Tracker Name: Zack Ohren
First Name: Zack
Last Name: Ohren
Age: 20
Location: Oakland, California
Years Tracking: 9
Favorite Tracker(s): Betrayer, Romeo Knight, Vantage, Blue Shade, and a way too many others to name
Favorite Genre(s): Metal, Rock, Whatever else.
Please explain a little about yourself: I am a 20 year old guy who looks 16 at the max. The only "Real" money I've ever earned in my life was from tracking when I got the opportunity to do 2 full soundtracks to Nintendo 64 games in my junior and senior years of high school which got my a car, some decent guitar/bass gear and a couple months rent after I moved out. Unfortunately, as I said, that's the only real money I've ever earned. I'm back living at my parents house where I run a recording studio. It's becoming more and more successful as I get better and better at the thing I've done since I was literally a little boy, sound engineering. My hopes are to either to go to recording school and gat a degree or gather enough cash to get equipment and location for a studio I could run 24/7. I went to college for a little while but it's not the thing for me. My life is and always will be either performing or recording music. I play in a number of bands, mostly on drums, which is funny considering how I have 10 year experience on guitar/bass but I find that it's my "place" in music and besides, nobody can ever find a solid drummer to work with. One of the other obvious benefits to this is that I'm now a potential one man band, and i highly intend to use the fact I own a recording studio to make solo work, which should be out soon. Some things I have planned also include recording "real" versions of a few old tracks of mine, including the one I did for this project, Defrocked, and who knows what else.
Do you play any real instruments? Guitar, Bass & Drums.
If so, for how long? Guitar and Bass - around 10 years (hence all the recorded solos I do). hehe. Drums - 3-5 years, depending on what you think counts as playing. I got a set like 3 years ago.
P lease explain how you discovered the metalmod scene: I don't think I did. I think it discovered me more or less. Jon Sorenson (Frizzle Fried) started a web site which would be the first "scene" like thing I consider myself to have been a part of, though at that point, I had already been tracking for years. It was around 93-94 I got internet started finding other works by trackers like Betrayer, the rest of the HORDE gang, Rabite Man, and a bunch of other tracks that have now been long forgotten.
What is your opinion on what the metalmod scene has become? Active, Friendly, yet somewhat uninspired. Kind of the reason I stopped really, is that with the way internet and recording technology is out of control and easier to get your hands on and use than ever, there isn't a clear format for which stuff gets played. This makes it hard to know how stuff is going to sound to your audience with different interpolation and XMPlay, Winamp, MODplug, and all their little oddities. And when I track tracks that are bigger than if I simple mixed them down and released them as mp3s, I, along with others, tend to feel kinda funny going through the effort of making guitar samples when I'm fully capable of playing the whole song like a normal musician. I think a few years ago the metal tracking scene more or less "leveled off" as far as the quality of tracks goes after years of constant improvement, but at this point, there is more or less a formula, one I think I helped create, to making a metal track. This leads to the next question
What are your future plans in regards to metal tracking and the metalmod scene in general? I actually have big plans for tracking. They start with one big thing. Making great drum sampls on my own, in stereo, that sound freakin real. Then, using the format of tracking to record songs that would be nearly impossible to play, in a somewhat Meshuggahesque style. Whether or not these end up in tracked or MP3 form remains to be seen, but they will be tracked completely as far as the music goes, it's really just a decision for vocals. I have one song I actually finished but thought was way too crappy sounding to release, so it's really a matter of getting a method of sampling down. I think I finally have a sold plan too. So look out in the future.