Jacob and Scott

I think I should never plan to sleep in. I can't even remember how many times it's been.....but every time I plan to make up some sleep I end up waking up by some uncontrolled forces.... Today I was woken up by Jacob's call this morning, and it wasn't good news.

Jacob is doing mixes for us these three days. He called in the morning to tell me that snare drum track (which Scott did the arrangement with) sounded phase-y. That means it does not exactly sync with other tracks and you hear phases of sound. Well...if that was the only problem then it would be easy. He only has to tell Scott and then have Scott print the track again then we can do the mix another day. The big problem was.....Jacob was fighting with Scott so he wanted me to call instead.

I would not mind calling Scott either since Scott knows I would never bug him to fix problems unless there is really a problem....but the situation is.....he was so fed up with Pastor Chen and got into a huge fight with Jacob because the PC project. (They wanted Scott to re-print whole bunch of stuff which Scott thought was stupid and a waste of time.) I really didn't want to get in the middle of the dirty situation and communicate about problems just because Jacob and Scott are not talking right now....cuz it wasn't news that everyone who worked with something related to PC projects would end up hating working for him.

However, since Jacob told me Scott would not pick up his calls.... I called Scott. I told him there may be some problems with the snare, and he said "no there is not, Jacob is crazy". I have to say I was a little shocked by the magnitude of Scott's annoyance toward Jacob cuz I have never heard him say things like that. He then complained to me about the whole HI and PC situation like I have never heard of it.....again.... (Come on....I worked there, ok? I know the pain in the ass...yeah....pain in the ass is exactly what Scott said....lol) Anyway.....this phone call kinda got nothing solved and I called Jacob and told him Scott said there is no problem (even though I doubt he really checked....)

Jacob was then frustrated and I explained to him how by me talking in the middle it won't get to prove the problem to Scott. I suggested him to just call and leave a message explaining the situation, and if by night time Scott does not reply then we can try to call him again using my phone since he talks to me. Jacob was reluctant but then he said alright. I was actually worried about the whole thing cuz I didn't want the mix to suck, but then there was not much I can do so I went to brush my teeth and cooked my coffee after all the calling and talking,,,

Around 15 min later Jacob called again, and told me he was able to get the right sound by pushing a bottom on the console and trigger an effect in the arrangement... so he was wrong about the problem. I was like....oh....that is great...make sure you tell or write Scott to tell him you were wrong and say sorry then. He was like "yeah I will"....I thought that was the happy ending....and then right after I hung up Scott called. He said "I checked the track, and there was something wrong. Jacob was right." I was like.....all....confused.....Scott told me he would re-print it and e-mail it to me so I can take it to Jacob tonight. I was like....that is cool with me.

I called Jacob and told him what Scott was gonna do and then I guess Jacob was kinda happy about it even though he figured out how to make it right.... Again right after my call with Jacob Scott rang again. He went "This is really odd....I have never encountered anything like this. I was trying to open the track in the OS 9 (or 10) which I did the arrangement with, and everything sounded just right. When I export it to the other version where I print the tracks with, it sounds wrong....but the original source was correct...." I then told him "It's ok....Jacob figured out how to do it and I will just tell him the original is fine. If we can just do it with the way he figured out then let's leave it at that. If there is any problem I will make sure to call you maybe tomorrow."

So that is about how everything got solved....back to where we started..orz....and it was surely a lot of talking, explaining, and arguing through early morning (when no musician is supposed to be in a good mood.) At the end I asked Scott "hey....are you gonna be talking to Jacob? Don't tell me you are just gonna fight with him from now on, k?" and then Scott told me " I will talk to him....He is still a brother in Christ and everything....but then ministry, work, friendship, and money should really stay separated from each other. Jacob gets all too personal with everything and that makes it difficult to work on their projects."

I couldn't agree with Scott more. Chinese people just like to mix everything together thinking if I am a friend with you, then you got to do everything for me for free. Ministries take people for granted and expects a lot of favors from people (in the name of God or so they think). The thing is...God does think people should get paid for what they work for. If you did not come to an agreement clearly with someone from the VERY BEGINNING....then there is no right for you to ask otherwise at the end. Chinese ministries don't respect who they work with, and don't nurture whoever work for the ministries.... so at the end whatever relationship people have with each other dries up and dies. At the end everybody gets burnt out one way or another.

I know how harsh Scott may seem for us fake Chinese, but I have always enjoyed conversing with him cuz he does not try to hide it. One just has to be as direct to him as he is, to make him realize he is not the only one who has principles. I like dealing with the "no hidden message" Scott much more than those fake Christian people who appear to be nice and then stab you in the back. Anyway.....very dramatic morning and yet good exercise of brain for me. There is one lesson I learned though.....being a musician....you just have to be the one who everyone likes. If you are the exact opposite....You will be famous in the circle in no time....just like the Chinese saying "bad things spread a thousand miles"........