Producer Spolight: Jacquire King
Jacquire King (James Bay, Kings of Leon, Tom Waits, Norah Jones, Buddy Guy) is American producer/mixer/engineer that largely works at Blackbird studio in Nashville. King’s approach to recording and mixing artists is one that has had great influence on my own work.
Microphone Recording techniques
Some of the microphone techniques used by King that I found interesting and have utilised in my own recording can be heard in the recording of James Bay’s ‘Chaos and the Calm’. One mic-ing technique I have used is the Kick/snare condenser. In-between the kick drum and snare I placed a large diaphragm condenser that sat parallel to the snare drum stand and roughly 10 inches away from the kick drum beater contact point. I switched the polar pattern to figure of eight so that it would pick-up from all directions. The result I found from using this technique was a great deal more of attack from the kick drum and a soft, detailed snare sound, adding excitement and energy to the drum sound.
Another Mic technique that King uses is the mic-ing of the echo chamber next to the drum live room in Blackbird studio. King will put a large-diaphragm condenser in the echo chamber that is situated next to the live room. He will then open the door to the chamber letting the drum sound enter and reflect off the walls and this is what will be recorded. He will then blend this auxiliary track in with the remaining drum tracks. This adds an overall wet and live sounding drum track, with the addition of compression on this track can make for a very full sounding auxiliary to blend in with your existing mix. As I did not have access to an echo-chamber I bussed my Stereo drum fader to an auxiliary track that had an EQ-ed reverb plug-in on it to give the sound of a reflective room.
Mixing Techniques
Some mixing techniques of King that have found their way into my production style is use of compression and his approach to arranging. King will tend to group the Kick drum, bass and snare together and send them to an auxiliary track. He will then compress this auxiliary track heavily and adjust amount added to the mix by the Aux fader. This technique is called parallel compression. As there is only Kick, bass and snare in this group, adding compression to these elements helps to ‘glue’ the bottom end of the mix together and makes for more exciting, symbiotic low-end. This technique also helps separate frequencies by treating them as one particular frequency group: making it easier to deal with your over-all EQ in mastering stages. Another benefit of using in-direct compression on tracks I found, is whilst adding excitement and gain to a particular element of your track it also makes automation within those groups feel more subtle and natural rather than automating a track that is directly compressed.
A less technical but equally as important production technique that I have found myself using in my own work is King’s approach towards arrangement. An example of this would be in James Bay’s track ‘Let it Go’. King’s arrangement of this song is very minimalist, exposing the bare bones of the song at the start but gradually adding different elements to help the song build. Elements such as programmed percussion, acoustic drums, bass guitar and backing vocals are added to the track gradually. I feel that when this approach is taken, it creates depth within the track, letting it be exposed acoustically bringing all focus to the song before building it into a more accentuated piece.
Cans on for a Listening List:
Kings of Leon "Use Somebody"
James Bay "Let it Go" "Collide"
Niall Horan "Slow Hands"