Job For A Cowboy: Nick Shinz details “Moon Healer” creation and ShinzBass Plugin

Job For A Cowboy, the Arizona-based band once known for their deathcore roots, have made a triumphant return with their new album, Moon Healer. The band, which shifted from their early sound to more inventive and idiosyncratic death metal, had been on a hiatus since their acclaimed 2014 release, Sun Eater. In a recent interview with BassEmpi.re, bassist Nick Shinz delved into the creative process behind Moon Healer, sharing insights into the gear used, the writing process, and the unique aspects of the album’s production. Additionally, Shinz discussed the release of a new plugin, ShinzBass, developed in collaboration with Submission Audio.

Shinz discussed the decision to continue using his Warwick Dolphin bass, a choice rooted in the success of Sun Eater. He explained, “We knew from the beginning that this record was going to be a sequel/continuation of the story of Sun Eater – and since we really nailed the bass tone on that record (to the degree that it’s very common when the record is talked about they mention the bass), we felt it only made sense to keep the formula the same and use the Dolphin again. I brought my MTD 534 17mm Ovangkol/Wenge 5 string down to Florida and it sounded incredible, but there’s something specifically about my Dolphin. Jason even bought his own Dolphin from Warwick after Sun Eater because it was so obvious how amazing it is, and we compared it to mine and for some weird reason, after matching pickup height/setup/etc, mine still sounded best. Probably something to do with that specific tree, I would guess.”

The bassist also shed light on the minimalistic approach to recording the bass for Moon Healer, emphasizing the raw sound of the instrument: “I think partially what makes the bass on the record stand out is really what’s NOT on it. There are no pedals, no amp, no cab – this is just running straight into the board and an analog compressor with just EQ in post. (Aside from the few parts where we put a ‘telephone'”‘ EQ on it or a delay/reverb thing on a fadeout.) I think it’s a testament to the bass guitar that, with no distortion, no amp, just the sound of the instrument itself, you can make such a wide range of sounds that fit even a technical death metal band. Don’t get me wrong, I love pedals and have 30+ but for this record, the sound of the bass alone is sufficient. I think it might make you potentially more creative not to have the ability to use them to vary your sound or dynamics as well.”

Shinz’s method of writing bass lines is both premeditated and spontaneous, blending structured pre-production with on-the-spot creativity in the studio. “Sometimes I’ll take a piece of the material, and focus on it specifically in pre-production. That was the case for the ending of The Forever Rot – that long epic ending part I had pulled into my DAW and played with the structure a bit, and then just really vibed with the material and felt this feeling of ‘finality’ it had going on. I tried to channel that feeling in the bass line I was writing for it, like something telling you non-verbally that ‘This is it, this is the end, and it’s okay’. So I’d work on some pieces of the record that way, parts that really just spoke to me or what have you. Then, as is standard procedure for Job for a Cowboy anyway, I knew all of the riffs are subject to change once they go through the Suecof filter (our producer, Jason Suecof), so don’t get too attached to anything until it’s actually tracked and on the record. As a result, then, we write a lot of the bass lines on the spot in the studio. There’s something I really love about the spontaneity of being in the studio and not knowing what a line is going to be like at the start of the day, and then by the end of the session we listen back and are like ‘How the hell did we come up with that!?’. The combination of those two approaches, I think, contributes nicely to the dynamics of writing style, phrasing, etc., you hear on the finished record.”

Regarding the band’s return and the new release, Shinz believes that Moon Healer will resonate due to its continuity with Sun Eater in terms of story, writing style, and production. “We really loved what we were able to do with that record, and so we wanted to take it and push all the elements we loved about it as far as we could”, he noted. “I think the amount of time we spent crafting and refining the material is self-evident so hopefully, that comes across when people listen as well.”

Additionally, Shinz discussed the launch of a new plugin called ShinzBass, developed in collaboration with Submission Audio. The plugin is designed to offer a versatile tool for musicians, enabling them to compose detailed bass lines regardless of their ability to play the instrument. Addressing potential concerns about technology replacing musicians, Shinz shared an anecdote that underscored the inclusive aspect of such tools, allowing more people to express their musical ideas.

“I’d never had the chance to explore any of the newer bass MIDI libraries; it was just whatever was in my tab program. I remember ghost recording bass for this world leader band, and Dave Otero started rearranging some of my techniques to create something new, and it worked so well. He said, ‘You should make a plugin/virtual bass instrument’. I thought that would be a really cool tool… Fast forward to recording Moon Healer, and Ermin contacted Suecof to get in touch with me about doing one. So, I flew down to Australia and spent two weeks in the studio painstakingly playing every fret on my bass multiple times until the note totally decayed, with every type of attack, and it was pretty intense, man. Like a whole note boot-camp [laughs]. We knew we were going to launch it with the album, and I worked closely with the company, designing the user interface, tones, all of it. I mulled over the ethos of it quite a bit. The technology is incredibly impressive, and what it can do for people who either don’t play bass at all or aren’t skilled enough to express their ideas but don’t want to wait for someone else to finish making their music is just astonishing. On the other hand, you could argue that you’re hypothetically putting real bass players (myself included) out of work in the future as bands might start to just use ShinzBass instead of finding a real bass player. However, this is the same concern people had about programmed drums, but after 15 years or so, 99% of bands use a real drummer. Sure, there’s sound replacement happening on a lot of records, but what really is left untouched these days? Vocals are tuned, drums are quantized and sound replaced, guitars and bass are dubbed at a minimum. So it’s really just about where your individual line is for artistic integrity. And I’ll say this as well: I saw this comment on a ShinzBass post the other day, one guy was saying ‘Just learn to play real bass’, to which another replied, ‘I only have one arm’. So it can be something that allows people who don’t have the physical capability to play the bass or to play at a certain level to compose bass lines and have them sound incredibly good on their recordings.”

Moon Healer is now available on Metal Blade Records.