He Doesn't Produce, He Scores Life Moments ft. Slimwav

In that era, you had to be a perfectionist. Like you had to really study your craft and get great at it. Now it's like none of that matters. You know, he didn't force me to listen to music, but my dad was my hero. I have to play drums. Like he's a drummer. He's like, bro, Drake? On the back end, he did a lot of post-production. He did a lot of work, which means he deserved a little more of the credit. I'm never mad at that. The melody is king. Interesting. And everything we do. My specialty is scoring life moments. When you hear the term producer, a lot of you guys might picture a guy in a bedroom cooking up beats and sending emails. Our guest today is much, much more. Grammy nominated Slim Wave is a producer, multi-instrumentalist, and musical director that gets paid for his taste and his vision. Not only does he produce for a small artist you may have heard of named Black, he does all the musical direction for his arena tours. And if you've ever wondered how a tiny desk concert is put together, this guy has directed four of them, and he told us all about it. We super enjoyed this episode.

I think you will too. Let's get into it. So yeah, off camera, Slim was uh saying some crazy shit, like hottest take. I'm just starting us off with He said a lot, he said a lot of artists aren't that creative. Can we just like start off by breaking that down? What did you mean by that? Man, honestly, I've worked with a lot of people. There's there's there's a select few that are like really gems, you know, Special Black is one of them. He's super creative. But in the past, I've worked with a lot of artists, and you you get to a session or you get to, you know, because I also I'm in the live world, you know what I mean? So I get there and it's like they have no idea what they want. You know what I mean? And it's like No vision, no vision at all. And it's kind of hard because it's like, yo, what what exactly do you want? Cause I'm the type of person, like, if you say, hey, I want this song to sound like cotton candy in the middle of the ocean with a frying pan.

And I'm like, oh yeah, cool. I got you. That's okay. You know what I'm saying? But a lot of them they don't know. And what happens is you end up doing your thing and they were like, yeah, no, actually, I was thinking about unicorns. And I'm like, all right. So um, yeah, a lot of them aren't creative at all, but you can tell, you can tell the ones that aren't creative. Why do you think that is? Because I have a theory, but I want to hear what you think. Because they're not artists, they're just talented. Ooh. Yeah. What's, yeah, that's the difference. Paradoxical as fuck. But what's your theory? I I kind of just was leaning toward like how easy it is to make music now. Oh, yeah, for sure. And how easy it is for anyone to call themselves an artist. Absolutely. You could go viral for something completely different. And you know, you could download GarageBand and whatever, throw some autotune on it. And just go crazy. Tight beat. Yeah, and throw, you know. But like, you know, not to take away, like, I I don't know. I think there's a lot of it's saturated, so it's tough. It gets real deep when you're talking about art, you know what I mean?

Yes. Because you have obviously like surface level level stuff that's just like, oh, this is popular because everybody likes it. This is viral. And then you have like deep art where you like, oh, this actually changes culture. This actually changes the mood, just changes me. You know what I mean? Like obviously Kendrick is Kendrick, Childish Gambino, people like that. They're true artists because they're intertwined with their music and their visuals and their art. It's like everything is just like intentional. So we know you have who you have in the beef. We know who you selected to win that beef. I can't even choose on that one because I I will say, you know, the boy, Drake helped my career out tremendously. So yeah, yeah. What you know, what is the connection to Drake? Well, you know, what so what happened? So before being a producer, I was just a musician doing content, you know, traveling with artists or whatever. And then I did this one specific piece of content, which was um uh like a horns and a talk box version of Laugh Now, Cry Later. Yes. And one of my homies hit me up the next morning.

Like he was like, yo, Drake? I was like, what? He's like, bro, Drake? I was like, Drake. I was like, bro, this is slim. What are you talking about? He's like, Dog, Drake reposted your video, and I was like, the fact that he called me, he I've never I've never talked to him on the phone. Like I just had his number, and I may have texted him one time years ago, but I've never changed my number. And he was like, he called me. I was like, this is not a lie. Obviously, because he has no other reason to call me. So I went and looked, and sure enough, it was there. And then my following went from like 14,000 to 30,000 in like a day. Quick 2X. We had a we had a similar We made Drake's story this year. Yeah, yeah, we made Drake's story this year. And it does. We gotta share. It does change shit for sure, bro. The Drake effects. Yeah, I can't, you know what I'm saying? I can't. So stop putting him in the middle of Kendrick and Drake, bro. Come on. I'll bring that up. I will say, you know, there's a there's a unique difference.

Like, obviously, Kendrick, he's deep art. Kendrick is Drake knows the people. Obviously, Kendrick does too, but I feel like there's a special craft on both sides, you know what I mean? And you just you have to appreciate both of them for sure. For sure. Well, we appreciate you, slim wave. Slimwav. Five times Grammy nominated producer for some of your favorite records. Type depot. And multi instrumentalists this dude played. How many instruments do you play? Come on. You know, I was thinking about this before I came here. To make sure you got it right on the podcast. To make sure I got it right. I've Narrowed it down to 11 if you're counting different forms of the instrument. We are. Yeah. So obviously, playing piano and organ are two different things. However, they're the same thing. Oh, okay. Yeah, I don't know if I agree with that. But organ. Okay. How many do you fucking play? Two. Barely. Yeah. I'm like, Jesus Christ. Yeah. Organ is like has foot pedals and draw bar. Like, it's it's a specific thing. It's almost like it's almost like being able to know your irons and golf. You know what I mean? Yeah.

It's like obviously you can you can honestly do a whole 18 course with a driver. I know However. I play with a buddy that does that. However, you know, knowing how to use certain irons at certain times. You know what I mean? That's that's the special, that's when it gets special. It's a crazy metaphor. Yeah. And we were talking about golf off camera. He really brought it full circle there. That's gonna connect with people. That's impressive. That's gonna connect with people. But yo, so fresh off tour with black. Yes. How many dates was it? Uh uh, it was a month. So I'm not even sure. I can't even calculate that up. Is that the first time you went on tour with him? With black? No, I've been I've been touring with black since 2017. Okay, for sure. So, like, just after a tour, how do you feel? Like, are you ready to just like just you know, snuggle up at home and never leave the crib for like or just hit the studio hard. Yeah, yeah, yeah. Get back to it. man. That's it. That's really it. Yeah, bro. Because when you're on the road, depends on what type of tour. Like, this was an opening tour. We were opening for Russ. So um, it was like we had a whole lot of time because we were only doing a 30-minute, 40 minute set.

We come to soundcheck. We don't even get soundcheck. We didn't get one soundcheck the whole time. We may have gotten like maybe one. What? No. Because everything is moving so fast. You get a line check where he's like, all right, can you hear? Can you hear? All right, let's go. No soundcheck for the opener though? Sounds wild. and these are what? These are arenas or yeah, yeah. Bro, what? Sometimes sometimes we do. Sometimes we do, but most of the time we don't because it just depends on how late they get set up and all that stuff. So they So them running behind is your problem now. Yeah, that's fuck, right? But I mean we've been doing it for for years, so it's like we don't need a soundcheck to we can just literally go in as long as y'all can hear us, we fine. Sure. Okay, but you have a lot of time on your hands somewhat. A lot of time. But if it's like uh our own headlining tour, it's not as much time because you gotta be there a lot longer, you gotta do a lot more. But I really enjoy opening to, act tours because you you have a lot more time and I can do whatever I want before and after the show. Like I don't have to stay to watch Russ or anybody that we're opening for, but most of the time when you're an opener, I mean when you're the headliner, it's like you gotta be around, you know what I mean? Yeah, so what did you do with all the time?

What'd you and black do? Man, I made these I I I just invested in like a little portable setup. So I'd be in my hotel room just banging it out. You know what I mean? Because tour, tour to me is I call it the great escape, you know what I mean? For for any adult, literally, because like when you're out on the road, you don't have to worry about home. You know what I mean? Yes, you just pay your bills, you know, pay your bills, send your money, whatever. But I love the text that's like, hey, can we um do this? Um oh I'm sorry, I'm out of town. That's literally my excuse. for everything. That's like crack, bro. Literally, my excuse. I can't do it. That's why you're always trying to go out of town. huh? I'm trying to go tomorrow. Especially for stuff I didn't want to do in the first place. It was like I'm out, you know what I mean? It's the greatest excuse. So when I'm out on the road, it's like that's that's what I'm doing. You know what I mean? But I've been trying to stay creative and productive while I'm out there, you know, just still creating and keeping that muscle going. So when I get home, I can you know hear my thoughts, you know what I mean? Here's something I think that could be a good gem. Um, what is your tour on the road setup look like? What are what's like a good set of um what are some essentials if we want to make music anywhere?

So I bring my my MAudio MIDI board, obviously. I'm I love using like actual keyboards with sounds on them, you know what I mean? But I have to use that because I have a bunch of sounds on my laptop. That and I use these IK multimedia um monitors. They're like small monitors, they got like Bluetooth and stuff on them, but those joints are so solid, like especially for like hotel setups, it's not too loud. You can get loud, but it's not too loud, and they fit in a little small bag or a suitcase if you wanted to. And my my interface, that's really it. Yeah, yeah, for sure. Yeah, you can't bring like a giant synth with you I wish. a bunch of sounds. Yeah. So are you and Black making music together? Or y'all kind of doing your own thing? Because obviously you have tons of placements with Black over the years. You guys have been working for a long time. You know what's so funny? Those all happen by accident. Well, what how so? What do you mean? I know it sounds crazy. Like, fur well, the very first placement I got with Black was um a Christmas album. Okay. And that was literally right after I got signed. It's like the Drake co-sign happened.

Maybe like a month or two later, I got signed, and then they was like, hey, you want to do this Christmas album? I was like, all right. And I thought I was gonna be doing it with somebody else, like with other producers. And then it was like, yeah, um, it's it took me a week to do all of those songs. So I had to like my turnaround had to be super fast. So I just like made the remakes, made them, and I had to like even demo them. And I demoed, you know, the song that Black has, and I sent it to him, and he cut it in like 20 minutes. And um after that, it was just like a it was like a really quick process, and I thought somebody else was coming, but nobody else ended up getting on the project. So I was like, all right, cool, this is fire. Okay. Well, you know, my first project. Um, and then that's how that one happened. It was like an accident. The second one happened. I just sent a bunch of loops to this producer that worked that was um pretty much EPN, his last project name, uh, Ford Slash. Really dope producer out of um out of uh the UK, or whatever. I love that name. Ford slash, yeah, he's fire. That's hard, he's fire. His his brain is just wired different.

Um and I just sent him a bunch of loops and he randomly hit me up. He was like, yo, Black really liked this one. And I was like, I don't even think Black knew it was gonna be on the I I did anything until like the project almost came out. And then this recent one that just came out. I did I did this camp. I can't say the camp, but I did the camp, and I was doing it with this uh artist, uh this producer named Los out of um out of LA. Okay. We were just in the camp making music for this artist specifically, and and I was the I I knew for some reason I was like, this is not gonna get placed for this project because you know the the sonics and the sound that they're going for is completely different. So I was like, this is not, you know, it's not gonna do anything here. So I just kind of threw it out of my mind. And then, like, maybe like a month before this song came out, uh, which is uh fuck the rap game. Okay, Black hit me. He was like, he was like, like, yo, you got credits on this record? And he sent me the video for it, and I was like, No. I was like, nah, I don't remember that one. He was like, well, Los

said you and him did it at this camp. And I was like, oh wow, I forgot about that. Because we did like five songs, five ideas. And I was like, oh wait, yeah, that does sound familiar now. Now that I think about it, so that was how that placement came about. That's what I love that story. Yeah, for so many reasons. We have uh we've had some like different views on camps on this podcast. It's it's honestly even less the camps and more just the like you completely put that out of your mind. Yeah, and now it's a black single. Yeah, like I would have never, thunk him. Yeah, I mean, and that just goes to show the power of collaboration, too. Yeah, yeah. You made this with Los. Obviously, he didn't forget about it, or someone on his team didn't forget about it, because someone got it to black, obviously. And I didn't even expect that record to be, because like that's such a chill record. Like, I wouldn't expect Black to be like, yo. Because the way he listens to music, he listens to a lot of unique stuff. You know what I mean? If you ever listen to his music, none of his stuff sounds like anything that's out. Not to say that this one does, but this one is a little more like center field, where it's like, oh, this feels like something.

You know what I mean? Something that I've heard or familiar with. And um, yeah, it was just, it was just it was real crazy how that happened, man. I was like, oh, that was that was real dope. You know what I mean? So I love center field. Yeah, as definitely. So we had Junior on from LVRN. Yep. I remember seeing that. Yeah, yeah. And so I asked him this question, and he told me I'd have to ask Black, and we haven't gotten Black on the podcast yet. So maybe you could help with that. But I'm gonna ask you, is Black a rapper? Like, how does he like what does he identify as like what are his pronouns? You're stupid. Yeah, like is rapper one of them or what? Black is definitely a rapper. Like he he loves hip hop. Like, I don't know if you know of his father. I don't. Oh my god. I'm not familiar. See, rapper with Mr. Black. His father, I wouldn't even call him a rapper. His father is a lyricist. Like poet. Who is it? His name is uh Sick Flow. Okay on Instagram. Wow. Like he's a he he's a barist. Okay, you know what I mean? And I was like, oh, this is probably where Black gets it from.

And then I I obviously black probably took some of that liking until when he was growing, and you know, that's back when the bar having bars was like the thing. The thing. Yeah. So he's definitely a rapper, but he's also smart because he understands people love melody. Yeah. So when you intertwine those two, it's like you low key can't lose, which is why Drake wins. Yeah. For sure. So what was your role on the tour? I'm a black's musical director. Okay, so but are you performing? Yeah, Yeah. I'm performing on stage. Yeah, so what are you playing? I'm playing keys and bass. Keys and bass. And then musical director. Musical director. I arrange all of the music, make it sound like movies and all that stuff. Four shows for him. Four shows for him. Okay. And a lot of other people too. Yeah, no, I I saw that term that you use musical director for, you know, you did the the uh tiny desk with you know Flo Millie. Yep. And I was like, musical director. And I didn't know. This is the guy that knows what the fuck is going on. Yeah.

So how drastically, because I think this is actually a good, you know, lesson for a lot of our community. It's like, how drastically are you changing the studio versions for the live show? It depends on the artist. Sure. Like for Flo Milli, like I had like a whole lot of arrangements and things that were because tiny, when you do tiny desk, everybody knows when you do tiny desk, that's the time to be as creative as you can. Because people will never hear that live. You know what I mean? So, but for her and a lot of artists, even like Jack Harlow, like they're they're not, they don't really want to hear like a lot of the extra bells and whistles and stuff. They just want like, yo, just play the record. Let's just play it how it is. You know what I mean? Which is cool. It's boring for musicians. Are you fighting the urge to want to just add the bells and whistles? Um, no, not really. Because I I at the end of the at the end of the day, I understand people are connected to their art and they may hear it a specific way, which that's how they connect with it. And if they connect with it and they have a huge fan base, those fans connect to it just as well. You know what I mean?

So I'm never, buttoned up, you know, like I want to do this, what you know what I mean? It's just like it is what it is. Like at the end of the day, I'm doing a service. Like being a producer, being a musical director, being a musician, it's still a service to the artists or still a service to the people. You know what I mean? So let's walk through. I I think because I mean NPR got it right with Tiny Desk. I mean, holy shit, What a, what a brand. What a legendary like bit of culture, honestly, like over the years, right? There's just been so many countless, you know, tiny desks that we all have come to know and love. Like, but I don't think anyone's really ever gotten like a sneak peek or like kind of like a peek behind the curtains as to like how it all even works, right? So, like Flo Millie gets teed up for her tiny desk. Uh-huh. Then can you just walk us through like what happens from like the time she knows that she's going to do it to then like the time that the camera is shut off after the last fucking song is done from their performance? I like this question. You know what I mean? Like, just literally paint the picture of like what actually goes down. A whole lot of waiting, a whole lot of, man, there was, I'm not gonna lie to you.

That was all that was a low-key stressful because Flo Milli's so busy, and her team, they also work with Gunna. So they're like super busy day in, day out working with them. You know, oh yeah, we were supposed to have Ebony on the pod for two years running now. Yeah, Ebony's the girl. I just know she busy, so I can't really be mad cause they got work, they got it, they gotta do stuff. So basically, like maybe a couple weeks before we did the performance, um, they was like, yo, let's hop on a call. You hop on a call, and they were like, yo, you know, let's do this, let's do that. And we we figure out um set list. That's the first thing, you know. So she's like, I want to do these songs. These songs specifically, yeah. But I didn't, I don't they didn't have that just yet. They just was like, you know, let's just let's just figure something out. So I kind of, you know, I had to use a cheat code, which is my girlfriend. I like because she listens to Flo Millie a lot. And I've listened to Flo Millie a lot, but I listen to so much music, you know what I mean, that I don't necessarily have a specific music that I just listen to a lot. You also listen to it differently as someone who makes music.

Than someone who's just a fan of music. Absolutely. and a fan of her, exactly. It's a different ear. So my girl sent me like a short list of songs that like her most popular. Then I also went and did some research on her uh social media to see what were the trending songs, you know what I mean, that people want to hear. And after that, I came up with a set list and sent it to them. They were like, Yeah, we like this. Let's change these two songs. I was like, all right, cool. And from there, I figured out a way to put them in order to make them make sense, whether that's keys or story, storyline, or even just like tempos, you know what I mean? Like, okay, these two songs, they work well together because they're in the same tempo. So I figure out a way to transition them to where it seems seamless, almost like a DJ, uh DJ. Yeah, you know what I mean? But DJing, but musically, you know what I mean? So I'll figure out a way to transition those two together, and then you know, I'll be like, all right, well, you can do a talking point here, and after that, I'll add like little little nuances in the song that accent their vocals, like breaks, stop outs, or if we're playing the same melody is what they're singing, just to really accentuate the music. Cause it's like my whole goal as a music director is to really bring out stuff in the song that people wouldn't normally listen to because they're just listening to the music, the the vocals.

You turn a passive listener into an active listener, literally. Literally. Oh shit. Literally. He's creating moments. Literally. It's my favorite. Do we talk about this? It's my favorite term. It's like if we could point to anything in all of the songs that we know and love, it's that they have these moments. Yeah, right? Like there's just very special moments. Yeah, very special moments that like are you know accented to your point. Like they're they're highlighted in some way. They're easy to talk about, they're easy to remember, like share. Yeah, can you? Well, you it makes you like, huh? Yeah, what was that? Yeah, it makes you rewind it, you know, turn that shit back. Like we see that again. My cheat code, if you will, is figuring out nuances of everybody people's everyday lives that they didn't know they're used to hearing and adding it into the song to make it more of like an immersive feeling. Like an example, give us a an example would be like, for instance, there was this one part on her her, she ended up cutting it, and I was so sad because I was like, Damn, that would have been so fire. Um, but there was this one part where she was like straight out of the mobile, and then just relax. And on that part, I had our guitar player play sweet home Alabama.

Oh shit. And she was like, I'm not sure. She may be too young, but I'm not sure if she knew the cultural significance how important that was. That would have been so crazy. Like, people would have been like, oh my god. And burning and then down and then burning and down. That's not sweet home, Alabama. That's literally uh that's walk this way. Yeah, talk about the guitar part though. Walk this way, that's walk this way. Sweet. Sweet home. Someone check out Alabama. Yo, editor, editor, can you go? Yeah, don't try Slimwav, bro. Why would I ever be right in that situation? Literally, he's the music director, and he thought of this idea, and you're like, nah, bro, this is how it goes. Sit down, Henry. I don't think she's like, I don't think she knew it. Like, I don't think she knew it, so she cut it because she didn't, I guess she didn't understand it. I was like, that's fair.

That's fair. Because it probably would have thrown her off. And but that was one of the ones I was like, that would have been special to have because that would have been something that connected you with your fans and family back home, and also connected you to a whole nother demographic that probably don't listen to your music, you know what I mean? Yeah, so then do you have to play her then? So you come up with the set list based on their initial feedback. Yeah. You start to think about these moments that you can create to like highlight the music. Then do you like record a demo for her? I record a demo. I just strip all of the music and just use their vocals and like play it live and just send them like an idea of what it for Tiny Desk is, at least. Sure. But for anything else, I would just keep like most of the stuff in there and just add like some you know little bells and whistles and stuff that are are reminiscent of live music. And you know, because you you kind of got once again, a lot of artists, not to say familiar is not, but a lot of artists they and and people in general, they don't have the vision. So I can tell you, you know, I can tell you this idea in my mind, but you're not gonna understand it until I just just put it on wax for you and you know show you a demo, you know what I mean? And I think that's where a lot of them are.

So I have to do that, or they're not gonna understand. Yeah, so then okay, so you have the demo. Then is there are there rehearsals? Kind of like what happens after that. Yeah, we did um we did a couple rehearsals. We did two rehearsals in Atlanta, and then we did one in DC. Um, she came to one of them. We was a little afraid because like she was only able to come to one because she had so many shows going on. Um, so we did one and then we we did a run through the day of and we was like, I hope this goes well. You rehearsal without the artist. You have to because that's why it's important to keep stuff is for people like that. It's important to keep it simple, you know what I mean? So it doesn't, you know, throw off. Yeah, well, because it comes back to like her schedule. Literally. She just can't make the rehearsals. But if she was able to make all the rehearsals, then I'm sure a lot of the stuff would have been gravy, you know what I mean? Yeah. Dang. Okay, so then we've done the rehearsals. And so is Tiny Desk filmed in DC? It's filmed in DC at um NPR. NPR is like main location, I guess.

Okay. So then what? It's like it's go time. We got the the like schedule date. So the process for that is like you get there early in the morning, um, you get set up, you do a run through from like 12 to 1, and then after the run through, you take a break, and then you come back and do it one time, one take Jake, and that's it. Some of the some people get some people get the the privilege of like, you know, can I do this over? Can I do this? Flo definitely was like, I want to do this this talking point over because I just didn't feel like I you know articulated myself properly. So she definitely got to do that over, but most of the time, like the other times I've done it is like one take Jake. So which other ones have you done? Uh I've done Summer Walkers, I've done uh, Westside Boogie. Yeah, I've done Drums. Drums was a um at home one. Was it COVID? Yeah, COVID. I I count that one, but it's it almost feels like the bubble, you know what I mean? Oh yeah. The NBA bubble is like if you win a championship in a bubble. it doesn't count. it's got an asterisk.

Yeah, low key. So I you know, I still count it. It's a ring for me, you know. Oh absolutely. No, I mean I'm fascinated by Tiny Desk in general, yeah. Um, and so yeah, for me, that that was just something I definitely wanted to cover because I don't feel like I had any idea like how it works. And so then, yeah, so it's one take Jake and then just comes out and they don't even tell you when it comes out. No, like I I asked one of the producers, well, she had hit me up, she's like the day before she's like, yo, this junk is so fire, like y'all sounded so good. And I was like, oh, really? Because we was nervous, we were like, we didn't know how it was gonna turn out because you kind of can't hear while you're there because you gotta play so low so that you can hear the artist. Oh, so interesting. All right, so then yeah, obviously, you play like 11 instruments. So as a producer, how how much of an advantage do you feel like you have over producers who don't play instruments? I have an advantage, but I also have I have a dis disadvantage. Why? Okay, so why is it an advantage to play multiple instruments? And then why is it a disadvantage? It's an advantage to play most instruments because I understand how every instrument is supposed to work, how everything um, how everything works, how everything's supposed to just happen.

You know what I mean? What instruments are good for certain songs, what instruments aren't good for certain songs. It's a disadvantage because I have so much knowledge sometimes it cripples me into overthinking. You know what I mean? Yes. It's like, do I use my seven or my eight iron? Bring it back to golf. Do I use my seven or my eight iron? Like, honestly, I can smack my eight iron one thirty. But at the same token, it just feels better to hit a seven because I know I might get a little closer to the pin. You know what I mean? So it's kind of like one of them things. It's like at your discretion, bro. Like, honestly, it it literally is. It's like you just gotta you gotta fill it out. And a lot of things that producers that don't play instruments have, they have that feeling of no technicality. You know what I mean? When you're when you're new to something and you're green to it, you're the most vulnerable, you're at the most, you know, open state of it because like you can just do it and not care about mistakes. Like I'm thinking of like, okay, if I do this, this is gonna be a mistake. If I do that, this is gonna be a mistake. Which you know, I've kind of like come back from that and not cared as much. But at the same token, you know what I mean?

It's it's just one of them things. If you know the rules, you're less likely to try and bend them, break them, etc. But ignorance is bliss. Yeah, it's easier to break them when you don't know them. Yeah, I'm just gonna go. It goes back to the Mexico Joe clip. dude. I know. It's like my I don't know what A B C D literally. I don't know nothing about no keys, and that's like a lot of people. I just said sounds good, and that's why the biggest songs are viral right now. Like, even on TikTok, people can hate on TikTok, but all but the reality of it is like these people are just coming into music. They have no information and no like anything on no preconceived notions. They just know feelings for the moment. And if the feeling for the moment is like, I want to get drunk and drive. There's so many people that identify with that. And then it goes viral because opposed to someone that's like trying to figure out how to poetically say, I've been drinking and driving, like you know, to the guy just fucking says it. Yeah. No, literally. No, literally. How much overthinking do you think? This is an interesting question. I'm trying to figure out how to phrase this without sounding bizarre.

But how much overthinking exists within the music industry in general? Um man, it just depends on the person. I feel like every fucking creative that I know and talk to is just in their own head, bro. Literally. With the exception of maybe to your point, some of these like green, younger, just you know, just fresh to it and excited about it. And don't don't give a fuck because they just do it. Just do it. But anyone that's been doing it for like any amount of time is so just in their own head. Literally. Because you you feel like you don't have a a lot of room to make error. Yeah. And it's and it's also a very like ego centric industry. Obviously, like we, you know, we're putting art out there. Yeah, people are gonna judge it. That that's a that's a that's that whole thing in itself is a is a is a you know is a mind bend because it was like there's a sweet line between newer artists and artists that you know grew up on specific artists. Like obviously, I wasn't one that grew up listening to like the princess and the Michael Jacksons and the, you know what I mean, the Kendricks and the Lauren Hills and the you know anybody, yeah.

And in that era, you had to be a perfectionist. Like you had to really study your craft and get great at it, opposed to now, is like none of that matters. Yeah, it used to cost a hundred grand to make an album. Literally. Now none of that matters. It is like, how can you connect with people around you? And that and how can you relate to people around you? Do you think it's good, bad, and different? It's both. Both. It's both. It's bad because it hurts the music community and it creates a extremely low bar for the entry of music. Yeah. But at the same time, it's good because it gets people that were above that bar to come down and get out of their feelings and just make regular music for people. Yeah. So if I'm a producer and I want to learn how to play an instrument, what's like the first one that I should learn? Keys. Easily keys, bro. Well, I I guess it sounds easy, but I'm like a kindergartner in this case. Why, why should it it translates? You can, you know, you can pull up a plug in and get any other instrument if you know your core.

It's easy to learn chords and stuff too, and visualize them. Yeah, outside of outside of country music or rock, um, those are the only two genres. I could be wrong, but those are the main two genres that really use. Or guitar heavy Guitar heavy. Yeah, yeah. Um, but every other genre, whether it's gospel, blues, um hip hop, even hip hop, RB, they use melodic notes from keyboards, you know what I mean? Okay, and so for you, when you know, when did you first pick up an instrument? Like how old were you? I was young. My dad was a drummer in a jazz band. Okay. And um he had some drums, and then one day he was doing some work on this lady's house. Um, and she was like, Hey, I got like these instruments. My husband, I'll just divorce my husband or something like that. And you know, you want them? He was like, Yeah, so it was like a fender guitar, a bass, and keyboard and stuff. So he brought it home, and he was like, yo, you know, he didn't force me to listen to music, but my dad was my hero. I have to play drums. Like he's a drummer, so I was trying to figure it out. And it was just naturally a natural gift. So from there, I just kind of gravitated from instrument to instrument. Then once I got to high school, I picked up horns and all that stuff.

So yeah. No, I just love the content. You know, we were talking about it off camera. Like he's he makes y'all go check out some wave content because literally, since he does play so many instruments, he does this content where like he edits himself Brady Bunch style. Yeah, the Brady Bunch style where it's it's him playing every single instrument, like five plus instruments in this piece of content. I don't know why I stopped doing that. And that I love your content, bro. Please make more. Yeah, that was how the Drake thing happened. That's what I'm saying. Like that was from a piece of content, obviously. So, like, guys, yeah. Drake ain't finding you making the fucking music in your bedroom and not posting about it. So, like nobody is gonna send a SWAT team to your house to pull music off your hard drive. Right, right. So are there any other stories about how, like, you know, posting a piece of content, showing your like music abilities led to maybe like yeah, awareness or something? So I have two stamps on my page. One is the Drake thing, I'll never take that down. Yeah, and the other one is the very first clip where it's like I have a I create a band called Waverly. Okay, and Waverly is like, I was just in my my um my studio making like these like retro sound and samples, you know what I mean?

Where it's a bunch of me's in the building in the in the place, and it just looks like a band. Yeah, so I posted that, and you know, I was like, I was like, this is me trying to be more consistent. And I started posting that. I only did like five of these videos, five or six. So I posted that maybe by the fourth, that was like the third or the fourth one, and I was just like, I'm just keep posting, you know, something's gonna happen, something cool is gonna happen. So around that time, I get a call from London, my boy London on track. Because I always I was already working with him on the Diddy stuff. He's like, yo, man, I'm about to fly to New York um to do this um this Mary J camp or this Mary J session. I was like, Yeah, I'm down, like let's do it. So we get there, and we're just going through beats, and she's not really liking a lot of the new stuff because she's like, no, I'm like, my fans, they want like they want retro Mary. they want Mary. I can't do like the new sound. Like, I understand the sound and I love it. But my fans want the old stuff. So I was like, yo, I text London on this. I was like, yo, man, I got like these old sounded samples like that that sound retro that sound like something, you know. And he was like, Man, just send them to me.

So he clicks on the first one and it starts playing. She's like, Oh, I like that one. And I was like, oh shoot. So, like the the this story is actually insane. Like, she's like, I like this one. Like, so her and Jazzy immediately, it was like, pull this up, let's start working on this one. So they pull it up, and I'm just sitting there like, wow, this is cool. This is happening. So I step out, I step out on my on a like a little break, and I pull up my phone and I was like, why is my TikTok going so crazy? Like, this is my first time having any type of action or motion on TikTok. Like, why is my TikTok going crazy? And then I open it up and it's the video of that, of that song that they were in there recording. They shot a video of it. No, no, no. So the thing was like uh it was like a little, it was a little, you know, 30-second clip. And it just randomly started taking off? It randomly started taking off, and it really threw me off because I was like, the timing, like they're in there recording to this right now. Yeah.

Real old time and sample. So as they're in there recording to it, I step out and on TikTok, this video is going up. And I'm like, How old had it, or like, you know, how long before had you posted it? It was a week. It was only posted for like a week. It does, it does that sometimes. You know, we had that. And it was so random. It was so random. Because like the first two days, zero. TikTok, the TikTok got a new Mary. Wait, Mary likes it? It's fucking dude. China's crazy. And how I found out I got the placement was even wilder. Cause I was like, my girl was like, yo, this is like a good start. You need to, you need to capitalize on this. Like, capitalize on this. So we did the session, and then like a week later, I was like, all right, I'm setting up. Cause you know, just stuff just never comes out sometimes. You could be waiting for years. So I was like, all right, well, I'm about to upload this instrumental. You know what I mean? Cause he was like, where's the instrumental? Where's the instrumental? So I started to upload the instrumental and I started to promote it on TikTok. And then one of Mary's people um reached out to me. He was like, yo, they didn't like that.

They was like, yo, take this down. Like, what are you doing? And I was like, what do you mean? What am I doing? He was like, Mary's gonna use this on her project. I was like, well, that's a great way to know you got a placement. You could have let me know, yeah. I mean, that's a great way to know you got a placement, but it was like, all right, cool. So I took it down, and um that that was the story of that. That's amazing, man. So is this is this girl? Are you still with this girl? That it's the same girl that did the Flo Milli AR research, and then she actually was the one. She's the one. No, no, no, literally. I never went down on one knee tonight, bro. Like, I never second guessed that. She was she was also, she was also the one that told me to do the Drake song. No, bro. Very coincidental. She's the fucking keeper, bro. No, very coincidental. Like the day the Drake song came out, she's like, I think this would be really dope if you did it on horns. I was like, and normally, normally me, I'm like, all right, cool. She's like, you're not gonna do it. And I was like, yeah, I'm about to do it right now. Cause I'm like, all right, I'm gonna stop not listening to you. Oh my god.

I was like, I did it the next morning and just posted it, and she was like, see? Yeah. As if you already shouldn't listen to your girl, you know, just for other reasons. Like actually. This sounds like career advice at the moment. Her receipts her receipts are heavy. That's crazy, man. Um, so I just want to touch on the you know, something you mentioned there about how Mary really wanted to make music uh in the lane that like she knew her fans would appreciate. Yeah, yeah. That's a kind of a big one. It's an interesting thing, right? I mean, it doesn't work for everybody though. Yeah, so like how do you feel about that? How should artists approach that, right? Because in my mind, there's kind of two options. One is that you know, honestly, your fan base isn't really letting you evolve if you kind of take that approach. And I think I think, yeah, they don't let you evolve a lot. They don't let you evolve, but they do. But I feel like your your evolution has to come years down the line. For instance, like, you have to give them a bunch of what they already love first. Yeah, first before you try to switch into a whole nother lane.

Like, obviously, childish Gambino was giving people what they wanted for so long, so he was like, All right, now I'm gonna now do the left to center stuff that I really love. And then that's when he had evolved to a whole new person, you know what I mean? Did Mary not give them enough for fucking decades? She did, but but I feel like her audience being out there a little older, you can't, there's no there's no evolution. There's in in that world, maybe because she was honestly heavy hip hop RB, you know, you know, hood queen. Yeah, but as she evolved, it became more melodic. Like, that's when she started working with uh Brian Michael Cox, and that that shifted her whole world. But yeah, it's definitely tough for legacy acts at that point. Right. You have a really like strong fan base from like a long time ago at that point. Yep. I hate to interrupt this episode, but guys, I got one thing on the mind right now, and it's data. I can't stop thinking about it. All the artists in 2024 are winning because of data. They know who their fans are. They have access to their fans.

Do you? Spotify is not telling you who your fans are. Apple Music ain't telling you who your fans are. But our friends over at DistroKid created a feature called HyperFollow. Every single release, you can set up a pre-save campaign with a hyper follow and get access to every single fan's email address. Now you can let them know when you have a show coming up, when you're dropping exclusive merch, when you're going live. And without the data, you're just bound by the algorithms of TikTok, Instagram, YouTube. No more relying on those platforms. We're going straight to our fans. DistroKid is the best DIY distributor. You can upload unlimited music for a ridiculously low rate. And you're gonna have access to features like HyperFollow. OMT Distro.com, you're gonna get 30% off when you sign up for DistroKid, and you can start collecting your fans' data today. Henry, let's get back into it. So yeah, you mentioned that you've done um musical direction not just for the tiny desk, but also just for like live shows. Are you kind of are you again embracing any of that type of shit where it's like if you're in Detroit, you're gonna do a certain thing or New York or you know what I mean? Like, how do you approach musical direction just for like a tour or like a live show that's not a tiny desk?

I get real deep into details, like where's the artist from? What do their audience look like? What type of music does their audience listen to? Can I find any interviews where I can use vocal clips from what they're talking about? What does the artist embody? Because all of these things are gonna make it more of an immersive feeling for for that song. We're gonna send him the audio for this podcast after this. Just in case. Right. Um, so it's like, yeah, it's just it just depends. All of those things matter, man. And and most musicians they just go into and be like, all right, let's just do some musical stuff. Let's do some, you know, cool hits and whatever. But I'm more like, I gotta get deep into it because I want to make this more so not just like musical direction, but scoring the film for someone's show. You know what I mean? No, it's so interesting. Yeah, so we, you know, we talked with Junior about how like, you know, LVRN are are the goats of storytelling, right? So their artists do it, them as a label management publishing company, they do it. Um, so did you go on the Since I Have a Lover tour with Black as well?

Yep. Okay. And so did you do the musical direction for that? And so Junior talked about how they like to try and bring the album to life in the live show. Yep. What are there any examples of how that was done with let's just take the Since I Have a Lover tour as an example? Like, you know, based on the project, what did we do within the live show, both like musically and then maybe like creatively, like visually, you know what I mean? Like how did they bring it to life? We brought it to life because like certain sounds and certain sonics make for, like I said, that immersive feeling. When you have trees on a stage, things are very reminiscent of the project artwork, things that are really like, for instance, we were in like these lawn suits. Um, like the band we were like in these lawn suits that had like black on the back and six on the front or something like that, which kind of alluded to the fact that we were like in the scene of the the artwork, which was like a very, you know, earthy purple and stuff like that. So it's like just creating all of those nuances that put people in a world that allows you to receive the music different from when you're just listening to in your headphones in your own room.

Yeah, for sure. What about any of the uh I guess like musical, you know, selections? Like, how did you kind of impact the music of the show? Uh Sonics, Sonics, and that that that's where the knowing what instruments and you know all that stuff comes into play because it's like cause there's a live band, right? Yeah. Okay. So that's what you mean. Yeah, like certain songs, I'm like, man, this song would be really amazing, acoustic, or with just, you know, with the bass or something like that. So bringing all those elements out that strip stuff down or even add to songs to really make them feel like, oh wow, I've never heard in this light, but this makes me feel even more connected to it. Yeah, so which instruments to use, even how to use them. Yep. Damn. Yeah, huge. It's deeper than y'all think, bro. It gets really deep. You know what you're doing. It's it sounds like a like he's a movie director, really. No, there's a lot of similarities. I definitely want to get into scoring. I was gonna say, do you want to do that? Yeah, absolutely. What's been your favorite uh score recently from a movie? One of my favorite scores from a movie it would probably be um I actually got a placement in it. It was They Cloned Tyrone.

Okay. They clone Tyrone has a really dope score. Whoever um did the actual um music supervision for it, they did a really good job because they really painted these scenes with the with with certain music that just fit, you know what I mean? Interesting. Oh man. No, I I'm like a movie, like I love movie music more than I even love like the movies. Yeah, you know what I mean? Like I'm paying attention to that shit for sure. Do you watch uh Jordan Peele movies? I've seen them, yeah. So obviously, you know, all of their movies are very eerie, very like it makes you think like, what? But the music coincides with that. The music is like what? Oh wow, the music is very unsettling and it's very like, uh, what is that? You know what I mean? But it makes me understand this this this scene. It reinforces the feeling that he's going for. Yeah. So your loop game is obviously, like extremely strong. I mean, you mentioned already a few placements where you've provided what the industry would, you know, yeah, term loops, right? You've also made content that I think is hilarious that you need to keep doing if you have time.

Homeless loops. Oh, yeah. I think you've titled it different things in each part, but I like homeless homeless loops. Like find a home, find a home for these loops. That's actually the one I ended up on. I know. All right. It's amazing. I'm gonna keep this one. I know. It was like the first was like loops for sale. I don't know, whatever. Like loops for sale, literally. Yeah, but then fourth, or like homeless loops is amazing. Trial and error, bro. Yeah, but but so like what kind of percentage do you think that loop makers deserve on records? Because I feel like this is such a polarizing topic. Like loops is so crazy, bro. Like, yeah. Because 99% of the time they're not in the sessions where the song's being made, right? And it does that depends on a person. If you're just some you know, Joe Schmo just hitting people's emails, sending them 30 loops, they're gonna treat you like that. Yeah, but I rarely get treated like that because people know who I am, or if they call me, they're like, okay, this guy's specific. I can you know ask him for something. So most of the time when I do loops, they're like, yo, we're gonna treat you fair. But a lot of times, you know, you'll get certain people that are like, well, you know, you just created a loop.

But in the same token, it's like, yes, I created a loop, which is the meat and potato of the song. If you just did drums on something, to me, that's not that's not the meat and potato of the songs. You know what I mean? The melody is king. Interesting. And everything we do. Yeah, it's it's so wild though, because we talked with uh Troy well and and Troy Taylor. Yeah. He just said melody is king, which is literally the words on one of our most viral clips. That was that was actually a gem I got from Troy Taylor. There you go. Yeah, well, so Troy Taylor talked about how like, you know, there's the clearly the difference between beat maker and producer, right? So do you you know, the way he argued it is that like if you're not in the session, you're not the producer. He boy he kind of basically said that. That he's like that is true, but still in that in that world, a lot of producers that are in the session aren't producing. What do you mean? So if I send a beat, if I send a loop to someone and they make they put drums on it, and they're just in a session while the artist is recording, they didn't really produce no direction, no help. No, Like, but if for instance, Los, this is a perfect example of Los.

I played, you know, with him in the session, I played like the loop, whatever we made together. But on the back end, he did a lot of post-production. He did a lot of work, which means he deserved a little more of the credit. I'm never mad at that. So that to me is producing. Like he took what the little small idea we did and he embellished it so much to where it was like, oh, this sounds, you know, even bigger than what we did. Yeah, but what do you think? Like, how much do you think the that they're like being in the session because of the relationship side of things? Like, how much does that count for? I knew the artist, I got it placed. You know what I mean? Like, who cares if you just did the drums? A lot of people? A lot of people do that too, which is like, you know, it's technically it's fair, but in the end, it's like if you're a producer that doesn't have any work, it's like you can't argue with that. Like, I can argue a little bit, but even in my argument, it doesn't matter to me because I'm like, okay, this is a layup. Like, you don't win a game, you don't win a game off of one layup. You know what I mean? It takes a bunch of layups to really win the game, and nobody's ever just become successful, like, oh, I just did music today and I made a hit tomorrow, and this just changed my life, which is possible from social media, but um, it's out of sight out of the mind.

So it's like I'll just work, work, work until it comes. Something comes, and then the more things by the end of the year, I'm like, oh wow, this looks good. You know what I mean? It's just it's very crazy, man. It's I think it's key what you said earlier too about like you were treated different because you had this brand, you know. You're you had posted content, you have people following you, whatever. You have an engagement. Like, you know, as much as people would love to be able to win without any type of like resume on social media, he's literally being treated differently because people can see who he is. Yeah, that's the importance of a personal brand. And he's doing things that they also value outside of just loops. The artists are coming to, I mean, either labels slash artists are coming to you for this musical direction side of things. So that almost just tips me off of like, let's get in another bag. Like let's showcase our creativity in another way that other people find valuable so that we're not just this loop maker behind an Instagram and email account. Exactly.

No one knows what you look like, no one knows what other things you have to bring to the table. Like, all you're doing is sending emails with fucking wave files of loops, which like we appreciate it. Don't get me wrong. That's also where I kind of I don't like sending beat packs as much. I do it because I'm like, okay, something can happen from it, but when you there's no different, there's no greater feeling of being in that session and playing the loop pack. Like sending the loop pack is like, all right, cool. But when you're in there playing them, they hear it different. I don't know what it is. And you can see the reactions. You can see their reaction. Cause it's like if I'm telling if I if I send you something and usually listen to your phone, you're like, oh, this is cool, this is cool. But there's been plenty of times where I like send something to somebody, and then like just out of sheer curiosity, like when I'm around them, we'll play it on speakers and then like, oh, what's this? What is your like how are you like when they're playing? You know, like how you do. What do you literally what do you physically do? Like if I'm listening to someone else's music, no, you're playing a loop. Your own loops. What do you what do you look like when you're playing? Like, I'm the artist.

All right, no, hold on. I love this example. I'm the hottest rapper in Atlanta. He loves this. All right, you're in you pulled it into my session. Yeah. Because you, I mean, you want to you want to placement with me, obviously. I'm the producer. And you got loose. I didn't give you that. I gave it to me. Okay, fine. You're the producer. You're playing the loop. I brought in Slim Wave. Yeah, he brought you in. This guy's got fire loops. He's got the best loops in the fucking game, bro. You click play. What are you doing? What do you physically look like? I know it may sound a little cocky, but I'm completely still. Really? I'm completely still. I've been I've been in sessions where like producers, they're trying to sell it to you, and a lot of people are dumb. They oversell it? They oversell it like they're like and I'm just, you know what I mean? It's so annoying. Because like they're trying to sell it to you. And a lot of times that worked. Because like I said, people aren't creative. They just they just know they're being they're being controlled. You know what I mean? I feel like you also want to like believe that your producer believes in what they're making too. It's Like a line.

I believe. I believe in it that much that I know if you don't like it, somebody's gonna take it. So I'm most of the time, most of the time, I'm just still like next. Scratching. No matter what, these records are going outside, whether it's you or not, you know what I mean? And I would hate for it to be a situation where we're like, oh, I passed up on that that beat, and then somebody else takes it. And it's like, I've been longing for that. That that moment where someone passed up on the beat and I sent to somebody else, but at the same token, it's like everything's not gonna be for everybody. Everybody's not in the same, you know, state of mind when it comes to music. Yeah. what's your ideal studio session like? You know what I mean? Like, are you cooking up? Are you just playing shit you've already made specifically for an artist? Are you going through random shit? Are you talking? Like, what what do you like? just your personal favorite. I hate Playing stuff that I already made. I like making new stuff on the spot because I'm also like a person like what do you feel like today? You know what I mean? Like, obviously, I can play beats that you may identify with like, oh, this is cool, but my specialty is scoring life moments. So if I play you a beat that I did like two weeks ago and it was just like on some hip-hop or some R and B, like some dark stuff, you may not be in that vibe.

So when I started to say something like, yo, what's been going on in life? How you been? You know, they don't know I'm like interviewing them to figure out how I'm gonna make this beat. So as soon as they're telling me, like, man, I've been in a really like weird space. As soon as I hear weird, I hear the uh a chord that um is uh I call it a question chord, and I've automatically like any word that you say has a chord. So if you said, Man, I've been feeling really sad and going in minor, I've been feeling really happy. Yeah, I've been feeling really like really like odd lately, or I've been trying to figure stuff out. There's a chord for everything. Can you list the chords off right now? No, I can't. Okay, I was gonna say this would be a cool like I can only like play in the moment. Okay, so like that's such a gem. That's more important than being able to list it. That allows me to get a bet a better chance at a placement, though. Because it's like at least I know if you're connected right here in this moment, you're gonna connect so deep that you're gonna write the best song you can because you're here in the moment. You know what I mean? You're gonna give a better performance too. Give a better performance opposed to me just dropping a beat on you, and like I'm just gonna put some crap down. Bro, that just comes back to the human element of music.

Yeah, yeah. We're fucking humans, bro. You're straight so far away from it. The creators are humans, the people making the shit are humans that are having bad days, good days, confusing days, sad days, whatever. And then us as the listeners also are humans, right? We don't always want to be fucking happy. Literally, we don't always want to be piped up, turnt up, going to the club. Coding uh computed, you know what I mean? Yeah, yeah. It's wild, man. No, I think that is that is a fucking cheat code, bro. Cheat code wave. Cheat code wave. That's Cheat code wave. We've entered a final segment of the podcast. I love how he said cheat code a few times throughout the interview, and then I just put two and two together that that's your branding actually. Yeah, it is. He's he's so fucking calculated, bro. Working on that. This dude knows what he's doing. We gotta do some content with that. Yeah, yes. Well, we'll see how he does on the rapid fire rampage. Oh, yeah. Let's see if he's got the cheat code to this. Let's see.

There's no blueprint been made for it. Yeah. There's three sections. We're just gonna start with some short answer questions. Let's get into it. Rampage! Starting with On a scale of one to ten, rate Ben as an interviewer and be honest. Ten. Ah. Let's go. All right. Ten for sure. Very fluent. Never end up, never a dead space. Everything's cool. Oh, yeah. No. Come on, bro. I'll give you that. Let's go. Good shit, brother. 200 plus episodes. I gotta be. I should have quit if I couldn't at least get like a seven. Yeah, yeah. If you said anything less than seven, this would be the last episode. Eight was my bar to not fire you. I was giving me a seven, but wave. What are can I call you wave? Yeah. Everyone calls you slim. I don't call you wave. What are three easy things that producers could start doing tomorrow to make better music? Listen to listen to some of the greats, number one. Number two, practice learning a instrument. It doesn't matter what instrument. And number three, being open, being open to different genres. That's big.

That's huge. Yes. Mm-hmm. That's so big. I say that because growing up in church, like when you grew up in church, like back in the 90s or or whatever, you play literally every genre of music. Now today we're doing more like CCM soft rock stuff in church, but literally we played funk, we played jazz, we played salsa, we played polka, we played all of these things. We play country and church, like everything, literally. Yeah. So that's also what she called. Your church sounded lit. It sounds lit. No, this was literally all churches across the board. Literally. I wasn't. A lot of our guests have come up in the church. You know, started playing music in church. Dude, the church is where all stars are born. I'm not even going to lie, bro. But that's why their music is so cold now, because nobody's going to church. Damn. Okay. We're not gonna. That's such a hot take. I love it. We'll do a part two. Yeah. Um what is one of the weirdest inspirations you've had for a beat or a song random something? Oh that's a good question. Yeah. One of the weirdest beats or inspirations I've had for a song. Something where you're like, ooh, I gotta, oh, I can make this.

Man, I don't know. That's a that's a crazy one. I'm a um, you know what I mean? When it comes to music, bro, I'm a nerd. so like I'll hear a hum and be like, oh, I hear that sounds like this, so this makes me feel like that. I don't know. It's it's that's a hard one. Okay. Could be it could be anything. It's The smallest things for him. So small. it's a hum. Interesting. What's a conspiracy theory you secretly believe in? A conspiracy theory, I secretly believe in is that the NBA is scripted. Ooh. That's not related to music. I think all professional sports borderline that there's a chance. No, Bronny just ended up on the Lakers. That's crazy. Yeah, or how they threw game three of the the finals. Cause I'm like, Well, you know, what is a fact is that they make more money when there's more games. So I'm just I'm not saying anything else is true, but that part is true. You said it, not me. That's just a fact. I didn't say it was you know scripted, but anyway. Well yeah, we'll move on.

Who are three unexpected artists in your rotation right now? Um Don Toliver. Yes. Love the new album. Oh, the new album is insane. he's so good at melody. He's so good at, even though all of the beats are similar, like I listen to them with a different set of ears. Each one of them. He's a master at that sound. Yeah, legit. Don Toliver is one. You know how excited I am I know. He loves Don T, bro. Sucks. Bossa Nova, I listen to a lot of Bossa Nova music. Ooh, who's who's an artist that we should check out? I don't really know too many artists from Bossa Nova. I just have a playlist of you know what I mean, because I I don't I don't really speak the the language, so I just listen to it literally every day. Um it's very calming. it's just like very smooth jazz melodic, but in a Latin feel. Cool. But I will say if you ever decide to listen to it, it's very calming. Like if you ever like stressed or anything, it's just impossible. Like it'll it'll cool you out. Do you have your own playlist that you made, or is it can you share? You want to share maybe?

Yeah, well let's get to that. At least maybe a few tracks. Number three. Um number three would be anything on the other side side of the spectrum, like if you're going to work out or you want to get hype or um the electric light orchestra. Yes. Totally. Are you familiar? Yeah. Oh, okay. Yeah. I listen to a lot of stuff, but Phil Collins is one of my favorite artists as well. So I listen to a lot of Phil. That drum set. I want that drum set. And all of the Disney stuff, he was a girl. Oh, so yeah, he loves scores, bro. That's a bag, too. Yeah. You feel me? Okay, you have been hired to direct a live performance segment with an unlimited budget. What does it look like? Oh, I'm going crazy. Let's get some like quick little details. I'm getting a full orchestra. I played um, I played in orchestra in high school. I was like, I think it was like third chair on the second or third chair, euphonium, um, which is like a baby tuba. Mm-hmm. And I just love that world, which kind of really opened my mind to the orchestral world of music.

You know what I mean? Which I think that's where I adopt a lot of my film scoring from when it comes to trying to score or arrange people's shows. I always like to bring the cinematic to our to our world. Yeah. So you're just getting all the best musicians, full orchestra together. It's probably not that far fetched, bro. Like I could imagine you doing that for summer or something. Atlanta Symphony. Have they done it? I don't know. I just feel like No, for sure. I'm definitely planning on doing that for Black whenever he does a tiny desk. Yeah. I was just putting that out there. We already kinda talked about it. Hey. We gotta start working on it. Because I want this one to be the best one. Cause I actually have time now to really sit and put all my thoughts together. What's your favorite tiny desk that you didn't musically direct? That I didn't musically direct. Yeah. We talked about this. We made a draft. It probably gotta be between these three Mac Miller, uh Um Tyler the Creator, or Snow Allegra. Snow Allegra. Snoh Aalegra. That's a that's a low-key one. My homies was playing that one, but it just was beautiful. And Ty Tye Tribbett. I you may not listen to a lot of gospel, but Tye Tribbett,

like I grew up listening to a lot of his stuff. So his that was real, you know, real unique to hear on a tiny desk. Hell yeah. Dope. We haven't had a good answer to this one yet, but I am thinking that we might get one right now. If animals could talk, which one would be the biggest asshole? It would definitely be something like a hippo or bro. I was just thinking hippo, swear to god, bro. Or a sloth. Ooh. And that's just sloth. They're like, they just trying to sleep. They're like, get the fuck away from me, bruh. I ain't got time for this. I'm tired. Yeah, like I swear right before he said hippo. Because we've he's asked this question at least like maybe two times. Hippos, They just look angry at everything. They are. I think they actually are too. They're very aggressive and mean, like, in in the wild, seriously. Yeah. That's actually a great answer. I'm bringing this segment back just because I think this is the perfect guest for ideal audio, Ben. We are going to craft the perfect should we do song or album?

Just song. Come on. One song. Keep it chill, bro. Any artists, alive or dead, any producers, alive or dead, any anyone else you want, instrumentalist, engineer, whoever you want, you could put together to create the perfect song. Who would you bring together? I would bring together Michael Jackson, Tam Impala. Um Michael Jackson, Tam Impala, and probably somebody left field, like Kanye West. Wow. Yeah. I mean, yeah. Mike Jack, Tame and Kanye. Come on, bro, with yay on a little sprinkle of yay on top. Fire. A little sprinkle of yay is wild. Final one of the short answer. What is your favorite curse word? Definitely type shit. Specifically type shit. That's a whole cuss or even the type. the whole phrase is more sure. no, I love that. Sure.

Moving on to part two. This is the this or that. I'm gonna give you two choices. You just have to pick one. Starting with producing or directing? Producing. Smooth melodies or thumping bass? Smooth melodies. Piano or guitar. Depends. Each one. I know this I'm supposed to do one or other, but each one evokes a different emotion. And that's why we ask the tough questions around here. You have to get rid of one forever. How about that? Oh my god. You just made it worse. He already I have to do I had to go there. He was struggling with the decision, and you now are making him literally. I'm cutting your mic off if you easily piano. I'll get rid of guitar. Okay, good. Good answer. AI generated voice or talk box? Talk box. I love the talk box. I'm a sucker for a talk. box. We all love the talk box. It can get annoying if you listen to it a lot. A lot of people don't like to listen to a whole lot of talk box. so AI generated would be obviously a consumer thing, but for me, talk box. Boom bap drums or trap drums. Boom bap.

Join me in the studio or send me a pack. Join you in the studio. But like this is you want to be like, this is now I now have like production in your session too. Like, do you like to be the guy? You know what I mean? I don't mind. I'm a very collaborative person. Like if you know what you're doing. If you don't know what you're doing, and we're just in a session, and it's like I'm carrying. So it was like, I could have sent you a beat pack for that. Right. Gotcha. Okay. Day session or night session. Day session. Party anthem or introspective ballad. Party anthem for sure. I didn't see that coming. I didn't either. I literally was like I thought the way this was going. Yeah. Yeah. Interesting. Highly produced visuals or simple DIY fun video. I'm an artist creative, so highly produced visuals. Yeah. Meditate or skydive. I haven't been skydiving. I want to go. So skydive. Yeah. Instagram or YouTube. I'm an Instagram person. Give up snare drums or give up auto-tune. I give up auto-tune.

And finally become a full-time label executive or leave the music industry forever. I I'm gone. I knew that was a good one. Bro. Bro, we literally plotted that one before. He was asking me what should I give him. Yeah, like what should he be instead of leaving the music industry? I fully support him. Even though I feel like I would be a good one, the only thing is like label executives, they're not even like doing legal label executive stuff these days because they're fighting algorithms, they're fighting social media. Social media's kind of taking their power a lot. But you know, I I can understand that's probably a headache. You know what I mean? For sure. He's empathetic, but he's still gone. I still think there's a lane where you're like where you're like the networker, like the director of your like the dot connector. There could be a lane somewhere. The dot connector. People used that link in a bio back in the day. They still do. For sure. And I don't want to judge anyone that has still has it in there, but maybe change it. We get it. It's time. We get it. You know people that know people. Like we understand.

It's time to give it up. Final section is the word association. I'm gonna say one word, and you just give me the first word that you think of right off the top of your head. Okay. As little thought as possible. Starting with music. Music. The first thing I thought of is I do music. There used to be a uh a little thing that happened at Apache Cafe downtown. Yeah. It's called I Do Music. Used to be like, I do music Mondays. Was that hosted by Fort Knox? Yeah. Was it? Wow, yeah. Heavy, heavy, heavy, heavy, heavy. Dude, we should get Fort Knox on the pod. I just love it. For just like a 15-minute episode. We threw that. It was on our list at one point early on. Yeah. We'll bring it back. Yeah, okay. Moving on. Should we? Yeah. Okay. Hero. Hero the band. Yeah. Garden. Madison Square Garden. Reverb. There's a website called Reverb that sells uh, used equipment. Yep. Dot com. Dot com. Reverb.com, literally. Snapchat.

Filter. I don't know why. That's the first thing that came to my mind. Totally. Snapchat filter. Frog. Frog. Um, there's an instrument that's like it looks like a frog, and you just take a wooden stick and you go and just literally. Wow. Side chain. Compression. China. Chinatown. Emoji. Emoji? Emoji. My first thought when you said that was Imogen Heap. Oh, yeah, the band. Totally. No, she's a she's a woman. Oh, yeah, it's one of the artists. I always think she's a she's got perception. She's massive. She's massive. You would think she's a band. Right. Saturation. Saturation. Um the color. I I think of a color when you say saturation. Like red and orange. Speaking of red, Santa Claus. Santa Claus. What do I what's the what's my first Santa Claus is coming to town? AI. Um AI generated. Lil? Lil Uzi.

Slim. Wave. Come on man. We have had Slim Wave on the podcast. What a good one. Yeah, man. Ah, Such great insights. I feel like I'm thinking about things differently right now. Oh man. This is great. Yeah, I loved it. I'm glad y'all had me, man. Yes. Thank you for coming on. As always, please like, comment, and subscribe. Follow us on Spotify Podcasts, Apple Podcasts. Leave us a five star review, God damn it. Please. We are trying to get our five star reviews up. We are. So let's do it. Let's do it. Do it. Do it. Let's go. Let's do it. And let's get out of here. It's been a long day, folks. Until next time, Henry, what are we doing? Get out of here. Get out of here. Peace, y'all.