Paul Strikwerda AKA The Nethervoice, has decades of experience in broadcasting and voiceover. His blog is one of the most read and subscribed-to Voiceover resources on the internet. Toby Ricketts and Paul chat about many things, including;
- His journey into the world of voiceover
- How he started blogging and what benefit that has for his voice work
- Whether he voices in different accents or languages
- The best way for beginner Vos to start in the industry
- Why it is important to stand out
- The story of his stroke and recovery from it
- His thoughts on work / life balance
- His opinion of Gravy for the Brain as a company
- Voiceover business tips
- Why passion in your craft is important
- How welcoming and supportive the VO industry is
- Technology in the studio, including microphones
- His book “Making money in your PJs”
- His new book
Stick around until the end of the video for a very generous offer from Paul…
More VO LIFE Interviews in the series: https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLZ…
You can find more info at www.nethervoice.com
Toby Ricketts: www.tobyrickettsvoiceover.com
Gravy for the brain Oceania: http://oceania.gravyforthebrain.com
TRANSCRIPT:
Toby Ricketts
Welcome to vo life. My name is Toby Ricketts from gravy for the brain, Oceania. And on this video podcast we talk to the big people in the world of voiceover and entertainment really we’ve we’ve had agents, we’ve had voices. We’ve had all kinds of people on the podcast movers and shakers. And today’s guests certainly does move and shake a lot on the internet, that’s for sure. It’s Paul Strikwerda. Be very afraid. How are you there? It’s very early where you are.
Paul Strikwerda
It is 5am. But I think we should start off by wishing Mel Blanc a very happy birthday. Birthday today.
Toby Ricketts
Very good. How appropriate.
Paul Strikwerda
I was called by Dutch national radio a couple of hours ago. They have a morning show. And they wanted to talk about Mel Blanc. And I said, Why do you want to talk about Mel Blanc today? Was it don’t you know said I don’t know what? Well, it’s his birthday. You should know your voice over? Who is Mel Blanc and why? Why should we talk about involves you called me. And he? He died 33 years ago. But it’s pretty amazing. That 33 years later, people in the Netherlands still remember him and want me to talk about him, which is phenomenal.
Toby Ricketts
Yeah, it’s a testament to sort of like what kind of like how voice artists can touch people really, you know, they can like the voices of all of these characters that they know and love. And it’s still like the same these days. We’ve got videogame characters who just like they’ll do one character and then go on, you know, tours for for years on the back of that passion that the fans have.
Paul Strikwerda
I think it’s always fascinating. If you stop some people in the street and say, Can you name five Hollywood actors? I think they can rattle them off straightaway, you know, five popular actors. But when you ask them to name one voice actor, there’s probably one voice one name that comes up and that’s probably Mel Blanc and O’Donnell Fondriest I will draw a blank. That’s, that’s part of our professional that we’re kind of the anonymous disembodied voices that people hear. But they’ll know who we are and what we do and stuff like that. But I think it’s a big tribute to Mel Blanc. And they asked me, Why do you think he’s so popular? I said, Who doesn’t love cartoons? You know,
you can love or hate your favorite movie star. There’s this big Johnny Depp thing going on at the moment of our recording. And some people love him. Some people hate him. But I have never met somebody who hates Mel Blanc are the characters that he voices. So that’s pretty unique. And I think there’s also a wonderful that we can enjoy someone like malbranque with different generations because I have a daughter, she’s 19 I’m 58 my father in law who is 90 years old who lives with us and our favorite pastime together three generations is to watch Looney Tune cartoons. It’s all Mel Blanc. That’s phenomenal.
Toby Ricketts
Yeah. Without his voice in there, like those characters just wouldn’t have been
Paul Strikwerda
told the interview yesterday. Now. Just imagine watching like Daffy Duck or even Tom and Jerry or Woody Woodpecker. Roadrunner, all his classic cartoons. Turn the sound on, you can’t hear anything. What’s left of it? It’s just images. And it’s really it’s, it’s nothing’s left to it. It’s not even funny. Yeah. And in those days, I mean, I know you wanted to talk about me. But I think Mel Blanc is more interesting. So let’s make this interview of belflex Sorry, people
Toby Ricketts
smell blanks journey through life. To talk more about your journey, of course, people might know you as the nether voice. That’s your big your website. You’re a prolific blogger and social media, right? So do you want to tell us about like your journey into voice acting, because you’ve got some sort of strong opinions on sort of, like, you know, training and how people get into voiceover. But how did you
Paul Strikwerda
struggle? gets me into trouble. You’re trying to get me into trouble. Every time I voice a strong opinion. I got a big backlash. So let’s do it all over again. I think I started like a lot of voice actors did because as a child, I love to imitate people. And that got me into trouble too. Because the first instance that I can remember me imitating somebody rather successfully was the first year of elementary school. And we had a teacher with a very weird voice. So to talk a little bit like Julia Child’s, but her name was Mrs. drinkers drinkers. And drunken in Dutch means in Hebrew, ate it drunk, drunk was drunk. So I talked like this. And they said, Well, to me, she sounds like she’s only drunk,
not knowing that she was just about to come into the classroom, and she said Mr. Strickland, in the corner with you, You troublemaker. And what she did was something that people couldn’t do these days anymore, but she took it took a big bandaid, put it over my mouth and I had to stand in The corner for 404 for an hour or so, and everybody laughed at me. Oh, Paul was silly voices. That’s my first first appearance, I think, is a voice actor. And it didn’t deter me. And I and I, my father was a minister. And I loved imitating him on his pulpit. And he didn’t like it either. But nevertheless, I persisted. And I kept on doing that, because I think there’s something so fascinating about the voice of voice. It’s like a fingerprint. It’s completely unique. And I remember doing these, what do you call them? That I was my father and I had this when we were building models. In the days, I’m dating myself now, where models weren’t these nice plastic elaborate
things that you glue together. But they’re a made of cardboard, cardboard, so you had to cut them up and put them together. So I had a whole village of models in my bedroom, put on the shelf, and I invited my family around of the bed, and I had a flashlight and I put the light on the different models. And I started telling the story with about the people living in those houses of what they would sound like what their lives were like. And later on, I did radio plays with an old tape recorder and old Phillips cassette recorder. And I had lots of instruments because also love music and play different instruments, instruments aligned around me for the sound effects. And I have
read stories like King Arthur and the Black Knight, or the five or all these famous kids books that reenact them all by me, directed by me voices by Paul stricker voice characterization, as they would say, with Mel Blanc, and all the sound effects. I think that’s how I got my start. Now fast forward, the small boy grows up. And it was 17 years old, I was studying musicology are four things in in Holland. And one of my best friends had an uncle who was in the radio business. He was a news and current affairs presenter and he said, My radio station is holding a contest for young kids who want to be involved in youth radio. And then, as sort of a joke of the party, all our friends said, You know what we’re going to all apply and properly, nothing will come out of it. But it could be fun, you know, because I was always
fascinated by radio voices. And I want to have a look behind the scenes. So if this is an opportunity for me, and maybe I could work for the Costco music department, being a musicologist and stuff like that. So I applied and, much to my surprise, they hired me on the spot to start doing youth radio programs. And one of the benefits was that I was mentored by the people who were the veterans in the business to people that I had grown up with. And it wasn’t only radio, it was television, as well. So as of age 17, I was a voice on Dutch radio and later face on Dutch television, can’t believe it, this face, but they they wanted me. But later on, we decided that I had a better face for radio, of course. But that’s, that’s how I got my semi professional start. And then I had another big break, because at that time, the Dutch Army still
was was Russia, we had an army of conscripts. I think that’s what you call it. And so I had to go, but I didn’t feel like going to the army because I’m not a big fan of shooting people with guns. And I became a conscientious objector. So instead, I had to do social service, which is fine by me. And I found a radio and television company that was enlisting. People who wanted to do social service by working for radio and television station isn’t that great? When it was my time to go into the army, I did my social service at that radio and television station. So that gave me another two years of a full time professional experience to do all kinds of things, producing presenting being a roaming reporter every aspect of the radio and television business. And after that, I got myself a free vacation, courtesy of the state of the
Netherlands. And I loved it so much that I flunked out of musicology. And I said, this is what I want to do with my life, and it would be in radio. And so that really became the start of it later. Was my voiceover career.
Toby Ricketts
Was there any point like a lot of people where you would sort of doing voice work on the side or it wasn’t making up like a majority of your income, and then you thought, like, there’s a leap of faith that happens with every voice artist, I think when you get to the point, like it’s done as a hobby for enough time, and you think I really want to make a go of this on it, but I don’t have the time to apply to it. So you think Well, I’m just gonna do it for six months and see what happens. Was there was there a point at which you reached with that?
Paul Strikwerda
You know, I was done with the whole radio and TV business by the age. I was 38 because I was working in the news and current affairs department. And you know, in most news is not good news. Unfortunately, that’s why it’s new. Who’s and it kind of sickening to have to deal with that every day. So I decided to take a break from broadcasting and got a training as an NLP practitioner that stands for Neuro Linguistic Programming or neuro linguistic psychology. It’s the stuff that guys like Tony Robbins teach, you know, you gotta believe in yourself, it’s all about changing your mind change your life and helping others to change their mind and their lives as well, which was
incredibly powerful, empowering, powerful stuff. And I became a trainer in that methodology. And I was invited by training institute in the United States to become one of the lead teachers. So I made it, my first leap of faith was leaving the Netherlands behind my friends or my family, packing my bags and moving to the United States of America, then joining an institute there. Now, the person who was running the institute that said it was very successful, which in fact, it was not. So while I was there, there wasn’t as much work as they said they would offer me and I had to do something on the side of this, you know, this this, I’ve always loved working with my voice. So let’s see if I can do something with my voice and I found an ad in the paper. And as said Mike Lemmon casting Philadelphia is having an open
casting call. So well, this could be my opportunity to fame and fortune. I knocked on the door of Mike Levin casting, and Mike Lemmon was the big guy behind the moves of M Night Shyamalan, like the six cents with Haley Joel Osment, when he says I see. Remember that movie. And he’s been casting them ever since. So he was a big name in our area. And when I opened the door of his casting agency, there were about 1000 people in the hallway. They all thought they were the next best thing since sliced bread. But most of them are like, like ventriloquist and jugglers and ballet dancers and singers. And there was only one guy who thought he could do voiceovers and it was me. So they looked at my application and said, Oh, voiceover we only have one VoiceOver so I was sent straight to the voiceover director. We
had tea and scones and the lovely conversation and she started directing me Give me a few scripts. And she noticed immediately that I know knew how to work a microphone know how to interpret a script, do different voices characters, and she said, You know what, I want you to meet Mike Lemmon. So I did and he worked with me. And they hired me on the spot, basically, because there was no one else I think, but they said, You know, Paul, you sound like unlike anybody else we have in our database of voices because you have this weird European thing going on. And at that time, this was mind you about 23 years ago now. I sounded very British because that’s how the Dutch children learn their English, the Queen’s English. So sounded like a stuffy Professor all the time is when we whenever we need a
stuffy English professor, kind of Attenborough type of guy, URL, man. And that’s how I started I started by imitating I think now for a very bad British accent that Americans don’t know what accent from the other anyway, so they hired me. And I was hired. I remember my first job was for Hershey parks, which is a big theme park, you know, Hershey chocolates, the most awful chocolates in the world. But nevermind, I they have a theme park like Disney World. It’s all about chocolate, of course. And right. And it was the voice of one of the rights that led to many other things. But back to your question five minutes later. interrupt me when when you need to. Okay, please, because I have a tendency to go very on and on even that coffee. But I, I did not quite believe in myself. Because I’m Dutch, just this
unknown Dutch guy in the United States. And in Holland, it’s very easy to be famous, because there’s only 16 or 17 million people in the Netherlands. That’s it? Yeah. So in Holland, most people knew who I was. But in the United States, this 250 or 60, or 70 million people there. And nobody knew who I was. Nobody had ever heard of me. Nobody cared, ready. And I, these were in the days where we didn’t really have social media. I didn’t have website, I had one agent. And just, I didn’t want to sit by the phone all the time waiting for the agent to call for another thing. So I wasn’t sure whether I could do this or pull this off. And we didn’t have home studios either. So it was more of a wait and see game. But then this whole arrangement with the training company, for whom I was going to train people to become NLP
practitioners wasn’t working out very much. I said, Well, I got to do something on the side, at least to get by. Because otherwise, I might as well go back to Holland. And at that time, I was in a romantic relationship in the United States. And I didn’t want to go back to Holland. So I had to make a choice and said, What am I going to do? I’m going to take this seriously, or will I stay an amateur forever and keep it as a hobby. And some people still think that I should have kept it as a hobby. But I decided note and I’m gonna give this a go. And then my I started my whole publicity campaign all around the nether voice that voice of the Netherlands Paul stricker Look at, look at us now we’re talking about it. I’m talking to somebody in New Zealand for things, working for a company called gravy for the brain.
Toby Ricketts
Who thought that crazy idea?
Paul Strikwerda
You got to be crazy to be in this business, don’t you? You do,
Toby Ricketts
you’ve got to kind of I mean, I think your things is exactly right about standing out. Like, there’s definitely something to be said for like, the thing that gets you the foot in the door. For me, obviously, like the fact that I was like, I mean, you know, I’m in New Zealand, I’m in the middle of nowhere and rural New Zealand. And that is a good enough reason to give agents a call, because they’re like, Wow, that’s different. That’s, that’s kind of, let’s get this guy out, you know. And then if you have the talent to back that up, it’s gotten you in the door. So it looks like that’s definitely worked for me. So I often tell people, it’s like, you have to find that that part of yourself that people find like interesting, like an odd stone on the beach, or whatever. And I’m, that’s definitely interesting
Paul Strikwerda
students is, you know, what’s normal for you, is probably special for someone else. And you don’t recognize it, because it’s normal. That’s why I need someone else to recognize that. And I got a hint, in my short and unglamorous career as a waiter. Yes, I’ve been a waiter in the United States as well to make ends meet. And frankly, I didn’t have a don’t tell them what I didn’t have a work permit at that time. So and it took years to become a US citizen. And when I finally applied we had 911 and then it took even longer because they didn’t want all this foreigners in the country. So I had to do something to make a couple of bucks and I became a waiter. And people love me for some reason because not because who I am but because of the way I sounded. And we had this game where they the the people I was waiting on had to
guess where it was frameless if you guess one from our by a free dessert. And, and I did waiting on the side for about two years, which was another life lesson I will eagerly forget. But it was fun too, because you have lots of different people in your restaurant, lots of different personalities, lots of different accent and you learn how to sell stuff, you know, when the kitchen says can you push dish triode free, we need to sell the the chicken today. And so I could talk people into ordering dishes and buying basically more from me than they were willing to spend. So it was an education and selling. And so I am losing my train of soccer wagering making money in United States accents. Getting a work permit helped me out again.
Toby Ricketts
Well, I guess we could fast forward into because I was next thing I was gonna ask you is about like, where? Because you’re in the United States. Now. How much of your work? You know, do you are you doing for United States companies? How much is back in Europe? And like, Where does this work come from? It’s like, you’re kind of all about self generated work. And agents probably come into it as well cuz I know you’re represented. And whether you fish in the ptps or not. Occasionally, a fiver maybe?
Paul Strikwerda
Is fiber. Yes. Don’t say the word Fiverr. Well, I dabble here on deck because that’s one thing. You can’t put all your eggs in a basket. Absolutely. in one basket. That’s that’s never gonna work. And I became a freelancer to be free to be an independent contractor. So I’ve always been a freelancer by the way, from the very moment I started in radio, I was my one man business. So I had learned how to to drum up my business and to stand out a little bit, if you will. So I have about 12 agents, most of whom I never hear from. And when they when they when they do it, they usually think I’m like Holland and Poland. They think Holland and Poland are the same sort of idea. He Polish scripts, or Pennsylvania Dutch scripts. Boy, you’re Dutch. You live in Pennsylvania. So you must be Pennsylvania Dutch. So let’s do
this in German, German accent and I still can’t do it. But so you know, I cannot rely on these things. And to everybody who’s watching at the beginning of his or her career. Some people may say, well, once you’ve got an agent, you have landed and it’s true. They gave me my first break. But that will dry out at some point. You cannot rely on your agents because if you do that, then you’re pretty much doomed. The only person you can rely on is you know, my wife has this wonderful tile next to her desk it says behind every strong woman is herself which is nice because they say you have behind every strong man is his wife or a woman or something like that. But she says behind every strong moment is herself. I think the hide every strong VoiceOver is him or herself, it’s gotta be you, the buck stops where you are, you
gotta make a lot of noise, otherwise people won’t hear you. It’s the whole deal is you’re a needle in a ginormous haystack. And what you need to do is make that needle as sharp and shiny as possible, so that you become hard to ignore. And that’s what I set out to do. Maybe arrogant at the time, but you know, I had nothing to lose. So I thought, somebody told me that I have a very unique accent. I’m going to leverage that accent, I’m going to make use of that. So I labeled myself I marketed myself as the ultimate European voice was very boisterous, because Holland, the Dutch people are very modest. You don’t talk about yourself. So I had to learn how to talk myself up in public,
Toby Ricketts
America is a pretty good place to learn that.
Paul Strikwerda
Oh, my gosh, the United States. That was the hardest thing for me, because everybody said, Paul, Tony, down, I have to tell my Dutch colleagues also, you know, you got to get out of your shell, sell yourself, otherwise, you will not you won’t be noticed. Yeah, but what people wear if people think I’m so arrogant, no, no, you’re not arrogant. You’re just proud of your accomplishments that we need to rephrase the way you think about yourself, the way you sell yourself.
Toby Ricketts
We call that tall poppy syndrome. You know, where the tall poppy is get cut off? Yeah, exactly. True.
Paul Strikwerda
Yeah. So. So I had to learn that. And one of the first things I did was a built a website, I’m not a website builder. So if you would look at my first website today, you would just pass me by because it was very bare bones. And the only thing that I did that was different at the time was I started blogging. And I always loved to write and stood first started as notes to self really, because I didn’t know who I was blogging for writing to if anybody would be interested. But apart from a weird accent, that’s something that I think I’m rather good at. So I started documenting my journey. And then, thank goodness, social media started and became a member of a couple of groups. I don’t even know
if Facebook had started at that time. But there were a couple of groups on the interweb, or about voiceovers, and I started posting links to my blog, and some people read my stuff and commented favorably on it and thought, you know, maybe I’m onto something here. And I’ve been doing that for the past 1718 years now. And it’s grown and grown and grown and grown. And today, I can say that my blog is the landing page of my website, and the single source for my notoriety, if you will. One thing that the Dutch have in common is that they don’t mince their words. They’re very, they’re known throughout the world as being rather blunt. Because they’re honest, they don’t want to be
nasty or rude, but they’re just honest. And they like to share their opinion and everybody’s got an opinion in Holland and they’re not afraid to share that with you. And I didn’t know that was made me different because I was just writing as me being blunt about the industry about the the setbacks and all the empty promises that were being made and all these people that pretend that there’s something and they’re not and you know, there’s so much humbug going on and hot air that a lot of Emperor’s without clothes. And I thought it was my, my service to the community of voiceovers to expose these embers will have closed and all the hot air that was going on, including hot
air about me because I was trying not to take myself too seriously. But somehow, that took off, and I got myself a name. But what this does is once your blog gets a regular amount of viewers, it gets noticed by the Yahoos and the Googles in the world to say, hey, this somebody who does something relevant, apparently something that’s interesting, and that people want to check out again and again and again. And again. Because the problem is most websites is that voiceover websites, I mean, is that they’re the same. Every day, every month, every year, I had some people that I worked with voice actor websites a lot in there. And they build the greatest websites for voice actors. And once they build a website, then five years later, they get a call and say can you please design another website for you? Because mine is not
working? Or why isn’t working? Well, nobody’s coming? Why is nobody coming? Well, because you didn’t change anything. Why would people come back once they visited your site? It’s like fish in a fish market here. If you don’t change it, it starts to rot. Nobody wants to nobody wants to come back. So that’s the great thing. A blogged us if it’s done well, I think if it’s interesting, you got to be interesting for people to be interested. So every week consistently through thick and thin. And then for better or worse in sickness and health, I’ve been writing this blog. I’m married to it, as you can tell. And every week, to my astonishment, still, people are coming back for more. And that has given me what they call a domain authority Domain Authority is a number between zero and 100 indicates how popular your website
is based on the number of backlinks. Whenever somebody links to your story, it means that they pass it on to another website, and then to another website, another website, because it’s an indicator for Google to say that people liked this stuff, they’d like to share it. And my website is one of the most shared websites, especially the blog articles in the voice of community. In fact, Joe Davis a couple of years ago, Joe Davis is the man behind voice actor websites, and he is an analytics guy. He is all about SEO, search engine optimization. He said, Paul, I just ran a search. And I found out that your website is the single most popular individual voice over website in the entire world is what how did that happen? Why said it’s all about your blog, man. It’s all about the blog, the single most visited individual website, it’s not
like a lack of voice 123 Are the other big ones that I shall name because they’ve got millions of visitors, I can never compete with that. But that that impressed me greatly. And that tells you something because I never set out to become the best or the most popular blog or the most visited website. It’s never voice.com By the way, if you’ve never visited Nether voice.com new blog every week. But that’s the power of of social media. And here’s the side effect. And now I’m finally coming to the answer to your question. When your website becomes popular, what happens when people type in a search for Dutch voiceover or European source or voiceover, or neutral English voiceover My name comes up in the top 10 On the first couple of pages. And that’s how clients find me. So I tell people, you attract clients, you have
to become a magnet yourself instead of chasing clients have clients chase you. And all things on my blog. I think that’s what’s happened that people find my, my, my website, my blog, they start reading, they start listening to the daily demos, and they end up hiring me for some reason.
Toby Ricketts
I mean, and that’s what Google is noticing, like you mentioned, SEO and I went on a really big SEO journey from about three years ago. And made improvements like it’s all about content now. And it’s got to be content that people have to find interesting. Like, it can’t just be pages of you know, nothing speak or voiceover repeated a million times. Like it’s got to be evolving, changing multimedia backlinks, as you say, and Google takes it all into account. And the more you can, like, I’d say that you know people with with with other websites, the more relevant you can make yourself to someone, like wanting to find a voice or find out about voiceover, then like, the more the better success you’re going to have, because that’s what’s Google is trying to intelligently do is find out the best answer for people. If you can be
the answer, then it’s brilliant. So you mentioned social media towards the end there in terms of you know, how that stuff has spread. And you’re very visible on social media on Twitter, all of the sort of the big things, commenting on things all the time. I don’t know how you find the time of the day to do
Paul Strikwerda
it. I kind of keep my big mouth.
Toby Ricketts
It’s a valid marketing strategy to, you know, be doing little videos every day, I see people on LinkedIn and on Instagram and stuff doing these live videos in the studio today. I’m starting to do a bit more of it. But do you think social media didn’t the blogging is more important than the social media stuff? Or do you need both these days?
Paul Strikwerda
I definitely need both. Because if you make a lot of noise, and nobody hears that you don’t exist. So I make noise, and then it makes sure everybody hears using social media. Is it a good strategy? Well, yes or no, it really depends on how you use it. And I still have to discover the world of videos because I know that on Instagram, and I’m very active on Instagram reels, the videos are short videos like tick tock, they’re all the thing you know that they get preferential treatment. So one of the things that I really should do, is become more proficient at producing videos, but it’s much easier to write a piece of 2000 words than to produce a minute a video,
Toby Ricketts
I think the opposite is the I think the complete if it would take me days to write 2000 words, it would take me about six minutes to do a video. So maybe we could swap stories sometimes.
Paul Strikwerda
Oh yeah, you got to play your strengths. That’s true. It’s different for different people. And so, but that’s one aspect of myself and my social media exposure that I have yet to explore. Unfortunately, I moved to the Northeast Kingdom in Vermont lately. I’ve been here since November 5. And it’s this outpost of America five miles from the Canadian border where nothing ever happens. And I like to keep it that way. But the nature is stunning. So I started posting little nature, pictures of where I live and what I know and what I do. And people seem to like that. So maybe I could become the pole strip reader of Vermont now of narrating my own nature, nature videos, you the data back from them from a golf, I can do that. But you know what to tell what I tell my students because I have a few students here and there. And I
call it well, the coaching that I do is I help people to stand out as a as a voiceover become that shiny needle in the haystack, right? I tell people, you know, what you should start doing first is do what you love already doing. So for me, my love was writing for other people could be photography, some people, it’s videography. Some people like to draw cartoons, but do something that you love, because it won’t take as much time and will give you pleasure. And when you are finding pleasure in something it shows and people hear it in your voice. So do what you love to do and make a mock that way. create yourself an audience, and then you can drag themselves into the world of voiceovers as well. Yeah,
Toby Ricketts
it gives you energy. I think that’s the key thing like I find with you know, if you do something that you love, everyday like voiceover, it gives you energy to do other things. And then like it’s it’s self sustaining in a way, whereas it doesn’t take your attempts to keep doing it. Yes,
Paul Strikwerda
yes, yes. Because because it’s such a crazy, it’s such a crazy business that we’re in really the uncertainty with a variety as well, you know, with uncertainty comes the variety as well, because you never know what tomorrow will bring. If it even brings anything and sometimes, you know, I don’t know what to do, because I have weeks where nothing happens. Really don’t you ask? You asked me Oh, how do you produce all that content? When you see me producing a lot of content, usually nothing happens. Paul is trying to desperately stay busy.
Toby Ricketts
It’s very true. Like I I’ve, I’ve learned to embrace I used to get really nervous as a sub subcontractor or an independent contractor. When you have those quiet weeks and you think, Oh, well, that’s it, maybe the dream is over and you get the imposter syndrome and you think, Oh, that’s it. That’s it career’s over, I’ll define the end of the week at the supermarket. But I’ve really learned always comes back it’s always goes back and it comes back with a vengeance usually. So now I really enjoy those weeks where I have no work and I’m just like, now I can catch up on this stuff I can do this stuff I’ve been meaning to do. And it’s like, you know, as a as an independent contractor, you don’t get you know, four weeks of paid leave a year. So you kind of make that your paid leave in a way so you know, it’s I’ve learned
Paul Strikwerda
to embrace ridiculous thing about living in the United States where it’s all about work, work, work, work, work, and I’m a European, I’m used to at least six weeks of summer holidays, vacations, as they say, Here are six to eight weeks, the Americans have what you leave work for more than two weeks, and you don’t leave your phone number and email address with your employer. He doesn’t get in touch with you, you don’t get in touch with your business. What ways that to conduct a business you always have to be able to be reached and called upon said no, no, no, my vacation that’s preventative health care. When I want to take off, I’m not taking any voiceover kits with me, no travel gets nothing. I want to be there for my family and myself to recharge the batteries. Because if I don’t, then I’ll go crazy. So this
whole thing about work, work work. Always being available. I don’t buy into that at all, I’m telling you. It’s such a relief, because I started doing that after I had my stroke three years ago. And that was an eye opening experience because I was one of those people who’s always chasing his dream and client after client and the more I did, the better I felt about myself and I said your I don’t want my self image to be linked by what I do. What I do is just an aspect of who I am and who I am is more important than what I do. So I really was working around the clock I was in my studio. And I tell the story a lot but I’ll keep it short but I was in the studio and I woke up on the floor of a studio and I was partially paralyzed and I had never experienced anything like that I had a terrible headache and and I could barely speak
could lose part of my face was paralyzed. And I recognized this because I’m having a stroke but it was by myself in the home in my soundproof studio I said this is the end it’s desert I’m waiting I was waiting for the tunnel and the light to show up and didn’t unfortunately but said this is this time to meet my maker because I was thought I was gonna die. And obviously I didn’t die I’m still here. But to cut a long, long story short, I was supposed to be at a meeting and my wife is expecting me she got a bad feeling and she asked a local police force to do a welfare check on me and they found me
Toby Ricketts
wow that’s because the door inward isn’t that right so you couldn’t like actually get another reading a blog at the time.
Paul Strikwerda
I was leaning against the door it was just The ordeal to get it open and get me out. I was almost suffocating because I didn’t have any ventilation in the room. Yes, very smart. Always have a studio with ventilation people because it might not end up well for you. But, you know, it took me about a year to get back to me, milk itself itself was a little bit weird and strange. And but you know, I decided I looked at life. And so you know, it’s also relative or called fame and working for big clients and building a name for yourself. What’s gonna be left at the end of the day, it was worth it. What’s it worth is worth dying for the studio on the floor and gas struck for? And I certainly know, forget it, forget it, I don’t want that. I’m no longer going to chase clients let them do the hard work.
Toby Ricketts
It’s interesting, because when I remember when I read that blog, it was of special interest because I’m one of the things I do in my spare time is I’m a volunteer ambulance officer at the local ambulance center. So I go out and calls and I’ve, you know, gone to people with strokes and stuff. So I was reading it, I was kind of like fascinated about being a voiceover and that whole thing of the booth and like how that all worked and stuff, but you’re so right that like when you’re confronted with those life and death situations, even if it’s vicarious, and you’re just sort of present, you do have this whole, it just shifts you into this other level, this top down view. And you’re like, what’s really important, like, you know, it’s really it’s really refreshing and like things like I always wear my seatbelt, no matter how short the
drivers because you just see things like you know, people didn’t read the seatbelts. And it’s just like that tiny little action makes a huge difference. And just like having your cell phone on you all the time. Like you’re saying the booth you could dial or something. So it’s yeah, that was a very interesting article. And it
Paul Strikwerda
was. So it’s, yeah, go on. Go. Go.
Toby Ricketts
Yeah, so you you are you you primarily doing, like European voices, like Dutch voiceovers, or you called on to do different Euro voices? What kind of what’s the character of the work you do? Is it character work?
Paul Strikwerda
Well, you’re obviously talking to a character, but most of the stuff is, is interesting. Because it’s, I’d say about 80% of the work I do is boring. Elearning which I tried to make interesting. And the most in demand accent is my what they call neutral accent neutral English doesn’t really exist, but it’s kind of you know, you listen to the voice and say, Where’s this person from? I don’t know. Is he British? Is he from the United States of America? Is it from New Zealand? No, there’s something an in between land of weirdness that I have cornered that market for us. And it seems so if they want to voice that doesn’t sound like Yankee or stiff, upper lip brittle solid like that. I I am called upon. So it’s a lot of international business stuff. And lately, the pharmaceutical companies have discovered me and they think that
I sound like some, some intellectual or somebody who can tell about the latest breakthrough medicine or therapy. And they sometimes they wanted to make more British more American, I can also do a Dutch accent or we talk like this, like normal Dutch people do. The Dutch people have trouble pronouncing the th this a decent death thing instead of this and that. So it was a talk to the client? What kind of poll Do you want to have today on the menu, I try to give that to them. And I’d say about 80% of my work is in English. And then about 20% is still in touch. One of the last things I did a couple of days ago was a museum tour. I like doing guided tours as well, because it’s kind of a relaxed pace, and you take people on a journey. It’s all about the journey, not the destination. And this is all about global
warming. So it was socially relevant as well. So 80% is like that, that every now and then is the odd commercial. So funny when I when I first got my status on a very British, I was asked to be the voice of the Beatles musical to have a jukebox musical called Let it be. And instead of hiring a Brit, they hired me Dutchman to be the voice of the ultimate British musical on Broadway. Which is fun because the next time I came to New York, I was in the back of the taxi and I could hear my own promo, which rarely happens. So I do that too. I still do Attenborough a little bit. My impersonation is much sought after.
Toby Ricketts
Yeah, every job it seems on the beta places for eight and
Paul Strikwerda
a half. Yes, yes. Yes. Again, it was very fun because I’m one of the very few touch voiceovers that has had a national commercial in the United States. Not as me but as somebody talking. They’d like Richard Attenborough about Hawaiian french toast from IHOP the International House of Pancakes. Yeah,
Toby Ricketts
it’s always fun and feels kind of naughty that like I’ve done national sports in the US as a American voiceover and just thinking that this I’m just in the middle of nowhere in the studio and New Zealand interest and like it’s going out to every home in America to kind of
Paul Strikwerda
say about the imposter syndrome. Well, we are imposters, imposters. Exactly that’s that’s that’s acting acting is being the good imposter, the best imposters get the the Hollywood Walk of Fame star and they get an Oscar. Yeah, the best liars are the best actors. You know. It’s true that we get paid to lie because we’re pretenders. Yes.
Toby Ricketts
So we’re on the the VO life podcast brought to you by gravy for the brain OPI Oceania and you’ve interacted with Greg for the brain. Over the years. You’ve a very tight opinion of us. Why is that? Yes,
Paul Strikwerda
yes, yes, absolutely. This is a business about personalities and about connections, personal connections. And the first time I met Peter Peter Dickon and Hugh Edwards was at VO Atlanta. And I’ve always had a thing for the Brits, I have to say, Holland being close to the UK, me working for the BBC for an hour for a year, which is one of the highlights of my career. If you may say, I’ve always had a fondness for the British language and British drama. So I have this natural affinity for anything British. So I don’t know what would have happened if gray for the brain would have been in Australia, Austrian company or German company with my mother headed off. But you never know.
I like these guys instantaneously. I didn’t even know what they were up to. Because who knows what bravery for the brain does? It’s Yeah, well, it’s a name even come from you know,
Toby Ricketts
it’s a food company.
Paul Strikwerda
But it was makes for great puns because I wrote this whole story about my sidetrack here, but about my recovering from stroke. I ended with that God had different plans for me that it was my time to go yet. Cuz I was too brainy for the grave. That’s pretty good. I love playing with language no matter what language it is. So we met and we hit it off. As they say over here, we hit it off really well. And then started find out what these guys were doing. They were often these amazing, amazing trainings. And really, what I liked is about they they don’t seem to if I’m mistaken, let me know. They don’t seem to run a get rich, quick scheme. This is really in depth training. That was not there
to exploit you. Because there’s so many other companies, as you know, that are preying on vulnerable hopefuls that think they can have a Korean voiceovers and if only you buy their Package, which includes 10 demos for free. They will promise you the world. And you end up on an island tried to get off and how did they get there? So so what I found is that this is a company that is really working in a very ethical manner. And going where others have not gone dig, they go deeper, more in depth and beyond. And they keep on supporting you no matter what level sounds like a commercial no matter what level of your career you are. But it’s true. That this is not run by pretenders. This is with people, like Peter like you have huge resumes. So they’re backed up experienced to better their connections, and they have
formed this whole network of love above all is that, you know, colleagues become friends. And that’s something I love about the voice of water in general, especially with the with the people that graduate the brain surrounds itself with, you feel like you’ve never seen each other. But you know, you have something wonderful in common. silliness, of course, because nobody takes themselves too seriously. Hence the name problem, which I also liked. They don’t pretend to be better than they are. But it’s just fun to hang around with too. And anything that’s fun is makes it more easy to learn. So it’s this perfect combination of being thoroughly intrigued, thoroughly entertained, but also educated at the same time. I think it’s kind of the the university level of voiceover training, I honestly mean that run by the most
ethical and wonderful people who also started this, this this voice of conference of one voice and One Voice Awards. And so I said, you know, this is something I can stand behind fully. This is something that I want to associate myself with. And I started doing that. So when, when the first conference was starting, he reached out to me and said, Paul, can you talk about it? Maybe you find it interesting. Maybe you want to write something in your blog about it. And I find it interesting. I wrote about it and people responded to it. And since then, every year when they have a new conference, we get in touch every year when they have new products or services. We get in touch. And it’s kind of my way of I know it’s cliche, but it’s my way of giving back of how much these guys are giving us as a community, me as a
person to tell you this, this goes beyond and I’m getting a little bit emotional here. But this goes way beyond talking about the business and voiceovers. Because when I was in the depths of misery in a hospital bed, thinking that it would never talk again, because that was one of the things the stroke did to me. I lost my voice, the ability to speak to emote even one of the first people to reach out to me and say, Hey, Hi, buddy, how you doing? Was you Edwards. And he’s kept on doing that ever since every couple of months or so we check in with each other and say how you doing? And that has meant the world to me. So when you mentioned great through the brain, I will walk on fire for them on hot coals for them and do anything I can to help them and spread the message. And and
I can’t say enough good things about them. Wow. By the way, this was not a paid promotion. Because I don’t get paid by them either. When I write a stock is it’s free publicity. But it’s really us working together promoting something for the betterment of society. Yeah, because I think there’s too many, too many people who are of ill repute, who take advantage of impressionable people. They are not, they are, as I say here, the real deal. It’s true. I joke about it. But I think you know what I’m talking about, you know, just when someone like you being associated with Shadid with them as well doing this podcast series, with people who are all in some way linked to gravy for the brain. That is a great tribute to the organization that they have built. And then they have this worldwide expansion as well. So they didn’t
want to keep it confined to the UK. No, the goodies must be spread all around the world. So in every geographical region, like the Oceania, you have grave with the brain for siano for aficionados. So you create more than just voiceovers because we can talk frankly, right, because what we do is is not really about voiceovers at all, I think it’s really this discussion that we’re having to this interview, it’s not really about voiceovers, it’s about living up to who you meant to be as a person, you know, about what makes life worthwhile and fulfilling. And for me, it’s, it’s wonderful if I can be a doctor in a script that will promote certain medications that can save lives. It’s wonderful, but it’s ultimately the people that you meet. In life, we have an impact on you. And you learn a lot about yourself through your voice, because you can’t hide
anything, the voice will reveal everything, whether you’re tired, whether you just didn’t in a divorce, or have gone through a stroke or anything, your voice cannot hide anything. Yeah, so we’re very raw, we expose ourselves, we become vulnerable, we have to deal with criticism all the time with rejection all the time, you know, it’s the uncertainty of making it to another week or another month. This really throws you back at who you are. And you got to be you got to be strong to survive as a as a one person business. And it’s a lonely business, of course, because you’re there in your new and improved studio. And I’m here in the middle of nowhere in Vermont, and not really anyone to talk to you about how buddies It’s a lonely existence that very few people could really stand because we are social beings, we
need water cooler conversations and be with one another. And you don’t really have that unless you find a community of people that are like you that know what you’re going through, then I’m not really there professionally, but say, Hey, how you doing, buddy? I hurt you were in the hospital. If there’s anything I can do, let me know I can do it.
Toby Ricketts
Yeah, yeah. And the voice industry like I’ve I’ve been really struck every time I’ve gone to one of the one voice conferences, or or just reached out to anyone in voiceover is that there is this genuine connection that everyone in the working voiceover seems to have with each other. And we don’t like it’s a competitive game in a way. But I like the fact that when you wit someone, someone wins a job against you. It’s not that they did better than you. It’s that they were more certain they were more suited to the job. So there’s actually any competitiveness is kind of faux competitive risk, because we’re all just doing our best and sometimes we’re not right for the role, and that’s totally fine. And it’s the attitude, I think that people need to walk into it with is that, you know, it’s about making yourself you know,
more appropriate for different kinds of jobs and, and but I I’m I’m fascinated and just I really love that I found this, this industry that does have so much warmth, and there’s so much genuine connection. And you know,
Paul Strikwerda
there’s so much unpretentiousness, I know it’s not a word, but people are unpretentious. Exactly. Yeah. And because I noticed that when I worked in radio and I worked for this big broadcasting company in the Netherlands. And there were two departments radio and television. And both had nice people, but very different people. People in television were much more aware of their personality, because they were in the picture literally all the time, they were recognized on on the streets. And they became very recluse because they didn’t want to be bothered by everybody. So they became not so nice persons, but always very, very aware of what they would look like how they would sound like and they did not become themselves and we voice over and radio people, nobody sees us, people only hear us and we’re
kind of the anonymous workers in the entertainment industry, the disembodied voices. So this, this whole thing about oh, look at me, and his big ego is not really here. A few big egos in the industry, but they deserved it. And rightly so they can, they can be proud of what they have achieved, but not as many as you find in the more visual arts. And that’s what I always loved about the voiceover thing. The unpretentiousness of it all, said the end, you know, it’s it. It’s so fragile, and it’s so easily forgotten. You know, people say, Oh, my God did a big commercial. I had to get used to that when it came to United States, people are proud of doing the commercial. And they said, Okay, great. You did a commercial for bathroom tissue. So what you know,
Toby Ricketts
put it on my gravestone
Paul Strikwerda
doesn’t really impress me. While you know, it’s a national commercial for bathroom tissue. Everybody heard me? Oh, well, okay, great. What do you do for mankind today? You know, it’s, to me, it’s very oriented about money, and status. And if you want to forget about your status, just get yourself a stroke. Nothing is is worth anything anymore. It comes back to the very simple things in life that make me going and probably make you go into because there’s a reason why you do the EMT thing too. Because there’s more to life than voiceover sorry, people. There’s more to live in voiceovers? Yeah, absolutely. Yeah. And I do for one another. And that matters. Yeah, exactly.
Toby Ricketts
Yeah. And I mean, I think like when I was about to talk about, you know, advice for beginner voiceovers and coaching and things like that, and going on to your book, but like, when people are coming into the industry, like I say to them, this is definitely not a get rich, quick scheme. You may see voiceover artists getting paid, you know, a stupendous amount for one commercial, but they’ve spent 10 years getting to that point. And they’ve done most of that, because they absolutely love it. And they were doing it even if they weren’t getting paid, which probably was happening anyway, you know, because I would I know that, you know, if I won the lottery or sees the need for money, I would still do this because I get such a kick out of it. And I think it has to be that way. And, you know, doing auditions, everyone
should be fun. It shouldn’t be a total chore. Did you sort of concur with that you’ve always found that gives you strength? And that’s the advice you give?
Paul Strikwerda
Yes, absolutely. I have to laugh because it is something that makes you happy. And if you do, what you make makes you happy. You have a rich life. And that’s, to me is the main thing is to have a rich life in more ways than just monetary compensation mean, I’m not gonna lie about it, I can make a very decent and comfortable living. So it’s really easy for me to say, but I’ve been in the trenches I’ve, I’ve, I’ve been away during the restaurant. I know how hard that is. And so I really started from a big unknown to somebody that that is sought out by clients. And when you look at successful people, you just look at the result and not at the road that that took them there. It’s like, you know, you go to a concert. I love classical music. And you see this wonderful classical pianist, make it seem seamless, easy to do, you
know, piano concerto Beethoven, Brahms. They just that seems like, Oh, you’re such a natural talent. But what we don’t see is the many, many, many hours and hardships these people have to go through. I tell people, there’s no success without sacrifice. Sorry, you gotta sacrifice you gotta want it more than anybody else in the world. Because otherwise, you’re not going to get there. One of my friends is a classical pianist. And a new is going to be famous. You know why? Because every morning, he went to the conservatory, he didn’t have a grand piano at his home. But they had pianos for the pianist. And he was the first one in line to be able to open that door to get himself grand piano so you could practice for a couple of hours a day. That’s the spirit. That’s the spirit. That’s what you have to have. You really,
really have to want it not something on the side. Not as some hobby or pastime, you really have to want it. And you have to know that involves much more than talking to the microphone, or pointing at a microphone, which you can’t see but Hello. It’s it’s not about that really, at the end of the day. You know, that’s only 20% of the workout. If I could do 20% of the work 100% of the time, that would be lovely. Yeah, all got to do the boring stuff, but everybody wants Should the fun stuff. And being becoming successful is having to do and wanting to do the stuff that you think is not too fun. But in the end could be very fun to like, attracting clients through writing a blog, you got to find something that really works for you. And that sets you apart
Toby Ricketts
from making videos, like making videos. And it’s funny, you use the example of a classical pianist because I often say to like, one of my examples is like, people come to the Veyron voiceover courses in person occasionally. And people say, you know, when will I start making money from this? Or like, you know, when when can I expect a return on my investment? And it’s kind of like, if you’ve just decided to start a new career, like in something creative. It’s a bit like deciding to like, learn the grand piano. It’s like if someone went to a music teacher and said, right, when can I make my money back on these lessons? They’d be like, Well, that depends on how much effort you put in how naturally good you are, like, you know, with the drive and determination, like so many factors. And I feel like with VoiceOver, they
just expect to like I can read already. I sound pretty good. I’m basically ready. When it’s just this this behind the curtain is so much more that people don’t understand.
Paul Strikwerda
Oh, yes. It’s the whole Wizard of Oz. situation. There’s a lot going on behind the curtain that you don’t see. But yeah, yeah.
Toby Ricketts
What was the experience of writing the book, like actually, like, what was
Paul Strikwerda
the book because it was really written? It’s basically a collection of my old blog. That’s one of the Okay,
Toby Ricketts
yeah, fair enough. Yeah. And I was I was, I was a bit like, I wasn’t sure because it says making money in your PJs. It sounds like it’s easy. Yeah. Were you worried about that title that it would say like, they would sound a bit too easy. And people would read it and think like, by the end of the book, they could be making money. Or they horribly disappointed, something
Paul Strikwerda
really silly and catchy. That was the only reason why I chose it. Yeah. And
Toby Ricketts
actually, incidentally, I almost always wear PJs, when I work at night, when I’m
Paul Strikwerda
wearing PJs right now, because it’s bloody early in the morning. I just came out of bed. Honestly, that’s no, that’s, that’s that’s the whole deal about it. I had to find a silly hook that people would remember me by. And so they could do so like have a sustainable career in voiceovers or make $1,000 a month as a voiceover artist. And that was actually boring. The best things come out of the most silly thing. So I woke up one morning, I had to go to the studio didn’t care to get dressed. They said, Yo, this is the best job ever. I don’t even have to wear normal clothes. I can do this in my PJs. Yeah. Well, there it is, Mickey money your PJs. And I kind of addressed that in the first chapter as well, that is, in fact, nothing like easy money at all, you can do this in your PJs, and you probably will, and you should, I can
highly recommend it. But, you know, you really have to put on your big boy pants and big girl pants to to make make a dent in the universe of voice RT. So it’s not as easy. So it’s kind of playful, I play with the ideas. And often, that’s not a good quality of mine. But I mock people a little bit, I preach a little bit because I’m the son of a minister. I try to to mock people who want to make things look like it’s quick and easy. And never is everything that you think is quick and easy never is. Because otherwise everybody would do it. Everybody would be successful at it. And it’s not. So yes, my approach is really to be treating this very, very, very seriously. But with a lot of fun. I had a pleasure that I had a background in radio, which is not always an advantage after my my radio career has helped me tremendously as as
a freelancer running the business as a business, of course, but also in the whole thing about approaching people in a business because as a as a roaming reporter, you have to talk to people that don’t want to talk to you. You have to talk them into doing an interview, they have to do the interview. They have to cut and paste it and put it in bite sized pieces. All of these things come together as a voice artist, because I had to talk to lots of people who were not intent on hiring me. But I had to convince them like Mel Blanc, by the way, there’s a nice segue. He he knocked on the doors of Warner Brothers for two years. And the guy who’s hiring voiceover said, Sorry, we have all the voices we need. But he kept on coming back and back and back again until the guy who was in charge of hiring the voices died. Somebody else got in
this place. And he said Mel Blanc. Well thank you know what, let’s have coffee. Let’s hear your voices. And that’s how you got in the door. And the second job he did was the voice of a pig, which became Porky Pig. So you need this persistence, this kind of I don’t care whatever the outcome is, I’m doing it anyway thing. Even though you know that everything depends on it. You have to work as if it doesn’t. Because otherwise you become too desperate. You don’t want to be too desperate. You don’t all other thing you should Didn’t do is invest lots of money and lots of expensive equipment in the beginning and, and this has become fingered as a lot easier to start in this business because you can buy a new microphone for two holida $100 Like the RODE NT ones perfectly fine. Voice Over microphone super quiet.
Toby Ricketts
And the Focusrite Scarlett series, they’re incredibly good value for their sound these days, like go back five years, that was just not possible.
Paul Strikwerda
So I know it’s been it’s really been amazing how that has, how the technology has cheapened in the way. And so it’s easy to get started. But you know, I am a frequent visitor of eBay and I can recognize a voice artist who has given up his dream. Post
Toby Ricketts
the package executive package that is online, it’s like so focus, focus, right solo, some headphones
Paul Strikwerda
with a free pop filter.
Toby Ricketts
So you’ve got a new book coming out. You’re telling me before What’s this one making lots of money in your pjs
Paul Strikwerda
don’t wear anything the naked voiceover don’t find a catchy title yet. But some people said I should put my big fat face on the cover that will sell so a lot but I I was I was going to call it the self sustaining voice over because that’s that’s the big thing that I that I teach people advocate in my blog as well to become self sustaining. Sustaining career not just a fling. Sounds boring. So I gotta find something else. So if you have any suggestions, please write a gravy of the brain attention to Mr. Paul string for the middle of nowhere Vermont, USA. And I will get get to me straightaway and they’ll give you credits. But it’s really about what it’s what it takes to become a self sustaining. VoiceOver so. So what’s going to be is a couple of years ago, I noticed that the subscribership to my blog was stagnating. And I thought
that I had reached the limit of people that I could reach because we have a very small community. I only have 40,000 subscribers, which isn’t known to the big bloggers, but a lot of people who blogs, whoa, 40,000. That’s a whole thing. But I want to at least have 400,000 and 4 million, why not $4 billion subscribers. So I said I had to tap into a new market. And I started doing micro blogs under the name of Nether voice on Instagram. And Instagram gives you about 2200 characters to write a story. And so I do a mini blog every single day about the business. So it’s something that you can read in a minute. So what I’m going to do for this new book is just have bite sized pieces
that you can reach read at the beginning of the end of the day or just in between me to take a break when you need like a vitamin shot in the arm, a little bit energy boost. But running a business about doing voiceovers about being a good person.
Toby Ricketts
That’s a good idea. I often would need something that’s like well, well my audio is processing or something I need something that’s like yeah, like a minute long just to pass that time. So we’re not just staring at a progress bar.
Paul Strikwerda
Yeah, cuz people’s attention spans are getting shorter and shorter. So I tend to write these lengthy blogs that it takes us seven minutes or seven minutes to read. But I try to be thorough and so if you if you like the small parts of try to convert people to come to my website and eventually read my blog that’s been working, I am tapping into a new and younger audience then the Instagram people are coming to my blog because they if you want to have a more in depth story, you can read the full story on my blog, but the short things I think I caught on to something there. And so the nice thing for me is that it’s basically already written now the big trick about being a good writer is not being good writer bits but being a good writer you have to edit your own work and make it even better. So I’m in that process now
selecting out of all the pieces that have had something that is not as voluminous as making money in a PJs because that is a chunk of a book because I noticed that some people let me get it here at this and self promotion
Toby Ricketts
app to screen to mess with
Paul Strikwerda
the scenery here.
Toby Ricketts
Oh wow that was candid.
Paul Strikwerda
always worked with very sturdy equipment. Exactly. But the best for me so Gobo for your life from GE ik acoustics you together you have a base panel like this then you have somebody that
Toby Ricketts
you can stand it up but like he did try a Japanese screen or something.
Paul Strikwerda
Exactly. Yes. So this is about is
Toby Ricketts
thick, isn’t it?
Paul Strikwerda
Is very thick. It has too many pages. I pedaled this around for a couple of voiceover friends that I wanted to have the input from. And they said, Paul, this will never sell because it’s too long. And look at the last page is 423 Bloody pages. Wow. Yeah, you could build
Toby Ricketts
and then a bookshelf out of those books I know. But
Paul Strikwerda
as you can see, there’s a lot of whitespace. So like to make things in bite size paragraphs, but so my promise, my dear readers, my next book is going to be a lot shorter. And sweeter, I hope.
Toby Ricketts
Yeah. Like the short form, I think, like and I’m gonna subscribe to Instagram as well, if I’m not already to catch those blogs, because that sounds very interesting.
Paul Strikwerda
It’s just easy. Add another voice and you’ll you’ll get something every day. And in fact, today I’m writing about the birthday of a certain voice artist. Oh, who is beginning it Surprise, surprise.
Toby Ricketts
You often blog on technology, voiceover technology, which is one of my passions. I just love technology associated with voice. I love helping people with the technology because like some people find it really difficult. And I just find it so easy and easy to explain that I just I just want to help people with it. Because I it reaffirms the knowledge of myself as well. Actually do to your article about the U 87. Microphones? Yes, I ordered one. And I hoped it would be here by the time we did this interview, but it’s still in transit. But I’m really because I’ve got a u 87. here and I want to put them side by side. There it is. I wanted like absolutely, like do an article that that just like picks every detail and massive because a bowl accounts. It works really well. Right? Yeah. So I’m very keen to send fake so I’ll send you my
test results, side by side of the real thing. And those because like, it sounds like there’s not much in it, which is interesting. But you’ve blogged the like, What’s your favorite thing about studio sound is it mics, it interfaces, computers are the whole lot.
Paul Strikwerda
There’s nothing that I don’t like really, I love playing around with them. It’s it just makes juice to toy around with things and have manufacturers send me free stuff. I need to get to know that thing too, that I that I that I’m on a mission to to educate my readers, and educate myself really because there’s so much great stuff being made right now take for instance company like Austrian audio, which just came came out of AKG and Luhut. And I always loved discovering things that were not used by others. Because I if there’s something I hate is that people say this is the inst industry standard, say must have the industry standard. Otherwise, you don’t count as a voiceover artists. There’s so much great stuff on the road NTG five in the short shotgun microphone is a wonderful like the for one thing is way
better than a 416 of a cheaper two. So why not test that. And so I wanted to give people an idea of there’s so much more than going for the TLM 103, or the MK h 416, or the U 87. So out of my own curiosity, I started writing about it. And then I got in touch with a guy who runs a big microphone database on the internet. And he now runs a company called Roswell audio, where he’s making his own microphones. And as I’m trying to, as I’m talking about, I’m trying to think about the name of the website is a Big Mac microphone database. Anyway, he invited me to start writing for him and test microphone. So that’s what I did. And this is a test for him and write stuff about it. I might as well do it for myself to put it on my blog. And that’s what I did. And the nice thing is that once you write honest reviews, people
recognize that and manufacturers too. And I tried to write about it in a non technical way because I’m not a George Witham who is one of the experts on home studio building and technology. I’m not a sound engineer like Uncle Roy, your cousin is or Dan Leonard, you know, those are people who approach it often from from the more technical side, I just use my voice over ears in my voiceover surroundings and say what would work what wouldn’t break the bank and what makes this microphone different from other microphones? And what do I think would be a good bet for people? Because I hate I hate people spending money on things that they don’t know how to use yet. Yeah. Or did they go broke on equipment that they don’t even need? You know?
Toby Ricketts
Yeah, exactly like people buying UAV sevens because it’s the industry standard. And it’s like yeah, it’s so overpowered in terms of like what you need and you also like the thing about like when I bought this UAV seven I was in my other my old booth and it actually it’s it sounded terrible in that old booth because I’d like I was I had designed it around for 16 to a super directional all the soundproofing was on one end, but a cardioid comes in and starts picking up all of the room ambience. And it was just And it’s one of those mics that’s brutally honest as well, if you don’t have a good space, it just does not sound good. So it was a real like wake up call for me in terms of like, you know, don’t you don’t just spend the earth and then it doesn’t just deliver suddenly a great voiceover. It’s like, that’s when the work starts.
And then you can you can go further with, I think, these mics and they’re very dependable. But in terms of sound, it doesn’t save you any money at all. Like it won’t get you gigs.
Paul Strikwerda
And I suppose all your oils, that’s what it does. Yeah. And so a lot of microphones are much more flattering. But now, what’s happened since COVID, is that a lot of people have entered the market. They all thought, you know, this is the best job to be doing from your basement or your attic. So we’ve had a lot of new voiceovers, which I don’t mind, everybody is allowed to chase his own or her own dream. But in order to separate the wheat from the chaff, some agents have said, well, you’re not going to be added to my roster unless you have this and that type of equipment. Yeah, so people buy Apollo preamplifiers, and the whole package with a plugins and they have to have the 416 and the TLM, one or three and the UHD. Seven, and otherwise, you you’re not on the map, and you’re not taking your job seriously,
which I think is nonsense. But it is kind of a badge of honor. And look what I can afford to I’ve landed. So on one hand, people can tell whether you’re serious or not, but the equipment that you have. And so I had run into this problem because I had this wonderful shotgun microphone, called the Cinco de
Toby Ricketts
to omega Chai. I heard about this, the Pratik scored 156
Paul Strikwerda
US dollars, but retails normally for 250. And honestly, I can’t tell the difference between the D two and 460. Maybe my ears are not refined enough. But you know what kinds are not listening on refined equipment either. So I think it’s often a moot point. But so I was using that one. And I was landing big jobs. And nobody ever said, Oh, you you sounds like you’re using a cheap Chinese microphone. Yeah. Yeah. But then it became time to get to a different space in Vermont now and I thought it would be time to upgrade my microphone a little bit. And I wanted to find another shortcut microphone and I ended up with this one. This is the Sennheiser MKH 8060, which is the successor to the famous 416. Very short one, two, I’m not going to unplug because you want me not hear me. But look this.
Toby Ricketts
Yeah, it’s like half the length, isn’t it? Yeah. Yeah, baby.
Paul Strikwerda
Those five things for me.
Toby Ricketts
More oh, five, I think the four or five they did a version 2.6. That was like, shorter. But, but yeah. And I think the longer the barrel is, the more the interference tube is the more sharp and the more like pronounced the HyperCard effectors. Yeah, it’s just really is just like laser focused on you get, but it becomes unwieldy at a certain point. It’s like once it’s 20 feet long, it’s kind of impractical. Now it’s
Paul Strikwerda
out of the way, you know, when you do a lot of social media, you don’t want this big microphone in front of your face. So yeah, it works really nice in this direction.
Toby Ricketts
I like this one in front of my face, though. This is my like, it’s I feel like this this culture that’s grown up in our microphones, like, it’s the same reason that like Conan O’Brien, and they put a microphone on their desk. You know, it gives, it’s a visual indicator of like, this is a microphone. This is what you expect when you see a voiceover and I’ve kind of like I took that and thought like, with my whole, like, Zoom background. I was like, let’s market the space.
Paul Strikwerda
That’s the background is that that’s fake. I know. That’s real. It’s real. Right? Yeah. But it’s yeah, the Fender Rhodes. I see. It is it’s Fender Rhodes.
Toby Ricketts
Yeah, man. Do you play suitcase road? So yeah, play keys. Yep, absolutely. Yeah. And a little bit of bass on the wall there as well, somewhere fantastic. And drink whiskey in the background. So all my interests are represented, you know, around my head, along with a voice summarizing
Paul Strikwerda
all that’s great for the brain is about you know, making music, drinking good whiskey and enjoying a nice microphone. Exactly.
Toby Ricketts
Exactly. Yeah. We better wrap it up soon. Because I mean, you’re beginning to work day soon. And it’s and we’ve succeeded
Paul Strikwerda
in the United States. Today, we sort of made the honor the the people who lost their lives for their country. So we got Fun and Games, because when America celebrates something, it’s always fun and games, no matter whether it’s Memorial Day or not. Yeah, so that means discounts in the stores gotta go to buy. Yeah, and we have parades. We have these poor veterans who are like 80 9100 years old, and we parade them around the town from making walk for a couple of miles. And at the end, they have to listen to speeches that never end and then they have to eat and drink again and buy stuff. That’s the
Toby Ricketts
stuff is the rule. Yeah, keep it going. Keep it all going.
Paul Strikwerda
Absolutely. So on this Veterans Day, bye, bye. But here’s here’s one, here’s one thing I want to do. Yeah. Because you’ve been so nice to me and give me all this time to to talk about myself and about Mel Blanc and all these things. So if you’re watching this interview right now, and you think that what you’ve heard is Interesting and silly and absurd, but also, hey, I’d like to hear more or learn more. Please write to me, please. At Paul at Nether voice.com One word Nether as the Netherlands voices voice Paul another voice.com. reference this interview. And I will send you a free digital copy of my book, a PDF version, which is even after one even longer because everything I didn’t put in the printed version, it’s like 600 pages of of me. You can watch every aspect of the voiceover business. And I write stuff that
people don’t like to hear. So I can be honest, brutally honest. But fair, I think. But so yeah, pull it near the voice.com References interview, even if you hear this, that 10 years from now, 20 years from now, I will still be there. Hopefully, I can send you a PDF copy of the book for free just as a way to say thank you for putting up with me all this time.
Toby Ricketts
No problem. No, it’s been a pleasure. Thank you so much for joining me and all the best with your your Veterans Day celebrations.
Paul Strikwerda
Well, my my father in law is a veteran, and he will be all dressed up and I will be applauding him. Yes. Which is very wonderful to do. So it’s I make fun of it. But it’s a serious thing too. I think that we should give credit to the people who put their lives on the line, you know, and we his voiceovers live such protective secluded life here. But it’s not an easy job. But in many ways, it’s a very comfortable job.
Toby Ricketts
I do feel like I have to gratitude is very important in this job. You know what you work hard for it, but you do when you get there, it’s nice to really sort of you know, to to give thanks for it and acknowledge the
Paul Strikwerda
reason you and I can do what we do in our freedom is because we owe a lot to these to these people. So with all jokes, joking apart, I really, really mean that. I’m glad that have an opportunity a day to honor these people. And really, I think we should have every day a day like that where we honor the people who gave everything without expecting anything. So on this somber note, we have to say with Mel Blanc, that’s all folks. Thank you, Toby. It was a
Toby Ricketts
joy. Thanks, Paul. It absolutely was Cheers. Bye
Leave a Reply