Bryan Carlstrom

Educated in music and voice at the University of South Dakota and having made himself a mainstay of the Los Angeles recording business, Bryan Carlstrom has garnered a reputation for working with hard-rocking bands. Guitar as a buzzword wouldn't really suffice to describe the types of bands he's crafted and framed in their signature sounds — stamped onto CD — working alongside producer Dave Jerden (Jane's Addiction, Alice in Chains, The Offspring), and on his own recent album productions. Currently he's well known for recording The Offspring's album Americana, which has sold in excess of 10 million copies. We're talking delivering the goods here. Yet he's also responsible for some of my personal favorite sounds of the '90s. He worked on the album Dirt by Alice in Chains. He's worked on over 50 albums and with such notable producers as Keith Forsey, Bob Rock, Ken Scott, Shel Talmy and Randy Burns. Jerden himself had Bryan as his engineer for 10 years and has said, "I think the best engineer on the planet is Bryan Carlstrom." Now he is cranking out records on his own, producing and engineering on them. These days he's really pushing it into full throttle with his own massive mobile Pro Tools studio in a steamertrunk and is working with like-minded individuals in co-producing, developing and doing the above average drive-by shopping of some new upstarts-with-guitars.

Versatile? How's surfing with Dick Dale,Crosby, Stills and Nash, Bonnie Raitt, Lush, DuranDuran, Goldfinger, Meat Puppets, Kiss, 4-Non Blondes, Social Distortion, Poe, Public Image Limited, Rob Zombie, and Die Krupps.

How did you meet Dave Jerden?

About 12-13 years ago I was working on a Billy Idol record over at Track recording studio. It was a two- room facility, so while I was working with Billy Idol in one room, Dave was in the other room doing the Jane's Addiction record Ritual de lo Habitual. That's when I actually met him, and he asked me to come on over and hang out with him. He'd come over and watch me work. And it was like 6-9 months after I finished working on the Billy Idol record that I got a call from Dave's manager asking me if I would be interested in working exclusively as his engineer. And I said, "Yeah". [laughter] It was actually quite ironic, because if I could have any engineering gig, it was the gig I wanted the most — you know it kinda came out of the sky.

What was it like working with him for all those years?

Honestly, it was like going through a doctorate program in how to produce records. Dave had worked with the Rolling Stones, Jane's Addiction and Talking Heads. He was just a reservoir of knowledge on how to make records, going back 25-30 years. As I worked with him on a daily basis, practically everyday, 6 days a week for 10 years, it was like going to the best producing school you could ever imagine. Each record was different and we'd run into different challenges with every record. We had to approach every artist differently, depending on the type of material, the songs and how much development they were in need of.

Could you anticipate where he was going with particular tracks?

Definitely, by the end of the 10-year period. I pretty much knew what he would say in most situations. There'd still be occasions where, wow, he'd say something that would blow me away, out of the blue. Most situations I could start moving in a direction without him even saying anything. I would just know what he wanted.

Tell us something about the notion of guitars that developed between you and Dave Jerden.

It's interesting. The very first day that I worked with Dave Jerden I was scared. I thought, "What if he doesn't like what I do?" And when it came to recording guitars, it's very funny, because obviously there's a bazillion different ways you could do it. Mics — cabinets — amps — how many mics you use, where you put them. And I was just feeling a little intimidated and not even sure what Dave wanted. So it came to recording guitars, and I decided well I'm just going to go out there and put one SM57 right on the speaker, straight on run that SM57 to a Summit tube mic pre thru a Summit tube compressor and straight into the tape machine, and keep it simple. When I put up the guitar sound Dave started shouting, "What's that guitar sound!" I told him it was just a 57 pointed straight at the speaker and then run through some Summit gear. And he goes, "Th.. th.. that's the guitar sound I've been wanting to hear for 15 years! Keep on recording guitars like that." [laughing] That day and that incident is the way we based a lot of our guitar recording from then on. It was almost always a guitar amp with a 57 on it, but we would change things. Use different amps, cabinets or guitars, stomp boxes, or layer things — record multiple passes — and put them on top of one another. But we never ventured much from using just that one SM57 thru the Summit gear. And that's the sound you hear on Dirt. It was funny how it worked out that way. But that's how I had been recording guitars prior to working with Dave. Doing things simple. Although, early on, I didn't always have access to good equipment, like the Summit tube gear, which definitely makes a big difference. And man, that is a rock and roll guitar sound.

Tell us about working with the Offspring. After having a hit record they changed their production team and hooked up with you and Dave Jerden.

One funny thing about doing an Offspring record is that we'll get the entire song recorded — we'll get the drums, bass and guitars all done and then we'll come to do the vocals on a song... [laughs] and Dexter will say, "I need to sit down and write the lyrics for the song before we can get started." My assistant and I would look at each other wondering how he's gonna write the lyrics an hour before he's going to sing. [laughing] But he'd pull it off brilliantly every time. It's rather amazing. Some stuff he has a rough idea on when he comes in, as far as lyrics go, but other songs he might not have anything yet. He'll just sit down and bang 'em out and when you read them you know just about every 12 year-old kid in America is going to relate to what he's saying. Noodles is a great guitar player as well, along with Greg on bass and Ron on drums. They are all great musicians and great guys to hang out with. Those were two of the most enjoyable records I ever made.

What was it like working with Anthrax?

One thing about that record is the drums recorded very quickly. We recorded 17 songs in 3 days. That's the fastest Dave and I ever recorded basic tracks. Some interesting things about that band... [draws breath] the bass player and the drummer are related and they didn't get along very well. [laughs] So there were definitely some band tensions that made things a little difficult. But it was pretty comical at the same time. I really liked working with the band. I love Scott Ian's guitar playing and he's a good friend of mine. And then John Bush the singer is a good friend of mine. I've been a friend of his for like 15 years. So it was really fun working with them from that standpoint. On all the records I've worked on, my first mindset goes to all the difficulties that I encounter making that record. There were lots of people hanging out during that record. So there were lots of people in the control room all the time while you're trying to work — trying to stay focused. That record was also weird in that we moved around to a lot of studios. We started out at A&M and then went back to Eldorado to do overdubs. We worked about a week when some really heavy rains fell late one night in Hollywood. When we arrived at the studio the next morning, it was completely flooded. The SSL console had been turned on at the time and completely filled with water, starting on fire, producing a very noticeable odor you could smell as soon as you walked through the door.

Oh, no.

Dave got up on the roof to see what had happened. One of the rain gutters had gotten plugged, so he reached down through about a foot and half of water to see what was in it and he pulled out the head of a large dog.

That is so weird.

Yeah, just the dog's head, that's it. It was not a pleasant sight. [laughs] In fact, there is a picture someplace of Dave walking around with the dog's head stuck on a stick. We were calling him the beastmaster. [laughs] But, it ruined the studio we were working in. The repairs were going to take several months. So we ended up moving the recording to New York City and finishing the record there.

Eventually you shifted your attention towards production. When did you feel the need to start to go on your own and begin to produce records instead of working it from the engineering side?

Well, my goal from the very beginning had always been to produce records. My motivations, intentions, and designs were geared along those lines. That was one of the reasons I was excited about working with Dave Jerden, and one of the reasons I worked with him so long. I stayed with him until I felt like I had outgrown the position. I started producing records in-between the records I was working on with Dave and at some point it just felt like it was time to leave. Those ten years with Dave were a doctorate program in producing records. And after that it was just time to strike out — do it for myself. It was just the natural progression of growth.

Now, in doing so you have become one of the actual pre-eminent Pro Tools users around. Can you explain how that transition came about?

Oh yeah, definitely. Well it was pretty funny. It was 1994 and I had produced some stuff for White Zombie in between records I was doing with Dave. They had asked me to produce their next LP and that meant I would have had to stop working with Dave. I knew to do that White Zombie record I would have to be a Pro Tools user and a strong one, and I wasn't at that point yet. I ended up staying with Dave and only produced a few songs for White Zombie. Some of the royalties I got from that project I used to buy a Macintosh. I didn't know anything about computers and started playing with it every night. I ended up finding out... computers were one of those areas I just had an aptitude for. I just began learning the ins and outs of Macs, in how to maintain and keep them running, both hardware and software wise. I got an Audiomedia card and Pro Tools software for it and just started teaching myself Pro Tools. Then we did a Stabbing Westward record and I used my small Pro Tools system. It had 12 tracks and you could only listen to 4 at a time. I connected the S/PDIF in and out to the 48 track Sony digital tape machine, via the AES in and out on the back of the machine, using transformers to balance the impedance between the 2 machines. I synched the two using SMPTE and Word Clock and it worked flawlessly. I started putting vocals into Pro Tools for production, tuning, cool effects, or layering. After I started doing this I realized how powerful it would be if the entire record was in Pro Tools. The power to do production and editing, it would just be mind blowing. But there was no Pro Tools 24 yet. So, I sat down one night drew up this picture of my ideal Pro Tools rack that would essentially take the place of the Sony 48-track. I put the picture aside and didn't really think much of it. Then about six months later Digidesign announced the release of Pro Tools 24, which sounded better than the digital tape machine we were working on. I realized this was the time to make the transition. So I went hog wild and bought this huge Pro Tools system and got rid of the Sony. Dave was a little freaked out at first. But as soon as I got it in there and started using it I couldn't imagine working any other way and it came just in time for the Offspring record Americana. That record was very challenging to record from several aspects. One, there was a lot of recording to do, overdubs and little pieces. It was probably the equivalent of recording two records at once. The other thing is that we really wanted to see it done and in the stores by Christmas, and it was already the beginning of August — so I really had my hands full. I could never have done it without Pro Tools. It ended up doing very well.

Over 10 million.

Yeah, sold over 10 million records.

What's in those steamertrunks?

The versatility of a hard disc recording system to do nondestructive editing and use DSP to apply different plug-ins to audio tracks is so powerful, tape just can't compete with it. The list goes on and on with the possibilities of a DAW. I also had in my mind a picture of another rack that would be a complete all-tube recording console, rack mounted and mobile, so that it could go anywhere and turn any remote site into a control room and studio. This would give me the best of both worlds. Having the most powerful DAW with 64 ins and outs combined with 74 channels of great tube gear in a mobile set-up makes things very quick and powerful. I can move and be set up someplace else in less then a day. Having this caliber of equipment is key in making digital sound good. People are always thinking that digital sounds bad. Digital doesn't sound bad. If you feed a signal into it that sounds bad, of course when you play it back it's going to sound bad. But if you use really high end, great sounding equipment and you put good sounding audio into it you get good sounding audio back. That was my goal. I couldn't afford to rent this stuff. The rental of the Summit gear alone would cost close to $2000 per day not to mention the rental of the Pro Tools rack that big would be $1,500+ per day. Try to make good sounding records with that kind of budget and the records would end up costing... you know around three quarters of a million [laughs] or a million dollars and you just don't have that kind of money to work with. So I decided that I was going to buy the equipment myself so I'd have the best gear possible for every single record. Then the sound quality of a record wouldn't have to depend on its budget. I would have the same gear on every record. The records with strong budgets would mean that I would have more time to work on them. But the records that didn't have as strong of budgets wouldn't suffer at the fate of recording through really crappy gear. I might have to spend less time on the lower budget albums, but I could have the same quality, sonic quality to work with. That was how all that came about, really came about in a vision. At first when I got a picture in my mind and wrote it all down, I kinda looked at it thought oh yeah, right. When would I ever own a half million dollars worth of equipment, but here I am 5 years later. [laughs] That's how it all came about. I wanted to have this amazingly powerful, sonically integral system that could go with me anyplace. Be used like a super tool in making records.

It apparently contains the largest collection of Summit Audio gear anywhere.

Yup. I think that's correct. The first place I heard Summit gear was when I was working on the Billy Idol record 13 years ago. That was a very rare opportunity for me in the sense that they literally rented every piece of gear imaginable. They rented Neve modules. They rented API modules. They rented George Massenburg modules. They rented Helios modules. They rented Summit preamps, EQs and compressors. They rented Tube-Tech. They rented everything imaginable. And we set it all up to where we could quickly go through, A/B, and listen to each and every one, quickly back and forth. That was such a great learning experience for me because I was getting to see how all these high-end pieces of equipment sounded against each other. Summit gear really stood out to me. It really captured the sound in a way that that felt like I could reach out and touch the sound. It didn't choke the sound but kept its harmonic structure intact, which a lot of equipment is unable to do. Bad equipment can just obliterate a sound. Sometimes this will work as an effect or texture on a track or two, but not for the basis of all my recording. Summit gear just sounds amazing. As I used Summit gear, especially on guitars, the one thing that kept happening was almost every artist I worked with would look at me and say, "I've never heard that before. That's exactly how my guitar amp sounds. Every other time I've tried to record my guitar it's never sounded like this. This is the first time I've actually heard my sound coming through in the control room — the way I heard it." That's why I went hog wild with Summit gear. I didn't want to have just a couple modules and only be able to record certain things through it. I decided I was going to have an entire rack-mounted Summit tube console where the entire record would be recorded through that kind of quality.

What are the some of the first things that you do in pre-production?

During pre-production I'll storyboard the song, taking notes about each section, writing down any weaknesses, as well as production ideas. This helps me to have an overall vision for the song. I'll look at the melody, arrangement, tempo, orchestration, and in some cases the key of the song as well. I'll storyboard a song for the same reason someone would storyboard a movie. You shouldn't find yourself bored or distracted during it. When you watch an Alfred Hitchcock movie it keeps you right there watching and listening attentively. Or for instance, John Huston, the way he directed movies, there's no filler. Are there places in a song where all of a sudden I find myself distracted or bored? A lot of times I'll come across sections of songs where there's nothing going on and a part or a melody is needed. Something for the listener to focus on, be drawn into.

Is it difficult to wear both hats as a producer and engineer?

It can be. Although, in every studio you run into technical problems where suddenly you have to sit down and figure things out. But for the most part, I've been engineering for so long that it has literally become like breathing. It comes so naturally I can focus on producing. Usually I'll let my assistant or assistants do a lot of the technical stuff that doesn't necessarily need my expertise. Some of it requires my skills like in shaping the sounds, blending sounds, equalizing, how I want to mic things, or set things up. A lot of the leg work, cabling, and stuff like that all goes to my assistants. I do keep myself very focused on producing and where the song is going.

What types of microphones and where might you put them in your approach in recording drums?

Let me first start by saying there's not necessarily an absolute given way to mic drums. Now you'll probably see drums mic'ed the same way 90% of the time. And for the most part I'll record a lot of drums like that where I put a mic on the kick drum, a mic on the bottom snare, a mic on the top snare, mics on the bottoms and tops of the toms, mics on the hat and mics on the cymbals, and then room mics. But then there's the other way of recording drums that I do quite often, and that is either recording with two stereo mics, or maybe 3 mics, or maybe just one mic. Recording with less mics gives you a completely different drum sound. A lot of the drum sounds on the old Beatles' records are mono drum sounds. One or several mics mixed down to a mono track, or maybe a pair of stereo tracks, with some fuzz and slap delay — I love it. So really when it comes to mic'ing and recording drums it's all about the production. Sometimes I might want to do some mono drum mic'ing for the intro and the verse, so it's small and kinda of vibey. And then when it comes to the chorus, I might open it up with a new or bigger drum sound using a different drum kit, or maybe the kit, but recorded more conventionally with all the separate mics on each and every drum. These are all production decisions. If you listen to things like Radiohead, you'll hear the drums being recorded many different ways on that record — conventionally and then more minimalistically. Things that sound mono, or even adding distortion to the drums, is something I like to do for certain sections. From a technically perfect approach you'd see the multiple mic thing. But from an artistic perspective you really do want to work from a standpoint of not having rules. Because you want to find creative new ways of recording that will bring out a sound not heard on other records, or not commonly heard, to make it more interesting to listen to. You don't always want "perfect" sounding drums. It's much like painting, You can think very conventionally and paint a picture that is an exact representation of what is seen. Or, you can think like Van Gogh and paint an impressionistic picture of something with an artistic slant to it. It's so much more interesting when these different recording techniques are intertwined and used together in a creative way. As far as the conventional way of putting a mic on each and every drum, I can tell you what those mics are that I often use. I put a D112 on the kick, a 57 on the bottom snare, and a 57 on the top snare. On the hi-hat I'll quite often tape a 57 and a 451 together to get a combination of a very bright sound and a harsher, meatier sound. I can blend those two together to get a thicker hi-hat. And then on the toms I'll quite often put 421s on the top and 57s on the bottom. On the overheads, I'll use a stereo Royer mic along with, if there's anything like a ride, another mono Royer mic on those. I'll quite often use things like PZMs on the room mics. The Shure PZMs are my absolute favorite mics for the drum room, usually taped to the walls up high. One to the left of the kit and one to the right. Or a more unconventional way of recording drums I might just use two PZMs, or one PZM, or one tube mic that's right over the drummers head. Then I'll use things like flange, slap delay, fuzz, compression, and over-compression, to create sounds that fit the vibe of the songs that I'm working on.

How might you record the bass guitar?

[laughs] I always thought of the bass guitar as one of the more difficult instruments to record. Bass guitar is one of the most important instruments, being the bridge between rhythm and harmony. It links what's happening on the drums with the chord changes of the song. So musically, it is probably one of the most important instruments. Recording bass can be very difficult because it spans so many frequencies. From ultra low to very high. It can have frequencies in it that are as high as those found in cymbals. So there's a lot that can be done with a bass sound. There are certain records you can listen to and the bass is completely round. No high end on it at all. It's just this round completely low sound. Then there are records you might listen to where there's no low end at all. It sounds like someone banging on a piano string, very metallic. So there's a lot that can be done with bass. In deciding on a bass sound for a song I think about what it needs production-wise. I'll have to determine if it's going to be a standard sound. Is it a sound that needs to be very round, with no high end? Should it be this more metallic, cutting through sound? I almost always record with a little distortion on the bass DI and keep the amp track fairly clean. I record them to two separate tracks to give me more versatility in the mix. I might even record a third track that is very heavily distorted for songs that are going to need this kind of thing. So that when I do mix, I can control the blend of how round, or how much distortion, or how metallic, I want it. Although I do tailor the bass sound to the song itself, I'll leave myself a little bit of leeway in that I'll be able to add a little more high end or a little bit more distortion by recording things on separate tracks. Within those two or three tracks I'll have room to alter the bass greatly if I needed to shape it in the mix.

How might you go about getting your guitar tracks?

First of all, the SM57 is the greatest guitar mic ever made. You just can't go wrong with the thing. There's another great mic that I've started using on guitar as well, and that's the Royer 121. I usually keep things fairly simple with very direct paths to the DAW. A great mic preamp, EQ and compressor, and you're there. Usually my mic'ing will be very direct, using a 57, or a Royer 121 and sometimes mixing the two together. Where I usually focus on changing a guitar sound is by changing the amp, or using a cool pedal, or a different guitar. Those are the kinda of things that really change the sound. One thing I will do with mics for guitar solos, or single lines, is use a second mic farther away for ambience and add that into the sound slightly. Because single line parts and solos that have a little bit of ambience on them sit better against rhythm tracks that have no, or very little, ambience on them. It's great contrast. Obviously, the way to get real contrast between guitars is not so much by changing the mics but by changing guitars, changing amps things like that. Another favorite mic'ing technique I use on combo amps that have an open back is putting a mic on the front of the speaker, as well as the back — equal distances from the speaker. I'll throw the back mic out of phase and blend the two together. That gets the thickest sounds when you can back mic the speaker and blend the two together. But you have to throw the back mic out of phase. If you don't do that, you're going to get the thinnest guitar sounds imaginable. [laughs] In fact when I do guitars on a record what I usually do is set up 15 different amps and have 10 different guitars ready. I'll have all the amps mic'ed and have everything coming up. Then as I'm working on a song I'll sit there and listen and go okay, this part of the song needs this kind of sound. You know what would work for that, let's plug the guitar into this amp and this amp, and then I'll blend those two amps together to make a sound that fits well in that section. Maybe I'll blend three amps together or maybe I'll just use one amp. Kinda like setting up a palette. Setting up the guitar amps in this way is like having a palette of guitar sounds that I can use to create new sounds like blending different colors together.

What are your recording techniques for vocals?

Unless the lyrics are unwritten, I prefer the singer to sing along during tracking. Even if I'm not going to use any of that vocal take, I want the emotion from the vocalist to energize the other musicians' takes. I'll also be able to tell if something isn't working with the vocals and fix it right then. When it comes to doing the master vocal takes, most likely the vocal take gotten during tracking will get replaced. Not always, but usually. I approach vocals much in the way I approach recording guitars. I have a great vocal sound set-up using a U67 through a Summit mic pre, then through two Summit compressors. The first set is for compressing. The second set is for limiting. I also prepare additional vocal set-ups using pedals, amps, and all sorts of tools for vocal texturing and production. I might add distortion to the vocals. I might decide on the verse that the vocal should be all by itself, and then doubled when the chorus comes in. Or maybe we'll have a single vocal that's distorted on the verse, and clean doubled vocals on the chorus. I try to be creative with vocals using little amps, pedals, or anything to make them sound different. I'll usually do a lot of this off tape to make it easier on the vocalist, unless the vocalist needs the extra vibe from hearing his vocal with some production on it. My overall technique for recording vocals is to have the vocalist sing whole takes, or at least section by section, but I don't like to punch vocal lines. I don't sit there and punch a line, and then move on to the next line. For goodness gracious, how could that ever sound natural? I'll have the singer sing the whole song through from beginning to end and then I'll go to a new track and have him or her do it again. If I hear anything that I can help with, I'll give my feedback, but I will never move in a direction where the artist's natural inclinations get lost. I'll usually do 4-8 tracks front to back so it sounds natural, and then comp these tracks together. After listening to the comp I'll pick out any weak lines and see if there is a better take on one of the other tracks. The end result is a vocal that sounds natural because you didn't sit there and punch every syllable. He actually sings things all the way through like a real performance. If there are still things about the comp that bother me I might have him sing a couple more passes and see if I can make the comp better. That's pretty much my vocal technique.

Are there any new pieces of gear on the market now that you are excited about?

Right now, there are several of products. The Sony DMX- R100 digital console really excites me. In fact I'm going to buy one. Royer's ribbon mics are fantastic. Their stereo ribbon mic is the best mic I've ever heard on cymbals. Then there's the Summit MPE 200 mic pre/equalizer which I wouldn't sell ever. The Bitheadz Unity DS-1 is a software sampler that is just amazing. Obviously, Line 6 Amp Farm is an indispensable tool that I just absolutely love. The Repeater by Electrix is the most amazing loop- making tool that I have ever used, I can't live without it at this point. McDSP has the best sounding and most versatile EQ and compressor plug-ins on the market.

As someone that was in the center of storm in the grunge era, what do you remember the most?

[Breathes, long pause...] Flannel shirts. [laughter] Very curious... It was a good time to be making guitar records. I guess the one thing I remember most besides flannel shirts would be, the great point in time for making guitar records. It's fun making guitar records. Something about the power behind it that I love.