Let's Talk...Audio

About Let's Talk...Audio

Hello World! Welcome to the Let's Talk...Audio Podcast. This is a home for minorities in the industry to talk audio and share their stories! Our host Tangela has been a live sound engineer in Texas for some ten years, and she loves connecting with interesting people and getting their two cents. We release episodes bi-weekly or so. Also you can find us on IG @letstalkaudiopodcast, and our website www.beatsinabottle.com

Publisher

Tangela

Category

business · education · technology

Language

en

Explicit

Yes

First episode

1 Mar 2020

Latest episode

7 May 2022

Latest episodes

29 episodes in the feed.

1. 

   7 May 2022

   Audio From Down Under | Let's Talk...Audio with Rose Parker

   Hello World! Welcome back to Let's Talk...Audio. Remember to join us on Discord (https://discord.gg/7RfWWYSb)! Rose was one of the first people to start following Tangela on IG when the podcast launched in early 2020. Tangela always wanted to visit Brisbane. Rose brings up an animated kids show that is entirely produced in Brisbane, called Bluey (https://www.bluey.tv/). Tangela shares her love for childrens' shows' theme songs as well as jingles in general. Tangela asks Rose about a favorite theme song. Rose's first thoughts are of the THX film intro (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sfg9DVwOd9w) and the Playstation 1 boot up (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oAhvQoLpvsM) sounds. Tangela's favorite theme song (at the time of recording) was for the TV show Psych, partly because there were alternate recordings of it depending on episode context, including Boyz II Men (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gGGzzZyJECE) and Bollywood versions. After discussing music in a similar light, they talk about front-of-house work and Tangela asks Rose about her work streaming live shows to the internet. That discussion includes running front-of-house with limited setups, such as fewer microphones than the band would have ideally. Rose - "live is the thing that made me realize that even if I screw up, it's gonna be alright ... and you can be annoyed about it, but the gig's done now" She points out that she is constantly reinforcing to her students that they should share their work, in process. It doesn't have to be perfect before they show anyone (and shouldn't, at least if you want constructive criticism and feedback). Speaking of students, Rose is a lecturer at a university. As a teacher-person, she's been teaching for 8 years this year. She originally went to school herself for a Bachelor's in Audio. Rose tries to keep up with changes in technology with regards to audio. She cites TikTok as a particularly powerful case study regarding impact on the music industry. FMOD (https://www.fmod.com/) is an audio middle-ware (between your game engine and your DAW) tool she's been particularly excited about. It is used to manage the audio library in the context of interactive media like games. Rose - "It allows you to just create all of this diversity from a quite small package of original sounds ... you get to choose how it will actually play back in a much more detailed kind of way" Next they discuss how and why Rose has segued into gaming audio. As part of the topic, she uses Red Dead Redemption 2 as an example for dynamic and flexible sound scoring/design. From there they discuss the nuances around creating audio for use in consumer grade speakers/headphones, as well as the compression challenges associated with streaming platforms. After, they discuss demographics in fine detail, in terms of inequalities and the differences between America and Australia. They also discuss whether or not there is a labor shortage in audio. Tangela refers here to the Tim Weaver episode (https://www.beatsinabottle.com/letstalkaudio/episode/4f06bbf4/whats-xlr-stand-for-or-lets-talkaudio-with-tim-weaver). Rose relates to Tangela how the festival economy has been seriously affected by Australia's state level border closings during Covid. For closing thoughts, Rose strongly recommends that creatives push themselves to make stuff, and release it, put it out! "Not being precious about anything" Rose can be found at roseparkeraudio on everything. "Rose had an early interest in music and audio production spurred...

2. 

   18 Mar 2022

   Diversity, Equity and Inclusion (DEI) in Audio with Gilly Moon

   Hello World! Welcome back to Let's Talk...Audio. Remember to join us on Discord (https://discord.gg/7RfWWYSb)! The interview starts off discussing the stereotype of the grumpy sound engineer, and where it might have come from. After some thoughts on stereotypes, they attempted a proper introduction for Gilly Moon. She is an audio engineer and sound designer based in Los Angeles, CA. She holds her MFA in Sound Design from California Institute of the Arts, where she did sound design for theater, themed entertainment, film, animation and spatial audio. After graduating in 2016, her wide range of interests led her to doing a lot of work for themed entertainment attractions, such as Halloween Horror Nights and San Diego Comic Con. In 2018, Gilly and her co-sound designer won an Ovation Award for Excellence in Sound Design for Rogue Artist Ensemble's "Kaidan: Walls Grow Thin," an immersive Japanese horror production that spanned three floors of a warehouse. Gilly currently works as a Broadcast recording Technician for NPR. Tangela asks Gilly about the general advice in the industry about niching down. "I find that there are a good number of people that do not do that, and you are one of them! ... Was that on purpose? ... How'd that come to be?" After some discussion about each of their academic and career histories, they concluded that while a person's career can seem to lack a defined niche, oftentimes there's a common thread that ties things together. Tangela asks Gilly how she developed an interest in audio. That sparked an involved discussion about both their backgrounds in theater. From there they move on to a discussion about resources for training your ear to be a better audio engineer. Gilly says she really enjoyed listening (https://www.beatsinabottle.com/letstalkaudio/episode/34f43a4e/black-cat-bonifide-or-lets-talkaudio-with-bonnie-bogovich) to these (https://www.beatsinabottle.com/letstalkaudio/episode/291c3255/make-space-to-fail-or-lets-talkaudio-with-daniy-oberle) past (https://www.beatsinabottle.com/letstalkaudio/episode/3d63e11e/be-a-kind-imposter-or-lets-talkaudio-with-akash-thakkar) episodes (https://www.beatsinabottle.com/letstalkaudio/episode/1d061afb/lets-talk-post-production-audio-with-christa-giammattei). After discussing podcast format, Tangela makes the case that the podcast industry still has a lot of growing room in comparison to other industries like cinema and gaming. From there they spend some time discussing the accessibility of recording and the different pros and cons of Apple products. Gilly wrote a blog post for Sound Girls a while ago about language and biases in audio (https://soundgirls.org/sound-guys-how-bias-is-transmitted-through-implicit-and-explicit-language/) that Tangela wanted to dig into. They cover a variety of specific examples of biased language before getting around to the question of, is there "an end point to trying to transform the audio world ... without it just turning into ... a clutter bucket of tomfoolery ... ?" Gilly explains the point of Diversity Equity and Inclusion initiatives, concluding with "I don't think there's an end goal, I think we're always gonna be looking at our group and being like, 'what does it look like right now, ok how can I make it better?' And I think that's kinda fun." Tangela wonders what diversity means outside of metropolitan areas. After riffing on that, they tackle the idea of "minorities are expected to take on the work of diversifying a predominantly white place often," in Gilly's words. Tangela points out to Gilly that a lot of her...

3. 

   6 Mar 2022

   Never Pass Up a Hundred Bucks | Let's Talk Christ in Audio with DJ Evon

   Hello World! Welcome back to Let's Talk...Audio. Remember to join us on Discord (https://discord.gg/7RfWWYSb)! Evan Smith wears many hats. He's a DJ, an audio repair tech, a producer, and an evangelist. He went to school at MediaTech Institute (https://mediatech.edu/campus/dallas/) in Dallas, TX, to learn audio. Tangela points out in the opening statements of the show that, while Let's Talk...Audio is about minorities in the industry, she views that umbrella as including things outside of the usual talk about identity. For instance, outside of the church, it is abnormal to find audio engineers who profess a Christian perspective. Evan says "I've seen God work more outside the church, than inside." Tangela: "I don't typically see audio engineers who are as forward with their faith ... I think that's something ... that would be nice for people to hear about ... to know that if that's something that matters to you, you can do it and be successful in it." Evan also works under the name DJ Evon. He uses the request for an introduction to talk about how he presents his Christian perspective in the context of his work. Evan does front-of-house sound for his church. He is also in training for audio repair with Audio Electronics (https://audioelectronics.com/) in Dallas. They spend some time talking about the joy of watching musical artists become successful, and being able to remember the tiny local gigs they used to play. Tangela: "How do you maintain that balance of being in the secular world ... with your beliefs ... that are at the forefront of your business model?" Evan: "We're not called to judge people outside the church; we are called to judge people inside the church ... what we need to do is stop, take a breathe ..." Tangela asks if he gets push-back against his desire to play clean music when he DJ's shows. Evan says most of his clients respect his preferences and roll with it. Tangela finds a need to clarify for her guest that, while Audio is in the title, it's meant as a starting place, rather than an end goal for interviews. This show is more about how do people function in the world of audio. Tangela points out that there may be members of the audience who follow Jesus, or there might be members of the audience who struggle with sobriety. So she sees this talk as an opportunity for discussing how to handle situations of excess when what you need is restraint. Tangela expresses a takeaway from Evan's thoughts. "You're talking about setting healthy boundaries with people ... being up front with [expectations]." So how do you set up healthy boundaries? It's one thing to say, you should have healthy boundaries. It's another thing to grow and develop healthy boundaries. Evan points out that having deliberate and consistent communication with trusted friends is a key strategy for keeping yourself accountable. He shifts to talking about maintaining rules in a studio situation. "Also, 9 out of 10 audio repairs are because of food ... so don't bring stuff into your studio ..." From there they talk about sound treating your work space with sound panels and bass traps. And then the gear talk starts, and "O my gosh, Evan just went to his closet ..." Evan shares an array of microphones he likes to use, and we find out he is a fan of Slate Digital. Evan takes another opportunity to praise the MediaTech Institute. This podcast interview is being recorded (on his end) with an Universal Audio Apollo X4 interface. His headphones are the Slate VSX. Tangela: "Would you say that you make the gear, or does the gear make you?" She wants to know what Evan's overarching philosophy about the relationship with gear. He says that he started out believing that he needed

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