Things Pro Musicians Do (that you probably don't)

[Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] n [Applause] nice feel dud this thing sounds great you're saying off camera it does sounds like an acoustic guitar projects like an acoustic guitar it does it's its own sound it's not like a strat or a Telly and it's not like a Les Paul or you know anything else it's its own sound so he's going to do really well with these we're here with my good friend Tim Pierce in the the famous Lair I've had this idea for a while things pro guitarists do that intermediate or amateur guitarists [Music] don't well the thing about guitar is that you have to really devote yourself to it to be good at it but that can make you a bit self-centered and the thing to remember when you're collaborating with people is that it's not about you and sometimes that can really be to the nth degree to the stream because a lot of the parts that I did on songs for people uh I would create a part that was pretty simple I'd make it simpler I'd make it simpler and it would almost disappear in the track sometimes so just remember when you're actually making a song with people with a singer in a group it's not about you and the problem with that is it has to be about you the rest of the time because you're getting good at your instrument and you have to have you know fair amount of you know ego for that but when you get in the group and you're making a song it's not about you yeah Dean pars told me the other day that basically graduated from North Texas the Jazz school and he realized I know exactly how to be a jazz ver choso but I want to be a rhythm player I want to go to La and do Studio work and he said that meant I became a drummer on the guitar you're a drummer when you play rhythm guitar yeah another thing gear that you get enamored with or excited about uh sometimes it doesn't pan out in a situation and I mean I'll give you an example you can buy the sweetest greatest coolest guitar take it into the recording studio you're with a producer an engineer an artist you put it up and they go I think I like the Squire better I used to work with this guy Trevor Horn and he had access to the most sophisticated expensive gear in the world but he had no problem playing a part through a line six pod remember those other Bean old bean pods It's like because he had completely transcended the idea the attachment to how you got the sound and the way I've said it to people it's h the gear is transportation I don't care what you drove to get here I just care that you're here and whatever that thing is out there that you drove here could be really impressive it could be an Uber yeah but the fact that you got it's just Transportation gear is just Transportation the sound is the destination the sound is all the really really people who know what they're doing they want a sound that sound could be a $5 thing or a $5,000 thing it's the sound and everybody wants be surprised and delighted by a new sound that's amazing yeah the gears just the transportation love that so when I play Live let's say it's in your hometown you're going to have like 50 people who you know there right they're all all going to want to talk to you yeah and so my strategy has always been to have those conversations with my guitar in my hand so let's say you do the sound check you have your dinner people start showing up well if I'm backstage and there's 12 people in the room and I'm talking to all of them I'm noodling the whole time right because I want to know that when I walk out on that stage that I've never been more warmed up in my entire life so I'm just I'm talking to you going yeah yeah right oh how's she doing oh yeah yeah right oh you you did oh that's really cool and these fingers are moving constantly it settles the nerves and it means that when you walk out there it's like it's burned in you're just you're just ready right are you thinking about anything in particular playing wise you're no I'm there for you I'm talking to you but theing I'm going for it and I when I used to tour in the 80s with Rick Springfield we would do a sound check there would cater dinner and you're filling that time before the show and it's a big audience they shut down all the lights this crowd screaming you're standing backstage nervous how do you prepare for that moment my way of preparing was to have the guitar in my hands literally for 3 hours before the show just walk around with it walk around with it and then so you have this this kind of hedge against nervousness and those first few moments on stage and then when you get up there you go oh I can actually play yeah yeah yeah you know before a gig talking to people socializing mindless noodling I recommend [Music] highly so the other thing is okay I built this pedal board I'm going to do the Grammy Awards in about a week and it's been built and tested repeatedly already and I'm going to have it sitting here for a few more days really bulletproof test your gear if you build something you put together a pedal board an app whatever you've got test it many many times before you take it to the gig because it really is Murphy's Law if there's one little cable that's a little out or one pedal that's problematic you need to find that early the the other thing I always do I always bring two of everything to a gig so there is a spare amp there is a spare guitar just in case I break a string there's a spare speaker so I'll have two cabinets two heads bring two of everything to the gig yep definitely two guitars I always always have two guitars at least extra cables yes patch cables have a spare of everything yeah it's really really important and then I had something else I wanted to talk about it's like when you have a really really big Client List you're working with let's say you have 100 people you work with when I was super busy doing sessions seven days a week and that's not an exaggeration maybe there were 100 people I was working with in the course of 90 days or whatever there were always one or two of those people that were problematic in the sense that maybe they didn't pay you on time right or everything was an emergency and so every time they called it would throw off your week you'd have to do it at An Inconvenient time and then maybe when you got there there they were so stressed out that it made you feel like you couldn't do a good job problematic clients okay so if you have two people in your life that are not respecting you or that are just in a constant state of chaos and emergency those two people can make you have a bad attitude towards the entire other 98 people on the list I call it poisoning the well so all of a sudden I show up for my session with you and I I look at you and I go what's your problem and it's just you you're a good guy right but because this other person that I've been dealing with has poisoned the well I'm looking at you like you're a bit of an adversary because musicians were programmed to take every gig and earn every dollar and every cent yeah never turn down an opportunity but if you can give up those people it's worth it because then what you bring to everybody else is Joy this I heard this quote remember Danny kmore the guitar player who produced The Don Henley records you know because he would hire you know he hired Peno Paladino and Steve Luca and all the greats to play on Don Henley records you know everybody would come in and play on those records They asked him what is the number one quality in the studio musician and he said Joy ah so protect that yeah protect your joy and can you talk a little bit about that like sort of dealing with not necessarily the ego of of an artist but just understanding that they're bringing you their life's work their most vulnerable work and how important it is to sort of maintain the the positive vibe in the studio yeah that's a really good subject so the reason there are very few films or photographs or very few records of our favorite amazing albums or songs is because when people go into the studio you're going to fall flat on your face trying ideas they're going to fall flat on their face trying ideas it's the most exposed situation in the world and so that's why nobody has taken films of all these great records and nobody's taken photographs and it's also because if if the artist is actually famous if you're taking something away that's really private and it's intimate you're actually exploiting them so if you do a selfie you're kind of like taking a piece of them and using it to push yourself out into the world it's a very safe environment so what you need to do is in the first 15 minutes with your body language with your demeanor you need to make that person feel safe and comfortable like you're never going to tell a story out of school about what went down where they missed a note they choked a note or they got food on their shirt or anything anything of that sort there's kind of an Unwritten rule about that and if you do that you will will be the person that they call back that they trust and it has to happen very very quickly it has to happen in the first few minutes wow well the easiest thing to do is to say less and just try and give them something musically that that they can use the less you say the best in the beginning and always you know if you have lunch and everybody starts to talk then you can talk too but never I've walked away from lunch going I probably shouldn't have told all those stories to Adele as we were having lunch you know she didn't need to hear that particular story what it is what it really is and this is the crazy thing you have to present yourself as an equal and as an equal you want nothing from them you don't need to be there you're there to collaborate musically I remember having a conversation with Rod Stewart about where he bought his reading glasses and these are the $15 reading glasses that everybody wears and so it's like it's those kind of things that make people really comfortable I remember a conversation with Bruce Springstein where he talked about how it was early days for cell phones and he was riding his Harley and he had a call and he parked his Harley in Beverly Hills and went and sat on somebody's lawn and used his cell phone he this pretty cool I can actually you know just it those kinds of conversations are What bond you to the people you are an equal you burned the cookies they burned the cookies you know you got stuck in traffic they got stuck in traffic right all of these things which I think that can be hard for maybe a less experienced or a younger guitar player who's starting to get some of these opportunities if you know I I remember what it was like my first time getting to work in a studio where it was owned by a person from a band that I really admired being Star Struck that I was even in the room yeah I I probably stuck my foot in my mouth a few times on that session we all do we all do I I did it once really badly but most of the time I was smart about it I worked with Phil Collins for a number of years and there was a person in the room who just took Phil aside right there and said Phil I got to tell you that you know Genesis was my favorite bandab all and Phil's sitting there going I don't want to hear this we got work to do uh why are you telling me this and he wasn't wrong he was not wrong it's like if you're in the situation with the person we're just Buddies yeah save it for later it's easier for them if you present yourself as an equal and easier for you too the first time I worked with Phil I walked in and he was tuning his drums and it was that sound on in the air tonight he's going and I'm going that's the sound he makes it's the only sound he makes he's there making that sound in front of me in the room I could melt right now but yet when I worked with them it was kind like hey Phil how are you yeah I think we should be you know it save that stuff for yourself you know and your friends later and stories that you tell 20 years later Tim thanks for having me man thanks for having me so uh I will have all of Tim's stuff linked down below his channel if you don't already subscribe to Tim Pierce you absolutely should be he's a big reason why I started making YouTube videos six or seven years ago and you're a big reason why I make YouTube videos today that's uh it's that uh that's an honor yeah don't forget to like And subscribe appreciate you guys watching my name is R scha that's Tim Pierce we'll catch you on the next one

Channel: Rhett Shull

Views: 379,594

Keywords: rhett shull, guitar lesson, music production, guitar tutorial, how to play guitar, beginner guitar lessons, how to learn guitar, beginner guitar songs, music theory, tim pierce

Id: 7E05ett39QE

Length: 13min 36sec (816 seconds)

Published: Mon Feb 12 2024