But when you’re trying to make so many people happy, how do you know that you’re ending up with the best alternative instead of some diluted compromise?
At the end of the day, and I learned this on a couple of recent projects, I have to be pretty intent on what I see. I have to know what I want first, before I start talking to the bands or the labels, and I have to be sure. I find that at the end of the day, if I’m super adamant that the chorus has to go like this or this has to be in this key, nine times out of ten, band and label agree with me. I find that if I’m on the fence about something and somebody in the band feels strongly about it, I’ll usually go with that. It’s just different in every situation. I’ve been in situations where a label called me and was like, “This song needs to be fast,” and it’s a slow song, there’s no way it’s going to sound good fast. But what they’re really saying is that they want a fast record, so you have to interpret what people are actually looking for and then go for it. When I was in that situation I was like, “I’m not going to mess this song up, we’re going to keep it the way it is, but the band will write another fast song to add more of that element to the record.” And you can call that a compromise, but it’s not really a compromise at all, it’s more of a growth. So, it’s just about whether you can turn the compromises into great music.
Recently I was interviewing Converge’s Kurt Ballou [a storied producer in his own right] and he was telling me about a friend of his who’s a slave to the major labels and is on the phone with them every day talking about songs. And that friend is you.
Right, well, that’s one man’s perspective. It’s funny because he was at my studio in Maryland the day Panic! went Gold, and he just saw me on the phone and heard one of the conversations and it couldn’t have been further from the truth. I was doing Boys Like Girls at the time and the people who were involved in that record, we were all obsessed with it and it was more like discussions and positive communication than slave labor. I’ve never been in a situation where I’ve had to make music that sucked because somebody told me to.
And you’ve never felt like you’re compromising your own integrity or the integrity of the band?
I mean, I can’t think of one. It’s possible, I’m sure. I’m sure it’s possible in the situations that I’m in for me to get bullied, I just never let it happen. It’s just about reading the situations. It’s about knowing when to say yes, and knowing when to say no. I’ve never said no to someone and had them be like, “No, you’re going to do it my way.” I guess I’m the producer so they kind of inherently trust that I know what I’m talking about. So, every time I’ve put my foot down I’ve won, it would be heartbreaking to lose one of those, so I’ll let you know how that feels.
