#94: The Problem(s) With YouTube Channels, Blogs And Podcasts On Recording Music

[00:00:00] Malcom: I heard a great quote recently and it was something like knowledge without action is ignorance, Ooh. 

[00:00:06] Benedikt: Yeah. Yeah, yeah. 

[00:00:08] Malcom: Yup. I think I know, but I haven't done it. So I don't really know. That's a good point. I got to do more stuff. 

[00:00:13] Benedikt: Yes, absolutely. Hello, and welcome to the self recording band podcast. I am your host Benedick tine, and I'm here with my friend and cohost Malcolm Owen flood. How are you Malcolm?

[00:00:37] Malcom: Hello, I'm gray man. Things are going just swimmingly. How are things for you in lovely Germany? 

[00:00:43] Benedikt: Uh, it's been it's better and it was wild the last couple of days, to be honest, but it's it's better now. So like my person's situation is better than the overall situation in lovely Germany. Not so much at the moment, like COVID is back full force, 

[00:00:58] Malcom: Jeez. 

[00:00:59] Benedikt: worse than ever. [00:01:00] But, um, yeah. Well, I dunno, I don't even want to talk about, but for me personally, uh, things aren't getting better, uh, the listeners won't know, but. My son poked me in the eye like a couple of days ago. And I couldn't see a well for a couple of days. Seriously hurt my eye, but it's it, it will recover. I cannot, my vision is back.

[00:01:24] Malcom: That is good. Yeah. When you send me that voice message, you like, and I can't see, you know, it's like, oh my God, this is serious. 

[00:01:31] Benedikt: Yup. Yeah, it was, it wasn't the weekend. And I went to the hospital and they couldn't do anything for me at the moment. So I had to wait and then go to the, uh, whatever the English word for an eye doctor is. And he, he had a look at it on Monday and he was like, yeah, it's hurt, but I, it should be fine. So yeah.

[00:01:50] Malcom: Um, I'm glad up. Comma trust optometrist, I think is the English word. I was up at like three in the morning today. So I feel like a lot of what I say is going [00:02:00] to be wildly false. 

[00:02:01] Benedikt: Yeah, yeah, 

[00:02:03] Malcom: I'll do my best. 

[00:02:04] Benedikt: yeah, yeah. Then that plus, um, which is very sad on like on the weekend, our cat died one of our cats, so that was not, fun. Yeah, totally, totally. I still didn't don't realize it really because I wasn't there when it happened and like, but yeah, it's, that's shitty for sure. But yeah, it's all, it will all get better.

[00:02:28] Malcom: Always does. 

[00:02:29] Benedikt: Yes, exactly. Now, did you or your house recover from the flood?

[00:02:34] Malcom: Yes. I mean, my vocal booth does not have nice, cool looking flooring anymore. That is a, that was a goner. Um, but otherwise everything is good. However, we have a forecast for even worse, right? 

[00:02:48] Benedikt: Oh, 

[00:02:48] Malcom: yeah, 

[00:02:49] Benedikt: shit.

[00:02:51] Malcom: so fingers crossed that is wrong. The weather is often wrong. So I'm just going to optimistically assume that they are wrong about this too. [00:03:00] And we'll all be fine. 

[00:03:02] Benedikt: Okay. So when is this supposed to happen 

[00:03:05] Malcom: This weekend 

[00:03:06] Benedikt: this week? Oh yeah. Fingers crossed. 

[00:03:08] Malcom: Fingers crossed. We will see, but, uh, yeah, it was wild. Like there, the highway's closed all over the province. Things got messed up. 

[00:03:17] Benedikt: Oh shit. Oh shit. Yeah. I saw the pictures. Crazy, crazy. Crazy. Yeah. Um, so I hope no more catastrophes the next couple of weeks, at least for a while, 

[00:03:28] Malcom: the rest of the year we come. Well, we can get out of the year without any more of those. 

[00:03:32] Benedikt: Yeah, for sure. Yeah, that would be super great. Now, before we dive into today's episode, I want to ask something from our audience. Like, I want to ask you the listeners, something that is really, really important for us. And we haven't asked it much in the past. And I think that was, that was absolutely our mistake. So here we go. If you like the show, if you get something out of it, if you enjoy it, please share the show with your friends. That's the number one most [00:04:00] important thing you can do for. Like just share it, share it with all your musician, friends that are self recording posted on social tag, us, all that stuff. That's the number one thing, but then also, please, please go to apple podcasts or iTunes or your favorite podcast app. Although the apple apps are the most important place to do that. And give us a review, please like a five star rating plus a text review. That will be super awesome. And I know we've asked that before. Not many people did. We know that a lot of people listen to it and we get emails and messages all the time. So we know you enjoy, if you just, for some reason you just didn't go there and give us a review. And probably the reason is because you think that someone else will do that anyway. So you don't have to, that is wrong because everybody thinks that, and then no one gives us a review. So,

[00:04:47] Malcom: yeah. There's a name for that. I can't remember what it is, but like, okay. Here's a true story that I'm going to get wildly wrong, but, but this lady was being attacked by this dude with a knife and she was screaming for help. [00:05:00] And. Lights turned on. She had been stabbed and, but like lights turned on and people looked out the window to see what's going on and, you know, attack attacker retreated, because it's all lights. Everybody just assumed somebody else's calling. The cops turned off their lights. He attacked again, same thing happened. It happened three times. Nobody called the car. That happened in the states somewhere wild. So that's what we're comparing our podcast to 

[00:05:24] Benedikt: Yeah. That's

[00:05:25] Malcom: now realizing this is terrible. You should not have used that as an example. 

[00:05:31] Benedikt: yeah, but it's 

[00:05:31] Malcom: This is nothing like that. 

[00:05:33] Benedikt: No, no, not, not at all bought, but still I get your point. It's called the, what you described as the bystander effect, I think. Um, and yeah. 

[00:05:41] Malcom: all we needed. 

[00:05:42] Benedikt: Yeah, there's this book called, uh, influence, I think is the name of the book where it's described in detail. But yeah, what happens is like when a lot of people, when everybody assumes that someone else will, will take action, then nobody will take action. And I agree it's a bad [00:06:00] comparison, I get the point. I got the point. Um, so anyway, what I, what, so please, please go to. Apple podcasts or iTunes or your favorite podcast app. And just leave us a review and rate the show and what that does for us, because I think also you might not realize why that is important. It's not just because we like to see that it's because apple will then show our show to more people. So it helps us help more people like you, it helps us reach more. Which is good for us all for the music community. So other musicians will benefit from doing that. And also the more people listen to the show and the more feedback we get, the better our content gets. So we just, we would just love to grow our audience obviously. And you can be a part of that and, and do that for us if you enjoy the show. And so, yeah. Thank you. 

[00:06:47] Malcom: Two things. We're a music podcast about recording yourself. So everybody listens as a creative and I would say that 99.9% of you. have apple devices. Based on that, um, [00:07:00] maybe 99.8. And so you, even, if you listen to on Spotify, whether you can't review, just go to the apple app, leave us a review. Number two, everybody loves the guest episodes we had and having reviews is the main way for us to get really bad ass guests. Um, luckily we know a lot of ass people, so we've been able to get great guests on already, but if we want to reach outside of our like warm network, we need more reviews from you. So please, please, please go. 

[00:07:26] Benedikt: Totally. I will give you the facts because I just opened up our podcast distribution hosting app, and it tells us where people are listening, what people are listening on, like what, which devices and stuff. So. The top app is apple podcasts. So you're right there. Um, outcome, the top device is an apple iPhone, 58% of you listening on an apple iPhone. Um, the top app is apple podcasts followed by a Spotify, followed by unknown apple apps, whatever that is, but still apple. So yeah, of people on an iPhone. So you can absolutely go there [00:08:00] and do that. And maybe you have a Mac or whatever. There's no excuse if you'd like to show. So, Anyway, thank you. Uh, and we will move on to with today's episode. I think. So, this today we are talking about, I would say it's a little weird. We, we are talking about the problem. Content like this with podcasts like this, with YouTube, with books, like any type of educational content, what we're going to talk about, what the problem is with that, or what, what can, could be, become a problem. and there's a couple of reasons for that. We all love like Malcolm and I, we both love to educate ourselves. We love to learn and grow. We consume podcasts, books, courses, all that stuff all the time, but sometimes it would actually be better to limit our own learning or our consumption of content and take action instead. So [00:09:00] consuming all that stuff can be a distraction or like a way to procrastinate for a lot of people. And while we obviously think that our podcast is helpful, we think. That we should be very careful with how much we consume versus how much we create basically. And I love to, to be a person who creates more than, than, than I consume. So like, I'd love to create more than I consume. And I think that everybody should be like that. Like if you're a creative and we want to talk about that, we're going to talk about why, why it can be a problem if you learn too much, or if you consume too much content and why and what you can do in this. Or how you can use the content so that it actually moves the needle and it actually helps you achieve your goals.

[00:09:46] Malcom: Yeah. Create more than you consume. That is like a powerful thing to think about. You and I Benny, we create a lot, um, like we, we both do this podcast. We both have other podcasts, respectively as [00:10:00] well. We both produce or mix and master music up there as well. Some, even some video content and stuff. None of my social content. So we create a lot, but I would say we still consume more than we can. Uh, personally each, so like, that's a very hard job to fill. And now if you aren't doing all those things, I guess that's fine, but it means that you should be doing a lot more producing of your music. Get like way more, way more out there. I'm trying to balance that out much, much more. I hope that's hitting hard. 

[00:10:31] Benedikt: Yes, a hundred percent agreed. And also. So that is part of it. Part of what we're going to talk about today. Also, there are a couple more problems that I recently, um, I've been talking about a lot lately when I was doing a coaching calls and talking one-on-one to people. When I realized. Not only is it a district? Can it be a distraction or procrastination thing? It can only, it can also be, this, this weird thing where people just blindly [00:11:00] adopt whatever people say in this content, like we, or YouTube or people in the book. And they just, they just hear someone say something. And then they just assume that this is the truth and they should always do it like that. So the good part about that is that these people actually take action. So they hear something and they implement it most of the time when they tell me that. But so that's good, but that can also be, become a problem. If you implement stuff, that's not the right thing to do the right approach for your project or in order for you to hit your goals. So I had this, yeah, this actually comes up pretty often in conversations like I was talking to. A friend of mine who, what who's watching, videos on guitar, recording on YouTube from people that I respect and that I watched that content as well. And he saw people do certain use certain techniques, and he was telling me about that and he asked why I don't do it that way. And I'm like, who said, I don't do it that way. Yeah. I've never seen you do this. Like you do differently. And I'm like, [00:12:00] sometimes I do it sometimes I don't depends on the project, you know, but like, and he was like, yeah, but this person says that this is the way. And obviously sounds great. Like haven't you seen this video, so why don't you do it? And then like, okay, this is the problem. Like I bet this person doesn't always do it that way as well. It's just one thing. He showed him this video. And I realized that people assume when they see something like that, that this is the way you should do it. And this happens to us as well. Like a lot of people listening to our podcasts have sent me messages where they say something like, I know you typically don't recommend X, Y, but I still did it this time. Or they say yes, stuff like that. And that tells me that they think there's this one way that we think you should do things. And they feel weird about like when they do, when they do different. And I wanted to tell you that it's totally fine to do it differently if it's the right approach for whatever you're working on. So even though we believe in what we say here, this is all not gospel and not [00:13:00] something you should always do. Like this is super important to me. So that's, that's the whole point of this episode today. I want to talk about all these. And, and, and maybe, and hopefully give you some, some alternatives, some ways to consume content, but then also apply it the right way. And like, yeah. I have a couple of techniques for myself that I, that I use to get the most out of the content that I can.

[00:13:23] Malcom: it takes experience. Um, I would say like, it's very natural when you're starting out, because you don't have any alternative. You get you here, you know how to set up overheads that so-and-so likes a space pair. And, so that's what you do. You, you don't really know have an alternative in your, in your kind of bank of techniques to go from and you try it. Yeah. Until you get experienced, you might just be like, okay, well that sounds like it sounds, but until you try a different one, say an X, Y, and you know what that sounds like now you have a comparison in your head for like, okay, these are totally different vibes, totally different stereo images, which one suits the project. Am I going that I'm going [00:14:00] with? I was totally guilty of this. My mentor was a hardcore Y guy. And to be fair, it works like a charm in his room almost every time. And I, whenever I went to other studios, I just kind of kept rolling with X, Y. Now I'm obsessed with the space pair. 

[00:14:14] Benedikt: Yeah.

[00:14:15] Malcom: That's not to say, you know, I've definitely set up space pairs and been like not working. We got to take those down, throw up an X, Y or, or try something different. Like it comes with experience that you question what you think. Rather than just being like, this is what I saw, you know, um, now what we're teaching and what everybody else is, teaching is totally awesome. Like those are great techniques and great starting points and that's what they should be. They should be. This is like an educated guess. It's always an educated guess. 

[00:14:44] Benedikt: Yeah, absolutely. So, yeah, I can totally relate to that. Like I've used so many things for so long without ever questioning them just because someone told me to. And so I, yeah, I get where you're coming from. And it's totally, it's perfectly fine that, [00:15:00] that it's that this is the way you do things right now, but I we'd love to challenge you to just try new things, to experiment, to be opened for new to new ideas and to not. Um, share information you got from somebody as like the number, like the only way to do things. That's because that's just makes the problem worse. Like if somebody sees a video and then thinks that's the only way to do it. And then they shared with all with everybody and they tell everybody that this is the only way this makes this, this makes things worse. Like when you give someone at wise advice make sure you, you, you say it's a, it's an idea as a gesture. Uh, way to do it, but not necessarily the only way, so. Okay. So yeah, let's, let's, let's just start listing out like the quote unquote quote problems with content. So problem number one, you. Here's something. And you think it's the only way. So we just talked about that. That is problem. A one solution to that is I would, what I do is I have, I think it's called a commonplace book [00:16:00] is what they call it back in the, in the day. It's like a that's, that's been something people used for like, I don't know, centuries. In my case, it's an app. It's a note app that I use, but you can have like an actual book or a notepad or whatever. And whenever I hear something that I, whenever I learn something that I think is awesome and could work when I learn about a new technique or a new way of doing things or an idea, I just put it there. I have one place where I dump all of these ideas and they are sorted in categories and stuff. So Whenever I encounter a certain situation. I have a number of ways to solve that problem in this commonplace book. So I can just open up that app and look for. Overhead miking techniques, whatever. And then I have a list of things that I've learned that I can then try or that I can like evaluate and see, like this could work for this pro project. This might not be the right approach for this project, but I don't forget about things. I learn. So I take notes and I just put in there, but I don't have to store them in my head. And I don't have to have only one [00:17:00] solution, but I have, uh, a variety of options that I can pick and choose for. And I do that with like everything in my life. Basically. It's like whenever, even for things like whenever, Someone when someone like we even have something like that for our family, when someone recommends a movie to us and I just can't watch it right now, or like, I will write it down. I will put it inside a notes app and I'll have a list of movies that have been recommended to me. And when I, when we were telling them and we want to watch a movie, I'll just open up that list and see whatever I want to watch today. And if I don't do that, I don't remember that recommendation. Same thing. If I'm. 

[00:17:33] Malcom: Okay. 

[00:17:34] Benedikt: If I'm out somewhere and someone recommends a mic or guitar or whatever, music related thing, I just write it down for later. And I have this, I built this library of things that have been recommended to me, but I never think about it as like, this is the one thing, like the best movie ever, or the one guitar that I have to buy. It's just one recommendation. And if like multiple people recommend the same thing, that might be the next thing. I'll try it. You know, but, but I have [00:18:00] this, this collection, this library of things that I can just open up and pick and choose. And some of it is in my head, of course, but other things I have to write down because I can't remember.

[00:18:08] Malcom: Right. Yeah. I mean, that's, that's amazing. That's great. Um, I feel like I love organization and, but I have to work hard at it where I feel like you love organization and you're naturally super organized. You were such a pro.

[00:18:20] Benedikt: I don't know, I've, I've become that. I think I wasn't like that at all. Like ask my wife. I was terrible at it. Like it was years of work went into this. Now it's natural because I realized how much faster I am with a lot of things. And it's a lot of. When you begin organizing stuff like that, but when it's all set up and you just make habits, like habits are the key. Like when you have to think about it and force yourself to do things like that, it's hard. But once it's, it becomes a habit it's not hard at all. I just make sure that in every single. Jacket that I have in my bag, in my car everywhere. There's a little notebook and a pen it's like everywhere so that I can write down things everywhere. Basically. I always have my phone with me, so I [00:19:00] can always open up an app. You just have to make it easy. You just have to, if you have to look for a pen and paper, or if you have to install an app or log into something complicated, you just don't do it because that takes time. But if it's just one click of a button or I just reach over here, grab a pen. And my note pad is right next to me, then it's super easy to just make it. Uh, all you have to do is like build habits for that, but you don't have to do it that way. All that's all I'm saying is if you can store it in your head, if you can, all I'm saying is like store these ideas somewhere and then see them as ideas possible solutions to a problem, but not the one way to do it. And always when you see a YouTube video, when you listen to podcasts, when you read a book, think about the situation, the context, and in which the idea has been presented and, and ask yourself why the. Particular example why it worked and uncheck. If it, if it's the same sort of issue in your situation, because oftentimes it's not like if someone shows you a technique to, to set up, [00:20:00] like to dial in an amp and Mike, the cab for a high gain metal tone it might not necessarily work for your blues record that you're making, like it could, but you know, probably there's a different context and you should always keep that.

[00:20:15] Malcom: Yeah, I like that was going to be my next technique for yeah. Organize your different techniques, but Lynn, um, I kind of call it like John or testing is when I'm thinking about what techniques I'm going to use or gear I'm going to use. I think about what genre I'm like, I'm actually working in. And then that narrows down the list. It's like a tag attached to the ideas in my head. And then as soon as I think metal or rock, that list gets smaller, you know? I'm not going to do like a four mic drum set up on a hard rock song. That's not going to translate for me. Works like a charm if you're going through. You know, when the levee breaks kind of thing, you can, you can pull it off. But, uh, for, for a big rock song, it's like [00:21:00] a heavy, modern rock song. It's not going to not going to go. Totally the same with guitars, you know, like I'd read man's guitar tone is the perfect guitar tone for that song. Which sounds terrible if it was on clocks by Coldplay, it'd just be the worst personable.

[00:21:15] Benedikt: Yeah, there's for sure. For sure. Yeah.

[00:21:17] Malcom: Um, so like everything is got to be filtered through the genre and that really helps you narrow down on like what actually is relevant. And you can, I think that's a really easy to remember because you can think about where you learned it from, especially if it's like a YouTube video or a podcast like us, like, you know, Benny and I are both rock the umbrella rock guys, you know, like that wide umbrella of genres. That's kind of where we live. So our ideas translate to that stuff generally. And, and, you know, sometimes it can translate to other stuff, but it's, you know, I wouldn't come looking at us for a bluegrass record. It's probably the wrong place to be learning. Um, although I know we have a bluegrass listener, who's killing it. 

[00:21:56] Benedikt: Exactly. Exactly. Exactly. And I, yeah. Keep, [00:22:00] keep going. I have to say something about that. If I keep going.

[00:22:02] Malcom: Yeah. Um, so, so just like with YouTube videos, especially though you can just like picture the person telling you, and you're like, you know something about them, you can, you know, the long hair and you're like, oh yeah, that in the metal. I remember that. And so this is like a good metal guitar technique stuff like that. Super helpful. 

[00:22:17] Benedikt: Yes, totally. Yeah, I completely agree with what you just said there. And yet, like no bluegrass is not the thing that I work on all the time. But I, in my case, I think that as long as it's like band music or with acoustic instruments, I can do a decent job at least like helping, you know, I can, I might not be the perfect person to mix it. There, there are other people who are, who mix this sort of stuff all the time, but I can definitely help you. Uh, I could definitely help you get your recordings right. And other things. And like, we have a listener who's who does a bluegrass, at least one listener. Like we know him, it's Greg. He's awesome. He kills he's killing it. And he yeah, I've been on the phone with him a couple of times for [00:23:00] coaching calls and he's in the academy and all that. And he just, yeah, he's, he's amazing. So, but you're right. Like, even with him, when I talk to them, I say things like. If this is what works for your genre and you know, it better than I do then by all means, go for it. My suggestion would be tried this and that, but always like, let the genre guide your decisions, let your tastes guide the decisions. so, so yeah, you, you, you completely, right. I wouldn't, I wouldn't show him or I wouldn't make him Mike a cab the way I do with a metal band. Of course. So yeah, this is was super important. Context is super important. It's everything. 

[00:23:34] Malcom: So I know. we've talked about this before, but it still drives me nuts. There was a video made by a very famous YouTube channel about, uh, using eight gauge strings and how they sound better than any other heavier gauge strings. And possibly like the most damaging thing to hop. It happened to rock music. 

[00:23:51] Benedikt: Yeah.

[00:23:52] Malcom: I'm sure live bands have sounded worse ever since. 

[00:23:55] Benedikt: Yep.

[00:23:57] Malcom: The, the comparison was that like they're [00:24:00] brighter. They're not really lacking in low end in comparison. And maybe that's true. In my experience, it's not usually the case, but maybe that's true. Um, now people in the video happened to be world-class guitar players and musicians. And I mean, I consider myself. I, you know, I'm not like like Steve vine or something, but I'm like a world-class touring musician. Like I can go into her and do the shit. And, uh, I still grab chords out of tune all the time by accident and shit. Like it's, it's hard work recording really in tune guitars. Thank you ever to now. And if I had aids, there'd be no chance. There'd be no chance I could do. If I practice really hard with eight gauge strings, I would eventually get it, but it's still be really, really hard. And, and so it's like, this advice is like, they sound better for me in this like no context situation. And then I, the music store in town said that everybody was buying aids, everybody.

[00:24:53] And it's like, okay, nobody in this town is good enough to play with aids, 

[00:24:57] Benedikt: Yeah.

[00:24:59] Malcom: nobody. [00:25:00] Oh no, this is a disaster. 

[00:25:03] Benedikt: For sure. For sure. Yeah. I know, I know the video you're talking about. We w we don't have to say who it, who made it, but, um, yeah, I've had conversations about that as well. And I, people get, the funny thing is if you tell people, if I offer my advice then, and that's also part of. Part of the whole problem is also that when somebody really famous or really like a big YouTube, or it doesn't even have to be a famous producer of musician, if just, if it's just a big YouTuber who says that it's very hard to convince people of something else or like to at least try and make them think about it, because what happened in this situation was I was like, people were telling me about this video and I was offering my opinion and said, like, exactly what you just said, Malcolm. And then people really. I noticed that people get defensive even like, I I'm very polite when I say things like that. And I like, it's just ideas and advice, but you don't have to do what I say of course. But if I offer [00:26:00] my opinion, then when I'm asked for it, then people will become, will get pretty defensive. And also the. They let me know that, like this big guy said, you've got to do it that way and they don't take my advice as seriously as the other guys. So I don't care about that. Like, you can, you can do whatever you want, but that's just, that's also part of the problem that just because these people reach a lot of people, they have, they seem to have some sort of authority and people will just follow blindly. And this is, yeah, this is, this can be dangerous. Like it always, it always is in all sorts of. Yeah, waste. But what I'm trying to say is I think some of the most knowledgeable, some of the best producers out there are not like the loudest ones or the ones who reach the most people, or some of them don't even do content at all. And if you'd ask them for their advice, they would give you very good advice. Probably they would look at it from different angles, different perspectives, but nobody hears these people. All [00:27:00] you hear is like the people who have. Reaching a lot of people who have big YouTube channels, podcasts, whatever, who are writing books and they are great of course, and what they do is great. But you just have to think about the context. You will always have to be open to other ideas as well and use it, just file them in your brain or in an actual apple, whatever, or wherever as like options to solve a problem. That that's it. So. 

[00:27:28] Malcom: like that, that channel we were mentioning, I'm sure has a ton of great advice on there. Um, stuff 

[00:27:34] Benedikt: why I don't want to talk shit about it.

[00:27:35] Malcom: Yeah, totally. And, and even that video is like, it's not like they really did anything wrong in their test with. 

[00:27:42] Benedikt: Nope. 

[00:27:43] Malcom: sounded cool, I guess. And people thought they agreed with it. Um, it's just, it's more so that the listeners didn't question it right. And blindly followed it and didn't notice that now every time they play a chord, it's awful. 

[00:27:57] Benedikt: Yeah exactly now. Okay. So I think [00:28:00] that at that point as clear yeah. Just try to be open, to try to question things. And don't assume that when you see something that people do do it like that all the time, and it's not your fault, by the way, like sometimes these videos are made that you could think this is what they do every single time, but I can assure you that even those people, because they know what they do. Obviously they are not idiots. They are great people and their ideas are great and what they do works for them. But I can assure you that they don't do it like that all the time. Like when some famous producer shows you a way to. It's probably not what they do in every single session. It's just the one thing they showed in this one video. And that's always something you have to keep in mind.

[00:28:38] Malcom: Yeah, actually, it's pretty safe to assume that if you're learning from one of the best in the world, that they change it all the time, because they are constant learners. 

[00:28:45] Benedikt: Yes, absolutely. Okay. So problem, number two, that is the one that I started this episode with, and that is that consuming. Content and learning is great, but if it distracts you [00:29:00] and if it keeps you from actually taking action and like doing work and practicing and doing the exercises and putting in the effort, that's necessary stuff that will really move the needle. If it keeps you from doing that, you have to stop it or limit yourself. You can do like a. Yeah, you can. There's just people do it differently. Some people just stop for a while entirely and just try to like really focus on getting a project done for a couple of weeks without consuming anything. Other people just limit themselves to a certain amount or you just find the natural balance, whatever works for you. But like, if you're not reaching your goals, like if you set goals and you, you find that you don't get there, you or you can't seem to make progress. Just think about how you take a look at how you spend your time and be brutally honest with yourself. And the thing why, like, the reason why I'm saying this is that the obvious distractions or procrastinations are things like Netflix or like stuff that is not music related. Like that's the number one thing that people look at when they, when they [00:30:00] look at their calendars, their schedules and they try to find out. Why they don't get anywhere. So that, that's the number one thing. But oftentimes people think they are very productive and they don't watch Netflix. They don't do a bunch of other crap. They think they spend all the time working on the music, but actually they're not working on their music. They spend a lot of time learning and consuming stuff, which feels productive and feels great. And you building knowledge, but as long as you just building that long, that knowledge and you don't take. It doesn't change much for you. So you gotta get to that point where you implement it and where you create more than you consume, as you said in the beginning. And so there's, this is really super important than diet, as much as I love that, that some of you have listened to all our now 94 episodes of this podcast. So I love that you do that, but. If you ever, like, if you, if you, if you ever have it to make the decision and I was like, record the idea I have right now, or try this new thing that I wanted to try all the time, or listen to another episode, please go and record that idea now. Or like work on the thing you [00:31:00] want it to work on and then go back and listen to the episode. So I don't want you to, to listen to it because you think you would need that first and, and, yeah. And just never get to the thing that actually needs to be.

[00:31:12] Malcom: Yeah. Yeah, Try and practice just in time learning for sure. I heard a great quote recently and it was something like knowledge without action is ignorance, something crazy blunt like that. And I was like, Ooh. 

[00:31:24] Benedikt: yeah. Yeah, yeah.

[00:31:26] Malcom: Yup. I think I know, but I haven't done it. So I don't really know. That's a good point. I got to do more stuff. 

[00:31:32] Benedikt: Yes, absolutely. Yeah, totally. You're totally right, man. I love that quote and it's true. And yeah. 

[00:31:39] Malcom: have. yeah. there's, there's one more problem with YouTube channels, podcasts, books, and everything that is on our list today that I, that I don't think is in our outline here and it's, uh, endorsements. and, uh, now. This is tricky because honestly, if you're not very aware how the content marketing world works [00:32:00] at a certain point and some people's entire platforms are based on affiliate marketing, so, or Yeah. Affiliate, which is where you get paid. If somebody buys the thing, but sometimes you just get paid money to talk about something and promote it. And. That doesn't always mean that they are lying. That actually, I would say most of the time, most integral people would be only willing to do the job if they actually liked it. And, but some people do, you know, some people talk about stuff and say, it's the bee's knees, but they don't even use it. It's just something that they it's just a job. So just be aware of that. We definitely are not like that. I want you to know. 

[00:32:38] Benedikt: Yes.

[00:32:39] Malcom: Are married, truthful humans. Um, and actually we don't even have anything that we promote. Do we, I mean, you got a affiliate like thing for some headphones, I think, but is there anything else,

[00:32:49] Benedikt: Um, I got a couple of things that are like, I have one affiliate thing with room sound, drum samples, because, but I bought them all before I, yeah. I bought them all before I [00:33:00] got the, the affiliate link. So I bought every single one of their libraries with my own money. And then I got the affiliate link and now I share it with people because it's what I really use in a lot of my productions. And I just love them and I will continue to buy whatever they, they put out if it's as good as the ones that I have now. 

[00:33:15] Malcom: Yep. 

[00:33:16] Benedikt: that's one thing. I have an endorsement deal with a headphone company, although audio from Slovenia, which they are great, which they, the company. No. 

[00:33:27] Malcom: No, no, no, no. You're on the headphones. Like, like, like the one I'm getting at is that these are all the, these aren't jobs. These are like happened stances. 

[00:33:35] Benedikt: Yeah. That's, that's not even an affiliate, an affiliate thing. I can't buy and resell them in theory because I get a little bit. But like, I have done that three or four times or so. I don't even promote it that hard. I, I, I will tell people that I love them. and then I'm, it's not the ones that I'm wearing right now because these are close and I use them because of the mic bleed, but the other ones, the, all those are open and I love them for mixing, but I use them every day and I really, really love them and I really [00:34:00] would recommend them to everybody. So, yeah. And then the other thing is dental up. I don't have an endorsement deal yet. I don't depends on when you listen to the show. But we're working on some, we have some partnership. That's all I can say. Um, they sent me stuff to try and part of the reason why we haven't, we don't have an official deal yet is because I want to try things first. I want to know if I really enjoy it. I want to know if it's good enough for me to stand behind it and like, Um, recommended to people with this microphone I already did because I enjoy it. I use it for every single podcast. It's great. I take it with me as a USB mic. I love it. I use it, so that's fine. But they sent me other stuff and I have to try it. And then when I've, um, yeah, so yeah, bottom line, we are not like that. If I ever make a piece of content about anything, you can be sure that I actually enjoy and use them. But this is not always the case. And sometimes it's not obvious. Sometimes people don't do like a promo or something. They just talk about a piece of gear and you might not know that they do it because it's their job.[00:35:00] 

[00:35:00] Malcom: Yes. Now a couple of things on that point is, uh, yeah, they there's people that do it because of the job. And that's what we're saying, China, and notice that and stay away from it. It's obviously not very like heartfelt advice. They don't necessarily have your best interests. Uh, But second, even if they like it and you like them, there's now a bias being created. You should question it even though you naturally think Benny's got a really great sounding voice when you listen to this podcast. And that might sounds great. Doesn't mean it's going to be great for you. It probably it's a manuscript might be fine, but, uh, like that's a bad example, but essentially what I'm saying is that you're naturally, if you enjoy the content, like if you're watching a channel all the time, you're going to naturally like what they like and just by association, I think it's the right thing for you and you should quit. 

[00:35:45] Benedikt: True. Absolutely true. I haven't even thought about that problem, but that is a true problem. Um, there are, I've seen really crappy products being promoted by a bunch of people where it was like, why, like how, but yeah. It's like, [00:36:00] it's a job, so yeah. Uh, be careful there. All right. Now the thing with the whole procrastination thing, um, to get back to that real quick, what you can do there is, as I said, like limit your time. Try to create more than you consume. and, uh, you, you mentioned just-in-time learning and just in time, education or learning means that you only learn or consume things you'd need right now to solve a specific problem. Like when, you know, You are in songwriting mode and you constantly like hit writer's block or you just can't come up with something you really stoked. Yeah. You got to educate yourself, you've got to do things. You gotta find ways to overcome that. And then education is obviously awesome, but it won't help much if you con, if you read a book on mixing when you're in that phase, right? So you should consume the right content. And once you have your answers or possible answers, possible ways to solve your problem, you should stop and implement what you've learned and see whether or not it works. And only if it doesn't work, you can like come back and [00:37:00] learn more, but always try to actually implement this. you're learning. So if you're honest, like if you consume, and even if you do that, even if you consume the right type of content, there's usually so much in like a single YouTube video, if it's well-made or in a single podcast episode or in a book that you read it. That it's going to be very hard to implement all of these things, like to even remember all the things and then implement them. So you'll have plenty of actionables after just watching one piece of content or listening to one podcast or reading one book. And before you move on to the next, you should try the things you just learned, or just write them down for later. But like make sure you make good use of it, because if you think about it um, the amount of time you put into that, like, think about how long it takes to, to read a book, a good book. That's a serious investment. You could spend time with your family. You could spend time making music, you could spend time with your friends, you could do all sorts of things. Instead of reading that book. Why would you read that book if you don't take any of the things in that book and actually try them and implement them and like, [00:38:00] yeah. And, and improve something with it. If you don't do that, if you just put in the time, but you don't implement that. It's just because then you read the book just for the sake of reading and that could be fun. And I like reading too, but just be honest to yourself, like if that's what you, how you want to spend your time, if you just want to read, because you want to read then cool. But if you think it's productive and it helps you make better meals. Probably not like you have to think about why you're actually doing this. And if the investment is really worth it, the time investment, and if it actually moves the needle and that's been so true for myself, like I read all the time, I, I read books and listen to audio books and listen to podcasts and take courses and all of that. And for the longest time, I moved on to the next thing without implementing, I may be implemented 20, 30% of whatever I learned in the last thing at best. And now I'm way slower with reading. It takes me much more time now to read a book, but only because as I go through [00:39:00] the book, I tried to take the stuff that I need right now and implement it right away. And that might mean that I can't finish a book in like two weeks, but it might take me six weeks or even longer. But during these, those six weeks, I take as many things out of this book as I can, and actually put it to action and see if it works. So,

[00:39:20] Malcom: Yeah. Those results are going to be infinitely better. 

[00:39:22] Benedikt: yeah, totally. So yeah, that's one thing. Action. And like the right, the right ratio there. And then there is another thing I think for some people consuming more content, even if you take action will not get you to the results. You're trying to achieve will not help you achieve your goals anymore. You might be at a point where you've consumed so much, you've learned so much, you might know all the things, but you just can't connect the dots. You just, you know, it you've implemented the stuff you've tried it, but you just still don't know which of the things are the right things to do or what the right approach in, in that situation you're in right now, what the right approach [00:40:00] is for that. You might need feedback or you might need accountability. You might need. Who actually like guides you through this or who actually makes you do the right things who helps to make decisions on what the right thing is? That's the whole reason why I've for example I hired coaches for all sorts of things. Like I hired a business coach to help me with my, with my businesses. I did that. Like I did that three times actually with different people. When you want to hit like. When you want to hit a certain fitness or health goal, you hire a personal trainer or a coach in sports or whatever, or you, you get someone to make you an exercise plan, a training plan or something. Join a team. Yeah. Something, something like that. You don't just read books and then you try to learn. I mean, some people do, but you get much better results. If you have an expert guiding you, coaching you. So. 

[00:40:47] Malcom: Yeah. 

[00:40:48] Benedikt: It might be that another course or another book or another video is not what you need. And if an, even if you take action, it will not give you the results you want, unless you get like accountability feedback, personal [00:41:00] guidance, and an outside perspective. So if that's you, and that's not the point of this episode, but I want to put it out there. Of course, if that's you, that's exactly why I've launched my coaching project pro program as well. So if you are that person and listening to another 93 or four of our episodes, Won't change much for you then maybe reach out, go to the surf recording, band.com/call and book a coaching call with me and see if that is what you need to do right now. If you want to, move your, your whole music career forward, or if we want to make that record, you've always wanted to make, so maybe coaching is the right thing. That's why I'm offering it. And Yeah, 

[00:41:38] Malcom: Yeah, I, you just said something, you said episode 94. And I was like, right, this is our 94th episode without missing a week is crazy. And if you're listening to this and you haven't taken action. Book that call with Benny. It's a no-brainer it's like you, you need somebody to help you get over the next little, like hump in the road, you know that that's just such a good call. You know, our Facebook [00:42:00] community is a good kind of accountability thing as well, and a good place to experiment and bounce things off of like, you know, ideas off other people Benny and I, you, you and I met in a mastermind group, which with the idea. You know, brainstorming and keeping each other accountable as well. That's another good thing. I think a lot of the reason people start bands is for that reason, it's easier as a team, right? It's easier with other people working towards the same goal as you. So like that's a form of, of this as well. So hiring Benny as a coach is just like, now you've got somebody in your corner helping you like navigate this long learning road. 

[00:42:38] Benedikt: For sure. Definitely for me, I should have done. When I started out my audio engineering career, for sure. We've talked about that. I didn't do that. I, I didn't, I didn't pay a coach or get a proper mentor or anything like that because there was nobody close to me. And I didn't know about, I didn't know. I don't know if like online coaching programs like that existed even back then, but I could have certainly reached out to people and just pay for the [00:43:00] time and let me let them mentor or guide me or coach me. And I should have done that the way I did it was I hired other people to mix my music. And I've learned from listening to what they've done with my recordings. I've asked a ton of questions. I was super annoying to people and I tried to, to just get as much like personal feedback and guidance from people as I could. And luckily a lot of those people were kind enough to do that and to offer me the advice, but it would have gone much quicker and I've could have accelerated the whole progress so much if I would just, if I would have just reached out to certain people and. Let them guide me, let them coach 

[00:43:38] Malcom: Right. Yeah. You know, there's a stigma in music. Like just learning music where like, you know, going to music school or taking lessons is sometimes thought of. Uh, I like the wrong path to take. Um, and then with becoming a recording engineer, getting an education, like by going to a university to learn recording arts or something is generally thought to be a terrible [00:44:00] idea. And like, honestly, I usually tell people I'm like, I don't think that's the path to take, but that gets misconstrued as education is not necessary. And that is like that couldn't be further from what I believe education is mandatory. It is absolutely mandatory. The phrase self-taught is just like utter bullshit. It doesn't exist. Nobody's self-taught you just learned from other things. That's all, you know, I just been as Dave girls' book, amazing. Highly recommended one of my favorite audio books ever. But he says a few times that he's self-taught, it's like, no, you just learned from other people, you, like, you learned watching your favorite musicians you learned from playing with other musicians. Like you still. Are absorbing information from other sources, nobody's just got it in them. 

[00:44:47] Benedikt: absolutely.

[00:44:48] Malcom: it couldn't be more true with what we're doing here as well. You know, we're trying to teach you through a podcast and, and really we can plant ideas, but you still have to, there's still way more like steps involved in the, in the like [00:45:00] implementing and having this knowledge become part of who you are and your skills. 

[00:45:05] Benedikt: Totally. And that was actually a perfect example with the audio school thing that you just mentioned because. The difference between audio school and like mentoring, coaching, taking online courses from the right people, reaching out to, to professionalism and ask for advice. The difference between that is that often not, not all the time, I can't speak about all those people, but oftentimes with audio schools or like universities and stuff like that. The people teaching the stuff there, they have not done it in reality. They have not done it themselves, or they haven't done it in a long time. And they're teaching you a curriculum a way to do things, which it sort of, um, yeah. It's is what we've talked about earlier in this episode, they are teaching you one way of doing it. They are not teaching you what it's like to do it in the real world. Like what it's like to be a part of the industry. They often are like behind the curve. Like they, they don't know [00:46:00] like a university or a school like that can never adapt quickly to when things change in the industry. So you might learn stuff that's not relevant anymore. So usually you're just better off. Education is important, but you're just better off talking to people and seeking advice from people who are actually doing what they talk about, what they teach. And the same can be said for some YouTubers or even book authors. There are great ones out there, obviously, but there are also some who, what they're saying is not wrong, but they haven't made a record in a long time. All they do is like make YouTube videos and experiment on their own. And again, what they say might not be wrong, but it might be a little different from. From how records are actually made and, and yeah, just keep that in mind. It's not true for everybody, but just make sure you ask the right people for advice and education is super important, but don't waste a time with the wrong information. That's what we're trying to say here, basically.

[00:46:53] Malcom: Yeah. education's just gotten better. It's changed. And, and it took us a while to realize that like these alternative forms [00:47:00] of education are actually education. And that's exactly what they are. They're just new forms of education that in my mind are just like far superior to what existed previously. 

[00:47:10] Benedikt: Totally totally. That's a whole like knowledge revolution going on now and it will take, it will still be a while until. Most people will catch up and really realize that this, that it is that way. But it's like to be honest, in some niches, in some fields of work, like it's already there, it's already happening. People without degrees are like doing things faster, quicker, better than people spending a lot of time with. The way things used to be, but that's not true for every industry. So I don't want to talk further about that, but just, just think about the possibility and the question when question, everything you see and yeah. Make the right decisions for your situation. 

[00:47:50] Malcom: with you. 

[00:47:52] Benedikt: All right. I think that's plenty for this, for this topic. So please keep listening to this podcast because we think it's relevant, but only [00:48:00] if you also do what we talk about here.

[00:48:02] Malcom: Yes exactly only. And also we mentioned it in this episode, 94 episodes. Very stoked on that. Leave us a damn review. 

[00:48:11] Benedikt: Yes, especially after you've implemented what we've talked about. That's actually the best thing, like pick your favorite episode, implement what you've learned and then leave us a review telling us how it improved your recordings. That will be 

[00:48:23] Malcom: No, no. You're setting too many barriers. Leave us a review implement, and then come back, edit your review. We want that room. 

[00:48:29] Benedikt: Okay. With you. Totally. Totally. Awesome. All right. Thank you for being a listener. Um, and yeah, see you next week. 

[00:48:39] Malcom: See you next week. 

[00:48:40] Benedikt: Bye.