"Engineering the Venom," Production Journal. Pt. 1

Last updated: June 28th 2021

Yesterday I got lost in an African jungle.

You don't need to know the details of how that happened, but basically I was searching for an affordable prostitute chimp.

Sadly, I couldn't find any, and in the process I accidentally shot myself with a tranquilizer.

Thankfully, as I wandered aimlessly in the jungle, just about to lose all hope, I stumbled upon Caesar, the famous monkey from the Planet of the Apes documentary.

I collapsed in front of him and his entourage, and they carried me to their monkey town.

When I woke up, we all had a nice dinner, consisting of meat from inferior monkey species.

They loved my jokes about human vegans. Turns out they make fun of vegans too. Caesar's right-hand man told the story of when he escaped from a zoo, and randomly attacked a human that was sitting at a vegan restaurant, and ate his face. The human was rolling on the floor screaming, blood all over the place, etc.

I was conflicted, because I'm a human. But I gotta admit, it was funny the way he told it.

Anyway, at some point I mentioned I was mixing the bass for my upcoming track "Engineering the Venom." And you're not gonna believe this: It turns out that, in addition to leading the fight of the apes against the humans, Caesar is also an audio engineer!

He proceeded to give me the following nuggets of wisdom:

Bass player always shit.

Even more when bass player is e.g. Zander Noriega.

When bass player is shit – i.e. always – bass volume all crazy.

If mixer man uses Compressor, bass volume good, but bass sound shit.

Mixer man better automate volume by hand.

Even better if mixer man delegate to unpaid intern.

After bass volume good enough, mixer man can compress.

Fast Compressor take care of peaks.

Other Compressor take care of other things.

More important bass volume is in 250-500Hz range.

Bad 250-500Hz, bad bass, bad mix.

Ape together, strong.

Thank you, wise Caesar.