Dan Hartzog on 6 Dogs Relationship, the Role of an Executive Producer and More

Nothing is absolutely stopping you at all besides yourself. And there will be obstacles along the way at any point, but you can get over those. It's like a thing. Like I'm from the middle of nowhere, and like I produce for a living, and like I love my life. The One More Time Music Podcast. Genuine conversations with genuine people about music. Hosted by Henry with a three and playback Ben. Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back for another episode of the One More Time Podcast. I'm excited about this one. We were Ladies and gentlemen, welcome back for another episode of the One More Time Podcast. I'm excited about this one. We were all running a little bit late. The guests almost actually beat me here when I was getting on him for what time we were starting. Anyways, I'm your host, Playback Ben here with my co-host Henry with a three, aka the Trap Jack Black. Trap Jack Black, who do we have on the podcast today, my friend? Welcoming in on episode 46 of the One More Time podcast.

You know him from his starring role in the Harry Potter movies. It's Daniel Radcliffe. Harry Potter. I love Harry Potter. Who doesn't? Yeah, exactly. I'm such a Potter, Harry. If you don't like Harry Potter, I don't. You're weird. I don't like you. Yeah, exactly. It's bold, but it is. That's actually how I start off any conversation with a new person. How do you feel about Harry? HP, HP. Good. Yay or nay. Exactly. In all seriousness, folks, we have legendary record producer, apparently mixed engineer these days. That's right. Uh vocalist as well. We found out. Daniel Hartzog. Dan. How's it going, man? What's up, Dan? What's going on, man? I'm here. I'm happy to be here. Yeah, we we are happy to have you. So, you know, we had Jack Mumford on, who, you know, obviously, your stories intertwine at some point. Absolutely. Um, he mentioned a little bit about where you're from, but tell the people where you grew up. Paint us a picture of kind of a a young Dan in the wild.

I am from South Georgia. South Georgia. So yeah, like four hours south of Atlanta. The name of the town is It's called Donalsonville, Georgia. It's just in the middle of nowhere. It's not even worth saying. It's like a very like a southwest corner. So I'm like, I was like 10 miles from Alabama, 10 miles from Florida. Like really like yeah, tri-state area. Very finishing first. I didn't know Georgia had a tri-state area. Yeah, it does, yeah. Right down there. Um there's like a point where they all intersect and you can go there. I don't know why you would. Wow. Like, I'm in three states at once kind of vibe. You do like the... It is. Is that where they took you on your class trips? No, no. We went to uh like this Indian burial ground, like multiple times. That's kind of cool. yeah, it was kind of cool. But yeah, I'm from just the middle of nowhere, South Georgia. It's like a 2,500-person town, kind of thing. like one stoplight type shit, or what? Three stoplights. Three, yeah, three. But how dare I with the one? Uh a lot of farms and stuff. It's a farm town.

We like to do a lot of farming there. Uh it's cool, it's good people though. I like it. Everyone knows each other, kind of thing. Everyone knows each other. And I go back to what's that like? It's interesting. Because I'm born and raised in Atlanta, so obviously everyone does not know anyone. no one knows anyone. Yeah, I mean, it's cool. You know, it's a little like it's it's a lot when you're older, you kind of thing. Like, you know, it's it's it can be a judgmental kind of vibe, I guess. But I don't know. Like, oh, I saw Dan smoking weed behind the uh dumpster on the third stoplight. Yeah, you guys should just like watch stuff like that. Just be more conscious of what you do. Or here it's like I don't have to think about anything like that. I'm allowed to be myself totally. Not that I I'm not allowed to there, just like I'm conscious about, yeah. Just like you know, old conservative people. Yeah, that's all. I get that. That's all. But I love it. I mean, I grew up there and I love it, and like um, yeah, it was it was awesome. It made me the person I am, so I can't complain. And I grew up there, so I don't really know anything else. And I've lived around now, like I've lived in Atlanta for years now. This isn't my first, you know.

Like, I I'm not just freshly out of the South, like, right. But welcome to the big city, Dan. I still drive into Atlanta, I go every time I come to the big city. We have a beautiful skyline, so you know, We do. I can't not make the joke, but yeah, I'm from there. So, so what kind of music were you, you know, I guess growing up with? What was it like country? I'm like imagining it being country music. I listen to country growing up, but a lot of classic rock. I love classic rock. I don't know. Okay, yeah, I fucking I like fucking love Boston and shit. Like, I don't know why, but a lot of classic rock and um, yeah, country. I listen to country growing up. I listen to everything, uh pop music, like um eventually I got into like hip hop and stuff, when in middle school, I'd say, type shit. And like I was listening to, like Beastie Boys and like run DMC as a kid. So like I was into more like that, whatever. I don't even know what you would call that genre. Like it's well, they were breaking ground at the time for sure. Yeah, like it's not just hip hop, like it's like it's got other elements to it, but I was listening to that too. That has those elements, but uh really everything.

My parents were like we played everything. Yeah, I was going to say, country was more so just around, like you just hear it all the time. So, like, you know, you you're you're you you learn the songs, yeah. Right, no, it's just like for me in a 2500 person town, and this is obviously you know, pre internet being like I was born in 94, so yeah, so yeah, exactly. You're not too much younger than I am, but so that's why I was like, How did you even like so? Were they putting you on the Beastie boys and shit? Like your parents? My parents showed me that kind of stuff, and the people in your school listen to shit. Like I don't know, like I don't know. Most people listen like country, but like it wasn't just like like like an all white like hick town. Like it was probably like it's like predominantly black, probably. I think our population might be like if you Google it, probably like 70, 30, like black to white. So wow. Yeah. So I was I wasn't like I didn't grow up in like a some super white place. There was a lot of culture and music. It wasn't just one thing, but um I just hear Donaldsonville, and I'm like, No, for sure. Oh, shit. there's no hip hop for miles. No, you would think that.

No, but I had other friends that produced growing up, so it wasn't just like, Oh, wow. So, it wasn't like just like in this like we had resources. And by the time I was a teenager, you know, there's internet. Yeah, right. No, facts. It reached out. Shout out the internet one time. Yeah, shout out. One time for the internet, one WWWeb. So you were you were telling us this about You were telling us about this off camera, and I wanted to make sure we you know shine some love on it. You were a vocalist a little bit in in uh high school. Yeah, I was in like a quartet with like it was like a our schools do like uh quartet competition, like singing competitions, whatever. So the I was baritone and you have a bass, you have a baritone. Bring that beautiful voice a little closer to the mic, so yeah, of course. Tell the people. Yeah, of course. of course. Come on, man. Yeah, we don't want to miss any of that. Absolutely, yeah. So you have like four vocalists, you know, like a bass, a baritone, uh, a tenor and a soprano. I want to say, yeah, that's what they have. I was the baritone, which is like the second lowest, second lowest. Yeah, so yeah, we just like we we won state twice. So True. Yeah, you know, that was like, one of those things. NBD. no big deal. I don't really sing much anymore.

I I used it for like sessions and whatnot, like maybe doing like some harmonies, like or like you know, showing an artist in harmony, but other than that, no, I'm not singing. I'm just producing and then mixing occasional albums for people, yeah. But people don't know that you know, singing background vocals and harmonies is a tool of producing. Like a lot of songs on the radio, even you know, you hear some harmonies, they might not be done by the same artist. Absolutely not. I've had multiple sessions where um my friend um grandma, like 18-year-old grandma. Shout out, 18-year-old Grandma. shout out grandma, yeah. It's an amazing artist. Grandma um is so talented and he's really great with harmonies. So he'll come in and he'll do them, and then we'll just leave it because he's he's grandma, like the vocals are always beautiful. So, like, we just like leave it under. We we do we did it on a song with uh Tom on this album where we got we got grandma vocals, so yeah, it's cool, you know. Shout out Tom the Mailman and Grandma, both of you. We'd love to have you on the podcast. We got to make that happen for sure. So how so how were you discovering new music though, like growing up? Um were you like a big blog guy, or like were you uh yeah, I guess there were blogs were way more popular back then, like hip underground hip hop blogs were amazing back then.

Um and then also when I was growing up, like Fuse and MTV played a lot of music videos. So I was always like I was into rock music growing up, like you know, and and they really were good at playing all these rock videos and stuff. So I was into all this new rock. Um and then when around the time I got into like hip hop, there was like Twitter and Instagram now, and all these blogs had started, like like underground hip hop blogs, and um, so I found a lot of music through that, and YouTube rap was back then was so popular, like this backpack rap type shit. Yeah, like and then Mac Miller was blowing up at that time, so like um I don't it was so easy at at that time to find new hip hop. It was so easy, it was everywhere, it was just like booming out. It was a really cool time. Yeah, um, so I found a lot through yeah, the blogs and YouTube. Yeah, for honestly, it was just inspiring, and that's when I was producing and learning how to produce, so it was more like you know, I was really paying attention to it, where now I'm just making whatever I want to, and like you know, it's it's not like not as much inspires me, but I do have to search a little bit more for you know, stuff that really gets me. Remember when MTV played music?

God, that yeah, those are good times. That was I don't know. I'm I'm I'm definitely a sucker for the reality shows, so you know on MTV? Yeah, I I don't know. My wife has some of the like stuff that now is on Netflix, but it was you know, I guess aired on MTV. Yeah, but yeah, so so you moved to Orlando at some point. Yes. What what job did you have when you when you moved to Orlando? Uh oh. So I worked I worked for Disney for like four years. Oh. I did technology for Disney. Um Mickey Mouse outfit, was that you? No. Mickey Mouse outfit was not me. I he was controlling the robot. Okay, that's exactly what I did. Um, so no, I I worked in technology, I was a systems technician for like the costuming department. And I had a little office like in a in a building behind uh well, originally I started off in like the park, like I had an office in the park, it was fucking sick. Did you go to college to get that job? Um, no, beautiful. Oh, yeah. Well, I started off in college and then I dropped out of college, got a job, and then uh I just wrote it out for like four years. It's what funded my like start of music, maybe I'd be able to get some of the gear I needed to get and all that kind of stuff.

So, but um I had a laptop, I was making beats since I was 13. Like I've been I've been going forever. Um I'm 27 now, so it's been a it's been a long time, you know, 14 years. But um I uh I just yeah, I just like worked that job. I had an office, so I was like fixing all the technology for the four parks that like of the costuming technology, so like anything that that would be wrong, like like wrong under the costuming department. I would fix and that's it. Yeah, and it was cool. I had an office, and I got to play with crazy tech every day. He really was controlling the robots. Yeah, but but like did you get sick of it? Like going to the you know, deal with like the same no, not you kind of like it. Not really. I loved that. I loved that job. I think it was sick. It was one of those things that it's like, okay, this is a job, and it's like a once-in-a-lifetime thing. Like once I leave this, I'm never gonna have a weird job. Like it's so weird. Like you know, there was just every day was unusual. Sounds bizarre every day. I mean, I I costuming systems technician.

Yeah. for Disney. I I uh all the costume designers were in my office in the building. And it's just an interesting group of people, really cool, and like everyone's smart and really passionate about their job, you know, Disney. It's a little a little weird. I'm imagining them yelling at Daniel being like, Something's wrong with Mickey Mouse's head. You know, they were all so nice. That's the thing. Fix Belle's dress. Like, I don't know. They were all so nice. So the the costume to the Disney basically keeps track of all of its costumes with the RFID chip. So it's like I was working with like radio frequency technology a lot, and just like working on the systems that that that check in and out those like costumes, and like we would install you know those all over the park or just stuff like that. And and so it was just really like seems wild, like why would they need that? But Yeah. for sure, for sure. It's like why are they tracking Mickey's head? I don't know. Like it's just they're really expensive, so you have to It's an investment track it in and out to make sure no one's fucking stealing Mickey and walking out. And we have so many employees that they all have to have costumes as well. So, like, it's tracking all their in and out.

There's more than one Mickey. You can't have more than X amount on your account. So, like, oh man. This is quickly becoming a Disney. Um, just is okay, but yeah. So obviously making beats in your spare time though. Yeah, that's what I was definitely doing. Yeah. Even when I worked at Disney, me and Riz were already working. Like okay, so yeah. Yo, shout out Riz. Big shout out, Riz. I got your dinner date tour shirt on. This shit is amazingly comfortable, by the way. Yeah, I love the quality of this shirt. high quality merch. My wife's like, you're wearing that again. It's like because I've worn it so many times in the last like few weeks. Um, but yeah, so you know, before you discovered Riz, like were you actively searching for artists to like work with, or kind of what you know, like where was your head at? For sure, but I'd been doing that for a while, and it wasn't like I was just like discovered like Riz. We kind of found each other online. Um, and maybe he even reached out to me or vice versa. I don't remember, but it was years ago. Like, we have we have we still have the original emails, like we emailed each other because uh some hip hop blog retweeted me and then he Why what'd you say? Um, yo, like like looking for I was probably looking for artists or something, you know.

I was like, yeah, I got beats. If anybody wants to hit me up, blah blah blah. Riz reached out to me and then we just talked. We kept in touch for a couple years, and then eventually I was working a job in Orlando. Um, and I was like, yo, you want to come out to Orlando? So like he flew out, and then I picked him up, and then like we paid him. did you pay for him to come down for the first time, yeah, yeah, for sure. That's yeah, I was. It's a fucking gem. Taking a gamble on an artist you believe in for real, dude. Yeah, yeah, but I I was like working at at Disney and like No, but still I don't care if you had money or whatever, that doesn't matter. Yeah, you believe. It's the principle of like wanting to work in person. I mean, because you could have kept trading like emails. No, for sure. But that's just hard to do. it's not I don't know. It's the whole like across the country thing. Internet thing, yeah. Yeah, and like um, I don't know. After we met, it was just like boom. we like were boys and we just made music and uh we we made a a few of our first songs that made our first project that trip. We made two of them that made the project, and then he flew back down, or I came up and we finished the rest of the project, you know.

Yeah, and it was so cool, but yeah, yeah. Like Pisces was one of those, right? Or um Pisces, maybe the beat started that trip, but we did like so like that's like Sweet Tooth and like another one, like really old records now. Yeah. We made them a long time ago. But yeah, yeah, we made some of those first ones then, and then I think he might have came back down one more time, flew back down one more time, and then I went one more time. Thank you for that. Absolutely Appreciate the plug. One more time. amazing use of that. Um then I went up to New York to finish the album after that. And I I met Andre 3000 in the studio. My boy. Which studio? Uh Flux Studios, it's on 2nd and Avenue A in on the on the lower east side. Amazing studio, really fucking cool. Um, but yeah, so like we were in the studio recording this first project. That's where we recorded the vocals for Pisces. So it was not we met Andre 3000, I want to say. Um, literally.

And so he's we were told he was in the studio all week, you know, same across the room. Yeah, who's snitching Andre's location? Like, the rumor mills like yo, Andre's in this fucking A room, bro. That studio manager has been let go. Yeah, yeah, no, no, no. He tweeted it. It was just like the they let you know so you don't like go geek out, or anything. it's a warning more so. It seems like counterintuitive of like who's gonna hear that news and not geek out, right? Fair enough, fair enough. But like it was kind of hard. just hope I don't find out, you know what I mean? Like at some point it would have been hard to not know he was there. Like we walked in and Fonzworth Bentley was in the lobby at one point. Was he dressed? It was like an all-purple suit to the nines. Yeah, it was sick as fuck. Love it. God, Fonzworth Bentley in every music video is just like the cleanest. Right. It was cool. He was really nice. Everybody was so nice. So me and Riz walk out of the kitchen at like four in the morning. I mean, walking out like out of the studio into the kitchen at four in the morning, and he's standing there like making coffee. Jesus. And like we're just sitting there like, you're casual, but at some point you have to acknowledge it.

Like he like he turns around the wall studio. We're like, sorry, bro, we can't not acknowledge like you're on your thousand. And he was just so nice. He was just like, Oh, what's up, bro? Nice to meet y'all. And I was like, I'm from George, bro. He's like, where are you from? And I was like, Seminole County. He's like, We used to play them football. He like daps me up, bro. He was such a nice guy. I'm so jealous right now, bro. Yeah, it was really cool. You lived out my dream. By the way, studio kitchens is becoming like a theme for like people meeting in studio kitchens. We've had a couple of people been, like, met some crazy people in Studio kitchens. Studio kitchens. It's just a place. It is. We end up there, and that's the thing. Yeah. Meet people there. I met him like two or three other times that week. Chatted up, like talked multiple times. Riz met him again later on. But I like even I I I got to introduce the girl I was dating at the time to. him. Like she met Andre. Shout out to her. She thought you were a legend. Yeah, for sure. For sure. But she got what she needed out of Dan and dumped him right after that shit. No, she's uh love to her. She was she was great. But um no, it was it was a funny experience. Really cool experience.

No, I got I don't send love out to everybody. Yeah, I don't ever burn. You do seem like that that kind of guy. Yeah, I wish everybody the best. Why would I wish anybody bad? Wow. Just kidding. Fuck you. I'm kidding. I'm kidding. So what did you like most about Riz when you first, you know? I mean, that's just my brother. Love Riz. Like the music is great. I just like the voice. And it's just it's just not being stuck to anything. Like, you know, you hear like something, you're like, okay, well, like, I mean, it's also knowing we've been talking, so like he's wanting to do a sound, and he'd let me know where his you know barriers are with this, and he didn't really have any, and that's the thing. So we just like could break down any wall. There's there's nothing stopping, no ceiling to it. So that was that was appealing to me. I don't because you seem like you might be the same kind of producer growing up on all different different types of music. You don't want to stay on one thing maybe too long. So he's the artist that doesn't want to stay on one thing too long. So it's beautiful. Riz listened to a lot of stuff too. He has a great like ear, and he listens to so much music, so it's just like you know, we just want to make whatever we want to make, and and also stuff that people aren't making.

Like, what is good music? You know what I mean? Yeah, everyone listens to so much different stuff. Even with all the different artists I work with, I make a lot of different stuff. Like with Riz, I can make whatever, and I and I love that. He's got some of my craziest beats, like sitting in a folder, you know, that are just like so. We have so many songs together that are just wild that people may never hear it, And Maybe they will, but we have you know, like we we get to make anything, and I like that. It's it's just like a really natural, organic relationship and process. That's cool. And and so those first sessions, like you guys are already been talking for a while, because one of my questions is gonna be like I I heard the story of like you found each other on the internet, and then you pay for him to come down. Yeah, that's like how it played out. So I was like, that must have been like a first date type of like session of like, hey bro, nice to meet you. But like it seems like that probably was not the case. It was like very like organic and immediately. He pulled up to the airport. He hopped in, he was like, I was like probably smoking a cigarette, and then like True, true. and he was like, Oh, I could smoke cigarettes in your car, you know, something like that. So that's how you bonded.

And he lit a cigarette. Yeah, and then the rest is history. And then the rest is literally, no, it was that's dead ass how it was. And then we ever seen it, Luke has been like locked. I can't even, like, you know. It's just that's how it was. It's so easy. It's hard to explain it because it was just that's how it is. Yeah. Not gonna lie. I mean, when you know when Jack put me on Riz first, like he's been in constant rotation since, man. I mean, I I definitely agree with you that like his music is so unique in that like it does push boundaries of like hip hop and then kind of like you know, alternative indie type shit, and then you know it's obviously got like his because he'll be spitting on some shit. Like oh yeah, I mean we have some racks on him. I wish one day I'll play you guys some of the records where he's just like going off just bars, he can rap, he can freestyle He can really rap. Can we get that after the interview? Can we yeah, of course, yeah. He can freestyle crazy though. Like I'll I'll say that like on record. Like, like if you play like a beat in front of Riz, like he can freestyle for like 10 minutes straight going, just ripping it. Yeah, that's a fact.

no, that's amazing. but no one challenged him to do it after this. You see him, don't do it if you see him. Yeah, everyone tag Riz in the comments. Start spitting now. okay, so you end up going on like a little underground tour with him as a drummer. Yeah. Was that out of pure necessity? He just needed a drummer and like drum. Let's go and put drums on the set and a guitar. We didn't want to just do like a fucking MP, like play a wave file, MP3 file on stage. Like, we did it. We have shows where you have to do that. Yeah. whatever. But for the most part, we want to put drums and guitar on stage, which he still does. To this day, yeah. Oh, yeah. Yeah, for sure. So but you since have retired as his drummer. For sure. Who's the guy in the spaceman outfit who was drumming for him? Oh, that's Sam. Sam was fired. Sam's a great guy. He's got a cool um clothing brand too, named Hellcat. You should check it out. Okay. Yes. He's linked up with Germ, who's the Hellcat connoisseur. Yeah, fact.

Absolutely. Yeah. I can put we can put that together. But yeah, he's he's a Cess Sam. He's he's a great drummer. Yeah. Yeah. So you had been a drummer like. before that? Yeah, I played drums my whole life. So you were playing drums like growing up. That was my first instrument I learned how to play. Okay, cool. Then piano, then guitar, and then some other just like bass random shit. You know, but uh mandolin. Ooh, that's a fun one. So how important do you think that is? And I mean, you know, I'll ask this to you, uh you know, as another producer. Like for me, I would think that would be so helpful. So helpful. Oh, yeah, it's definitely oh god, it's definitely really helpful. I mean people said it. he stayed up all night, folks. He's not bored, I promise. He's been in anticipation. No, he literally texted me like an hour before this, and he lives 45 minutes away. Yo, bro, sorry. I just woke up. It's like 7 p.m. now, guys. By the way, he was like, I pulled an all-nighter session, and like you gotta do that sometimes. That's part of the gig, dude. I was like, bro, if you can still make it, like let's run it.

And here he is. yeah, I still did it. But he's just a little, I'm not sure. he had his morning coffee at 7 p.m. yet. Yeah, but yeah, I don't actually even drink coffee. Fun fact. What? Yeah, I don't drink coffee. I don't trust people that don't drink coffee. Well, morning Jay, bro. Morning Jay. I just never like got into it. I don't know. I'm like good when I wake up, like I'm like 100% okay. It's freaky. Oh, I mean, you're doing an interview having just woke up an hour ago. yeah, no, like I'm like good, I'm happy when I wake up. Like it's not like I'm in a good mood for some reason in the morning, and I'm just up. I'm like a grump until I get my drugs, my caffeine drugs. Yeah, that's so funny. So the um instruments, yeah, being able to play instruments. Oh, definitely, yeah. Yeah, it's yeah, big, yeah. But at the same time, I meet people that don't know anything about it, and it's really the ear and the taste, too. Like that's most important. That's the most important, but it definitely helps me like, oh my gosh, like just like basic music theory, it's very helpful. And then I feel like there's a point where you learn too much and it starts to kind of like hinder you a little bit, you know. That's a good one.

In a sense, I've gotten there. Um, so I've kind of just tried to like dumb myself down and not overthink stuff because you can definitely overthink stuff really easy. People don't hyperlisten so much as someone who mixes or produces. Right. I've tried to tell myself that, you know, enough. Yeah, I mean it that's kind of something you've you know, I feel like talked about as far as like if you try and do everything like by the book, it ends up like not even sounding as good as if you like break rules. You end up with the end of missing the big picture. It's it's like you're so concerned on if this you know, these two bars sound good. Meanwhile, the whole song sucks. Yeah, exactly. It's like fix the whole song, don't like you know, fix that bar. You gotta have this like overall perspective, and then when you're in there editing or you know, producing or like mixing and doing these little things, it's super easy to lose that bigger picture, you know. what I mean? Yeah, absolutely. It's just really based off feeling too. Yeah. When your records are, like, feeling, it's not just, like, perfect mixing and everything a lot of times, you know.

Yes. Yeah, because I mean, and I think that's why as good as technology is gonna continue to get, right? I think it's still gonna be because hypothetically, if it was all rules based, right, you could run it through an algorithm and it would spit out the quote unquote like correct mix, right? 100% run it through lander for the master. Yeah. Shout out LANDR. But there's a reason why but there's a reason why I think that you know, this is once again me being like a third party to this. A mixed engineer is still gonna, even if he's just like taking what the software gives him and then like making little like tweaks and you know, whatever. Everyone's voice is different, every mic is different. So you know like and people forget you're paying a mixed engineer for their taste, their creativity. You're not paying them to follow rules. Yeah, engineers all it's a taste thing, yeah. For sure. You're paying an engineer for their taste. And there are people you can go get to pay and follow the rules. Like a lot of the old heads will do really technical mixes, and they'll sound great, but it's just not like you want that modern spice on it, you know, just all the crazy shit. Like, I don't know.

Yeah, I did I I I like I I mixed some and then I mastered all of the uh Faiyaz's after me project. So like yeah, so I get a lot of um a lot of like you know, people wanting Faiyaz mixes all the time from me. you know like and like I made um that template that that that they recorded like after me with you know so like it was just like I but everybody wants always wants to sound like Faiyaz. I'm just like well it's not the same, like I can't just give you the preset, it sounds the exact same, right people love Faiyaz, bro. They do. People are obsessed, obsessed with Faiyaz. Yeah, they are it's crazy. It's great, it's been great for me. People hit me up for you know the mixes all the time now for since that it's been it's been awesome. And I I was really glad to help with that project. It's really cool. It was a big project for me. For the people out there. How much does a does a mix from Dan Hartzog cost? If if you want to get you some again, you can go high. I mean, whatever. Oh, it just it just depends. I don't know. I that if you if you really want to know, just discuss it with me in my in my DM. Hit the DMs.

Yeah, hit the DMs. You reply to all DMs for the most part. Yeah, no, I go through them. I reply when I can. Sometimes I'm really booked up. Recently I've been really booked up, so like I've and then but then I'll finish a project and I'll go through all my um, you know, uh like inquiries and I'll I'll get back to you and I'll give you a price. It just depends on everything is different, you know, too. And a lot of people have like, you know, budgets and stuff like that. So I just charge less for an artist that you genuinely connect with, maybe if you like their work and you want to want to produce for them, maybe you might maybe hook them up but yeah absolutely I I try to do that if I and and that's when I have the time though sometimes I'm really having to do you know finish up stuff with clients I'm already taking over but if I have time and I and I can invest in an artist I will absolutely still do that. Sure and I still look for artists all the time to do that with have to. But yeah I if I can help someone out I I absolutely will but there's still like you know like I have like a base rate like of course that I won't go below. Like just because I mean I've I I mix a lot of records but anyways yeah I I honestly didn't even you know having thought I was familiar with you know you and you know kind of what you're up to I didn't know that you mixed so much. Yeah to be honest that actually surprised me as far as like People know that. I know you had like done stuff here and there but I didn't know that you actually like were a mixed engineer outside of like the you know record you produced and stuff.

Oh yeah for sure I um you know a lot a lot of people know that I produced the last like 6dogs album but before that I mixed this last album in its entirety like I didn't miss any of it I mixed that I mixed R.I.P. 6dogs by the way yeah of course I mixed like two uh Riz albums of mixed no I mean this is awesome yeah I just I just didn't I genuinely didn't know that that was like part of your you know career. Yeah I did after me you know with Sofaygo and then I've done a bunch of other ones too that are just singles off here and there like top you know records. So that's dope. yeah I love it yeah do you mix a lot of the records you produce I love to mix records I produce. Um but a lot of the artists like Tom we we have an amazing engineer I really really like his mixing so like he does all of our stuff and like I would much rather have him do me too, but I don't have that guy. I mix like everything I produce. Usually, usually I do, but there's some instances where I don't have to, and then like uh with the Riz album we've been working on over the last X amount of time. Like, we're gonna have um someone mix that, like that's not me.

And like that's just like I work on these records so long. It's nice to have a different set of ears. Oh my god, just an objective, like different, a fresh perspective. That's all, yeah. Like I can snap on these records, and I know I can. I've done these demo mixes and whatnot, and like and they're great, but I I at this point I've worked on some of these records so long these fresh years. Yes, I'm working on so many other records right now, currently. It's like whatever. Like, that's amazing. Please turn it up if you can, like, do whatever you can. Take this. make it better. Make it Get it out. If not better, just, you know, figure out what it needs. Exactly. Yeah, so that's that's dope. So you end up connecting with David Morse, who ends up being a longstanding friend, collaborator, partner in crime of yours. Shout out to David Morris. Yeah, shout out David Morris. He's going crazy with Dirk right now. Yes, amazing. Crushing, he's got like three on two on Yeah, two. On the new project, two on the new Dirk project. That's like number one, bro. Like, oh, it's yeah, like he deserves it.

David works harder than anybody I know. Like, I also want to put that on a record. Like, David is like super super talented, but he also works harder than anybody I've ever met since I've met him. Like, he's just that's dope. Like, he loves talent and hard work. He makes fucking so many beats, and they're all like really good, and and he's just a good guy, and I think that's really important to know. Also, he's just like a solid fucking dude. Yeah, I love David. I've seen him like twice this week because he's so funny. There you go. Yeah, so so how did that relationship start though? Was that another internet? I guess connection, or like I just like he had his song with like Yaudia or some shit. I think. It was it was like, I think it's called Diamonds. I don't remember. It's a good song, though. I fucking love that song. It's him and Danny Wolf. Um, like I know the lyrics, I just can't think of the exact name, but I think it's called Diamonds. Uh I met him, was like, Yeah, fuck with that song. No, I told him I fucked with his six dog song. He had a song out with six dogs, and I forget what song it was even right now, but like it was I was called I think it's called Getaway. David, he knows none of your songs.

Yeah, sorry, dude. He called he calls him a friend of yours. Me, man. Doesn't know any songs he's done. I know I'm fucking with you. it's called Getaway. Okay, okay. Um so then you end up hitting him up. I was like, yo, I fuck with his song. I and this is what I do. He just like was cool enough to message back, and then I just was living in South Georgia with um about by myself at this time. Jackson and DA hadn't moved out with me yet. So I had just like went up to meet David and then we just cooked up, and then I drove back all the way, four hours. I would do this at a time. I just kept driving. I would drive up four hours to David's house, like once a week, once every other week, whatever. Wow, and we would just cook and we cook and we cook, and then that's how we just got close because I would drive up there, and then eventually I started bringing Jack with me because Jack eventually moved in with me. And yeah, because I had I quit my job at Disney, moved back to South Georgia, and then that's when I started I was full-time producing, right? You know, so yeah, was that scary?

Like no, I mean, I don't know, I don't really think about that much. Like I I can work like life is always just fucking scary things. Like Facts. at some point, you just like you just like make peace with it, right? Yeah, you do. You just match that frequency, and you say, Okay, it's always gonna be this way. If I can just like keep moving forward and do what I want to do, like things will happen. And they can, you can do anything you want, guys. Like, you know, to into the world. Like you can do anything you want to do if you just do it. Like clip that. Like nothing is absolutely stopping you at all besides yourself. And there will be obstacles along the way at any point, but you can get over those. It's like a thing. Like I'm from the middle of nowhere, and like I produce for a living and like I love my life, you know. So like anybody can do anything. But anyways, yeah. So that's huge. Yeah, so but I was just going and we were just friends, and like I I like people. I'm just chilling all the time. Like I fucking live this life. Like I love music, but I'm also just like super dude all the time. Like, just chilling.

Like, but so we just became good friends, and then yeah, because I started bringing Jack up, and then like we we were all just close, and then DA started coming up with us because DA eventually moved in with us in South Georgia. Because I had like a compound, like my like my whole studio was there. Um, so yeah, and then we that's how it happened. We came close, and then Jamie was like, so it really was just DMing him and like kind of you know, saying that you liked this certain record. Because I'm always like fascinated by like That simple. the like producer to producer, like collab approach, right? Like, how do you approach another producer without sounding like corny or sounding like selfish or whatever, right? Like being genuine. You know, there's a point where you're like trying too hard, you can tell when someone's trying too hard, and it might be like annoying, even though, like, you know, I I shouldn't be annoyed by that because like I know they're just trying to get seen, but also for some reason it's like oh god, yeah, but you know, I don't know. And you know, I hope you're like, do you get some DMs now?

all the time I get DMs. I try to be good at responding. But do you get some that you're like trying to trying too hard? Or like of course, annoying. Yeah, I mean, I don't want to call any people because they just want to like I was like, I mean you don't have to put them on blast, but I'm just saying sometimes I'm like, it's a little much. I have a life, like I'm dealing with stuff all the time. Like, I'm I'm still producing for a little like trying to I don't I'm just not where I can like put everyone on, like working like on myself, like just trying to you know get my own placements and everything. That's all like yeah, like I wish I could help everyone out, and I wish I could do more. And I you know, and I've been able to help some people out for sure, definitely. But you know, just like to an extent, I'm still always working on my own stuff. I got stuff going on. But um, if I can though, I do want to help out. For sure. people, of course. So you mentioned that you were starting to build kind of like a a group of creatives, almost like a little, you know, I guess click, if you will. Like, you know, there was kind of like a crew, you know, building.

I mean, Jack, DA, you, David Morris. I mean, I think backwoods enters the picture at some point. He does. For sure. This is all the same time. yeah, like all these people. All these people are kind of like I I'm always fascinated by like how important do you think that is for creatives to like build that community of people that are also creating and whatnot, right? Because it's really important, yeah. It's really important. We've done a lot together, like uh so David knew Backwoods and Jamie grew up with them, type deal. So, like my circle is Jack and DA. So, like we all just kind of brought it together right there, and then we just all became really good friends. Um, but it's so it's so important. I mean, and I've done so much with them. I've traveled with all these boys, and we've just done work together. You know, me and Backwoods done a lot of records together, me and Davids have done a lot of records together. It's nice doing it as a family, like it's a group, and it's just nice to have people that have your back and like care about you and whatnot. So yeah, safe to say you wouldn't be where you are now without a good team. For sure, absolutely.

I think so, yeah. You know, yeah, you know. Yeah, me and Riz had our thing. Like before I met any of these people, like me and Riz already had our first like million plays. I will say that's dope. So I don't know where I would be, but I I wouldn't want it be without these people. Sure. Like I'll say that, but definitely with all my other stuff, I probably wouldn't have like even some of the six dog stuff or stuff like that, like without these people. I just think in general, like for me, once again, I'm not the creative here at the table. But as far as like if I was, I would imagine that it's so crucial to not be like creating in a vacuum, right? To have those like creative influences that are like you know, right next to you, and like you can back, you know, because whether you know it or not, like your conversations are probably inspiring you with like other creatives, even if it's not like hey, what key should I put this in, or some shit like that. Like, it's maybe the subconscious shit, but like being with other creatives. I mean, I've been in enough rooms now where I see like what's going on, where there's like multiple artists in a room or multiple producers in a room, you know. what I mean, to know that like that shit seems important.

It's important, yeah. It's nice to be able to bounce shit off each other. Need someone to tell you if it sucks. Yeah, yeah. Definitely need people, that do it. Fuck the yes, man. I love walking in a room, being like, yo, this sucks. like I'm like, I like to try to be a nice person all the time. The funniest thing I can do is saying it's walking in a room and just be like, bruh, this shit sucks. It's valuable. Yeah, but it's funny, we all do that to each other, it doesn't really matter. Usually I'm joking when I say it. Usually it's really fine when I walk in and I say that anyways. It's garbage. But yeah, no, but it's usually really good. But occasionally, yeah, we are serious. We don't tell each other if something's not it, You need that. You gotta know, we gotta get shit placed, yes. We gotta do cool shit with it. So, yeah, yeah, that's that's that's interesting. So, you know, Jack told this story, but I want to fact check his ass and make sure that it was accurate, right? Tell us What's kind of the the first six dogs placement that you got, like the story behind that. Um Jack had this like play with uh an A and R at Interscope and whatever. It's true so far, guys.

So far, so good. Fact-checking, that is true. I'm listening. Yeah, so he sends off a pack of these like David beats and my beats, and um we get a fucking how big was the pack. I don't know, I don't remember so much. Okay, I had like a few beats. So we can't confirm or deny that it was like 70 beats or something like he said he sent like the world's largest beat pack ever known to man. We had well, it's because we had like two or three producers on it, so there was like Yeah. But still, he was like, 20 from this person. 20 from him, like 20 from me. Yeah, but he said now he sends only like you know, five five beats in a pack. Yeah, for sure. He thought that that was like the strat Excessive. We sent like a lot of beats, yeah. But I don't, I don't know if it was 40 or 50, it could have been 30, but there was a lot, there was more than a pack should have. It still sounds it still sounds pretty true, guys. So what is a good what is a good pack size? Yeah, I'd send like 10. Yeah, 10. You know, if I have 10 for you, like, type deal, because I want to send packs that are like relevant to each artist, obviously. So, like, you know, I'll try to do that.

But five to 10. I think it's, if you send 50, it's like you you clearly just don't know that artist's sound. Yeah, your best five to ten you have for that artist for that artist is the you know, and it can be five if you only feel comfortable that like the ones you have are hot, like you know, send those five. Like, don't send some if you're not uncomfortable sending if you don't want people to judge you on that. People are gonna listen to what you send them. So if you don't aren't 100% with it, don't show it to him yet. But um, yeah, you're five to ten of your best songs. That's, that's what I think a pack should be. So, yeah, we sent a sent a big ass pack. Um, and one of the songs was Max Keeble, and like that's what's you know, a lot of people love that record. I got a DM yesterday or today. I got at least two DMs saying Max Keeble is her favorite song because, uh, three years ago we had released, uh, a project called Rough Mixes from David Basement with Six Dogs, and it had a little plant life on it. And I had tweeted something about Max Keeble. So I had a lot of people tell me how much they love Max Keeble. But that was mine and Chase's first song. Yeah. I love that record. Chase's Six Dogs, yeah, Chase's Six Dogs, yeah. So, like, yeah, that was our first song, and I think that record is so cool.

It's like really repetitive and like it's very just like ambient and kind of spacey, it's dope. Yeah, yeah. But like, how did you hear that you even got it placed? Instagram. Uh on Instagram, and there was like a snippet of him. I was like, that's my fucking beat, bro. I was on a date. I was on like a date. Wait, did you see it or did you have like 10 people send it to you? Um because I heard that like a bunch of people had sent it to you, being like, yo, bro, like I don't know. I I was in a movie, like so. I was about to go into a movie when I saw it, and like I was on some date in like Tallahassee or something. Okay. I was about to go into a movie with this girl and I saw it. She was super cool though. So I was just like, Shout out to her. but you were not thinking about the movie when the movie was playing, probably. No, no, no, not at all. Like, I gotta go hear this record. But she was fine with that, yeah. We we became friends after, like, she was really cool. Um but um but yeah, so I I don't know, but yeah, That was really the whole story. I was beat down. I was like, oh my fucking

god. Like I loved Six Dogs, I was such a fan before, which is cool when you get a a record with someone you really like love. But of course, you know, I I I go on to do all of this with with with Six Dogs. So it it's crazy. But back then, huge fan, never didn't know him at all. Didn't no no connection to him. Just got a placement. Crazy. I was so excited. Um, and then I get to know him because David knows six dogs, and I meet David later on. It's just a crazy coincidence. But at that point, no connection, just a fan. I got that placement. I saw it on Instagram. Geeked out. Great time. Fucking sick. Love it. And at that point, it was, it was a time with like Interscope too. I never had a song that come out with anybody under a label. So that was cool as fuck. Yeah. Yeah. But but like, where were you at in your life at that point? Because I mean, what you know, wasn't this around the time of like the hurricane and hurricane? So we had just lost our house through a hurricane. So we, me, Jack, and DA, um, lived in, uh, a, um, like, my dad, my dad owns a pharmacy, and there was a house above the pharmacy that we like had renovated, and it was really fucking sick.

10 foot tall ceilings, brick walls, wood floors, like really cool. It used to be a law office in the 1950s. I'm like it was a sick fucking place. Um, so we lived up there, we all had our own bedrooms, we had a big studio up there, and this hurricane comes through, like, you know, category fucking five, like 120 mile an hour winds, rips out all the windows, tore off the roof of like the neighbor's house, like put a Giant holes in our roof. I mean, the whole place flooded with water. I saved my studio and all my animals were okay. Dope. I mean, I lost like everything else that I I really owned, but like whatever. That shit's replaceable, and then none of my work got lost, which is really cool, you know. Yeah, because like that would have sucked. I have songs I'm still working on, you know, from years ago. Like it's like the music gods protected your studio. Do you do cloud backup now? Hopefully, like get some stuff. in the cloud. I have a lot of back stuff. Yeah, I have some stuff in the cloud for sure. All my important stuff I'm working on currently, and then I have um I have like 20 thumb drives, dude. Yeah, I'm a thumb drive guy. I have so many different things, for sure. Backed

up on them, and I have I have them that are with me. I'm I'm so like I'm really good about keeping up with all my little stuff. I'm I'm you know, almost like just yeah, I'm I'm good about it though. Good. That's funny. So did you think that was like a pretty big momentum shift though for you? Could you like feel it, you know, when that placement happened? Because like shit was obviously hitting the fan with like your fucking apartment, yeah, flooded, you know, you know, whatever. Like could you kind of feel it or not? really? Sometimes things just get So bad that you're just like, whatever. I'm in this shit. Like, you know, the meme with the dog and the the house is on fire, and he's like, This is fine, everything's fine. That's really how everything was. We were just living. Cause. Cause when you're like doing something with a purpose, you're just like going. Like nothing's gonna stop me at this point. Like, literally, not like whatever. My house is my house. Like, that has nothing to do with my fucking art. Like, you know, like nothing was gonna stop me. I just kept doing it. Like, we went on tour two or three weeks later. We found a house in Tallahassee for a little bit, and we chilled there. And went on tour two or three weeks later with Riz, and then we just flooded around after that.

But we made it work, like whatever was gonna happen, like you know, like like whatever's gonna work, we were gonna make it work. And we just kept going. Um, I can't even really tell you so much about the time. It was like it's not like you know, my memory is not the best of it because it was so intense, also. But so much was yeah, it was tunnel vision, but we got through it, and there were some funny times in that time. Like when things are bad, it's like, oh my, you know, it's just it's comical, it's comical. Yeah. Well, of course, our apartment just got hurricaned on. Yeah, like, why wouldn't it? I had clothes, you know what I mean? Like everything. Like, I don't know. But it was it was cool. I mean, it was a fucking hell of a story, and it it was it definitely definitely probably motivated me somewhat, you know. Of of course. So obviously you would go on to, you know, at first you were just a fan of six, but then you obviously would go on to like cultivate a really strong relationship, both, you know, you know, musically and personally, right? Definitely.

Like, what was the energy like between you guys? It was great. It's just like close homie of mine. We just kick it, like we're both goofy. Like, say, we just hang out and just fucking tell jokes, whatever. Just we we he's, he's, you know, a strange guy just like me, and I love being weird all the time. Yeah, just like be weird together and just like you know, yeah. So I don't know, we just kick it and make music, and it was never too serious. Like, we just had fun. That was our whole thing. We just had fun and made music. So at first it was always him and me and David making music, and we just hit it off, you know. We just always had fun, and then eventually he asked me to mix a project. So I go in and I mix that project for him, and after that, it's like I just want to start making records with you, like just like so. He'd come over once or twice every week for the past like you know, last like two years before we had dropped that the last build up before the last album came out, and then we were just making music every day, super casual, just like we have a lot of half songs that are like unfinished, you know, kind of stuff. So much that we just like whatever, but we just had fun.

And then he would spend the night and we'd like make half a record kind of stuff, like all the time. Jamie would record him, kind of, you know. It was cool though. We the energy was always really good. Um, some sessions were more serious than others, like we'd really lock in and get to the artist stuff. But we'd go on a hike before every session, and we go hike and then we'd come back and make a song and then probably take four or five hours, and then we just you know, chill, and then he'd dip back and drive drive back home, you know. It's pretty much always the thing we did. We didn't we did that for two years, just about. So yeah. And and so you you know, you went on to executive produce the posthumous album Ronald. Yes, right. How would you describe the role of an executive producer, right? Because some of our folks out there probably don't know like really what that means to someone, like how would you describe it, you know, from Daniel Hartzog? It's just like overseeing the whole vision of an album, like, you know, He asked me to do this album, and we worked on it in person for every session. Like he'd come over, we'd spend, you know, and even but even the stuff before that, like going on a hike together and trying to set a vibe for the day of what we want to record.

Like we would set these moods and themes for everything, and it's just like seeing a whole album to its completion, but it's it's more like a body of work can be so many more things, like a whole vision. You know, I don't want to just like make records. I want they need to be maybe they need to be like, you know, like coincide, and then um, yeah. So I just like having a vision and just bringing it all together into this one body of work. So we have this that whole album follows a sound so well the whole way through, if you will listen to it, you know, like and and it's just like that's kind of the vibe of doing it's like bringing a feeling and um like a theme if if you will, whatever, just like to an album, yeah. You know, and I think that's important sometimes. It all depends on what every album what you're going for in every album, of course. But yeah, you know, it's just like of doing everything. Like sometimes producing is like like I'll bring producers in for that album too. They gotta be like, oh, we got this. I want some hi-hats from Woods.

It's not always about making everything, it's about just like guiding the process, exactly, you know, like you're completing these records and getting to where they need to be. I was doing everything like the arrangements, the I mixed that project as well. Like I didn't just produce it, I did all of the so you know, I really got the really fucking executive producer And I picked every producer that was on there to come on to it and all of that. And Chase let me have that freedom as well. He was like, do whatever you want, bro. I trust you. You know, let's make it crazy, just like go. So I was just doing it the whole time, you know. Yeah. So yeah. Was was there a debate about that project coming out after he passed, or was well we'd already turned it in before he passed? Okay. So it was already submitted. So we just pushed it back. you know, with his, like, we know, I'm close with his family, and and all his friends. So it wasn't like a, you know, I decide this kind of stuff. Like we would his family decided it. And so we just pushed it back.

Yeah. But it wasn't um, yeah, we we we we we we we had already submitted it. It was so it wasn't like he had heard the final project multiple times. Yeah, you know, so yeah. And cleared it and everything on it. Cleared it, yeah, it was done. It was already turned in. The guy that that that worked at the offices, uh I forget what offices they they are, you know. But he sent me the um the the screenshot of it uploading, you know. We, this is weeks before Chase had passed, so it was like he sent me a demo, since, like submitting the album already, and I was like, Oh, fucking sick, yeah, let's go, you know. Yeah, but it was cool, it's a really special project for me. And like I had a really great time making it. Me and Chase both had a really great time making it, and I'm proud of that work. You listen to a lot of my other work, it doesn't sound like that, you know. Like it's like I do a lot of this alternate, like even with Riz, we don't really have it's just this different genre. And then with Tom, I'm doing a lot of this alternative rock stuff, and like is it different when you have the opportunity to really lock in for a whole project and really cultivate like a sound, right? Yeah, so I'm allowed to do these sounds.

Like I'm working with synths and and 808 for the whole 6 Dogs project. Like we really like locked in. Like you don't hear any of my other beats out there, like you won't hear those ever again, like except for on Ronald. Just because like that's what I was making for that album. Like I won't ever touch that zone again. You know what I mean? And I have some of them that are that can, like, flutter around that genre. I just meant like that's such a specific sound. Yes. And like I have plenty of others out within that that would that we released the singles before that are even different from that. So like, yeah, we we had a few different sounds. I don't know. I I really liked it, but yeah, I doubt I'll go back to to that one. But it's cool. I love that album a lot. Did that help in like the grieving process, like it coming out, or did that make it harder? I mean, I don't I don't really know. It was just like it came out right, you know, after it was it's it's sometimes it's tough. I mean, I I love to read all the messages from the fans. Sometimes it's also tough. Like, cause you know, it's just like it's a lot to go through and it's a constant like uh reminder in some sense.

But I uh I like to talk to them and I like to get back with them if I can. On the days when I'm feeling strong enough, I'll open my phone and I'll I'll uh reply to everybody and send them love and thank them for their words. Cause I get them all the time. Like I love all these guys they're really fucking cool and they check in on me all the time. But uh it it I don't know if it it it it gave me something to like it's it was nice to have people you know remembering Chase, so I don't think it really made it worse. I think it made it better in a sense it definitely probably helped with the grieving, and it was nice to share our work and have people listen to it and say nice things, and then like you know, a lot of people I got a lot of the new fans, and a lot of people, you know, will like communicate with me now, so like I probably wouldn't have that if that wasn't out, so yeah, yeah. It's nice, it's cool. I'm glad people are listening to it. I get it, I get uh so many messages a day, like I said, where it's changed people's lives, or you know, they say they just they you know use this album during hard times. So that's always nice.

Like if I can do that, then I've done my job regardless of the pain that like I have to go through. If I'm doing that for other people, then I've done my job, you know. So silver lining. Yeah, yeah, for sure, for sure. That's why I do this. Like it shit is tough. Like, life is fucking tough as fuck, bro. Like, you know, but if I'm doing that at the least, then like let's go. Thumbs up. I'd rather do that than anything. For sure. So is there a certain song that maybe like captures such a perfect essence of his that you like go back to on repeat that or you know, like since he's passed, has there been like one song maybe that you like have found yourself really going back to, or you know, I don't know. I mean, sometimes it's hard to listen to it. Like, yeah, I mean, some day I love his music. Like, I'm a fan, like I was a fan before, like I said, like Someone is my favorite 6 Dogs song ever. Like, I think it's fucking amazing. Someone by six dogs all the first album. So good. Um, I really like our song Takashi Murakami. Yeah, like if I'm gonna go back to song, I go back to that one all the time. That one's fucking sick.

We had a great time making it, and it's really just like a colorful song. Um, is that why it's called Takashi Murakami? Yeah, yeah, and the chorus it's like it has like a thing, it's part of the hook, but I love the beat, and we had a great time making that song. Yeah, I was really excited. That and Burberry Weather, we had a really good time making. Oh, in the fucking album, but just like those are just like special to me, yeah. For sure. That's dope. So you know, you mentioned you like being hands-on with artists and obviously like trying to cultivate some sounds, and we even talked off-camera about how like just having one record on someone's project, like, yeah, it's great, you know, but it's just not enough. You know what I mean? So, like, tell us about some of the artists that you really locked in with. We, you know, we kind of hinted at Tom, but like I want to, you know, want you to give us what you've been up to, what you're excited about coming up. Okay, yeah, for sure. No, um, we're really yeah, the Tom shit right now. Um, I'm very so excited about this because I have five songs. So his album drops on um April 8th.

I have five songs on that album, and I pressed it. That's huge. I'm super excited about it. Last album he had on the club. And that's SV2, right? Is the name of the project? Yeah, um, Sunset Visionary 2. Sunset Visionary 2. Yes, April 8th. Yes, and uh streaming on our platforms. Yes, absolutely. So I had three songs on this last project that I was really excited about. We did we had one that was uh called Last Night, and we took the Everlong riff, like and then uh Foo Fighters, yeah. I mean, we we replayed it, like it wasn't interpolated, and we yeah, we interpolated it. We took the first two chords of the song only, and now just you have to clear that, yeah. We had to clear it. Dave Grohl approved it. Shout out Dave Grohl. If you look, no way, yeah. If if you look at the I can actually pull out my phone, no way, Dave Grohl DM'd you saying clear go for it, guys. Yeah, no, love your stuff. Oh, Dan, you asked, yes. I love Dave Grohl, by the way. Like, he's such a legend. Okay, let's go to the credits. Yeah, let's let's go to the song credits. Does it have him on there?

Maybe. Oh my gosh, what a legend. So it's Daniel Hartzog, Dave Grohl. Back to back. Yeah, back to back. He's he's showing us the uh written by or sorry, the produced by and written by Yes. Oh man, Tom the mailman, last night, Daniel Hartzog, Dave Grohl. Ben put a clip of the uh I'll somehow put it I'll somehow put a screenshot of Spotify. Yeah, you know, it's it's all I'll somehow get that edit I can handle. I love giving him like edits to do for he's like just make Daniel's hair look like it's on fire. I'm just like yeah, because I'm a final cut pro expert. No problem. Yeah, exactly I didn't just teach myself how to basic edit these podcasts funny. Yeah, shout out to me though for fucking 45, 46 episodes edited. That's awesome. Editing. I had no idea what the fuck I was doing. I got you on the right path. Henry definitely, I was all right. Now go ahead now I don't even want to give you any love, though.

I was gonna say Henry was my was my final cut instructor, and then I got my feet wet and I was you know rocking all up in there. But I'm definitely not good enough to do any sorts of crazy edits, but I'll try and get a screenshot of your Dave Grohl, Daniel Hartzog. That's fire. Yeah, that's really funny. That's amazing. It was one of those random things. Especially like a rock fan like you. Yeah, no, it was super cool. It's one of those just random things. It's just like um it was so sick. I don't know, so funny. And um so folks, if you want to sample someone, you might actually end up in a credit next to them. That is what I've learned. Uh since then, I've just been like, yeah, I can sample anything. Fuck it. Like go for it he just gave me this like, yeah, I'm just like, you know, I think I can get away with anything. So like, yeah, it's I've already sampled so many Drake records. I'm just kidding. it's actually it's gonna be Drake, that's gonna be Daniel Hartzog. Yeah. But but no, I was really excited about that one. Yeah. Um and the rest of the song, the other two songs I produced on that project, I also really um love. that was one that was just like cool, like my childhood would be like my childhood self would be screaming, you know, type of thing. But we love Tom.

Yeah, right. That's awesome. Yeah, Tom's good. I really like Tom's music a lot. Like he's he's he's a great guy, and like I I fucking love him, but I'll also like really just love his fucking art. I think it's so good. Um and we've been we've been working on new records that aren't that that aren't even on the new album. We've already got like two, and uh that I'm really like enjoying. So SV3 on the way going. He's got, he already got names for these other projects and everything. He's got a whole vision. He he really sees this shit. He seems like a visionary. He's he knows what he's doing, he's got it going. I think that's what's gonna continue to. I mean, we talked about his he's like million monthly listeners almost every every month for the last year. Yeah, it's over a million monthly listeners. Yeah, one point one. And I think that you know, this is something you and I have talked about a lot, man. Like the artists that have this like very specific vision for like what they want to do and like the art that they want to make. And I mean, even six, you know, like the way that you talked about how, you know, yeah, in in conjunction with you, would talk about like what mood are we setting, what vibe are we trying to curate, like being intentional about that shit versus the guys that show up in the studio don't have a fucking idea of what they're actually like trying to do. I'm sorry, man.

Like, that's what wins It's like that type of shit. Yeah, and sometimes, of course, those those sessions come out of anything. Like you people walking through and not know what they're gonna do. True. It does happen, but no, I'd rather do this more of the time. You're gonna get a better, better like. Yeah, it doesn't need to be so strict that like every time we must have a per. But like I'm just saying, generally speaking, absolutely. Those that you can if you can say that about someone, it means that they're doing that the majority of the time. Just thinking intently about their art. Exactly. their art maybe a little more seriously. Exactly. And I think that I admire that more. I do too. And yeah, maybe it's just me, like that's the type of people I want to continue to surround myself with, like, for real, because I think that's that's what I think just breeds, you know, longevity in in these careers, too. Absolutely. No, 100% agreed. But yeah, so we got the Tom project, you got five on there. Yeah. Who else have you been kind of you know working with regularly lately? Um, Eric Doh's project that's coming out soon. Yeah. I'm really excited for. I love it.

But one's not good enough, Eric. What the fuck? We need more. No, but he is crushing right now. No, one is perfect. I'm happy to be a part of it at all. And we made it in person. Like, that's cool. We did we linked up by the station. Well, yeah, where's he from? Um, I want to say he's from like New York. Okay, yeah. But he lives here now. Um, he does? Yeah. And if I got that. wrong, Eric. Come on over. We'd love to have you on the podcast. Come on over, guy. But he definitely definitely lives here now. But he's everywhere. You know, he's traveling, he's touring, he's doing some stuff. Fucking superstar. You know, I don't know where he's at. Yeah, but anywhere. Yeah. But no, I have to. Who's got eyes on Eric? Yeah, I have one on that project. I'm really excited for. I think he's really, really fucking talented and makes amazing music. So I'm just happy to be part of anything. I literally only played like three or four things on that song, a guitar and a few cents. And like it's, you know. Did he announce when that's coming out yet? Or no, he hasn't. Okay, so has he announced that? No, I don't even know.

Can we get it one more time exclusive? Okay. I'll play it for you guys after. Oh, I meant like he tell us when it's dropping. Oh no. Um, another group that I thought is super dope that you've at least had the one record with Riz Pop Tropical Sluts. Oh, yeah. I have a few records with them. And I have some more coming out with them on the new album. Yo, they are dope. Yeah, they're they're fucking sick. It's like a year ago, Jackson. Well, this story's actually fucking crazy. So they came down the week that we're here for it. They came down the week that Chase had passed. Oh, yeah. Yep. They were here for one day, and then that happened. And then I ended up working with them, you know, that whole week after that. Just trying to, like, yo, I gotta take today off. I took the one day off, and then the next day I got right back in with them and we made World War III, the song that just came out. It's going crazy. Yeah, so that's got like half a million on Spotify almost. Yeah, if you If you watch the lyric video for it, they they draw six in the star at the end of it. Oh, really? I didn't I didn't catch that. It's really sick. Yeah.

And um that whole song's for Chase. You re-listen to the lyrics, it'll make sense now. Well, because Riz was really close with Chase. Yeah, yeah. I just missed him a lot during the album process. Yeah, like because they had a song on Ronald together Two. two. Yeah. Two on Ronald. I really wanted to make that happen. He also performed like two or three Six Dog songs at his show. Yeah, yeah. No, for sure. We um and Chase's parents were at that show. Word. Yeah, they were on the side over there. Okay, wow. But um, but uh we uh I I I really wanted to introduce them because I was like, oh, you guys would be such good friends. So one day Riz was down, and I was like, yo, Chase, let's get a session. And then I just introduced them, and we made two for the album over the week. So we came we came back, we linked up again, and we made another one. But the first time we made Post Malone, and then we made Beach House the second time. Yeah, yeah. It was super sick. I was really glad I got it introduced. I mean then after that they just became good friends, you know. That's what, you know. So yeah, that's cool. it was awesome. It was awesome, man. For sure. Good deal. So anything else that the people should know about you know what you got going on? Secret projects or anything like that?

I'm enjoying what I'm doing. Like I said, the Pop Tropics stuff is real, it's also really cool. I want to say I have three out of them that I'm really, I really love, the World War III, the uh Bad Habit, and Grandma Got Run Over by a Lawnmower. Um I love that name for a song. It's a funny name. It's been on the hyper pop playlist a lot. I did I and I did that one with grandma as well. Um he produced on it with me and Guala Beats. So it's kind of ironic that grandma got run. that's why they named it that. Oh, yeah. Yeah, you know, that's that's why they named it. I thought it was just punting off of the grandma got run over by a reindeer. Yeah, yeah. We made it all in person. It is both. Absolutely, yeah. And we made those all in person, and they were really um crazy sessions because of the timing of that week. So but it was it was cool, and we we really made some cool art that week. And I and they've came back down since. Um then I brought them back down since. And because they're from New York area, or where are they from? Oh, yeah, New York area. Um I want to say like Long Island, maybe but but but they're from, but like they're in the city now, they're doing stuff. They'd be there.

Like they're they're in like LA right now, fucking Hollywood boys. Um, they're so cool, brother, they're they're like Blink-182, like reincarnated. They're just like, it's so funny to hear them talk. They're just like young and they're they're cool and then they want to make like rock music, and I love it. I don't know, and it's like um, it's just they're they're just cool, dudes. They're funny. Shout out Pop Tropical Slide, yeah. Shout out, with them, it's cool making like rock music again. So I'm doing all the drums, I'm doing everything for these. So like it's a fun to do that. Are you programming drums or are you playing them? Um, I'm programming them, but like what do you use for uh I've gotten insanely good at programming live drums, like you would not know that I use easy drummer and I'm okay at it, but I I need I need the sauce special built kits that I have for Ableton. Really, that's all just one shots, you put them together, yeah. I've built like super special kits that are just and then I just add like certain room reverbs and stuff. Are you selling these? No, one day I'm going to the yeah, one day I'm gonna do it. Yo, be on the lookout for a Dan Hartzog, yeah, yeah. First customer, first customer, and he's like, I'll pay whatever.

No, I'm I'm definitely gonna um put these out at some point, yeah. Cool, for sure. Well, Dan, buckle up, my friend. We've entered a final segment of the One More Time podcast. Do it. Oh man, I gotta put on Oh, It's getting serious, Dan. That's how you know it's getting serious. Dan already has his on, so yeah, yeah. So I wanted to match the vibe. So this is the rapid fire rampage. It's a three-part rampage. Okay. We're gonna start with some short answer questions. I'm gonna hit you with some this or that. Give you a couple choices. You're gonna pick one. And then we're gonna do a word association. I'm gonna throw a word at you, and you're gonna just throw the first thing off the top of your head. Okay. Starting real simple, starting with a short answer. Are you buckled up? Are you prepared for this? Yes. This is an intense segment. Okay. Stop laughing. It's intense. Serious. I can't. I laugh in an intense moment only. It's my worst problem. No, that was cool. I like that. Okay.

Part one, one more time podcast, episode 46. Dan Hartsog, Rapid Fire Rampage, starting with the short answer. I'm just gonna go ahead and start off with a really hard one just to get it out of the way. How are you doing today? I'm doing great today. Fantastic. It's a softball, Henry. It's super soft. It's gonna get way easier now. Dan, list as many digits of pi as you can. Oh, fuck that. 3.14. I don't know. That'll work. That'll work. That'll work. Moving on. Dan, how many producers is too many producers to send the same loop? And also, how many artists is too many artists to send the same beat? Who? That's a good question. I don't know. I mean, I don't know. I because some producers really send it to like a ton of people. I send it to one or two. I think usually two is my limit of artists, too. I need to keep track of who's using them and who's not. So for me, and I I make really specific packs, I will say. So for me, it's it's two.

But for other producers, you're making like a hell of a fucking rage loop. Fuck it, dude. Send it out to as many people as possible. Get the best song back. It's a win. I like it. I like it. Fuck it. Yeah. It's exactly the answer I was hoping. That's a good one. No, that's that's insightful. Dan, what is one job you could not be paid enough to do? Ooh, I don't even know. I money talks. You'll do it. It's got a price for everything. I like it. I like it. That'll work. That's the answer. Dan, you can executive produce an album for any artist, alive or dead. Who is it? Oh my god. No! How am I how would I ever answer that? That's so hard. Maybe like the cure. That'd be so cool. Ooh, good one. He goes, how would I ever maybe the cure immediately into his answer? I just had a probably like 20 of those that are like really good answers. That was good off the top. Yeah. You wake up as a squirrel. Yes. What is the first thing you do?

I don't know. Jump. They jump. Have you ever seen a squirrel jump from a limb to limb? That's impressive. Test out your jump. Jumping a bit. I get it. Check it. Well, check the area for dogs though first. Sure. Yeah, so that'd be really the first thing. He'll be smarter than the average squirrel. My dog loves squirrels. That's why I said that. Oh, my dog's, you know, it's just like on the hunt at all times. That's why I said that. Yeah. You wake up as God. What is the first thing you do? Oh, I don't know. That was an evil god. Yeah, I don't even know what I would do. I never really thought about that. Um that's what we do here at the One More Time Podcast. Yeah, absolutely. Make you think. Wow. I'd lower gas prices right now. Fuck yeah. Legend. Dan for God. He's a legend. It's currently 2022. Because God is a vote. It is currently bad out here. If it if this comes out and it's not bad, you know what I mean? Like it's bad right now. It's expensive. It's really bad. Why?

If you were a food, what would you be? I don't know. That's a hard one. This, because, like, I don't know, like, I don't know how I'd feel. Like I like I like pizza, right? But like I don't know how feeling like a pizza pizza He's thinking of the physical aspect of being feel to be a pizza? you feel cheesy yeah cut me into eights you know what I'm saying um they're gonna cut me in squares or uh or pie slices pepperoni hats. Yeah, yeah. I'm not I'm not too sure, but I'm gonna go with pizza. because I had pizza recently, so good answer. Safe answer. Safe, so safe. Dan, you have to delete three states. Which states do you delete? Oh, um fuck. Probably like um Nebraska. Uh I don't know why. That's fine.

Um I approve. Yeah, I'm trying to think of states that like I don't really like I can't say they don't matter, like I just don't go to. Um where where did Kanye make that album? Wyoming? Wyoming. I feel like that's beautiful though. I shouldn't delete that. But like I haven't been, you know? Ohio. Yes, that's a great one. Ouch. And then Indiana. Wait, Chicago's in, wait, no, it's Illinois. We're good. Okay, okay. Okay. And then Indiana. Yeah, so we got Nebraska, Indiana, and Ohio. Yeah, those are good. Those are good three. that's messed up. Perfect. Fuck the Midwest, am I right? Yeah. I'm Just kidding. I'm kidding. No, for real. Good music out of the Midwest. I love a lot of Midwest rock. I don't know. I haven't heard many Nebraska artists lately. So Dan, is a hot dog a sandwich? Yes. I mean, it's gotta be. Great logic. How many onions would fit in a hot air balloon? Like the basket or the balloon?

That's a good question. I guess the balloon. A lot. I don't know. Probably a hundred thousand. Okay. I mean, I don't know. Onions aren't that big, you know? And like, are they compacted or does it just fall out the bottom? This is all the information that you get. This is it. No, you'll see like 50,000 anyway. 50,000. Okay. Okay. What is your favorite curse word? Oh, I don't know. That's a bad one. I don't curse. I'm just kidding. So none of them so many times. Okay. Yeah, probably just fuck. I say fuck a lot. Shout out, fuck. I don't even think about it. Shout out fuck. Part one of the rampage. Part one. Sorry, everyone. Part one of the rampage. How's Dan's doing? He's doing good. He's doing good. He's overanalyzing a lot of them, which is hilarious. And it's great content, but it's not great for speed. I'm loving seeing his hearing his brain work. Yeah. I'm letting him. He's describing how the brain is thinking. Yeah, I love that, before he says the answer, which is really good. It's okay. But it is the rapid fire. I'm sorry. So let's see if we can pick it up here with the this or that.

Okay. I'm gonna give you two, he just woke up like two hours ago, give him a break, give him a break. He has no coffee, uh, but I guess he never has every day. So part two of the rampage, this or that. Here we go. It's a moot point. Ramp starting with melodies or starting with drums? Oh, it depends on the day. More so, more often. Which one? Melody. Plugins or hardware? Hardware. Eight bar, twelve bar, or sixteen bar verse. Uh sixteen bar verse. Snare twelve. Sometimes, but never eight. Never eight. Too short. Depends. Maybe. On a hyper pop song, maybe I'll do it. There you go. Snares or claps. Oh, uh, claps for for hip hop, snares for rock. Home studio or commercial studio. Um depends on the project and depends what the commercial studio has. You got a lot of instruments, fucking commercial studio. But home studio any day for just like, graphics.

they just have a board and like nothing else. Yeah, fuck that. I don't need that. Thanks. Windows or Mac? I have both, so uh whatever. What do you prefer? Uh Mac. It's just user friendly, but like I make all my beats on a Windows laptop. Just leave it at just leave it at Mac. Mac. Alright, Apple whore. Beach or camping? Camping. Salsa or guac? Salsa. Lemon pepper or hot. Depends on the day. I like both. I love both. God. It depends on the hot place. So some places have the best hot sauce. True. And some people have the best lemon pepper or the shittiest lemon pepper. But lemon pepper for the east of just like it's less. You're gonna get lemon pepper right more of the time. Right. But if I'm going to my places, hot. I feel like hot is easier to mess up. Yeah. Yeah. Consistency of the sauce and shit versus lemon pepper is very straightforward for the most part. For sure. Like there's a place by the studio, or in, by Jamie's Studio. Like best fucking hot sauce I've ever had in my life.

Shout it out one time. It's called Wings Pub. It's like it's like a it's like a Latin like restaurant, and it's just like holding the wall, so good. You can get like a 10 piece and some rice, fried rice. Amazing. Hungry again. Really good. Live the rest of your life with one giant hand or one giant ear. Well, fuck. That sucks. Either way. I mean, like, probably I don't know how like my off, like you wait. I feel like my head will be leaning all the time, but I make music with my hands. So, like, hey, I gotta do the ear. Can I make music with my hands? Yes, yes. I mean special headphones. I'm gonna be like that that would be really tough for here. Um hypothetically, could it make you like have a better ear? I mean, I'm just saying. It'd be imbalanced. You'd be hearing like you'd be like, man, the the low mids, low mids are really muddy on the right. Oh, wait, it's my big ear. Yeah. Luckily, this is all theoretical. So that's right.

That's right. Go to jail for one year or lose one year off your life. At least one year of my life. I'm not going to jail. That's what I said, bro. Fuck that shit. I went to jail for one night. I mean I got arrested one time. For what? Weed. It was fucking uh wax, too. So it was like it's like a felony, but I got dropped to a misdemeanor. Stupid, stupid shut up. I wasn't like doing anything bad. I was even sober. Like we we just had to had some wax. Yes. That's it. This next one's really sad, so buckle up. Oh god. A wife who never argues, or a wife who never hugs you. Oh, definitely never hugs me. I'm just kidding. No, a wife that never argues. Okay. Okay. I'm just joking. One year without the internet or one year without bathing. Oh, with one year without the internet. I I don't need the internet. Don't need it. No, I'm chilling.

There it is. I don't know. You've made some serious plays on the internet. Well, no, but I mean I can still just like use my thumb drive and put my shit on someone else's computer and they can use their internet. Ooh, loophole. I I it's a loophole. My job doesn't require an internet to work. So I'm chilling. It's true. Like, you know, a little bit. That's fair. That's fair. Yeah. I live with my own. You did cheat the system slightly, but you are a misdemeanor, almost a felon. Yeah, almost, but I'm not. Yeah. Smart and ugly or dumb and hot. Dumb and hot. Duh. Nope. That's it. Final answer. Final answer. Give up Google for life or give up Amazon for life. Oh, Amazon. It's gone. I fuck with Google. I mean, not like probably like you know, a huge like, you know, just like corporation. Like, fuck that. But also, I like Google more than like Amazon. Fuck Jeff Bezos. Okay. But also, if you hear that, man, I'm not. I don't see the thing. Give me something.

Give me something. The opinions expressed. The opinions expressed by the guests on one more time podcast do not necessarily reflect the opinions of one more time podcast. Yes. You're just gonna hit man on me. Right. Okay. This is a good one. A 75% chance of executive producing a platinum album. Or a 25% chance of producing a diamond album. A 75% chance of executive producing a platinum album. Going with the safe shot. Yeah. Part two of the rampage. Part two. Much quicker. Yeah. He picked it up. Yeah, he's good. Very rapid. It's all gonna come down to this last segment. This is the word association. Oh wow. I'm excited for this one. Glad it's something like this. I'm just gonna give you one word, one phrase, and you just say the first word off the top of your head right back at me. Okay. Here we go. Rapid fire rampage part three. Dan Hartsock. FL Studio. Uh green. It's very green.

It's pretty green. Like for noobs. No, why is it green? FL Studios looks so green when you open it. Like actually color. Oh, like yeah. Visually speaking, yeah. Yeah. I was thinking about it. I was thinking some like deeper meaning. Yeah, the color green. Okay. This is gonna be interesting going into the second one. Yeah, Saint Patty's Day. Oh god. Pinching. Gutter. Ball. Netflix. Show. Cheese. Wheel. Marriage. That's an acceptable answer. That's it. That'll work. OnlyFans. Subscribers. Fitness. Dick in your mouth. Fitness Dick in your mouth. I just scarred by high school and just people saying like these nuts and all that stuff. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

It was a really good opportunity. Wow. That was great. You took uh you took the opportunity that was in front of you. I'm so Sorry. I thought he said he was 27, but you know. No, I just definitely put out a child moment. I just couldn't help it. You set yourself up. No, I set you up on purpose. That was the goal. That was Wow, okay, it was perfect. My plan worked. To the next one, yeah, for sure. Nuts! Okay, this is rapid fire, guys. Okay, sorry. Umbrella. Brianna. Whiskey. Shots. Salamander. You haven't thought about that word in a while. No, I haven't. I haven't. Toes. Salamander toes. They do have like the yeah. I'm with you. Lil. What? Lil. Lil? Lil. Wayne. Zaza.

Um God. Zaza Loud. Bounce. House. Bitcoin. She's a Fucking goddamn. Oh. I'm so out of this world, by the way. That's fair enough. That's an acceptable answer. Blockchain. There you go. Blockchain is good. Math. Homework. Boat. And hose. Yeah, of course. Yeah. Weapon. Entertainment. Prestige worldwide. Prestige worldwide. Yeah. Weapon. Fight. Vegan. Food. Riz. La Vie. What a rampage. What a rampage. Yo, the third part. He, except for an hoes and La Vie. He actually stuck to the one-word responses.

Most people. Most guests give us like a sentence about what the word makes them think of. He was surgical with one word. I'm gonna give it to I I I tried on that one. No, that was great. Last very last part. Yeah. Dan, appreciate you coming on, man. Thank you so much for having me. Right after an all-nighter, fresh out the bed. You showed up at the One More Time podcast. crushed it Amazing stories, man. I I love like your perspective on shit, man. I mean, just you know, acknowledging that this shit is hard and all you can do is like put one foot in front of the other type shit. You've obviously dealt with you know some you know traumatic loss in the past, you know, year and change, but it sounds like you've like tried your best to get through that and create and you know do what you love which is this this music shit man so like it's it's beautiful appreciate you coming on for real man and um yeah I can't wait to get some more of the uh you know Jack DA that whole gang on the show man because they're all coming on yeah they have to sure but yeah and Henry until next week what are we doing? Getting out of here we're getting out of here bye bye she like one more time Hop up in a flying skirt tripping to the law