Recording/Production Charges - What's Reasonable?

[ruckus328]

Hey guys, really curious about what you all are charging for recording & production. I'm just starting to actually do it for bands in the area other than my own and am in the middle of building my studio. I know alot of people on here charge a set amount per song, but what is a resonable amount? I know the hourly rates of most of the other studios in the area range from $35/hr to $60/hr, but most of them don't do set rates. Let's assume I was recording 1 song for a metal band. Live drums to a click and the band could actually play their instruments (I know the chances of this are slim...lol). Guitar Quad Tracked DI & Bass DI. Drum quantizing and replacement. Vocals need some slight tuning here and there but the guy can sing well. And then post-production/mixing. What would be a reasonable set price to charge?

I know this might be hard to give a straightforward answer to this, but if you guys were presented with the above scenero, what would you charge?

Most of the bands around here seem to prefer a set rate which will probably translate into me putting more time into it than it's worth, lol. I don't want to overcharge but obviously I don't want to sell myself short either.

 

[Zack Uidl]

this has been covered here numerous times.....do a search

 

[ruckus328]

My bad, I'm an asshole.

 

[Zack Uidl]

^haha, no worries dude.

 

[GarethSE]

im earning less than £1 an hour right now when I mix, and if youre some kid nobody's heard of too, good luck earning more

 

[if6was9]

I'm very cheap. I charge 70 euro a day for tracking and I mix stuff I tracked myself for free. But if a band only wants to do 1 day I charge 120 euro, more than a day and they get the cheaper rate. It's not worth my time only doing something for 1 single day with a band so I try get them to do more.
I've got nice mics and am getting pretty good results but for the time being my rate is helping me attract work. Thinking about raising it soon.
Something to include when you're working cheap is an overtime rate for long days. I charge a set fee of 70 a day and a few bands have had me work till all hours to get stuff finished- make sure you charge extra per hour for it, otherwise you're just doing work that you should be doing on another day.

 

[AdamWathan]

Charge by the hour, for everything, period. Bands are notoriously dicks about money. If you charge per hour for tracking but mix for free, expect to do about 500 mix revisions and still have a hard time getting the band to pay up because they are pissed that their $250 six song EP doesn't sound like it was mixed by CLA in a $500k studio.

I would charge at bare minimum $15/hr. Make sure you schedule a proper time to do the mixing so they know what they are paying for and so someone from the band can be present for it if they want to be. Charging by the song gets you ripped off huge. If a band thinks they can track every instrument for the aforementioned six song EP in two days, tell them sure and charge by the hour. When you are a complete tracking Nazi and they notice at the end of day two they only have drums for 4 songs finished, they have to book more time and pay you fairly for it, it's the only way to ensure a quality product. Charging by the song means you get lazy about the quality of the takes because every minute it takes to get it done decreases your hourly rate and the value of your time. Charge by the hour and you will have no problem spending 10 hours on bass parts for 3 songs because you are getting paid for it, and the end result will be a WAY better mix because the performances are EVERYTHING when producing a recording.

You have to charge enough to make it worth your time to edit for free though, because no band wants to pay you to edit, they all have egos and "don't need editing". This is okay though because you are charging by the hour and spending an hour for each instrument on every 30 seconds of audio, so editing will be a lot easier and faster than if you rush the tracking, and well tracked stuff sounds a million times better than half assed performances with twice as many edits.

Trust me, if you do things any other way you will be beating yourself with a hammer wishing you had taken my advice when everything goes wrong and you end up doing way too much work for way less than a reasonable cheque.

 

[::XeS::]

Also charging by day is a good thing because you have more margin. For example if the band books 1 day for bass and they finish in 4 hours, you earn other 4 hours that you can use for editing or something else. And it also covers possible delays (for example a guitarist should be in the studio at 9a.m. and it arrives at 11.30a.m. ..charging by hours, you loose 2hrs. but you can't charge them, by day you're covered for the whole day)

 

[AdamWathan]

Also charging by day is a good thing because you have more margin. For example if the band books 1 day for bass and they finish in 4 hours, you earn other 4 hours that you can use for editing or something else. And it also covers possible delays (for example a guitarist should be in the studio at 9a.m. and it arrives at 11.30a.m. ..charging by hours, you loose 2hrs. but you can't charge them, by day you're covered for the whole day)

The band should be paying for hours booked not hours used, if the guitarist is two hours late then I am getting paid for those two hours...

I've never met a band that would pay me for an 8 hour day even though they were only at the studio for 4 hours... They would either want to start tracking the next instrument or not pay for the time they didn't use. How do you convince them to pay you when they finish early?

 

[::XeS::]

Because they book the studio for the whole day. If they have to finish the guitars tomorrow and they use only 4 hours, the studio can't do something else for the rest of the day because the band booked it. Hertz studios in Poland and also our Joey use this policy.

 

[AdamWathan]

Yeah so if they finish guitars after four hours, they want to spend the next four hours doing vocals... If I tell them no and that I'm not doing anymore tracking that day for them, I'm the one forcing them to only use four hours... If they choose to bail for the day after four hours even though they booked eight, then yeah I would charge but if I tell them it will take eight hours to do bass and the guys comes in and finishes it in four it's not really fair to charge them for four hours they aren't using, the band is going to want to keep going.

 

[Trevoire520]

I'm just starting to actually do it for bands in the area other than my own and am in the middle of building my studio.

This is a really hard question to answer as it depends on the going rate in your area, the quality of your work, and ultimately, how much bands are willing to pay to work with you.

Personally I work out of a studio thats not my own, so I'm tied to the fee's they charge for recording (£18 an hour, which includes my wage) When I used to work out of my bedroom/peoples garages etc I charged £8 an hour. Charging a flat rate per song or a day rate ends up with you getting ripped off unless you set limits (e.g. a day is 8 hours, after that you get charged hourly)

For editing mixing and mastering I charge a fixed rate per song for 2 reasons. 1, it's nearly impossible to get bands to pay for mixing, let alone editing. 2, I can get quite anal when it comes to mixing and am not averse to completely tear a mix apart and start from scratch if I feel I've gone down the wrong track and don't feel it's fair to charge a band for this (this is very rare mind you)

The only exception is if a band want to attend the mix session, in which case I charge by the hour. I've only had one client want to do this in the past as they were a very good wedding cover band who covered a variety of styles, the guy actually knew his stuff so the mix turned out great and it was alot of fun!

 

[Demonstealer]

Yeah I think what Trevoire520 says is accurate. All depends on the going rate in your area and how good are you and if bands want to work with you.

Like here in India I charge per song and I'm pretty much god for these bands like what I say goes and its cool I've never felt like I'm not getting my dues and the band is also happy because they are not stressed about the clock so they are more at easy when recording. But I've set limits like once I track something I'm NOT going to retrack it. And for mixing I just do it at my pace, email the band the 1st mix then get them to collectively decide what they want from the mix and come over, make changes, burn the cd and send em home.

So far I've never had to tear down a mix completely and redo it.

So yeah thats about it

When I worked in a commercial studio I was paid per shift. So if I worked 1-4 hours I got paid for half a shift. If I worked 4-8 hours I got paid for the whole shift and so on and so forth.

 

[dcb]

after reading this i really think about chanign from daily to hourly rates.

but i've read from you guys you cant get the bands pay your editing time ?

i personally have 1 day minimum for editing as this is the worst shit of all, wasting my lifetime..
im not gonna give it to them for free.

@trevoire520 : it's nearly impossible to get bands to pay for mixing,

i tell the bands that the "magic" happens while mixing (which is the truth i would say for most "not so talented bands....")
never would i mix a song without being paid for that.

 

[zackpennington]

This is the message I just sent a potential client. Maybe this route makes sense, maybe it doesnt.

"The number of hours it will take is going to depend on you guys, as I'm sure you're aware. If you know your material well and have each individually practiced playing it to a click, then you will take way less time in the studio. As of right now our rate is $15/hour + $50/song for mixing. I can also quickly "master" the material for no additional cost, but there are better mastering houses out there if you want to spend a little more to have it done right.

I prefer to book sessions in either 4 or 8 hour blocks with about an hour of "swing time" per session.

What swing time means is that if you actually need to spend 9 hours during an 8 hour block because we're on a roll or almost finished, you will still only pay for that 8 hour session, BUT if you only end up using 3 hours of the 4 hour session (commonly on vocal days) I don't refund the 4th hour. Doing it this way evens out in the long run or even works in your favor financially. Plus, this way we don't have to keep an eye on the clock and we can just focus on the music.

To book specific dates and times I require a 10% non-refundable deposit (unless I have to cancel, in which case you'd definitely get your money back). So for example, if you wanted to book 40 hours in five 8-hour blocks for a 10 song project you'd be looking at:

40hrs @ $15 = $600
10 songs mixed @ $50 = $500
Total project cost = $1100
Total deposit needed to secure dates and times = $110

I would budget 5 hours for each song, so think closer to 50 hours. If we don't end up using those days, you won't have to pay for them. Just pay for time that we are actually in the studio working. Also, if you put down a deposit now and decide later you need less time (aka are doing less songs), tell me, and the deposit will go towards the balance due at the time of recording."

 

[beyond dead]

I charge an hourly rate for tracking, and per song for mixing. I hate having bands present during mixing, so I prefer not to have them pay by the hour, cuz the last thing i want is a musician running my mixing session!

if everything is tracked properly, then i can usually mix a song pretty fast. the longest part is re-amping the guitars and bass really.

If a project is recorded in another studio and sent to me to mix, I charge a bit more for mixing, because im likely going to have to do a lot more editing.

I charge 40-50 bucks canadian per song to mix, and $15 and hour for tracking.

It works out to about 120 bucks a day for me, which isnt bad considering the amount of gear I have. once I have a bit more credibility, I`ll start charging more, but fuck its hard enough getting bands to pay that much to record. alot of musicians around here are tight asses :s

 

[Line Level Recordings]

1 song - $80, incl. setup/mixing
2 songs - $110
3 - $140
4 - $170
5 - 200
6 - 230
7 - 260
8 - 290
9 - 320
Ect.

if your a beginner studio kind like me
then you dont want to be a complete dick yet ( unlike the PROS lol )
charging them by the song will make them not feel rushed
considering its going to be their first time

but when you get REALLY good
thats when you charge hourly
cause you have consistant talent in your blood
and after that

your time is money
not your songs...well they are .. but you know what i fucking mean

hope that helps!

 

[jval]

The actual rate will depend on demand and quality of work but I find it's better to charge either by day/week or by the song. Once you start getting busy and get to a somewhat serious level you'll have a pretty good idea of how much time you need to book, and if you are booking months in advance then the hourly system just doesn't work; each project needs a finite timeline.
I understand that in theory it is better to charge hourly so that you're never doing work for free. But the flip side of that is what happens when you want to put some extra work into a project to make it better, but the band is cutting you off at xx amt of hours because they're out of money? In this way a song / project rate yields more consistent results and puts you in control of the final product.
i guess it really depends on who your client base is

 

[jval]

but when you get REALLY good
thats when you charge hourly
cause you have consistant talent in your blood

in my experience most mid to top level engineers / producers charge by the day or by project, and mixers by the song.

 

[colonel kurtz]

charge what you can get people to pay you...it's as simple as that