Help, innocent songs under attack

[seamless]

Hi everyone. I need to rant a little and would REALLY appreciate any advice.

 

I am a solo songwriter, still pretty young, and I am not in a band. In fact, I've only really become a songwriter in the past 2 years. I'm very well acquainted with other areas in the arts though, so even though I'm new to the whole traditional music scene, I've been a part of the arts world for quite some time.

 

I've recorded most of my stuff acoustically in my rinky-dink home studio, and now I've been trying to get a proper demo in order. Key word is "trying." Because without a proper studio of my own, and with experience only on guitar, I've had to rely on other people for drums, bass, keyboard, etc.

 

This seems to be where my first mistake was: using my existing contacts - all of whom highly experienced - to work with both as "studio musicians" and as engineers. I don't live in a big town, so the pickins' ain't very good besides the people I'm working with. They are talented musicians, but let's just say that we don't see eye-to-eye stylistically. The basic problem is this: I am sick and tired of my music being hijacked by people with no vested interest in the final product (after all, I'm solo, not in a band), arbitrarily making style and production decisions about MY SONGS during the recording session!!!

 

I really feel like these people, with good intentions, are thinking "Oh, look, Seamless is writing songs - let's turn them into clones of the same stuff we write!!! Nevermind that Seamless doesn't like our taste in music!!" Of course they never run these ideas by me: it is as soon as the recording starts that they will make style decisions that they never discussed with me prior to that. They have tried turning an upbeat song into a ballad, increasing the tempo on another song to 180bpm - far faster than the 120bpm that I specified, and adding some very incongruous jazz elements to another uptempo song.

 

The core problem seems to be that since I don't know very much about studio recording, they are assuming I don't know very much about music in general. As a result, the assumption seems to be that I don't know what's good for my songs, which I guess they think would be much better if they sounded like Barry Manilow-meets-Barry White. (Note: nothing against either of those guys, but they'd both sound pretty silly singing power pop, which is what I write).

 

I know I can't tell these people that the reason I'm working with them is because they are the only people HERE, and NOT because I like their taste in music. I don't want to alienate them, but I NEVER invited them to produce my stuff, just to assist with what they've already heard me play a million times. I *am* paying them, so this leads to more resentment for me, since they still take a condescending, pat-pat on the head attitude, all while cashing my checks.

 

So a few questions:

1) How do I extracate myself without offending them? I stupidly told them previous to this that I would like to record my entire 40-song catalog.

2) Do studio musicians ALWAYS try to hijack songs?

3) How can I better communicate my specifications in the future so that people will listen? I don't want to be a Nazi, but if you want to ruin a song, go write your own and ruin it: mine are innocent bystanders!!!

4) How much experience does it take before people stop patting me on my goddam head????

 

Thanks ...

 

:-(

[filthykarma]

Sorry, bud, but those people are not professionals!! Period! I heard of a similiar situation with my former guitar player and a buddy of his who had a DAW. Only thing was . . . he was swapping out bass/guitar licks for some Cubase recording time . . .

 

When I first started reading your message, I thought, "Well, if you pull out some cash, you may get better results." Apparently, THAT doesn't even seem to work for these clowns . . .

 

I hate to say it, but these people are not your friends, either. You need to tell them straight up that they either do it your way or they go away and you can pay some "real" studio musicians, instead. And they may be charging you a cut rate, but paying full musician fees to a pro session player may be cheaper. IOW, if you go into the studio with an idea of what you want, and how things should sound, the pro's will pick up the feel of what you want very quickly . . . that's how they make a living and they can't afford to piss off customers . . .

 

Good Luck . . .

[WattsUrizen]

Yeah, you just have to put your foot down and tell them, 'This is my song, we do it MY way'. If they are taking liberties with your material, they are the Nazi's, not you. You shouldn't feel like a bastard doing this. You should feel justified and righteous.

 

If they get offended, it's their problem. They shouldn't take it as a personal thing.

[HuskerDude]

You might try printing out charts for them. if they're even Kindof professional, they should stick to those better than verbal instruction.

[seamless]

Thanks for your input guys. After another horrible session yesterday, I fired the whole lot of 'em. I did it as nicely as I possibly could under the circumstances, but I know they were still pissed. The last straw was when my keyboardist was pretending that he couldn't read the sheet music I specifically wrote out for him (in lieu of the jazz-funk stuff he was writing). Sorry, bud, but I can write sheet music, you are certainly able to read it, and I *HATE* it when people lie to me.

 

Thanks everyone for your help. It was good to run this situation by other musicians to make sure that I was justified in my response, unfortunate as it is.