Tyler Spicer- The Role of a Music Producer

Sarah Harralson speaks with Tyler Spicer, England based music producer, about his career and role as a producer. 

https://www.tylerspicermusic.com/

Episode Transcript

(00:06):
Hi, this is Sarah Harrelson.You're host of the Mind Your Music Business
podcast. Thank you for tuning intoo, season three. Today we have
a guest that is joining me fromthe UK. I think he's the first
guest on the podcast from the UK, which is exciting. And he is
known as the British guy that doescountry music. He is a music producer

(00:27):
that has produced songs for Minnie,Nashville country artists and Tyler Spicer began his
music career as a touring bass player, which led him to production. So
thank you for joining us today.Tyler, how are you? I'm great,
Thank you, thank you so muchfor having me, and thank you
for the nice injury. Yeah.Absolutely so. Please elaborate on your background

(00:49):
a bit more for us. Didyou start your career as a producer in
the UK and then what led youto producing music in Nashville? Definitely,
so I've started my career here inthe UK. I again, like you
said, started as a touring bassplayer. Originally, music has always been

(01:11):
part of my life. I've spenta long time finding my way and production
kind of found its way to meeventually. That was always the long term
goal. I always wanted to bea producer. I always loved being involved
with songs. I always felt maybemaybe as a bass player, I was
a bit of a frustrated bass player. I maybe wanted to do a little
bit more than I should do,pla little bit more than I should do

(01:33):
and becoming a producer and falling intothis role during COVID, which I think
for a lot of us changed allof our lives in different ways, good
and bad. And that was Yeah, that was when the production thing came
to light and I realized, actually, I've always been doing this on the
side. I've been doing little bitsfor artists. I've been being involved with
your range, and I've been coproducing in studios when I'm kind of on
a session. Actually it's time tojust really make this happen. So yeah,

(01:57):
it all started here in the UKas a producer. Awesome. Yeah,
I think that happened for a lotof musicians. During COVID. We
couldn't go out there and do gigsanymore. And with modern technology, many
of us know how to you know, work in pro tools, work in
logic, and I know so manyguitar players or bass players or drummers that

(02:20):
just decided to use that time toget more involved in production and learning how
to do that side and making extraincome when they're not on the road to
produce artists back at home. Absolutely, it's a great way, and I
think it's a skill. I mean, you know, the intention by the
end of this year is to moveto Nashville, move to town permanently.

(02:43):
The minute. I've been kind ofcoming back and forth the last year or
two. And one of the peoplethat mented me particularly was Forrest Whitehead,
who worked on the original Kelsey Ballerinirecords. And that's one thing that he
was always pushing. He was alwayspushing, you know. I went to
town as being able to play isgreat, but being able to come and
do something tune a vocal, beable to add some production layers, be

(03:06):
able to get in a room withsome songwriters and help with the demo,
that's just really valuable. And takinghis advice and then matching that up and
his skills that he showed me andpassed down to me along with my own
interests, I kind of fell firmlyinto the production thing and just love it,
just love every minute. Did youconnect with Forrest by making trips out
to Nashville or were you still inthe UK doing production at the time.

(03:30):
Originally it was all over the internet. It was all online, as you
say, And I think even peopleyou know, like Forest, people that
are well up the food chain interms of the music industry and have had
great experience doing things, they alsosaw covid as a time to kind of
share their experience and when they can'tdo things in person, Well, hang

(03:51):
on, when I think about whatI'm doing, how about I can share
what I've done, share what I'velearned with people all over the world and
help them connect and grow in thatway. So, yeah, I'm at
Forest kind of online and then eventually, yeah, I came to town and
met and in person and we hungout and yeah, it's been great,
awesome. Yeah. So you mentionedyou're moving to the US later in the

(04:15):
year with I believe your fiance Rachel, who will also be on another episode
of this podcast soon with her PRcompany. So what made you want to
make the move to the States?I presume Nashville. Was it just because
most of your clients that you wereproducing are in Nashville. It's not to

(04:40):
be honest, most of my clientsare in either Canada or a bunch of
them are in the UK as well, so the UK country scene is kind
of really growing. Country music rightnow is the biggest growing genre in the
UK. You know, the BBCNews always posting about it. Recently with
Beyonce's you Know shift into kind ofthe country Realm and really in two tracks
in the genre, Suddenly the BBCare getting anyone who's in the UK country

(05:03):
see and they're just like, oh, hey, you know about country right
can you talk about this for us? So I just see artists all around
me are jumping on different radio showsat the minute. But yeah, the
reason for me, for us bothwanting to move, both Rachel and I
is is, I think partly thechallenge, partly the fact that we love
it. We've spent a few monthsin Nashville over the past couple of years,

(05:28):
and we love the feel. Wefeel more comfortable in Nashville, and
I feel like it's a place wherenot many people are from the area.
Most people, it feels, havemoved there and have moved to Nashville for
a reason. They've moved because theywant to go and be the best at
what they do, to try andpush their craft. And that's exactly the
same for both me and Rachel.Me in particular, I really want to

(05:50):
push and I work in country music. The home of country music is Nashville,
and I want to go and seewhat I can do on that stage.
I want to push myself. Iwould feel forever as much as I
can blaze the trail over here inthe UK, I'd love to go over
there, test myself, push myself, really integrate myself in the whole culture

(06:10):
around country music in its kind oforiginal home. And yeah, developing that
way awesome. Yeah, and youmentioned that, you know a lot of
your work is remote. As manyproducers and even Nashville, they'll work with
people in many different places around theworld just producing tracks or working with them

(06:34):
from their home studio. But Ithink there is something to say about being
able to have a some sort ofhome studio or base in Nashville, because
there's always artists coming into Nashville thatwill want to record in person and just
kind of be in person with aproducer sometimes. Yeah. Absolutely, that's

(06:59):
the one thing. You know,I connect with so many people all over
you know, I've got a bunchof clients all over America. But you
know, when there's so many studiosin Nashville. So many opportunities you can
go and be in person. Thereare so many people who can work with,
so many people with home studios.I just love the opportunity to immerse
myself that into that yeah, andbe able to just be there in person

(07:19):
and have that connection. Because it'sgreat being remote. I have got a
very successful kind of business going asa remote producer, great results. But
there's something about that moment when youcan be in a vocal session and say,
oh, hey, what about thislittle thing? Can you just push
that a little bit more? Oryou can be in person with another session
player and be like, oh that'sgreat, man, but could just do

(07:40):
this little thing and have that littlebit more of a guidance and a back
and forth. Sometimes you lose thatat touch with the remote stuff, right,
and then you have to wait onthe other person to get back to
you about the notes. Yeah,yeah, yeah, I love it.
So you mentioned and many of youronline and that a modern producer needs to

(08:01):
wear many hats now, such asbeing a musician like you are, a
mixer and even sometimes a mastering engineer. Do you find that to be an
easy task with modern technology to beable to take on all sorts of roles
as a producer, I feel likethe most important thing is to be able

(08:24):
to have a little bit of experiencein all of them, but also to
be able to delegate and specialize inthings at the same time. So for
me, I generally try and stickto the production side of things. Really,
my strength is in arrangement, it'sin parts, it's in understanding the

(08:46):
music side of things, and I'vegot the technical know how and I love
digging into all the technical stuff.I love my analog gear, I love
pushing it, I love using thegear to create the sound, but there's
definitely a point where it becomes overwhelming. I think it's really important to have
that balance of not necessarily being greatat everything, but be able to do
enough of all of those things torepresent what you're doing. So, for

(09:09):
instance, with the remote stuff,I'm never going to send someone just the
pure Hey, here's the instruments playedand nothing done to it. I'm always
going to add a little bit ofsomething to get it sounding a little bit
more like it's mixed, because Iwant everybody whenever they hear anything. When
you know, when you send someonethe scratch for your song, and it's
just a guitar and vocal and Isend you back a whole band arrangement of

(09:31):
it. I want you to think, oh, this sounds amazing. I
don't want you to think, oh, that sounds like it could be good
once it's been to mix, orthat might sound good once it's been mastered,
and it's louder right now. SoI think it's about having all those
skills, having a little bit ofeverything. He's a producer that you can
do that. And again it's somethingthe Forest has always been pushing to me,
is the be a musician, butalso be a producer. Be able

(09:54):
to do those little skills and beable to create a master for someone,
particularly when you're in town on asongwriting session or whatever, be able to
the next day have someone there witha demo something they can use and take
to their publisher whoever they want totake it to, you know, right,
yeah, And I think it's soimportant as a producer now to be
able to have multiple skills, likebeing able to play instruments, add a

(10:18):
little bit of a mix to asong. But you know, not to
the point where it's producers, youknow, wanting to make extra money.
So they try to do all thedifferent services themselves, even though maybe their
expertise doesn't lie in mastering. LikeI think it's important for producers to be
able to know when to outsource theirneeds and team up with other people instead

(10:43):
of taking on everything themselves. Definitelythe whole creative process and being an artist,
I'm fueled by the exchange of artand the exchange of spirit and the
exchange of this form that we allwork in. And actually I love the
fact that I can send it tosomeone else at this point, you know,

(11:03):
you pass it on. It's likepassing on a batter on You just
pass on to the next person toadd their little touch to it to make
it even better. And I knowsome people might argue you could, you
know, some people might say,oh, I want to do everything so
otherwise diluting the product or diluting theart form. And what I'm feeling is
like the perfect vision. But Ioften find that by passing it to that
next person in the chain, youfind things that maybe they have a perspective

(11:28):
that you didn't enough. And I'llsend things to top Peterson, who regularly
makes this stuff for me, andhe'll suddenly have put the spotlight on something
else, and I might have hadthe spotlight of the track being oh,
this is really important and he's hearingit for the first time, and go
on, oh wait, that's notthe priority. It's this really cool thing
over here that you've added in.But it's now our time, little part,

(11:48):
you know. And it's things likethat that can really really change the
game and change that form and continueto feel that ll feel that create you
need. Yeah, I totally agree. I think multiple perspectives on a song
and a mix is always so important. So I will always like to ask

(12:11):
producers about their gear. I knowyou mentioned you like to use analog gear,
So do you prefer using outboard gearor do you try to keep it
more in the box these days?Oh no, I'm I'm out bored as
much as possible. Okay, LikeI say, I maybe I was about

(12:33):
to say I'm lazy. I'm totallynot lazy. What I do is I
just make sure that when it goesin, it's sounding great and that it
already sounds great. And for me, I like to take that old school
approach of let's make it sound greatat every step of the process. Just
like you know, guys in theseventies or whatever, would maybe you'd have
multiple engineers work on something. Again, talking about the collaborative element, you

(12:54):
might have someone work on something oncea year, then the tapes get shipped
off to the next studio in anotherpart of the country, and then guy
would work on it. And everytime that opened it up, you want
them to go, oh, thissounds great, this sounds like a record.
I know what's going on, andfor me, it's all about tracking
through as much outboard as possible thatmakes sense. I don't have loads of
it. I have enough that itreally enhances what I'm doing and makes it

(13:16):
sound a lot closer to finished witha lot less work. If you I
find as soon as you I canhear it now. As soon as I
start stacking plugins one after the otherafter the other, generally I'm just making
it worse and worse and worse.One or two things to enhance is amazing.
But if I've if I look ata project and I've gone, oh,
hang on, there's ten plugins onthat vocal, it probably means that

(13:37):
I should take them all off andfind the real problem. Focusing on what
the problem is and then get towork. But that happens sometimes so long
as you're in a room with someoneand you just want to work quickly,
and they go, oh, thisis a problem, and you quickly dine
in something and change it, andthen they say, oh, this is
a problem, and you quickly donein another pluggingcuse just trying to do that,
but carry on the flow of thesession. But definitely I try and

(13:58):
strip it back, keep it asant as possible. Do you have a
favorite piece of gear? Eleven seventysix compressors just go to on lots of
things, nothing really fancy, it'sjust a classic. You can do so
much with it. And again inLA to a compressor as well with a
Neve pre amp probably and you're ina good place. Nice. Yeah,

(14:24):
And you were mentioning plug ins.A lot of newer plugins coming out have
many AI features where you just hita button it does it all for you.
Do you like some of these pluginsthat have that feature? Are you
willing to embrace AI as a produceror are you worried about it replacing the

(14:48):
role of a producer. This isprobably a broader topic on AI in general.
I feel like there's going to beI think we're at that point right
now that people can really make themost of this new technology and get ahead
quite quickly by using AI when peoplearen't using AI. But there's also a

(15:11):
part of me that believes that makessense, particularly on the business side,
in terms of systemaizing things. Ithink AI is an amazing tool for that
kind of thing. You know,I see I can't remember it is a
notion calendar, motion calendar, somethinglike that, And I always get tempted
to buy that the idea that,oh, that could kind of take care
of me. Rather than me schedulingwhat I'm doing every day, it could

(15:33):
just put my to do list andput it in the right places and make
that stuff happen. But I don'tfeel like AI is naturally something for creative
purposes. I feel like the thingthat I love about music is the connection
between humans. I love the feelingof writing a song and feeling like,
oh yeah, I get that.I can connect to that and to that,

(15:54):
And I'm not sure how much Ilove AI in the creative space in
general. I feel like for pluginsand things that are tools to help you
get to a result quicker, Ican kind of get on board with that,
But so long as it's getting youto where you want to go and
your creative vision. If it's justthe kind of option just ar click it

(16:15):
on. Oh that's what it soundslike because A I did it, then
I'm not sure. I think whenyou're able to control it and go,
hey, i'd like this thing,and I know that you're going to give
me that, then I think it'sit's kind of worthwhile. One of the
examples would probably be it's not AI, but a tool like sooth, which
is completely absolutely everywhere in the productionworld, and you drop that plug in

(16:36):
on and it's like an easy button. It just gets rid of all the
harshness, all of the frequencies youdon't want, and it's everywhere. But
there's also a balance of that ofif everyone's using that, it does all
start to sound a little bit thesame. Yeah, yeah, that's true.
I think that's very well said.How I think AI as well can
be a great tool for business,but when you're mixing it with creativity,

(16:59):
it can really kill creativity in thesense where hey, I'm just using this
AI plug in just to use iton my session. I'm not really understanding
the skills behind using it. Butif you can understand the background behind it,

(17:22):
why you're using it and control it. Then it's it's more using it
for Hey, I want it tosee if it can find where I'm trying
to get and then I can tweakit from there. Otherwise, I agree,
like you said, everything might startto sound the same if it keeps
generating the same kind of results everytime. Yeah, I feel like it's

(17:49):
probably and I'm by knowing as anexpert on this, I'm sure inherent in
the product. Is it a product? Isn't really a product? It's a
what is AI? Let's not gointo that question. But that seems a
bit crazy, But you know,I imagine the nature of it is to
react to whatever it's given. ButI do feel like the over use of

(18:10):
certain tools. I know there's beenAI edging its way into plugins all the
time, and it's trying to dothis thing. And I suppose over time,
as AI becomes more advanced and learnsit's you know, I'm probably not
the person to talk about this enough. I've done a lot of dabbling in
the idea of AI and people thatare experts talking about it and trying to

(18:30):
understand that. But I guess thereis a place in time where maybe AI
can be really creative and do adifferent thing with everything, and maybe that's
today. I've got to say Ihaven't doven into it enough, but for
me, it's the human connection ismore important. I actually think in our
the most important thing we can probablybe doing is keeping it as human as
possible when the world is gradually becomingless and less human and there's less connection

(18:53):
and what we see on Instagram andsocial media isn't as real as we think
it is, and we're always doingour highlight reel of our life and that
isn't very human, right, Yeah, I agree. So I kind of
want to track back to when wewere talking about different skills of a producer.
You mentioned in another interview that somethere's some essential skills that a producer

(19:18):
needs to have, including communication,which is very important when working with an
artist's willingness to learn, and evenresilient. So can you maybe elaborate on
those different skills and why they're importantto you? Yeah? Absolutely funny funny
that you mentioned that the communication thing, and obviously I have mentioned that before,

(19:40):
but it's something again that even acouple of days ago, became so
critical and upfront to me. Andobvious communication is one of the most important
things for a producer and is somethingthat I think really can kill a vibe
with an artist and can really scaran artist. Is honestly just the way
that you communicate with them and whatyou choose to do and how you choose

(20:02):
to behave in the room I hadthe other day, I had an artist
that was definitely from the pop schoolof things. They've never really delved into,
you know, the theory side ofmusic, the understanding in a classical
sense, a traditional music education,I guess what I'm trying to say.
And he had brought in a trumpetplayer who had come from entirely the opposite

(20:26):
school. He was, you know, regularly working with choirs and big bands
and arrangements and working with very notatedforms of music. And the artist,
on one hand, was trying toexpress this one thing and the trumpet player
was trying to understand that thing.But they both come from completely different places.

(20:48):
And having been on both sides.In my music education and how I
grew up, I grew up studyingclassical music, studying jazz, really diving
into the hardcore musical theory and beinga great technical player, and then I
match that songwriting and the approach thatpeople have on the pop side of things,
and it reminded me how important itis to be able to see both

(21:08):
sides and to be able to almostbe a communicator, not only between yourself
and the artist, but sometimes it'sbetween the artist, yourself and then a
band or the session players in theroom, or whoever else it is.
And it's just using those skills tomake everybody feel comfortable and knowing that maybe
maybe the artist wants to say alittle bit too much, and you've been

(21:30):
in that situation and you want tosay to the artist, hey, that's
great, I completely understand. Letme just relay that to whoever the player
is. And being able to dothat in a way that doesn't patronize the
artist, doesn't make the artists feellike, oh, you're taking control and
you're not letting me say my thing, but also allows you to get the
best out of the session player inthe room, for instance. And it's

(21:51):
things like that. The communication isso important, and the other thing is
just art is so delicate. Peoplewho are artistic and creative feel more.
We're all more more emotional, weall worry about things more, and we
all have that little bit of egothat an imposter syndrome. It's like a
blend between the two where you wantpeople say, oh, it's great,
but you also always feel like it'snot good enough. And it's a balance

(22:12):
between nurturing that and understanding each personand every person has a different perspective.
You'll have to remind me what theother two topics were that I meant to
have replied about. Yeah, andjust to go off of the communication.
I think that's so important because theproducer is pretty much the leader in a

(22:33):
studio setting, and it's not thatthey control everyone, but they listen to
everyone and everyone's different ideas and it'sjust a way of the producer explaining those
ideas to everyone and finding a focalpoint to move forward with the session that

(22:57):
makes everyone happy. Absolutely, you'rejust getting the best out of everybody.
That's the most important bit is gettingthe best out of everybody, and that
normally means more importantly looking after theenvironment, looking after everybody in the room,
making sure everybody feels okay, everybodyis in a good place, and
that everybody feels like things are movingalong productively. It really is a leadership

(23:18):
role when you're in a studio asa producer. Yeah. Absolutely, Yeah.
The other skills you mentioned were willingnessto learn and resilience are important.
Yeah. Absolutely. Every day isthe learning day. Every day I try
something new and somebody comes in andsays something, Oh, can I try
this? Yeah, let's try it. Let's always try it. There is

(23:41):
really no reason nowadays that you shouldsay you know that the five minutes again
communication a touch, but there's reallyno reason why you should spend five minutes
saying why someone shouldn't do something whenyou could have spent thirty seconds doing the
take, and then they can hearit back and if you both like it,
you can both go yeah, that'sgreat, we'll leave it, or
you can just hit the delete button. We don't live in a world where
is constant. You know, obviouslyon big sessions, sessions that have the

(24:03):
budget, or maybe a session whereyou really know exactly what's locked in and
you go, hey, right,we've got this. Now let's get it
to tape, and maybe you mightwant to you might want to say,
hm, I'm not sure about that. I don't want to waste the tape.
But it's important. It's more importantthat everybody has the moment of creativity
allows themselves to you know, allowstheir expression and creativity to flow. And

(24:25):
I mean, I can't think ofit a single time where I've said to
somebody, yeah, sure, let'sgive it a go, and then we've
gone is it better and they gono, not really, and I've gone
no, not really, and that'sfine and the session moves on. But
I've been in rooms where people go, oh no, no, we're not
doing that, and the artist spendsthe time all whoever it is, is
going I really want to try it. I would love to see how it
sounds. Oh no, we're notdoing that, and that just creates a
vibe in the room that's just notgood. It's always just so much easier

(24:49):
nowadays, just to go, yeah, sure, we'll try it, give
it a go. If it soundsgreat, you humble yourself and you allow
yourself to say, hey, whatI thought, maybe in my head,
was not gonna work. When itdoes work, that's okay. And that's
part of that learning is kind ofputting that ego aside. There's no ego,
there's just the aim to get toa great piece of art. And
in terms of resilience, I thinkit's I think the resilience comes from maybe

(25:14):
the imposter syndrome thing. It's alittle bit of the mental stress, a
bit the belief that you're good enoughand that you can do a great job.
No matter what level you're at,whether you've won Grammys, whether you've
not won Grammys, there's always somebodysaying, well, everybody else likes it.
I was in a session today andthe guitar player came in to do
some overdubs, and you know thisrecord that we've worked on. Everybody behind

(25:40):
the scenes is their record label,their manager. They're saying, hey,
this is going to be the beststuff we've put out this year in the
UK, and it's some of thebest stuff that you know the UK is
going to seem for a while.Do I think that? Of course I
don't think that. I just thinkI've done my best, and I still
would compare it to someone else andgo, oh, that must be better.
I think that's better than what Ido. All you can do is

(26:00):
do your best, be resilient aboutthat, stick to it and be consistent,
and people will find things that aregreat. And if you keep honing
your craft, then yeah, goodthings will happen. Yeah. Do you
have any favorite projects that you've beena part of in your career. I
think this latest one is one ofmy favorites. It's with a band called
wood Bent Red. They're based herein the UK. They were recently signed

(26:23):
to W twenty one Records and they'remanaged by is Imagined here in the UK.
And they are great guys. Theyare they're all almost I don't want
to say this in a derogatory way, but this is kind of their second
chance. They've kind of done lotsof different bands and things, and I've

(26:45):
never met a band that are alsocommitted to the cause. Everybody wants it,
not just the lead singer and notjust the guitar player. Every member
of the band wants it, andthey all want to commit themselves. So
there, and they're good natured andfun about it as well. There's no
they're not overly intense about it.They're serious about what they do, but

(27:07):
they aren't kind of eurotically controlling itor anything like that. That they love
the process. They are really happyto go through it and we're all,
you know, learning together again.As you said of mine, go learning.
I think that's what makes great projectsis normally great people. Yeah,
and that's what makes it great too, is that everyone's just having fun,

(27:30):
you know, taking it seriously,but also you know, not too seriously
to the point where every little thinghas to be perfect and you feel like
you're in a hostile studio environment.You know, everyone's just having fun and
playing music they love, and especiallywhen it's a band, you get to

(27:52):
work with a whole lot of differentinstruments and sounds. Yeah, no,
it's it's great. We really lockedourselves away and studio for a week or
so for this EP, and it'sgreat. You know, we worked hard.
But again that residience comes in whereyou kind of but to be honest
with you, when you love itand you love the people you're with,
it doesn't take that much. Youcan have very little sleep and still enjoy

(28:15):
every moment. It's more about thatenergy, that feeling of progress and everybody
being in a great vibe and thingsmoving forward. I find the sessions where
people are a little bit more guardedor second guessing things and being a bit
more internal, that's when it becomesmore difficult. When you can really open
up that communication and share freely,feel like you're not going to be judged

(28:38):
for saying one thing, or particularlythe musicians feel like they're not They don't
feel like they're going to be judgedfor saying this or suggesting an idea.
That that's a really good place tobe. Yeah, absolutely, well,
Tyler, We're so excited to haveyou in Nashville to work with people in
person here. But in the meantime, where can people find you? So

(29:00):
if they need a producer to workwith and you produce all genres. I
definitely have the skills and the talent, not talent. I don't want to
say talent. I don't have thetalent. That's a silly thing to say.
I have the skills and eclectic tastesthat I love working on all sorts
of genre. But really country musicis kind of my thing. I really

(29:22):
know what I'm doing in that world, and generally people when I've when I've
sent things back on a remote sessionor whatever, I rarely have ever had
someone come back and say I don'tlike that or I want to change that.
In fact, I can't think ofa single instance then maybe one or
two things. So that's kind ofmy wheelhouse, and the best place to
find me is at Tidler Spicer Musicon Instagram. Everything is there. If

(29:47):
you want to drop me a DM, that's the best place to do it
and I will definitely get back toyou and I keep an eye on that.
That inbox much better than any otherone. Amazing. Thank you,
Tyler. We appreciate having you onthe podcast today to talk about all things
about the role of being a producer. Thanks so much.