Meet Our Founder: Max Inman

I'm just a normal guy that is passionate about working with churches and helping them sound their best with what they have. I happened to get good at mixing and learned how to hand that over for churches to use - as if they hired me locally. I am married with two young boys and everything I build here is for them. I have an affinity for pop music, consumer technology, and manual espresso-making techniques. I used to be addicted to video games, but now I don't have the patience to sit down and play them. Read on for my mix engineer origin story.

My audio journey began on a church praise team, strumming an electric guitar. After receiving my B.S. in Computer Engineering at N.C. State University, I got volun-told to run sound at a mobile church. I endured grueling years of loading stuff off trucks and being bad at mixing. The turning point occurred when I was tired of being horrible and overlooked as an engineer.

I cared about being good at what I was doing, so I earned professional certificates in Live Sound Production and Advanced Music Production from Berklee Online. This did not make me a professional. Audio school was helpful, but I still needed more practice.

After the courses, I joined a paid masterclass/mentorship community led by a respected Berklee professor. Practical experience is far more potent than theoretical learning. Having a mentor that can coach you is the fastest way to grow. But I am stubborn. I don't listen, and I ignored some of the advice I was getting that seemed to only apply to 'baby engineers'. It took me a good bit to realize that some of the best practices in setting levels was what held me back.

My 'get good' moment happened when doing a church project, experimenting with getting a fantastic raw balance (no EQ). I realized that my processing was making the final result worse than the unprocessed tracks. I learned that balance, gain structure, and EQ were the skills holding most engineers back, not flashy plugins and 'master chains'.

I served in a local church until I started Emperor Audio. Today, I assist churches in achieving top tier livestreams they can be proud of on a weekly basis. I also fly out to help them with their in-person audio experiences.

-Max