1. [Jobs]
I'm currently interning at WaveGroup Sound, located in Fremont about 7 minutes from my house. As I was mostly unaware of this when I joined, these are the guys that recorded pretty much all the music for the majority of the Guitar Hero games as well as Rock Band. Other than that, they seem to be the go-to guys for a lot of corporate VO and telephony work, recording a lot of the stuff that gets put into phone listings (addresses, business names, movie times) and customer support. Overall it's pretty cool because they maintain steady telephony work and get to work on the more creative game/post stuff as it comes along.
In terms of the actual work, I basically was doing 10 hour days five days a week for the first month or so, with a pre-planned week off for travel and an eventual shift to 3.5 days a week since there was a second intern there 2 days a week. A lot of the work ended up being semi janitorial in nature, and since it's a small company there really isn't room in the budget for a cleaning crew. I pretty much spent the first 6 weeks cleaning anything and everything. A "deep clean," if you will. There just seemed to be things that hadn't been properly tended to for months to over a year even. Well, it may not have been the dream job in that respect, but the amount I learned while there easily made it all worthwhile. Plus, I can say I've left a lasting impression both on the staff and the building itself, which feels pretty good.
The company is only 11 people at this point, so sadly there is no chance for a job (at present) following my internship, but I'm hoping to keep on their short-list for the future. I learned about 4 weeks in that there would be no job, but my intern coordinators encouraged looking for jobs and had no issue with me starting to reduce my hours to allow for personal time and job hunting (interns are normally in 2 days a week instead of my initial 5). Taking a day and a half off did make a huge amount of difference since I suddenly wasn't so exhausted and I actually had time for the little things...like finally unpacking my stuff 6 weeks after moving home.
It's hard to tell what will happen here, but I have 2 weeks left including this one, and I can tell I'm going to miss it. On the plus side, I've made a lasting impression on the President and basically everyone there, so I'm thinking at the very least I'll get a good reference or two out of it on top of everything I learned from being there.
2. [Projects]
I'm back to work on my own music again! After a 6 month hiatus, mostly due to my singer vanishing from the face of the earth, so now I'm back to figuring out how to work on some of that material. I've also made a lot of headway on the next "album" I want to finish after that: It's basically a suite of 8-12 songs, all guitar-based and tuned Standard with the low-E dropped down to a B, where each song flows into the next, hopefully creating a sense of a series of fluid movements over a span of an hour.
Other than that I'm somewhat working with an Oakland rapper, both by recording vocals for his new album and possibly mastering a collection of 15 years of his older work. From working with him I realize that it really would not be hard to transition into working with hip-hop more, and I'm always down for collaboration if you guys ever need another engineer, a guitarist, or anything really.
3. [Location]
Fremont, CA. I'm planning to stick around here for at least a few months, maybe the next year even, to see what the bay is like for sound. It almost has more to do with the majority of my friends and family being nearby as well as my external commitments (namely soccer and rock climbing). However, I did have a chance at something in LA last week that made me reconsider it all, so I know I'd be down to move down there even at a moment's notice if it was the right job.
4. [Events/Shows]
Been to some good ones over the past few months, and going to one this Wednesday! These Arms Are Snakes at Bottom of the Hill in SF. Other than that I'll be seeing Portugal. The Man in late November at Slim's, which should be an amazing show. Despite my somewhat outlandish or bizarre music tastes, I have a feeling P. The Man's new album has something pretty much all of you would enjoy somehow. They have a few of their new songs on their myspace.
In terms of events, I'll likely be going to AES and maybe MacWorld in January.
5. [Cool Sites]
This one.
6. [Stuff I Learned So Far]
I have far more intimate knowledge of how Corporate VO works, and have gained tremendous insight into the multi-faceted inner workings of the small company. I'd say the number one skill I've picked up is editing from the VO sessions and learning how the composer edits and builds his music.
7. [Job Hookups?]
Maybe? I feel like I "know a guy" at a few places, and am about to extend my sound tentacles out into the world to see what sticks, but so far, no. On that note, as my internship is about to end in 2 weeks, my tentative plan is to work on my own stuff from home, maybe giving myself until the end of the year (or longer), all the while continuing the job hunt each week. If for whatever reason any of you find yourselves needing help on anything, I am, as always, open to assist and/or collaborate, and in the rare event that you come across anything post/game audio related that you inexplicably don't want, I'm all ears.
That being said, once I get a better idea of what all of YOU want to do and where, I will gladly return the favor.
8. [How Am I?]
Great! I will say that 3 months of this internship have really made a huge difference. While I initially feared the move back home to Fremont would kill my social life, I actually know more people down here than I did up there! Right now I'm in the "no rent zone," so I finally have a chance to just focus on music/sound stuff with little other worries. My suggestion: if living at home even seems remotely feasible, and you've already gained your sense of independence and freedom, then go for it. It's totally worth it.
That aside the non-sound aspects of my life have been rather fulfilling, and in general I feel consistently much happier than I have been in a while. It would be nice to hang with all of you again sometime soon though! Maybe we can arrange quarterly "reunions" to catch up and see how we're progressing in our careers.
On a side note, if there's anything you all have been working for, I'd love to hear it! While it's old, I'll get things started with the rough mixes I posted of my "work in progress" album from back in March:
Consider it a placeholder for the ideas for the time being. Hopefully I'll have more to share and report soon.
Well, that's it on my end. I'm looking forward to catching up with you guys soon and seeing how the past few months have been treating you!
Take care,
Sean
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1 comment:
Yay Sean! Thanks for posting :) Can't say the same for all you slackers though :P
I feel you on the cleaning situation, but it's all about the 'paying dues' thing. Sounds like the people at the company are really nice. That's such a big thing too... when everyone feels comfortable with each other in a working environment.
I'd love to hear the album when it's done. I don't play in Standard tuning a lot, but I'm actually trying to gravitate towards it to see what I can come up with.
It would be cool to see you down here in LA!
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