Hey everybody, Daniel here. Just real quick, want to announce these gigs one more time here. We're going to be in Ireland, we're going to be at the Beehive on the 18th of July. On the 22nd of July, we're at Blake's, and on the 23rd, we're at McGroery's. And then on August 1st, my Tom Petty tribute band Broken Skyline is playing in Columbia, South Carolina at Prohibition. And I'm really looking forward to that one. It's our first time up there. So if you're in the Char— or the Columbia, South Carolina, uh, area, please come out and see us. Opening band, The Letter Show, and, uh, looking forward to it. All right, let's get into the intro. Hey everybody, this is Daniel Patrick and this is episode number 315 of the Mandolins and Beer podcast, brought to you in part by my favorite website, The Mandolin Cafe. How's everybody doing? I hope you're doing well. As you're listening to this, I'm in Ireland. Hopefully, hopefully I'm in Ireland. I'm recording this ahead of time so I can post these while I'm in Ireland. And so hopefully I'm a few pints in and, uh, just hanging out this first day. I'm gonna be in Dublin just hanging out with, uh, Whit and our wives, and then we're gonna head up to the first gig in Ardagh at the Beehive. And so excited. So anyway, uh, my guest this week is Eric Wiggs, uh, just an Incredible producer and engineer, also incredible guitar player. Uh, when you go to his website, here's some of the quotes from like Brian Sutton: a serious level of command of the instrument and unmistakable artistry. And quotes from like Grant Gordy, one of Colorado's preeminent flatpickers. I mean, the list goes on, and he's just done some great stuff. I've always been a fan of his work, and it's really nice to talk to him about the art of recording. You know, I, I say it a lot on a lot of these episodes when I talk to people who just got out of the studio, It's very hard to capture an acoustic instrument's tone. Uh, you know, people, I think they think they can just throw mics up and, and, and it's willy-nilly, but there's some thought into it. And Eric really breaks down a few things here that would really help anybody out if you're just, you know, just getting into it, or, you know, or you're advanced and been working at it. I think he's got some tips as well. And it's easier than ever to buy an inexpensive interface that hooks right up to your computer And, you know, there's tons and tons of microphones out there from low end to obviously crazy high end, just like mandolins. And Eric, I think, breaks down a couple things that are really, really important, and I appreciate him taking the time to do that. So thank you to Eric. Also, I appreciate everybody who signs up for my Patreon and who supports this podcast and who's purchased the MTV-style t-shirts and stickers. Thank you so much. If you're listening to this today, again, I'm in Ireland, so I will not be shipping anything out for 2 weeks, but you can still order And I will ship them out as soon as I get home, assuming there is still some stock left if you order them while I'm gone. I also wanna give a special shout out to David Benedict and Tabitha and Tabitha's brother, Reuben Agnew from Cup of Joe. They are— David hooked me up with Tabitha's brother Reuben and let me borrow a small PA system for our trip in Ireland. So Reuben, thank you. Cup of Joe is obviously incredible. And David, I mean, just legend. So I wanted to shout that out as well. It was very important. So thank you to all of them. Let's get into the sponsors. Peghead Nation with Peghead Nation streaming video courses and mandolin, guitar, banjo, fiddle, dobro, ukulele, and bass. You'll learn bluegrass, old time, and other styles from some of the most talented players and instructors in Roots Music. People like Sharon Gilchrist, Joe K. 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I'm loaded up for Tone Slab picks here for my trip to Ireland. I love the picks. I literally have not used another pick since then. I have got them in all my instruments and backups in all my cases. Big fan. Go to toneslabs.com, check out their website. If they don't have what you're looking for, I'm sure they can make it. David and Frank are crushing the pick game. Go get yourself a slab of tone. Tell them Daniel Patrick sent you. toneslabs.com. StringJoy Strings, again, another great, great company. I've got a bunch of StringJoy strings for my trip as well, just in case I oddly bust a bunch of them while playing in excitement and Guinness at Smitty's Haze. maybe Jameson's, who knows. But I love my StringJoy strings. I use the Foxwoods. They're coated. They sound better than any coated string I've ever used. That is just my opinion, but I love them, and I've also used nothing since then. You can go to stringjoy.com right now and you can get 10% off your first order with the code mandolinbeer, all one word. Dedicated to building for the impassioned player. Pava Mandolins. I just saw, uh, some pictures of a new Fresh Pava being sent out, and they're just absolutely gorgeous as well. Sound incredible. And Elderly Instruments— you know what, they carry Pava mandolins. Elderly Instruments is your trusted source for new, used, and vintage fretted and stringed instruments. For the experienced to the beginner player, their vast selection of mandolins, guitars, banjos, ukuleles— and did I say mandolins?— includes all of the accessories and books to go with them. All instruments are inspected and set up for easy playability, and their down-to-earth and knowledgeable staff are there to help. They're in their 54th year, going into their 54th year. They're family-owned and operated. They ship worldwide. You can visit them anytime at elderly.com. All right, I'm going to lead into this episode with a little bit of Jake leg. All the things though we talked about, they aren't artists that are on the podcast. I did put links to the, uh, the things that we did discuss, including a killer video of Tony Rice in the studio with Alison Krauss, and also a link to, uh, Sierra Hall's old beveled mirror she did for the Hartford Fiddle Tune Project. Those are all in the description. I hope y'all have a fantastic week, and even though I'm in Ireland, there will be an episode the next week as well. I've stacked them up so they can all come out. So sláinte, everybody!

My name is on the mailbox, my hat hangs on All right, well, my next guest—

this is exciting. I just had a bandmate of his on, Dylan from Jake Legg, on, and, and now guitar player and vocalist from Jake Legg, Eric Wiggs, is on. How's it going, Eric?

Hey, Daniel, good to talk with you, man. How you doing?

I'm doing good. Thank you so much for doing this. I really wanted to have you on because multiple times now I've, I've seen your name like in production notes or the stuff with Jake Legg or Magoo. Just, you are such a good engineer and mixer and capturer of acoustic tones. I really thought it'd be cool to pick your brain a little bit on something that's really hard to do that I think people underestimate.

Oh, well, first of all, I appreciate your kind words. That means a lot, I think. And also, yes, being on the other end of it for a long time, I would agree that it is especially hard to capture those things if you aren't used to, you know, being around them. I'd say maybe it's just like the familiarity part. I would agree with you there.

And the other thing too is like, you know, people send you tracks to do, um, and so I thought maybe we could even talk about in a little bit like some of the, the dos and the don'ts. I mean, I'm sure you've seen all sorts of, uh, stuff come your way.

Oh yeah, oh yeah. And I'm sure early on I was probably guilty of going the other direction, so I've, I've definitely learned by, you know, there's some trial by fire with recording.

Editor's note, this is where my Pro Tools rig crashed, which was perfect timing when talking to an incredible audio engineer. Back to the podcast. Yeah, it just stopped and I have no plugins going, so cool. Anyway, except Pro Tools.

Well, it wouldn't be an audio podcast in Pro Tools if it didn't crash at least once.

Exactly.

Yeah, hopefully, hopefully Avid's not listening. Yeah, you know, you know what your problems are.

Exactly.

There's always the joke when you first get into the studio, it's like, well, when is it going to crash today? Because it's got to do it once. So I usually like to get it out of the way in the first 30 minutes if we can.

Yeah, no kidding. Now, have you always been into acoustic music? And how did you get into music?

Well, okay, so that's a— how long you got? It's gonna be a circuitous path there.

How long do you have?

Yeah, it's true. Getting into music, I'll try to, I'll try to go the quick and dirty route. I started playing music— well, okay, my dad's a huge music fan, so that's where it comes from to begin with. He never really played, but I was always surrounded by thankfully good music to hear. I don't think everybody's as lucky. And so, you know, I think like a lot of us, I started in band. I played trumpet when I was in middle school. And then I wanted an electric guitar at some point, and marching band was coming up. And I grew up in Alabama, and I was watching marching band practice where they were wearing wool suits in the 90-something degree summer. And I said, that is not for me. Yeah, I will, I will take an electric guitar and sit in my room, please.

What kind of music was your dad listening to?

Oh, he's You know, he went to Vietnam. He's of that generation. So I mean, he was a Hendrix fan. He saw Jimi Hendrix live. He saw Clapton multiple times. Um, he was into Cream, Led Zeppelin, you know, all the good stuff. And, uh, he used to take me to concerts when, unbeknownst to me, that I was lucky to attend when I was, you know, 10 to 13 to 14. He would take me, just take me to the stuff they were going to, and it would be amazing classic rock. Like, I saw Clapton on his Unplugged tour. And now, you know, now my adult self is like, what? What? Like, I can't believe that happened. As a kid, I was probably like, when do we get to go home?

Right. So you get the electric guitar, it's much cooler in a room at home. What kind of— what kind of stuff then were you— was that the type of stuff you were learning? Or at that point, were you like, kind of getting into more rock your age?

No, my— I was into the grunge thing. Like, I got a guitar right as Nirvana and Pearl Jam and Soundgarden and all that was hitting. So that was what got me in. And I remember the day that I had, uh, I got a guitar magazine and there was— I opened it up and there was tab. And I'm looking at it, I'm like, what does this mean? And then all of a sudden it clicked and I was like, oh wow, I don't have to read music to figure out how the notes work on a guitar. Like, that's amazing. So yeah, here I am. Sorry, sorry, all you teachers out there. I also teach. Tab has its place, you know, it can coexist.

Yeah, I— whatever makes it easier for you to play. If you just want enjoyment out of playing an instrument and that's the easiest route, do it. If you want to push yourself and further it, then's the time, you know, then, then look at shedding it. But if you just want to play— oh yeah, if you just want to play a tune and that's the easiest way, and you have 3 jobs and a family Then pull the tab up, man.

Yeah, whatever gets you there. You know, ultimately everybody's got a different goal with music, and also all the guys that I was into at the time certainly didn't know what notation was, so I wasn't even going to give— I didn't even know to give myself a hard time about that because I just figured out. But yeah, that wasn't what we were— that wasn't the focus of this. But yeah, so we were Long story short, that started there. And then I ended up going to music school for jazz guitar, which I had no business doing. But they let me in somehow.

Where was that at?

That was at the University of Alabama in Tuscaloosa. Yeah. So that was my undergrad. And then I actually— the reason I ended up out here in Colorado was I came to grad school at the University of Colorado here in Boulder. to get a master's degree in jazz.

Wow. So you went from being like going to a jazz program, you're like, probably not the, you know, you're like, oh, I shouldn't have been there to end up getting a master's degree in it.

This? Yeah. Yep. That's, that's once I realized I could actually play guitar and it didn't have to be classical. You just, I didn't have anything else I wanted to do at the time. And they were letting me into school. the first time. So I figured once I, once I was, you know, after undergrad, I'd clearly committed to music full-time at that point. I was teaching probably, I want to say towards the end of undergrad, I was probably teaching 30 to 40 hours a week and gigging. So I was, I had a lot of music going on, and it seemed like the natural progression. Well, actually, I took a year off, and I took a year off in a college town that's a party town, and I And I realized that one year could turn into decades. And I told myself, I was like, I need a way probably out of here one way or the other. And grad school seemed like a good reason to move across country.

Did you know anybody out there yet or no?

No, not a single person. I just, I came out. Funnily enough, I came out on a road trip with a friend, just to check out. She was gonna hike a peak in Colorado, and a couple of us went with her just to hang out. And I just happened to swing through and check out some of the universities and saw Boulder and was like, hey, this is a pretty cool town. I could, I could live here.

I love Boulder. That's a cool, that's a cool vibe.

It is. I mean, it's a lot different now, as is everything.

Yeah, actually, I haven't been there in years, so I, I might have just, you know, I could be sorely mistaken.

No, it's, it's still the— it's still a vibe. But I mean, it's, you know, you're, you're in Charleston. Is that what you just told me? Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, you've seen it change. It's— the Southeast is growing exponentially. It's anywhere that's cool, people are finding it, and it's easier to get there now. So they just— they move there.

So then how did you find yourself into acoustic? I mean, What kind of— I guess, what jazz guys were you listening to? What was— who were some of the jazz cats that you dug?

Oh, man, like a lot of, you know, at the time, I mean, coming into grad school, I had my, you know, head buried deep in the super modern guys. Like, you know, there's like the big 3, the modern that I call it, like Pat Metheny, John Scofield, Bill Frisell, way into them. And then I was into this guy, Kurt Rosenwinkel, if you've ever heard of him. Yep. Um, you know, he's— he kind of changed the face of jazz guitar, in my opinion. He brought in a whole new thing and all that sort of stuff. So I was just kind of going deep on that. Um, and then funnily enough, like, while I was in grad school, you know, turns out making a living as a jazz guitar player is not the easiest thing. So I joined a wedding band.

Oh, no kidding.

Yeah. So that was— and that was where I— that was where I really got a lot of chops up on just, you know, we did R&B, funk, I would do ceremony solo acoustic, you know, run the gamut, 14-hour days, just really kind of, you know, it's kind of like boot camp for, hey, can you— can you handle being a full-time musician?

Yeah, those are— we do— we've kind of narrowed it down to just doing cocktail hours now because Dude, it is. That's the sweet spot. It's the sweet spot. Ceremony and cocktail hours, that's perfect for bluegrass stuff. But having to do the whole—

you get to leave.

Yeah, boy, that's a— you're on the gamut. And then just people coming up hammered being like, don't you know Pink Pony Club? I'm like, oh no, does it look like we know Pink Pony Club?

I know. Yeah, do you— this is not a ukulele.

Exactly, exactly.

But It's, uh, it's— yeah, I mean, I'm thankful for that, that experience. I got a lot of chops out of that. It's— I'd never actually sang publicly before that gig, and that's where I started doing it. So it gave me like an outlet and almost in some ways a safe space, because as you said, most people are not of sound mind at the end of the night at a wedding.

Right.

So, um, I was not super worried about how good or bad what I was doing was. I just had a chance to to just get out there and do it. Um, so, you know, I did that. But now, yeah, same, same here. Uh, I try to, I try to cut people off at the pass when they start saying they want a bluegrass band for a 3-hour reception. I'm like, I don't think that's actually what you want.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. So then how did you go from that into acoustic music? Because that's a pretty— I mean, bluegrass is a pretty different world than than, you know, I would say like Kurt Rosenwinkel and, and, you know, I was going to say Bill Frizzell.

But Rich, that—

yeah, I was going to say Bill Frizzell, but Bill Frizzell had that killer Nashville album with like Adam Scott on it and stuff.

So yeah, Bill, Bill is the easiest. He's the most crossover artist that never meant to be that's probably ever existed. I feel like, yeah, I've met so many different people that if you put on a Frizzell record, they're like, oh, I like this. It's like, yeah, it's hard to not like— Yeah, I, you know, that is actually my getting into the acoustic scene was actually a byproduct of Colorado having such a strong community. I was— so I also played at the time, actually in grad school, half the time when I was in grad school, I was playing upright bass as well, just to fill out combos because bass players, as they are in every genre, are hard to find. Um, and so I remember at one point in grad school, the head of the program came up to me and said, hey, I know you play upright, can you play like in this combo and this combo? And, and so I worked out a deal. I'm like, I'll do that if I don't have to do big band anymore because it's 4 days a week. And he was like, deal. I'm like, great, that sounds awesome. So through that, I ended up playing upright bass in a folk Americana band. And my good buddy Bill Houston in that band was— he was into the bluegrass scene at that point in time, and he took me to a jam. And I showed up at these people's house. I didn't know anybody except for him. And everybody just breaks out an instrument at some point, and they all know these songs, and everybody's having a good time, and they're getting along. And, and I'm like, wow, this is—

Yeah.

these are people just playing music just because they want to play music together. Like, there's no ulterior motive. Like, you just want to sit around and hang out with your friends and play songs. Yeah. And coming now, it seems like, you know, as you know, you're in the world too. Like, to us, it's just like, yeah, oh yeah, you want to pick? Yeah, yeah, just happens. But I— that first, that first initial one, I can still remember back and being like, wow, this is a community and music is a part of the community. And also you like the people you're with and everybody's just here to like be present with each other and have a good time. And it was very— it was very much— not to throw shade on jazz, but it was the opposite of going to a jazz jam in my experience. But that's— so that got me into the scene. And then, you know, um, through doing that, I was, I was in some pickup groups and then some bands and And then, you know, to make the leap from that to the recording thing, I'd had some recording experience in my undergrad. Alabama had— the degree was called Jazz Studies and Music Media, which at the time, to date myself a little bit, I went— I started college there in 2000. And so at the time there was Pro Tools. But there wasn't, you know, like you couldn't just go pick up an Apollo and make a record in your house. Like that was, you had to go to a studio still. The idea of, you know, recording yourself or learning all this stuff on your own was nonexistent to a large degree. So that music media, they had a studio at the school and the head of the program at the time was one of these guys that he'd been playing guitar since he was 5. He could sight-read anything, and then he had figured out how to run a studio on his own. He could probably solder the studio together if he wanted to. He's just one of those people that can— if he decides he's going to do it, it's, it's a— he's doing it better than everybody else within a week. It's really great. So, and his name was Tom Wolfe. You know, he's an educator. He ended up being a dean. Great musician, did his time in New York, but he also had this whole studio skill set. And so we learned about the basics of things like signal flow. What, you know, what is a microphone? Not even how a microphone works, but just like, here's— this is literally a microphone. Here it is. You know, some people had never seen one or thought about it. And I think it was kind of like it sort of took away the mystique for me, or not even the mystique, but the— there's like a barrier of entry where it seems scary.

Yeah.

Like, oh, I'm just gonna start recording? Like, whoa, I don't know what I'm doing. So it kind of got rid of that scary part. And you're like, okay, I've touched, I've touched some knobs on a board before. I know what a fader is. You know, it sort of eased us in. And since it was school, you can make mistakes and it was fine. And it was understood that you were trying to learn. So that sort of always stuck with me. And then, you know, honestly, I guess now thinking about it all ties together with the wedding band thing, I ended up being the sound engineer too, in addition to being the guitarist and one of the singers. So I was always running, like turning around between songs trying to fix everybody's monitor mix or fix the house mix or whatever, you know, trial by fire.

Right.

While somebody's yelling Mustang Sally at me at the same time. So, you know, that was, that was a lot of, there's a lot of hats at once. So I think that sort of just ended up funneling into the the studio thing because I didn't— I felt like I had some comfort level with sound.

Yeah, so then, and that's a whole nother world than acoustic instruments too. Not that, you know, miking an amp is quote unquote easy, but it's, it's like a lot easier.

There's a lot more good spots.

You know, it's not so dependent on, oh, where's the best place on this body of this instrument? Where's the volume the sweetest or the You know, so when did you like first maybe like decide to record like an acoustic sort of act? Like, when's the first time you sat down and you're like, okay, I can— I think I could do this?

Question. I was trying to think about that because I realized I should— hey, I should probably have things, everything I recorded in one spot so that I can remember because I'm not that old, but at some point I'm sure I'm going to be. forgetting what I even have done. The first— actually, the first thing that I recorded that was any sort of legitimate recording, I believe, was my buddy Chandler Holt. Uh, he was the banjo player in Chatham County Line for 20 years. You know that band? Um, you know, they're a Raleigh area band. Uh, they're still on the scene. Chandler, Chandler had moved out here maybe like a couple years before the pandemic because his wife's from here. Um, and he was like, hey, I'm gonna record a solo record, will you play on it? And I'm like, yeah, let's do it. And then he's like, you know anybody to record? I don't really have a budget. And I was like, well, I got this garage out— because I used to live— we used to live outside of town, literally out amongst farmland. We had this one house with this one lot and no, we had no neighbors. And I had a garage that when we bought it, I had the idea, oh, maybe I'll convert it to a studio one day. And I'm like, I got this garage, I haven't really done anything with it. He's like, let's just do it in there. Like, okay, you know. So it was basically, you let me do this at my pace and I'm going to make a lot of mistakes. The trade-off is I'm not going to charge you because we're both getting something out of this, assuming that I eventually get it to the point where we can release it, you know. Um, because it was, you know, he took a— it was a lot of faith on his part to be like, uh, you know, you can do this. And it was pretty low stakes for me because at the end of the day, if it wasn't going to work out, he didn't have to— we didn't have to use any of it. It didn't cost him any money. It just cost him time. So.

At that point, had you— had you worked up like a big mic locker? Like, what was your equipment setup like at that point?

I mean, at that point it was pretty basic. I will say that before that, um, there's a killer engineer, uh, north of Lyons here up near Fort Collins, Colorado. His name's Aaron Youngberg. Um, you would know his name— well, he's in a great band called FY5, but he's, he's a killer banjo player. You would know his name from— he recorded all the Kahala and Eli records.

Oh wow, nice. They're— and by the way, they're reissuing those on vinyl. I just— I know.

Well, yeah, it's already— it was in my cart the day I saw that.

Yeah, golly, I love those albums. Me too.

Yeah, so I had— so Aaron Youngberg, he's got a studio called Swing Fingers. He's kind of a prolific acoustic guy here in the state, and really he's known all over, but he just happens to live 45 minutes from me. Um, and that was when I first realized, oh, like, this guy's right here and he recorded those records and I love those records and they sound great. And so my band was going up to record and I started going down this rabbit hole of like, well, who has— so we're gonna go up and I started reading these articles and it's like, oh, Brian Sutton has his own set of mics he takes to the studio. I'm like, oh, that's a thing? You know, like gearhead me, I'm gonna, you know, I came from electric guitar world and it's like, yeah, you, you know Why, why have 4 amps when you can have 5? Why have, you know, why only have 3 pedals? I can have a 3-tier pedalboard. So it wasn't a hard leap for me to make to be like, oh, there's, there's gear involved with acoustic music. I can get down with that. So I started looking around, and Brian was kind of my, you know, point of reference because, well, unbeknownst to me at the time, like, Brian Sutton sounds good no matter what you point at him. But in my mind, I was trying to figure out how does his guitar sound so good? Well, we know— I now know 95% of that is because Brian is playing it, and, and that's why. But I started looking, and he started talking about, yeah, I use these Neumann mics, and, you know, they're, they're old and they have tubes, but if you can find a pair, that's what I take to all sessions. And then I go up to Swing Fingers, and Aaron Youngberg has a pair of them. I'm like, oh my God, my acoustics never sounded this good. So that was, that was my, my one set of like real good mics that I had at the time for gear.

What were the— what models, what models were those?

Oh, I'm sorry. Those are KM54s.

Okay. Yeah, cool. Podcast note right here. We had to pause just for a second so Eric could let his dogs out of the room that he was recording in. And then we dive back in.

Here. Um, sorry, where were we at? We were talking about the gear.

Oh yeah, like just the— all the things that you can, like you said, like consoles.

Yeah.

Preamps or—

Oh yeah.

Internal and external stuff, you know, app or up, and you— not apps, but you know what I mean.

You want to talk about a rabbit hole? Like, you can, you know, you can— you could buy a Lure or you could buy a Neve console. Which one do you want? You know, like, it's that sort of stuff. And the Neve console isn't a whole studio, that's just one part. So you can go as crazy as you want in that world. Um, but yeah, so I didn't have that much then. I will say I did just remember this. That was when— and I know you know the Grace Design stuff, you're a Grace Design owner.

Yes.

Most of us probably listening on the podcast, you know, have, have had a Felix or a Bix or an Alex or currently own one. Those guys are friends of mine and they had just come out at the time with They have an 8-channel single rack strip that's called the M108, and that also has a converter in it, so you can just go straight into your computer and record 8 channels with grace, quality, and clarity. Yeah, and that was— that had just come out at the time, and I want to say I had like a beta test model, and that is probably actually most of the mic preamps on that album were that. So, which, you know, it is, it is nice to have friends that make audio gear for a living.

Yeah, and make really good audio gear.

Yeah, yeah, make the acoustic preamps. Yeah, yeah, it does not hurt.

You know, you mentioned though, like, the Neve console, even with something like that, like Neve, for people who aren't, you know, maybe necessarily familiar with that, like, that's like the— it's kind of like the Lohr era. Like you said, you compared it to a Lohr, you know, the And but I've, I've heard recordings out of a place where they had a Neve console and the acoustic instruments didn't sound good at all. So I really— that's how, how do you figure out then, like, oh, it's more to this than just the equipment, you know? It's the place.

Yeah.

You know, is it just trial and error sort of things?

Well, I mean, there is that. Yeah, of course. I mean, There's— especially when you— once you have some stuff and you have time, and I could play instruments, so it would be like, okay, let me get my bass out and like mess with these. Okay, this doesn't sound that good. All right, let's go to the internet. But what videos can I see of people in studios? I started just kind of honing in on acoustic-specific tones, and then I started really trying to research the albums that I thought sounded the best. And some names kept coming up, like, uh, Bill Vorndick, who did, you know, a lot of Bela and Jerry stuff in the '80s and the '90s. Um, I think he probably did— I mean, he was kind of like the acoustic guy in Nashville as far as I'm concerned in the bluegrass realm, you know. Like, he did Drive, he did Tales from the Acoustic Planet, he did a bunch of Jerry Douglas records. I started looking for interviews with Bill, and then You know, I started thinking, well, you know, the Alison Krauss records sound amazing, and Bill did the first ones of those. And then who's this guy? Oh, Gary Pachosa. Oh, well, he has a sound too. And so I started looking for interviews with him and started realizing that, okay, these guys don't always get asked these questions, but every now and then somebody's like, well, you know, what mic did you use on Adam Steffi's mandolin? And he's like, oh, a pair of KM84s. I'm like, oh, what's a KM84? Okay, that's expensive. Well, you know, let's go check that out. But then I would go find YouTube videos of like— there's a great one of Union Station in the studio with Tony Rice. And I don't know what this was for, but there's some sort of a— it's not like a documentary, but it has that vibe. It's definitely professionally shot, and they do like 2 or 3 songs. Yeah, there's, there's one where Allison sings Shadows, which was a Tony tune for a long time. I mean, it's a Gordon Lightfoot tune, but Tony made it popular in our world. And, you know, it's just— it's gorgeous. And everybody— it's, you know, the best band on the planet as far as I'm concerned at the time, playing with Tony Rice. Like, okay. And, and Gary's there engineering it. And so they're just going around the studio, and the whole time I'm like, stop. Okay, what? Where are those mics pointed? Okay, okay, write it down. That's the mandolin. Okay, next. And I would just like go through those videos meticulously, like literally trying to see, well, if this guy gets the best tones that I've ever heard, then what is he doing? And so I would literally just start trying what I saw. I mean, and it's only possible because we're in like the YouTube era, you know. 30 years ago, you'd just be like, all right, I guess this sounds like a mandolin.

Yeah.

All right, here we go.

Yeah, let's roll with it. Even, well, the equipment era now too is nuts. I remember the first time I interviewed Sierra Hall and they had just put out that Hartford album, like the Fiddle Tune Project. I think it was the first one. And she did a song called Beveled Mirror. And I was just like, oh my gosh. I bet you I listened to that song 15 times in a row. I, I'm not even an exaggeration. I think I was just like on a walk and I was just like, this is like the most incredible tone and technique and everything. And then when I talked to her, it was just basically like, I think she did it at home with Justin there. And it wasn't like a, I don't even think it was a Neumann mic and it was just into a Focusrite preamp. And I'm like, yeah. Oh my gosh.

Yeah.

Now I'm sure it was mixed and mastered that those things helped too, but the fact that she was able to capture that.

Yeah.

that at home with, you know, with Neve consoles or, you know, KM84s or what have you. It was just like, okay, this is a possibility for people to get good sounds.

Yeah, I mean, it's— we're definitely in the most user-friendly era of recording that's existed. I mean, everybody, if you've got a few hundred bucks, you can start you can start capturing something that's, you know, that's going to sound good. And, and at most, at the very least, you can start experimenting, which is really kind of— I feel, you know, your ear, your ear has to come along for the ride. So as your ear grows, you start looking for different sounds. And so that's, that's where the experimental part sort of comes in.

So let's, if you don't mind, if we could focus now on maybe trying to— I'll pick your brain about just some things about people. Maybe they just want to record some mandolin at home. And I, I think there are some things, uh, like obviously you're not gonna be able to treat your entire room. And for what I mean by that is like if you go into a studio, they're usually, uh, if you pay to go into a nice studio, it's usually set up and the rooms are, have baffles and things to, you know, kind of deaden all the reflections of sounds. But what are like maybe a couple simple things in a room people could do like a bedroom, I guess, for instance?

Yeah, I mean, and that's a great question. And yeah, there's— I'm glad you touched on that because that is an often overlooked part. And, and I definitely was guilty of this early on, is the room that you're in has almost as much to do with the sound as the microphone you're using. Like, like, you can't— I could put a $10,000 microphone in, in a very reverberant, echoey room, and there's nothing I can do to make it sound not that way. But, you know, you can take a $100 microphone, and if you just point it the right direction, you get some absorption going on, you're going to get a much easier to use, uh, track, um, for recording. So yeah, like, with that in mind, I mean, one of the first things I remember doing was upstairs in, in our, our house a few houses ago that my wife and I were in. I remember reading a bunch about absorption and people being like, oh yeah, sometimes you just hang curtains in the closet and just make like a booth. I was like, well, I don't even have a walk-in closet, I can't do that. But I was like, what I can do is open up our closet where all the coats and everything are behind me and point and basically sat with my back to it and put the mic in front of me. And that sort of acted as enough absorption that I didn't really get the room in the microphone. And so that's one, that's your cheapest trick is find that or find a big fluffy couch or something that can sort of absorb sound. And the initial thought, and I did this, I'll tell you all these things because I did them wrong to figure out how to do them right.

Right.

The first thing I remember thinking was like, cool, I got all this baffling. And I'm like, I'm gonna, I'm gonna face it because that way my instrument will go into it and it won't come back out. But then at some point somebody's like, yeah, but hey man, the microphone's pointed at the wall behind you. That's, that's, you know, a bare wall. Like, that microphone is getting all that reflection. And I was like, oh right, the microphone is— that's your ears. So whatever you point the mic at, that's what it's going to get. And I'm like, oh. if there's something behind me, then the microphone's not going to get reflections off of the wall behind me. Okay, got it. So that's— that would be my first step, is like, whatever you're doing, just try to— try to get into a space, you know. And there— it could be— there could be a bookshelf behind you that— that diffuses sound, that breaks it up, you know. Like, if you're recording a mandolin, there's not a ton of bass, so we're not— we don't have to worry about low Really, it's the thing you're going to hear the most is when you chop. You just don't want to hear it bounce off the wall and come back in the mic. So any sort of absorption, anything that can break it up. I mean, right now I'm sitting in a room with all my gear and stuff because my new studio is not done yet. And if I recorded and had my back to all my boxes with all my gear and all my guitar cases, it's going to break it up. way better than if I turn back around and there's a bare wall on the other side and the microphone's pointed that way. It's gonna— I'm gonna hear the room more.

Got it. Yeah, that's great advice.

Yeah, and that's, and that's, you know, again, I am, uh, none of this— so I will be completely clear, I came up with none of this. This was all learned, as it all, as it all is. But trial and error is a lot of it. But, you know, after that, I started realizing when I was in a professional studio, oh yeah, they're way more concerned about what's behind me than what's in front of me. I was like, okay, all right. I just wasn't paying attention when I was there before. So, you know, that, that helps a bunch.

You know, another thing is obviously if you could have 2 microphones, that's a great case scenario for a mandolin. You see a lot of professional recordings with, you know, 2 mics and doing it. But, you know, again, budget constraints. I'm trying to think of like budgetary reasons, you know, because again, you know, not everybody can afford— like, I, I love the KM84s, but there's other condenser mics out there, you know. If you had to pick—

Oh yeah.

Like, if— and again, it is a condenser mic. I mean, I think ribbon mics are probably a bit more expensive than an inexpensive condenser mic, but I'm not positive. you know, if you had to pick like one mic that was budget friendly, I guess, you know, because again, KM84 is kind of like the industry standard in a sense, or KM184 is probably even more common now, obviously, because they make them.

Yeah.

But, um, yeah, what do you recommend for like a microphone and, and like trying to place it?

Yeah, so if you're just gonna do a single one, Honestly, if you were just gonna buy one microphone, I would suggest getting a large diaphragm, which is not what we've been talking about. We've been talking about small diaphragm ones so far. And the reason for that is because if we're talking budget-friendly, let's say you do wanna record some vocals, or your buddy's gonna come over and lay down guitar, or, you know, your bass player's gonna come play. If you've got a large diaphragm mic, it's going to be a lot more amenable to different sources than like a small diaphragm. That's not to say a small one wouldn't work, but a large diaphragm, it's just— I mean, it's bigger, so it gets more of a spread. And so therefore, in my opinion, it's just more versatile on different things. So I mean, even something like, you know, like you mentioned earlier, you have an ear trumpet. Like, that's a great live mic, but that also works great in the studio. It's a solid condenser mic, you know, it's a good mic, it's built well, um, and you can EQ it, takes EQ well. And, you know, maybe that's not considered affordable, but in the mic world, a $500 or $600 microphone isn't like a bank breaker. Um, but you could, you could easily find something else below. I mean, MXL is like a, you know, I don't know what, who makes them, but you can find a lot of guys that sell those microphones that have been modded to sound like more classic mics, you know, in the $200 to $500 range. There's kind of a whole— there's kind of a whole world of guys that are like, I'm not paying that for a mic, I'm gonna fix this cheap one and make it sound better.

Now, where— again, there's so many places to place a microphone, you know, you got— first off, you have 2 F-holes. Um, you know, if you've ever— if you started on guitar, you've heard the, uh, oh, the best place to mic it is the 12th, you know, pointing it at the 12th fret. There's so many things out there. So again, yeah, you know, what's some advice for miking a mandolin? And especially, I guess the other thing is, is thinking about like, if you're the only person, like you don't have somebody who can play mandolin, so you have no idea what the front of it's gonna sound like sometimes. Like whenever I, you know, when you sit in front of somebody playing a mandolin, it sounds completely different than when you have the mandolin in your lap and you're playing it.

Oh, totally. Yeah, yeah, always, always does. Often are surprised when you hear someone else play your instrument, you're like, oh, okay, that's what it sounds like. Um, yeah, like with a single mic, you know, first of all, again, encourage experimentation. What works for one mandolin might sound totally bizarre on another one, so you never know until you try. But like a general rule for me would be If I was— if I only had that and I'm sitting there, I guess if it's just me, this is even harder because I don't have the— a lot of times if I'm going to go in to record a band like I am in a few weeks, I want to hear their instrument in the room in front of them to sort of get a sense of what it sounds like so I know where I'm trying to go. So that way when I go back to the control room, I'm not like, oh, that's what a fiddle sounds like to me, but is that what your fiddle sounds like?

Yeah.

You know, I want to give them their an accurate picture of their instrument and how they sound, not what I want it to sound like. So it's a little trickier when it's just you doing it yourself, but a good rule of thumb is I kind of just, you know, where the neck meets the body on a mandolin— I don't know what fret that is, it's probably different on different mandolins, but let's say 14th. Is it the 14th-ish area?

Yeah, 14th, 15th, 12th. I guess it depends on the model.

Yeah, right. But that sort of area, if you sort of think about that as where you're aiming You know, I might start there and then play with my distance from that. The closer you get, there's something called proximity effect, which means the bass frequencies typically get amplified as you get closer to the microphone and they drop off as you get further away. So there is a bit of a sweet spot that you want to find, but that's a good starting place. And then, you know, I might move left or right from the microphone just to sort of see if, hey, closer to the bridge sounds better on this mandolin, or, you know, whoa, that's too much string noise, I'm going to turn the other way and get closer to the neck. It's, it's— but that's kind of a— I kind of think about the center of the instrument and start there and then sort of work my way back from that. Yeah, and like, trust your ears. Like, wear headphones, and, you know, if you can get headphones that are closed back or something that's sort of blocks the room sound so that you're really hearing the microphone. You can get a little bit better picture. But then also, like, just record it. And then, you know, I've done this before when I get a new microphone. I'm like, okay, here's, here's whatever, here's a guitar. All right, I'm here, this is how many inches I am, this is where it's aimed. I'll say that, I'll play, I'll move over, I'll say what I did, what I changed, I'll move again, I'll say what I changed. I'll do that for like 5 minutes, and then I'll go back and listen without an instrument in my hand so I can hear what it really sounded like.

Oh yeah. I just, that's how I end up doing a bunch of stuff too. The same thing. Like, okay, now it is about 6 inches further back.

Right. Yeah. It's amazing. Like what, like 2 inches in one direction will change it overall. Like so drastically.

Oh my gosh. Yeah. Or if you forget, that's the other thing I'll do sometimes if like I'm doing like punching or something like that. And then I'm like, what? Oh no. Then the wrong spot.

You're like, the tone's not the same, I'm in a different spot, the strings are a day older. Oh no.

What are, um, what are some definitely don'ts? I mean, again, from maybe some tracks you've been sent, as somebody who's, you know, been sent a project to, to do some mixing on, and, you know, what's, what's some definite hard nos or things to try best to avoid?

I mean, generally speaking If, if I get, if I get acoustic instruments and I only have DIs, it's not really going to sound very acoustic. Um, that's, that's not that— now, if you have it and you have access to it, like, there's no reason to not record it if you want to, but just be aware that the only instrument usually where I might even use some DI is on bass. Um, and that would only be as a supplement.

Yeah. And for that, anybody else in that, that would be like if you bought a, you know, if you just plugged a— didn't use a mic at all and just used a pickup and plugged it right into something. Yeah. Yes.

Right. Yeah. So that's like if you're trying to, you know, if now if that's your tone and you're running through a bunch of effects and like that's what you're doing, then like have at it. Like that's a different thing. But if we're talking about trying to make an acoustic sounding record, That would— that might be the only hard no I would have. Like, everything else you can probably work with, but that one would be like, man, if I got a fiddle and a guitar and a mandolin and it was all plugged in DI tones, it would be like, we need to have a conversation about what you're trying to accomplish at this because it's, it's not, it's not gonna, not gonna sound like Sierra's album.

Exactly, exactly. I think, I think another thing would be is, uh, Check your tuning every take. That's another one where— yeah.

Oh yeah, we're talking about performance perspective. Yeah, please, especially when you have doubles of strings like a mandolin with courses. It's, it's the worst offender easily. Um, yeah, please. Yeah, please tune. And as you, you brought up a good point, like, if you're gonna overdub yourself Yeah, so we had talked about Magoo a little bit. Like, those guys did all the— Cortland from Magoo did all the engineering on his end, recorded it all. I just got tracks. So he set all the mics, did all that stuff. He was very good about making sure that when they did overdubs that the mic placement and everything stayed exactly the same. I believe, if I'm not mistaken, they just left it set up between tours and would just go back into his garage or his house or wherever it was and just be like, okay, everything's in the same spot. I was about this far away. My strings are about as dead as they were or as live as they were. And they would go for it. And I didn't really have a problem mixing and matching anything with them because they all paid attention to it. But that's a big one too. If you record, you know, if you record a solo today, And then you go play 5 gigs this week and you come back and you want to fix part of it and your strings are the same, even if your mic position has been exactly the same, it is going to sound like a weird punch if we try to marry those 2 parts together into one piece.

Yeah, so many little things.

Yeah, I know. And it's all the stuff I'm glad you're asking me because it's the stuff that I take for granted now because I've done it. But you forget, like, at some point in time, I was the one that came in and the engineer was like, whoa, whoa, whoa, did you just change strings? What did you do? What's different? Like, no, man, I didn't do anything. He's like, yeah, you did.

Yeah, what pick are you using? What? Look in your hand.

Pick, look down. Hold on. Are you sitting in the same spot? That's why when you see a lot of studios, like when I place people and they're in a chair or something, or they're standing, if it's a fiddle player, I'll use gaff tape and mark spots and be like, that's where you're feet were, that's where your toes were. Remember that. Remember which way you're facing. You know, all those little things sort of add up in the— and, and, you know, this is not to scare anybody. Like, you can also, you can also point to recordings where whatever, you can hear that somebody punched in, and I don't care because the solo is awesome. And, uh, so, you know, take it all with a grain of salt. You know, the, the, the, uh, the vibe and the performance trumps all.

Yeah, well, and that's the thing is I think people— it's home recording is easier than ever, and it gets easier every, every day, it seems like. I mean, I just saw some camera, I forget what the company now, but it was like the most incredible, like, kind of like a GoPro thing with like this microphone on it that sounded incredible. The footage— I mean, it's just like, get out of here. This is it's every day it's something more affordable and better quality than ever. And people— oh yeah, people should take advantage of that if they can. And you can get a just even an inexpensive, you know, preamp thing— or not preamp, uh, interface that you can plug in.

And, and, you know, and I mean, also, like, even just becoming familiar and comfortable with that means that if you do want to go into a studio and, and make a record you have this awareness and this comfortability that you, you can sit in front of microphones and it doesn't freak you out. It's not going to be this whole new environment where you're trying to make art and, and all of a sudden the microscope's on you and you're like, whoa, whoa, whoa, whoa, I gotta, I gotta— this has gotta be cool too. Like, I'm stressed out.

Yeah.

Like, it's a lot of just sort of like exposure therapy in a lot of ways. Like, if you get used to hearing yourself in headphones, it's like singing. Once you hear yourself the first like 10 or 15 times, you're like, is that what I sound like? Oh no. And then, you know, somewhere in there you're like, oh, that's what I sound like, okay. And it, and it, it sort of flips the script. And I think it's the same with instruments. Like, yeah, if you've got the means and you can buy something and, you know, just start doing it, start messing around, start seeing what happens. Yeah.

Yeah, especially if you have studio time coming up and you've never been in a studio before. That's a great point, man. Throw some headphones on. Even you use your phone, or if you don't have a mic or anything, just record yourself playing along to a song for 3 minutes or 4 minutes or whatever and listen back, because that'll—

Yeah.

That'll be a huge help when you're doing it for free at home as opposed to whatever you're paying an hour. in a studio, right? And being like, uh-oh, this is— I didn't expect this, you know? And then trying to fix it on the clock.

Oh yeah, I mean, that's the biggest thing is like, I, you know, I see people come in and you can tell the folks that have really worked, worked it out and, and everything, all the arrangements and everything's sort of a well-oiled machine. And they just go in and they know what they got to get in order to get through the song. And then there's people that come in Well, maybe we should try this and maybe we should try that. And, you know, on, on the receiving end of that as the engineer, I mean, that's great, I'm making more money if you want to do that. But at the end of the day, like, nobody has the budget to make a Zeppelin record anymore. Nobody's spending a year and a half, you know, like, you're lucky if you got 7 days that you can afford. So to maximize that, to your point, yeah, the more things you have together, the more comfort level, like the better your comfort level is sitting with headphones on and hearing yourself back, like it's just going to make that process have less hiccups.

Yeah, I think another thing that I hear a lot from engineers too is like, don't ever assume, no matter how often you've played with your band, if you guys have never been in a studio before, don't go in with 45 minutes worth of songs and think you're going to record it in 45 minutes worth of— 45 minutes worth of studio time.

No, not unless you're James Brown.

Right, right.

The only one that did that.

Yeah, we have 10 songs. I figured 10 hours, like, well, let's start with one song and let's see how long it takes.

Yeah, that's true. That's a common misconception. Yeah, yeah. And I mean, and that's how records used to be made. I think that's the romanticization of like, if you look back, you know, everybody's like, well, you know, Bill Monroe only did 2 takes. And it's like, well, yeah, because like there's like literally a vinyl that like they're cutting it. Yeah, he couldn't do 10 takes, you know, like what are you gonna do? But now we got everything's digital and, and everybody's got Auto-Tune and, you know, we're— our, our standard of what every— everything has to live up to, it can be a little bit high a lot of the times. So you want to, you want to have every advantage you can walking into that situation.

Yeah. And then there's that whole tough— the debate of perfection over feel, which for me, I'm a fan of the feel. I mean, you know, those Tony Rice albums sound like perfection, but before I even noticed the perfection, I felt the feel and the heart and the soul of those recordings, you know, is what touched me before realizing you know how when you analyze the playing of Tony Rice, you're like, oh geez, that wasn't the thing that captured me at first besides he was a great guitar player. But I'm like, I felt that in my, in my gut.

Oh yeah. And I mean, I'm sure if you had asked those guys at the time, I'm sure Tony would have told you 15 things he wished he'd done better. And the rest of us are like, that's a master, that's a master class. Like, that's, that solo is perfect. And he would have been like, nah, Miss that, miss that, miss that, you know. So yeah, but like you said, they went in and it felt good, and they, you know, those guys, you know, Drive is one of my favorite albums to listen to by Bela. And, you know, I know from— there's been extensive interviews and stuff about that record. For as much as some of that maybe was overdubbed or piecemealed in, it doesn't feel like it to me. It feels like a band playing an And, you know, that's as much a testament to those guys. I mean, they're all the best. Let's, you know, let's be clear here. It's the best guys at the top of their game, the best at each instrument, you know. I guess you could argue maybe not the best, but I, I'm not— I'm saying that. So like, at the time, at that point in time, like, that, that was probably the most amazing instrumental bluegrass band on the planet, and it sounds like it. They're just dropping in. And if you told me they'd been playing in bars for 10 years, I would have believed it. And to find out that later a lot of that stuff, you know, got flown in or whatever, you're like, wow, it doesn't feel like it.

Yeah, even the new Bela, uh, that My Bluegrass Heart, that— yeah, again, like, that's— and I love Drive and Tales from the Acoustic Planet. Like, Drive— I mean, Drive That's definitely a desert island album for me. I mean, I, I don't think I could ever grow tired of it. And, you know, I knew that my Bluegrass Heart project was going to be obviously killer from the players on it, but I was just like, man, just those guys all have a feel, man. They, you know, again, who knows how many takes were edited together potentially, but you would never know because it's all about, it's all about the feel, I think, in, in that process. So.

Well, and also like big big kudos to Bela. He engineered and— well, I don't know, he probably wasn't engineering while he played, but I'm pretty sure he mixed that whole album.

Wow.

So, you know, talk about a guy that can do more than one thing better than he should be able to do.

No kidding.

You know, like, hey man, you're already good enough at banjo. Could you not— could you lay off the rest of us with the rest? Come on, what are you doing there? Yeah. So yeah, and that record, you know, he did Did a great job with that. And like, you see, to your point with the feel thing, I love that it's different bands and it feels like a different band, but it still sort of feels like there's a different vibe on each track when the, when the players change. Like, like, it's cool, but it still feels like an album.

Yep, totally, dude. Eric, this has been, this has been awesome, man. I not only do I want to go listen to Drive now, and, and, uh, but now I want to record also or something and mess around with some mic placements and stuff. But, um, before I let you go, I do have— do you, um, are you a beer drinker?

I mean, I'm in Colorado.

Well, yeah. So do you have a favorite beer?

Well, you know, funnily enough, I was gonna— well, the one I bought last night is not a Colorado beer, but I'm gonna plug something that's probably not as mainstream because my local store had a— had Pliny the Elder last night, so I had to get one of those.

Oh my gosh.

I'm a huge IPA fan. Yeah, it's been getting out of California more now, which is kind of nice because we get drops here like every couple months where you go in and there's bombers of Pliny in the store. And I always, you know, there's limit one, so I try to go in, you know, once a day so everybody else gets their shot. But there's a brewery in, I think there's Santa Fe, maybe Albuquerque down in New Mexico called La Cumbre. And I have been into their IPAs recently, and I don't even know if they distribute outside. They might just distribute in Colorado and New Mexico.

Oh, that's— it's IPA, you said?

Yeah, the one that I— the one that's kind of like that I've had the most regularly is, I think it's called Elevated IPA. Let me look it up real quick. I'm sitting in front of the computer. I can do— yeah, elevated. Awesome.

Well, I'll do some research here, but definitely got to get back out west.

Oh, and speaking of, like, have you been to Rocky Grass? Have you come out for that?

I have not. I've been to Telluride, but I haven't been to Rocky Grass.

Oh, you got to come to Rocky Grass.

I know, man. Yeah, I need to put that— I need to make that a priority.

Yeah, you should, you should look and come one year, like, look and see who's teaching at Academy. And do the whole thing. Like, come hang out and just immerse yourself in mandolin all week. And then, man, the picking scene at night during the festival is just unparalleled, in my opinion.

Yeah, well, now I have some guides too. I have people who can help me or figure out the, the jams too, with you and Dylan.

Oh yeah, for sure, man. I mean, there'd be a lot—

you—

I'm sure you have a lot of former guests out here Hanging out. But yeah, it's, um, it's also fun because it's just not such a— Telluride, if you've been, it's huge, like literally and figuratively, you know. It's twice the amount of attendance, so it's 10,000 people. Rocky Grass caps at 5,000.

Oh, does it really?

I didn't know. Yeah, it's smaller, it's more family. I mean, Telluride is super family-oriented too, but like a lot more families go to Rocky Grass because there's a river and it's like, you know, it's kind of enclosed in sort of like the side of a canyon. And it's, uh, I don't know, it just— and it feels like a family reunion every year. Everybody says that about every festival, so I get it. Like, you see your friends every year. But man, just campgrounds, like, you're walking around at night and, you know, there's no less than 15 or 20 jams happening at any given time. And, you know, in all levels, like, you'll walk past and be like, oh, that's an old-time jam and they're ripping. And then all of a sudden, you'll go past, you know, Dominic Leslie's family's been going there for decades. And you're like, okay, well, there's all the Nashville cats are hanging out and they're picking, you know, and you just kind of cruise through and there's like different, like mini ecosystems happening all over.

All right, that's, that's— I'm gonna tell my wife that as soon as we're done, because she's way better at planning than me too. And so she'll, she'll put it on a calendar and be like, hey, I think Rocky Grass tickets are going on sale. So that's me. She's my, uh, that's, she, I gotta—

Well, also not, not a bad trip to bring a spouse and your family on because Colorado's always good to visit.

Yeah, totally awesome. Well, Eric, this has been great. I'm sure people who listen are gonna find some of this stuff helpful. Um, what's the best place for people to find you on like the, the, the interwebs?

Um, you know, I have a website that, as you said that, I realized I haven't updated in a long time. So I can— sure, I can get an email through that if you would like. But I'm on Instagram, I'm on Facebook. It's just my name, Eric Wiggs. Um, you can find me there, and I'm usually pretty responsive on those platforms.

Perfect. Well, I'll post links. And dude, thank you so much. And, uh, I really do love your work, man. I think you do a killer job with, with, with all your production sort of stuff. I mean, everything I've heard of you has just been top-notch, and I, I know how hard that is to do. And so kudos to you for working hard and, and doing what you do and still, and still working hard to, to, to do it. And I appreciate you taking the time to do this.

Yeah, well, I appreciate the kind words, and I'm just glad people, people dig it. I mean, I like it, but I always put it out there and I'm like, you know, hopefully somebody else thinks it sounds good because I think it sounds good.

So that's awesome. Well, dude, thank you.

Yeah, man.

All right, thank you so much to Eric for doing the podcast. Thank you so much for listening. Links are in the description to, uh, all Eric's things— his website, his Facebook, his Instagram. I'm in Ireland. Have a fantastic week.

Slouch, everybody!

Slouch, everybody!