Article Preview - Secrets Of The Mix Engineers: Robert Carranza

Jack Johnson is living proof that you don't need Auto-Tune, Beat Detective or a million overdubs to record a hit album. In fact, as engineer Robert Carranza explains, he didn't even need mains electricity...

Paul Tingen

Jack Johnson's album Sleep Through The Static has been phenomenally successful, reaching number 1 in every Anglo-Saxon country in the world, including the US and the UK. Not bad for music that was created entirely on analogue, almost without effects, and with a philosophy that deliberately championed feel, spontaneity and simplicity. There are, arguably, lessons here for prospective hitmakers.

From his home in Los Angeles, Robert Carranza, the album's mixer and engineer, elaborates. "The whole focus of making this record was to simplify things. Even the process of using outboard gear was enormously simplified: there was hardly any. We trusted our instincts, and we had the good sense of not being bound by how people are making records right now. We did our own thing. We focused on feel, and so if something felt right, we went with it. Even when it came to mastering, we told Bernie Grundman that this record didn't need to be loud and that the acoustic songs should feel like acoustic songs and be less loud than the other songs. And it's interesting for people to see that a hit record can be made in such a very simple way!"

Not Static

Robert Carranza has worked with Jack Johnson since 2003, when he engineered and mixed the singer's second release, On And On. He performed the same duties on In Between Dreams (2005), and graduated to co-producer (with the singer) for 2007's Curious George. The making of Sleep Through The Static was rather different from those predecessors: it features more electric guitars and keyboards, and was the first time Johnson had recorded in Los Angeles and to analogue tape. It was also the first time producer JP Plunier (Ben Harper, John Lee Hooker) was involved.

"The previous records I did with Jack were recorded to Pro Tools at his studio in Hawaii," recalls Carranza. "Jack had never made a record to tape, and he asked me one day: 'What's the difference?' I replied 'I don't know whether you'll hear the difference, but I can show you what the difference is.' So he decided to do it on tape, and we soon realised that this was a good decision. Most of all it forced us to pay attention. With Pro Tools you spend a lot of time looking at the screen and you start listening with your eyes. Working with tape forced us to sit back and really listen to takes and to what was good or not in terms of feel, and be a little bit more forgiving of little mistakes that happen. That was really liberating.

Jack Johnson's emphasis on live playing and performance is refreshingly different today.

"Jack had gotten tired of listening with his eyes, and he loved to sit back and close his eyes and just use his ears. He also enjoyed the fact that we only had a limited amount of tracks, and for most songs we didn't even fill all of them up. We went with the attitude: 'Let's not be precious about it, if it works let's leave it as it is. The feeling of the song is more important than the technical side.' The other thing that helped was that we had moments of pause in between takes and songs. With Pro Tools the files come up instantly, but it takes a while for the tape machine to roll back, and it takes another minute to change reels. These are little moments of quiet in the recording process, and they made us pay more attention. The pauses forced me to refocus and get my thoughts together, and pay attention to what was happening next.

"Personally I don't mind whether I record to analogue or Pro Tools, but I will say that my views have changed after doing Jack's last record. Pro Tools is a great thing, but working with a 24-track analogue multitrack forced us to make quality decisions, sometimes even irrational decisions! You can't just fly things around at will, and that really helped us form this record. The point of our approach was not that it was old school, but that we had a clear philosophy that was liberating for us. It helped us psychologically, and also sonically. But we did not overthink it. It was more a matter of 'Let's just do it.' "In the end, the gear aspect is superfluous. If the song is not there, it doesn't matter how you approach the recording. As for JP, when you bring someone else in, it keeps you on your feet. JP brought a lot of objectivity, which at times could be very challenging!"

Let It Bleed

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