Alright – so today we’ve got the honor of introducing you to Brandon Smith. We think you’ll enjoy our conversation, we’ve shared it below.
Brandon, looking forward to hearing all of your stories today. Can you share an important lesson you learned in a prior job that’s helped you in your career afterwards?
I’ve often had to remind myself in this line of work that you have to check any ego at the door and you can’t judge a book by its cover. There’s times where a bad experience will sometimes make me have a preconceived notion about an artist, venue, promoter, manager, etc. and you forget that person could’ve just had an off day, or something happened to them you don’t know about. Or maybe the artist’s setup is so stripped down because they can’t afford a full band or fancy gear, but then they blow you away with incredible vocals and lyrics. Every experience, show, and interaction could be stellar, and you have to go into it with a positive, open mind.
Brandon, before we move on to more of these sorts of questions, can you take some time to bring our readers up to speed on you and what you do?
When I went to college, I initially thought I was going to major in film production. But then we were assigned a task for our final in our first semester where we had to get rid of the audio for a 4-5 minute scene from any movie of our choosing. So I picked the bank robbery scene in “The Dark Knight”. I made the music, came up with all the sound effects, and dialogue for the whole 4-5 min clip. This changed everything for me and I knew that I had to do this. So I switched my 2nd degree path from film to sound design for visual media.
I also got a degree in audio production and engineering. I began to work on editing/mixing several commercials, independent films, and then I applied for an internship at a radio station in Minneapolis (89.3 the Current). While I was there, I helped with in studio performance sessions for artists like Phoebe Bridgers, Chvrches, and Death Cab for Cutie.
Once I moved back home to LA, Covid hit literally a week later. Everything shut down. I had a job waiting at Warner Brothers that never happened because of it, but I still needed to make money to pay off student loans and get by. So the only thing in the industry that was still open was rehearsal spaces for bands that were preparing for when Covid ended. I got a job at 2 different rehearsal spaces, one of which had very big name artists. I wanted to be a little more hands on and be a part of it so once I got familiar running monitors and in ears for these artists, I left the rehearsal spaces and did sound for Whisky A Go Go and Blackrose LA where I began mixing actual shows, doing both FOH and monitors for 5-7 artists a night. This also changed the game for me because my 2 degrees weren’t in live sound, but I started getting several opportunities from mixing these artists.
As a musician myself, I know what it’s like to perform and not get the best sound in your wedges or in ears, and it can be very difficult. So the one thing that I really wanted to make sure of was that I took care of the artist on stage first. If the artist is happy, then they’re not only going to trust you, but they will also perform better and with confidence. Then I could focus on the FOH mix and make sure that if I was doing sound in a 500 cap room, I wanted it to sound like it was at The Forum or a stadium. I truly believe this mindset was what caught the attention of the artists I work with, and also with Grant Owens of We Found New Music. Grant still has me mix all of his shows today.
Throughout college and returning to LA, I also started my Alt Rock project SØUNDHOOSE. I never wanted to be a solo artist and never will, so I waited until I moved back to LA to find like-minded artists like myself. I already had a catalogue of songs to play so I showed them to Paul Burns (our drummer) who immediately loved them and wanted to be a part of it. About a year later, Paul and I realized that we absolutely needed a bassist and we found Jeremy Bauer who just really took us to another level. I got very lucky finding both of these guys and the songs we started writing were VASTLY better than what I had previously been making on my own. The mixes also undeniably improved due to mixing live shows every day. We put out our first full length album together in March of 23’ and are currently working on a group of new songs today.
Let’s talk about resilience next – do you have a story you can share with us?
I was always a competitive kid growing up playing hockey, and the competitiveness/resiliency never changed. The music industry is by far the hardest industry in the world to be in and it’ll eat you alive if you buckle when you get rejected or told no. You’ve gotta focus on your path and can’t try to mimic someone else because you’ll never make it. There’s one story where I was filling in for a colleague who double booked himself that day. The gig was for a Breaking Sound showcase and the venue didn’t have its own mixer. My colleague I was covering for, gave me his X-Air to mix off of. For those who don’t know it is basically a stage box that connects to a iPad via Wi-Fi. Once soundchecks started, I began to notice that the connection, despite having a router would disconnect every 30 seconds or less, and it became impossible to get anything done sound wise. There was no other mixer available or to rent and we were so delayed, that 45 minutes after doors the promoter came to me and asked if they should just cancel the show. I didn’t have any options and no one came up with a solution, but I also wasn’t going to let this happen so as a last ditch effort, I plugged the vocal mic directly into the back of the PA, daisy chained the line to the other PA, and then turned the floor wedges around and plugged tracks or keys directly into those and daisy chained those as well. I had no control of EQ, compression, or FX. The only thing I could control was speaker volume. I mixed the entire 2 1/2 to 3 hour show with no mixer, and the show went on. It was any engineer’s worst nightmare. But like I was told my first day in college, 90% of our job is troubleshooting. Most people would’ve given up and canceled the show, but I was not going to let that happen.
What do you think is the goal or mission that drives your creative journey?
I never wanted a normal 9 to 5 day job. I know too many people that wake up and hate going to work and life‘s too short for that. When I die, I wanna die happy after living a full life and not one of regret that I didn’t go after what I wanted. In terms of our music, that is my outlet for therapy. I don’t really like talking about my feelings and opening up but somehow when I am on stage, singing, my deepest, darkest thoughts, to a bunch of random people I don’t know, I do it with ease. It’s sick and twisted but it’s the only outlet where I feel comfortable sharing how I feel or what’s on my mind. Mental health is a very monumental aspect of the band. I’ve seen what it can do for me, and if we can help even one person with something that they’re going through, then we’ve made a difference. I’m not in it for the money, and I do it because I feel like I absolutely have to.
Contact Info:
- Website: www.soundhoose.com
- Instagram: @soundhoosebrandon @soundhoose
- Facebook: @soundhoose
- Twitter: @soundhoose
- Youtube: https://youtube.com/@soundhoose8868?si=jDsI0-xmjSd3BqiU
Image Credits
Matthias Fau