 Hey, it's time for voiceover body shop here on it's a Monday here But you could be watching this at any time and this week we have a fabulous guest a voice You will recognize from everywhere Neil Ross say hi Neil. Hi boys and girls Alrighty if you've got a question for him, you can throw it in the chat room in Facebook live You can throw it in the chat room in YouTube YouTube live you can throw it on clubhouse if you happen to be listening with Danny Burnside over on a clubhouse And we're gonna have a great time talking about this fabulous biz that we're all so enthralled with so stay tuned You ready George ready? Let's go. It's time for voiceover body shop right now From the outer reaches they came bearing the knowledge of what it takes to properly record your voice over audio and Together from the center of the VO universe. They bring it to you now George Wittem the engineer to the VO stars a Virginia Tech grad with the skills to build set up and maintain The professional VO studios of the biggest names in VO today and you Dan Leonard the voiceover home studio master a professional voice down with the knowledge and experience to help you create a professional-sounding home VO studio and Each week they allow you into their world bringing you talks with the biggest names in the voice of our world today Letting you ask your questions and giving you the latest information to make the most of your voice over business Welcome to voiceover body shop Voice over body shop is brought to you by voiceover essentials comm home of Harlan Hogan signature products source elements remote studio connections for everyone voice actor websites.com where your VO website isn't a pain in the butt VO heroes.com become a hero to your clients with a word-winning voiceover training JMC demos when quality matters and voiceover extra your daily resource for VO success and now Live to drive from their super secret clubhouse and studio in Sherman Oaks, California Here are the guys Well, hi there, I'm Dan Leonard and I'm George Whidham and this is voiceover body shop or VO Bs Alrighty well another week has gone by but everybody's vaccinated now well, so everybody who chooses to be vaccinated that that's true and So some people think it's still make-believe. Yeah, well, sorry guys Tell that to the people in Mumbai right now. You know, tell me about it. Yeah We went to Universal yesterday because Marcy insisted we go somewhere with the family, you know, so pick Universal So what was that? What was that like? You know, that's all I need to know It was universal, you know There was some fun stuff and then we went bet, you know lines are like two three hours to get in the Simpsons ride It's like what this I was at the pier and we got there like three with my daughter and her friend to ride rides You know and the line was like, I don't know 150 people deep and the kids were like, maybe if we come back later It'll be shorter. I'm like Wait, what grade are you guys in again? Like what part of math do you not understand? Yeah, but we actually longer and longer Yeah, we actually came home took a three hour nap and then went back and then the lines were shorter So, you know, hey, brilliant actually works there. Yeah Anyway Enough about our insane lives here out in Southern, California we're here to talk about home voiceover studios and the voiceover business and We have a great guest tonight You know, you may not know his name, but you definitely know his voice Aside from his instant recognizable work in promo and trailers Neil Ross has provided voices in many American animation productions most notably Voltron gi Joe and Transformers. He's also done voice work in numerous video games including Mass Effect and leisure suit Larry 67 really Larry. Yeah, that's awesome. Yeah, he's also provided voice roles such as Radio announcers in many movies including back to the future part to babe That'll do pig quiz show and being John Malkovich, which was a great film He also has announced live award shows like the Oscars and he's written a retrospective on his long and iconic career It's called vocal recall a life in radio and voiceover So why don't you play his voice so we can hear what he sounds like? Oh that guy They are the guardians of justice Elite warriors with no master 47 Ronan critics are calling body of lies a combustible spy thriller you're blown I know you work for the agency powerful and riveted We're an ancient target Leonardo DiCaprio burns up the screen Winona Ryder and Bancroft Ellen Burston Kate Milligan Alphrey Woodard how to make An American quilt. This is the tale of an ordinary man who had everything Until a man of power stole his freedom Now Sweeney will have his revenge you can bolt the door lock the windows and kill the lights But it won't make you safe every action has an equal and opposite reaction Chain reaction Whoa Let's welcome to voice over a body shop Neil Ross Neil. Welcome to the show. Oh, thank you so much, Dan It's a pleasure to be here. I've been looking forward to this for a long time Yeah, we've been we've been talking for a couple of months and finally we can get you on here You know, that's quite that's quite a long list of stuff when you go through your IMDB It's like, okay, keep going keep going Okay, and you keep scrolling and scrolling and keep going on Every now and then to keep my ego in check I look at Frank Welker's IMDB and realize it's about times longer than mine and that puts it all back in perspective again But thank you You've written a book which you know to me And now at last people write books and it's called vocal recall a life in radio and voiceovers So without reading the whole thing out loud, which would I know sound great because I actually did listen to it I was just gonna do that Cosman bit now hang on this is going to take a little while in the beginning. No Finnean's wake by James Joyce and he starts to do it in the audience and initially initially they laugh You know, it's a bit. Oh, he's gonna read a book out of funny And then apparently he really is going to read all of Finnean's wake while they sit there and the tittering subsides And it starts to get really awkward Anyway, the king of awkward. Yeah, so, you know, I like I said without reading, you know reading the whole book here Tell us a little bit about yourself and and how you ended up where you are today. I was a series of Accidents or disasters you you tell me Initially when I was like five six years old, we didn't have a television. So it was the radio and the record player and I just found myself Pulsively imitating the accents and the voices that I heard coming out of these little devices It wasn't with any thought of having a brilliant career. It was just fun You know, some kids build model airplanes and I sat in my room and did weird voices and My father was convinced he had a mental case on his hands, but Then as I got into my teen years I discovered rock and roll music which led me to the radio, which was just about the only source at that point and Then I gradually began to pay less attention to the music and more attention to what was happening in between the tunes The DJs what they were doing what they were saying How they wove commercials and weather forecasts etc etc and put together a show and suddenly One mad night when I was about 15 years old listening to Bill Balance on KFWB. I thought maybe I could do that and This little tiny spark became a roaring fire and I became utterly obsessed with radio And that became my goal and I got into the business just after my 18th birthday And I stayed in far too long. I was in for 21 years But somewhere along the way I discovered this wonderful business called voiceover existed And once I found out about that my goal became to get out of radio and get into voiceovers because I felt at that Point I was only using about 40% of what I had to offer in radio Whereas voiceovers if I could find any job that would be close to a hundred percent It would have to be it would have to be V. Oh, I I struggle for a metaphor, but Well, that's nice one of the That's my metaphors One of the ones I use I say well radios like driving a cab and Voiceovers like driving in the Indy 500 they both involve driving, but it's a whole different level or It's voice radios like working at McDonald's voiceovers. It's like working at a five-star Michelin French Bistro It's it's just no comparison. So I was I was able to make the transition between the years 78 and 83 And I did my last radio work in 85 never look back And and then you look back and go thank God he left that Yeah, how many salesman did you kill? You know if I'd stuck with it. I could be getting kicked out of a trailer park today I mean, this is what I missed out on by foolishly getting into voiceover That's yeah, it's one of those things. Well, you know, I'm gonna jump ahead on this question But before and before I get to that I want to remind people that you can ask questions on Facebook live if you're watching this live if you're Watching it live on YouTube live. You can ask there as well somebody is monitoring our chat room and on Clubhouse and You'll be able to actually ask Neil your question live on the air or if you're listening to this on Thursday Back what he said on Monday But you know, there are so many people who start in radio who aren't able to cut it in commercial voiceover You know, why is that? Why do you think? Well, you know, there's superficial resemblances between the two businesses, but they are very very different And I think you have to really have a genuine love for and desire to be a part of voiceovers to make the transition from radio. I Frequently will get a call from a disc jockey who just got fired and hey man Can you get me into voiceovers? And I always say to them look if if you really have a Genuine desire and passion to do this I might be able to help you But if you're just looking to make a couple extra bucks on the side until you get another radio job, don't bother It's not you're not gonna get anywhere The problem is that radio gives you you develop bad habits you develop what the late Dawes Butler called the cosmetic read It's a it's a radio announcer You hear them doing live copy on radio stations and they're reading it kind of like this and it's all very smooth and professional And they don't make a single mistake, but it has absolutely no believability. The subtext is I'm just reading this I have no idea what it is. I'm thinking about what I'm going to have for lunch this afternoon member FDIC and And you think well, that's pretty slick and everybody at the radio station loves it boy You sure sound professional. Maybe you should do voiceovers Well, maybe I should and you toddled down some to some agent the first agent I talked to who listens to your demo looks at you and says in the tone of voice They might use to say child molester you sound like a goddamn radio announcer What's the problem with that and and he tried to explain it and I went to workshops I'm still trying to solve the conundrum you you're not an announcer You are if all goes well a trusted voice Who is imparting really important information to the benefit of the listener and You are if you really are good somehow the microphone and the console and ever and the Radio or whatever they're hearing it on the television all washes away and it's just one person Communicating with another person, but it's incredibly difficult the I worked with a guy named Brian Cummings that was the first workshop I was in lovely guy and You know, he was trying to Teach us how to how to make these things come to life and he'd say picture yourself talking over the back fence to a neighbor What's the fence made out of what does his yard look like? You know, but I was willing to try anything at that point What really hit me was when I took an acting class in Hollywood, which I was horrible at But this one guy got up and tried to do a monologue and the teacher stopped him and he said wait wait wait wait wait Let me ask you a question. Have you read the entire play that this monologue comes from and the guys said well No, and he said well, that's why you the monologue isn't working because you don't know the situation you don't know the story and I and something clicked in my head and I said, yeah, that's the thing with a 60-second radio commercial It's a monologue, but you don't know the story There is no story really and then I realized well, then you have to make one up and I used to do that I'd look at a piece of copy and then I'd try to imagine what what Set of circumstances might have led all the way up to the moment where I first begin to speak and Almost those first few words should almost sound like I've already been talking you just missed that part. Here's the part you get to hear I don't know if that makes any sense. No, totally. Yeah, and that's what we tell people I mean, that's what we try to we try to explain to people look. It's a one-on-one conversation. You're not talking to a crowd You know, I mean you unless of course you're you announcing at a football game or something like that But most of the time voiceover is a one-to-one conversation. It's intimate and people need to learn that so once again, we're talking with With Neil Ross author of the book Vocal Recall a life and radio and voiceovers again if you got a question throw it in the chat room So we can get to that question a little bit George and I had a great guest couple weeks ago Kevin Gershan and and as he was talking He said something along line along the lines of well We we had Neil Ross available to narrate this or that and that was all I had. I didn't have to worry about Something along those lines He apparently was very happy to have someone like you. What was what kind of stuff did you do with him? Oh bless his heart. Well, it's you know, I haven't actually done that much with with Kevin once in a while I will work for him, but we're more friends than than Employer employee It was probably a promo the the thing is and I remember my agent T. J. Scott of What was then CED what is now CESD and he's no longer he's retired But he was sort of musing and he said I regard you as my utility player and I knew just what he meant, you know baseball term It's a player you can stick in any position and he'll do a good job He might not be the best first baseman in the league, but you throw him into first base He'll do a damn good job put him on second short outfield. Whatever That's kind of the way I am. I'm uh I'm a utility player. You can throw damn nearly anything at me and I'll manage to come up with something There's there's almost no phase of voiceovers that I haven't worked in up until recently I hadn't done a game show, but now I'm doing a game show. So I can't I literally can't think of anything else in voiceovers, I haven't done, you know, yeah Again looking at your IMDB. It's like well, you're in did a lot of stuff But you you've also played an announcer in some movies Yeah, then you have to try what were those bad habits? I've tried to get rid of I've got to get them back, you know, how about medical narration? Have you done much of that yet? I Used I used to do those but Not lately. Yeah, yeah in the beginning. I'm one of my first successes when I got into voiceovers was actually narrations and I figured out why that was and in this case radio helped, you know, you work for these Stations where there's not much of a budget and so you don't have a newscaster You're the newscaster. So what happens is you roll the last record before the top of the hour And you run down the hall and you rip a five-minute Newscast off the wire. Don't don't ask what the wire is boys and girls And you run back in the studio and you scan it real quick looking for typos And you tear it into a minute to look for typos. Wow Well, sometimes it's a you know, the president said today You got ad-lib something the president said so you don't want to get in that trap But anyway, the record is now tailing out and it's news news news time boom boom bang bang and on I come and I haven't had a chance to read this as I said, I just checked it for typos So the news is as big a shock to me as it is to the audience But it can't sound like that. So I've developed over time this very authoritative newscaster read which the subtext of which was I have researched this and prepared it and I am thoroughly familiar with its contents and now I am going to impart it to you the listener and somehow that worked for Non-broadcast industrials especially stuff where they were trying to Get salesmen hyped up to go out on the road and sell something and I think that's where the medical stuff some of that was medical and So I had some luck there early on in my career Which made up for my my hideous lack of success in commercials Yeah, yeah, the the whole thing about what we used to call rip and read You know and you run back there and you find the teletype and you know The teletype was a typewriter that was typing by itself. It had a keyboard, but no one you know, but it was taking out Who is typing or where the hell are they? That's right? You know like you get four headlines and like pray that as you're reading it, you're not reading about some disaster in some very pleasant voice Anyway, again, we're talking with with Neil Ross now you've worked in all the big studios here in LA Tell us what studio work was like in you in the 80s and 90s well, it was it was Delightful because in the radio business, I don't know how it is now now that it's all digital I'm sure it's a whole different world but in those days it was record turntables and cartridge machines and this sort of thing and Most of these stations were hideously maintained the equipment was old. It was Didn't work. I Never forget I was I was at KMPC, which is on me the Mike Mike flag here that actually was in the studio at one time And this was a big deal 50,000 watt Los Angeles radio station Golden West broadcasters etc etc And I was asked to record a commercial and we had this old scully tape deck And I'm trying to record this commercial I play it back and it's full of dropouts The thing just drops in and out of record So I went across the hallway where there were three I swear three engineers sitting in an office They all had their feet up on desks, and they were reading equipment catalogs And I said there's scully it. Yeah, we know. Well, is there anything you can do about now? We've tried three times and we can't fix it. They should buy a new one Well, when are they gonna do we have to have this goes on the air in half an hour Well, we can't help you bud And they went back to reading their equipment catalogs and then I spotted the vice president and general manager in the hallway And I said can I just have a moment of your time, sir? And and I took him in and I explained the situation. He said I see your problem I see your problem, but I'm afraid there's nothing I can do about it and he turned on his heel and walked away Meanwhile just up the Kuanga In the past there was LA studios with all this brand spanking new Lovely equipment and everything worked and the people operating it knew what the hell they were doing and I mean, I couldn't believe it. I thought I'd died and gone to heaven and and really every studio I went to they were all Just beautifully equipped and and the engineers knew what they were doing and I just thought man I've arrived. I gotta do that. I can't go back into radio. It's You know, the contrast was just so amazing so stark and The engineers I've got I can't see enough good things about the engineers. They're just the best and There's a little thing that I put in my book. It's a sort of a composite of the kind of thing that happens and You get into a situation where you're doing a Radio or television spot and the takes start to mount up into the forties and the fifties and the sixties And what has happened is you've got a relatively inexperienced director or directors and it's a day It's a glamorous thing. They got out of the office They're gonna have lunch somewhere nice and they're in this interesting studio and they get giddy And they don't realize they got it on take seven and they just keep chasing this mythical perfect take and putting on Layers and layers of instruction try to do that be happy be sad be fat be thin and try to have fun with it And you know, I mean look, you know, I know there are people out there that have real jobs digging ditches and doing Horrible stuff and the idea of some guy moaning about having to talk into a microphone for 45 minutes Doesn't elicit a lot of sympathy, but it's tough to keep it fresh After about 50 takes it turns into gibberish anyway What happens is the engineer if he knows me and trust me he sneaks the talk back on so I can hear him and He turns to the director and he says look I have a session coming in at the top of the hour and it can't be moved If you want to get out of here with anything usable you need to start listening to some takes I recommend five seven and nine and I sit there and look at my shoes Pretending I didn't hear it and the guy was all right. Just a hang tight for a second Neil We're gonna check something in here and I have five ten minutes goes by and then hey, guess what you're done Come on out find the form, you know, you know, we had it on take seven. Isn't that a hoot? And it's still working with you may God forgive me for lying and You know that my if an engineer ever says anything to me and they don't very often I mean it's not really their job to But if somebody says something boy, I pay attention to it because those guys and the lady there weren't many women in it now I'm sure there are many women now and that's good, but you know, they they've seen it all they've heard it all and Everybody should listen to what the engineer says. Yeah, but you ever have a client in there that you've had a deal with oh Yeah, sure sure sure that that you know Yeah, any time the client shows up, you know, you're not gonna have any fun Because you can't do shtick they get they get worried just like why are why are you people laughing? This is serious. This is my livelihood concentrate Okay, sir Once again, we're talking with Neil Ross again if you got a question for him throw it in the chat room They're starting to pile up in there. So if you want your question answered put it in there now And we will get to that in the next segment So you were you worked in you know in in the studios in the you know in the 80s and 90s and you know You've accumulated all this stuff and then how long did it take to really shift? Into what we're seeing today and trust me We've seen it change a whole lot since it's gone online and stuff and how did it change for you? If you will indulge me, please read a whole lot, but I want to read something from this book That I don't know if it's it's called how to break into motion pictures television commercials and modeling it was written by a woman named Nina Blanchard and She's passed away and the book is out of print But I read that thank God. I didn't read this before I got started in the business But here she doesn't write a whole chapter on voiceover she just writes a few paragraphs, but boy what paragraphs they are Quote the voiceover field now this was this book was published in 1978. So this is the business in 1978 The voiceover field in commercials is probably the most lucrative Has the fewest number of actors and is the most difficult to establish yourself in Voiceover where the artist it's heard but not seen is used in commercials animated cartoons Movie trailers promos radio and other television work. You know that There are about 100 good voiceover actors working in los angeles 100 in new york and 20 in chicago The ratio of jobs for women in this field is about one job in every 10 Actors who are considered super stars in the voiceover field may make from two to three hundred thousand dollars a year remember this was 78 And then she says voiceover actors are a rather elite group somewhat isolated in the commercial field They often work alone in a studio. They seldom come in contact with the other actors working on a commercial Their faces are mostly unknown to the public except for the occasional film stars There are no very young actors among them. They are all over 30 and I think as a group are probably the most professional actors in the industry Wow And you know, I would I would quibble on her figures. I think there were more than 100 in los angeles at that time But maybe two three hundred. I don't know and they were all mostly men and they were older men the median age In those days, I would have pegged at maybe 55 or 60 I mean, I didn't get rolling till I was almost 40 and I would show up for these auditions And these guys would call me kid and sunny and boy Because they were all 20 25 years older than me. They had The voices had gotten down in here because a lot of this and a lot of this And uh Yeah, and and and we were considered elite You know, I stumbled across this book after I'd gotten into the business and I just felt a surge of pride like wow I'm part of this but if I'd read that in 78, I probably would have given up but You know, sometimes we would audition at places where they mostly did on camera Casting for commercials, but they would pick up a voiceover job And they put a little tape deck on the desk and hang a mic off a fishing pole and you'd read And more than once I've had people say to me boy, we love to work with you voiceover people You're so professional not like those slobs out there You know, I gave you some direction and you actually did it I thought that was the definition of the job not well those clowns We just have to bring a lot of film and they stumble into a performance, you know We we really were elite and respected. All right fade in fade out I think bob loyed who started the voice caster told me there were maybe 600 people working in la this was around 1982 83 When I wrote the book I got a hold of kathy kalman son of kalman son and kalman son She told me she has an a list the top people on her computer And I said may I ask how many are on that list and she said yes It's about 30 thousand And that was two years ago It's uh, whoa changed a little bit And then of course there was that horrible sea change around the turn of the century where they suddenly decided they had no interest in anybody but young people And they figured the only way the only people who can communicate with young people are other young people So they fired all the old directors and producers And they brought in all these kids who had served no apprenticeship And uh, then they started saying we don't want to audition anyone who's ever done voiceovers We want real people real people and they got real people real bad people I started hearing stuff on the air that would have got you kicked out of a beginner's workshop back in the day I mean I would I would see a television commercial and the visuals would be stunning the music would be soaring and Voiceover guy just kind of wasn't up to the task And and I would think my god, they've run the scratch track by mistake And you know that can't happen that's that they somebody approved this track And that went on for a while for a while. I didn't want to hire anybody who had ever been in animation before suddenly it was like they were It was a uh an industry-wide pledge to hire anybody except somebody who works in this business And it was a very very crazy time and a lot of people took early retirement and careers were truncated and we we've gradually come back to our senses over time, but It's uh, it's been a long and rocky ride since 2000. I'll tell you Yeah, well, we watched it the last year has been even more fascinating Since everybody had to be at home, but Once again, we're talking with neil ross. You got a question throw it in the chat room right now Or if you're on clubhouse clubhouse still working george Unmute your mic There you go, that clubhouse is definitely working. Okay, good. So if you've got a question there throw it in there And uh, this is very entertaining. You know having come out of radio Of course I can relate to everything you're saying and I know there's a lot of people who listen to our show That also came out of radio But perhaps not in the golden age when you and I were there in the 80s and stuff and or even in this in the 70s when I started And uh, everything you say is absolutely true That's so in case you're thinking this was his unique experience. No, that's what radio was like Um So, you know things have changed Um, but now I take it as you're saying that you're you're still working. You're not retired. Are you? I'm sort of semi retired at this point. I'm I'm lucky enough to have the pensions, but I continue to work And excellent. What is your definition of semi retired? No, I'm serious because to me to me that because I was just talking to a financial planner for the first time in my life And she was asking me hey, when do you want to retire? And I was like, what does that mean? Exactly. So what does it mean to you to be as you would call it semi retired? Well Just just the fact that I that I have the pensions, but no Michael Cain said something in an interview once that I absolutely think is 100 true He said you don't leave show business show business leaves you He said occasionally you'll see an old actor and you'll say, I don't do that anymore these movies. They're making today They're horrible. They're seen they're filthy. I wouldn't be a part of that He says, you know damn well if the phone rang they'd be there in half an hour So I'm sort of waiting for show business to leave me and it it it just doesn't quite ever get around to doing it, you know Sometimes I think well, maybe this is it and then the phone rings and I'm back in the game All right, well, we're gonna take a break right now and we'll get to your questions in just a minute So stay tuned again You gotta throw them in the chat room or on clubhouse and we'll be right back here on voice over body shop with neil ross right after these Well, hello there I bet you weren't expecting to hear some big voiced announcer guy on your new orientation training for snapchat. Were you stick around? You don't want to miss this At target we want you to come as you are be comfortable Okay, maybe not bathrobe comfortable Pants for the customer on aisle four, please Watch anywhere anytime on an unlimited number of devices sign in with your netflix account to watch instantly at netflix.com The ice cream maker is a big risk that can have huge reward Until you forget to turn it on Well, that's it guys time is up Hey, it's jmc. Thanks for watching the voiceover body shop if you're demo ready or looking to get there Check out jmc demos.com and see a sample of our work. Now. Let's get back to dan and george and this week's tech wisdom Hey there, it's david h. Lawrence the 17th with vo heroes and you may be watching voiceover body shop v o b s Because you're interested in becoming a voice talent and you looked around the internet You found that this was a great place to come and you're absolutely right Um, but you don't have any of the knowledge yet as to how to get started and I'd like to help you with that I've got a free course online. You can take it anytime you want It's called getting started in voiceover and it walks you through the equipment you need the business side of things the actual categories of voiceover work that you'll likely be pursuing And also the mindset that you need to have when you're getting started and moving into being successful at doing voiceover for a career So if you're an actor or you're not an actor you want to side grade from another business you want to learn about voiceover Go to vo heroes.com slash start. That's vo heroes.com slash start For the vo heroes getting started in voiceover class and I'll see you there Voiceover essentials.com would like you to know that there's a lot of so-called Experts out there saying go to bedding and bath stores and buy a mattress topper and use the foam for your diy studio or portable setup And counterfeit offshore acoustic foam is flooding the web studio foam although Expensive is all about shaping your sound So you're recording sound the same as a professional audio studio the sound our clients expect to hear And will the memory foam have the memory of how you sound Look bed foam is great for keeping an old mattress alive and preventing bed sores But it doesn't cut it for acoustical treatment The porta booth plus and pro use only oralex studio foam They have a limited inventory of both while shipping logistics of the new inventory is delayed With the country starting to travel again the booths are selling fast So go on over to voiceover essentials.com and get yours now while they're getting good That's voiceover essentials.com for the porta booth pro and plus This is the latin lover narrator from jane the virgin anthony mendez and you're enjoying dan and george on the voiceover body show And yes, we are back with neil ross. It was everybody's moving around here. It's like an odd brady bunch thing. We're doing here. Uh, anyway Uh, we've got lots of questions from lots of cool people out there who are watching the show and uh, we'll start off with, uh, George You pronounce his name right so go for it I'm gonna have to try to get it right this time. Hopefully it's rob rider. It is. Um He's on youtube. He's watching and he says I I see a call station flag on that s5. Everybody's enjoying identifying your mic Um, i'm guessing that's a day gig and I think you've already entered that now, but uh, what do you use for vio? Uh, sennheiser 416 is my my primary microphone This is just uh, I was telling the guys before we went live, uh, this at one time This was the radio studio microphone and the first time I encountered One of these was when I made the jump from san diego to san francisco and I went to work for kya And they had one of these and I I thought i've arrived. I'm in the big time Yeah, that's just based on this microphone the microphone flag is from the old 7 10 k mpc The station of the stars in hollywood. It's no longer that it's uh, I think it's kspn the espn Affiliate I was wondering why is it why was it called the station of the stars? That's an interesting story. I didn't even know that until I think after I left there in 85 I thought that was my last radio work, but I read up on it somewhere. I've forgotten there was a time I don't know if you guys Listen to the old time radio shows on uh on the serious xm. Yeah You hear a lot of movie stars doing radio drama and they did that back then the studios did not see radio as a threat The way they saw television as a threat And so they had no problem with their stars doing radio shows in fact it promoted the stars and and the movies And so there were there was a ton of stuff produced with with major motion picture stars as radio actors They would surround them with rate regular radio actors in the smaller roles And a lot of those shows were recorded at kmpc in the late 30s and all the way through the 40s And that's why they called it the station of the stars Because they actually had movie stars coming in and out of there to do radio dramas And they just kept the slogan eventually the stars became the recording artists that they were playing and to an extent the djs kmpc was home to a lot of djs who did television work wink martindale was there gary owens was there Jeff edwards, you know a wink martindale of course has done a million game shows and And they would you know, it's funny a lot of radio stations didn't want you to be on television Well, you don't need to do that. You need to be here But gene autry was a show business guy and he said you know the more these guys get popular in any Area The better it is for everybody us included So they facilitated these guys doing television work They were told if you need some time off to do television just let us know and we'll they had actually two What they called full-time part-time guys who had a show on the weekend But then we're available to jump in and fill in for Folks during the week if they had television commitments. Yeah, that's a long-winded answer But that's why it's this Well, I mean if you watch some old cartoon something like roger ramjet It was all the la sound got all the radio djs and la were doing that stuff So, you know, it's always kind of no wonder those voices were so good And you know the art was terrible, but the voices were fabulous Who we got next there george? Well, we have Randy thomas, maybe a name you might know on facebook randy says kneel you the hell from somewhere She said you are the best It's been a minute since we sat side by side announcing the oscars more than a few minutes That was 2003 and yes as I say in my book or god bless you randy. Thank you She got me through it. I don't think I would have made it through without randy and our our assistant Tina they just They had There was a moment Where I would I would miss a cue and tina would she was sitting behind us with headphones clamped on You know listening to the truck and she'd whacked me on the back and I go and she said do you mind me doing that? I said darlin if it's necessary hit me with a brick Just just so I don't miss a cue And you know That year they decided to go with a man and a woman rather than just one announcer And so in I came stealing half of randy's show and she could not have been more gracious and helpful So bless you randy. Thank you. Lovely to hear from you Well, they're definitely always trying new stuff for the oscars production. This year was definitely a big This year, yeah um This one's from actually I don't see anybody queued up yet in the clubhouse. We've been having some technical issues with clubhouse. I'm hearing mixed reports of the audio dropping out and etc etc So again, it's one of our multicasted platforms and it's the hard part about clubhouse is I can't monitor it So I don't know what's being heard. So sorry about that If anybody does have a question in clubhouse, please uh raise your hand if you can understand What we are saying um back to the normal chat Bob ledum, uh, here's somebody actually Let's let her in And here she is Hi shana Sound good now. I got kind of fun there for a minute during the commercials. Oh, wow. Well, you know, we like to keep it fun No worries. Thanks for joining us. How are you doing? I'm doing all right, you know What's your question My question is I love you guys and I was just making sure that george knew about any Unusual sounds we were hearing during the commercials Oh, thank you shana. No worries. Thank you so much Cool. Cool. All right. That's great to hear from the chat. That's great to hear from the clubhouse. Thank you um Bob ledum says what advice do you have for those contemplating documentary narration What I did, you know the one Thing they can't you know, they can always not hire you but they can they can't prevent you from practicing and uh To me that's you know, the one the one thing they can't stop And what I did was I fortunately my wife is a subscriber to national geographic So I would actually read national geographic articles into some sort of recording device and then play them back and Try to discern if they sounded sort of like the folks that I heard on pbs and That kind of thing you the I always say it's it's it's it's preparation patience and persistence the three Ps and Robert Edmund Evans who ran paramount and wrote this wonderful book called the kid stays in the picture Which I highly recommend He described luck as when opportunity meets preparation Everybody seems to think if I just met the right person if I just went to the right party if I just got made the right connection I Well, that's part of it But if you haven't been doing your homework as you wait for this wonderful accident to happen Uh, you're liable to blow it And so if you if the phone is not ringing things are not happening grab a national geographic and record an article and listen back to it And you'd be surprised what can happen I remember being a lowly disc jockey in san diego watching nova on public television and thinking what a wonderful show it was and I couldn't have dreamed at that point that I would end up narrating upwards of 25 of them. Wow You know, but it had it happened and Yeah, we had will lineman on a few Yeah, we had will lineman on a few weeks ago who's you also did a lot of uh, Nova and the the voiceover stuff on pbs is always fabulous What do you think is really the the real key to doing documentary narration? Well Aside from I mean obviously practicing but when you're you're sitting there doing it What what is it that goes through your mind or what is it that you're trying to practice? well It's it's it's a different animal They're all different animals these these various phases of voiceovers, but I remember I I did something in nova or something like that and I alerted my parents And they watched and my mother called and she said You know, that was a fascinating one and the story and the the thing that had she said I got frankly I got so caught up in it. I forgot it was you I hope you don't mind and I said no I consider that a complement The the narrator should impart information, but he shouldn't hammer it to the point where it becomes distracting You know, I remember a particular show and I won't say which but they had a narrator who who had a very distinctive Style and my wife started to watch the show and at certain points. I can't watch it anymore His voice is just so distracting I I'm just not enjoying this anymore and she stopped watching it so You you need to sound as though, you know, what the hell you're talking about They're all comes back to the rip and read thing and then you you need to Kind of blend with the show as best you can and sometimes it's tough because sometimes They bring you in and I I don't know if the show is even cut together and you you reach a certain point in the Script and you say what's the music going to be like here? Oh, we haven't picked it yet And and so a lot of times you're thrown at the invisible dartboard trying to hope that you hit the right mood I remember during this awful period after 2000 where they started looking for real people I heard a narration young guy And it was a story of a horrible story of a Plane crash in russia and the plane was for some reason rather filled with children and they were all killed Uh, you know a horrible story And they cut to this Misty graveyard with these gravestones and the line the guy has This is the something or other cemetery where the victims of flight four something or other are buried and he said This is the other cemetery where the victims of the thing are buried And I thought how the hell did they allow him to do that who directed this thing? He's got a smile as he's talking about dead children And I thought I gotta Words fail me So you you've got to sort of fit the mood of the story. Some of them are lighthearted. Some of them are very very heavy um One of the things i'm proudest of I think you can find it on youtube. It's called sugi hara a conspiracy of kindness It's about a japanese diplomat in lithuania who managed to save Several thousand jews from the holocaust now how the hell does a japanese guy end up in lithuania saving jewish people but It's just an amazing story And I would get so caught up in it that I would start to cry and then have time I'm sorry. We got to do that again. You know i'm sobbing here And I get choked up Even today thinking about it. So maybe the There's a little bit of acting in in narration A very subtle kind of acting and not everybody can do it. It's it's an interesting Interesting thing and mr. Lyman is wonderful. Yes, I'm very jealous Great voice. Yeah, we got next george Uh john morse and youtube says is there a favorite area in voiceover That you enjoy the most if you could just do this the rest of your life Oh, I don't think I'd want to do any one thing the rest of my life You know if if there it's funny you opened up with my promo trailer reel such as it is That's the one area of the business that I I really didn't do that well And I don't think over the of the I did some but I didn't do that well But in a way, I'm kind of glad I didn't click in the promo world because if you think about it, they they're always alone And they're essentially doing the same two or three reads over and over and over again All they're doing is plugging in a different show name and a different actor name And I'd much rather be in a studio with five or six other people like, you know, rob Paulson or tress mcneal or you name it and and and doing a doing an animation project. That's much Much more fun. I just like doing all of it But you know, if you put a gun to my head and said you have to do one thing and this And that said it would probably be animation But a narration coming in a close second Awesome. You had an actual question, george Yeah, um because it was read off earlier in the show that you had been uh part of a leisure suit larry game production I I I remember leisure suit larry from the literally the original Leisure suit larry. I'm sure I was too young to be playing when I was playing it But I didn't my parents didn't know any different. Yeah Do you what what do you remember working on and how long ago was it because they've had some reboots? I guess Yeah, this was a million years ago. I think this was the early 80s. No, no, it couldn't be that far back Games didn't really start. I the first game out now game I ever did was a game called stunt island and I think I did that in 1990 and I had nine lines And the person directing said that's all we have room for the game was released on floppy disks Yes Yeah, it would have been after 1990 Somewhere, I don't know 94 95. Yeah, it has to be after 87 because I'm watching Can you hear this sound effects? I don't know if you'll hear it on the air But I'm watching a playthrough on youtube of the original game And this is when all of the action was just very low res graphics and then types on screen what they're saying There's no actual voices because it was too too new So you obviously weren't voicing the game in 1987. No No, I was the I was the narrator and I All I remember was it was kind of fun to do because he was so snarky the narrators, right? Well, Larry, you seem to have screwed up again, haven't you, you know, that's sort of that kind of stuff Doing snark is the is the best. That's why we've been doing the show for 10 years Um What else we got Yeah, do you do you still audition? Maybe that's sort of semi being semi retired. Do you stop auditioning? Well, I I try to limit The driving that I do but I do a lot of auditioning from home No, one of the one of the workshops that I went to was a celebrity workshop and one of the celebrity teachers was The late great joni gerber Who our younger? Viewers will not be familiar with but she was just one of the top voiceover women of all time Just seemed to be able to create a million different characters and wonderful actress and She uh at the start of the thing she motioned to us to come closer and said gather round voicelings And then in a voice like the story lady she used to do on the gary owens show on kmpc She said, um, there are no stars in voiceovers You will always have to read for it and they are never going to send a limo And if you can't live with that Then don't get in this business Now in those days stars were not daining to do voiceovers now, of course they all do it But what she meant was the rank and file voiceover people no matter how successful you become you are not a star You'll always have to read for it and they ain't going to send a limo And at the time I thought what is she talking about? I I want to be in this business I don't need a limousine But then time passes and you get a little Successful and you get a little full of yourself and the agent calls And we want you to come out and read for this at five o'clock on a friday afternoon in some horrible Place that you'll have to sit in traffic to get to and You you you you're just about to say go tell them to go to hell and then you hear Joanie and your voice going no stars got to read for it. No limo and you go. All right. All right. Tell them i'll be there Tell them i'll be there So yes, yes, I will I'll I'll always be reading for it I there's only There's only one limo and voice over I could think of and that has to have been dawn Lafontaine Yeah, they weren't sending it to no He bought it. You know, he paid exactly Well, anyway, neil, thanks so much for joining us. This has been a very entertaining hour Talking with you and reminiscing about what this business was was like and you know what it's like today and uh It really are very very different. Uh, where can people get your book? Well, he said cleverly whipping out his visual aid here. Excuse me while I whip this out The book is vocal recall a life in radio and voiceovers and uh, there's a website you can go to www neil book dot com neil bo ok dot com The book is available at amazon. There is an audio version that is available at audible for the which which you narrated as I might add Yes, there was a huge, uh City-wide audition nationwide actually audition for the part of the narrator of my book and Strangely enough, I won that audition. I don't know how that's amazing Yeah, well neil. Thanks for being with us this afternoon and this evening and uh, I look forward to having coffee with you one of these days It sounds like we'd have a great talk the sooner the sooner the better because that will mean Normality of of some kind has returned, right? Absolutely. Tell me about it Neil Ross everybody. All right. Well, george and i'll be right back to wrap things up and wrap it up for uh Get it geared up for tech talk right after this don't go This is the latin lover narrator from jane the virgin anthony as you're enjoying dan and george on the voice of our buddy Shaw In these modern times every business needs a website when you need a website for your voice acting business There's only one place to go like the name says voice actor websites.com Their experience in this niche webmaster market gives them the ability to quickly and easily get you from concept to Live online in a much shorter time when you contact voice actor websites.com Their team of experts and designers really get to know you and what your needs are They work with you to highlight what you do Then they create an easily navigable website for your potential clients to get the big picture of who you are And how your voice is the one for them plus voice actor websites.com has other great resources Like their practice script library and other resources to help your voice over career flourish Don't try it yourself. Go with the pros voice actor websites.com where your via website shouldn't be a pain in the you know what It's that time of the show where we talk about source elements the creators of source connect and many many other amazing tools for collaborating remotely, which is a huge part of the voice over business now more than ever And uh source connect is really the primary tool that you as a voice actor would interact with you Definitely want to be able to connect to the studios that are recording you And be available for those bigger budget jobs and let's face it The jobs that do use source connect tend to be those of the bigger budget gigs Um, there's a couple reasons for that one is in order for source connect to be used There has to be a studio involved to be somebody on the other end to record you So those are jobs that have the budget to actually hire a studio And have an engineer and all that And so it's one of the best kind of gigs a voice over actor can get as those where you're being directed Live especially for commercial work because well when that session's over on source connect You hang up and you go on with your day to the next audition or whatever. It's a beautiful thing You want to get started head over to source dash elements dot com and get a 15 day free trial So you can get yourself familiar get it up and running Um, if you actually sign up for a subscription or purchase the software you get completely free support To go through all of the hoops that may be involved to get it running So anyway, go check it out sign up now and tell them we sent you. Oh, we'll be right back to wrap this show up. Thank you Yeah, hi, this is carlo zellers rocky the voice of roco and you're watching voiceover body show And we are back here. Well, that was that was that's the kind of people I like talking to about what this business was Really all about and how it's changed, uh, you know, I also noticed that You know being the technological genius that you are that the clock right above your head is still on standard time so You know the other person to point that out was joe sipriano He was talking and taking taking for a guy who worked on radio and was in the studio to notice stuff like the time Yeah, yeah Well, I came out of radio. I knew we're right before the top of the exactly that clock's gotta be right That's right Next week on this very show, uh, tune in because uh, we're gonna be doing tech doc number 56 And uh, george and I are getting ready for uh to reset and do that right now So if and we'd love your tech questions So get ready for that and then on may 17th lori ellen's going to join us I believe so we i've actually reached out just to do a double check because you know We as it is with acting working working actors like lori never know You never know we'll get a confirmation. Hopefully soon, but uh, we miss her and She'll be on the show one way or the other. We'll make sure great. Alrighty. Who are our donors of the week? Well donors of the week Include our friends many of these and many of them familiar names. Uh, shelly avilino tom pinto Natasha Merchevka Jennifer and dixon brian page My dad george a winem Rob rider patty gibbons greg thomas Shawna pennington baird who chimed in on the chat room or actually in the clubhouse tonight to let us know how we were sounding Thank you Uncle roi of ant land productions, of course martha con our old friend don griffith And steven chandler Alrighty, hey join our mailing list too. You can do that by going to our website v obs dot tv And it says sign up for the newsletter or something like that I have to go to the website and check those things every now and again. What is it saying? Is it still working? I mean it's still working. It is still working. We know I know for a fact that it's working Yeah, it says please donate in a red box. Yeah, and it helps every little bit helps And that's how we maintain the technological perfection that you are witnessing at this very moment Uh, we need to thank our sponsors like harlan hogan's voice over essentials voice over extra Source elements bio heroes dot com voice actor websites dot com and jmc demos Uh, well, whoever was it in the chat room. We don't know where jeff was tonight, but you know, whatever Uh, danny bernstein. Yeah for for for toughing it out over on clubhouse And of course our amazing technical director who always gets it right no matter what uh, Sumerlino thanks to her and of course lee penny for just being lee penny all right, well george and i'm gonna reset things and do tech talk and So stay tuned for that if you're here with us live and get your questions in if you have home studio questions So that's what makes it roll. Um, you know something not an easy business to to work in but uh, technologically when it comes to your audio if it sounds good It is good. I'm dan lennard and i'm george widdum and this is voice over body shop or v o b s Yes We'll be back with like tech talk