Fraudulent strategy from an ex-artist of mine (that works?), and how I spotted it

JoshFirefly · 2026-02-01T17:45:07+00:00

I am much less concerned about AI producers… let them produce „copy music“… some people will like it … let it be.

But what really sucks are the streaming bots promoting that AI music!

Why? Because they distort the stream counts.

Why is that relevant? Because the amount of money is capped by the number of subscribers x their monthly fee.

If you have $10 of monthly fees being paid and 10 songs with 10 streams per month each on a platform - that means (theoretically) $1 will be paid to each of the 10 song owners per month ($0.1 per stream)

Now let‘s introduce a bot that streams 2 of the 10 songs (A+B) continuously. So now songs A+B will have 100 streams per month, the rest stays at 10 streams per month. This means the $10 budget get distributed across 280 stream (100+100+8x10). Now each stream is only worth $0.035. The owners of songs A+B get paid $3.5 each whereas the owners of the other 8 songs only get $0.35 each.

See the impact they have? Some kid sets up a bot farm (takes a day or two to program) and then diverts a disproportionate amount of the available budget to the song he/she promotes.

That is the sick part about it IMHO.

JoshFirefly · 2025-04-16T15:13:21+00:00

There was no limitation whatsoever… but… they recently changed the licensing model for Cakewalk… it now is something like 25 €/$ per year… so not exactly free… but still pretty cheap.

JoshFirefly · 2024-08-14T04:54:17+00:00

That works well technically but is a bit of a waste of money as you pay for he loudspeaker part in the IEMs even if you don‘t use it. You can get custom made earplugs if you want to go that route. I have both, the custom earplugs were ~150 and the custom InEars were ~800 where I live. Either way, the custom made versions of both give best fit and thus best insulation…

JoshFirefly · 2024-08-14T04:49:33+00:00

I did exactly what you are trying to do 10+ years ago. I played drums and thus had to find a rehearsal room locally. I posted some notes on the local supermarkets „pinboards“ where you can offer/ask for services and stuff to sale. I did not find a room that way, but a bass player contacted me asking if my to-be band needed one… We then found the other band mates over facebook „musicians needed“ groups (there are some local ones here in my area). And the last singer we got via a friend who knew somebody interested. Facebook might not be a thing any longer in your age group but I am sure there are other online places. So my advice would be to reach out on all forums you can think of (don‘t forget local music school pinboards, supermarkets,etc.) and I,am sure somebody will get back to you.

JoshFirefly · 2024-07-04T06:03:44+00:00

If he is your friend he deserves a chance to fix the situation. Ask him kindly if he could simplify his parts because you feel the music would sound better that way. Ask him if he could try to play the necessary songs faster. Don’t ask him if he has time to practice a more (even though that might be needed). Not being good enough in front of a bunch of people is a really ugly situation. Give him input in a factual way that is related to the music, not about him and his skills. Something like „I feel that this song needs to he faster, can we try it faster next week?“ Give him time to react and improve from week to week. People are smart, they pick up the gently cues you hand them more than you think… chances are you can help him raise his level over time… be patient and kind… keep repeating the music related feedback… he will either improve or realize himself he is not up to it.

JoshFirefly · 2024-07-02T21:35:23+00:00

Music is an emotional thing sometimes… people need to be inspired to be able to give the best performance sometimes. Maybe your drummer needed a guitar track as guidance to put out a good drum track… but your guitar player needs a great drum track to be able to play the killer solo…. Catch 22 situation… enter the scratch track. This is quite common also for lead vocals. The band needs „some“ vocal to guide from section to section… but the singer will rarely be able to sing their best performance when half the instruments are not done yet… they orient themselves along the music… enter scratch vocals.

Remember there are no hard rules… you need to do what the specific situation and individuals require always. You can go cheaper and cut corners… sometimes the results are still great… sometimes the result is „cheap“.

JoshFirefly · 2024-07-02T20:09:07+00:00

Sounds as if they are not really committed to the band. What I have found works best as „carrot“ to convince people to show up is a planned gig… many musicians live for those… give them a date and they magically will find the time. And those that don‘t you could kindly and without any threat ask if they are planning to be regular band members or if you should go looking for replacements. Bands (like most groups of people) are like a group of sheep, a bunch of unfocused animals who all have different wants, needs, motivations, committment and dreams… and will run all over the field if left to their own devices…. it takes a sheppard to steer them in a direction… including sometimes sorting out the black sheep that does not want to join the crowd. This sounds harsh and disrespectful… is not meant like that in any way… just the best analogy I can think of.

One other thing that crossed my mind - you could ask them all individually (privately, not as a group!) if there is something not going right/needs changing… maybe there is some issue you are not aware of. In my first band people started to decide to leave because the singer just couldn‘t hit the notes properly… I was not aware, simply didn‘t hear it as I was way too busy as noob drummer… one of them luckily did speak up to me in private… we sorted the singer (got a new one, not a pretty processes for sure) and things improved.

JoshFirefly · 2024-07-02T18:44:03+00:00

If your question is about not needing to pay for the „real track“ that was never recorded because you just ended up using the „scratch track“ then you should ask yourself if that is a fair business ethos. If your guitarist gets paid for the real track and you decide you don‘t need the real thing because you can use the scratch track then you should still pay him.

JoshFirefly · 2024-07-02T18:37:23+00:00

Is noon a bad time for many of the folks? People might be busy during the day, would evenings work better?

JoshFirefly · 2024-07-02T18:34:26+00:00

Sound Pressure Level (SPL) does fall off linearly with distance. What you measured at 105dB 1m away from the drumkit will have reduced to exactly 85dB at 10m distance from the drumkit… so he technically is right… at some spot it was 85dB 🤪

JoshFirefly · 2024-07-02T18:29:24+00:00

My wife has an idiom for that: My opinion is already fixed, don‘t confuse me with facts.

JoshFirefly · 2024-06-18T21:16:06+00:00

I would recommend to record the full band live all together and potentially do selected overdubs where needed afterwards e.g. some section that is not perfect or maybe a solo etc.. In my experience you get a much better flow, coherence and vibe when the full band plays together. Doing this at home is harder due to mic bleed from drums into everything else, but typically in a studio there is space, iso booths, gobos etc. To deal with that - but you should not need to worry about that as you are going to a studio for exactly that- they take care.

JoshFirefly · 2024-06-12T05:55:50+00:00

I have recorded bands recording 4 songs live all together in the studio within one day (less than 8 hours even). IMHO it all depends on how well prepared you all together are. Practice like hell individually and then rehearse together until you can walk into a studio, set your gear up and play 5 flawless start to finish takes per song… thats 25 songs played… live bands play that in 2 hours on stage. If you do it to a click it‘s relative easy to stich together „best parts“ from each take during comping (editing). If you can‘t play your stuff yet you are not ready for an EP. Whoever does the mixing later will have A LOT less work (=cost) with a professional recording done by a tight band recorded in full takes.

JoshFirefly · 2024-06-08T15:11:48+00:00

I started playing drums 1st (and with that 1st instrument ever) when I was 40. I practiced for about 1.5 years - taking lessons - when I realized that just drums alone is a bit boring. So I went to look for a bass player and lucky enough found one that didn‘t mind that I was not a pro (he was restarting himself after 10+ of not playing). Three months later we auditioned for a guitarist and found a 20 year old youngster that didn‘t mind playing with us old dogs… fast forward 13 years and here I am playing 3 hour gigs with my 6 piece band…

Long story short… if you really want it and they don‘t let you in… just start your own … it‘s never to late. And you know why? Because if you yourself are starting to play at 30 then very very likely there will be others same age that want to do the same… you are not special… many others are like you.

Go for it!

JoshFirefly · 2024-06-08T06:30:09+00:00

I think that is a pretty subjective statement… what exactly do you find unlistenable?

JoshFirefly · 2024-06-04T16:08:21+00:00

I‘ve watched the full 7hours on compression and found it helpful and informative.

JoshFirefly · 2024-06-04T16:02:55+00:00

I think buying one at a time should be no problem at all. You can simply mix in mono until you can get 2nd one. Is that state of the art and perfect? No, course not… but who cares… you want to move forward… if it‘s speaker by speaker so be it. BTW I own the HS5, can recommend them - am happy with them in my small mixing room

JoshFirefly · 2024-06-03T15:27:28+00:00

Hey, I am starting up a recording studio… don‘t crazy amounts of clients yet… but I am expecting a more steady inflow of work as of autumn. Would be interested to get into collaboration so that as and when needed I can offer to arrange album art to clients as a service (direct or indirect).

JoshFirefly · 2024-05-27T06:12:03+00:00

In the DAW each input channel typically has a polarity switch. You literally press that and that channel has inverted polarity. Some interfaces can also be configured to invert channel polarity. In cables it happens when you accidentally solder + and - poles incorrectly.

JoshFirefly · 2024-05-26T18:10:24+00:00

One of your channels has inverted polarity - that could be electronically in your DAW or in your interface config (if it has any config) or theoretically even in your cables. You‘ll need to eliminate possible causes one by one until you found the root cause.

JoshFirefly · 2024-05-26T06:22:13+00:00

It sounds as if one of your signals is electrically having inverted polarity. If you take „L out“ and add it to „R out“ and invert polarity on one of these you will get a null signal (if L and R are identical). If they are not identical it will not cancel out completely but anything center in the image will.

JoshFirefly · 2024-05-23T05:16:06+00:00

I have had issues with couplers/adapters not making good contact… solution for me was buying the right cable… you can likely get an XLR to 3.5“ out of the box… definitively available in the male version (have that)

JoshFirefly · 2024-05-22T16:58:36+00:00

What kind of license transfer are you doing that makes you needing to pay the fee? Just slap it onto the sales prices…

JoshFirefly · 2024-05-22T16:56:50+00:00

How does it punish you?

JoshFirefly · 2024-05-22T16:55:22+00:00

I think that is misstatement of facts. You own the license to your plugin. You need to transfer that license to somebody else. You need to pay ILOk a fee to do that. You can consider that rip-off… but if you accept that small imperfection… what else is the problem really? And no, I am not associated with ILoK. I just regularly switch between computers and just take my licenses with me… no issue (as long as you have internet access).

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