Find Your Light: Matthew Weiss on Building a Mixing Engineer Career (Episode 88)

Everything you do is an audition.

Matthew Weiss is Akon's right-hand engineer. He moved to Los Angeles in 2016, partnered with Kanye West's engineer Andrew Dawson to run a commercial studio, then became a technical consultant on a studio Akon was building. Akon liked what he heard and made Matthew his personal recordist and mix engineer. Since then he has recorded and mixed four albums and hundreds of B-sides with Akon, earned a platinum plaque for engineering "Comentale" by Ozuna and Akon, and mixed for artists from Chris Brown and Nicki Minaj to Rick Ross and Becky G.

In Episode 88 of The Career Musician, Matthew walks Nomad through how a mixing engineer career actually gets built in LA: the plan, the network, the follow-up and the business side most people skip.

Don't romanticize the move

Nomad asked how Matthew made the trek to LA, and Matthew was glad he did.

"People very often romanticize coming out to a place like LA... and they say, I slept in my car until I made it. But the only reason you hear from those people is because they made it. They're the exception, not the rule."

Matthew Weiss, 7:33

He built up his contacts first, came out with a plan, and executed it. If you haven't visited, he says, you can't move there. Learn the neighborhoods and the cost of living, and find older friends who have been through it, because the rent alone is tremendous. Nomad did the same in 2005, building relationships before he ever arrived.

Open the door and let people in

Matthew's plan took real money, savings he treated as a personal investment. He shared a serious studio with a friend and paid around $2,500 a month toward it, knowing his network was the most important thing he needed to build, and that it could take a couple of years.

Then he dragged a producer friend out to LA and told him: come in whenever there is no session booked, bring your writers, producers and players, just restock the toilet paper. Matthew wasn't making money from it, but people who were actually doing things came through the door. Some went on to write for major artists. And one of them introduced him to the person who introduced him to Akon. He did that artist's early mixes and tracking for free.

That is Work begets work, starting with work nobody paid for.

It's a who-you-know business, and they need to know you're reliable

Nomad pointed out that musicians often audition, but engineers rarely do. Matthew said it is even simpler than "do well on the first session." He had just done his first session with André 3000, a bucket-list artist. It came through a friend of a friend of André's engineer, who needed someone in LA. Nobody scrutinized Matthew's mixes.

"They know who I am, they know my reputation, and they know I'm reliable. So they booked the session."

Matthew Weiss, 14:51

You can do a lot online, he says, but to really elevate, people need to see your face. Reliability beats virtuosity, and your reputation gets there before you do.

Follow up with value

Right after the André session, Matthew sat down to plan how to stay on their minds, so the next LA call comes straight to him. Maybe a record to send over a month from now. Maybe just staying in touch with André's engineer.

"There's a million engineers who want that kind of a gig... I need to show them that I'm good at what I do, that I'm reliable, that I'm trustworthy, that I'm somebody that's easy to get along with. And I had four hours to showcase that."

Matthew Weiss, 18:28

Every opportunity is a step to another one. Getting in the room is the first layer. Becoming valuable in that person's professional life is the second. Nomad's word for it: value. Nobody owes you anything. Everything you do is an audition.

And the network has to grow together. Now that he is working with Akon, Matthew makes sure his producer friends are involved and get credits and publishing. If they helped elevate him, he wants to help elevate them.

Be the great facilitator

With Akon, Matthew records, does vocal production, mixes, and sometimes adds drums, instruments and backing vocals. He calls himself the glue guy. Nomad calls it being the great facilitator.

Studio etiquette, he says, is whatever the artist prefers. Akon likes a loose session that feels like a party. André wanted a closed session, so they booked a studio with a single room and it was just the two of them. The main thing was to ask, and read the room.

Run it like a business

Matthew was candid that he is still getting his business side together, 12 or 13 years in. His practical tips: put every business expense on one credit card, which makes itemizing at tax time far easier. Once you clear about $50,000 a year in income, get a CPA. They will make you keep receipts, and they pay for themselves.

He also broke down a common confusion. Publishing is your share of the intellectual property you contribute to a song, set by the split. Your performing rights organization, like BMI, collects performance royalties, which is not the same thing. If you write, register as a writer, and add a publisher account if you are collecting your own publishing. Nomad says writing is about a third of his own income, even though he started as a guitar player. Do your homework. It is your money. That is Make Music Your Business.

Help someone else stand in their light

Matthew's own line on success: it is not something you achieve, it is something you perpetuate. It took him about ten years to get to credits that were locked in and continual, and he is still asking what's next.

And the advice that shaped his career came from KRS-One, backstage at a show when Matthew was young and torn between performing and engineering.

"The easiest way to find your light is to help somebody else stand in theirs."

Matthew Weiss, recalling KRS-One, 48:55

The takeaway

Come with a plan. Open your door. Be reliable enough that people book you without listening. Follow up with value, bring your people with you, and learn where your money comes from. You can find Matthew at weiss-sound.com. And when your next opportunity comes, start with the free Get the Gig guide.

Get the gig. Keep the gig. Build the career.

Watch on YouTube or find every episode on the TCM Podcast page.