Songwriter|Producer|Mixing

Q: Tell us about a project you worked on you are especially proud of and why. What was your role?

A: ive bunch of songwriting for 88 rising

Q: What are you working on at the moment?

A: Currently i'm working with oliver brassil(hes worked with don toliver, kevin gates, NBA Youngboy just to name a few), he currently has me doing a lot of song writing and vocal production/tracking sessions in la i also work for hybe japan/korea doing song writing via briefs through a publisher

Q: Analog or digital and why?

A: They are the same both can achieve the same thing for me since im mainly tracking vocals i use analog gear to help me in my vocal production process by gently compressing(so avoid having to clip gain in post) and some general eq just to reduce the amount of eq i have to do in post. I also have a large amount of analog gear that i use for sound design(moog studio, nord wave, kurzweil k2000, moog one etc). Sound designing on is limiting and not at the same time obviously you don't have to worry about CPU issues but a lot you don't have unlimited options in terms of DSP

Q: What's your 'promise' to your clients?

A: to deliver amazing finished product that sounds well produced and dynamic

Q: What do you like most about your job?

A: i really enjoy working on different styles of music and challenging myself to write things that i myself would never write on my own working with artist give me a lot of ideas that i always end up bringing back to my own music

Q: What questions do customers most commonly ask you? What's your answer?

A: this one i get very commonly oh thats so too many vocals!?! do you need that many?!? and my usual answer is yes charlie puth records upwards of 120 vocals for a track! usually for me a average size is 300 tracks

Q: What's the biggest misconception about what you do?

A: people tend to think i only do sound design/mixing/mastering because i make electronic music when that is not the only portion of the song writing process i know/do.

Q: What questions do you ask prospective clients?

A: How much? haha

Q: What advice do you have for a customer looking to hire a provider like you?

A: be open to feedback alot of times with artist since they write the demos and it means alot to them they are alittle resistant to change my goal as a song writer is not to change your idea but to structure, develop and expand your idea to its fullest potential

Q: If you were on a desert island and could take just 5 pieces of gear, what would they be?

A: tubetech mac studio sony c800 apollo twin moog studio

Q: What was your career path? How long have you been doing this?

A: i have been producing for about 10 years, first i went to a school called icon collective in burbank california studied music production there. than from there i started working for hybe japan a through friend of mine that i met through doing some music production for some of his friends. eventually through that i met my mentor chris kapica and started doing online music production lessons. than from there i started working with oliver and writing for his artist

Q: How would you describe your style?

A: currently for my own personal music im making alot of hyperpop brackence style music with alot chord changes dubstep influence strong topline and cool sound design

Q: Which artist would you like to work with and why?

A: The list is endless, I'm inspired by 2hollis, Hanumankid, playboi carti, Skrillex, Empire of the Sun, I could go on for ever.

Q: Can you share one music production tip?

A: this is something i literally experience with every artist i work with which is a good mix/master does not make a good song good song writing makes a good song just like how you cannot expect to get do a good mix on a completely clipped vocal you cannot expect to make a poorly written song to sound better just because you mixed it.

Q: What type of music do you usually work on?

A: i truly make everything i actually heavily enjoy mixing genres as much as possible but in general i make electronic music imagine grimes/nine inch nails/skrillex but when writing or working with other artist/clients i mainly write k/j/c pop, house, r&b, hip hop, afrobeat, DnB, chicago house

Q: What's your strongest skill?

A: i have a very macro understanding production and a wide skill set i can spot issues ina production that maybe someone who only toplines/mixes/records will not see due to them only composing a specific portion of the track but not the whole song. Also same thing for mixing many times mixing issues can be resolved just by fixes issues at the sound design or midi level

Q: What do you bring to a song?

A: everything! i do vocal production, vocal melody writing, tracking engineer, mixing engineer, mastering engineer, sound design(huge serum guy) i am involved in all steps of the production

Q: What's your typical work process?

A: usually i will receive a rough demo(vocals, roughly structure instrumental production) i'll give the song a good listen and understand the core issues with the song such as: - is the topline staying harmonically in the same area to much(maybe they are singing only do,re,mi for the whole song) - is there any vocal production? - do the chords change through the song or remain the same unnecessarily(so if someone wants stay in phrygian i expect the chord progression to always contain a b2 or something) - lastly does the song have all the needed parts for a finished song composition wise(synths, drums, vocals, fx, bass etc)

Q: Tell us about your studio setup.

A: its rather complex but essentially i have a home studio with 4 different audio interfaces chained via ADAT those interfaces are apollo twin apollo mk II apollo silver firewire ferrofish all i/o runs into them than for outboard compressor/eq/chromatic tuner(imagine like autotune with super low retune speed like 75ms) i use a rackmount voicelive 2 lastly i have some outboard synths

Q: What other musicians or music production professionals inspire you?

A: skrillex, nine inch nails(huge fan), i like alot of early 2000s rock/idm so linkin park for example

Q: Describe the most common type of work you do for your clients.

A: usually its combination of topline writing, song writing(fleshing out the structure of the song via the chords/chord rhythm/chord extensions), mixing/mastering & vocal production(adding harmonies and doubles etc) lastly making the instrumental so essentially all parts