I love you, radio – Brady Goodman, Iron Imager 2014…

After about 20 years in radio full-time, I’ve been working as a director of video productions for a manufacturing company in Kansas City for the last few years. I have clients I do imaging for as a freelancer on a consistent basis as well as working with my “home station,” KZPT-FM 997 the Point in Kansas City, where I’m also on-air as a weekend/fill-in jock.
I’d also like to mention how much I love this “Iron Imager” contest. I’d like to thank Benztown for making it happen. I’d like to thank Dan Kelly and the other champs for being involved and bringing a large amount of credibility to this event. The trip to LA and the chance to share the stage with Dan, catch some hang time with the Benztown Team is a prize in itself! If this brings me new opportunities, that’s just icing on the cake. This experience has easily been one of the most exciting things that has happened to me in my radio career.
I love you, radio.
Love, Brady

PS: I’m on twitter, @bradygoodman, and I’m always open to new opportunities

Check out the interview with Brady:

Which production system do you use  and why?

I would consider myself an Adobe evangelist. I have been using Adobe Audition since it was Cool Edit Pro. And now that Audition is part of the creative cloud suite, it’s a no brainer for me because I do so much work with video and images, in addition to radio imaging.

What are your favorite plugIns? What is the perfect VO chain?

Again I’m going to go back to my history of working in fairly small markets, in situations with limited resources. So I’ve strived to make the most of with the resources available. The one plug-in I consider a “must” is Ozone from Izotope. I run Ozone on my master mix to clean up my levels and give the audio a bit of extra punch. Past that, I mainly use layering and effects native to Audition. Audiophiles who listened to my Iron Imager entry probably noted the lack of plug-ins and sound effects; I consider myself a production minimalist, coming from a mindset of allowing the writing and music hooks to carry the piece.

How do you schedule your work (priorities…..)?

My whole goal with radio imaging is to serve clients and make their radio station sound as close to their perfect vision as possible. In fact, the majority of my workflow is based on clients needs. If client A has some music promos where they want a ton of creativity, and they are allowing me time to really dive in, I’m going to prioritize it behind client B’s need for a promo with several sponsors attached to it. Additionally, quick turnaround times are key, so I focus on knocking things out as I receive them. Currently I have two clients I work with on a part-time basis so prioritizing isn’t a huge deal to me, as long as I can maintain a work/life balance.

What do you love about working on your own compared to being the head of imaging for “x”?

Working outside of radio has been a culture shock for me and also an experience where I’ve learned a tremendous amount. As far as working specifically with radio, I love the camaraderie of being in a building with a team, working toward a unified goal, day in and day out. That said, the freedom and chance to work on radically different projects, for different clients, from one day to the next as a freelancer is wildly exciting as well. I guess my answer is, as long as there is a DAW in the mix, I’m in.

What is the best protools or production trick anybody should know?

I’m a champion of pre-sets, shortcuts and templates. It might be a bit of a pain to get it worked out initially, but once you have all of those things set up, your workflow can really benefit. I personally like to keep most of my tool shortcuts where my left hand would naturally sit on the keyboard, but that all comes down to personal preference. I’m also a big fan of the “recording favorite” functionality in Audition. Again, the big benefit here is increased speed in the production room.

How do you get inspired and what do you use as a source of creativity? What does the term “creative Imaging” mean to you?

Most of the inspiration of any piece of production comes from the client. Have they been creative with what they requested, were they creative in the writing of the piece, or are they creative with their brand? I’m inspired by Benztown and the product it is putting out. When I’m given copy, if I turn to Benztown for the parts, I often feel like it’s my goal to keep my work up to par with parts I have been provided.
I also look to my comrades in production for inspiration and ideas. Listening to production from outside my market is a huge place of inspiration as well. One guy that really pushes me is Matt Steele. I hear his work, and I can always hear him pushing himself to progress in his production, which helps me push my own limits.

Who were your radio production idols, who influenced your work as a  producer?

Great question and tough to answer. There are so many amazing producers and radio guys I’ve met over 20 years of radio that I could go on for hours (pages). My first paying gig was in Salina, KS, and I would just hang around the station when I wasn’t babysitting American Top 40 carts with Jerry “the Beaver” Libby. I was really impressed with the way he operated in a studio and I was also impressed with what he could do with a cart deck and two reel-to-reel machines.
A few years later I was in Phoenix in the same building as Marty Whitney. The production on that station was and is legendary, and rightfully so. Phoenix was my first market where a single station had one guy dedicated to imaging, and it paid off for them in the sound of the radio station.
From Phoenix, I headed to Magic 93 in Boise, ID and met the two guys who showed me what a production obsession really was about. Matt Steele, Matt Rydberg and I spent a ton of time, probably too much time, in the production room. Almost 15 years, and several market moves later, Matt Steele and I still talk daily. His dedication to his craft is both inspiring and motivational. Can I eat up some more time and just list a bunch of guys that have impacted my production and radio career? Brian Sieminski, Tony Lorino, Dan Holiday, Joey Dee, Mike O’Reilly, Rick Tamblyn, Luke Jensen, Hoss Michaels, Dave Steele, the guys at California Aircheck, names that I’ve forgotten but shouldn’t have and so many guys through the years that I might not know by name but have heard their imaging from around the world.

What are 3 things of advice you can give to youngsters trying to get into the business?

1) Just produce. Nothing will improve your production like producing. It sounds simple because it is. There are many other important and useful ways to improve your production (listening to other stations, radio conferences, talking to other producers, mushrooms, booze, movies, video games, making movies, and on and on), but the more hours of production time you have under your belt, the better producer you will be.
2) When you are outside of the production room, don’t forget the fact that we are in an Industry, it’s not all fun and games, make sure you are also trying to improve the business aspects of your operation, your networking and your client service.
3) Pick up a musical instrument. I’m often drawing from what I learned in music and piano lessons that I took in high-school. I’m pretty sure I know enough about music theory to understand I don’t know enough about music theory. What little I do know about music theory certainly benefits me as a creative imager.