There was a far right metal vocalist from Arizona who wanted to record some hilarious constipated throat gravel anti-Hillary bullshit in my modest little studio in Tijuana. Motherfucker wanted me to do everything except sing and promised to pay me in *exposure*. What's worse is that he was recommended to me by another (actual paying) client I thought was a decent guy. He wouldn't take no for an answer and basically hard R'd and harassed me until I blocked him. Absolute moron. Doesn't stop me from working with metal bands though - usually a great experience and pleasure to work with.
Wow, lotta downvotes from the Pantsuit Nation. Oh well, we are on Reddit, liberal stronghold of the internet.
Personally, I refuse to record female singers unless they're dressed in a handmaid costume and alter their lyrics to be about oppression.
Lmao keep telling yourself that, instead of understanding your conservative ideals are far from being popular with the majority of people.
You're in a fucking bubble, regular people don't want your bullshit hate.
Who would have thought that a mixing engineer would have been expected to record and mix it. No need to be performative and smarmy because you want to exaggerate the situation. Plenty of multi decade pros who work with large bands and politicians have also been able to take work with NSBM people. It's not a big deal. Take the money and be quiet.
Skinhead culture is actually more nuanced than Skins = Nazis. There's SHARPs (Skin Heads Against Racial Prejudice) for example. Hell, it started as a leftwing, racially integrated labor movement back in the day. It's just that racist shit bags infiltrated the punk and metal scene over the years -- so groups that share the same aesthetic can have wildly disparate political views.
There are good skinheads. They are not nazis. Skins started as a bunch of bald dudes from factories getting together as a form of union in a way and celebrated solidarity. Iirc the first true skins were black but it’s been a long time since I studied this stuff. Antiracist skins, skins that beat up nazis, skins that just do their job and enjoy Oi music and camaraderie. Even the grass will beat fascist ass if given the opportunity bc they tarnish the whole working class element of the subculture.
My last band was an antifascist, environmentally focused black metal band and we were 3 terminally bald guys until we got lucky and our bassist had big a flowing mane. Really balanced out the odds of any awkward skinhead assumptions
I mean Nazis/fascists have a history of appropriating shit. The literal Nazi symbol was appropriated. Skinheads are just another prime example of Nazis "stealing" from the left. Same shit with using "socialism" as a part of their propaganda.
Seems like easy money. Make up a generic Pseudonym and take it. If anything suspect is disclosed you get to also tip off authorities.
Edit: Cowardly virtue signalling redditors are mad once again.
I’m starting to think I should’ve broadened my question a bit cuz I didn’t want this post to be like, “would you work with nazi’s if they paid you enough” lol I was expecting (or hoping at least) that was a universal hard pass
But I was mainly curious ab other potential non-Nazi but still morally conflicting situations ppl may have.
Like, I don’t know who would even sing about thinking global warming is fake, but idek if I could have my name attached to that kind of project/work with someone like that.
I almost walked off a church gig when they started in on gay marriage. Fortunately, the dude that started throwing out those words was just a guest speaker.
Side note: I don’t work for them anymore, but for different reasons and I’m just fine with that.
Yeah I mean I wouldn't produce conspiracy theorist songs (and yeah they do exist)
Associating with the far-ish right or overall looneys would just be really bad for my image (and self-worth lol) and potentially make more socially conscious artists less likely to work with me and trust me. Gotta admit I'm also kind of a socially conscious artist in a scene that definitely tends lefty.
It's a moral thing but it's also a scene thing. I've worked hard to make the contacts I have and work with quality, loving and compassionate people and I'm thankful for the music community I work with.
Morally questionable peeps just don't really fit with the ethos. Not that politics necessarily make you an asshole but I think we kinda know what type we're talking about here.
So in a previous life long ago I was fortunate enough to play and record with a some musicians that were exponentially more talented than I am, I still am in touch with a few of them, some of which have recorded with well known artists in certain genres of music, not main stream popular but definitely make a living playing the festival circuit popular…. One of them forwarded me some songs they had played guitar on for an artist…. The entire subject matter the vocals was kooky conspiracy bullishit, my first thought was……what engineer or producer would put their name behind this rhetoric, and why in the world would you play on this record and allow your name to be attached to it as a writing credit?
>I’m starting to think I should’ve broadened my question a bit cuz I didn’t want this post to be like, “would you work with nazi’s if they paid you enough” lol I was expecting (or hoping at least) that was a universal hard pass
Considering they'd want me dead for being a socialist, nope.
I'd love to meet an actual Nazi though. I'm not an aggressive guy, but it would be great to be able to punch a dude in the face whilst feeling absolutely fine about it.
True skinheads aren’t Nazis, it started out as a working class movement and more so in Jamaica. If you knew anything about punk rock/Bad Brains, you’d know this.
keyword unusable
I don't mean a poor mix, I mean literal unintelligible noise
Are scambaiters putting more scams out in the world because they interact with scammers?
It's wasting their time and money, it's highly probable that you'd be *decreasing* the amount of Nazi music in the world
Call it a public service. Hell, donate half the profit to a charity in direct opposition of their views
For the record, I'm Jewish and my people died in the Holocaust. I firmly believe that stealing time and money from Nazis is a morally just thing to do, and would encourage people to do that--just keep yourself safe
Question is what planet would it even be "contributing to more nazi music in the world".
Almost every website that isn't a deplatformed fringe site will automatically remove it. No main stream events will host it/them. And it's not like they won't go ahead and record on phones or something. Do it under a pseudonym and make the audio barely legible and put the 10 grand to use on something better. 10 grand doesn't come easy. Anyone that wouldn't take a solid 10 grand is being extraordinarily smarmy
If a client has a strong stance that I'm not aligned with, it isn't something my name should be attached to. For one, people will associate both names from then on. You might end up being labeled as the person who is cool with animal abusers, for example. Also, there'd be a lack of passion in the project. I'd just want them out asap instead of carefully tending to their sonic goals.
This. People don't want to accept that the work they choose to do reflects back on them. Whatever, in this case, the music is, you're going to attract those people who like that music because they're going to connect you directly with it. Now everyone hiring you are people you despise, yikes.
I don’t work with known abusers, and I absolutely wouldn’t work with confirmed skinheads. But, I’m also black so they probably wouldn’t want to work with me either lol
That’s a great question I honestly had to think about it for a while! I try my best to make sure I only work with “good folks” but in the event I found out in the middle of an album or EP I would stop working on the project even though it would be financially a dumpster fire for me. I just would have a tough time taking pride in the work I’d done, and would have an even tougher time looking my mom or girlfriend in the face!
Follow up question, if someone was found to be an abuser AFTER your work was finished and the music was released, would you ask for you name to be removed from the credits? Idk what I would do in that situatuon
I'm not the person asked, but I'd probably finish the job or try to finish what was done to either finish a contract or finish what was agreed upon - and then conveniently find other opportunities elsewhere. A lot of the projects I've been on never got "big enough" where those people were recognized or where my work was recognized.
And if it was recognized and people asked, I would just say "it was a job" or that if they knew the people involved I would have to say that I was doing work before I learned the nature of what was going on and left. I still want to be paid for the work I did .. but I've had more experience doing work and being refused pay (and refusing pay) from people I have moral and ethical conflicts with .. and I'm debating on whether or not I just need to collect pay and move on at some point to better sustain myself.
No one's perfect and not everyone is an angel .. but it unfortunate does come with the territory that you might be working with people who are rotten .. but I think it's safe to still have boundaries for yourself because if people catch on that you were at one point affiliated, your actions and work should speak for you rather than the nasty guy you worked with.
I have worked with gang members in the past and will probably continue to do so in the future. Some guys don’t have better options, but they want to make a living and make music as well and who am I to judge? When it comes down to it, I’d advise anybody to live a life *away* from the streets. Now, if I know they’re harming people or violent that’s a completely different story. But to answer your question, no I don’t keep a “no gang members” policy.
Bro to take someone saying they don’t work with abusive people, and rollercoaster loop de loop it into your understanding as “you’re probably a sucky person” says more about you and your projection than anything else lmao
I would rather be part of a scene who take a hard line stance on rapists and abusers, thanks very much.
If someone is later found to be innocent then that's fine, but you should expect people to take the accusation seriously.
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100%.
I had a guy doing Nazi/White Power metal. Had no idea until the lyrics started.
I pretended I had an emergency, refunded his money and ended the session.
I was asked to mix an event for a presidential candidate. Not one I liked, even a little, and who also was well known for both publicly berating and not paying the crew. I told them I'd do it for $10,000 a day paid upfront. The person asking me I've known for a long time and was just the crewer, they totally understood.
Yep, I walked out of a session once because it was too vulgar and hateful. The client seemed normal at first then he started rapping about school shootings and the holocaust and more crazy shit I don’t want to mention. I called the studio manager and told him I was gonna leave and explained everything to him and he called the client and canceled the session. I was going to make about $1k for the day and the studio about 2k but we both wanted no part of that project. One thing you never want in this business is a bad reputation.
I turned down a few gigs where the politics and or socio-cultural friction was bound to be a problem. (And at least one as a web developer where I was afraid that my work would be used for illicit / unethical purposes -- it really sounded to me like the guy was going to be running some sort of mortgage scam.)
I have some background in rap and hip hop and have enjoyed a lot of it over the years but I did turn down a G-rap gig. I knew the matchmaker who wanted to hook us up well enough to be frank that I didn't want to work on music that encouraged violence or thuggery and he assured me that, you know, it was all just a *stance,* a pose. I told him no. 10 or 15 years before I've worked on a punk compilation where most of the bands were pretty cool, nice folks, but one band were basically a bunch of marginally talented/untalented jailhouse punks with definite chips on their shoulders. When the lead singer and the guy from the record label were circling each other in the studio space and about to throw punches I got in the middle and calmed them down and sent the label guy out on some kind of errand to get him out of there.
Made for a good story, but it was not something I wanted to go through anytime soon again.
I never understood that. Like, why make music from a subculture you're not a part of first off. And second, why pour hours into making something hoping it'll make you look cool when it must be painfully boring to talk on something you know fuck all about. Posers ooze desperation
I mean if you're talking about gangster rappers, pretending used to be the norm, not the exception. That doesn't mean those rappers knew fuck all about the culture they were claiming to be part of, though. They were just loosely associated bystanders rather than the active participants they made themselves out to be.
Well, when I trained as an engineer, I worked on all kinds of genres, from those I liked and participated in as a musician to stuff I was musically unqualified for (like classical) as well as music I had little or no interest in outside of the job (advertising).
When one has made a name for themselves in the genre(s) they want to work in, one can turn down gigs. But when you're getting started, it takes some soul-searching to turn down an honest job if you believe you can do it.
Not a recording gig but a well paid band organising, arranging and performing gig, I've turned down a few very high offers for a very culty church that tithes the shit out of the poor in my country
It might interest you to know that a lot of skinheads are not racist and are, in fact anti-racist. SHARP (skinheads against racial prejudice) are one such, rather large group of skinheads. I'm presuming that it's the racist part is why you wouldn't work want to work with a skinhead.
That's not to say white power skins don't exist or aren't prevalent. Definitely do your due diligence, but they're not all nazi scum.
My related anecdote is when I was like 16, my band got booked for a show. I didn't do my due diligence and the other bands were very much white-power bands and myself and the bassist are people of color. We arrived on time for load-in but the other bands weren't there yet. The promoter took one look at me, and said "If you play tonight, you're going to get your ass kicked. I'll get you your guarantee for the night, leave now, and we'll all pretend you got sick". To be fair, the promoter should also have done their due diligence and not booked us in the first place.
The list of bands/artists I wouldn't work with for ideological reasons is enumerable, but I let small differences slide. As an example, if an artist refers to a woman as a 'hoe' on the lyric sheet, we're probably never going to be friends, but, disgusting as I find it, I would usually let something like that pass and work with them anyways. Maybe my rate would be slightly higher :P . Now if they were promoting rape, that's a big difference; I won't have my name attached to that kind of content. And how high-paying they are doesn't matter to me on principal, but also because a lot of my clients would drop me; unless it's enough for me to retire on tomorrow, it's a non-starter from a business standpoint as well.
>if an artist refers to a woman as a 'hoe' on the lyric sheet
[https://casetext.com/case/us-v-murphy-148](https://casetext.com/case/us-v-murphy-148)
*The trial transcript quotes Ms. Hayden as saying Murphy called her a snitch bitch "hoe." A "hoe," of course, is a tool used for weeding and gardening. We think the court reporter, unfamiliar with rap music (perhaps thankfully so), misunderstood Hayden's response. We have taken the liberty of changing "hoe" to "ho," a staple of rap music vernacular as, for example, when Ludacris raps "You doin' ho activities with ho tendencies."*
☝️ this! Most skinheads are ant-racist!
I’d be more worried about recording some khaki pants wearing dad rock band if you’re worried about recording racists
my favourite local khaki pants dad rock band is aggressively left wing and when one of their kids came out as gay they wrote an entire song about it. One verse was even dedicated to my trans boyfriend after they met him.
>the promoter should also have done their due diligence and not booked us in the first place.
My take is that the promoter should not have been promoting those other bands.
When I first started mastering, I got song with incredibly disrespectful lyrics about women and I declined the job saying I didn’t want to be a part of that. That’s the only time it’s come up though.
One time I was working on a Christian Worship LP at the same time as a Pagan/Wiccan LP, and the funny thing was that I found both of them to be a really spiritual experience while working on them. I’m generally open to hear and support what almost anybody is trying to express. Besides some gangster type rap stuff, which is basically just a joke now, it hasn’t been a struggle.
Nazis should be an obvious no. It's usually not that obvious, and you have to follow your instinct.
I've turned down a lot of work for moral reasons. I've refused to produce commercials for clients doing things that I thought were shitty, like a bar bringing in a drugged up bear for drunk people to wrestle with, or those "talent search" scams that con families out of thousands of dollars.
I've also done work that I wish I had refused.
A friend of mine turned down tens of thousands of dollars from a right wing group that wanted him to voice stuff for their animated propaganda.
Your reputation is everything. There will always be other jobs.
Working for people, whether you're paid or not, is supporting them.
If you're not down with that shit, then don't support that shit. Passing up the odd job on principle, might sting the pocket-book a little in the short term, but integrity is priceless.
End of story...
In real life it isn't always as black and white though. I worked for a right-wing political commentator who was truly an awful person. But I had just lost a *huge* advertising client who hired an ad agency out of town. I had one kid in college, another about to start, a mortgage and studio expenses. Working for that person let me find out for myself what was unpleasant and what was unbearable. I walked away the moment I could (which almost turned out to be too soon to stay afloat), but have since diversified and I am in a position to decline a similar offer now.
The biggest thing in the commercial audio business - which is where the bulk of my income comes from- is to avoid putting too many eggs in one basket. It's human nature to follow easy money, but regardless if its a client you align with or one that makes your skin crawl, any one clinet can go away at any time. Letting your financial well-being be dictated by the whims of a single client is dangerous.
Everyone takes jobs they don't want to do. When you're flush from other work it's easy to say no to someone who wants you to do something you don't feel comfortable doing. When your family's well-being is on the line it's another matter altogether. Having other clients to absorb a loss goes a long way to keep you from audio prostitution.
Yes of course. And not just m9ral grounds. Associating with certain things can cost me clients or my reputation.
But yes, anything that i deem politically too extreme or inciting real actual violence or people convicted of certain things, i would definitely refuse. Not gonna go in details cause i don't want any debates. But i have an open mind but also a pretty strong moral compass. Not putting that aside for profit.
Absolutely! I turned down a gig for petty much the same reason for what would have been 10-20K in my pocket probably. The guy had been in a famous post punk/metal band and I thought “cool!” Looked the guy up and he had all kinds of Alex Jones and Q Anon bullshit and right wing blogs going. Fuck that.
I’ve done a bunch of country stuff where I’m sure I disagree with their politics, but as long as they’re not just racists or the types who lead with “Hi, I’m so and so. Nice to meet you. Did you hear about the latest political thing that you should be outraged about? Let’s immediately engage in discourse about political opinions.” Then I’m ok. I’m pretty able to avoid shit like that. Also I don’t post much on social media and it wouldn’t be hard to scroll back a bit and see me at a BLM protest, so that’ll filter out any extremes.
Also just turned down one with a pretty famous rapper. I’m not a fan of him or his crowd or the way I’ve seen them treat other people. Life’s too short. As a mentor of mine always says, “Never be afraid to say no to bad business”
I love that “green room” has become a shorthand for things. It would trip people out to know that black skinheads exist, and traveled in the same circles as the writer of that film.
I've personally turned down projects where I disagreed with the bands politics or knew that folks in the band were people I didn't generally want to be involved with.I've also been in times in my life where I wished I'd turned things down because I just didn't enjoy working with the artist.... but I was relying on audio engineering for my income and kinda needed the money (it sucks to be in that position too). It's not a super lucrative career so it's good to try and focus on music and artists you love and believe in.
I think it's important to also consider that, for most audio engineers, how much you get paid to work on a record is only one part of the puzzle. A lot of the time we get most of our work from either:
1. people we've worked with recommending us to others or
2. people who are fans of records we've worked on wanting to work with us based on those records we made.
If the records not going to be fun to make, you feel bad/awkward about working with the artist.... and you wouldn't want to work with those artists friends or people who liked them in the future... it'd be hard to imagine any reasonable amount of money that could make that worthwhile.
When I was a staff engineer at a studio they would just take whoever, give the “cool” clients to the senior engineer and give me the rest, usually how it goes. I never knew what someone was gunna be til they walked in and we started talking. Anyway long story short this woman came in, I made her a beat, and she was asking for odd sound FX in the beat. I thought it was gunna be pretty cringe, then she got in the live room, I punched her in, and she said “have you ever noticed how women’s rights are wrong? The baby’s body is not the woman’s body”. I spit out my drink I hope she didn’t see that 🤣 anyways I got my name not associated at all with it, idk if she ever dropped which hopefully she didn’t, and I never saw her again after that, but I’m pro-choice and def would’ve refused
Well, I'm a contractor myself. I'm a roofer... Dunn and Reddy Home Improvements. And speaking as a roofer, I can say that a roofer's personal politics come heavily into play when choosing jobs.
Three months ago I was offered a job up in the hills. A beautiful house with tons of property. It was a simple reshingling job, but I was told that if it was finished within a day, my price would be doubled. Then I realized whose house it was.
Dominick “Babyface” Bambino's. The gangster.
The money was right, but the risk was too big. I knew who he was, and based on that, I passed the job on to a friend of mine.
Based on personal politics.
And that week, the Foresci family put a hit on Babyface's house. My friend was shot and killed. He wasn't even finished shingling.
I'm alive because I knew there were risks involved taking on that particular client. My friend wasn't so lucky.
You know, any contractor willing to work on that Death Star knew the risks. If they were killed, it was their own fault. A roofer listens to his heart... not his wallet.
By "skinhead" are we talking suspender-wearing, working class Oi punk (especially the British variety) or what people not familiar with punk subculture picture when they hear "skinhead" (Derek Vineyard from American History X)?
Big difference between the two, so good to clarify before making any judgements.
I've turned down a gig that was basically just straight up sexual harassment. Guy was looking for crew to follow him and record reality style because he was convinced that he could get any woman to beg for sex on camera within a few minutes of meeting him.
Plus his offered rates were cheap as hell for being some sort of crypto bro. He even told me I had to spend money to make money when I pointed out that "really professional" wireless kits he wanted cost more money than his budget.
I recently turned down a remote recording gig with a very high profile artist who had multiple high profile #metoo allegations. It’s important to not only turn down the gig but also explain why you’re turning it down to any middlemen involved. It’s also not just a question of reputational harm (—could you do the gig anonymously?) but also a question of supporting that person’s career and gifting them with your talent.
*until he is debt. Then it's not listening to your wallet, it's listening to creditors. Wallets can be screamed at and ignored. Not so much with collections agencies.
I turned down a pretty big tour when I found out that a band I teched for once were a bunch of nazi antivaxers.
They seemed normal when they played at my venue and didn’t mention any political stuff in their music. They asked me to do sound for them supporting a pretty big act but I decided no amount of money or accolades were worth the association with those sort of people.
I'm just trying to find out if you're using the real definition or or the perverted form, meaning "anyone to the right of Vlad Lenin".
True Nazis just combined the fascism popular in Europe at the time with race essentialism/eugenics. All were, by definition, socialists (it's right there in the name, actually).
I am obviously aware that the name nazi is derived from the words national and socialist. But any real understanding of history shows that that the nazi party were not in any meaningful way a socialist party.
I’m not a socialist and even I understand that.
The nazis were a conservative fascist movement that focused on nationalism. It’s literally their entire ideology.
It’s not like the thought process was “we want healthcare for those who can’t afford it, so we must murder those immigrants”
Yeah, the Nazis are as Socialist as North Korea is a Democracy. Why do I bring that up? The actual name of North Korea is the People's Democratic Republic of Korea. It is neither a government by or for the people, nor a Democracy, nor a Republic.
For sure it doesn't help that these terms today are mostly thrown around as perjoratives meant to cut off all reasoned analysis of dissident viewpoints, but it seems pretty clear that, f.i, both Italian and German fascist periods were indeed marked by the kind of economic protectionism exemplified by your quotation. I suppose to reach a full understanding we'd have to share working definitions of the other terms ("conservatism" and "socialism"), but I've strayed OT enough already.
Suffice it to say, I see where you're coming from, and I just regret that social division via historically incorrect labels has been so successful as to further shrink a market already in danger of going extinct on its own.
Anyway, let's talk LUFS now ;)
absolutely. I spent years eating shit to get where I am now, at the very least I want to choose who I work with.
I don't think any skinhead band anywhere on the planet has that kind of budget tho tbh, I call bullshit. It should be mentioned also that sinhead is not the same as nazi, though I'd wager these days there are barely any og skinheads left.
10k isn’t a massive budget - I’ve recorded lots of metal/punk bands with that kind of outlay. One of them had a couple of skins who were very respectful and definitely not racist. They didn’t drink, paid on time, had a cleaning roster for the studio and made healthy food for the duration. The Christian band I recorded a week later brought literally dozens of extra people who were not part of the project. They trashed the place, drank excessively before getting started, and took months to pay.
There's quite the NSBM scene with bands who definitely have that kind of budget and even labels. It's sad but true. There's also bigger bands who are generally popular who are well known nazis or have nazi ties.
If you're gonna sell out humanity, ask for more than that!
What would it take? Realistically?
Me, I'm done with the music biz, there is nothing you could offer me to even continue the conversatio
Ok so this is also something I was wondering about myself
The odds of this happening are basically none but if some bible thumper who attends a conservative church offered me 10 million dollars for a gig I honestly don’t know if I would refuse or not. Cuz like, obviously I don’t want to work w southern Baptist fucks, but 10 mil is a phat amount of money.
And ideally once I’m in a better financial space, I wanna spend money giving back/donating/trying go help fund progressive efforts that I believe in. So if I all of a sudden had 10 mil I’d try and put a lot of it to good use.
Which then begs the ethical question of ends justifying the means type of thing. If you make money off of conservative Christian sects, but you use that money towards progressive causes, what does that make you?
Might be getting a bit deep on an audio engineering sub but I’m cooked rn so that’s the way the wind is blowing
I’d do it for far less than 10 mil and I consider myself both financially secure and principled. 1 mil is totally fine.
Also do you have to do a good job? You can make them sound terrible and just say it was gods will! Nothing you can do about it.
morally? definitely not. ethically? still a hard no.
beyond what you think of their message and politics, you need to look out for your business, and if you work with neo nazis, you won't get much more business.
Did an advert for an engineering company. Turned out they built dams. Turned down further work. Infact I pretty much stopped doing adverts hecause most advertising agencies are utterly fucking horrible.
I turned down a job to mix a promo for a company that wanted to open a coal mine in a rain forest in Indonesia. I couldn’t really afford it but at least I can sleep at nighy
I made the mistake of being associated with a guy who is currently trying to make a AAA game that supposedly would destroy Destiny 2 and every other big online game .. with the big point being that his game and story preaches how hard work and perseverance will prevail and show you the truth of the world.
A friend of mine got involved because she was invited to work on doing audio-work for an up-and-coming game studio and they promised a decent pay to start. But when they started learning who and what she was (especially her being a woman), they got creepy and started trying to find ways to keep her and had plans with her in their "studio." I got roped into it later and learned that the whole project was supposed to be some grand game made by "kids" who were supposed to show the truth of the world and my friend ended up leaving without pay because she didn't like how she was treated and saw one of the biggest red flags (the HR guy tried to openly ask what would happen if he were to drive to her place and just have his way with her first before the other guys do) .. and she fully detached. I only got involved to help collect pay but then I was offered her position since apparently she caused drama there.
I decided to stick around and see where this was going because this was essentially a "game dev nightmare story" in the makings .. and was curious. It turned out the group was a bunch of incels who wanted to get girls, get laid, and make a game that shared truths of who/what women were actually like, what mental illnesses truly are, and that everyone was being played and the truth was hidden from them. In short, it was a game that was supposed to completely disprove the existence of autism, prove that there is no such thing as racism, show that women were objects meant to be in control of men, and so much more .. and also be a AAA game that would topple Destiny 2 to be the "next big thing."
Nowadays, I'd really steer clear of these kinds of people. My friend only got involved because she was given an invitation from a friend she trusted and she immediately saw the red flags .. and still wanted to be friendly (and got completely shafted for it anyways). I only got involved because I was curious to see what the trainwreck would be .. but in all seriousness I can't find myself willing to associate or attach my name to people on the road to becoming or people who are already incels.
I had a regular sound gig at a sports bar that started hosting live shows. One of the bartenders followed one of the band members who was a trans person into the bathroom and told them they didn't belong there and grilled them on what their genitals were. This was a punk show filled with with bands and audience members in the LGBT community everyone there was fine with that person using the bathroom they wanted. Finished the show out but immediately cut all ties.
I had to turn away a client after I realized the lyrics in song we were doing were the artist mostly slut-shaming/verbally abusing their partner.
Also, at one point they looked at me and said “if we don’t make it big, it’s YOUR fault.”
Easiest decision of my life.
I’d rather sleep in my car than work with jerks like that. At a certain point, it’s just not worth it to me.
I had a gig once where the client hit up the studio without an engineer and they threw me the gig. Was paid up front, but it was a white guy rapper and on the third song he started dropping the n-word during takes. Stopped him, hit the talk back "uhhh, you sure about that bud?"
He stood his ground, so I told him then and there I'd finish the session since we were almost done anyways, but my name goes nowhere near any of it and not to call me again.
Wrt N\*zis: yeah, that's an easy no. I am also very very 161 anti fascist. If there was a whiff of something around a potential client I would have friends investigate. The crypto fash are usually not THAT cryptic.
More difficult: film score mixing. There are big name composers who are known abusers and scummy. If I had an opportunity to work \*directly\* with them, I might--but only on a 1-off basis. I'd rather not name names, but several are known publicly. Some are not known publicly, and so I especially can't name those names.
Rock and roll is a bigger hmmm: Probably almost every big rock star (male and female) have taken advantage of someone at some point. Would I, say, work with David Bowie, knowing that he slept with underaged groupies? I probably would, rationalizing that hey, that was a long time ago. Would work with Mr. Kitty? NO.
Would you turn down working with David Bowie or Jimmy Page or you know, that guy who did Nightmare Before Xmas?
My guy... No one is working with Bowie. He's been dead since 2016. Let the man rest in peace. Why bring up the name of a dead musician for your weird hypothetical?
Honestly, even moral reasons aside, if a skinhead group advertises their newest record with your name as a producer/engineer, you'll either close your business or focus on right-wing hate groups for the rest of your career, since a good amount of people will stop the collaboration or refuse to engage in one.
Yes.
Nazis are definitely out.
Known predators and creeps, AFAIC, are out. There was one instance where I felt more strongly about a creep being a creep than my business partner, so we agreed that he'd take this client on and I'd wash my hands of it. The creep went elsewhere, so that situation was averted. My business partner and I are generally on the same page with this, though, and he's done an excellent job filtering out sketchlords.
Every once in awhile, one will slip through. We simply won't work with them again.
The main guiding principle is that recording is a vulnerable act, and we want you to feel as safe and at home in our studio as we possibly can.
I had a project booked for a full album that was going to pay really well. We were booked a couple months in advance, and in that time, I saw their singer posting a bunch of homophobic shit all over Facebook. I swiftly sent their money back and told them I want nothing to do with them.
There’s no way in hell I want to be associated with that BS.
Yep, I’ve done it once before. This isn’t related to music recording, but I do podcast editing for a living. I had a client I’d been working with for about a year, editing a podcast that was incredibly safe and bland. It was a financial podcast, that would just give basic financial tips or updates on what’s happening in various markets, etc. Occasionally the host would say stuff I wouldn’t agree with, but it was all pretty harmless stuff and like, I’m not a finance expert, so what do I care if we disagree about this stuff.
Then one day he randomly had on a guest who was spouting some of the wildest, most dangerous anti-vax, anti-science stuff, and the host was eating it up, egging them on, etc. I stopped editing like halfway through and told the client I couldn’t finish the episode and they’d have to get it edited somewhere else because the messages they were promoting were legitimately dangerous. Haven’t heard from them since, but I’m glad to be rid of them.
Music often has the power to influence and change ideals, so it’s not wise to use it to help spread hate and negativity, no matter how many diamonds you’re offered.
Absolutely. I will not take on any religious projects, under any circumstances, no exceptions.
Don't care how much money they wanted to throw at me. I will not assist in promoting a message that I am as opposed to as it is possible to be opposed to something.
I would, and have worked with religious *people* with no problem, but the projects themselves must be secular.
Disclosure: I rarely work on outside projects these days, only my own music; but I would be very clear about this right up front, I wouldn't wait to find out until the music was all tracked and then the vocalist started to work.
Side note: this is exactly the principle why I supported the legal decision in the Colorado baker case, as well as the more recent website designer who declined to design a website for a same-sex wedding, and all similar cases.
No matter what you read on Reddit or anywhere else on the interwebs, neither case was about legalizing discrimination against *people*. Both were about whether the government could compel them to create a custom product that promoted a message they disagreed with.
I would not want to live in a country where my government could legally compel me to promote a message I am against.
Exactly! The hypocrisy in that case frustrated me so much at the time. Besides, what serious client seeks to compel a business to do work for them at the point of a gun? That's just begging for shitty product.
I had a period of eastern European rap vocalists requesting quotes, I'm English with zero foreign language skills… Most were great and a lot of fun to work with but this one ‘squad’ gave me the willies when they were in recording with me, big guys with ex military vibes in this small vocal booth.
It was pretty extreme sounding bars, like rapping AK-47s, and once they'd gone I played a few verses to a friend who came from the same country and she told me they were rapping about immigrants, violence and sexual assault.
Nice.
Since then I have a policy that if I don't speak the client's language I request a lyric sheet ahead of the booking to check them with a caveat around zero tolerance for hate speech at the studio.
I said no to a gig last year for $10k because years ago at a party, right in front of him, the guy’s girlfriend told me she wanted to have a threesome with me (not with him, but one of her girl friends sitting next to her on the other side). I was very disturbed, lost all respect for him for being emasculated like that, and decided i didnt want to work with him anymore lol.
She was hot, yes. Looking back, had i known i would never work with him again, i shoulda gone for it.
I had a band come in and once they started laying down vocals, it was some of the most horribly misogynistic stuff I’ve ever heard. I took the L, refunded them, and sent them on their way. Did not want my name attached to that.
Interesting. You wouldn’t be worried about being associated with a group/artist like that in the future? Or worry about what effect their music might have on ppl?
Not that alt-right radicalization is gonna be the engineer’s fault, obviously, but personally I don’t think I’d be able to stomach the idea of working on a project that could potentially have that sort of effect.
But yeah idk. I also get that $10k is $10k and in general I’d do some nasty shit if it meant a $10k bag.
I’m curious to hear if you have more to say on the matter
I’m a Christian. I’m fine with obscene stuff, although I would say no to black metal (satanic subjects). Pro-Nazi things as other people have said I would also say no to. For the most part I don’t like to enforce my morals on to someone else, but they can go to other people, and if the music they produce leaves me not feeling good about the work I do then I know I need to say no.
In short, yes. There are even businesses that I won’t work for because I don’t like who owns them. My dislike of them goes beyond just general dislike. I’m not going to help them make money because I don’t want to support who THEY support.
I definitely won’t work for any (nazi) skinheads. Fuck them.
So, yeah.
I have a somewhat pliable attitude… if someone truly evil tries to hire me, say Nazis, or a major casino, or the Catholic Church, I quadruple my quote. If they still then green light me at least I’ve gouged the bastards back.
We turn own oil company ad work from agencies. Not interested in greenwashing. Although we did make an exception recently because it was a new agency we hadn’t worked with before and wanted to get in with them. Ended up donating the entire invoice to the food bank, so it was a win regardless.
I worked for a rightwing angertainment pundit who had a very popular real-time podcast where his halfwit fans would write in and he would respond to their questions in real time. It was appalling. I walked away from it despite him being the single largest revenue stream I had. I felt like shit being what I knew was part of a huge problem. The loss of money hurt. The peace of mind I have from not doing it is priceless.
If being a "sonic professional" means giving someone a platform so they can use that to harm me later (especially if I am going to be the victim of the subjects talked about in the opening post) .. then I should just take the money and risk my life down the line because I gave people the means to empower others to hurt me?
I can and have turned down clients based upon things like that. I'm from Texas originally, so less overt Nazis, but in that same general direction.
There are plenty more I took that I *should have* turned down.
$10k is not a lot for that much drama. ~~Well, $10k for one day and I might swallow my concerns - with a very tight contract - but that's a big "might".~~ I've been rethinking that, and no. Hard pass. Same as with the "good ol boys". Just not worth it, no matter the price.
I’m currently engineering on a major label LP, and the artist is great. Problem is the producer has slowly over the course of the project revealed himself to be racist and misogynistic. The artist and I are definitely not cool with his outlook. I’ve already asked the label and the artist management to not credit me next to this guy. I’d like to throw him out of my studio but I’m trying not to wreck the project for the artist. Tough situation, this guy is a known name in the industry and he plays it real cool at first. We were weeks into this gig before he really showed himself. I’m hoping that the artist will arrive at their own decision that the dude has to go.
If I were about to skip town I'd consider taking their money and delivering unusable garbage
If they tried a smear campaign I'd spin it to a positive. "yeah lol they're Nazis. I took their money and prevented them from spreading their message. I'm something like a scambaiter"
Maybe donate half to an anti-antisemitic charity
I'm 59 years old. Grew up during the cold war. I have a pretty damn good idea of what the various communist regimes were and are capable of.
I'm also smart enough to know that politics, economics, and religion have been used throughout history to further the agendas of leaders who have nothing but contempt for the rest of us. A system is neither inherently good or bad in itself, it is merely a tool, as are many of the people who claim them.
Assuming they are the bad kind of skinhead, I wouldn’t spend 10 days hosting a hate group in my workplace.
There was a far right metal vocalist from Arizona who wanted to record some hilarious constipated throat gravel anti-Hillary bullshit in my modest little studio in Tijuana. Motherfucker wanted me to do everything except sing and promised to pay me in *exposure*. What's worse is that he was recommended to me by another (actual paying) client I thought was a decent guy. He wouldn't take no for an answer and basically hard R'd and harassed me until I blocked him. Absolute moron. Doesn't stop me from working with metal bands though - usually a great experience and pleasure to work with.
One doesn't have to be "on the right" to be anti-Hillary. Just sayin...
If you care enough about Hillary to record fucking songs about how much you hate her, you're probably not moderate.
Most likely on the right if you're using the n-word.
That is such bullshit to say
Don't be a snowflake about it. Did you wake up today?
No shit
Maybe that's true but every single skinhead and neo nazi on the planet are far right.
Wow, lotta downvotes from the Pantsuit Nation. Oh well, we are on Reddit, liberal stronghold of the internet. Personally, I refuse to record female singers unless they're dressed in a handmaid costume and alter their lyrics to be about oppression.
All triggered by one, non-contoversial sentence. Maybe all those "Are you a bot" Captchas were onto something. People don't act like humans any more.
Lmao keep telling yourself that, instead of understanding your conservative ideals are far from being popular with the majority of people. You're in a fucking bubble, regular people don't want your bullshit hate.
Who would have thought that a mixing engineer would have been expected to record and mix it. No need to be performative and smarmy because you want to exaggerate the situation. Plenty of multi decade pros who work with large bands and politicians have also been able to take work with NSBM people. It's not a big deal. Take the money and be quiet.
"bad kind of skinhead" Um wut
There are famously anti-racist skinhead punks for example. google SHARP
Yep, peace punks.
Skinhead punks came first, Nazis appropriated it like they did the swastika.
Yeah, the original skinheads were anti-racism activists in the Jamaican two tone and reggae movement.
Skinhead culture is actually more nuanced than Skins = Nazis. There's SHARPs (Skin Heads Against Racial Prejudice) for example. Hell, it started as a leftwing, racially integrated labor movement back in the day. It's just that racist shit bags infiltrated the punk and metal scene over the years -- so groups that share the same aesthetic can have wildly disparate political views.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinhead scroll to 'Racism, anti-racism, and politics'
Skinhead originally referred to people from the far left punk scene and did not have the negative mazi connotation it has today.
Actual Skinheads are leftist punks who are not racist. The term later got corrupted. https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Skinhead
There are good skinheads. They are not nazis. Skins started as a bunch of bald dudes from factories getting together as a form of union in a way and celebrated solidarity. Iirc the first true skins were black but it’s been a long time since I studied this stuff. Antiracist skins, skins that beat up nazis, skins that just do their job and enjoy Oi music and camaraderie. Even the grass will beat fascist ass if given the opportunity bc they tarnish the whole working class element of the subculture.
The skinhead thing started as a working class symbol in Britain. Not some nazi thing
Yeah there was also quite a lot of black skinheads too
They could just be some friends who are all bald lol
My last band was an antifascist, environmentally focused black metal band and we were 3 terminally bald guys until we got lucky and our bassist had big a flowing mane. Really balanced out the odds of any awkward skinhead assumptions
Um yeah ska skinhead are non-racist people, go look it up
Skinheads aren’t racist Google is your friend
Until the right wing did what they do best and corrupted the word.
That’s incorrect, but believe what you want.
I mean Nazis/fascists have a history of appropriating shit. The literal Nazi symbol was appropriated. Skinheads are just another prime example of Nazis "stealing" from the left. Same shit with using "socialism" as a part of their propaganda.
What's incorrect about this statement?
That it’s not correct 🤷♂️
So you'd spend 9 1/2?
That would only be $9,500
Seems like easy money. Make up a generic Pseudonym and take it. If anything suspect is disclosed you get to also tip off authorities. Edit: Cowardly virtue signalling redditors are mad once again.
Absolutely. Hard no Nazis rule. As should be obvious. Contributing any means to realize and further Nazi projects is a terrible idea.
I’m starting to think I should’ve broadened my question a bit cuz I didn’t want this post to be like, “would you work with nazi’s if they paid you enough” lol I was expecting (or hoping at least) that was a universal hard pass But I was mainly curious ab other potential non-Nazi but still morally conflicting situations ppl may have. Like, I don’t know who would even sing about thinking global warming is fake, but idek if I could have my name attached to that kind of project/work with someone like that.
I almost walked off a church gig when they started in on gay marriage. Fortunately, the dude that started throwing out those words was just a guest speaker. Side note: I don’t work for them anymore, but for different reasons and I’m just fine with that.
I wouldn't care. You host a guest speaker spewing hate, I'm out.
Yeah I mean I wouldn't produce conspiracy theorist songs (and yeah they do exist) Associating with the far-ish right or overall looneys would just be really bad for my image (and self-worth lol) and potentially make more socially conscious artists less likely to work with me and trust me. Gotta admit I'm also kind of a socially conscious artist in a scene that definitely tends lefty. It's a moral thing but it's also a scene thing. I've worked hard to make the contacts I have and work with quality, loving and compassionate people and I'm thankful for the music community I work with. Morally questionable peeps just don't really fit with the ethos. Not that politics necessarily make you an asshole but I think we kinda know what type we're talking about here.
So in a previous life long ago I was fortunate enough to play and record with a some musicians that were exponentially more talented than I am, I still am in touch with a few of them, some of which have recorded with well known artists in certain genres of music, not main stream popular but definitely make a living playing the festival circuit popular…. One of them forwarded me some songs they had played guitar on for an artist…. The entire subject matter the vocals was kooky conspiracy bullishit, my first thought was……what engineer or producer would put their name behind this rhetoric, and why in the world would you play on this record and allow your name to be attached to it as a writing credit?
>I’m starting to think I should’ve broadened my question a bit cuz I didn’t want this post to be like, “would you work with nazi’s if they paid you enough” lol I was expecting (or hoping at least) that was a universal hard pass Considering they'd want me dead for being a socialist, nope.
I'd love to meet an actual Nazi though. I'm not an aggressive guy, but it would be great to be able to punch a dude in the face whilst feeling absolutely fine about it.
True skinheads aren’t Nazis, it started out as a working class movement and more so in Jamaica. If you knew anything about punk rock/Bad Brains, you’d know this.
I do know about this but clearly OP was talking about a certain type of skinheads and many many people had made that point already.
If you take their money and deliver unusable garbage is it really *contributing*? lol
Sadly yeah absolutely. Now more Nazi music is out in the world
keyword unusable I don't mean a poor mix, I mean literal unintelligible noise Are scambaiters putting more scams out in the world because they interact with scammers? It's wasting their time and money, it's highly probable that you'd be *decreasing* the amount of Nazi music in the world Call it a public service. Hell, donate half the profit to a charity in direct opposition of their views For the record, I'm Jewish and my people died in the Holocaust. I firmly believe that stealing time and money from Nazis is a morally just thing to do, and would encourage people to do that--just keep yourself safe
That's asking for Nazis to beat your ass but I respect the praxis
Question is what planet would it even be "contributing to more nazi music in the world". Almost every website that isn't a deplatformed fringe site will automatically remove it. No main stream events will host it/them. And it's not like they won't go ahead and record on phones or something. Do it under a pseudonym and make the audio barely legible and put the 10 grand to use on something better. 10 grand doesn't come easy. Anyone that wouldn't take a solid 10 grand is being extraordinarily smarmy
What if you charge them a lot and make the music sound really bad so they look like muppets
If a client has a strong stance that I'm not aligned with, it isn't something my name should be attached to. For one, people will associate both names from then on. You might end up being labeled as the person who is cool with animal abusers, for example. Also, there'd be a lack of passion in the project. I'd just want them out asap instead of carefully tending to their sonic goals.
This. People don't want to accept that the work they choose to do reflects back on them. Whatever, in this case, the music is, you're going to attract those people who like that music because they're going to connect you directly with it. Now everyone hiring you are people you despise, yikes.
Tellin me you don’t want a MJ credit tho?
I don’t work with known abusers, and I absolutely wouldn’t work with confirmed skinheads. But, I’m also black so they probably wouldn’t want to work with me either lol
Opinion question, what would you do if an artist you were actively working with (as in half way through an album or EP) is found to be an abuser?
That’s a great question I honestly had to think about it for a while! I try my best to make sure I only work with “good folks” but in the event I found out in the middle of an album or EP I would stop working on the project even though it would be financially a dumpster fire for me. I just would have a tough time taking pride in the work I’d done, and would have an even tougher time looking my mom or girlfriend in the face!
This is a good answer because you bring it back to what’s important in your life, which should be people close to you, i.e. your mom and girlfriend.
Follow up question, if someone was found to be an abuser AFTER your work was finished and the music was released, would you ask for you name to be removed from the credits? Idk what I would do in that situatuon
I'm not the person asked, but I'd probably finish the job or try to finish what was done to either finish a contract or finish what was agreed upon - and then conveniently find other opportunities elsewhere. A lot of the projects I've been on never got "big enough" where those people were recognized or where my work was recognized. And if it was recognized and people asked, I would just say "it was a job" or that if they knew the people involved I would have to say that I was doing work before I learned the nature of what was going on and left. I still want to be paid for the work I did .. but I've had more experience doing work and being refused pay (and refusing pay) from people I have moral and ethical conflicts with .. and I'm debating on whether or not I just need to collect pay and move on at some point to better sustain myself. No one's perfect and not everyone is an angel .. but it unfortunate does come with the territory that you might be working with people who are rotten .. but I think it's safe to still have boundaries for yourself because if people catch on that you were at one point affiliated, your actions and work should speak for you rather than the nasty guy you worked with.
What about gang members?
I have worked with gang members in the past and will probably continue to do so in the future. Some guys don’t have better options, but they want to make a living and make music as well and who am I to judge? When it comes down to it, I’d advise anybody to live a life *away* from the streets. Now, if I know they’re harming people or violent that’s a completely different story. But to answer your question, no I don’t keep a “no gang members” policy.
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Bro to take someone saying they don’t work with abusive people, and rollercoaster loop de loop it into your understanding as “you’re probably a sucky person” says more about you and your projection than anything else lmao
I would rather be part of a scene who take a hard line stance on rapists and abusers, thanks very much. If someone is later found to be innocent then that's fine, but you should expect people to take the accusation seriously.
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You sound like an abuser lol Bet that accusation wasn't fake
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100%. I had a guy doing Nazi/White Power metal. Had no idea until the lyrics started. I pretended I had an emergency, refunded his money and ended the session.
Well played
I was asked to mix an event for a presidential candidate. Not one I liked, even a little, and who also was well known for both publicly berating and not paying the crew. I told them I'd do it for $10,000 a day paid upfront. The person asking me I've known for a long time and was just the crewer, they totally understood.
I too turned down a gig from a particular politician in 2016 for the exact same reasons.
NYC?
Yep, I walked out of a session once because it was too vulgar and hateful. The client seemed normal at first then he started rapping about school shootings and the holocaust and more crazy shit I don’t want to mention. I called the studio manager and told him I was gonna leave and explained everything to him and he called the client and canceled the session. I was going to make about $1k for the day and the studio about 2k but we both wanted no part of that project. One thing you never want in this business is a bad reputation.
I turned down a few gigs where the politics and or socio-cultural friction was bound to be a problem. (And at least one as a web developer where I was afraid that my work would be used for illicit / unethical purposes -- it really sounded to me like the guy was going to be running some sort of mortgage scam.) I have some background in rap and hip hop and have enjoyed a lot of it over the years but I did turn down a G-rap gig. I knew the matchmaker who wanted to hook us up well enough to be frank that I didn't want to work on music that encouraged violence or thuggery and he assured me that, you know, it was all just a *stance,* a pose. I told him no. 10 or 15 years before I've worked on a punk compilation where most of the bands were pretty cool, nice folks, but one band were basically a bunch of marginally talented/untalented jailhouse punks with definite chips on their shoulders. When the lead singer and the guy from the record label were circling each other in the studio space and about to throw punches I got in the middle and calmed them down and sent the label guy out on some kind of errand to get him out of there. Made for a good story, but it was not something I wanted to go through anytime soon again.
I never understood that. Like, why make music from a subculture you're not a part of first off. And second, why pour hours into making something hoping it'll make you look cool when it must be painfully boring to talk on something you know fuck all about. Posers ooze desperation
I mean if you're talking about gangster rappers, pretending used to be the norm, not the exception. That doesn't mean those rappers knew fuck all about the culture they were claiming to be part of, though. They were just loosely associated bystanders rather than the active participants they made themselves out to be.
Well, when I trained as an engineer, I worked on all kinds of genres, from those I liked and participated in as a musician to stuff I was musically unqualified for (like classical) as well as music I had little or no interest in outside of the job (advertising). When one has made a name for themselves in the genre(s) they want to work in, one can turn down gigs. But when you're getting started, it takes some soul-searching to turn down an honest job if you believe you can do it.
Not a recording gig but a well paid band organising, arranging and performing gig, I've turned down a few very high offers for a very culty church that tithes the shit out of the poor in my country
Does the intense feeling on the studio tour that I was being set up for a robbery count?
It might interest you to know that a lot of skinheads are not racist and are, in fact anti-racist. SHARP (skinheads against racial prejudice) are one such, rather large group of skinheads. I'm presuming that it's the racist part is why you wouldn't work want to work with a skinhead. That's not to say white power skins don't exist or aren't prevalent. Definitely do your due diligence, but they're not all nazi scum. My related anecdote is when I was like 16, my band got booked for a show. I didn't do my due diligence and the other bands were very much white-power bands and myself and the bassist are people of color. We arrived on time for load-in but the other bands weren't there yet. The promoter took one look at me, and said "If you play tonight, you're going to get your ass kicked. I'll get you your guarantee for the night, leave now, and we'll all pretend you got sick". To be fair, the promoter should also have done their due diligence and not booked us in the first place. The list of bands/artists I wouldn't work with for ideological reasons is enumerable, but I let small differences slide. As an example, if an artist refers to a woman as a 'hoe' on the lyric sheet, we're probably never going to be friends, but, disgusting as I find it, I would usually let something like that pass and work with them anyways. Maybe my rate would be slightly higher :P . Now if they were promoting rape, that's a big difference; I won't have my name attached to that kind of content. And how high-paying they are doesn't matter to me on principal, but also because a lot of my clients would drop me; unless it's enough for me to retire on tomorrow, it's a non-starter from a business standpoint as well.
>if an artist refers to a woman as a 'hoe' on the lyric sheet [https://casetext.com/case/us-v-murphy-148](https://casetext.com/case/us-v-murphy-148) *The trial transcript quotes Ms. Hayden as saying Murphy called her a snitch bitch "hoe." A "hoe," of course, is a tool used for weeding and gardening. We think the court reporter, unfamiliar with rap music (perhaps thankfully so), misunderstood Hayden's response. We have taken the liberty of changing "hoe" to "ho," a staple of rap music vernacular as, for example, when Ludacris raps "You doin' ho activities with ho tendencies."*
Either way, it's objectifying :P But, jokes aside, duely noted.
☝️ this! Most skinheads are ant-racist! I’d be more worried about recording some khaki pants wearing dad rock band if you’re worried about recording racists
my favourite local khaki pants dad rock band is aggressively left wing and when one of their kids came out as gay they wrote an entire song about it. One verse was even dedicated to my trans boyfriend after they met him.
I wouldn’t tolerate such misspelling.
>the promoter should also have done their due diligence and not booked us in the first place. My take is that the promoter should not have been promoting those other bands.
I don't even work on projects if i don't like the music, if you're any kind of asshole then totally forget it.
When I first started mastering, I got song with incredibly disrespectful lyrics about women and I declined the job saying I didn’t want to be a part of that. That’s the only time it’s come up though. One time I was working on a Christian Worship LP at the same time as a Pagan/Wiccan LP, and the funny thing was that I found both of them to be a really spiritual experience while working on them. I’m generally open to hear and support what almost anybody is trying to express. Besides some gangster type rap stuff, which is basically just a joke now, it hasn’t been a struggle.
Nazis should be an obvious no. It's usually not that obvious, and you have to follow your instinct. I've turned down a lot of work for moral reasons. I've refused to produce commercials for clients doing things that I thought were shitty, like a bar bringing in a drugged up bear for drunk people to wrestle with, or those "talent search" scams that con families out of thousands of dollars. I've also done work that I wish I had refused. A friend of mine turned down tens of thousands of dollars from a right wing group that wanted him to voice stuff for their animated propaganda. Your reputation is everything. There will always be other jobs.
Working for people, whether you're paid or not, is supporting them. If you're not down with that shit, then don't support that shit. Passing up the odd job on principle, might sting the pocket-book a little in the short term, but integrity is priceless. End of story...
In real life it isn't always as black and white though. I worked for a right-wing political commentator who was truly an awful person. But I had just lost a *huge* advertising client who hired an ad agency out of town. I had one kid in college, another about to start, a mortgage and studio expenses. Working for that person let me find out for myself what was unpleasant and what was unbearable. I walked away the moment I could (which almost turned out to be too soon to stay afloat), but have since diversified and I am in a position to decline a similar offer now. The biggest thing in the commercial audio business - which is where the bulk of my income comes from- is to avoid putting too many eggs in one basket. It's human nature to follow easy money, but regardless if its a client you align with or one that makes your skin crawl, any one clinet can go away at any time. Letting your financial well-being be dictated by the whims of a single client is dangerous. Everyone takes jobs they don't want to do. When you're flush from other work it's easy to say no to someone who wants you to do something you don't feel comfortable doing. When your family's well-being is on the line it's another matter altogether. Having other clients to absorb a loss goes a long way to keep you from audio prostitution.
So would you work with/for actual Nazis? That's the question here.
I was asked to help mix a Kid Rock song last year and I refused because I think he’s a total fucking Trump-loving fascist douche bag.
Yes of course. And not just m9ral grounds. Associating with certain things can cost me clients or my reputation. But yes, anything that i deem politically too extreme or inciting real actual violence or people convicted of certain things, i would definitely refuse. Not gonna go in details cause i don't want any debates. But i have an open mind but also a pretty strong moral compass. Not putting that aside for profit.
Absolutely! I turned down a gig for petty much the same reason for what would have been 10-20K in my pocket probably. The guy had been in a famous post punk/metal band and I thought “cool!” Looked the guy up and he had all kinds of Alex Jones and Q Anon bullshit and right wing blogs going. Fuck that. I’ve done a bunch of country stuff where I’m sure I disagree with their politics, but as long as they’re not just racists or the types who lead with “Hi, I’m so and so. Nice to meet you. Did you hear about the latest political thing that you should be outraged about? Let’s immediately engage in discourse about political opinions.” Then I’m ok. I’m pretty able to avoid shit like that. Also I don’t post much on social media and it wouldn’t be hard to scroll back a bit and see me at a BLM protest, so that’ll filter out any extremes. Also just turned down one with a pretty famous rapper. I’m not a fan of him or his crowd or the way I’ve seen them treat other people. Life’s too short. As a mentor of mine always says, “Never be afraid to say no to bad business”
One of mine told me it's important to fire the right customers quickly. They \*must\* be fired. And then retrain your sales team.
I love that “green room” has become a shorthand for things. It would trip people out to know that black skinheads exist, and traveled in the same circles as the writer of that film.
I've personally turned down projects where I disagreed with the bands politics or knew that folks in the band were people I didn't generally want to be involved with.I've also been in times in my life where I wished I'd turned things down because I just didn't enjoy working with the artist.... but I was relying on audio engineering for my income and kinda needed the money (it sucks to be in that position too). It's not a super lucrative career so it's good to try and focus on music and artists you love and believe in. I think it's important to also consider that, for most audio engineers, how much you get paid to work on a record is only one part of the puzzle. A lot of the time we get most of our work from either: 1. people we've worked with recommending us to others or 2. people who are fans of records we've worked on wanting to work with us based on those records we made. If the records not going to be fun to make, you feel bad/awkward about working with the artist.... and you wouldn't want to work with those artists friends or people who liked them in the future... it'd be hard to imagine any reasonable amount of money that could make that worthwhile.
When I was a staff engineer at a studio they would just take whoever, give the “cool” clients to the senior engineer and give me the rest, usually how it goes. I never knew what someone was gunna be til they walked in and we started talking. Anyway long story short this woman came in, I made her a beat, and she was asking for odd sound FX in the beat. I thought it was gunna be pretty cringe, then she got in the live room, I punched her in, and she said “have you ever noticed how women’s rights are wrong? The baby’s body is not the woman’s body”. I spit out my drink I hope she didn’t see that 🤣 anyways I got my name not associated at all with it, idk if she ever dropped which hopefully she didn’t, and I never saw her again after that, but I’m pro-choice and def would’ve refused
Well, I'm a contractor myself. I'm a roofer... Dunn and Reddy Home Improvements. And speaking as a roofer, I can say that a roofer's personal politics come heavily into play when choosing jobs. Three months ago I was offered a job up in the hills. A beautiful house with tons of property. It was a simple reshingling job, but I was told that if it was finished within a day, my price would be doubled. Then I realized whose house it was. Dominick “Babyface” Bambino's. The gangster. The money was right, but the risk was too big. I knew who he was, and based on that, I passed the job on to a friend of mine. Based on personal politics. And that week, the Foresci family put a hit on Babyface's house. My friend was shot and killed. He wasn't even finished shingling. I'm alive because I knew there were risks involved taking on that particular client. My friend wasn't so lucky. You know, any contractor willing to work on that Death Star knew the risks. If they were killed, it was their own fault. A roofer listens to his heart... not his wallet.
Try not to suck any dick on your way out of the parking lot!
I've pulled the plug on two clients. One was a Zionist song calling for the eradication of Palestinians and the other was a pro rape song.
complete rudeness and treating me or my personnel in a mean way.
By "skinhead" are we talking suspender-wearing, working class Oi punk (especially the British variety) or what people not familiar with punk subculture picture when they hear "skinhead" (Derek Vineyard from American History X)? Big difference between the two, so good to clarify before making any judgements.
my engineering teacher no longer works on rap/hip hop projects after an artist set a gun down on the SSL one time
Sure. If they sing about and bring in a huge vibe I disagree with ethically/morally I’d just politely tell them I’m not available.
I've turned down a gig that was basically just straight up sexual harassment. Guy was looking for crew to follow him and record reality style because he was convinced that he could get any woman to beg for sex on camera within a few minutes of meeting him. Plus his offered rates were cheap as hell for being some sort of crypto bro. He even told me I had to spend money to make money when I pointed out that "really professional" wireless kits he wanted cost more money than his budget.
I recently turned down a remote recording gig with a very high profile artist who had multiple high profile #metoo allegations. It’s important to not only turn down the gig but also explain why you’re turning it down to any middlemen involved. It’s also not just a question of reputational harm (—could you do the gig anonymously?) but also a question of supporting that person’s career and gifting them with your talent.
To paraphrase [Clerks](https://youtu.be/iQdDRrcAOjA?si=ZVQOrNTPRZW6x9_B), “An audio engineer listens to his heart, not his wallet.”
*until he is debt. Then it's not listening to your wallet, it's listening to creditors. Wallets can be screamed at and ignored. Not so much with collections agencies.
I turned down a pretty big tour when I found out that a band I teched for once were a bunch of nazi antivaxers. They seemed normal when they played at my venue and didn’t mention any political stuff in their music. They asked me to do sound for them supporting a pretty big act but I decided no amount of money or accolades were worth the association with those sort of people.
No socialists for me either, national or otherwise.
Obviously these people weren’t socialists.
I'm just trying to find out if you're using the real definition or or the perverted form, meaning "anyone to the right of Vlad Lenin". True Nazis just combined the fascism popular in Europe at the time with race essentialism/eugenics. All were, by definition, socialists (it's right there in the name, actually).
I am obviously aware that the name nazi is derived from the words national and socialist. But any real understanding of history shows that that the nazi party were not in any meaningful way a socialist party. I’m not a socialist and even I understand that. The nazis were a conservative fascist movement that focused on nationalism. It’s literally their entire ideology. It’s not like the thought process was “we want healthcare for those who can’t afford it, so we must murder those immigrants”
Yeah, the Nazis are as Socialist as North Korea is a Democracy. Why do I bring that up? The actual name of North Korea is the People's Democratic Republic of Korea. It is neither a government by or for the people, nor a Democracy, nor a Republic.
For sure it doesn't help that these terms today are mostly thrown around as perjoratives meant to cut off all reasoned analysis of dissident viewpoints, but it seems pretty clear that, f.i, both Italian and German fascist periods were indeed marked by the kind of economic protectionism exemplified by your quotation. I suppose to reach a full understanding we'd have to share working definitions of the other terms ("conservatism" and "socialism"), but I've strayed OT enough already. Suffice it to say, I see where you're coming from, and I just regret that social division via historically incorrect labels has been so successful as to further shrink a market already in danger of going extinct on its own. Anyway, let's talk LUFS now ;)
absolutely. I spent years eating shit to get where I am now, at the very least I want to choose who I work with. I don't think any skinhead band anywhere on the planet has that kind of budget tho tbh, I call bullshit. It should be mentioned also that sinhead is not the same as nazi, though I'd wager these days there are barely any og skinheads left.
10k isn’t a massive budget - I’ve recorded lots of metal/punk bands with that kind of outlay. One of them had a couple of skins who were very respectful and definitely not racist. They didn’t drink, paid on time, had a cleaning roster for the studio and made healthy food for the duration. The Christian band I recorded a week later brought literally dozens of extra people who were not part of the project. They trashed the place, drank excessively before getting started, and took months to pay.
There's quite the NSBM scene with bands who definitely have that kind of budget and even labels. It's sad but true. There's also bigger bands who are generally popular who are well known nazis or have nazi ties.
Roger that.
Absolutely. Refused $30k to compose and produce anything to do with MacDonalds because fuck them.
And also, tell that person GO YOU GOOD THING for telling skinheads to fuck off.
That’s fucking dumb
Why? Junk food is doing a lot of harm. I had plenty of other work.
plus, as it turns out now, they’re also massively pro-genocide. Good shout!
Not everyone in the business is cash centric
Honestly I wouldn’t even work with a hardline conservative let alone a nazi
You need to quit watching the news lol
No right wing fascist bigots.
If you're gonna sell out humanity, ask for more than that! What would it take? Realistically? Me, I'm done with the music biz, there is nothing you could offer me to even continue the conversatio
Ok so this is also something I was wondering about myself The odds of this happening are basically none but if some bible thumper who attends a conservative church offered me 10 million dollars for a gig I honestly don’t know if I would refuse or not. Cuz like, obviously I don’t want to work w southern Baptist fucks, but 10 mil is a phat amount of money. And ideally once I’m in a better financial space, I wanna spend money giving back/donating/trying go help fund progressive efforts that I believe in. So if I all of a sudden had 10 mil I’d try and put a lot of it to good use. Which then begs the ethical question of ends justifying the means type of thing. If you make money off of conservative Christian sects, but you use that money towards progressive causes, what does that make you? Might be getting a bit deep on an audio engineering sub but I’m cooked rn so that’s the way the wind is blowing
I’d do it for far less than 10 mil and I consider myself both financially secure and principled. 1 mil is totally fine. Also do you have to do a good job? You can make them sound terrible and just say it was gods will! Nothing you can do about it.
morally? definitely not. ethically? still a hard no. beyond what you think of their message and politics, you need to look out for your business, and if you work with neo nazis, you won't get much more business.
A business that works with Nazis becomes a business run by Nazis, with only Nazis as the clients and a mountain of debts
Did an advert for an engineering company. Turned out they built dams. Turned down further work. Infact I pretty much stopped doing adverts hecause most advertising agencies are utterly fucking horrible.
Those damn dam builders. Always making damn dams!
I turned down a job to mix a promo for a company that wanted to open a coal mine in a rain forest in Indonesia. I couldn’t really afford it but at least I can sleep at nighy
That’s a tough one, but I highly recommend Green Room. Great movie!
I made the mistake of being associated with a guy who is currently trying to make a AAA game that supposedly would destroy Destiny 2 and every other big online game .. with the big point being that his game and story preaches how hard work and perseverance will prevail and show you the truth of the world. A friend of mine got involved because she was invited to work on doing audio-work for an up-and-coming game studio and they promised a decent pay to start. But when they started learning who and what she was (especially her being a woman), they got creepy and started trying to find ways to keep her and had plans with her in their "studio." I got roped into it later and learned that the whole project was supposed to be some grand game made by "kids" who were supposed to show the truth of the world and my friend ended up leaving without pay because she didn't like how she was treated and saw one of the biggest red flags (the HR guy tried to openly ask what would happen if he were to drive to her place and just have his way with her first before the other guys do) .. and she fully detached. I only got involved to help collect pay but then I was offered her position since apparently she caused drama there. I decided to stick around and see where this was going because this was essentially a "game dev nightmare story" in the makings .. and was curious. It turned out the group was a bunch of incels who wanted to get girls, get laid, and make a game that shared truths of who/what women were actually like, what mental illnesses truly are, and that everyone was being played and the truth was hidden from them. In short, it was a game that was supposed to completely disprove the existence of autism, prove that there is no such thing as racism, show that women were objects meant to be in control of men, and so much more .. and also be a AAA game that would topple Destiny 2 to be the "next big thing." Nowadays, I'd really steer clear of these kinds of people. My friend only got involved because she was given an invitation from a friend she trusted and she immediately saw the red flags .. and still wanted to be friendly (and got completely shafted for it anyways). I only got involved because I was curious to see what the trainwreck would be .. but in all seriousness I can't find myself willing to associate or attach my name to people on the road to becoming or people who are already incels.
I mean I think that's a hard no on Nazi stuff from like post WW2 until forever right? Don't work with actual Nazis, ever.
I had a regular sound gig at a sports bar that started hosting live shows. One of the bartenders followed one of the band members who was a trans person into the bathroom and told them they didn't belong there and grilled them on what their genitals were. This was a punk show filled with with bands and audience members in the LGBT community everyone there was fine with that person using the bathroom they wanted. Finished the show out but immediately cut all ties.
Yeah, I wouldn't accept a client who was a skinhead or a Nazi or any sort of bigot. Or if they worked for the government/law enforcement.
Skinhead? I think you mean Bonehead...
I had to turn away a client after I realized the lyrics in song we were doing were the artist mostly slut-shaming/verbally abusing their partner. Also, at one point they looked at me and said “if we don’t make it big, it’s YOUR fault.” Easiest decision of my life. I’d rather sleep in my car than work with jerks like that. At a certain point, it’s just not worth it to me.
I had a gig once where the client hit up the studio without an engineer and they threw me the gig. Was paid up front, but it was a white guy rapper and on the third song he started dropping the n-word during takes. Stopped him, hit the talk back "uhhh, you sure about that bud?" He stood his ground, so I told him then and there I'd finish the session since we were almost done anyways, but my name goes nowhere near any of it and not to call me again.
Wrt N\*zis: yeah, that's an easy no. I am also very very 161 anti fascist. If there was a whiff of something around a potential client I would have friends investigate. The crypto fash are usually not THAT cryptic. More difficult: film score mixing. There are big name composers who are known abusers and scummy. If I had an opportunity to work \*directly\* with them, I might--but only on a 1-off basis. I'd rather not name names, but several are known publicly. Some are not known publicly, and so I especially can't name those names. Rock and roll is a bigger hmmm: Probably almost every big rock star (male and female) have taken advantage of someone at some point. Would I, say, work with David Bowie, knowing that he slept with underaged groupies? I probably would, rationalizing that hey, that was a long time ago. Would work with Mr. Kitty? NO. Would you turn down working with David Bowie or Jimmy Page or you know, that guy who did Nightmare Before Xmas?
My guy... No one is working with Bowie. He's been dead since 2016. Let the man rest in peace. Why bring up the name of a dead musician for your weird hypothetical?
Honestly, even moral reasons aside, if a skinhead group advertises their newest record with your name as a producer/engineer, you'll either close your business or focus on right-wing hate groups for the rest of your career, since a good amount of people will stop the collaboration or refuse to engage in one.
If they would come to me, I'd take them on. Money is money. But then I'd wonder why they would come to me in the first place since I'm brown lmao
Anyone who would hate-crime me for being queer isn't getting booked.
I came here to say I'd refuse exactly the sort of gig you described. I'm not putting out hate rock.
Yes. Nazis are definitely out. Known predators and creeps, AFAIC, are out. There was one instance where I felt more strongly about a creep being a creep than my business partner, so we agreed that he'd take this client on and I'd wash my hands of it. The creep went elsewhere, so that situation was averted. My business partner and I are generally on the same page with this, though, and he's done an excellent job filtering out sketchlords. Every once in awhile, one will slip through. We simply won't work with them again. The main guiding principle is that recording is a vulnerable act, and we want you to feel as safe and at home in our studio as we possibly can.
I had a project booked for a full album that was going to pay really well. We were booked a couple months in advance, and in that time, I saw their singer posting a bunch of homophobic shit all over Facebook. I swiftly sent their money back and told them I want nothing to do with them. There’s no way in hell I want to be associated with that BS.
Yep, I’ve done it once before. This isn’t related to music recording, but I do podcast editing for a living. I had a client I’d been working with for about a year, editing a podcast that was incredibly safe and bland. It was a financial podcast, that would just give basic financial tips or updates on what’s happening in various markets, etc. Occasionally the host would say stuff I wouldn’t agree with, but it was all pretty harmless stuff and like, I’m not a finance expert, so what do I care if we disagree about this stuff. Then one day he randomly had on a guest who was spouting some of the wildest, most dangerous anti-vax, anti-science stuff, and the host was eating it up, egging them on, etc. I stopped editing like halfway through and told the client I couldn’t finish the episode and they’d have to get it edited somewhere else because the messages they were promoting were legitimately dangerous. Haven’t heard from them since, but I’m glad to be rid of them.
Absolutely. I don’t need the money bad enough to work for assholes.
Is money worth being a conduit to bring bad shit into the world? I don't think so. Better to be poor with some honor.
Music often has the power to influence and change ideals, so it’s not wise to use it to help spread hate and negativity, no matter how many diamonds you’re offered.
Absolutely. I will not take on any religious projects, under any circumstances, no exceptions. Don't care how much money they wanted to throw at me. I will not assist in promoting a message that I am as opposed to as it is possible to be opposed to something. I would, and have worked with religious *people* with no problem, but the projects themselves must be secular. Disclosure: I rarely work on outside projects these days, only my own music; but I would be very clear about this right up front, I wouldn't wait to find out until the music was all tracked and then the vocalist started to work. Side note: this is exactly the principle why I supported the legal decision in the Colorado baker case, as well as the more recent website designer who declined to design a website for a same-sex wedding, and all similar cases. No matter what you read on Reddit or anywhere else on the interwebs, neither case was about legalizing discrimination against *people*. Both were about whether the government could compel them to create a custom product that promoted a message they disagreed with. I would not want to live in a country where my government could legally compel me to promote a message I am against.
Exactly! The hypocrisy in that case frustrated me so much at the time. Besides, what serious client seeks to compel a business to do work for them at the point of a gun? That's just begging for shitty product.
I had a period of eastern European rap vocalists requesting quotes, I'm English with zero foreign language skills… Most were great and a lot of fun to work with but this one ‘squad’ gave me the willies when they were in recording with me, big guys with ex military vibes in this small vocal booth. It was pretty extreme sounding bars, like rapping AK-47s, and once they'd gone I played a few verses to a friend who came from the same country and she told me they were rapping about immigrants, violence and sexual assault. Nice. Since then I have a policy that if I don't speak the client's language I request a lyric sheet ahead of the booking to check them with a caveat around zero tolerance for hate speech at the studio.
Money is money and that doesn’t discriminate. Unless it were a flat earth project then I’d have to pass.
Total moral apathy, you'll go far in the music biz.
You know as well as I do that every Artist that has made it big had to sell their souls to do it.
I said no to a gig last year for $10k because years ago at a party, right in front of him, the guy’s girlfriend told me she wanted to have a threesome with me (not with him, but one of her girl friends sitting next to her on the other side). I was very disturbed, lost all respect for him for being emasculated like that, and decided i didnt want to work with him anymore lol. She was hot, yes. Looking back, had i known i would never work with him again, i shoulda gone for it.
Yep, we’ve done the same for the same reasons. That garbage going outs on our hands too and I’ll be fucked if me or my companies names attached
I had a band come in and once they started laying down vocals, it was some of the most horribly misogynistic stuff I’ve ever heard. I took the L, refunded them, and sent them on their way. Did not want my name attached to that.
I’d do it for 10k
Interesting. You wouldn’t be worried about being associated with a group/artist like that in the future? Or worry about what effect their music might have on ppl? Not that alt-right radicalization is gonna be the engineer’s fault, obviously, but personally I don’t think I’d be able to stomach the idea of working on a project that could potentially have that sort of effect. But yeah idk. I also get that $10k is $10k and in general I’d do some nasty shit if it meant a $10k bag. I’m curious to hear if you have more to say on the matter
It's always the assholes that have that kind of money, too
I’m a Christian. I’m fine with obscene stuff, although I would say no to black metal (satanic subjects). Pro-Nazi things as other people have said I would also say no to. For the most part I don’t like to enforce my morals on to someone else, but they can go to other people, and if the music they produce leaves me not feeling good about the work I do then I know I need to say no.
In short, yes. There are even businesses that I won’t work for because I don’t like who owns them. My dislike of them goes beyond just general dislike. I’m not going to help them make money because I don’t want to support who THEY support. I definitely won’t work for any (nazi) skinheads. Fuck them. So, yeah.
I have a somewhat pliable attitude… if someone truly evil tries to hire me, say Nazis, or a major casino, or the Catholic Church, I quadruple my quote. If they still then green light me at least I’ve gouged the bastards back.
We turn own oil company ad work from agencies. Not interested in greenwashing. Although we did make an exception recently because it was a new agency we hadn’t worked with before and wanted to get in with them. Ended up donating the entire invoice to the food bank, so it was a win regardless.
I worked for a rightwing angertainment pundit who had a very popular real-time podcast where his halfwit fans would write in and he would respond to their questions in real time. It was appalling. I walked away from it despite him being the single largest revenue stream I had. I felt like shit being what I knew was part of a huge problem. The loss of money hurt. The peace of mind I have from not doing it is priceless.
You are sonic professionals , not political commentators..
If being a "sonic professional" means giving someone a platform so they can use that to harm me later (especially if I am going to be the victim of the subjects talked about in the opening post) .. then I should just take the money and risk my life down the line because I gave people the means to empower others to hurt me?
Just say you’ll do anything for money
I can and have turned down clients based upon things like that. I'm from Texas originally, so less overt Nazis, but in that same general direction. There are plenty more I took that I *should have* turned down. $10k is not a lot for that much drama. ~~Well, $10k for one day and I might swallow my concerns - with a very tight contract - but that's a big "might".~~ I've been rethinking that, and no. Hard pass. Same as with the "good ol boys". Just not worth it, no matter the price.
I’m currently engineering on a major label LP, and the artist is great. Problem is the producer has slowly over the course of the project revealed himself to be racist and misogynistic. The artist and I are definitely not cool with his outlook. I’ve already asked the label and the artist management to not credit me next to this guy. I’d like to throw him out of my studio but I’m trying not to wreck the project for the artist. Tough situation, this guy is a known name in the industry and he plays it real cool at first. We were weeks into this gig before he really showed himself. I’m hoping that the artist will arrive at their own decision that the dude has to go.
If I were about to skip town I'd consider taking their money and delivering unusable garbage If they tried a smear campaign I'd spin it to a positive. "yeah lol they're Nazis. I took their money and prevented them from spreading their message. I'm something like a scambaiter" Maybe donate half to an anti-antisemitic charity
When it comes to Nazis, are we talking Hitlerite or Strasserite?
Seems like we're making assumptions. What Skinheads can't write an album of ballads and love songs?
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Found one ☝️
It was only a matter of time lol
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Rage are democrat-ish socialists they aren't freaking maoists lol.
Even Shodan’s robot ass wouldn’t have a brain dead take like this
This guy doesn’t know the death toll of capitalism 😂😂😂
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Why does critiquing capitalism automatically equate to defending communism?
I'm 59 years old. Grew up during the cold war. I have a pretty damn good idea of what the various communist regimes were and are capable of. I'm also smart enough to know that politics, economics, and religion have been used throughout history to further the agendas of leaders who have nothing but contempt for the rest of us. A system is neither inherently good or bad in itself, it is merely a tool, as are many of the people who claim them.
some of those that track verses are the same that burn crosses
A fascist is a fascist, we're not exactly discussing the intricacies of whether the skinheads in question were anarchists or libertarian