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Two longtime music pros (Sensei & Fatboi) go deep on what makes music great. A podcast for music producers, artists, and fans.
Fatboi is a Multi-platinum, Grammy nominated, award winning producer whose credits include: Camoflauge, YoungBoy Never Broke Again, Gucci Mane, Young Jeezy, Rocko, Shawty Redd, Flo Rida, Bow Wow, Bone Thugs-n-Harmony, Juvenile, Yung Joc, Gorilla Zoe, OJ Da Juiceman, 8Ball & MJG, Jeremih, 2 Chainz, Nicki Minaj, Bobby V, Ludacris and Yo Gotti, Monica, Zay Smith, TK Kravitz, Future.
Sensei Hollywood (a.k.a. Dan Marshall) formerly an instructor and chair of the Audio Production program at the Art Institute of Atlanta, is an accomplished musician, producer, engineer who's performed on and engineered multi--platinum records with Big Boi, Outkast, Killer Mike, Chamillionaire, Carlos Santana, Mary J. Blige, Snoop Dogg, Ron Isley, Lil Wayne, Trillville, Monica, and more...
Fatboi (00:00)
I like Thundercat. I fell in love with his music. because he gave me that nostalgia. felt like throwback to my childhood
remember how exciting it was to have a Walkman and to be able to put your own tape in there, listen to it,
Dan Marshall (00:14)
Dude,
now the new generation longs for that sound and It's the Brian Eno idea, the distortions of a medium become its
So my son really digs the synthesizer soundtracks of the eighties. I mean, cause like, know, um, stranger things with the bridge for his generation. Then they're like, wow, the eighties are actually pretty cool. And he's wearing vans and you know, and the whole, he's got my walkman, my sport walkman is 40 years old and he's playing cassettes. Dude, I have to, I have, in fact, I'm he
Fatboi (01:08)
Smart, yeah, smart kid.
Yeah.
You still have a wall?
Dan Marshall (01:24)
he uses it so much he broke the headphone adapter off in the jack. I'm waiting on parts from ⁓ eBay to fix. Well, but you know, he found a loophole school. You can't have a phone, but you can have the kids. The teachers like, a cassette. That's cool. Yeah. Go ahead and listen to that when you get done with your work. And so he gets music at school that no other kids get to do because he found a loophole. Yeah. The, the hold on. I'll grab it here.
Fatboi (01:28)
Hmm. You have to be very skilled to do that.
He found a loophole. Wow.
I bet it's yellow. my God, how did I know?
Dan Marshall (01:57)
Yes, it's the sport. Yeah, yeah.
It's empty right now because like I said, I broke the he broke the jack off in it like he had the big headphones and he kept his back. So I'm getting a new jack to I got to fix it up. But there are 150 bucks if they work on eBay. So I found one for 10 bucks just for the part. So.
Fatboi (02:14)
Yeah.
Wow.
You know how I knew it was yellow?
Dan Marshall (02:22)
Those are the ones that last. I have a spare too. Somehow I got ahold of a little cheap plastic one, but it's keeping them tided over until I get this one fixed.
Fatboi (02:23)
Because everybody had a damn yellow one. I had a yellow one.
Man,
Dan,
remember how exciting it was to have a Walkman and to be able to put your own tape in there, listen to it,
Dan Marshall (02:42)
Dude,
Fatboi (02:43)
flip it around?
Dan Marshall (02:43)
sight. He's a 12 year
old kid discovering music. He's playing drums now. He's getting into like kind of interesting stuff. So like I set him up with my old dual cassette player so he could do like dubs and then he can, we've got an adapter so he can play his playlist off of the phone into the cassette recorder. Uh, he's found an artist, this guy named lemon demon, who's actually pretty interesting kind of 80s throwback, but, he releases cassettes.
Fatboi (02:47)
Okay? Okay? Okay?
Lemon Demon.
Dan Marshall (03:10)
but he takes a sweet time delivering and he takes like three or four months to get them. that's analog. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Hey, man, I'm trying to keep. You know, I just have the stuff laying around, so I'm like, well, you might as well have it, you know.
Fatboi (03:13)
Hey, that makes it special. That makes it special. Dan, I salute you. You are raising that kid right.
Yeah, wish I wish because I do I do have some cassette tapes around here a little bit. My son has ⁓ he's come across a few of them and, you know, ask questions about them. But I don't have anything to actually play them in anymore. ⁓ And yeah, that's that's that's the part that hurts.
Dan Marshall (03:46)
man, yeah well.
I gotta say I might have an extra deck laying around here somewhere. I've got a bunch of that recorder, DADH, all this crap that I don't even know if it powers on anymore. just, it's not worth selling it to me. I like having them as a prop if nothing else.
Fatboi (03:52)
Okay.
Just there.
You know Kenny Mix at Patchwork? Mixed engineer at Kenny started running. Kenny's is his name. ⁓ Can't think of his last name, but he was, yeah. But Kenny, no, no, no, Kenny started. ⁓
Dan Marshall (04:07)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
Is that his real name or is that just his thing?
of the Boston mixes?
I'm sorry, I derailed you. Yeah, yeah. ⁓
Fatboi (04:33)
He actually started running his masters through a cassette deck. Yeah. So, so whatever he's doing over here, he was actually running it through. He was letting it run through the circuitry of yes. Yes. Yes. Yeah. Yeah. The tape, the tape in there and everything. And you can still do that.
Dan Marshall (04:41)
Ahhhh
I got tired
Was he running through a cassette tape to get the his or just the whole nine yards. wow.
Can I tell you back in the day, the lengths
we went to to get rid of that noise. ⁓ no, no, no. Like this is the worst crap ever. Now it's like, right now it's like, ⁓ guys, top mastering engineers are like putting that sound back in.
Fatboi (05:05)
Yeah, we're going to doby.
And you know what? The cheaper the tape, the louder the hiss. TDK. TDK on Max Hill.
Yeah. You know, I used to buy, ⁓ when I discovered ⁓ TDK Metal, his gone. They were the most expensive, but...
Dan Marshall (05:33)
what
was the one CRO two or something that was another like a chromium or something. There was a switch for that. man. just realized I happened to be wearing this shirt today. Teach them well techniques. ⁓ that's right. ⁓
Fatboi (05:41)
Yep. Yep.
Yes, yes. And you know, actually it's called Technics. But we always call it Technique. It's Technique.
Which sounds, it sounds cooler than Technics. Technique. Technique. Night.
Dan Marshall (05:59)
I'm using the Australian pronunciation. No, ⁓ but, ⁓
I actually didn't even think about that. then here I am. ⁓ you know, but, ⁓
now the new generation longs for that sound and it's the distortions of the medium. said this a bunch of times. It's the Brian Eno idea, the distortions of a medium become its
Fatboi (06:21)
Yes.
Dan Marshall (06:26)
So if you want the eighties vibe, you don't want the
In addition to the synthesizer stuff, you want the hiss, you want the warble, you want the VHS distortions in your video. Without it, how do you even have that vibe, right?
Fatboi (06:39)
Yes. Which is
why I love recording in Luna because I literally slap a two inch tape on every individual track and I have it ⁓ Ampex at the back. And I mix down through that. So I get if I if it's something that has that. ⁓ That.
Dan Marshall (06:56)
Mmm.
Fatboi (07:07)
70s through 80s vibe, ⁓ more of a live feel, I'll turn the hits on. And I won't start the, you know how all of our songs now today, they start from the top. I'll give it an open space so you can hear the, and then start the song. Nobody does that anymore, man.
Dan Marshall (07:27)
Mmm.
Fatboi (07:32)
It's very rare that somebody will try to emulate that where they let you hear the hits come on first and then the song starts.
Dan Marshall (07:40)
I love
stuff like that. That's like some of the most memorable things is like the little outtakes at the end, like on a zeppelin record or, ⁓ there's a famous, I'm trying to remember as a black dog, we can hear the print through, you hear an echo of the track because it printed through the tape that was spoiled, spooled on each one. like, and now that people have heard it, some, you hear it a million times as part of the song.
Fatboi (07:43)
Yes.
Aw man.
⁓
yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
It's just part
of it. Yeah, it's just part of it. It's part of it.
Dan Marshall (08:06)
Yeah, those idiosyncrasies
are what the imperfect imperfections like you like to say.
Fatboi (08:09)
Perfect
imperfections. And you can't recreate those. You can't recreate it.
Dan Marshall (08:13)
That's what gives.
You can't fake. I
mean, you can try, but you can't fake the funk. So you can smell usually. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah.
Fatboi (08:20)
Yeah, well, I mean, in the moment,
if it's happening and you get rid of it and you're like, you know what? It was cool. Let's do it again.
Dan Marshall (08:30)
Yeah, or you just like, uh, you turn my snare. can't hear my snare. That kind of stuff, you know, like you could, but because that's part of the performance. Yeah.
Fatboi (08:38)
Part of the performance.
Part of the performance. Yeah, man, we could go on forever about this
stuff.
Dan Marshall (08:46)
You know
who does that a lot though? Thundercats.
Fatboi (08:48)
What?
That's my guy, man. My cousin Bam Bam turned me on to Thundercat some like around 2016, 17. Man. Thundercat. Different. Yeah. In a Bootsy Collins, George Clinton kind of way.
Dan Marshall (08:52)
That's
He's he's different. is super interesting, dude. I'm like, I've kind of been. I've been.
Yeah, and you know, those guys are very they kind of came out of the funk kind of emerged from like the hippie era and in the sense that everything, anything goes, everything's like a big party. There's no rules ⁓ and flashy stage shows with.
Fatboi (09:14)
.
No.
Yeah.
Dan Marshall (09:32)
spaceships and big costumes and just whatever you know ⁓ so that spirit of just like anything goes eclecticism that's thundercats bringing that forward in a big way
Fatboi (09:42)
Yeah, yeah.
he Thundercat?
I like Thundercat. I fell in love with his music. Excuse me, because he gave me that nostalgia. Like it was, felt like I was, throwback to my childhood
Dan Marshall (09:59)
What was that?
Well, he did that whole track with Michael
McDonald and Kenny Loggins, and it wasn't really even a parody. It was like an homage to like the yacht rock Titans and somehow still worked. And, you know, like I even hate saying the term is like kind of overused now, but those guys are the pinnacle of that. But here's what's crazy is Thundercat used to play in suicidal tendencies, like a punk band. That's his background.
Fatboi (10:14)
Amen.
Yeah.
Yeah.
Dan Marshall (10:36)
like just punk rock ethos and then somehow marry it into that. like I said, like the seventies funk thing where anything goes. mean, it's no wonder he's as eclectic as he is. And that's something you don't see a lot in music right now because people are categorized. They get the formula, they got a silo. I must do this, that the other. the algorithm will blow me up.
Fatboi (10:42)
Okay.
Yeah.
Yeah, and that's where music gets boring and everybody suffers from samism. Everybody's the same. like, yeah, it's predictable. You know what's coming. It's like, I've never heard this song before and I can tell you what's coming. Even the chord progression. like, duh, yep, duh, yep, I can hear it. I know it's coming because it's just tried and true and nobody's
Dan Marshall (11:09)
Predictable. It's predictable. Yeah.
Fatboi (11:31)
Testing the waters.
Dan Marshall (11:32)
And Thundercat is not like that at all. I hear stuff, I'm like, wow, why did he think to do that? And he's playing the bass like a lead guitar and playing the bass at the same time. And it works, I guess.
Fatboi (11:35)
at all.
Yeah.
Yeah, and it might.
You might hear three songs in one.
Dan Marshall (11:50)
It's triple music. ⁓
Fatboi (11:52)
Yeah, the song shifts gears three
times to where you have to look at the... Yeah, to see if a new song came on. No, it's the same song. It's like, ⁓ shit, he just... Movements. Movements, there you go. Which is something that... I mean, if you do that now...
Dan Marshall (12:01)
the lead seed or whatever and just figure out. Right, right, right, right.
It's just several movements. do complex music here in Thundercat Land.
Fatboi (12:21)
they will just make it a new song. know, when most people is like, yeah, that's a whole other song. Yeah, no, but it's a part of the same movement.
Dan Marshall (12:31)
I mean, is that, is that the short attention span theater thing going on? Like you, got to grab them in the first three seconds or the swiping and you can't let a song develop over three months, three minutes. I like that's a long song.
Fatboi (12:35)
Thanks, all.
But
to me, think if you make something interesting enough, they will stay interested long enough. Look, good is good is good. It's good. can't, like every song, every song doesn't have to start with the hook. Every song doesn't have to start with the
intro necessary, you know what saying? Like, something different. Like, let's let the song start sometime with everything in it. Just bam and everything. It's everything. like, my God, what is this? You know, and then it goes into, instead of starting with the first verse of the hook, starting with the bridge. You can do that. You can do that. And I saw somebody, ⁓ Gene Simmons.
Dan Marshall (13:18)
Right.
of all people.
Fatboi (13:39)
of all people was talking about ⁓ brilliant songwriting. He was bringing up McCartney and he was talking about yesterday, how yesterday started with the word yesterday, but then it also ends with yesterday. And you make that like a bookend.
Dan Marshall (13:59)
Right. Right. ⁓
Fatboi (14:02)
Thanks.
Yeah, that's all he knows. That's all he knows.
That's
all he knows, man. I mean, he's a master at it. That's what he knows. He is music.
Dan Marshall (14:34)
Well, I took my kids. I'm like, you know, this is like going to see Mozart. You know, you're not going to get a lot of chances. You know, he's guys getting up there, but like this is about as good as it gets. Yeah. Yeah.
Fatboi (14:43)
Yeah, Clinton is still performing. Clinton's still
performing. He doesn't have, I think it might only be like one, maybe two original parliament members up there with him. But I mean, still, even then the focus is George. You don't have it if George ain't there.
Dan Marshall (15:03)
No,
no, no, he's the son. He's the dude that would just do whatever randomness. Flip the tape backwards. That's the hook. then there's 10 hooks in the song like ⁓ bow wow. Yippee. yeah, that's a hook. And then who the dog? That's another hook. This is just a series of hooks. And that's a song, right?
Fatboi (15:15)
Yeah.
Well, that song...
Well,
you know how that song came about though, George was high as hell.
Dan Marshall (15:26)
Tell me about it.
I figured there was a twist like that.
Fatboi (15:33)
He was super high
and came into the studio and saw the band jamming and felt like, you know, he got in his feelings about that. He was like, uh, how y'all doing this without me? Like, hold on, how y'all do it? And it sounded good without me. So George, let me go show these young punks something. So he goes in the, uh, in the booth and was like, uh,
Dan Marshall (15:39)
Hmm.
Cough cough
y'all didn't tell me we were recording and I yeah yeah yeah
Fatboi (16:03)
Yeah, bring that back. Start that over. And the engineer was rewinding the tape. It wasn't recording yet, but George was so high. He thought that was so while it was going, started doing the intro rap. Yeah, this is a tale about a dog. He started the intro rap and it was so different.
Dan Marshall (16:15)
Hahaha
Ha ha ha ha ha ha
Fatboi (16:32)
And, you know, George, after he did all that, he went to sleep. He had to take his obligatory nap after being so high. ⁓ And when he woke up, they had pieced what he did together and actually made the reversing. We have to make it, make it the song. We have to make that the song.
Dan Marshall (16:41)
Well, you know.
someone had the presence of mind to like, that's kind of dope. Let's record that the master of that and then figure it out.
Fatboi (17:01)
So when he woke up and he heard the song, it was Atomic Dog. Mind you, that song was pieced together.
Dan Marshall (17:09)
Well, it sounds like it, but somehow it still works.
Fatboi (17:13)
And I believe, you know, I think that was George's recording philosophy, just kind of just throw things. And I've heard him say this because he, I think when Prince was being inducted to the hall, ⁓ George ⁓ introduced him. And George would say, you know, I would call Prince and I would throw something at him, you know. ⁓
Dan Marshall (17:41)
Throwing
spaghetti against the wall, hope it sticks, yeah.
Fatboi (17:42)
See if that sticks
on the wall and then, know, hey, let me throw that, let you pee on it and then you throw it back to me and let me pee on it and see what we come up with. And I think George has kind of pieced up together as it went and whatever was going through his mind.
Dan Marshall (17:46)
Hahaha
Kind of that dog terminology is
still going there. Marking your territory on this beat.
Fatboi (18:00)
Yeah, Mark, he literally said
that, inducted Prince into the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame. Yeah, you pee on that and then send it back to me. Let me pee on it and see what we come up with. But that's just how his mind works.
Dan Marshall (18:11)
Hahaha
Oh man. He had a
very fluid sense of songwriting.
Fatboi (18:21)
Yeah, and I think it works. Me, ⁓ I'm... ⁓
Dan Marshall (18:25)
I said
fluid. Dad jokes available at all times here.
Fatboi (18:28)
Fluid, very fluid.
Yeah, I think that flow for me, like, once I'm... See, now we can't get out of it. But that flow for me.
Dan Marshall (18:39)
you
It was golden.
Fatboi (18:50)
We stuck in it now. We stuck in it now. But you know, that flow for me doesn't, I don't, when I'm in the moment, it comes to me and I get it done. And it throws me off a little bit when I have to piece a song together. Piece, piece, piece, piece.
Dan Marshall (18:51)
lordy. This will be the viral clip now, of course.
Right, right. I got to that bridge from here and
there's like the third take of the seventh track. I could fly into the thing that gets tedious. I know I know that life. Yeah.
Fatboi (19:21)
Yeah, that. Yeah,
and that right there, that to me slows my creativity down because I like to work fast. I like to be in the moment. And if I'm feeling good, like right now in this moment, I like to record that. And when somebody is always let's try this, let's try that, it starts throwing it starts throwing me off. It's like this is working. Like, why do we have to like now? We're not sure. If this is working.
Dan Marshall (19:46)
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Fatboi (19:51)
But for George, I think the way his mind works, but he's also like that as a person, like kind of sporadic. So yeah, that's what makes him interesting. ⁓ as a producer, if that's how you create, then yes. Yes.
Dan Marshall (19:59)
Hmm. Right. But that's what makes them interesting.
You got to work around the
big personality like that. The randomness is what makes them interested. So that may not be a good fit with every producer. You know, some people like to work regimented and get the seventh take of the third track correct. And you know, before you move on that kind of stuff.
Fatboi (20:15)
Thank
Yeah, yeah.
No.
Yeah.
And I can work that way, but it's kind of like...
I'm like the producers of the Atomic Dog, like, hey, when George goes to sleep, I'm gonna piece this record together. Yeah, you know, I'm a, hey, I'm a let him do his thing.
Dan Marshall (20:43)
You got to have an agenda, a secret agenda to make it work. Because it's such a thing.
It's such a thing as too much randomness, right?
Fatboi (20:53)
It's too much. It's like, look,
look, look. While he's doing all this, I'm keeping little mental notes of all the good stuff that he did. like, ooh, ooh, ooh, that, that, that, that, that, that.
Dan Marshall (20:58)
Play along, just keep nodding and yes.
Just keep saying yes and
then eventually he's got to go take his nap and then we'll put something coherent together out of this.
Fatboi (21:09)
When the nap comes, he's gonna be out.
He's gonna be out for eight hours. Easy, he's gonna be out for eight hours. Plenty of time, so when he wakes up, we just play the song for him and now he doesn't have time to say, I don't like it. Or let's do this or let's do that. Either he likes what we put together or he doesn't. I like to be in that.
Dan Marshall (21:16)
Yeah, so we've got plenty of time to edit the good takes together, ⁓
Right, right, right.
But you gotta have it finished. You
can't let them hear it in the middle of the cooking, because it's too soon. Yeah. Yeah.
Fatboi (21:38)
Yeah, you can't let, yeah, it gotta, it gotta be done. You know, it gotta be
done at least 95 to 98 % done.
Dan Marshall (21:48)
There's
something to that.
So I used to work with these producers pretty high level. I'm not going to say who or who for, but they would do this thing. And like the, the, the artists at the top of the food chain, the pyramid scheme, what have you, they would always leave one wrong thing in the beat. Like obviously wrong. Like that high hat's just all fucked up. And I'd be like, you're going to leave that there? And I was like, yeah, yeah, yeah. Cause when he hears it, he'll say, yo, it's great. Except for that high hat. Just take that out and then everything's good to go.
So they would add like a red herring to every finished mix knowing that they had to do that to get the version they wanted out. I thought, man, y'all read the 48 laws of power to a T cause dang, that is some next level thinking right there.
Fatboi (22:29)
Yeah.
Yep, to let him think he's in control the whole time. But really, it's like we're working this the way we want to work it. Yeah.
Dan Marshall (22:37)
Right. They had his personality dialed in like that.
And I was like, that's maybe the most amazing thing I've ever seen.
Fatboi (22:49)
What you
you you you have to, you know, as the producer working around these different personalities with these different artists, you have to hone in on what makes them tick. If it's the kind of artist that feels like they have to be in control of everything that's going on with it. OK, you lead them into that water and do something that makes them think that.
They're in control of it, knowing they ain't gonna like it. So you can take it out and do what you actually want it to be done.
Dan Marshall (23:21)
Who's axe?
No, no, that's
good. But it was actually more subtle than that. He wasn't that way, but he felt like he needed to be that way. So they gave him an out to do the one thing. Right. But otherwise he could just sit around, smoke weed in the session and just be like, yeah, yeah, that's great. And then he's like, oh yeah, I should probably weigh in on this. So they gave him something obvious to weigh in on. And then they could just, it was fine. Everything worked.
Fatboi (23:30)
He wasn't that way.
I got you, got you, got you. Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yeah.
Hey, which is kind of kind of kind of like the the wrong man, you know, like, yeah, the wrong man is like, hey, the wrong man has something he needs something to do, you know, bring him in. He never likes what goes out in the world. Like if any big records, he's the opposite of the yes, man. He's the well, the no man is the opposite of the of the yes, man.
Dan Marshall (23:56)
We were just talking about that. Talk about the wrong man again.
It's the opposite of the yes, man.
Okay, yeah, we gotta go through the,
so these are all variations on the Yes Man. The Yes Man's, so the Yes Man tells you what you wanna hear. The No Man is the guy that just gives it to you straight. Well, it's not afraid to say no, but the wrong man is.
Fatboi (24:19)
The wrong man is the guy that never picks the right record.
Yes.
Yes. Yep.
He's the guy that goes against the grain. If the majority likes this, he never likes the big records in the like Billie Jean. let's say it's Billie Jean. He's the guy in the room that he won't like. He don't like Billie Jean.
Dan Marshall (24:52)
I don't know that beats a little predictable. I don't know billy. Does anyone even care about this billy jean person and they're picking losers they pick losers
Fatboi (25:00)
whenever they pick,
yeah, whenever he doesn't like the smash, you know that's the one. The records that he loves, absolutely loves.
Dan Marshall (25:07)
smash hit, you know it's a smash.
You're like, we gotta go back to the lab now.
Fatboi (25:18)
That ain't it. That ain't
it. It's at least not a single. that ain't it.
Dan Marshall (25:24)
Right, right, right. So
that's the subtle psychology of building the crew around the project, right? You gotta know the personalities. It's the psychology of it. It's more than just pushing buttons and putting cassette noise into it.
Fatboi (25:32)
Yeah. You gotta know him. Yeah.
And this is what the general public doesn't understand about producers and musicians, not the artists. They get fed the artists over time.
Dan Marshall (25:52)
Right, right. The artist is
well manicured image and blah, blah, blah.
Fatboi (25:55)
Yeah,
yeah. Cinderella, if you will. You know, because at 12 o'clock he turns back into a pumpkin. And all that. But when you're working, you know, the people behind the scene from the. The mice, the the producers, the musicians, the engineers. These are the people.
Dan Marshall (25:59)
Right, right.
You gotta go scrub the floors.
the mice.
Fatboi (26:25)
that are building these records and putting these records together and making them.
Dan Marshall (26:31)
the support squad that gets Cinderella to the ball to meet Prince Charming. Yeah, no, I feel that. I feel that. And then...
Fatboi (26:33)
Yes, absolutely. Absolutely. And
the general public doesn't understand the stuff that we go to dealing with these different personalities and how each one is different. It's not one size fits all. It's different per. And you have to get in that like it could be somebody that you're working with and you have to act. There are certain people when I know I'm going to work with them, I have to woo saw.
Dan Marshall (26:53)
Right.
Fatboi (27:03)
putting myself in a, because it's going to be a tug of war. And these are the guys that I'm saying that it's kind of like, they got to, the final word got to come from them, not me, even though I'm going to end up with the final word. But they have to be able to like, today he don't like the record.
Dan Marshall (27:22)
Right.
Right.
Fatboi (27:30)
Tomorrow, he loves it. But that's probably because he took the record, played it in front of people, and then...
Dan Marshall (27:41)
his yes men and
no men and wrong men and felled it out. He needed to get some consensus on it.
Fatboi (27:47)
He needed to have that. And now he loves the record. Hey man, ⁓ man, I was listening to it, man. Hey, I love it. You know, and I know that's just cold for you let's you let your yes men and you know men here and everybody was like.
Dan Marshall (28:00)
Yeah. I'm not high anymore.
And I listened to it. I'm like, yeah, actually sounds pretty good. Yeah.
Fatboi (28:06)
Yeah.
And then that's another thing right there. A lot of artists.
As producers, we listen to Sonics. How are you saying something like it could be. 3 o'clock in the morning, you're dead tired. You you've smoked a little bit. You drank a little bit. Your voice is horses hill. But in this moment, that voice is perfect for this song. Your fresh I just woke up voice is not going to work.
Like, and it's perfect for what we're doing right now. We never catch this again. And a lot of times, ⁓ you know, artists want to, yeah, I don't like it. I'm listening to the sonics of it. Look how your voice is in this moment is perfect. I need, I need that raspy on this song.
Dan Marshall (29:02)
We
need to push now and get this thing done now because tomorrow is gonna be a whole different vibe. It's not gonna work
Fatboi (29:07)
It's a whole, a whole different
vibe, whole new voice and all that. This is the moment to catch you. And a lot of times, you know, for certain songs, you got to know this going into that. It's like, dang, it's going to be a long day because I'm not really going to start working until like three, four o'clock when his voice sounds.
Dan Marshall (29:25)
It's been properly treated.
Fatboi (29:27)
Yeah,
because for this song, that voice is going to be perfect for it. So I'm not even going to pull that song up until three, four o'clock in the morning when...
Dan Marshall (29:40)
So you got like a schedule
kind of mapped out in your head about how we got, this is going to go tonight.
Fatboi (29:45)
Yeah,
yeah, yeah. Or if he comes in and it's been that kind of day and his voice is already there and they may be apologizing, man, I'm sorry about my voice. No, no, no, no, no, Let's just get it out.
Dan Marshall (30:00)
Tell you what, let's just warm up in the booth. Why don't you go ahead and just try that verse one time and uh, yeah, what's that you're here, you know?
Fatboi (30:02)
Yeah, yeah, yeah, let's just lay down. And
then after once I get the performance, it's like, oh, I got it. I got it. No, we ain't change shit. This shit is it. It's it, man. I don't like my voice, man. I'm this is this is the other thing right here. I don't like when people try to set a record up like. OK, I'm pushing for this record. This record is fired.
Dan Marshall (30:12)
Hmm.
Hahaha
Fatboi (30:31)
and the no men or the wrong men is trying to get everybody's opinion on their side and they set the record up. Hey, listen, I don't think it, no, just play it. You need a genuine.
Dan Marshall (30:51)
Just let let let the person
hear with their own ears without the prejudged kind of deal. Yeah.
Fatboi (30:55)
No setup, no preparation,
no setup. Just push play. That's how you get honest feedback because when you're dealing with all these yes men, well, no men gonna always give it straight, but when you're dealing with yes men and wrong men, no setups. Just let me get their honest opinion.
Dan Marshall (31:14)
Well,
the wrong man thinks he's a no man.
Fatboi (31:20)
He does. He thinks he's a no man, but nah, you ain't a no man, you just wrong.
Dan Marshall (31:25)
It's a subtle shade of no to wrong, right? Like you can't just be a contrarian who just goes against what everyone does because then you're definitely a wrong man. Just just to do it for the sake of doing it. Now, if you believe in your heart, you're like, man, y'all are tripping. This is terrible. What are you thinking? Are you all high? Yeah. Yeah. Like. Yeah.
Fatboi (31:29)
Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah.
This ain't it. This ain't it. That's a no man.
The no man just gonna give it to you straight like y'all like this shit? No, this ain't it man. This ain't it.
Dan Marshall (31:54)
You guys have been locked
up in this room too long. You've heard it a hundred times. You fell in love with it, but I'm telling you. Yeah, that's what it is. The.
Fatboi (32:02)
There you go. There you go. Demo-whitis.
And the no man will give you the opportunity to change his mind. Play it again. He'll listen to it. Play it again.
Dan Marshall (32:10)
Yeah, yeah.
And I've been in those position a few times and like sometimes the no man, you know, they're for real because they'll come off it when they're saying, okay, you know what? It's not the whole thing. It's this one part that gives you an actual detailed analysis of what's it that thing's distorted or they're a little out of tune here and you're letting it go in a way. It's not funky out of tune. It's just bad attitude. There's a subtle distinction sometimes, you know, stuff like the actual helpful, uh,
Fatboi (32:28)
Yeah, the part that's bothering.
Dan Marshall (32:44)
Constructive criticism is what you need out of an old man. A wrong man just wants to be a contrarian.
Fatboi (32:46)
constructive criticism.
Yeah, he's just happy to be in the room.
Dan Marshall (32:51)
He likes the attention of causing a problem in the creative space.
Fatboi (32:56)
This is true.
This is true. Which is why the wrong man is the last person that you actually let into the room. Like he's the you don't want the wrong man in the room during record because he's going to stop the song. Like I don't like it. Shut the fuck up. What you heard is shit. And that.
Dan Marshall (33:14)
It's going to slow everything down. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. You haven't even heard it yet. We're working through it. Yeah. Yeah, exactly.
Fatboi (33:24)
That's where the wrong man can be a deterrent to what you're doing. The no man, he can wait until it's done and tell you, I don't know, man.
Dan Marshall (33:36)
Yeah. He's like, I wasn't going to say
anything, but apparently you're to let this go. man, there's some distortion on that snare. That's not, I think maybe you should take a look at it. It's going to be like that, you know, or something like that. Yeah.
Fatboi (33:40)
you
Yeah. Yeah.
The wrong man can be there at the beginning of the track and all you have is a kick snare and a bass line. He's like...
Dan Marshall (34:02)
Yeah. Yeah. It, it never ceases to amaze me, especially like an executive level, but like never sees to amaze me. There's people in this industry that don't have an imagination that will weigh in on things as they're developing. And even if you have a track record, they'll still be like, I don't know. I don't hear it. And it's just like, let it develop.
Fatboi (34:02)
Nah. You don't even know what the, you don't know what it's gonna be yet.
No.
with these people.
Because these people think they're on the creative side with us, but really they're just consumers. You have the consumer ear and the consumer has to hear it done. The consumer can't differentiate the song being constructed as we go versus what it's going to sound like when it's done.
They can't differentiate between that. But they think they're part of the creative process and they know where the song, you don't even know where the song is going. They want to be, and then.
Dan Marshall (35:04)
Right. They want to be, they think they want
to be, but they don't want to put the hours in to actually develop the song. They just want to weigh in on.
Fatboi (35:13)
And the way in is one they weigh in with one part. Not understanding that as a creative, that's one of a million thoughts that I've had. Yeah, that thought right there. Yes, I thought that, but I thought this and I thought this and I thought this and I thought this your one thought. That's the only thought you got in your head. Yes, I thought that that because that's obvious, because all you know.
is the obvious. But I'm thinking deeper than just what's obvious because do I want it to be obvious? If I want it to be obvious all the time, it's going to sound like everything else all the time. Sometimes I don't want to be obvious.
Dan Marshall (35:54)
Right,
it into AI and let it finish it for me if we're gonna do that, you know?