Little visit with Jack Joseph Puig

Posted on 01. Aug, 2013 by Tim Bushong in News

(This actually took place back in March of 2010, and I posted this on the Phil O’Keefe blog on the ‘Harmony Central’ site, bit I thought it was worth re-visiting.)

Jack's room at Ocean Way in LA

Well- here’s my report from a very enjoyable evening at Sweetwater, with producer/engineer Jack Joseph Puig speaking about life in the music biz, and promoting his new line of Waves plug-ins:

As you may know, JJP has developed some really interesting plug-ins with Waves, and was just tickled with how they came out. He took some less-than-stellar (tone-wise, that is) vocal takes from Mick J., Lady Gaga, Bono, etc… and demonstrated how his new plug-ins affected each one. You gotta love a slider that’s labeled “Magic”! It was a great demonstration by a great producer.

Then, he and Mitch Gallagher sat down (in the comfy chairs) and talked about Jack’s philosophy of music, production, and “chasing the song”. After that they opened it up for Q&A. Now, I’m no genius, but when you have an opportunity to ask JJP questions about music, you really shouldn’t worry about questions like “will these plug-ins work with Reason?”, or, “Can we get these for Windows?”.

But Jack was very gracious with everyone, and yes- the topic eventually turned to Spilt Milk and Ro Shambo!

The real kicker for us was after the presentation, when my precocious friend Anthony actually got Jack to listen to the stuff we were mixing that day in my studio. Talk about nervous; I walked back into the theater, and there’s Mitch Gallagher looking at Anthony and Jack, and they’re both fishing around for some headphones. They then popped the disc into the CD player and Jack stood there and listened to about a minute or so of one song. I’m now feeling like a chef looking on while somebody licks the spoon and ponders…

He was so cool- he told my friend how everything was sitting nice in the mix– the bass is right “up there”, kick and snare in the good space, vocals (he made the “hand-cage in front of your nose” motion) nice and fat. I’m waiting for the other shoe to drop, and then Anthony asked him what he would do differently for that song. “Here it comes”, thought I, but he stood there kind of shaking his head a bit and said, “I really couldn’t give you an answer to that–pick any mix guy or producer and it’s gonna sound like him, or (pointing to me) him”. Wow- I had to think to myself: “How many of us would have started right in and started a critique of the mix” (I probably would have!), but he didn’t.

My son Aaron asked him a few questions about John Mayer’s production, and how much he totally loved “The Grays”- Jack just kept talking with us like he wasn’t in any hurry at all to get out of there. Got into the different aspects of the 60′s, 70′s, etc… and how each era has its own characteristics. Tonic Lemon Parade- example of ‘chasing the song’ and simply going for it. He is a really nice guy- and the whole experience made me appreciate again what a great business this is and how blessed anyone is to be able to do this for a living.

And–those new plug-ins are really cool…

Tim Bushong, Jack Puig, and Aaron Bushong

Tags: engineer, Fort Wayne, Indiana, Jack Joseph Puig, musician, producer, recording, studio, Syracuse, Tim Bushong