In this episode of #TilYouMakeIt, seven-time Grammy Award-winning producer, engineer and mixer Vance Powell (Chris Stapleton, Buddy Guy, Jack White) speaks on the delicate relationship between artists and their collaborators.
#TilYouMakeIt is a collection of stories chronicling those moments and capturing wisdom from the game’s most esteemed producers, mixers and engineers.
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TRANSCRIPT
Nurturing relationships with the artist is a little bit like nurturing a relationship with your mother-in-law. You want to do it, but you don’t want to become too friendly.
I want to know them. I want to know about them. I’d love to hear about their children, but unless they reach out to me, then I’m cool if we work together. We know each other. I respect them. They respect me. But I’m not saying, Hey, why don’t we do this? Or wouldn’t it be cool if we all went to the movies or you know, because they got life and that life doesn’t have anything to do with me when it’s not here.
Every relationship you have with an artist has a expiration date and a lot of times that expiration date will come and go and people will try and hang on and hang on and hang on. And that’s sad, but it’s human nature.
You know? It’s happened to me. It happened to me a little bit with Jack White. I mean, I worked with him for eight years straight on every single thing, and then I wasn’t, and it was because I was busy and it’s totally good.
Like I’m totally, we’re totally good. We work together afterwards, we’re totally good,
But I’m not calling him up and asking anybody to go to movies with me or whatever. It’s just, just weird. Don’t do it.
