Sound Interviews: Jon Gordon, Pro Guitarist and Engineer

Friday, May 17, 2013

Photo credited to: Mikiodo

During his career, Jon Gordon has worked with Madonna, Suzanne Vega and a number of other big music talents. So I was excited when he took time out of his schedule to discuss his inspirations, his struggles and how technology has continued to change music.

1) What are some of your musical inspirations?

Oh goodness, there were so many in terms of groups that were inspirational to me when I was growing up. There was the British invasion: The Beatles, The Stones, Dave Clark Five, Herman’s Hermits, Gerry & the Pacemakers, etc, etc, etc. Then some of my friends were teaching me about Motown music that was out then: Marvin Gaye, The Supremes. Smokey Robinson and The Miracles, they were a big one. As I got a little older, I got interested in blues music. Some of the great players were doing that, such as Albert King, B.B. King, Eric Clapton, Jeff Beck, both sides of the aisle: the British guys and the Chicago and southern guys. Buddy Guy was a particular inspiration I remember. There was a band I was in where a bunch of the guys were older, smarter, and hipper than me, including a guy named Walter Becker, who went on to be a founding member of Steely Dan - which is another story altogether. Back then there was a record he turned me on to, “Chicago, the Blues Today”, which was a sampler of a lot Chicago blues bands. In particular there was a vocalist/harmonica player named Junior Wells. Buddy Guy appeared in the backup band. In those days Buddy Guy was more of a traditional blues player, and less of a show boater than he became. Walter Becker pointed him out to me, saying: you want to know what funky is? listen to this guy! 

There were some other people at that time I loved, even though I can’t say I went there with my own music, such as Django Rienhardt. He was a French Gypsy and played jazz in the 1940’s; he was just an amazing guitar player. His music had its own sort of European slant on it that was really great. There are so many guitar players that are worth mentioning. For each one I can think of there are probably ten I can’t think of. And there are so many bands I have been into that were inspirational at one time or another -- there was just a whole lot of great music out there.

2) Who are some of the current pop artists you like?

I actually have this thing about “Bottoms Up” by Trey Songz; I just love that song. The vocal arrangement is almost like Bach the way all the little motifs play off each other. That’s the first Nicki Minaj rap that I was aware of. She had a brilliant performance; how much it was created electronically I don’t know. Even though the sentiments I can’t say I entirely approve of - hey I’m some big guy who is going to get you all drunk and steal you from your boyfriends - I think it’s brilliantly put together. Also Gym Class Hero's “Stereo Hearts” - I like that song a lot, as well as the song Travie McCoy did with Bruno Mars - “Billionaire”. Muse is doing some interesting kind of crossover stuff. Hot Chelle Rae - I like how they’re mixing and making this fusion of rock sound with hip-hop elements. I like some of Ke$ha’s production too.

3) How are current trends in music affecting the work you do?

For me it’s been interesting. For a very long time I didn’t listen to top 40 stuff. What actually happened is that my two daughters, who are now 12 and 15, made me listen to the local top 40 station in the car all the time. On the radio then a lot of Taio Cruz’s music was playing, like “Break your Heart” and “Dynamite”. So I was listening to these songs and thought they were so processed vocally that they all sounded like robots. But then I started to listen more and said hmm that thing they used for Ke$ha’s song is kind of interesting; I wonder how they got that effect? I engineer and use the same tools, but up to that point I was using them to make someone sound better than they really did - not to make it sound like it was messed with. Some of the stuff that people are doing, intentionally creating these effects, is very interesting from a production standpoint. 

And I started saying, well gee, I bet I can do that. So I ended up writing a bunch of songs that I sold to music libraries, that are my takes on some of that pop production. Those types of songs are finding their way more and more into my work, including a job I’m working on now. I do a lot of work for a major production music library. It has a website that production assistants can search, find music they like, and then pay a fee to license it. The people who write the music, which includes me, get royalty payments on the back end when it plays. There seems to be a steady market for music that sounds like current pop stuff, but it’s different songs and different artists.

4) What lead you to music production?

I was music major at NYU for a short time; there I learned a lot about harmony and theory but then I dropped out. I was about 21 and had an opportunity to play professionally. At the time I didn’t really want the degree because I didn’t see myself going into teaching, and thought I should take advantage of the work while it was there. At the same time, the year and half I was at NYU I learned a lot about music and harmony. I’m glad I did it. Effectively I do a lot of arranging in my production work. I have some people who just walk in, sing a melody, some words, and I have to create everything around it in terms of the arrangement. I can’t say I have formal training in arranging beyond the basic knowledge in theory and harmony, but I have a lot of practice doing it.

I have done the one man band production thing since 1986 or so. In the early eighties there was a sharp line of demarcation, that’s when the Linn drum came out -- that was the first drum machine that anyone ever heard. Then the Oberheim systems came out. Oberheim made a bunch of synthesizers. They found a way of locking all their synthesizers together and running them with a sequencer. All of a sudden there was a sea change – people were creating interesting things with this technology.

At that time I was mostly trying to stay in New York and play guitar in recording sessions. The impact of this technology was that there stopped being as many rhythm dates. Up to about 1982 or so, if a songwriter needed to make a demo they would take their song, hire some sort musical director/arranger who would make an arrangement of it, then pay a recording studio and hire a rhythm section. The rhythm section would be drums, bass, guitar, and piano maybe in its simplest form. Then you would go to the recording studio and the arranger would stick the music in front of the musicians and they would play the music. Maybe after you would add vocals, maybe you would add strings, maybe you would add horns, but that was how you would make a demo. There was no way for you to open up Garage Band and pick a loop you like. So as that technology started to have an impact, the companies that were making things like the Linn drum heavily sold the idea of you getting one guy with a synthesizer and you don’t have to hire those five guys to be your rhythm section. That took hold in the circles that I was trying to break into; so then all of sudden the more established session players who used to throw you a gig now and then were struggling to hold on to what was left. As a guitar player someone may call you in for a solo, but really your bread and butter was doing those rhythm section dates. The rhythm section dates started to be nonexistent. That was one of the big things that got me interested in the technology because my work started drying up.

5) What were some of the obstacles you had to face to get to reach this level of success?

When I actually got into production it turned out to be way harder than I expected. If you are a session musician, you sit on your side of the glass and people in the control room are asking you to do stuff. Maybe you don’t think they are the smartest people in the world or have the best ideas in the world, which makes it very easy to go “I can do this job”, but it turns out it’s not so easy. It’s a lot harder than I thought. I’m glad I got into production but I definitely faced a large hurdle doing it.

The latest hurdle for me was my business skills. I already had a basis of my musical and technical skills but really had no business skills at all. I was hippie as a kid, I was a musician, and I went to music school for a while and dropped out. I sort of knew how to work the word of mouth network that I had started to build as a musician, but I didn’t work it all that well or consistently.

When I started doing production work there was a period when the job in front of me was to get a lot better than I was. That occupied my time and attention for a while. Then it got to a certain point where my skills were pretty well developed and I moved into this space. I expected, because my skills were developed and I made the transition to a much nicer studio space, that people would find me and I would get lots of work.

Unfortunately building it, and having them come are two different things. It took me being beat up by the recession for a couple of years to finally arrive at a strategy: Due to the urging of my wife and friends I went to SCORE, an organization that helps small businesses. The people at SCORE took me back to school. We ripped apart my pricing structure, overhead, and promotional materials. We spoke about sales and marketing techniques, and we tried a whole bunch of different stuff. Most importantly they made me aware that in order to have work you have to spend time finding work. What did work in my situation was just salesmanship; being a lot more consistent with getting back to people, creating new leads out of existing leads, and just follow-up, follow-up , follow-up.

6) What tips do you have for aspiring musicians?

The music industry is changing as we speak. With the Internet, and new media it is important to effectively understand the new ways of promoting yourself. Learn to do your art as well as you possibly can, but also learn about business because that can be a big stumbling block if you don’t. Absolutely get out, schmooze, and meet other musicians. Your best allies are other musicians and people who do what you do. If you are on good terms with them they will be a source of work to you. If you pursue rivalries with them you are shooting yourself in the foot. Also don’t make people mad unnecessarily. That’s easy to do when you’re young and you think you’re a genius.

If you would like to work with Jon click here for a link to his website.

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