Walking up the stairs, you can hear the sound of the iron staircase "Bang Bang" under your feet, and it took almost no effort to find your target on the second floor.

"Stupid".

The word with a sarcastic flavor hung on the door like this, turned around, and saw the name of the room behind him, "Loser", which made Lan Li can't help but retract his gaze. It seems that the booked room is not bad.

When he was about to push open the door, he didn't want to, but the door opened first, Lan Li's footsteps stopped suddenly, and a face was revealed at the door, and at the same time, he was frightened, gasped, and his eyes widened, and at such a close distance, he could even see the violently vibrating pupils.

The two of them couldn't help but be stunned for a moment, and there was a faint sound of chatting in the open space downstairs in their ears, lively but not noisy, and the second floor seemed more and more quiet. Such a scene was really a bit joyful, and after a short silence, the other party burst out laughing, and the corners of Lan Li's mouth also outlined a curvature.

"If I hadn't gone to the wrong room, that would mean that you were my recording engineer?" Lan Li reacted and said with a smile between his eyes.

The other party's eyes flashed slightly, a bright smile was retracted, and he nodded slightly, "If George Slander is not lying, then indeed, I am your sound engineer." ”

Standing in front of me is not who Herbert Jones is.

At the time of the Sound City in Los Angeles, it was Herbert who completed the recording of the two singles "Cleopatra" and "Ophelia" for Lan Li, although it was only a short collaboration, but the two really rubbed a lot of sparks in the studio at that time. After more than half a year, the reunion of the two people turned out to be a recording studio again, but the meeting place came from Los Angeles to New York.

It is speculated from the words that Herbert should have received an invitation from George to be in charge of the recording of the Blue Rite album this time. Just, why? Among the countless sound engineers, why did George choose Herbert? Is it because of the previous collaboration between Herbert and Lan Li?

Lan Li was slightly surprised, and just as he was about to continue the conversation, his words were interrupted by a voice behind him, "Hey, why are you all here?"

Turning his head, George stopped, stood on the steps, looked up at the two people, with doubts on his face, although he opened his mouth to ask the two people, but his eyes fell on Lan Li's body.

If it were Herbert, it would not be unusual for him to arrive at the studio early, as a recording engineer would have had the priority of working with the producer to position the album, but if it was Lan Li......

George also thought that Lan Li would maintain his usual casual and lazy style, and it was fortunate that he arrived at the time point and was not late - after all, George knew nothing about Lan Li's work on the set.

Lan Li noticed George's gaze, did not hide it, did not explain, just said simply, "An accident." ”

Faced with such an honest answer, George tilted his head, his eyes showing helplessness, and shook his head gently.

Herbert, who was standing by the door, was an anxious man, and cut into the conversation between the two of them strongly, "Now that everyone has arrived, let's get to work now." That look of enthusiasm fully expressed his initiative, "Before that, I'll go downstairs and pour a cup of coffee." ”

After saying that, without waiting for the two to respond, Herbert completely opened the door of the recording studio and rushed downstairs at a trot, leaving only Lan Li and George in place.

George took another step and walked the last two steps, "Honestly, how many surprises did you leave behind?" Without a polite greeting, George pushed open the door of the recording studio and cut straight to today's theme, his cheerful expression faintly revealed between his eyebrows, not bright, but extremely shining. "Twenty-seven, I don't think that's your limit. ”

Twenty-seven, this is a list of self-created tracks compiled by Lan Li, a total of twenty-seven songs.

For the production of an album, choosing songs is the first step in the long march, and choosing songs that meet the artist's style and market demand is an important foundation for the success of the album.

If Justin Bieber's "Baby" had been chosen for Jason Mayez, it would have been a disaster, or "Moves-Like-Jagger" in Maroon-5 for Norah Jones, and the album would have been disastrous.

This shows the importance of song selection.

If it's a singer who can't create, then the producer needs to choose from the distribution company's huge library of original songs, and the well-connected producer with a deep background will have the upper hand because they have an unmatched wealth of resources. Therefore, producers with strong connections are always more popular than producers with outstanding capabilities.

But for those singers who can write themselves, producers need to evaluate the repertoire currently created by artists and select those excellent songs with commercial potential. Or a song that fits the singer's positioning and album style.

Of course, if the style or quality of the self-created tracks doesn't meet the requirements of the album, the producer will need to go back to another path and contact the distribution company. Not all original artists can fill the entire album with their own creations, and not all producers will give original artists the greatest freedom to do whatever they want and make an experimental album with a strong personality but no market value.

After confirming that an album was about to be made, Lan Li put together a list of his own tracks and handed it to George.

Twenty-seven self-created tracks is not a lot for an album, and in order to produce a 10-track album, producers often have more than 50 or even hundreds of tracks, but surprisingly, George struggled with the choice of one song, because every song was amazing!

Even though George was mentally prepared, he was still getting more and more frightened as he browsed through the twenty-seven tracks.

The maturity and wisdom revealed between the lyrics and the melody do not look like it was written by a twenty-one-year-old young man at all, and the experience precipitated over the years and the vicissitudes of time have brought the beauty of the melody into full play, and more importantly, the talent contained in it is even more amazing.

George has always believed that Lan Li should be a singer, a singer who is born to belong to the stage.

After reading 27 tracks, George realized what kind of genius he had encountered, and he couldn't imagine that such a talented singer was working tirelessly for his dream of being an actor...... Ridiculous.

Twenty-seven tracks, at least eighteen, George loved all of them, and they were all at the level of recording an album, and they were at the top level, but the problem was that if an album had more than 10 tracks, the artist suffered.

The specific reason is related to the calculation of royalties by record companies and distribution companies, which is very complicated to explain, even for insiders, but the simple summary is that for albums made with artists' own tracks, record companies need to pay two royalties, one is the royalty for the artist, and the other is the album royalty that must be paid for each sale of each song.

The problem lies in the album royalties, because this royalty is paid one by one, and the more tracks, the more royalties there will be. This is obviously not a good deal for record labels and distribution companies, so they require artists to sign an agreement: the record company will only pay album royalties for ten songs, and the excess will be paid by the artists themselves.

Therefore, the album repertoire of original singers is generally controlled within ten songs.

What's more, making an album with 18 tracks, which is almost equivalent to two albums, will increase the cost and the sales price will naturally increase, which will not only not increase sales, but will be too expensive, which will discourage the general public, and then affect sales. As a result, more money is spent on the album and less money is earned, which is a thankless example.

In other words, making an album with more than 10 songs is a loss for artists, record labels, and distribution companies. Naturally, no one wants to do such a loss-making transaction.

This also meant that George had to make a trade-off, and even if he picked out ten of the eighteen, he had to discard eight, which was a cruel torture.

Lan Li didn't know the sigh and shock in George's heart, and shrugged his shoulders slightly, "I'm talking about the first album after recording it first." As for the future, he has no way of predicting. "So, twenty-seven songs, is it enough, or is it not enough? If it is not enough, I need to shoot a drama first and find inspiration. ”

"Enough. Of course it's enough!" George said hurriedly, lest Lan Li turn around at this time, and the recording work will be pushed back again, "In fact, it has exceeded expectations, I have eliminated a batch of songs, but I still need to continue to eliminate them, this is not an easy job." You can also express your opinion. ”

"I thought it was your job and Herbert's. Lan Li said directly.

"That's true. George nodded in the affirmative, "But with most of the tracks up to the mark, as a creator, you can create an album that is your own style according to your own ideas." ”

For most original singers, this is difficult to ascend to, not to mention that Lan Li is still a rookie singer without any experience, which is even more incredible. For this album, George is full of confidence and even more full of anticipation. It's been a long time, it's really been a long time, and this feeling of excitement and emotion not only makes him feel enthusiastic again, but also makes him feel young again.

After three years of silence, George's life finally brightened up again.

"Where are we?" Herbert's voice burst in abruptly again, with a steaming cup of coffee in his hand, he rudely and directly pulled over the chair and sat down next to the console, spreading his legs apart, his hands on his knees, and looking at George and Lan Li with burning eyes, "My personal opinion, the core soul of this album is: Lan Li Hale." ”