Featured User: Rogers Masson

This week we’re introducing the Gobbler world to Producer/Engineer/Musician Rogers Masson! Rogers is a genuine guy who’s been really taking advantage of the beta period by  really using the software to the fullest & providing the community with awesome feedback *Rockstar*!  Here’s all about Rogers:

How have you integrated Gobbler into your workflow?

Gobbler has made its way into my standard tool set, seamlessly integrating itself alongside my most trusted pieces of gear.  My mix room is located in Nashville, Tenn, but I produce projects all over.  I use Gobbler continually while I’m mixing — especially during the recall process — sending reference mixes to my clients in Los Angeles, Denmark, or the UK.  Gobbler can run in the background, sending over the latest mix of one song, while I’m making changes to another song, for example.  My clients love it as well. Having used other transfer programs in the past, they immediately see and feel the intuitive nature of the GUI.

Tell us a little about your background in the music business/audio….

Music was always a major part of my life growing up, and I was always fascinated by the different sounds I would hear jumping out of the speakers.  I always wondered, “how did they do that?!”  My career started as a guitar player in the US Army Band.  There was a recording studio in the band hall — nothing fancy – but enough gear to get the job done. I was hooked.  After the Army, I went back to college, earned a degree in music and that’s when I started producing.  I was recording my classmates’ bands, radio promos, voiceovers for children’s stories, location sound and anything else I could do to just keep recording and learning the craft of putting projects together.  I built a studio at my house, eventually, and dove in head first.  That was about 15 years ago, and I’ve been at it full-time ever since.  I’ve done so many different types of projects, especially early on.  I recorded tennis at Wimbledon for a sound library company, did forensic audio restoration for a district attorney’s office, did sound design for a cartoon show, was a re-recording mixer for a few films, and even had the amazing opportunity to record humpback whales in Alaska using the coolest hydra-phone I borrowed from the US Navy.  But it has always come back to music — the one constant for me.  Working with artists and bands is truly what I love to do. It is my passion in life.

What is your favorite record at the moment?

This is a tough one, as it fluctuates depending on the day and sometimes the activity I’m doing.  For the home improvement projects I’ve been working on lately it’s Morcheeba’s “Big Calm“.  The Who’s “Who’s Next” is keeping me motivated during my runs and workouts.  I listen to pulling up The Bravery’s “No Brakes“ and Black Rebel Motorcycle’s “Weapon of Choice” almost daily while I’m doing administrative work in the studio.  And lastly, right now while I’m writing this I’ve got Tom Petty’s “Wildflowers” spinning.

If you were on a desert island and could take just a few pieces of gear, what would they be?

My Army bayonet and a water purifier.

Just kidding…  My Mac, an SM57, Sennheiser’s new MK4, a 1073 pre, NS-10′s, pair of earbuds, solar panel for power, and a VHF radio transmitter/receiver…got to get the sounds out somehow right?!

Preferred DAW?

Depends.  If I’m recording, then it’s ProTools.  If I’m mixing – Logic.

Give us a situation where Gobbler has saved the day and/or a time when you could have really used a software like Gobbler?

Oh man, where do I start?!  In the short time I’ve been using Gobbler, I’ve thought of about 1,000 times when I could have used a tool like this for past projects.  I got a Skype call at 3 a.m. a few weeks back from Vintage Trouble, a band I produced/mixed, who has been on tour with Bon Jovi in the UK.  They were shooting a video that afternoon in Camden and desperately needed stems of the song and couldn’t find them. I headed to my studio, opened Gobbler and found it straight away on the drive Gobbler had scanned already. I zapped it over — done.  No hassle, no size concerns, no BS.  My client’s manager called me “The King” in an email that afternoon for saving the day.  I replied, “You should thank ‘The Great Gobbler’ for that.”

I’m mixing a project right now for a rock band who is located in Copenhagen, DK.  They have a healthy amount of tracks and it would have taken forever for them to parse out the data in to 2gb blocks, transfer it over to me(one block at a time), then assemble it all back together, hoping it’s all going to be in the right place.  Gobbler has allowed the artists I work with to be artists, not technological computer whizzes.  I want my artists to focus on their art, not on technology.  I want to focus on art, not technology.  Gobbler has allowed me, as well as my clients, to do just that.

What is your Website/Twitter/Anything you want to plug?

You can visit my website to hear some of my work, contact me if you like, and see what I’ve been up to lately at rogersmasson.com. Or, you can find me on Facebook at Rogers Masson and Twitter @RogersMasson.

If you have a moment, please check out the benefit project I’m producing with some of the top artists in the country music industry at ForOurCountry.Org. If you know of someone who is in the military, or has ever been in the military, please help spread the word about this much needed cause.  Thank you so very much in advance!