We recently connected with Ali “AMAC” McGuire and have shared our conversation below.

Hi Ali “AMAC” , thanks for joining us today. What sort of legacy are you hoping to build. What do you think people will say about you after you are gone, what do you hope to be remembered for?

Wow what a question. Honestly, I’m not so worried about being remembered forever. I of course want to be a great mix engineer and make classic records but I think of my legacy differently. I hope to be inspirational to the people I am around and through the internet. I hope to help as many people as I can live the life they dreamed, Help them heal. Help them be better at their craft, whatever that is. I hope that what I give to them they take with them and pass down to more people. That they won’t be gate keepers. That they will freely share all knowledge, their success and their failure. That they will be kind but they will not be stepped on. I hope that these messages and many more are passed along from me. Whether the person receiving that information knows of me or even the person telling that it came from me. Thats what I want my legacy to be.

Ali “AMAC” , 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?

I’m Ali “AMAC” McGuire. I am a platinum mix engineer, vocal producer, songwriter, and former but also still sometimes FOH engineer. From Philadelphia PA currently in Los Angeles CA. This is my story…

One of the coolest things about being an audio engineer is that there are a lot of different opportunities within one job description. Sure there are varying skills depending on the job but being an engineer can see you in a lot of different situations. For me, I’ve been a live sound FOH engineer and a studio engineer professionally. Let me take you back to the beginning.

One day I decided to drop out of college to pursue music. I didn’t really know anything about audio engineering then but my research that day lead me down a path that I wasn’t going to be able to escape from that day on. I moved too Baltimore to go to The Sheffield Institute for the Recording Arts. A 6 month course that introduced em to the language and how to plug stuff in. After that I went back to Philly and truly “faked it till I made it”.

I didn’t know anyone at the time who did music professionally so I would talk to anyone who was willing to talk to me about music. I did a lot of this by using craigslist at the time. Any kind of job that was involved in music. Some of them only paid me the toll money from Philly to Jersey each week. It didn’t matter to me anything I could do. That led to my first internship at Sigma Sound in Philly. Then to partnering into a studio name Drowning Fish which still operates today!

Still with all these endeavors I wasn’t making any money and had almost runout of my savings. Enter The Legendary Dobbs. I saw a post on Craigslist that basically read “we will take anyone who will accept $60 per night to do FOH upstairs” So I went there and told them “don’t interview anyone else I want every single shift you can give me”. I had no idea what I was doing for real but I showed up everyday and did it. That turned into 7 years of live sound work. All over Philly, touring etc. I tour managed, sold merch, DJ’d, drove, whatever would have me working in the “industry”. This ended up leading me to doing FOH for Fetty Wap and Post Malone on tour in 2016. From there it was time to take a chance on the studio for real. Enter LA.

I moved to LA with no job leads but I knew my live resume would be able to land me gigs as a searched for a way into the studio world. So thats what I did. After about 4 months I go introduced to a great mentor and friend of mine J.P. Negrete who owns a studio called Melrose Sound. JP took a chance on me and made me a studio engineer. I took every session I could and got my chops up. I ended up working all around town from GOOD Music to Atlantic and even a Platinum album. I’ve worked with Joji, Shordie Shordie, Murda Beatz, Sophia Reyes, PNB Rock, Tee Grizzly, Kelly Rowland, Lizzo, and many more. It’s been a wild ride. Now I have my own space and I focus a lot on developing artists and helping them achieve their sound.

When I work with my clients my goal is to help them achieve the sound they are looking for and help push them to go far past what their expectations even are. I am always looking to be better at my craft to better help them. I really care. This is less about a numbers game as it is a growth game. One of my favorite parts about being a mix engineer is that I FINISH songs for people. The amount of songs that get started and not finished it high to say the least. So I love to give it that final push the finish line. Over all I just love to create and help create art.

Can you share a story from your journey that illustrates your resilience?

Well working in the music business you need to be resilient always. There are always going to be No’s and tough times. People won’t believe in you. They will openly tell you that you aren’t good enough and you will keep going regardless. My whole career illustrates resilience and overcoming obstacles.

What do you find most rewarding about being creative?

Joy is the most rewarding aspect. Those lows you can feel from having to be resilient are easily quieted by the joy making art brings. When it gets really tough you just go back to why you wanted to do it in the first place. Because you loved it with all your heart.

Contact Info:

• Website: www.amaculent.com
• Instagram: amaculent
• Twitter: amaculent
• Youtube: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCePMZ6Mcqt3Y-Hms9Yj9k4g

Image Credits
Pretty Rad Reg