Well, pulling out that particular "golden ears" stuff, Philips specific complaint is that Yep is wrong that this is something anyone can do, and he asserts this is because "In reality, Golden ears are rare and complex: They are rock-star singers and producers themselves: They perform multiple instruments with strong conviction and vibe. Such individuals sacrifice their time to listen for others, have great patience, great love, innate talent, and are compulsive composers who love music and art on numerous levels. They don't troll for attention. Their songs are extremely sincere and have message-hooks and vibe that edify others".

Now that's just plain claptrap.

For starters: there are loads of really good engineers out there who don't play, sing or write songs at all.

Weeeellllll.... 


I'm not sure that Yep is all that bad...he may be a little bit more salty for some however.


But I am not going to quibble with his expertise that is for darn sure....

Yes, there are plenty of excellent engineers who aren't good musicians.  one job is not equivalent or even a prerequisite for the other.

BUT if someone claims to be able to do both and declare themselves an expert, then when they post their stuff and it's obviously amaturish, then they have no credibility to back up their self proclaimed expertise.

Well, that's certainly true.

Thanks John, Reece, James, Ben, and all.

The blind leading the blind has been a concern of late.  I don't consider any of you blind leaders, however.  But Yep left us because he was not of us.  He never went to war for any of us, despite his loving words.

My personal opinion(s) on "golden ears" may be wrong.  The definition of 'golden ears' has a compound meaning anyway.  Perhaps all of us have golden ears some of the time ... those all-penetrating ears that can decipher vibe, beatz, acoustics, etc. etc.

What does "go to war" mean, in this context?

"Go to war" with our song battles:

Yep never critiqued our songs, never collab'd, never immersed himself in our song struggles, never demo'd his *excellence* for us noobs to follow.  He was all talk and no bloody (song) action.

Yep, IMHO, preferred to be 'teacher of babes', with ear-tickling words about every facet of song creation.  All of us noob-pioneers were amazed by Yep!  He 'understood' DAW domains and rock; he encouraged us to finish our battles ... but without ever getting his own hands dirty.  Yep seemed a beloved politician working on paper alone.  He only critiqued our words, iirc!

"Finished is better than perfect" ... hahahahaha!  Ear-tickling stuff!

By old-school mixing: I meant: performance driven wide-dynamics 80's music (vs. sample driven): Yep spoke highly of real expert (garage) guitarists, singers, and drummers (to me) ... while eschewing fake ROMplers, Samplers, hip-hopsters, and recent pioneering ... that never involves real expert guitarists, expert singers, nor expert drummers.  

Yep loved Motown (when I cornered him to state his favs).  Hahahahaha!

Yep gave us some invaluable signal chains and such to be sure.
 
I love Yep but wish he would have joined in some of our battles ... as many of you joined in my battles.  What good is an advisor that never shares your battles.

Today the beatz-master and DJ rule in skating halls and dance halls ... world-wide. 

IOWs, Yep was a godsend for us noobs, an excellent politician (except for monster cables) who encouraged his troops to go to rock-war, but hid himself during our serious song-battles. 

Who was this Yep anyway?  What were his songs and song motifs?   Could Yep even tune a guitar?  Did Yep ever sing a message at all?

Where are you my old friend, Yep?  I miss you!  You are the fantom phantom of hope for us all!

For all we know Yep could be Bruce Swedien, or he could be some kid in his basement. Without hearing anything, how can we tell anything of what he says is right?

The old Russian proverb comes to mind:
trust, but verify.