Ghost Producers

(Debate time - You know me, I LOVE a good debate :wink: :wink: )



So it’s done a lot in the music industry, but is it right?

I mean, surely you’re just living your life as a lie by using a ghost producer and pretending to the world that it’s your track?



Could you imagine it applied to other career choices in the world?

Just doesn’t happen does it.



The concept when you think about it is f*cked up, your job title is ‘producer’ but you don’t actually produce you pay someone else to do it for you??

So surely you’re not a producer but just a big nothing, a fake?



Your thoughts…

I love milli vanilli theyre the best and my fav :smiley:

[quote]egg2 (02/03/2010)[hr]I love milli vanilli theyre the best and my fav :D[/quote]



???













I’m thinking there is only one good exception to when this should ever be ok… when you’ve already proved yourself as a producer and artist and due to your busy working schedule you have someone do the engineering of all your parts.

I was reading actually a Tweet from Steve Angelo talking smack about real Producers .well everyone says that he hires Producers to polish his sounds and master it .llol

now personally i dont care if i am called producer   . as long as I Dj and Produce good music .the rest doesnt matter .

depends how and why they are used most so called “ghost producers” are used to finish projects started by the artist/producer and they are usually hired because they have the same or similar production skills, in many cases the ghost producers are only used because the artist is fully booked and stretched to far as it is.



but on the other hand getting someone to write a complete track for you and selling it as your own work is a joke.



at the end of the day though they are only cheating themselves so i won’t lose a nights sleep over it.



there are a lot of big artists that use ghost producers mainly when they are requested to do remixes, they will usually split the fee in some way with a lesser known but still good producer. its a you scratch my back i’ll scratch yours situation

It’s all about money and exposure. I’m sure anyone would do it if they were that big and it would help them out.



Maybe, (and my analogies are not too good) if you manufactured automobiles and had another company make the vast majority of the parts for the car. In the end, its still the main company’s car, even though they commissioned another car company to do the majority of the work. Believe me though, that the commissioned company didn’t do it for free. Just my $.02

I have used an engineer a few times on tracks that only have my name on, but all of them tracks the engineering rights have gone to the engineer.

The engineering days i have had i have taken the midi riff’s all the samples, presents where needed and taken example tracks with me so i get the sound i want, i also find it has helped my production now when on my own as picked up so many tips and tricks!

:cool:

Sure yes, if you’ve produced most of it or at very least the main parts then you have an engineer to make it sound all good together then that’s cool and fair. But i’m not talking about having an engineer to do your work.



I’m talking about paying someone to make a whole track for you then sticking your name on it.

[quote]roben (02/03/2010)[hr]Sure yes, if you’ve produced most of it or at very least the main parts then you have an engineer to make it sound all good together then that’s cool and fair. But i’m not talking about having an engineer to do your work.

I’m talking about paying someone to make a whole track for you then sticking your name on it.[/quote]

I.m.o i think its pathetic to do something like this,  If i was a big name and someone asked me to do this id tell them to hit the road .

People who do -do this should be properly ashamed of themselves and give up making music . :slight_smile:

I know of a HUGE producer that did this. I actually know the name of the song too. It’s dumb, but its just a part of the business. I could care less.

One of the biggest names in house music David Guetta is a prime example of this. Have a read of this article



http://www.houseplanet.dj/index.php/Articles/The-Evolution-Of-The-DJ-Artist-Behind-The-Scene-of-the-Dance-Music-Industry.html

I think this is a very general question that has a lot of different situations that can occur. I’m gonna list them as a know them correct me if you think I’m wrong please and I’m sure we are all in agreement on which ones are whack and which ones are expectable.


  1. G.P. writes beats the and produces the song for the artist and the artist writes the song.


  2. G.P. Writes the beat and produces the track the artist buys the song from a Ghost writer and only performs the song.


  3. G.P. works for a Dr. Dre or Timbaland and writes beats all day with other G.P.s and The famous Producer uses whatever he likes and puts his name on it.


  4. G.P. Masters and possible mixes another producers track either because he has better gear or is simply better at finishing up projects.


  5. A G.P. Producer takes a famous person and creates the entire project and simple has the famous person perform the vocal track. Then promotes the track as only the famous persons.



    Heres my opinion the music business is big business and its all about making money and getting your name out. These people who manufacture artists or help ok performers sound a lot better also make money in the deal as well its not like they aren’t getting taken care of. It reminds me of the saying “get in where you fit in”. If you are a talented producer and aren’t famous yet and a sub-par performer asks you to “fix” or create a track for them and offers you a lot of money to do so I’m sure most of us would do it. Not to sell out but to get your foot in the door or to get you tracks out there. In the hope that you will get noticed. I know a little about the music business and I know record companies hire producers on Producing deals just like artists on deals. The record companies need to insure that the “hit machine” keeps turning out hits. It’s a business and to me if I like a song I don’t really care if it took 20 different people to make the finished product if its good. I personally want to be able to do it all myself but that’s not how the music business works most of the time. I mean hell when the Black Eyed Peas started out they didn’t have Fergie but the label signed her and the Black Eyed Peas were good but to them to underground hip hop so they put Fergie in the group. I loved their old stuff before Where is the love but now do you think any of them are mad that the label did that? Probably not cause now they can do whatever they want because they have such a huge fan base. My point is it’s not just Ghost Producers out there doing things like that there are Ghost Writers and all sorts of other invisible hands doing things to make people with talent better or more marketable. I think I know a lot about music but the most popular music where I’m from is County. So I’m sure theres a lot I don’t know about marketing music to masses and most of the artist you guys have mentioned fall in that category. The people who matter know the difference in the end anyways. Just my thoughts. thanks!

Wow I just wrote my reply before I read that article About David Guetta THat article was pretty crazy basically saying everything I had stated in my post but about him. I had no idea he didn’t make his own tracks thats kinda sad to me I feel like I was just told santa claus isn’t real. Crazy stuff

[quote]krisdjsteel (05/03/2010)[hr]Wow I just wrote my reply before I read that article About David Guetta THat article was pretty crazy basically saying everything I had stated in my post but about him. I had no idea he didn’t make his own tracks thats kinda sad to me I feel like I was just told santa claus isn’t real. Crazy stuff[/quote]

Yeah man its wrong isnt it ?:slight_smile:

[quote]nellycrock (05/03/2010)[hr]One of the biggest names in house music David Guetta is a prime example of this. Have a read of this article



http://www.houseplanet.dj/index.php/Articles/The-Evolution-Of-The-DJ-Artist-Behind-The-Scene-of-the-Dance-Music-Industry.html[/quote]



Awesome read!!!







So basically we should just give up doing this and get someone with real skills to produce our tracks for us?



Phil… fancy a bit of cash? :wink: (jks)

[quote]roben (05/03/2010)[hr][quote]nellycrock (05/03/2010)[hr]One of the biggest names in house music David Guetta is a prime example of this. Have a read of this article



http://www.houseplanet.dj/index.php/Articles/The-Evolution-Of-The-DJ-Artist-Behind-The-Scene-of-the-Dance-Music-Industry.html[/quote]



Awesome read!!!







So basically we should just give up doing this and get someone with real skills to produce our tracks for us?



Phil… fancy a bit of cash? :wink: (jks)[/quote]



Lol haha yea you could look at it that way or hone your skills even more and become a well established producer that the big name artists come to your for engineering duties.

[quote]numca (05/03/2010)[hr][quote]roben (05/03/2010)[hr][quote]nellycrock (05/03/2010)[hr]One of the biggest names in house music David Guetta is a prime example of this. Have a read of this article



http://www.houseplanet.dj/index.php/Articles/The-Evolution-Of-The-DJ-Artist-Behind-The-Scene-of-the-Dance-Music-Industry.html[/quote]



Awesome read!!!







So basically we should just give up doing this and get someone with real skills to produce our tracks for us?



Phil… fancy a bit of cash? :wink: (jks)[/quote]



Lol haha yea you could look at it that way or hone your skills even more and become a well established producer that the big name artists come to your for engineering duties.[/quote]



I wouldn’t do it, too busy producing for myself! I’d be happy to do remixes for them however.



In the Computer Music (or is it Future Music? One of the two) magazine DVDs there is one with The Wideboys and they were saying how they don’t produce for other people anymore (except remixes), simply because one of their tracks they did for someone got really high up in the charts (top 10 i’m sure, was a while back i seen it).

Anyways basically they didn’t get much money for the work yet the ‘artist’ ended up getting thousands and thousands.



If they can’t produce their own sht, fck em, they don’t deserve to be ‘up there’, the producer who made it does, he/she is the REAL artist and the REAL success.



We should boycott fakery.

There is rumour going around Brighton that Prok & Fitch don’t make their own tracks, to be honest I’m not sure I believe that, but I’m also not sure if i’ll ever ask them haha. I knew them way before they were ‘famous’ and they were still producing tracks back then.

So to be honest it’s probably bullsh*t rumours.



I did ask James why him and Ben haven’t done a ‘in the studio with’ for Future Music or Computer Music yet, and he said he’d be up for it so who knows?

Surely the magazine would have approached them by now.



I also don’t know why we’ve not seen one by ATFC yet, or Mark Knight… but then that’s a different discussion.


Some of music producers decided to make ghost production as their way of career.
I don’t deny it. Great example of ghost producer team is http://bestghostproducer.com/ .
Their music production team can produce a lot of kinds of edm so this kind of career doesn’t limit them.

One of the best sites for finding ghost producer related services is Edmwarriors.