Category: Tips

The Mayers on Premier Gospel’s Family Hour


We were invited to be interviewed for The Family Hour on Premier Gospel Radio in the UK. If you don’t normally tune in, it’s a great station with awesome presenters and good mixture of Gospel music and talk. (Listen to the live stream)
We mainly spoke about our four month adventure in St Kitts, but also covered things like large families, marriage tips and other topics!

You can listen back to the show here: 

It’s always really weird hearing your own voice on the radio. I wonder if regular presenters feel the same way!

Was there anything we spoke about that you’d like to know more about? Or maybe something we didn’t cover but you’d love to ask? Let us know in the comments, via Twitter or Facebook

Advertisement

Stepping Out of the Comfort Zone

image

The best times in my life have been when I’ve stepped out of my comfort zone;

-Applied for that job that was “above” me and got it!
-Moved abroad with my family for 4 months rather than stay in the UK.
-Stepped suddenly into a career change by responding of a friend’s Facebook status.

image

So I just want to encourage you to do the same! Perhaps you’re not quite ready to fully step out, and that’s ok. Maybe try a few new things that stretch you to start with. I get inspiration from blogs and podcasts. I just found out my local library does online courses and free audio books [goodbye Audible]. Or ask for some suggestions from one of your inspirational friends (you MUST have at least one, right?)

Then share what you’ve done because you just might inspire someone else! It would be awesome to see more people step out of the ordinary and into something new. I know I’m happiest when I do.

Shout out to my Ninjas…you inspire me daily!

apologies for the blog break. I don’t quite have as much downtime as I did when I was on holiday 😁, but I do plan to keep this regular

This Video Changed My Life (a little!)

image

*Vegetarians look away*

Not sure if you know, but in a family of 7, we get through a lot of food. Now that I’ve escaped the rat-race, it’s even more important to make the money I do have stretch further!

The humble chicken. So tasty, so versatile, so cooked a lot! Quite simply, it’s cheaper to buy whole chickens, and cut them into pieces yourself, than buy pre-prepared legs/thighs/wings/breast etc

Now if I’m really smart, I’ll embed a YouTube video

 here…otherwise it will just be a link and I’ll embed it later!

I’ve been doing it for a few weeks and it’s been really great. Add this to the veg only dishes we have a few times a week, our food budget is much more manageable 😀

Anyone got any more time or money saving tips for families?

Thanks to Lifehacker for the inspiration!

Producer Tips #2

Ok, I tweeted this tip earlier…
“If a vocal take is not good enough to be upfront in the mix, it’s not good enough”

I say this because whether you are singing or rapping, there is always some kind of message you want to get across to your audience.

There are a few common mistakes in this area.
– Letting an artist do a weak vocal and hoping you can tune it/edit/mask it with effects

– Making an instrumental so full, there is no room for the vocals

– Placing the vocals too low in the overall mix.

Personally, I’d rather get a good vocal take with lots of feeling, than a pitch perfect one with little emotion. By the way, don’t be afraid to give guidance on how vocal phrases should be approached for the best end result.

Making a beat without a song is ok, but once there are vocals on it, again don’t be afraid (or too proud) to strip stuff out to make room for the vocals.

Lastly, once you’ve got the vocal ready, make 2 or 3 final mixes of your tracks, where the lead, and possibly backing vocals are brought a bit forward in the mix and see which one ‘sits’ best.

There’s a lot more of these tips coming, so feel free to comment here, ask questions or let me know what other tips you’d like to see!

Producer Tips Series

I promised I would update my blog with some producer tips. Not sure how many tips there will be in the series, but here is number one…

Producer Tip #1: Learn another instrument, even if it’s a shaker, and use it to spark ideas, or add to your tracks

[Note, most of my tracks have a shaker in them!!]

%d bloggers like this: