Episode 3 - Part 1 - Chris Stevens

ANNC: This, this is The Producers with Ryan Drain, a podcast designed for radio imaging, commercial production, all things audio. Feedback is encouraged at ryanontheradio.com.

RYAN: All right, here we go, episode 3. I'm Ryan. Hi. it's funny, I, I do these interviews usually during the day because that's when people are accessible, and then I take it home, I edit it up a bit, and I do the intro real quick in the home studio, and I'm, I'm sitting here talking to myself, just thinking this is, you know, I mean, I was on the radio for like 10 years, but still, for some reason, this is weird. So I'm not gonna waste much time with the intro except to say I apologize that it's been so long since I put up an episode. So today you get a 2-parter, if that's worth anything. It'll be the same guy, just split up the interview into 2 parts to make it a little more manageable on the download and whatnot. The first part, we're gonna talk a lot about radio in general. I'll tell you who my guest is here in a bit, but he's more of a music guy now in jingle production, but he's done radio imaging in Europe, not to mention basically internationally, for quite some time. And also, part 2 will get away from his background as much, and we'll get into more tips and tricks and stuff that producers may or may not want to know, but stuff that hopefully will make you a better producer. Voiceover artists, if you're tuning in, there might be some interesting stuff here, but it also might� it doesn't� we don't go into too much voice work this time. Not a whole lot of stuff with those techniques or those technological details, especially like we did with the Jeff Berlin interview. So with that, here comes part number 1. I'll wrap some stuff up at the end of part number 2. I do hope you listen to both, and of course I want your critique as well. I've had some good emails from people saying they do like these, so I really appreciate that. Here we go. Our guest today, Chris Stevens. Hi, Chris.

CHRIS: Hey, Ryan.

RYAN: Talk a little bit more so people can hear where you're from.

CHRIS: Okay, yeah, I'm, I'm not American.

RYAN: All right, there we go.

CHRIS: I'm an import.

RYAN: I got a British bloke in the studio today, and actually this is the first episode where I'm looking at the person I'm talking to.

CHRIS: Real life.

RYAN: Real life, it'll be a little weird. I wanted, now, just to let people know who you are, you're the VP of Creative at TM Studios.

CHRIS: That's correct.

RYAN: And they're called TM Studios officially?

CHRIS: Yeah, we were Jones TM, we were TM Century, we keep getting bought and sold. You know how it goes.

RYAN: I met you through, I guess through business, I mean through, I work at a station here in Dallas, you guys are based in Dallas, We've had a good relationship over the years. Again, we're still trying to come up with some things to get going on the station I'm at. But you came over here, it's been what, a couple years? How long has it been now?

CHRIS: Yeah, 3 years now.

RYAN: 3 years now. So you actually got here just a little before I did in Dallas. You came from the UK, but you work at TM Studios as the VP Creative. So what exactly does that mean you do?

CHRIS: I'm responsible for ensuring that TM has a really good range of products. that will be very useful for radio stations. So, for example, I've expanded the range of jingle packages that we have. We've done some more contemporary stuff. We've brought in a lot more freelance composers around the world, brought in some different singers as well. There was absolutely nothing wrong with what TM was doing beforehand, but it was all of a certain nature. It was all quite traditional stuff.

RYAN: I was just gonna say, traditional would be a word I would have said about TM.

CHRIS: Yeah, absolutely. A very reliable They always had great customer service, but there were some areas that needed some expansion. You know what it's like now with the way that music production has gone, everything is so different. TM have always been very lucky, they've had all these enormous studios for doing fantastic live sessions with live musicians, and orchestras could fit in there, whatever else. But sometimes that's not what you need. Sometimes you need more electronic stuff, more post-production stuff going on. So we've expanded that side of things.

RYAN: The Kiss FMs of the world.

CHRIS: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, you'll not hear the timpani too often these days on KISS FM. So, no, you know, things are� things have changed. And, and as, as I'm sure you know from the music production you do, it's, it's not so much now a case of composing with a lot of these formats. It's a case of sound production and soundscaping and, all the post-production stuff that goes on with, with plugins and�

RYAN: Oh gosh, yeah.

CHRIS: All the effects and the hardware and the, and the software.

RYAN: So all the tools you can buy.

CHRIS: Yeah, absolutely.

RYAN: Heck, just REX 2 files have made it Yeah. Where pretty much anyone can get a really good track going.

CHRIS: That's right. It's so easy now to start doing that kind of production. Having said that, you know, talent, the best talent will always shine through. So although it's easier and cheaper to produce than ever before, you know, there's still no substitute for making great stuff. And we're really lucky that not only with the guys in Dallas, but we've got composers in, you know, across the States, South America, across Europe as well. There's so many good people out there with technology now. We can harness all that skill and bring it through TM and supply a stronger range of audio than ever before.

RYAN: So you're obviously, I mean, you're basically running the show when it comes to the jingle department. Is there any, you know, kind of standard radio production that's going on, like with your job at TM right now, or are you really just focused on music?

CHRIS: It's primarily music imaging, which includes jingles as we, as we know them. It also includes packages for news talk stations as well that don't have the vocals on. We're doing a lot of rock stuff that doesn't have vocals, but primarily music-based imaging and not really the kind of the sweeper production and promos, that kind of stuff. We haven't delved into that yet.

RYAN: And what, what, what actual production do you do right now on a day� and just for TM, we'll get to your other stuff in a minute, but You know, are you literally on a Pro Tools rig all day long now? Are you ever on a Pro Tools rig? I mean�

CHRIS: You know, I'm not on it quite as much as I'd like to be, but I think most of us can probably say that in some way or other. Quite often when it's the original creation of a package, I'll be very involved with that and liaising with the client and the studios. I see myself quite a lot as a middleman in that. I know radio, I've worked in radio for many years, you know, I'm still working with radio stations, but also I have a musical background as well. played keyboard for many years. I've been in bands, pretty bad bands, it must be said, but such is the way. And I still do some composing now. So when we've got a client who's after a package and then we've got the musical guys, I see myself as almost like a translator. When a radio�

RYAN: Okay.

CHRIS: When a PD says, oh, I want it to kind of go up at the end and have a big vocal that does this and that and the other, and it's got to say the morning show name twice and whatever else, then I can go to the composer and say, well, what he's after is he wants it in a major key and wants it to, you know, the chords to follow this pattern. So kind of a middleman. And so I do get involved. I still get to use Pro Tools, which is great. We do a lot of syndication, so generally I'll be involved in getting the original package sounding fantastic and then keep an ear over the syndications to make sure that, you know, when the next station buys it, it sounds good.

RYAN: You mean syndicate, like for instance, you guys made the KSCS package once upon a time, and then you named it that and then started selling it as that?

CHRIS: Absolutely.

RYAN: And that's what you mean by syndication?

CHRIS: Yeah, completely. So when another station said, hey, we heard that Riding High package that KSCS had, we want that. to make sure that all the little vocal effects and toys that were on the original version pass through to the syndication version.

RYAN: Yeah, that's one little thing about jingle production that I thought would be irritating or tricky or whatever, but if you have a station, you know, KISS FM, and then you want to change that into Q108, I mean, you know, just getting the names to fit the songs would be�

CHRIS: Yeah, it's a really fun challenge. It really is. I mean, the KISS Fill package that we sell and we get involved with is a great example of that. You know, one minute you're selling it for, yeah, like for KISS FM or a Z100 or something like that. And then you get, you know, 107.9 The Beach wants it.

RYAN: Exactly.

CHRIS: Or even foreign languages, you know, that package is on in Denmark and Portugal and Brazil and all over the place. And so you're kind of, you're not only translating the words, but you're translating the effects and what works well on You know, like if you're saying the word kiss, it starts with that hard K, which is really good. But if you're doing a wave, for example, you can't stutter a W like you can stutter a K.

RYAN: Sure.

CHRIS: So that's what I really like. I love getting into that really fine detail of making the syndication versions of a package sound just as cool and exciting and great as the original. And that's when it gets really fun. And that's when you've got these massive Pro Tools sessions going on with more bus channels than you've got faders for. It gets really cool. And that's always exciting to do.

RYAN: Right on. All right, now let's go back in time. So your story's kind of fun, obviously, because you've worked in this business and it's taken you across an entire ocean, which is kind of cool. Because I know I've always thought it'd be fun to go live in London, you know, if I had a job that took me there. I mean, I don't know if I'd want to live there forever, but� so you started radio years ago, and start us there, and then kind of just quickly take us through where you've been and what you've done.

CHRIS: Yeah, the brief story would be that when I was at university in the UK, I'd done a bit of community radio before that, what we call RSL radio in the UK, which is short-term licenses. While I was at university, did uni radio, which is very big in the UK. Unlike the ones around Dallas, we don't play jazz music all day. It's very weird here. They got all these students playing jazz songs. Never quite understood the logic of that.

RYAN: I went to Colorado State. There's an amazing student station there. It's just pure alt. I mean, you know, it's nothing you'll hear on� I agree with you 100%.

CHRIS: Yeah.

RYAN: What a waste.

CHRIS: Our student stations are very much kind of alt-rock and new music. experimental broadcast. So I did a load of that, was involved with the marketing and did shows, got myself on the local commercial station. Then when I left uni, did evenings there, I guess what you guys call nights, right, for about a year and a half. At which point I realized that although I really liked being a DJ, the listeners didn't have quite the same enthusiasm all the time.

RYAN: Where were you doing nights?

CHRIS: A station called Sun FM up in Sunderland in the northeast of England.

RYAN: And so give me an idea of how big of a market that is.

CHRIS: The market was a quarter of a million people.

RYAN: Okay, so, okay.

CHRIS: I guess I'll be like maybe a 200 mark here or so. At one point, this gives you a difference in US and UK radio. Obviously, you get your percentage of how many people were listening. At one point, our fabulous PD, Ricky Durkin, got the station so in any week, 39% of people were listening to us.

RYAN: Oh, wow. That's like a station from the '50s.

CHRIS: Yeah, absolutely. It's, you know, it figures that And even then, we were the number 2 station. That was a ridiculous thing. The heritage station, Metro 145, and they had the soccer. So what could we do? So did that for a year and a half, realized that�

RYAN: Wait, did you just call it soccer?

CHRIS: Yeah, I'm learning.

RYAN: No, but you would normally call it football, right?

CHRIS: Oh, absolutely. Yeah. Oh, okay. No, that's cool.

RYAN: You're Americanizing it.

CHRIS: I'm translating as I go along. I'm talking about hoods and fenders next as well. So, did that, decided to leave before I was pushed. You know, you kind of know it's coming.

RYAN: Uh-huh.

CHRIS: And got a job doing production for a new radio group over there called GMG Radio. And luckily, what I did at their first station went really well, brought in some new jingles, some new production ideas. And as the group expanded, my role expanded with that, and I became their group head of production. They bought the Jazz FM network. bought other regional stations and won some new licenses as well. Did that for almost 4 years, had great fun.

RYAN: When is this about, late '90s?

CHRIS: No, this was 2001 to 2005.

RYAN: Okay.

CHRIS: So 2004. But had a blast there, really enjoyed it. But got the opportunity to move to the BBC. And Radio 2 is the national AC radio station.

RYAN: Radio 1's the hip pop Kiss FM-y type thing?

CHRIS: Yeah, Radio 1's the pop one. You can get that on Sirius, or at least you could. I think you still can now with the� with what's going on. Radio 2 is the AC one. But if you want to hear an eclectic station, it's really worth listening to because during the day it's relatively mainstream AC, although they do have a 2-hour news and current affairs show at midday, which is a bit different. Yeah. And then from 7 at night, it's a whole range of specialist shows: folk, jazz, country, new music, live music. They have a classical concert every Friday night, they have book readings, they have a '50s show, a '60s show. It's really quirky. It's the whole ratings by day, reputation by night, but it works and it's immensely popular. It's worth checking out.

RYAN: So similar to what we'd call a full-service station.

CHRIS: Yeah, kind of like if you imagine NPR but mixed with an AC station, that's kind of the result.

RYAN: So yeah, real safe during the day.

CHRIS: Pretty safe, although there's just been a big news story in the UK. One of their presenters has just been fired for phoning up an old actor and leaving messages on his voicemail about how he'd slept with his granddaughter and stuff like that. So it also really pushes boundaries.

RYAN: Really? On an AC-type station?

CHRIS: Yeah, absolutely. Yeah, it'll push boundaries. It'll go a long way, which is a bit of the luxury of being the BBC in a way that you know, you've got the state funding to do that. You're not running commercials, you've not got advertisers and funders that you're gonna piss off and they're gonna stop supporting you. So, but I'm a big fan of the BBC and I could fill up 20 podcasts alone about why the BBC is superb.

RYAN: I'm guessing, again, I'm not from the UK, but there's a lot of people that are probably against it, right?

CHRIS: There's a minority that don't like it the way it's funded.

RYAN: Just the idea that it's a The number one media company is also a public company and it's funded by taxes.

CHRIS: In a way, yeah. Commercial radio over there, the commercial� I guess the equivalent of the NAB here, every now and then have a rant about how it's stifling commercial radio, though you don't have to listen to commercial radio for too long to realize that commercial radio is also stifling itself quite a lot. But that's a whole other debate that could go on. The BBC is a lot more popular there than NPR is here because there's more services, the funding is greater, they don't have to do those annoying pledge drives every 3 months.

RYAN: Well, that and they all� well, yeah, I know that would be one big thing. It does have a lot more, but they also seem to have content that's pretty darn good. I mean, I listen to BBC or Radio 1 all the time.

CHRIS: The content is incredible. And even Radio 1, which is the pop and rock station, still does a lot of social campaigns.

RYAN: Yeah, you can check their schedule. They actually do have a lot of community-type shows going on.

CHRIS: Yeah, there's a lot of really good stuff. They break a lot of bands, they play a lot of new music. You know, again, they'll, they'll do a lot of shows that aren't pulling in enormous ratings but are very credible and are leading the way. And someone's got to do that kind of stuff, otherwise radio is just gonna, well, you know, not go anywhere.

RYAN: All right, well, let's get back because I, like you say, I bet you� I'm not even from there and I bet I could probably talk for an hour on that kind of stuff because I'm a geek.

CHRIS: It's all good stuff.

RYAN: So you're in London now, you're doing production and you've gotten to BBC.

CHRIS: Yeah, I spent a year at Radio 2 there. I went from being the group head of production for this commercial group to basically being the lowest on the totem pole for the station sound department at Radio 2. There was 3 of us there. I got the showbiz jobs like delivering the mini discs to the studios with the trails on.

RYAN: I just wanted to point out real quick, station sound is what they call, what you would in the UK call basically radio production. I mean, station imaging.

CHRIS: It's like creative services, I guess.

RYAN: Creative services.

CHRIS: You know, jingles, promos, all that kind of supporting audio for the radio station.

RYAN: And so you had one station, Radio 2.

CHRIS: National station, biggest station in the country.

RYAN: It's based in London, but is it on like translators or how does it get all over the country?

CHRIS: Yeah, there's about 30 or 40 transmitters across the country, all between 88 and 91 on FM. So you go down there and�

RYAN: How many guys did you have working in the production department there?

CHRIS: There was 3 of us there.

RYAN: So you had 3, was there like one in charge and then 2 lackeys, and you were one of the lackeys?

CHRIS: Pretty much, yes. I mean, we� the roles and responsibilities were slightly wider than they would be at an equivalent radio station over here, but we were working with a lot of high-end talent. We were working with a lot of the presenters who were, you know, big names. So it was a slightly different, different approach to things than commercial radio would be. You know, you had to make sure you were there when they wanted to record their promo and stuff like that. It's It all, it was all a bit of a different thing. But, you know, it's like when you go to a massive station, and I felt really privileged to go there, and you expect everyone's gonna be an asshole. They're all gonna be these big egos, and it was the complete opposite. There was such a�

RYAN: Yeah, that's what I've noticed.

CHRIS: And also, I was thinking that everything would be really researched and would be thought about, but actually, you know, in the morning, our lead guy Robert might go, hey, got a great idea for promo. Let's make it. By the afternoon, we make it and be on air. And it was like, wow.

RYAN: Yeah, you kind of figure there's like rooms of scientists putting research into everything you put on that radio station because it's so big.

CHRIS: No, that's not the case. And this has 13 million listeners a week listening to this thing. And the BBC culture is that people love to complain about it. So, you know, you've got� you're kind of balancing that up. But I was expecting, you know, every time I wrote a script, it'd be checked by loads of people and whatever else. And it just wasn't the case.

RYAN: Over a fifth of the country is tuning into the station, you got 3 dudes putting all the stuff on the air, and you're basically doing it like, yeah, all right, let's do it. Okay.

CHRIS: And what the great thing was, it was actually a really minimalistic production approach. There were no sweepers on the station. You never played a sweeper between 2 songs. It just never happened. There's no need for them. the jocks would rarely say the station name when they were doing a link. that you might play 2 jingles an hour, perhaps. They've had the same jingle package for 10 years as well.

RYAN: production guy, BBC in the UK, And how did you eventually get over here to the States?

CHRIS: I sent a drunk email.

RYAN: Ah, yes, okay, I remember the story. Tell me the story.

CHRIS: I had no intention to� moving to America was not in my plan at all. I was at Radio 2, I was learning a lot there. I was on TM's mailing list because I'd met David Graupner, the president of TM, in the past, and I would get their CDs through the mail and everything else. And got home one night. London is a drinking city.

RYAN: Really?

CHRIS: London is a city where you finish work.

RYAN: That's surprising.

CHRIS: I know, it's bizarre, but it takes so long to get home. You don't go home and go back into town to meet people. You just go straight out to the pub when you finish work. So, so I got home about 11 o'clock and I had a few ciders that evening. There's an email in my inbox from TM. I guess they sent it to their mailing list, you know, wanted creative director, must be able to do this, that, and the other, blah blah blah blah blah. And I sent this email back in my slightly drunken state saying, oh, what you need is someone who's gonna change things and is gonna do some really cool jingles and isn't stuck in the Dallas way of life and blah blah blah. And wrote this thing and, you know, you know when you shouldn't hit send but you do?

RYAN: No, no, it's like the drunk text.

CHRIS: Yeah, absolutely.

RYAN: Suddenly you realize, wait a minute, am I actually hitting send? Oh wow, I did that.

CHRIS: Yeah, it was one of those. Sent it off, following day I got a reply back from David saying Hey, we should talk. I'm like, talk about what? You kind of, you know, look down the emails like, wow, I said that? Okay. So I just ignored it for about a month or two because I was happy where I was until David Graeber cornered me and basically said, look, are you applying for this or not? This is the start of 2005. My New Year's resolution for that year was to visit 12 countries in 12 months.

RYAN: Okay.

CHRIS: Which is easier in Europe than it is here. I'm trying to do the same thing with states here. And so, you know, there's a few obvious easy ones. France is close, Ireland's close, and so on. And then David said, well, do you want to come over for an interview? Haha, America, that wasn't on the list. Great, let's go out there, you know, free trip to America. I'll go meet them all, and then I'll politely decline saying it's not quite the right thing for me. That was the plan. Came over here in February, met the team at TM, and there's such an infectious enthusiasm there, and the talent is incredible there. You've seen the place, the studios.

RYAN: Oh God, I've been there a few times, yeah.

CHRIS: It's pretty�

RYAN: what do you call it, Studio A? Is that your name for it?

CHRIS: Yeah, Studio A.

RYAN: It's pretty amazing.

CHRIS: It's a big studio. The control room is lovely.

RYAN: You guys just got a new board, in fact.

CHRIS: We did. We got our new SSL board. I have still no idea how it works. That's a plan for next year.

RYAN: Might take me 3 years to learn that thing.

CHRIS: I found the volume control. That's about it. I came over, I met these people, and everyone was really nice and friendly. There was no egos. There was no people that were really precious over what was being done. Met the sales team. Mary Adams, who's our VP of International Business, took me down Greenville Avenue and got me very drunk down there. If you know Dallas, you'll know it's a big kind of bars and pubs area.

RYAN: And if you don't know Dallas, then just picture the one little area that kind of looks a little old school but has about 57 bars in a 4-block That's the one.

CHRIS: Yeah. And I flew back home. I was here for about 4 or 5 days and thought, actually, that could be really cool. And my idea was it'd be really exciting to create the kind of jingle packages that I would want to buy. And that's jingle packages that are created not only by musicians and studio guys, but also by radio people.

RYAN: Talk about some� I wanted to talk about some, you know, UK or European versus US stuff. Anything in the transition that you can talk about, even technologically speaking, that was glaring? Like, wow, I can't believe this goes on in the US, or man, we never had this in Europe?

CHRIS: Yeah, yeah, I think European production is more adventurous overall.

RYAN: Like US production is a little safe, a little Well, down the middle.

CHRIS: When I first got excited about radio in the� I guess it would have been the early to mid-'90s� whenever anybody went to the US, they'd record a couple of hours of radio, bring it back, and we'd all swap it around, listen to FLZ or Z100 or KISS. Clearly only the stations near places that people would go on holiday were the ones that got heard.

RYAN: Florida, New York.

CHRIS: Yeah, absolutely, absolutely. So yeah, yeah, Austin sadly never made it back, which is a shame because it's a great place to go. And we'd listen and, you know, it would be these really cool big voices and exciting production. But when I came over, I was surprised. I was expecting to be wowed, and there's probably 10 or 20% of stations that are really, really good at production.

RYAN: What do you consider the ones that wowed you over here?

CHRIS: I really like listening to KISS. When I came to town here, KISS in Dallas. Listening online�

RYAN: Remind me the name of the guy who's doing KISS.

CHRIS: Deke.

RYAN: Cousin Deke? Uncle Deke? That's right.

CHRIS: Cousin Deke, who images pretty much every station in that building.

RYAN: It was� Chris Hamill's got 18 stations in Dallas and he does them all. Yeah, I've never met him yet, but I've heard good things about him.

CHRIS: Very talented guy, great guy, doing a lot of good voicing as well now. and, what else was I listening to that I really liked? I was actually really impressed by, � this is a bit of a, a curveball one� KLTY here in Dallas is the big contemporary Christian station. Yeah, I, I was listening to them for a few hours before I realized they were a contemporary Christian station. Because that's the idea of what they're trying to do. The production is really good, really, really solid. I was listening to, I mean, stations online I'd listen to. So I'm trying to think of some of the CHR ones. KDWB was great.

RYAN: Well, Ricky.

CHRIS: Ricky's just gone up there.

RYAN: Ricky Ruse, the guy who used to work with Chris here, and he's on the, up there to image it.

CHRIS: He's gone up there. He sent me a reel of some of his bits the other week and good stuff, really good stuff. And you have Z100, of course, sounding great. Some of the� I mean, WLIT was sounding really good in Chicago as well. But�

RYAN: Did you ever check out KROQ in LA?

CHRIS: Yeah, I went� I met the guys when I was over there, and that was really good. And also, actually, that leads me on quite nicely to the Jack stations. Jack here in Dallas was a sort of new experience for me, listening to a station that has no jocks. We don't have them in the UK, for starters. And, and that kind of turnover of production that they were doing there, that which again was Ricky most of the time that I've been here. Really, really good stuff there. So, but then there's just so many stations that are just kind of almost doing imaging by numbers.

RYAN: Yeah.

CHRIS: Where it's just like, hey, well, we'll play a sweeper here that says the station name, and we'll put a drop of a listener there. Well, let's get some generic artist IDs and throw them into the top of the hour and You know, all this kind of� it's almost like production doesn't have the emotion in some places that it used to have. I'm a commercial production on all things audio.

RYAN: Feedback is encouraged. Okay, I know that was very abrupt. I apologize. That would be the end of part 1. There was no good way to cut it near the middle of this thing, so again, I apologize. I'm not yapping too much now, so go check out part 2 if you can. Notice how my home studio mic actually sounds even a little better than my $100,000 acoustically engineered Citadel Broadcasting used to be Disney Broadcasting Studio mic. Yeah, I noticed that too. Okay, part 2 coming up, hopefully.

CHRIS: Bye. The Producers. The Producers.

RYAN: Send your questions, feedback, guest requests, love, and of course constructive criticism to show@ryannontheradio.com.

CHRIS: Episodes available through iTunes, other podcast sites, and ryannontheradio.com.

RYAN: We thank our guests for their expertise and time.

CHRIS: We thank you for listening.