Insights In Sound 188 – Vanessa Parr, Audio Engineer/Educator S19 E8 – Live from Village Studios

Welcome to Insights and Sound, where we talk to the people behind the scenes, behind the technology, and behind the
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We are live from Village Studios. I would like to welcome my guest, Vanessa Park.
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Thank you. Happy to be here. Let’s start with your basic background. Um, where do you come from?
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I’m from Virginia. I’m from Northern Virginia, uh, DC suburbs. So, uh, grew up in that that area and, um, moved to
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Boston for college. So, I went to Berkeley. You went to Berkeley. Mhm. 2000. Okay.
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And, uh, graduated 2004 and then came straight out here. So, by the fall of
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that year, I was here and by November, I was working in this room. I was working at the village. Wow. Yeah.
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This was your first gig kind of. Yeah. I had a brief stint at um, Mad Dog in Burbank. Oh yeah, Dusty’s
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Place. Yeah, Dusty’s Place. And that’s where I met Ross, who you had mentioned, Ross Hogarth and who was doing a Steve Brutin
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record there. So, kind of my first introduction to the Nevve world because I had come from SSL world at Berkeley.
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And ah okay. And then uh I had interviewed here a few times. It was always just a couple of
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questions and a a waiting game of waiting for them to have an opportunity for
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another runner. And uh when they did they called me and yeah I think by the end of the year I was working here as a
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runner. So what’s your musical background? What did you study at Berkeley? Uh production and engineering. Um I went
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there. I didn’t really know I was going to do that. I was a singer in high school and kind of participated in
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everything I could that had to do with music. I would arrange stuff when I could. Although I didn’t have the strongest um music theory background,
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but I kind of did a lot of stuff by ear and um hated my music theory classes. I love them.
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You know, the whole orchestration thing with parallel fifths and Oh my god. I wasn’t the biggest fan of traditional
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harmony, but I thought jazz harmony was fascinating because you could kind of analyze things from a variety of
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different perspectives. Sure. Sure. And then learning the charting systems and how those applied was was always really interesting to me. Um, but I
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started when I was at Berkeley, I I didn’t really know what I wanted to do and they had a lot of fairly practical
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majors for people that didn’t want to be performers. Um, but I ended up singing on a couple projects in the studio which
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kind of got me interested in that. So then took an intro class and applied to the major and then I just
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spent the rest of my time there in the studios and that’s kind of how I veered in this direction. It wasn’t a plan and
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I certainly didn’t know anything at all. Um, I tried to plug my mic into a bass
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amp when I first you know got to got to like I I didn’t know hey whatever works. Whatever works, right? And uh but uh but
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it was a good program. It was a pretty thorough program and they had a a really solid technical foundation which I
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appreciated. I like I don’t like learning on the fly. I like kind of immersive like making sure that
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I’m as prepared as I can possibly be. And so they they were good in that. Wow. And yet you’re in this industry.
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Well, well, as as far as like um
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yeah, I mean, I guess that’s a fair point. Yeah, every every the first day of every session always feels like the first day of school for me,
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but um but I prefer to be as prepared as possible and to Well, we try our best. We try our best
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and then of course we prepare ourselves for the fact that there’s going to be a curveball no matter what. Yeah. And I think this business teaches
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you that part of being prepared is learning how to become an instant expert at things when you need to be. So,
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that’s part of the preparation. So, um, but yeah, so I didn’t really know what I wanted to do, um, with regards to I
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didn’t know if I’d want to go more towards film television or stay more in the rock world, but I knew that LA was a place that was still making music that I
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was interested in. So, and I was very much interested in this studio because of that. Um, and I
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wanted to see real musicians in a room together. And it’s no disrespect to the pop studios that do a lot of vocals. It
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was just more that was my interest. So, I just bothered Jeff non-stop,
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harassed him until he finally relented and gave me a job. Well, it’s interesting that you mentioned that though because that’s uh
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you know to me I mean I came up in the rock era in that sense. Um, and working
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in studios that had people playing together in the same room at the same time was always my fascination because I
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came up as a performer and you know and so um to me studios like this
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were the thing you know and it really in my ignorance that’s all I knew.
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Sure. you know, um I I had a four track. I was cutting demos that way, you know,
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and then I moved to LA and I got a job at Cherokee. So, you know, same kind of thing where I was like,
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you mean there’s other kinds of ways of making music, you know, and and so, um I
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was always fascinated with that. And I think, you know, the idea of watching the musicians interact with each other
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was really, you know, to me that was what music was all about. It was it was everything. And I’ve never
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I I like technology, but I’m not a super technical person in the sense that like I don’t geek out over new equipment and
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like I love gear and I love all that stuff, but I see it as a means to an end. Like it’s a tool. Thank you.
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And Yes. Yes. So I don’t talk specifications on stuff. I don’t remember serial numbers. Like,
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you know, I’m I’m not one of those people. Um for sure. Doesn’t mean I don’t know what I’m doing, but it’s like I I just I’m It’s not my fascination.
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But I think I was lucky when I was here that, you know, after I started assisting, I got to work with people
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that were also very much interested in making acoustic music. Um, and that those interactions were super
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important. And everything, all of that equipment, all that gear was just a tool to kind of
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help facilitate the music party, which I was very much um happy to be involved with. and a bunch of kind of renegades
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and people that were bucking tradition and bucking methodology that was common at the time for me was super exciting to
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be in a room with people like that and I sometimes I look back on some things and I’m like I can’t believe I was in a room
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with those people like that’s crazy you know that’s been you know for so for so many of us it’s like you know just the idea
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that we’ve actually you know met these people and worked with these people that we you know whose music we grew up
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listening to. Sure. But but you rais an interesting point that I really um I think about
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very often. In fact, I I got into a conversation, shall we say, recently on
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social media with someone because they had raised the premise of whether or not
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it was the idea of fetishizing about a certain microphone. Oh god. You know, and to me it’s like, yeah, I
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love gear. Yeah. You know, I nerd out on all this stuff. Absolutely. But at the same time, it’s
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like, you know, I it bothers me sometimes that people lose sight of what we’re doing
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with this gear. You know, it’s the idea is we’re trying to capture music. We’re trying to capture something that’s, you
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know, a once in a-lifetime performance. And it’s like I’d rather have a 57, you know, and a
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really, really brilliant artist, you know, and yeah, I get it. I I really do understand why we use the gear and I
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love the gear, you know. Yeah, of course. But yeah, it’s like, you know, you’re drawn to it because of what we’re doing
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with it. Yeah. And you know, I love I think if if I had a gear fascination, it would be more on the front end. It’s I love
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microphones. I love speakers and microphones and that kind of stuff. But at the end of the day, like you say, it
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doesn’t that’s not the that doesn’t make the record. And you get into this all the time, I feel like, especially nowadays when when things are more
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sterile and more clinical because of the way that like people are recording more at home and more things are obviously
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more things are in the box. And I’m not saying that’s a bad thing, but people get really obsessed with gear and
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especially front end Yeah. And it’s like that ain’t going to make the song,
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right? You know that I mean it’s great if you can use obviously we want to use the best tools that we possibly can for
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every recording, but it’s it ain’t the microphone that makes the recording. Exactly.
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So I um I 100% agree on that. Yeah. I mean I you know we we were
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talking about this just yesterday too. There’s an engineer whose stuff I really like, um,
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guy named John Kunie, and he does these one mic recordings with these Aea ribbon mics, you know,
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and he puts the whole band in a circle around it. And I love that old school approach, you know, but again, it’s like, you know,
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we’ve had this conversation, he and I, and he says, you know, first of all, it’s got to be the right band. Yeah. 100%.
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They’ve got to be able to play together. And also, the room Yeah. You know, the room is a big part of it.
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What’s the room sound like? Yeah, you know, the room’s another band member at that point. And yeah, I’ve seen that happen
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with with certain people in the past where they get it in their heads. They want to do the one mic thing and it’s like that’s cool if you guys know how to
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do it. It’s it’s all about it’s it’s all about the artist at that point and it’s pre-production.
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Yeah. And there’s there are artists that know how to do that and they do it great. But yeah, it’s not for everybody. No, it’s not. And you know, I I love the
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idea that we can have some control over things, you know. Control’s not bad. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But it’s, you know,
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I I was um I was talking to somebody recently about um I had seen the old
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Mottown studio and I don’t know if you’ve ever seen that room, but it’s tiny.
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It’s I’ve only seen it in documentaries and stuff. Yeah. It’s like a twocar garage, you know, and the idea that they fit, you know, 12,
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14, 18 people in this room, you know, and okay, Sax is going to play Step Forward. Mhm.
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Because they really worked on that stuff and they had such a groove going. Yeah. You know, they could have done it
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without a mic. Yeah, for sure. Yeah. I I recorded a record a couple years ago where we did it all in a room with minimal isolation.
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So, I don’t even we didn’t even use headphones on every song. Like sometimes we had them and sometimes we didn’t. And I remember being very nervous
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because the room wasn’t big. It was probably about the size of this control room. And there was going to be a drummer there. And
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Oops. Well, that was my thought. But I was like, I’ve done too many KCRWs. Like, I know how this is going to end. And then,
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but the musicians knew how to understood how to play together in that capacity. So, the drummer did not wail, you know,
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he he balanced very much with everybody. And it was actually we had ended up
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having a lot of control, like way more control than I thought we were. So, it was all to do with the musicians and and
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their competency and and awareness of the situation. So, um, yeah, always always stressful
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knowing going in that that could be a possibility that it could all get blown up if one person doesn’t understand the balance. And so,
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yeah. Yeah. Well, that would usually be the lead guitarist. No, no, sorry. I’ve seen all kinds of culprits in that.
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Oh, it’s true. It’s true. Yeah. Yeah. This is I mean, again though, this is why I like this room because there is
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a lot of isolation, but there’s also really good sight lines. They have good sight lines and I love the I love the
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corner layout like you know because people can spread out and they’re kind of tucked away yet they’re also close and that’s a unique
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thing. Not a lot of places have that. So what um what was your experience training in this place?
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I was probably pretty similar to a lot of other people that came up in the studio system. You know you started off
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they told us then it’s all dying. None of us are going to have jobs in a few years. They’re still right. you know,
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and that doom and gloom, doom and gloom as always, and this is kind of the height of the Napster era. And uh,
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but it was great. I mean, I walked in and I always tell people this, and it’s true that Oasis was in studio A,
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Courtney Love and Billy Corgan were in studio B, Ninish Nails was in this room, Janet Jackson was upstairs, and Jimmy
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Jam and Terry Lewis were on the third floor. And that was my first day of work. And it’s like that that’s magical. Like
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that’s that’s so cool. And so yeah, you spend a lot of time getting coffee and and helping to set up and tear down
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sessions. And I think still believe that that’s a very valuable experience. Absolutely.
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Um just getting to understand the flow of sessions, how people work, when is it
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appropriate to be in different spaces, how do how do the rooms work, what are the layouts of the rooms, what’s the
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patching like, what’s you know, what’s the bad outlet you’re not supposed to touch? Like you know, there’s always one. Like just all the little things
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that you start should you not use? Yeah, exactly. Which which faders aren’t taped over but should be taped over, you
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know. Um, so I did that for about a year. Um, and I was working a lot. I was working the front desk. I was running. And the
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way it usually happens here is if they have an availability, they’ll kind of throw you on a session and just see how it goes. And I shadowed another
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assistant here and it was with Leslanne Jones and in Studio A, which was great and super cool. And that went okay. Mhm.
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And so then I got put on as a shadow um on a T-Bone
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brunette session, which was a tracking session for Across the Universe, the movie. And um that was wild. And
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that went on for like six to eight months or something like something crazy like that.
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It wasn’t that long actually now that I’m remembering. It was probably more like three to six months somewhere in there. It felt like it was perfect. No,
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I get the mixing and the tracking confused because the the tracking ended and that was great. We had three drummers. It was Kelner and Jay Belrose
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and Carlos Zar and they were, you know, all out in that just a bunch of nobodyies and like the whole T-Bone crew of that era.
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And then once that ended, they decided I was okay enough to assist. And so then I went for
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almost a year on the Dixie Chicks for or the Chicks now um with Rick Rubin and Jim Scott um and Chris Ta. And that was
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terrifying and great and a huge learn on the job situation. Um,
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well, especially with somebody like Rick Rubin who really kind of throws you in on the deep end and says, “Here, handle it.” Right.
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Yeah. I mean, I think it’s easy to kind of look at him and and think of it as being, especially at that point, a
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little handsoff. But I also think that there’s a machine that works around him. And if that machine isn’t working, if
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you’re not a part of it, you’re not going to last very long. Someone’s going to let you know, right? So, it may look like dad’s not home, but
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dad’s always home. Oh, dad’s always home. But that’s just the thing. dad’s watching you and you have to kind of find your place in that
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sense. Yeah. And I I love Jim Scott and he was wonderful to work underneath for for
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that long and just what an education to get to work with him and then when that was over went right back to across the universe and now we
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were overdubbing and mixing. So for like two years it was like you know backtoback really long lock
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by fire. Yeah. Yeah. And the across the universe days of the mixing were three 51 rigs in
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the room. One in the live room, one in here, one for recording. you’re everyone’s manning a rig, you know, just complete chaos. Every channel on the
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board being used um and totally fun and crazy. Wow.
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So, yeah, it was great. I feel like I got the true like LA thrown into it experience. Um I feel very fortunate um
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that I was able to come to a studio that still after all these years is still
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here like we’re still in this room which is amazing when so many other places are not. Yeah. Um
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and as you say the idea of all these different people Wow, that that always I mean that’s the stuff I miss too.
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Oh, I love that. Like, you know, I I work on this for ages and then it’s like, okay, you’re going to work with Hal Wilner for six months now and that’s
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going to be awesome. And then, okay, we’re going to throw you on a Thomas Newman movie and then, you know, it’s just that that constant back and forth
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of like different types of projects that it’s titillating and it keeps you interested. And the live broadcasts for KCRW for years
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were like incredibly uh educational. I I just interviewed
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Josh Rogeson last week in fact in New York and and that again that fascinated me because he has this completely
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different approach you know um recording people as a journalist as opposed to
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putting uh you know a certain mic on the kick and everything. It’s like no I just like you know I throw it up in the room
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and you know get it live. Yeah. You know. Yeah. I mean it’s it’s it’s an amazing
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process and you learn so much about the board and the statuses. Like I felt like there was a period where I don’t feel
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like anyone knew more about this desk than I did because of all the things I was constantly I mean that’s not true but I felt like it felt like that at the
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time. You had to learn it in so many different context. Yeah. Yeah. Um and yeah the lives were
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Yeah. the scariest thing but also super fun. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. But and I mean I think
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also it’s not just learning the technical stuff but as you say you know it’s being there in the sessions
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watching the creative process happen. You know, I loved the idea of watching over the shoulder of these producers and
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watching the psychology aspect of it, you know. Oh, yeah. That’s another whole thing. Yeah, absolutely. And it’s um I’ve been
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so fortunate to work with so many really awesome producers and you learn so much from them and you learn you also learn
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from the ones that aren’t the best and you learn kind of when things go wrong, you’re like, “All right, I’ve I’ve learned a lesson here.” And y
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um don’t do that. Don’t do that. Yeah. Um there’s few people that are as situationally
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aware all the time I feel like as people who have been assistants for a long time
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and even now and I haven’t I haven’t been staff here in over 10 years but like if I’m in a situation somewhere and
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I can sort of start to sense things happening behind me even if it’s a restaurant or something like that I’m always looking at like what’s going on
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or what do I need to do or you know that that instinct doesn’t really go way um ever.
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It’s true. It’s true. And not just the situational stuff, but really kind of learning to read people.
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Yeah. You know, read nuance, read facial expressions, all of that stuff that I think um
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in certain ways we don’t think about. Yeah. In our daily lives. But yeah, it becomes sort of a sixth sense, doesn’t it?
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Yeah. I mean, I worked with a a fairly well-known artist who the first question he asked me was, “What’s your sign?”
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And I’m not an astrology person. And I was like, “I’m a cancer.” and and he’s like, “Okay, interesting.”
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And I looked at his assistant, he was like, “Cancer’s good.” And I think that what that means is like
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he’s looking for a certain amount of like um a caretaker vibe or quality or empathetic person of some sort, you
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know? And it’s like, yeah, I, you know, regardless of whether you believe in any of that, it’s like, I understand that it takes a person that is
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um that is empathetic in a way to the people around them, perhaps to an
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unhealthy extent, to truly thrive in that environment a little bit.
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You know, there’s a codependency aspect and and there’s a codependency as all of Yeah. Well, I work with a lot of um I I do
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presentations and workshops on on neurodeiversity and we’re all on the spectrum somewhere,
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you know, big time. And so, um but you know, I mean, that’s an interesting point because yeah, there’s a lot of
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that codependency. There’s a lot of that um you know, I’m damaged in this way,
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you’re damaged in that way, you know, kind of if you want to look at it that way. I think I I prefer to call it gifted.
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Gifted. There you go. Thank you. you know, but yeah, we are, you know, in a certain sense, I mean, how are you going
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to get that magic if you’re not that way? Yeah. And I I think the only reason I
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use the word damaged is because there is an unhealth starts to happen. What starts to happen is this almost
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unhealthy obsession with the moods and feelings and swings of someone that is not yourself. Yeah.
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And I’ve learned that sometimes the most difficult people I work with are not the artists, they’re the engineers or
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they’re the producers. And especially with the engineers, I think it takes people by surprise because people assume
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that all engineers are kind of clinical and leftrain. They are there are I I call them the rockstar engineers and the like
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analytical engineers. That’s interesting. And the rockstar engineers kind of have to be nurtured and coddled a little bit
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like an artist and they need more breaks and they need to clear their thoughts and they, you know, they’re more vibe
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inspired. But I get it because now that I’ve done so much more mixing, I’m like mixing is such an artistic endeavor. It
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is it is such a creative endeavor and there’s a lot of ego in it. There’s a lot of ego in it and you do have to kind of stoke that fire and you
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have to to fill that pot. And so um yeah, that’s why I feel like letting go
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a little bit of that need to like track and be aware of of other people’s energy
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is hard to do. It is. It is. And you become sort of a denmother in a way. Oh yeah.
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But yeah, it’s uh it’s funny. So, where have you where have you progressed to now? What do you do these days?
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I mean, I don’t know if we ever progress. We just keep move we just keep moving. Um, digressed. Yeah, we just I I mean, I’ve been around
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I I spent some time on the East Coast um kind of during COVID and and um around
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those years just dealing with family stuff and um came back about three years ago. So,
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it’s almost felt like I’ve just moved out here again. So, it’s kind of weird. Um but we um
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city’s changed a lot in those years too. It’s changed a lot and yet there’s a lot that’s the same. I mean the overall feel
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LA will always be LA is LA. Gotta love it. Um but uh yeah
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nowadays um my husband’s an engineer as well. Terrific engineer and he
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is he left brain or right brain? He’s kind of both. I always think that he walks that line of like he’s got the
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some of the rockstar tendencies. He’s got a lot of the analytical. I feel like he’s kind of in the middle which is interesting.
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Um he would disagree but that’s my assessment. Um, but no, we
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work a lot more these days in like film and television. So, he’s a music editor. I’m kind of an aspiring music editor at
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this point. So, I’ve done a lot of assisting editing on his projects. And then I did some music
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editing on a documentary for HBO. And um I also record whenever I can. So,
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anytime someone says, “Hey, let’s do something,” I’m like, “Yeah, let’s do it.” Uh, I know a place. I know a place. I know I know lots of
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places. Um, I teach classes at Berkeley, so I teach online. um
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ProTools classes and production analysis classes and I went there earlier this year and
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did like a a clinic with Larry Klein, like a recording session. I love Larry. Oh, yeah. He’s the best. Yeah,
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Larry’s sweet. And so smart and so interesting. Um definitely one to learn from, not
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he gets off on these interesting conversational tangents, you know. Yeah, I had him on a panel on a NAM panel a
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couple of years ago and uh he would just kind of meander a little bit and I’d have to
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do this a lot because he’s definitely he’s got like so much going on in his head. Oh, and he’s lived a life like I think
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people meet him in this era of his life and they’re like you don’t know what he was doing 30 years ago, 40 years ago. Um
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so I you know so I do stuff for Berkeley which is great. I mean, they’ve been awesome and um it’s nice to kind of see
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where kids are coming from nowadays and to check in with that. I think a lot of the basics hold up, but um it’s
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definitely a different world than when I was there. And uh I think yeah, it’s hard to tell.
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Sometimes it’s hard to tell because a lot of what I teach is on Zoom, so there’s a filter, right, between you and them. But when I went
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there in person and actually because I was kind of like, I don’t know if stuff registers and like I don’t know if they look at us like dinosaurs. Like I’m not
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sure because I don’t remember feeling that way when I was a kid, but I don’t think the gener the generation and
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technology gap wasn’t as big when I was at Berkeley as it is now. Yes. And but when I went there in person, it
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was so great like just to be able to talk to the kids and they they have the same desires and concerns that we did
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when we we were their age and they’re all, you know, brighteyed and and ready to go and and uh that’s that’s inspiring
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to see. Like I like to see that. I don’t know what world they’re walking into, but then none of us know that. So, well, and you know, their world is
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something that I mean, they don’t have our world to compare their world to. Yeah. Yeah.
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So, whatever they’re walking into, they’re walking into in that sense, you know. Yeah. Yeah. Just like we walked into
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uncertainty and I’ve watched sessions dwindle from being a year long to being three days long. I mean,
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yeah, it’s um coming in for overdubs. That’s it. That’s it. Yeah. Got to track this and then I’m taking it home.
24:09
Exactly. which I mean there’s benefits to that. So yeah, it’s it’s interesting. We always we always joke well like ask
24:16
us in 10 years how this is going because we’re we’re both the two of us, my husband and I just sort of figuring it
24:22
out. But I think it’s nice the way that things have evolved. Um because we were on the east coast when when he started
24:29
doing a lot of this music editing work and COVID hit, we were already kind of ready for that that digital transition
24:34
because we had already been set up for it. Okay. So that transition for us working remote was pretty smooth.
24:40
Um where everyone else was kind of scrambling to figure out what’s going on. Yeah. Um and uh
24:46
now we have like a a circle of producers and musicians that we like to work with and that we um try to work with as much
24:53
as possible and we all try to give each other jobs. Um but it’s a nice little east side life
24:59
that we’ve carved out for ourselves. Yeah. Yeah. But uh yeah, I don’t know. We’ll see.
25:05
I’m I am just getting up every day and hoping to keep doing this another month,
25:10
another year, another couple years. It’s all we can ever hope for. Ever hope for. Um yeah.
25:17
What do you tell these younger people now coming in? I mean, how do you what
25:22
what do you say to 15year-old you? Yeah, I think I would say, you know, the
25:29
well, 15-year-old me had some fairly different aspirations, but like I I remember when I first came out here and
25:35
there was a teacher at Berkeley, uh, Terry Becker, who, um, you passed away a long time ago, but had been a really
25:41
foundational teacher for me, especially as the only female faculty in our department. and um just her knowing her
25:49
history and her lineage with this place. Um she helped me get in contact with Jeff when I moved out here. But more
25:55
importantly than that was I was like um I hit my rental car and I need help and
26:03
she’d be like cool. I’m going to go to a mechanic. What color is it? And like got me paint swatches and like let’s help detail the bumper. like I don’t know
26:10
what car insurance company to go for or like just the practical stuff of being in LA and and trying to understand how
26:17
the city works and just being a supportive older person in my life that um there was never any judgment on any
26:23
questions. She was just like text me, call me, whatever. And well, I guess this was actually pre-text. But
26:28
having someone like that in your life is invaluable when you first move far away from home and you don’t know what you’re
26:34
doing. You’re not sure if you’re ever going to make money. And I remember sitting with her in her apartment and
26:40
she was like, I’ve sold everything I’ve owned three or four times in my life. She’s like, I’ve had to sell off gear.
26:47
And and her her point was basically like, no one’s got this figured out. We’re all figuring this out. Um, and
26:54
there’s going to be mistakes and it’s okay. You’re doing fine. And so what I always tell students is like, it’s not
26:59
going to look how you think it’s going to look at first. It’s going to be chaotic and it’s going to be stressful and you’re going to worry. Um, but it’s
27:07
okay. As long as you’re driving towards something that you really want to do, if if first of all, if there’s anything
27:13
else you can think of that you would want to do that you would be happy doing, you should do that because this is a hard life. But if you really want
27:20
to do this, there is a way. It just you have to be patient and you can’t send off 50 resumes and be defeist if no one
27:28
calls you back. Um, that’s just not the way it’s going to work. It didn’t work for me that way. It doesn’t didn’t work
27:33
for anyone I know that way. I mean, unless you’re extremely well connected. Um, and so, yeah, patience,
27:39
in which case you already knew in the sense, but you know, to your point, I mean,
27:44
it’s not just, you know, at the beginning. I mean, it ne that never changes. It never changes,
27:50
you know, it’s always like be ready for the unexpected because change is the only constant.
27:55
I never I don’t try to scare anyone, but you know, it’s it’s like I’ve gone and done other things like I took a break
28:01
and, you know, I was having some health issues. I was living back on the east coast. My dad was sick. There was just a
28:07
lot going on. And I started bar managing. I was managing a restaurant, you know. Interesting. I worked as a wine rep. Like, and what was funny is
28:13
that like I saw the crossover in this job to those jobs so completely. Sure.
28:18
Especially in the wine world with with regards to things that are subjective and artistic. Like the people are a a
28:26
convention of audio nerds and a convention of wine nerds are almost identical if you start switching words
28:31
out. Oh, I love it. Yeah. and uh and you know bar managing and all that’s all customer service that’s all
28:37
it is and this is a service industry and this is a service industry so and I don’t say that I don’t think of that
28:42
period of my life as a failure I think of it as something that like gave me so many more skills and a lot more
28:49
perspective and appreciation for when I do get to work because I know that in the industry that I want to be working
28:54
in is is a gift to be able to do that and um so I I think that like that’s always kind of my line to the kids
29:01
especially when they’ve only been out here for like six months and they’re panicking a little bit. It’s like it’s okay. I ran for free. You know, I went
29:07
and got coffee for free. I commuted from West Hollywood to Burbank every day to go work at Mad Dog and no one was paying
29:12
me. And it wasn’t going to be able to last that way forever. Could only really financially afford to last that way for
29:19
a couple of months. But you have to have a little bit of faith and you just keep working and you just keep trying and
29:26
eventually you’ll find something. There’s a really great uh plotline in
29:32
the fifth season of The Marvelous Mrs. Masel, which I I love that show. I just think it’s brilliant on so many levels.
29:38
But she’s it’s a perfect example of how you can be really good at what you do
29:44
and you can be so lucky in so many ways and it still might not be enough. And
29:49
sometimes you have to kind of create that luck for yourself. And sometimes the way forward, you know, she ends up taking a job that isn’t what she thinks
29:55
she wants to do. And sometimes you have to do that in order to make yourself find the place that you do want to get
30:01
to. And so I think I far more than call this person at this studio or you know,
30:08
yeah, I’ll give the practical advice about send the email, follow up, like all that kind of stuff. My advice is
30:13
always just be patient and be determined and it will be okay.
30:18
Yeah. Yeah, you’re right. And be ready for the unexpected. Be ready for the unexpected. And you
30:23
don’t want that opportunity to show up. And your first response is no, I can’t do that. Like I can’t that couldn’t have
30:29
happened for me here. They couldn’t, you know, if they came to me, I’ve been running for a year and offered me a session and I said, I’m not comfortable
30:35
doing that because I’m not ready yet. Then the question next question would be like, well, what the hell have you been doing for the last year? And so that’s
30:43
the the old adage of luck and preparedness and that intersection and yeah, you know, and a lot of determination.
30:48
Luck favors the prepared mind, right? It does. And you want to be able to say yes when that call comes. If it if it
30:54
comes. So, well, some call will come. Some call will come. Maybe it’s not the one you expect, but
31:00
And sometimes you have to do a job you really hate to to rule it out to be like, “Yeah, okay. I don’t want that. I know I don’t want that. What do I want?”
31:07
Got to kiss a lot of toads. You do. Yeah. And I I don’t think even in the worst session that I’ve been on,
31:14
there’s always something valuable that that can be learned from that. Um, sometimes there’s not a lot, but like
31:20
there’s always something you can learn. Um, I’ve had sessions that have made me go
31:26
home and repolish my resume and start start going like, I’m not too old to go
31:31
back to school, right? I could do this. Like I’ve done that so many times. It’s true.
31:38
But, you know, you really I mean, yeah, saying yes and remaining flexible is really, you know,
31:44
Yeah. And also, you know, understanding when you have to say no is also important, but not as important in the
31:51
beginning as saying yes. True. Vanessa Parr, thank you for being with us. Happy to be here.
31:57
Been a pleasure. Nice to meet you.
32:03
Hey, I’m Daniel Keller. Don’t forget to hit the subscribe button and join us each week for Insights and Sound.