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Recording engineer Mike Plotnikoff gives Kelly Clarkson heavy sound, up for Juno

Mike Plotnikoff, son of Grand Forks residents Doreen and Mike Sr. Plotnikoff, is up for the 2013 Juno for Recording Engineer of the Year.
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Grand Forks native Mike Plotnikoff at his studio in Los Angeles.

A Grand Forks-born sound engineer is once again vying for a Juno award.

Mike Plotnikoff, son of Grand Forks residents Doreen and Mike Sr. Plotnikoff, is up for the 2013 Juno for Recording Engineer of the Year for his work with band Daughtry and former American Idol winner Kelly Clarkson.

With a resume that includes work with Bon Jovi, Aerosmith, Van Halen and Kiss, working with rockers Daughtry seems like a natural fit but helping record music for pop star Clarkson might seem odd – Plotnikoff said that both want to have a commercial pop sound but one that borders on heavy.

“The reason why (Clarkson) hired me is because she wants a little more edge,” Plotnikoff explained. “The songs I did with her are all the ones where she wants to be more hard rock with bigger drum sounds, real drum sounds, bigger guitar sounds, so that’s why I do a record with Kelly Clarkson. It’s the songs that she wants heavier, so she hires me for more of an edgy sound instead of more of a pop sound. Even though she is very pop, she wants to be rock, believe it or not, so she wants to be more aggressive and heavier.”

As a recording engineer, he works with bands and artists one-on-one and decides on the sound for a record.

“Basically right now, I have a sound of my own and that’s why all these (musicians) come to me. Obviously we fine-tune it for each artist to give them their own sound; I don’t want to make everyone sound the same. There are a lot of guitar riffs, a lot of hooks and a lot of guitar layering, so there are a lot of guitar tracks but to make it sound like one guitar,” explained Plotnikoff.

Plotnikoff was up for the same honour back in 2011 but lost out to friend Kevin Churko (who won for work with Ozzy Osbourne) and coincidentally, Churko is once again one of the other nominees Plotnikoff is up against this year.

“I want to beat him this time and we’ve been trash-talking already but he wants me to win this one,” said Plotnikoff. “I didn’t even know I was nominated actually, he was the first to tell me. I had an email from him that morning – he must’ve checked it the minute the results came out – and emailed me even before the Juno people let me know.”

The 2013 Juno Awards ceremony will take place April 21 from Regina, Sask.



Karl Yu

About the Author: Karl Yu

After interning at Vancouver Metro free daily newspaper, I joined Black Press in 2010.
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