Mitch Craig, Owner/Producer, Mitch Craig Productions, Memphis, Tennessee
He's a veteran producer for radio with over 25 years' experience. Four years ago, he left the world of paychecks and bosses and went out on his own. Since then, his voice has become one of the most heard sweeper voices in the country, he has produced a jingle package, and now he is about to release his third production library. The sole proprietor of Mitch Craig Productions is obviously a busy man, but we managed to steal a little of his time for an interview. Grab a cup of coffee, kick back, and join us as we check in with Mitch Craig.
R.A.P.: Give us a day in the life of Mitch Craig. What did you do today?
Mitch: Today started around 7:30. That's when I got to the office. First thing this morning, I had to face the problems of keeping the studio maintained. I had to switch out a capstan motor in a machine. Even though I'm not an engineer, I've seen them do it enough times that I can take it apart and put it back together. Then I started producing some of the stuff I've had come in. I did that until about noon. After lunch, I started watching the fax machine. The people I work with on a regular basis usually start faxing in their material around that time. Then I start voicing or producing or both, and get it ready to overnight back to them. It's 5:20 now, and hopefully I'll be out of here in an hour or so.
R.A.P.: So, you're pretty much producing what comes in on the fax machine all day.
Mitch: Yes, but I have several other projects I work on also. Of course, I do sweepers and promos for radio, but I also do commercials, A/V work, and various other things that I can schedule as "upcoming." I usually take one or more of these in the morning, then the afternoon is devoted to things of a more timely nature that have to be there the next day.
R.A.P.: Give us a brief rundown of your background.
Mitch: I started in Louisiana at age fourteen when I was in high school. I worked through high school then went to KNOE in Monroe, Louisiana. From there, I went to the William B. Tanner Company in Memphis for about a year or so. Then it was to WMPS in Memphis where I did afternoon drive and Production Director. Then there was a stint in Uncle Sam's Army, in Armed Forces Radio in Korea. After that, it was back to Memphis followed by a stint in Dallas at KNUS, the Gordon McLendon station, where I was Program Director for a while after Michael Spears and John Rivers. Then it was back to Memphis to the Tanner Company. I stayed here with the Tanner Company which became Media General and is now gone. It has been bought out by TM in Dallas. About four years ago, I went out on my own, and this is what I've been doing ever since.
R.A.P.: How did you feel about programming after the gig at KNUS, and how did that job come about?
Mitch: I didn't like it. I was not cut out to be a Program Director. That was not what I had been trained to do. I was already there as Production Director and did a shift from six to ten at night, and I guess I was the logical choice when the vacancy came up. I had always wanted to be a Program Director, but I was not quite ready for market number eight. There was too much paperwork and too many schedules to fill out. It was too time consuming, and I really couldn't get into it that much. I enjoyed being in the production room.
R.A.P.: How many stations would you say you have done voice work for since you went out on your own?
Mitch: The number is in excess of two hundred, but there are a lot of guys out there doing this stuff. Some of the stations that I have voiced for have probably gone with other people.
R.A.P.: Do you feel an increase in the number of "sweeper guys" out there getting into the business?
Mitch: Oh yeah, there's no doubt. Everybody and their brother are trying to do something now, and there's a lot more competition than there ever was before.
R.A.P.: When you get in the studio and knock out some sweepers or promos, what kind of processing do you like to put on your voice?
Mitch: I try to keep it as clean as I can. I always voice my first generation flat, then I go to the 8-track. When I mix down, I will EQ the voice and whatever else needs to be EQ'd on each individual track. Once I get it all mixed down the way I want it, I get my best results by blanket compressing the whole mix. It seems to give it a pretty good punch. There are some exceptions to this, depending upon what I'm trying to achieve, but most of the time I compress the whole mix. I don't add an awful lot of compression; I try to add enough to thicken it a little bit, but I don't try to make it pump or anything. I also use a little reverb, and on particular words or whatever, I'll really throw it out there to highlight a word or phrase. I think reverb makes is so much richer.
R.A.P.: We keep a continuous eye on the use of the famous "stutter" effect. Do you use sampling this way?
Mitch: Yeah, I'll do that quite a bit. A lot of mine is done by using the SPX-90 and the Ultra-Harmonizer. Sometimes I get some effects out of these units that you don't get on a keyboard.
R.A.P.: Do a lot of your clients still ask for the stutter effect?
Mitch: Yes, there's still a good bit of it, and there are some stations getting away from it. Every once in a while, you'll run up against a guy who will say, "Man, do not use that stutter effect. That's the most horrendous sound I've ever heard, and I don't want to hear it on my radio station." I think the stutter effect is all a matter of how you use it. On certain things, I still think it sounds really good.
R.A.P.: You don't use the stutter effect as your signature in any way, do you?
Mitch: No. My signature is, "I'll try to do what you want," whether it's stutter or non-stutter. If they say, "You're not going to give me that stutter effect, are you?" I'll say, "No... I'm not going to do that. I'll read the line backwards if you want. Whatever you want, I'll try to give it to you."
R.A.P.: Are you working several different formats with the voice work?
Mitch: Yes. I guess the main focus has been CHR, but I do some country and some A/C gold. As a matter of fact, I'm mailing one package off to Tokyo for a station called FM Yokohama. It's all English, but I don't know what the format is there. What was interesting about this deal was the call I received from this fellow in Japan. I have an answering machine that I leave on 24 hours a day, and I'll come in sometimes and have a call from Italy, or Germany, or Australia. You never know what you're going to hear, and I don't know how these people know about me. I guess it's from listening to the States or word of mouth. So anyway, when the guy called me from Tokyo, he said, "I want you to do a sweepah, and I want you to do it like this..." and he played some sweepers that I had done for KMEL, and some that I had on Pirate Radio and on Z100. I thought, "Boy, this is weird. I'm listening to a call from Tokyo and hearing sweepers that I did in the States!" So, we made the transaction, and they're going out today.
R.A.P.: There seems to be a growing trend with the country stations to use more "CHR sounding" sweeper guys. Have you noticed this trend?
Mitch: Yes. The ones that I've dealt with are like that. They're very much the CHR presentation. I mean, they don't want to get it too "lazery" or with too much "attitude" that it gets cocky sounding, but they do like that CHR approach and it sounds good.
Radio production overall, not just on country stations, is getting slicker. Plus, radio stations are now putting the bucks into hiring outside people, like myself, to produce for their stations, whereas years ago, they didn't do that very much. Now, they're allocating budgets for this kind of thing, and you're hearing a lot better production on radio stations across the country.
R.A.P.: What kind of facility are you working out of?
Mitch: I have a three room suite in an office building. One room is devoted to office space, one room is the main production studio, and the other is like a dubbing studio and storage area. The main studio is 8-track. I have a Tascam ATR-60, which is their new, big 8-track. Plus, I have an Otari 8-track. I have three Otari MX5050-III 2-tracks, DBX, the H3000 Ultra-Harmonizer, an Aural Exciter, a Gain Brain, SPX-90's, reverb, and a few other goodies.
R.A.P.: Is that H3000 your favorite toy?
Mitch: I like it a lot. I use that little SPX90, too. For the dollar, you can't beat that thing with a stick. It's really clean and it is inexpensive. The H3000 is some $3000, so it's a little more expensive, but it has some pretty neat effects in it, too. I'll combine the two every once in a while and run one through the other. You can really come up with some crazy sounding stuff that way.
R.A.P.: Other than your obvious vocal talent, what else would you contribute your success in the voice business to?
Mitch: What has always been my ace in the hole is being able to actually produce. When I was working for a radio station, being able to produce always seemed to be my job security. Now, all of those things -- the production, the experience I've had with syndication -- are sort of meshing together and working for me now.
R.A.P.: Do you have any tips for folks wanting to get into the voice business?
Mitch: Well, I don't know if there are any tips, really. There aren't any secrets. Everybody knows the same things that I know. If you want to get in it, you just bow up and get after it. I think it's all in your presentation and what you put forth to your clients -- what they hear, what they see, and how you talk to them. I think the key to how successful you are in the end is how you treat 'em once you get 'em. I would always badmouth car salesmen because they would sell you a car, then you would never see them again. When I went into business, I always said that I would never do that. That's what I try to live by, and it has worked well.
R.A.P.: Are you a musician?
Mitch: No.
R.A.P.: Where do you get the synthesizer sounds you use for your sweepers and ID's?
Mitch: I have some guys that I work with here locally that are very accomplished musicians and keyboard specialists. They provide the synthesizer sounds for me. In fact, one of them, who is no longer here in Memphis, used to be one of the writers for the Tanner Company and Media General. I worked with him in Nashville, too. He wrote several of the major libraries they had and numerous ID packages.
R.A.P.: Are these the same guys you used on your libraries?
Mitch: Yes. On the Digital Energy package, I used the guy I was talking about along with a couple of others. Just one of these guys was responsible for putting Future Shock together. We worked on it together. On some of the package, he would come to my studio and we'd work on it a little bit. Other times, we'd use his bigger studio that's just devoted to music. I would feed him ideas and tell him what I wanted, he'd give me rough tracks, then we'd go from there.
R.A.P.: Let's talk about your libraries. You've produced three since you've been on your own, the latest being Future Shock. Judging from the demo, Future Shock is quite different from your other two and different from most everything else out there. What do you think the difference is?
Mitch: Well, a lot of Future Shock is non-melodic. One of the main things you hear from radio production people is that they need tracks that are good for promos, something that has a good driving rhythm but doesn't have all the melody. Being a production person, I knew exactly what they were talking about. Plus, I wanted to offer some things that grabbed your attention as soon as they hit; and with most of those tracks, as soon as they hit, you know it. As far as the effects, I tried to include effects that could be used for sweepers, ID's and the like. It was strictly planned for the production person that's doing the hot radio production that's out there now. The Effector, one of the other packages, is along the same line, but Future Shock is even hotter than that.
R.A.P.: Several of the cuts on the demo tape featured electric guitar licks. Was this a synthesized guitar sound included in the MIDI tracks or was the guitar overdubbed live?
Mitch: The electric guitar was live. There may be a couple of spots with a synthesized guitar lick or two, but there is live overdub of guitar in the Future Shock library. In the Digital Energy package, there is live guitar, sax, and a few other instruments as well.
R.A.P.: How far along are you with Future Shock?
Mitch: As a matter of fact, I finished up with the printer this afternoon, and I'll have that ready to go to the CD plant next week. The digital master has been made and is ready to put on CD's, so in two or three weeks I should have some CD's to start sending out. I have only mailed out about a half dozen demos to people I work with regularly just to get their input, and the first six out of the chute said, "Yes, I want it! Book it!"
R.A.P.: The library demos are very well produced. You've obviously done a few of them before.
Mitch: Yes. That was also one of my main jobs with the Tanner Company and Media General. I produced a lot of demos for libraries. The fourteen years that I was there, I was more or less the General Manager of the syndication department that put out contests, promos, and that type stuff. Plus, I was manager of six production libraries.
R.A.P.: The Effector, which was released in 1988, was your first library. What made you decide to do it?
Mitch: I like to have as many things going as I can and be as diversified as possible. The library was something I had always wanted to do when I was at Media General or the Tanner Company. I wanted to do a library that was geared more towards promotion instead of a full scope library that took in everything. The Effector is geared more to CHR and urban formats, and AOR stations bought it, too. Digital Energy is a little more broad-scoped. It has some seasonal and international stuff in it. It's more like a mini full-scope library. Future Shock is straight ahead promotions all the way; and it can go on CHR, urban, and even some country stations can use it.
R.A.P.: When you did your first library, were you pretty much aware of what you were getting yourself into?
Mitch: Yeah, I had it planned out. Monetarily, I knew what it was going to take to put it together. I also tried to do a little pre-sell and a little talking up around the country to different people to avoid getting myself in a bind. I spent cash money up front for all those libraries. There's the expense of getting them produced, getting them on CD, plus all the printing that needs to be done, and you want to make sure you don't get caught in the hole. I also had a lot of training from my time with the Tanner Company. I knew how to deal with the mastering process and the CD plants because I had done all that. Plus, I had produced presentations for years. It made it a lot easier because I knew what I was doing by that point. It just became a matter of finding the time to get the libraries produced.
R.A.P.: I take it your first library did well, or you wouldn't have done two more.
Mitch: Yeah, it did, considering the fact I did all the selling. Until I went on my own, I had never been a salesman, but I found out I could do it, and I've put the library in an awful lot of markets.
R.A.P.: What kind of marketing did you do for your libraries? Was it mainly hooking up with stations that were already using your voice?
Mitch: Well, I did a little bit of everything. I did a little advertising in some of the trades, I did some direct mail, and a lot of it was just talking it up. The radio business is one of the greatest in the world as far as what happens once you get something going -- the network will spread it, and the people will call you.
R.A.P.: Well, good luck with Future Shock and continued success with your voice work! What's next for Mitch Craig?
Mitch: I'll tell you, I'm just as content as can be to keep on rolling just like I am. I've enjoyed being out on my own, and I hope to come up with some kind of different product each year just to keep myself fresh, whether it be a production library or something else. I even had a jingle package for a while. It was called Front Runners. I hired a bunch of jingle singers here in the market, and boy, it's a smokin' ID package; but I got tired of fooling with that. When you work for yourself, the only person you've got to depend on is you. When you're doing jingle packages and somebody buys the package, you've got to bring in four or five singers and set up your session. If one of your singers comes down with a cold, well your session is gone. If your engineer doesn't show up, you're messed up there. It can be a real headache trying to get six or seven people together. It's a good jingle package, but I didn't stay with it very long. I may try it again and try to get a little more control. God willin', I'll just keep on keepin' on. ♦