1% Inspiration, 99% Perspiration
“Genius is 1% inspiration and 99% perspiration.” – Thomas Edison
First things first, I’m not calling myself a genius. Secondly, music is usually a team game. Even as a guy who writes, records and plays all the instruments, I rely on Travis to tie it all together for me. Thirdly, I know this applies to almost everything, especially these days. I mean, there are actually people out there who think that the grocery store is the only way you can get food. Our materialistic, disposable culture has led to us not valuing anything.
But, I digress.
On one hand, greatness usually looks like downplaying the hard work you put in. You don’t want to sell the fact you almost had a nervous breakdown trying to finish Pet Sounds. You want to sell the emotion that the music is supposed to invoke. Whether it’s a love song or a social commentary, or whatever it is, you don’t want people to know you spent two days getting the snare sound right.
On the other hand, I think most non-musicians think you just put a microphone in front of a snare drum and there you go. Or, worse yet, “no one needs to know how to sing or play anymore, you just fix it in ProTools.” And there is some truth to both positions. If you can play, people should be able to hear that no matter how bad the recording, and yes, if you’d prefer to spend more time in a computer program than you do making music, it is possible to have very little talent.
Now that I’ve just said that, I’m about to admit that I spend a ton of time in Logic. But, not for that reason. I loathe editing. It’s a necessary evil, but I spend most of my time on the front end getting the sounds I want. Which is why, at this point, I write in Logic most of the time. Occasionally, I pick up the acoustic and go beginning to end, but not nearly like I used to. The more time you spend getting the sound right and playing your instruments well, the less time you spend on the back end fixing things.
I remember one time, when my friend Ryan was first working at Track Record around 2003, he was doing a record with Andy Johns. A song came on the radio and Andy said, “That’s a Mackie….”. The dude could hear the mixing board. Ryan was a professional and even he was impressed by this. You don’t learn what a mixing board sounds like without spending a lot of time listening to different boards.
People want music to be magical. That’s good, music is magical, but it’s not rocket science. Back when I sold wine and people were amazed at my blind tasting skills, I told them, it’s just time, a lot of wine and deductive reasoning. Music is no different. At least recording is no different. I’m just working with my ears more and my mouth less. Most people who know me probably think this is a good thing.
Just remember, if I hear something, a guitar out of tune, piano slightly out of time, a drummer who speeds up, my own voice just a quarter-step flat, it’s not because of some God-given ability that came to me like the Ten Commandments came to Moses, it’s because I’ve heard a lot of out of tune guitars, out of time pianos, drummers who sped up and my own, slightly flat, voice.
Work is not glamorous. That’s why we call it work. As Finn McKenty says, “this is not the music business, it’s the entertainment business.” If you hear something, it’s only what I want you to hear. If you see a picture, it’s only how I want you to see me. I don’t walk around my house in a velvet jacket all the time. Just as the guy who built a hot rod from the ground up got sweaty and dirty, busted up his knuckles and screamed four-letter words at the top of his lungs sometimes, so does the humble songwriter (well, I don’t get dirty, but the rest applies).
Greatness only comes from failure. It only comes from trying things you’re almost positive you won’t get right but doing it anyway. In sports, we love stories like Larry Bird shooting five hundred free throws every day, but Larry knew what it took to be great. And that’s not limited to basketball. Whether you want to knit your own sweater, write a novel, paint a mural or record a song, there are thousands of hours behind that three minutes and thirty seconds you hear on Spotify.