Podcast Side Project: Episode 5

For this week's episode, we interviewed one of our first lecturers Adrian Carroll. For the questions that we prepared for him this week, I wanted to ask questions more about production techniques as I know he'd have a lot to talk about. Regarding posting our podcast online, we've had an issue with SoundCloud. Because we only have a free account, we have a 3hr limit to what we can post and we're not able post another podcast without one of the early episodes getting deleted. We're still in discussion as to what other audio platforms we can use to pst our podcasts for our audience. Anyway let's get into this week's episode.

Also for the past couple of episodes, we've been using 2 SM7Bs, 2 RE20s and the "Elvis Mic" (which I still don't know the model name of) which is normally reserved for the interviewee. We sometimes swap the the microphones around but Brea and I normally use the SM7Bs and Liam and Stephen go for the RE20s.

Sure SM7B 2x Rode RE20 2x I think this is a Shure 55SH, not sure

We got on with the interview with Adrian and everyone's questions were really good as they were different to previous interview questions we've asked. I asked about what was different to recording a psych rock band to a classic rock band and his answer was interesting and also expected, in that he's more experimental with recording psych rock bands and they are more chill to work with compared to classic rock bands. The rest of the members asked him about his career, where he has recorded during his career and his best memories working in the audio industry, which he had very interesting stories that went along with them. It was amazing to hear that he worked at Abbey Road Studios and how he thought it was the best sounding place to record. It's really inspiring to hear stories like this of where the audio industry can take you, especially if you know the right people.

One of our members asked him what advice he'd give himself 10 years ago and his answer was hilarious. He wish he'd told himself to not set off fireworks in the BBQ and that when it stopped sparking, to NOT go near it. This has got to be one of the best advices I've heard so far, no doubt.

He then asked us a question about where would we see ourselves after graduating or what we would like to do after. We all answered with our goals after getting our degree and it was cool to hear that he's always proud of the students that are successful and who also manage to get out there in that field.

In all, I was really glad to get Adrian in for an interview as now I know a little bit more about it and he's funny too.

Album Review

This week, I was lucky to review Tyler, The Creator's album Flower Boy recommended by Liam. As mentioned in my previous blog, I've heard some songs from that album but never got to actually sit down and listen through the album in its entirety so I'm glad I got the opportunity to review it.

Flower Boy is Tyler's 4th studio album and was released in July 2017. It includes 14 tracks and features a range of artists such as Frank Ocean, A$AP Rocky, Kali Uchis, Steve Lacy, and others. I thought this album had a great blend of acoustic and digital instruments and was mixed really well, with every instrument having its own space. I'm a huge fan of jazz chords and there was a great use of it throughout the album which made it very daydreamy. This is the sort of album I'd be chucking on to laze on a couch or have it playing in the background of a late evening summer's pool party with a bunch of friends. There were 2 songs (Who Dat Boy and I Ain't Got Time!) that brought me back to Tyler's Bastard album, which was released back in 2009. I had many favourite songs from this album which were "Where This Flower Blooms", "Who Dat Boy", "Garden Shed", "Boredom", "911/Mr Lonely", "November", and "Glitter".

Overall, a bloody great album, and I can see how well Tyler, The Creator is progressing through every album he puts out. An obvious 10/10.

Look out for my next blog post of our next episode where we interview another of our lecturers, Akshay, and also for our album reviews where I'll be reviewing Loyle Carner's Yesterday's Gone; another artist I've always wanted to listen to, so I'm really keen to review this album! I'm also keen to interview Akshay as I don't really know that much about his background and it'd be interesting to hear his stories and hear any advice he's got for us.