In 2017 John and I went to visit Scott Jacoby in Manhattan at his Eusonia Studios. Since then heās mixed Jason Mrazās Look for the Good album, produced and written for a diverse slew of artists (including Deva Mahal, Cory Henry, Rachel Platten, and Stormzy), and helped create a studio (AMA Recording) at The AMA Center on the island of Anguilla for teaching arts, media, and technology in the Caribbean region. His career includes songwriting, production, mixing, and more, and he keeps busy, working with artists like Coldplay, Vampire Weekend, Sia, John Legend, and JosĆ© James.
I know you started out as an artist, right?
I think my whole way of coming to this is probably different than a lot of peopleās. I never thought I would be doing music for my career. Since I was 10 or 11, Iāve been writing songs and playing instruments. It was my favorite thing to do. I never thought music would be my career, and as such I went forward with what I thought my life would be. I ended up going to medical school, which was very much a choice. It wasnāt like my parents were saying, āYou have to be a doctor.ā I was interested in mental health and international public health issues. I went to medical school, and then halfway through, at 27, I questioned all of what I had held true, such as, āCan you do your favorite thing for a career? Can you pursue a career in the arts, and do it unselfishly? Or at least a little less ego-driven?ā I forced myself to answer those questions as honestly as possible. I made a decision and left medical school without a net.
Thatās terrifying.
Yeah. I didnāt grow up rich; I was paying for it myself. I didnāt know or understand that people were producers, writers, mixers, engineers, mastering engineers, or drummers. When I looked at the back of my favorite album covers, it would read, āproduced, arranged, and performed by Stevie Wonder.ā I realized, āEveryone does it all themselves!ā
Thatās a rare example, though.
I didnāt know that at the time. I thought, āI like writing songs and doing this thing that seems to be production, so I guess that I have to sing and perform.ā Neither of which I liked too much. I realized, in the course of doing that, that I was decent at producing and mixing. Iām decent at writing. That was how my career started.
What were the first projects you ended up working on?
I was my own guinea pig, so I figured out how to do production and engineering. I was never trained properly, and since then I have gotten to work with all of these great engineers; the Neil Dorfsmans of the world. In doing my own recordings, I asked myself, āHow do I make a Rhodes piano sound good? How do I make a drum kit sound good?ā I listen to my first recordings now, and I had 27 keyboard instruments in one song. There was way too much shit in everything that I did! I soon realized how good arrangements work, and how interactions with different instruments in different frequency areas work. That was all with me as the artist. Among my first projects was a woman named Maiysha [Kai], who I ended up having a very long working relationship with starting in about 2001. She was one of the first people I co-wrote with. Maiysha was a willing person on this journey; she has a great voice and talent. Many years later we got a Grammy nomination. That was my first thing that Iād call a real project. I was a very reluctant mixer, at the time. A lot of people end up mixing because they have a vision for what they created, and no one else is going to honor that vision. It was the same thing with me. Itās easy to get intimidated with mixing and engineering, where you seemingly have to have a whole bunch of knowledge and training to be good at it, but there are a lot of different ways that people get good at their craft.
Arranging instruments so that they arenāt cluttered, like you mentioned, makes mixing easier!
It sure does! I recorded something at Avatar [Power Station] in the A Room. It was beautifully recorded. I wasnāt engineering the session, because I didnāt know enough about what I was doing at the time. I got it back here, and I was tweaking like crazy, compressing everything and EQing, and it didnāt sound right. I took off everything Iād done and listened to the raw tracking session. That sounded good. It was one of those great lessons. The first thing is to sit back and listen. A lot of work has already been done, so donāt undo the good.
In what ways have you learned more about mixing and how to approach that? You mentioned Neil Dorfsman and others youāve worked with. Have you sat and co-mixed with people along the way?
I have. Iāve done it with Neil. I produced a project that he mixed. Since then, weāve worked a lot together. I learned a little bit of what he does; Iād sit there and listen. Everyoneās got their own thing. Jimmy Douglass [Tape Op #130] is another one. Heās a good buddy of mine. We worked on something I had produced that he had mixed. Another great experience. At a certain level of the game, the mixer is a reflection of who they are as a person. I find that [to be true] more and more. It gets increasingly psychological the higher you go, and then you see how people work. You see how people hear, as well as the types of decisions they make. Thereās a tremendous amount of humanity in the process. One flaw of the YouTube way of learning is that itās very easy to absorb technical information. The pieces that are more important are the human aspects, and how a mix makes you feel. Thatās what makes someone special in what they do. You have to be fluid enough in your thinking and approach that your methods donāt get in the way of your total vision.
How did your career progress from working with Maiysha to other artists?
The Maiysha project got me my lawyer. A friend happened to swing by the studio and said, āIāve got to play this for my lawyer.ā Having a good person representing you can make a lot of introductions. I did a lot of local New York-based projects. I was into soul music and neo-soul, and I became a bit known for that. My manager at the time pitched me for this this singer, Laura Izibor, who was on Atlantic Records. That was my first major label project. I was up against some other well-known producers, and I got an a cappella [vocal stem]. This is a woman from Ireland whoās an incredible soul singer. I went way beyond what I should have. I brought in some horn players, a baritone player, I wrote arrangements, recorded live drums, and programmed drums. They were expecting to hear a sequenced, little track and I gave them fully-realized, arranged tunes. They were like, āYou can do most of this record.ā It opened my eyes to working at a commercial studio, which I hadnāt done much of. We tracked at Avatar. Neil Dorfsman did some mixing. We had the ability to hire musicians; real heavyweights on drums, bass, and keys. It was then that I realized that my producer fee for a track was probably ten times what Iād gotten on a single song Iād worked on before. I couldnāt believe it was happening. This was in 2007. After that I started getting a number of different gigs. Vanessa Hudgens was another big one for me.
Thatās a trip.
Thereās this guy named Jon Lind whoās an industry veteran songwriter and producer. He co-wrote āBoogie Wonderlandā for Earth, Wind & Fire. He was A&R at Hollywood Records at the time, the company putting out all of the High School Musical records, then the Jonas Brothers, and then spin-offs from High School Musical. Vanessa Hudgens was one of those people. I was always submitting songs to Jon but never quite made the grade. One day I got a call from Jon Lind, āScott, Iām in my office with Vanessa Hudgens. Weāre loving one of your songs, and Vanessa wants to cut it.ā It was a song called, āLast Night.ā I didnāt write it with Vanessa Hudgens in mind; I thought of a riff that happened to be in 5/4 and made it into a song.
Weāre used to a lot of music in that world being kick-snare, kick-snare.
Exactly. All 4/4! I think it rarely happens. That was the lead track from Vanessaās album [Identified], released in 2008. I never would have pictured in a million years a Hollywood Records artist choosing that song to do.
Did you end up producing the song and carrying it through?
I produced it and mixed it. In fact, that was one of my first mix gigs. Jon said, āWhy donāt you mix it?ā I said, āSerban Ghenea is mixing most of the other tracks on the record. I canāt do it.ā He was like, āDo it! Youāre going to be fine.ā Mine didnāt sound as good as the other songs on the record, but it was close enough. That gave me a little bit of confidence to say, āHey, I can actually mix a record.ā
Were you doing it here or at another studio?
All here.
Thatās wild. Did she come sing here?
No. I tracked all the instruments here and then we did all the vocals in L.A. If thereās one lesson Iāve learned, itās that youāve got to do the thing that you do better than anyone. If youāve got a natural talent and individuality, then allow that to be your master.
JB: What is the one thing that you do better? What is your mission statement?
Iāve never put that into words before, but Iām going to try. I would like to think that I take musical sophistication and do it in a way that is appreciated, without having to be a āmusic head.ā I have a decent amount of background in music, and I like taking some of that and throwing it into the mix. I think thereās a way to do that where youāre not batting people over the head with sophistication. Iām very hybrid in all my approaches. There might be programmed kick and snare, for example, but then there will be live hi-hat. Itās a mixture of organic with programmed.
Youāre keeping some life in it.
Absolutely.
Looking around here I saw records by Stevie Wonder and Sly & the Family Stone.
Those two guys probably sum that up better than anyone. Stevie, in particular. Itās appreciated by the people who are the most sophisticated musicians in the world, but itās also enjoyed by everyone. He has a gift for that.
You keep the multiple talents thing going here.
How often have you met a person who can write a decent song and mix a decent record? Itās fairly rare. Maybe if I would have picked one thing, Iād be better at that thing; but I get a lot of satisfaction out of being a person whoās seeing a song through from beginning to end.
If you hadnāt written the song, you wouldnāt be working on the production in many of these cases.
Thatās a good point. Thatās how a lot of it works these days. You happen to be in the room, or you happen to be the person who wrote the song.
Have some of your songs ever been covered and/or produced by someone else?
There have been several of those. A JosĆ© James track. I wrote the song āTroubleā with JosĆ©, and someone else produced and mixed that. I like that too. On the flipside, Iām mixing a lot of records these days that I had nothing to do with the writing or production of. I find that a whole different trip. Itās someone elseās vision youāre trying to help articulate.
How does mixing work come to you?
Iāve gotten to love mixing. It means Iām not. in the studio every night until 2 a.m. It allows me to focus for bursts of time. I have two guys at the studio who help me full time. They set up all of the mixes and do whatever recalling there is, as well as revisions. I can focus my energy on getting something sounding right and in pretty quick shape. I think that work has increased because I enjoy it, and I have been focused on that. Itās still something that people put value on. When Iāve produced a track and itās time to mix, thereās barely any work to do.
In what way are you working with hardware? Do you have a console here?
Itās not a console, but all the major groupings have a hardware insert. The drums are going through an SSL compressor, the bass is going through a whole chain. I have these set chains for tracks that I donāt always use, but itās what Iāve figured out to be my method for mixing. I know what theyāre going to sound like in terms of the gear, and how to hit them if thereās a compressor. Aside from the mix bus going through a whole bunch of analog, itās the drums, the bass, the lead vocal, and some of the keys and guitars. Then some of the effects I have are some old spring reverbs as well as a lot of kooky elements, weaving that in there to get some noise.
Definitely. Are you using a summing amplifier?
Itās all hardware inserts, including the mix bus. Itās hardware inserts, and then it goes through about five boxes in the analog realm and comes back in. I didnāt grow up on a console. Iām good friends with Fab Dupont and I consulted him when I was deciding whether or not to incorporate summing into my rig. He sent me the Dangerous 2-Bus which is a great example of very uncolored, high-quality summing. I set it up and had all the guys at my studio, including Neil and other people come by. I, as well as everyone that was here, didnāt feel that there was enough of a difference that it made sense for me. I get a tremendous amount of color from all the hardware inserts. I decided it wasnāt worth it to complicate the workflow.
Does gear change often for you? Do you get tired and sub it out with another piece?
It hasnāt happened yet. Iāve tried to make good choices. The only thing thatās happened with gear is I kept getting more of it! [laughter] Iāve run out of space, but I donāt feel that I need anything else. Of course, thatās after a half million dollars of spending over the course of 17 years, but I feel good about it.
I was talking to some musicians the other day about, āRemember when we started on 8- or 16-tracks?ā Weād plan ahead and get all of our ideas into this minimal amount.
I think thereās very much to that. Every argument you can have about music making and audio, there are different sides, and I always appreciate both sides, but I think that committing is something we see less and less of these days. Itās an important part of the process, and itās an important part of the way you can think about production. A production concept is something that happens in 30 seconds, and the next 50 to 100 hours is the articulation of that. I know what I want something to sound like; Iāve done enough records. If we think in that way, it allows us to commit. āThis is going to be our vocal sound.ā
Youāve had this studio space for quite a while now.
Yeah, 17 years.
Can you talk about the economics of that in Manhattan?
Iāll say, first of all, that since 2000, and weāre in 2017, the first eight years I had a partner here. That was very helpful. We werenāt partners in any other way than that we split the time. It got to a certain point in late ā08 or ā09 that I was working a bit too much, and he was living in Brooklyn. It was a very amicable parting. This is not a commercial studio; Iāve never once in 17 years rented the place out. In this particular neighborhood of Manhattan, at 25th Street and Park Avenue, itās expensive, and itās a lot more expensive now than it was 17 years ago.
No rent control?
No. One thing that Iāve realized about the economics of this is that having a family, as I work less and less, there are a lot of hours per day where this space is not used. Iāve started something called the Eusonia Studios Club, where Iām offering anyone whoās ever interned here, which is about 50 people, where they have a membership fee per year or per month (with a minimum of three months). Once they pay the membership fee, they can be here for as many hours as they want when Iām not here, which will be calendared, at a very low hourly. Like ridiculously low. Iāve gotten a huge response from folks, and everyone canāt believe it. Itās a little bit of a gift back. Those people have worked and come up with me, but they donāt necessarily have their own studios or places equipped with as much gear. If ten people are doing this membership, then it covers some bills. Fortunately, for the most part, I havenāt had to worry about it. Iāve had enough work where I can employ one assistant full-time.
Totally. You have a label, Eusonia Records.
Which is probably the best way of losing money in this business. I have a new partner at my label, former Recording Academy P&E Wing co-chair James McKinney. He and I are building up a whole set of projects we want to release and get going; I consider it the 2.0 version of the label. We actually helped build a recording studio in the Caribbean at The AMA Center. Itās funded by the Sheth Sangreal Foundation and we have the Grammy Museum Foundation as a partner. Itās a multi-million dollar music academy in Anguilla, and a world-class studio called AMA Recording. Itās a unique place for A-list international artists and for local and regional talent, as well as a music institution for kids from the Caribbean. Weāve been the technical and creative directors of the whole project. Iām going to be calling on friends in the industry to come down there, check it out, and work there. Iāve got a lot of people lined up already, both artists and producers. Itās not a money thing. Just to get down there and have people teach.
Any last thoughts?
Be true to yourself. Itās a little bit clichĆ©, but I think thatās how the best art is made and thatās how people find their voice. If thereās one thing that I have been pursuing, and care about, and try to hold as my mission, itās that.
