff as much, not as much as you know. So quite often you know and I've recorded and mixed records or I've worked with an external mixer I'll go to the mastering session and they don't do anything, they don't need to do much. Yeah, the mix is right. You know, when we did, for instance, when we did the second Frey record, I flew out to hang out with Bob Ludwig who mastered it, and most of the record had been mixed by Michael Brower and a couple of the singles were mixed by Mark Endert, who is absolutely phenomenal. It's Mark Endert. And we had to turn Mark Endert's mixes down because he couldn't get Michael Brower's mixes as powerful and as loud as Mark Endert. And that was his only job. Yeah, he didn't add any EQ or compression or limiting. He just kind of rebalanced the mixes a little bit. He limited a little bit on on on Michaels to try and get them up to the same level as as Mark's. But essentially his job was to take Mark Endert's, didn't do any EQ, compression, limiting at all on Mark's at all and just brought them down like a DB. And because that was the only way to kind of match the level, and sometimes that is the job of an amazing mastering engineer is just that last thing.

Benedikt Hain: 24:38

That's a skill in and of itself. Right Knowing when not to do something. It's definitely a skill in itself.

Warren Huart: 24:42

But I think that's the reason. I think because I wonder why I'm going to that direction. To answer your question is I think for a lot of home recordists, mastering is a different thing. Yeah, it's. For a lot, of a lot of you out there that are still learning this craft, Mastering for you is probably the last part of the mixing. To be honest, it's not that it's not a final, absolutely amazing mix that a mastering engineer goes. You know, I just need to turn this down, a DB, and we're done, yeah, down. So it's a very difficult question because you know, there's and there's so much confusing information out there. That's the understatement of the decade. You know, it's really confusing. So how are you approaching to solve that in your book for people for example, like what's your taking, like Well, I mean, I agree with the standard hypothesis, which is basically mix the song as best as you can make it sound like it should be on the radio and then think about mastering later and make it a later thing that you do Put it to another. You know, I'll come back to that in a few days time, when my ears are clean, or at least the next day or something. Yeah, that that is a very smart way of doing it. If it's there specifically to solve a problem and you've got problems, open up your mix and solve the problem.

Lucas: 25:53

Yeah.

Warren Huart: 25:54

Don't use mastering as a kind of. It's a tough one, because mastering is a very, very confusing, underrated and overrated at the same time process, you know, because people underrate what it can do but then overrated as though it's some kind of thing that's going to solve everything. You know, really, like I said, if you've mixed it really really well, you shouldn't need to do much in mastering Most of the time with these top guys what they're doing, guys and girls, and to be honest, in this business, I think the top six mastering engineers, I think three of them women now, yes, so which is a?

Malcom Owen Flood: 26:28

really good part of our industry.

Warren Huart: 26:30

You know you think Kim Rosen, piper Payne and of course, emily Lazar is probably the most famous mastering engineer in the world. So I think you know people say to me sometimes, like you know, I bring that up often I'm like you know, there's no real war going on now between men and women, because women have already won when it comes to mastering. So there you go. But the but anyway, try to solve your stuff in your mix. Don't think about mastering when it comes to mixing. Don't even worry about it, just be just mix, just mix the songs the best you can, yeah.

Benedikt Hain: 27:03

You mix into a mastering chain or like just a mix bus, basically a simple one.

Warren Huart: 27:07

I do a very simple mix bus. I first of all growing up in analog and then I'm in that. You know, being a Gen X or I'm at that. I'm at the crossroads. So I grew up at a time when, when I was a teenager, things were only predominantly done on tape. As I got into my early 20s it was the full crossover. Everything was crossing over. So what we would do is we would record on tape and then dump into Pro Tools to edit. But we hated late 90s, early 2000s. People were too nervous to commit only to Pro Tools. People did, but the difference was very. In a DAW it was very obvious. You heard those records and it was super brash, super bright. The high end was like sizzly and it just didn't sound that good. And I mean, you know there was genres that probably benefited from it, especially modern metal. They probably really liked that ultra, ultra bright, aggressive kind of stuff. But at the time people were nervous. I remember when I was working with Dave Sardi and we did like the thrills and hot, hot, heat and jet and stuff like that. We would still tracking everything on tape. But then and that was 2005, 2006, you know, there was still that crossover. It wasn't really that long ago if you think about it, but as things have sort of progressed, now you can stay entirely in the box. You can keep everything fully digital. You need to be solving everything at a mixed stage. So by the time you get to answer your question directly, get to the mixed bus. You don't have to do very much If you're doing a schnizzle tonne of compression, eq and everything on your mixed bus. Find out why. Why are you doing that? What's going on? Solve the problem earlier on in the chain and it's really just not the way to be working and there's a lot of confusion. The two things have sort of become my mission when it comes to, like, trying to combat the misinformation and stuff out there is. People always say to me well, you know what about this reverse mixing thing that blah blah blah teaches? And I'm like it doesn't work because it works for the person that has created the master bus, based on how they mix into it. They have a template where they have individual EQ on the individual sources and that template. They also have a bus where they're busing their drums and maybe they have two or three buses which have like a clean, a parallel, then a combined bus. All of this stuff is being done, this template. So by the time it gets to the master bus they can have fixed amount of compression, eq and limiting Maybe they've got ozone on them, all this kind of stuff. But unless you have figured out their template going up to that stage, don't even think about it Now. It might be after a year or two of you mixing. You know, using that you'll get your own template and you will have a master bus that does all those things, which is totally cool. But don't adopt somebody's master bus and think that's gonna solve your way of mixing Absolutely absolutely.

Benedikt Hain: 30:01

I always see it when people ask online about how to implement, for example, the braorizing or things like that, and they, you know, don't fully understand how he does it and then wonder why it doesn't work for them and, like you know, these types of things, it's such a unique sound.

Warren Huart: 30:12

I mean the braorizing thing is, I get it, I get the principle of it, but you know it was going through so much when I've worked with him I did three or four albums with him, so much parallel stuff, and it's been developed for like over decades, to the point where it's then turned into the but it's also a little bit haphazard, because what it was is a ton of very, very old, you know equipment that probably was creating all kinds of different phase relationships. I don't do you want to adopt that kind of way of working. I think it's so unique to him and it creates. And also, you know I listened to a lot of those records that it was big on, like the Coldplay stuff, and I don't know if it sold any more records. I think people bought yellow because they wanted yellow you know, it's weird, you go back and listen. I listened to yellow the other day. We were driving and it came on the radio and it's like that. I mean that guitar is like literally a quarter tone out of tune, quarter step out of tune.

Malcom Owen Flood: 31:16

And it just the bend never quite hits the note and everything.

Warren Huart: 31:19

I mean, it wouldn't get, it wouldn't even pass the taste test. Now no radio station would play that song right. But at the time it was like, yeah, that's cool, you know.

Benedikt Hain: 31:27

So it's. I know what you mean, yeah.

Warren Huart: 31:29

So you know everything. In context, I think people now are looking for mixed. They're looking for you all out there to be able to do everything, which means you need to learn how to mix classic rock, you know modern hip hop, you know you name it, whatever it might be, everything in between country folk. You need to have all of those things under your fingertips because if you wanna make a living at this, the person that's gonna walk through your door or email you a track to mix just wants you as a mixer. Now it might be that one of you out here is a very specialized in modern metal. That's great. But I think we can name all those people in one, maybe one or two hands, the people that only work in that genre. But I'm telling you there is a lot of people that we know, like inside of produce, like a pro academy, that make a living, that have a proper middle class living doing music that you've never heard of. So it is possible to make, you know, make enough money to buy a house and be relatively successful like you would as a I don't know some other professional thing. You don't have to be a household name, but you are what I would call and what I did most of my career a jobbing professional. I don't know what that works in, in, in, in Deutsch, but you know it's the person that that we would, even while we were still doing all the well, started the channel. We would. I would get up in the morning, I would film from nine to 11 doing a video for the channel, then 11, I might be recalling a mix or mixing a song, and then I, you know, would scoff down some lunch and then I'd be doing guitar or keyboard overdubs on another piece of production, and then in the evening a singer would come in and sing and maybe we would start the mix off after we comp the vocal and we'd so. We'd be doing four, three to four different productions a day and of course there'd be a voiceover and maybe a rap. You know that's what you do. And then I would master a song for somebody else or mix a different genre. I had a German band fly in, you know, and we had to recut the vocals. The singer came in, the vocals weren't very well recorded for some. Whatever reasons, we recut the vocals. So you're mixing and you're recutting vocals. My point is like that's a jobbing professional.

Malcom Owen Flood: 33:38

Yeah, working yeah and that's what everybody I know does.

Benedikt Hain: 33:41

I mean we've got examples of that. I'm a I've been a full-time mixing engineer for more than 10 years now and I was a producer, then transitioned to mixing only, and I've some of the records I worked on were did pretty well, but I never had a number one or any like really big records the people that the masses know about. But I've been able to provide for my family, make a good income and that's my job, that's my thing. So it is entirely possible like you said it is entirely possible.

Warren Huart: 34:02

yeah.

Benedikt Hain: 34:03

And even if you specialize, it's possible. But I think you should do that later on, like I've been doing everything I could potentially do for like five, six, seven years and then eventually transition into like more specialized stuff. But in the beginning I was in totally S mode and did everything basically.

Warren Huart: 34:15

Yeah, yeah, I still think that's for most people. I remember I think Andrew Shepes was talking about it about four or five years ago. He's got busier now, but at that point he said that he was doing two or three records a year because he wasn't, he was only probably working on huge albums, and I think that that is the reality. If you're a rock producer, engineer or mixer, how many records a year are there for you? But if you're somebody that's working in multiple genres, like he must be now, because his credits, like he's super, super busy, but he's probably mixing something a little bit more pop or a little bit more heavy, a little bit more folk, a little bit more that. So that's diversity in music. Yeah yeah, just do it. And if you're doing voiceover, who cares? You're still getting paid, absolutely.

Benedikt Hain: 35:03

Yeah, now, if you had a question about go ahead, Well, this kind of pertains to.

Malcom Owen Flood: 35:08

Going back to the mastering question you had and I think it's the point you're proving is that learning understanding mixing helps you understand what mastering is, and understanding the tracking helps you understand what mixing is. So if you want to become a good, just hard metal mixer, you still have to learn how to engineer everything else and develop all those skills in tandem.

Warren Huart: 35:28

Agreed Every time I've mastered where I've been given stuff to master. I just kind of Not every time, but often I'm just thinking I wish I could just open up the mix and make this, because I'm sitting there. You know, maybe there's some low end issues, but they're pertaining to certain sections of the song. So, like the chorus doesn't have enough low end, or part of the chorus doesn't have enough low end, so what are you doing? You're automating on mastering, trying to get it, but all you're doing is sort of applying a blanket approach to something that could be so easily solved if you could just get to the bass guitar and make the low end more even you know, and the same could be said if you were mixing and you're like, oh man, if they just you know. Recorded it differently.

Malcom Owen Flood: 36:07

yeah, it's always working that way and I think that really proves your point of why you need to try everything.

Warren Huart: 36:14

Well, I think our job is. This is my personal opinion. There's a phrase in England, jobsworth. You know people I don't know what the German version of it is where people like you know, like I was only hired to do this. You know that kind of like Jobsworth mentality. It's more than what Jobsworth. You can't be in music and do that. So just for a tangent, for a second. Not very often, but every now and then somebody will put a comment up like how do you find better clients? And I'm just like the question is the problem. The fact that you've asked that question is the problem. You can't think that way. You just gotta do the job. So often Ace won't mind me telling you this, but I did three albums with Ace Freely that I co-produced. You know they bring me the tracks and we'd end up having to recut stuff. And often when he sent me something just to mix, there would be like no stereo guitar in the chorus because he's got so many ideas. So he would put down like a really cool lead part on the left channel and then he'd do a strumming part on the right and it was like, well, where's the bounce? And so I would either go to the second chorus and pull in the rhythm part and put it on the first. But often I was like there needs to be some rakes in there, we just need to cry and cry just to lift the chorus. So I'd plug in a guitar and do it and he would listen back to it and know that those weren't his rhythm guitars. But he did not give a crap. All he wants is the record to sound great, and that is our job. I tell this story maybe I shouldn't, because it's going live. I'll blur. But there's a friend of mine I won't say who the singer is, but he is like an MD for a very, very famous singer and he was asked to do a track for a movie and they recorded it and produced it and he played on it he's a wonderful musician got everything up and then the singer said to him you know, would you mix it? So he mixes it. And the singer said do not also tune my vocal. Whatever you do, do not tune my vocal. I don't want anybody to tune. I work with this other guy and he never tunes it, but he always makes me sound great. So he said, well, what does he do? He said, well, the use of this special combination of delays and reverbs that makes me sound perfectly in tune. So of course he mixes it. He references the other person's tracks, he does his best, sends it to the singer I'm not gonna tell you gender, because as soon as I tell you gender you'll start guessing who it is Sends it to the singer and the singer says my vocal's down sound right. You haven't got the right blend of delays and reverbs. So he's like so they get sent another reference track. So he sits there and he matches the reverbs and delays and makes it sound exactly the same, sends it back. No, you still haven't got it. Just said you know what, you did a wonderful job on the production and the recording and everything. I'm just gonna have this other mixer mix it. We all know the answer is what happened?

Lucas: 38:58

didn't it how?

Warren Huart: 38:58

the mix of tunes of other people.

Malcom Owen Flood: 39:00

just doesn't tell the singer it gets the job done, and that's what we have to do so.

Warren Huart: 39:05

it's just a reality. I don't want to have a five hour discussion about audio chain or anything like that.

Robert: 39:10

But the point is is that your job is to make it sound amazing.

Warren Huart: 39:14

So sometimes somebody sends you and not to lecture the, because that was the question. That's why that, when that person asked that question, I'm like you've got to change your thinking. Because if an artist comes into my studio to record, for instance, that lone mix or whatever and the drummer's not that great. It's not my job to get there and destroy the drummer and make them feel like that they're worthless or whatever. I've been in situations as an engineer where I've seen producers do that kind of stuff. And it doesn't benefit anybody. You're there. Yes, you want them to be better, but you've got to get in there encouraging. It's like when people ask me about vocal production, they're like how do you get a great vocal when the vocalist is not singing very well? I'll just say well, where did it sound good? On the second verse, was there a line where maybe they got breathy and it got lots of personality. Talk about that. Be like hey, you know that second line you did there where you went ah, that sounded great. We should do more of that.

Lucas: 40:10

That's how you get a good vocal performance or you can be the dude, that's all.

Warren Huart: 40:14

like you know, bruh, you sucked, it doesn't do any, I'll fetch you for it.

Benedikt Hain: 40:19

It doesn't get you very far at all.

Warren Huart: 40:21

But that's our job. Our job is to empower people. The best compliment I've ever got is when you or get is when you work with an artist. You help them understand what good songwriting is, what great arrangement is and all that kind of stuff. And then they come back to you next year to make the next record and their songs are better and their arrangements are better and their performances are better because you help them do that.

Benedikt Hain: 40:41

Yes, totally, totally. So, warren, thank you again for doing this for the time I spent here. We're already at the end of our podcast slot here, unfortunately, but I also want to thank Mark and the guys at Sound and Recording Studio Sofa for letting us use this cool sofa here, into the podcast. It's so amazing. So do we have time for a little Q&A, mark, is that right? Okay, so we can give you a little longer. Do you have time too, warren?

Warren Huart: 41:07

Yeah, absolutely Perfect, I'm Mark's the boss, so whatever he says, if he says I have time, then we have time.

Benedikt Hain: 41:13

Awesome. So if any of you here have questions for Warren, please, there's a mic that Mark has in his hands and please grab it and ask. And if anyone wants to prefers to ask in German, I'm happy to translate.

Warren Huart: 41:24

So I'll try and understand it. Yeah, so my limited so if you said that slowly, I probably would have understood. I got bits of it.

Robert: 41:42

Hi, my name is Robert Kleiner and I got a question. I got a two-part question for you. Okay, there's a certain charm about old analog consoles. Sure. So, being a hobbyist on a budget, I'm not able to pay for a lot of servicing and maintenance for a console. Sure. So would you say that I should scrap the idea altogether of having a console in my setup because of budget reasons?

Warren Huart: 42:10

Well, I suppose I have to ask you what is your budget? If you were to buy an analog console, what would it be?

Robert: 42:15

Well, you see a lot of old analog consoles on the internet for like 500 clicks, you know. Yeah, but if you buy that and you have to service that for like, say, 5,000 a year, you know.

Warren Huart: 42:30

That would. It wouldn't be that much. To be honest, I'm plugging the book now. You brought the book In my book. I talk about that a lot. That's one of the things I agree with you. There's something, isn't it interesting? Like every single guy I'm going to say guy, because there's always a dude that started a YouTube channel that says they mix entirely in the box and are trying to. You know, look how come every single time they take a photo, they're sitting in front of a console.

Lucas: 42:56

You ever know it's absolutely. Yeah, you don't need it. Hand on a fade or all this kind of stuff.

Warren Huart: 43:02

There is something lovely about a console and I really. And when you walk into a recording studio and you see even a small 16-channel kind of console, look, here's a bottom line. When I did a lot of the first fray record when we tracked the drums on how to Save a Life, I used the TAC Scorpion. It cost $750. And I think 50. No, it was 24 channels. So I think one of the channels didn't work at all and another one, the EQ. Just don't engage, don't use the EQ. I never bothered repairing it because I still had 22 channels. That worked absolutely fine. And yeah, maybe it would have cost. I don't think it would have cost more than 200 euros, dollars, whatever to repair it. I don't see anything costing $5,000 to fix in that kind of rail. I think it's a really easy way to get into a console to look at like an old AMAC. The TAC Scorpion sounded great and when I did the first record I did with Dave Sardy. He was in a bank. He had his bank called Bark Market, which Rick Rubin had fallen in love with, so hired him and that's what made him successful and he became Dave Sardy that you know now he did all the Bark Market records on a TAC Scorpion. So when I said to him, oh, I've got a TAC Scorpion, that's how I make records, he's like, oh great, all these records that Rick Rubin thinks sound amazing, all done on a console that probably cost him $1,000 used. I think it's a quick, easy way to get into it. I think Allen Heaf 80s consoles, soundtracks, 80s consoles, soundcraft, 80s consoles, and then, to be honest, you can get things like like an AMAC. Now, super, super. I saw an Einstein for sale a few weeks ago for like three grand. That was a 65,000 pound console when it was new. You know it's an interesting one. You know, like when I first moved to the States, quad consoles were like nothing. Now they got trendy. You know People used to always say, oh, don't buy anything with an op-amp when I was a kid. Of course APIs have op-amp, so what does that mean you?

Robert: 45:03

know what I mean. It's like there's always their criteria.

Warren Huart: 45:05

You know, based on and look, when I bought my first 1073, it was a BAE one, a Brent Averil one. I think it was 1,100 pounds dollars, something you know. Now you can't get into something like that for less than like 4,000. When it's like either a high quality clone like a BAE or an original, you know you can buy the cheaper versions. But my point is is, like you know, what's trendy or whatever is an interesting kind of nebulous thing that kind of moves around. I think getting a 1,000 Euro console is a smart way of getting into a lot of mic preys really cheaply that have insert points and stuff like that. How else are you gonna do it? I mean, there's some great gear here for sale, but if you go and buy 24 channels of any one of these mic preys you see around here, which is great if you can afford it, but it's as much as we'll buy a used console. You know what I mean. Most people are buying one channel of a high quality mic prey to do vocals and to do guitar overdubs and do bass and piano. My point is is like you could buy a pair of something nice and then have a console for tracking drums in your garage and get that for the same price as buying one mic prey from it. Still buy the nice mic prey for all the other dubs. Don't get me wrong. But it's really a smart idea to go out and buy, like a used tax scorpion, for 750. You know what I mean. And if two channels don't work, who cares? Yeah, why bother even repairing them? You know what I mean. You're still going to have 22 that work and you're going to have a nice, cheap, easy way of getting into some really good, quite interesting sounding my praise.

Robert: 46:40

Thank you, and my second part of the question is I got the book here. Would you sign it for me?

Benedikt Hain: 46:45

Of course, Any other questions?

Lucas: 46:53

Hi, my name is Lucas.

Warren Huart: 46:54

Hi Lucas, hello, how can?

Lucas: 46:57

you work out your attitude as well, Thank you, and I had a question regarding polishing turds proverbial turds because I noticed that when I started mixing and I was looking into a lot of courses online mixed with the masters this and that the material itself is way better than anything I would have gotten when I started out, and I feel that I've gained a lot of experience by having to fix things that I've never, ever, seen anyone on YouTube talk about.

Warren Huart: 47:32

So I'm with you. I've talked about this before, maybe you've heard me say it but the first time I ever got into a quote, unquote proper studio as an engineer, I was bewildered. I come into a studio. I'd already had my own recording studios. You know, from 4Track to ADATS was like the first proper thing I had. I had one ADAT and a Soundtracks Topaz. Everybody remember the Topaz, that gray ugly console, yep, all like the kind of what do they call it? What do they call that thing? Pastel, kind of pink and yellow and green. So I had that. That was how I started. That was when I was making my first proper records. I got bands signed. I even got recordings done on ADATS with that Topaz and I had I can't remember the name of the compressor. It was like one of those ones you could get from Guitar Center from like entry level in like the late 90s. But anyway, my point is is like by the time I finally got into a recording studio and I was the engineer, slash, producer and I had an assistant, I was bewildered by the assistant and I realized they couldn't do anything I could do. At one tenth of speed I could do it. And I'm like what's going on here. They're working on major label records. I was like, oh okay, that's the point. All they do is spend all day, you know, you know, with the world's greatest drummer recording growing up some mics, generically speaking, and that's what you're talking about. You're talking about, you know, and some people started like that. So this assistant I was working with, who's a lovely guy, he's never had to do the kind of stuff that you and I are talking about. I've had drummers that couldn't play a beat, you know, literally. So I've got like 25 takes of drums and I'm sitting there and I am, you know, deciding what you know. Oh, this bar works here. I'm going to fly it over there. That fill works here, I'm going to fly it over there. They completely changed the groove in the second verse, but it's not right. I might just prefer the way the second half of the blah, blah, blah Point is. I've just built it all up from scratch, while still trying to maintain a feel and not make it just feel like it's just doot, doot, doot, doot, doot, doot, doot, doot. So like, take a grip, and that's how you learn. So, by the time I got to make record records, it was so easy because I had worked with all of what you're describing as the turds and I'd done lots of polishing. To be honest, I own it and I love it. People say to me when I'm editing they're like you're so fast, I'm like I am not working quickly. This is just how I work, you know, and it's because of what you're talking about. So I would embrace it, honestly embrace it, and it's tough. Yes, you do watch those kind of like high level. I'm a famous mixer guy, you know. Go, yeah man, I just just pull a little, look, see, you hear that. You hear that. You're like I get it, I get it. I get a little frustrated by that. But that's another reason why I started Produce Like a Pro, because when I started there was mixed with the masters, there was Pincardo's Paste, there was Graham of Recording Revolution and I didn't feel there was anything in the middle. I felt that there was Graham, which was very much beginners, and then there was this sort of I suppose I hate this word, but people use it. It's sort of an elite way of doing it. So I put a little bit in the middle where the rest of us live. You know, it shouldn't all just be like kind of yeah, man, I just hear that, hear that Little oh yeah yeah, I've watched some of those videos and I'm like I didn't learn anything except that if I had a Neve and I was boosting some 10K, it might sound better, you know. So I know what you're saying. It's kind of like getting in there and, you know, really trying to make this getting the best out of everything, and 99% of it is like we were talking about right at the beginning. It's ground up. It's like get a great performance, capture it really well. If you have to edit it to make it better, that's what we have to do. You know, we can't be wagging our fingers telling off our artists, because I'm friends with a lot of guys who made records in the 70s that we all consider to be the greatest records of all time. Jack Douglas is a family friend, shelley Yaccus, you know Jay Messina. These guys made half of the records that people are always telling me are the best sounding records, and if you sit with them and go, well, what was it like making Erasmith Rocks? Jack will go be like oh my God, you couldn't get that groove right. We had to cut the tape, we had to redo this. We fed them back out through speakers to bring in room sounds, he told me on a cheap trick, live at the Budacon record that actually it wasn't the Budacon, it was Osaka. So when they found the video or the film of Budacon they couldn't use the original recordings but nobody really noticed. But now they have Pro Tools they could go back to the original tapes which were so badly recorded and distorted, blah, blah, blah. The point is it was never like a bunch of geniuses just happened to walk into a recording studio and somebody pressed record and they're like, oh my God, we just did, hey Jude it was amazing. It just wasn't like that it's always been work. It's always been work and sometimes it's you know, a stereo mic and genius and sometimes it's getting in there and multi-tracking and fixing it and most of the time it's somewhere in between. So I would say, take the experiences that you have and own them, and just think it's great that you get to work with artists that you have to do a lot of work with, because as you get better at your craft, you will generate more customers, the customer will get better and you'll find that your solving problems like really, really fast. I remember tracking Stephen Tyler's vocals and he would sing a line. First of all he would self-comp, which is genius. You sing for an hour and a half on a song. When you finish it, you'll also comp it. Because he would go oh, he'd sing a line, maybe two or three lines, and he would miss a word or wouldn't sing the second line quite the way he wanted it to. So he'd be like, can I go back and punch that in? The thing is, I've been doing this for a thousand years, so I knew what he wanted me to do. I was already queued up and so he would like you know what? And as he was saying it, we're rolling back to that thing and playing that part, and he just punched it. Just doing that he realized, oh, warren's really super intuitive. But I got to be super intuitive because of what you're talking about and working with a lot of really bad singers. I wasn't just sitting there going you're a genius, let's go on. And I'll tell you one last story. I won't say who the guitar player was, but I did get to spend some time with Jeff Beck a few years ago. He was a really good guitar player and he had made a record with a really famous guitar player who had produced it and I said to him wow, how come it never came out? He's like he was too much of a fan. So part of your job is to not just go. Oh my God, it's amazing. It is, unfortunately, to suffer a little bit and get in there and work and go. I need to redo this. This needs to be done, and the only way to learn that is to work with people that aren't that good, and often some of the most successful artists that you get to work with aren't necessarily technically very gifted, but they have amazing ideas, and I'd much rather work with an artist with an incredible song and a great idea and a left of center way of doing something than working with anybody who's a technically amazing guitar player. Haven't you noticed that sort of trend on YouTube? There's so many videos of just like it was the Mixolydion, phrygian45971, eq'd. Blah, blah, blah. It gives a rat's ass If I have to watch another video of somebody telling me how they did this when you ask the artist and the artist is like I have no idea what this guy's talking about. No, galaga was interviewed recently and said oh, I watched a video breakdown of how one of your songs is he's like. I watched it. I had no idea what the guy was talking about. He's like Gc and D. I threw in an E minor, went to a B minor. It's just, I get it. It makes people feel like they're really smart, they know how to, but at the end of the day, you just got to roll up your sleeves and get in there and learn. It's good to have technical knowledge Of course it is, but don't let it be a crutch. I think that you're in the right kind of career path, which is work with some crap and polish the schnizzle out of it. The more you do this, the better your client base will be, the better you'll be at your job. Unfortunately, watch some of the stuff we do. There's quite a lot of stuff we do that isn't that well recorded. I know what you're saying. A lot of that stuff sometimes feels like fluff pieces based on. Look at me, aren't I amazing?

Benedikt Hain: 55:57

All right, all right, thank you so much for that answer. I hope it helped. It was a great answer, and so much to unpack there so many nuggets in every one of these. Thank you, guys for your questions. Thank you for coming in your live.

Warren Huart: 56:08

Sorry, I need two questions, so I talk too much. No, that's amazing.

Benedikt Hain: 56:11

I think you've answered like 10 questions with your two answers for those questions. So this is perfect. So much in there. So, yeah, thank you guys for coming here, for joining us live. There's more to come. There's more interviews that we do here with amazing people like Jason, joshua and so many great people, and also many of our peers and Studio Sofa, studio, yeah, studio yeah it's going on all day. They do a lot of cool things here, so please come back and thank you.

Malcom Owen Flood: 56:35

Thank you, warren, real quick, shout out Warren's got a master class coming up. Oh yeah, so please go check that out. It's very important. Pick up his book, and can we please get a huge round of applause for?

Lucas: 56:44

Warren.

Malcom Owen Flood: 56:44

Hewer.

Warren Huart: 56:45

Thank you for coming, sir. Yay, you all rock. Thank you very much. Marvelous, that was fun, very fun. Thank you, sir. Tickets add up to 12.