Jim James Quotes

Every record I've ever done with Tool has been on tape.

Today a record producer is even more involved and is often the production's sole musician, one person playing all the instruments one-by-one.

I'm always going to do that - record and make music.

I had this fascination with four-track recorders when I was in high school.

As a producer, I'm trying to challenge myself to just make something that is of a professional quality - not necessarily pop music, but maybe in the sense that Nine Inch Nails is professional quality.

Making records should be fun.

It don't take me no three days to record no album.

Some people record onto tape, and then they pay for the tape, and download those onto a hard drive. Initially in a Pro Tools program. Other people go straight into digital, and use no tape at all.

For the most part, I like to record music as I write it.

I'm not that big a fan of sampling. But I feel like if I'm going to do it, I'm going to do it to where it's more of a reimagining of a track. The songs that I do utilize samples on, most of it you wouldn't even be able to tell what it was unless I told you.

Producers like to record all the drums first, then they do the bass, then all the guitars, so you're constantly moving from one song to another.

I started making remixes for every specific girl I wanted to date. That's how I learned how to use Pro Tools, and then I started making my own music.

When you're recording to analog tape, it captures performance and you can't necessarily manipulate that in different ways. It is what it is.

People are so into digital recording now they forgot how easy analog recording can be.

I'd sometimes do 50, 60 takes of song.

As far as arrangements after the basic track is cut, if I'm writing a horn arrangement or playing strings, I might arrange that, plan that out. Other times, I'll just sit and roll tape.

We always record with the whole band. That's key to capturing the feel, especially trying to get a good basic track.

A lot of people record on a laptop and use plug-ins, which might be OK for the kind of music that they're doing. But for the kind of music that I'm doing, that just doesn't work. I can't cut corners; everything has to be organic.

It's no secret that my favorite part of the process is making records; if I'm not making them with Flatts, then I'm out producing them on other folks.

There was a recording studio in my school, and I knew this kid who had a key, so I'd write lyrics in school while I was in class, and then, in a 10-minute break, I recorded the song 'Hurt' in one go at the school studio.

A lot of people hear things on the radio and try to make their own version of that.

I like that kind of classic-type sound. A lot of my favorite albums were tracked live, with a four-piece band. I love the way those albums sound, but I want to make records that sound like that in the way I like to make stuff.

Any musician - I would say 99% of musicians - needs some help along the way. Most people, even if they're self-produced, have someone else mix it, or they'll have someone else master the record. Inevitably, it's like somebody else's personality being put into your art.

That's what records do: represent a compressed, heightened version of the sound. Because of the compression of the tubes and microphones and the wax, it's magic!

I'm a producer, not just a beatmaker but a producer.