Latest / The iAlign Podcast with Flint Mitchell / #5 - Producing Music That Evokes the Past With Brian Kelley (BKAYE)

Transcript

#5 - Producing Music That Evokes the Past With Brian Kelley (BKAYE) · The iAlign Podcast with Flint Mitchell

• 0:09
  SPEAKER_00: What's up y'all?
• 0:11
  SPEAKER_00: Welcome to Seeking Authenticity.
• 0:13
  SPEAKER_00: My name is Flint Mitchell, and I get absolutely psyched by having conversations with authentic people that I admire about the things they value.
• 0:21
  SPEAKER_00: Their stories and perspectives don't just make me smile, laugh, and think.
• 0:25
  SPEAKER_00: They inspire me to wake up earlier, listen better, focus, and work harder, and help make me a better version of myself.
• 0:32
  SPEAKER_00: And it's my hope that sharing these conversations through this podcast might do the same thing for you.
• 0:40
  SPEAKER_00: In this episode, I talk with one of my best friends, Brian Kelly.
• 0:44
  SPEAKER_01: Brian is an electronic music producer who goes by the title BK and has been creating music for the past six or so years, amassing over 14 million listens on his songs on Spotify alone.
• 0:54
  SPEAKER_01: There will be a link to his music in the podcast description.
• 0:58
  SPEAKER_01: We grew up near each other and became solid friends as teammates playing competitive soccer.
• 1:02
  SPEAKER_01: What sets Brian apart is not only the way he mixes his laid-back attitude with a hard-working and analytical mindset, but also that he's just a good guy.
• 1:11
  SPEAKER_01: He has good, honest intentions, and that always comes through in conversation.
• 1:15
  SPEAKER_01: Here, we talk about his transition from being a collegiate soccer player to a professional producer, about his experience in the industry, some wild stories from the journey so far, and his hopes for his music and career.
• 1:27
  SPEAKER_01: I had a great time listening to Brian, and I know you will too.
• 1:31
  SPEAKER_01: Enjoy.
• 1:42
  SPEAKER_04: It didn't seem like the reach was organic.
• 1:44
  SPEAKER_04: It seemed like someone had fucked my song and like thrown it to China and just said, like, play this to a million plays or something.
• 1:51
  SPEAKER_04: It's just like you know what you've achieved thus far, and so you wanna keep doing that or do it better.
• 1:57
  SPEAKER_04: You don't want to see it go backwards.
• 1:58
  SPEAKER_04: They were at Coachella and they were taping Major Laser and they played the Be Together remix.
• 2:04
  SPEAKER_04: So he had a full video of like them on the main stage at Coachella with like pyrotechnics and everything, like fireworks going off with my song.
• 2:13
  SPEAKER_04: It was just crazy because I was like, you're so famous, everyone in this room is so famous except for me.
• 2:18
  SPEAKER_04: And then the people who tune in to watch their artists play a set, they are constantly just donating money to like reliefs and and and organizations to help people.
• 2:30
  SPEAKER_04: So the first festival they did raised like half a million dollars or something crazy like that.
• 2:35
  SPEAKER_04: I would say now more than ever, like the main thing I focus on is not music, it's just balance.
• 2:45
  SPEAKER_01: Thanks for doing this with me, Brian.
• 2:46
  SPEAKER_01: I really appreciate it.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_04: Of course, man.
• 2:48
  SPEAKER_04: Happy to be here, happy to do this with you.
• 2:51
  SPEAKER_01: I've really enjoyed watching your progress becoming a DJ and in the music industry.
• 2:56
  SPEAKER_01: I think it's really inspiring having friends like you who reach for their goals, you know, their dreams, especially, or even if they are relatively hard to attain, as I'm sure success in the music industry is.
• 3:09
  SPEAKER_01: Um and something I'm really curious about, though, is because we played soccer together.
• 3:14
  SPEAKER_01: I'd love to hear a bit about the transition that you made, maybe this was in college, between having academics and collegiate soccer being the priorities in your life, how that transitioned into music becoming the center of your life.
• 3:29
  SPEAKER_04: That's a good question.
• 3:30
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, it was a really gradual, slow transition.
• 3:34
  SPEAKER_04: Like I would say end of high school is when I was starting to get into music.
• 3:38
  SPEAKER_04: But at that point, at the same time, obviously soccer was my focus because all I really cared about at the end of high school was graduating, getting into the best school I could, and playing soccer for the best college I could.
• 3:51
  SPEAKER_04: And so that's where I just focused in on Nescaq.
• 3:54
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and I was already familiar with it because my sister going to baits before me.
• 3:58
  SPEAKER_01: Um the conference.
• 4:00
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, the Nescaq is the conference.
• 4:02
  SPEAKER_04: So yeah, senior year of high school, it was just soccer and just school.
• 4:07
  SPEAKER_04: And then as I got into college, soccer and academics were obviously my focus, and music was like barely a thing, maybe like 10% of my energy.
• 4:16
  SPEAKER_04: Um, I just started getting into like electronic music at that point, like listening to artists like Avici, Alessi, etc.
• 4:23
  SPEAKER_04: And I had maybe one friend who was kind of interested in music that I met freshman year.
• 4:29
  SPEAKER_04: Um, but nothing really going on there, just soccer, just the school.
• 4:33
  SPEAKER_04: And then it pretty much changed for me junior year because I had an internship out in LA and I was interning for a music management group.
• 4:44
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and you know, in college in the summers, it's like you're just kind of relying on yourself to be training and getting ready for preseasons and whatnot.
• 4:53
  SPEAKER_04: And the pre in the summers before that, I was really um good about practicing during the summer and just strict on myself to stay in shape and be ready and whatnot.
• 5:04
  SPEAKER_04: But junior year was when I really struggled because I was out in LA, I didn't have a car, I was working, you know, 10 hours a day, five days a week.
• 5:12
  SPEAKER_04: So it was just hard to have the motivation to go to the gym or find a field and find players and you know, get get the hours in.
• 5:21
  SPEAKER_04: And at the same time, when I was working for that management group, I also wanted to be producing.
• 5:26
  SPEAKER_04: So when I had my free time, it was like work on music or go track a soccer field for an hour, you know.
• 5:34
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and I picked the first one usually.
• 5:36
  SPEAKER_04: So junior summer of my junior years when I had to basically call my coach and tell him I was thinking about quitting and and text some of my teammates and say I was thinking of quitting.
• 5:48
  SPEAKER_04: And to them, I think it was like a huge shock.
• 5:51
  SPEAKER_04: Um yeah.
• 5:52
  SPEAKER_04: And my coach was like pretty disappointed, but he played it well and just like said he understood and whatnot and supported me.
• 6:00
  SPEAKER_04: Um but yeah, that was a weird transition.
• 6:03
  SPEAKER_04: Then my college experience kind of totally changed because suddenly my friend group, which was my soccer team mostly, I wasn't spending 100% of my time with them every day because they would be in their routine of going to practice, going to the locker room an hour before, whatever, you know, getting meals, and then suddenly I was just kind of like on my own, and I had all this free time to spend making music in my room, and I was like, Well, I better fucking make the most of this because I'm I am a sociology major, I'm not gonna get a job working in sociology as much as I value academics, which I still did, like I wasn't skipping class, I wasn't not studying, like I still had a lot of pride in doing well in school, and I and I knew that my parents were paying top dollar for you know a top education, so I wasn't just gonna like squander that.
• 6:55
  SPEAKER_04: Um so I was just at that point, I was just soccer was now out of the picture, so I was just trying to find a balance between doing well in school, getting my studies done, and then also having time to like explore the music and and do my first remixes, like unofficial remixes, and then do my first official remixes, and then uh at that point start working with Tim and start hitting up artists to open for them, you know, in the Northeast.
• 7:24
  SPEAKER_04: So try to do a show, you know, random weekend in Boston because I no longer had a game to worry about, right?
• 7:29
  SPEAKER_04: And I didn't have a travel restriction or whatever.
• 7:32
  SPEAKER_04: Um, so yeah, try and do that in Boston or to New York or um and then eventually talk with fraternities and and you know, fly down a weekend where I could to go to Virginia or Maine or whatever, and at the same time, like plan around my schedule, like okay, I can only miss four classes this semester, otherwise, like I get penaltied like a grade, you know, or whatever the rules are.
• 7:58
  SPEAKER_04: And so I'd have to figure out okay, this weekend I could do a show and I'd have to sacrifice missing this one class so I can take my flight on a Friday and make it there, you know, and come back in time.
• 8:10
  SPEAKER_04: And then I know, okay, I can't miss this class two weeks from now because otherwise I'll get penalized.
• 8:16
  SPEAKER_04: And so it's like knowing when to be on my shit and when I could take a leave was super, super important.
• 8:23
  SPEAKER_01: So you it's at the start you said it was a super gradual transition, but it sounds like it was gradual up to a point, and then it was like a sheer cliff.
• 8:31
  SPEAKER_04: No, exactly.
• 8:32
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it was very gradual freshman sophomore year.
• 8:35
  SPEAKER_04: I was getting more and more into music, and I was still enjoying soccer, but like sophomore year I had mono during the season and I didn't even know it.
• 8:43
  SPEAKER_04: So that was my best season, but I was I was exhausted, kind of starting to struggle, and I was exhausted and I didn't know why.
• 8:51
  SPEAKER_04: And I got tested during the season and I came back negative, and I I went again um after the season because I just didn't trust the stupid schools and nurse.
• 9:00
  SPEAKER_04: And when I tested again, she said I had it like the whole season.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_04: Wow.
• 9:04
  SPEAKER_04: Um, so that was rough.
• 9:06
  SPEAKER_04: And then junior year, when I played, I didn't play as well as my sophomore year, and I just I knew I just wasn't as into it.
• 9:13
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and then by the by the summer going into my senior year, that's when I was like, yeah, I'm just not really feeling this anymore.
• 9:20
  SPEAKER_01: That's pretty cool transition, to be honest, because it seems it seems like for most athletes, the general way it happens is that they get to the end of college and then they realize it's not.
• 9:34
  SPEAKER_04: It's a pipe dream to keep going.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 9:36
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and then it's like there's no transition.
• 9:39
  SPEAKER_01: It just ripped from their life, and then they have to do something else.
• 9:42
  SPEAKER_04: And that's harsh, yeah.
• 9:44
  SPEAKER_04: No, I'm actually I feel kind of lucky that it happened that way because I know a lot of kids on the team, like, and you saw it when people would come back for alumni weekends or whatever, like they really missed Trinity and they really missed playing with those guys and just being part of that team, and I just don't have that like empty feeling in me where like I'm I wish I could go back and I wish I had more years to play there or whatnot.
• 10:09
  SPEAKER_04: Like, I just don't have that energy.
• 10:12
  SPEAKER_04: And uh, I'm glad I don't because I yeah, I just don't have but I guess regret or whatever or nostalgia for it.
• 10:20
  SPEAKER_04: No, I've no easy for me to like move on and not be sad about it.
• 10:24
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, yeah, it sounds like you had something that you were getting excited about at the time.
• 10:29
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, did you see while you were first off, that's crazy that you played a season of college soccer with Mono.
• 10:39
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, what's wrong?
• 10:40
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sure there was a couple really brutal games.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 10:43
  SPEAKER_04: Um I would be yawning while I was warming up, like trying to get myself sucked up.
• 10:49
  SPEAKER_04: Like falling asleep on the bench.
• 10:50
  SPEAKER_01: Do you have any do you were there any games where you came off the field and were like there's something's wrong?
• 10:56
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, yeah, multiple times.
• 10:58
  SPEAKER_04: I would just go to my coach and tell him, like, I don't feel I don't know what's wrong.
• 11:03
  SPEAKER_04: And he would just be like, All right, but like you gotta push through, like, we'll we'll get this, we're gonna need you this game, like as a super sub or whatever.
• 11:10
  SPEAKER_04: And I wouldn't be starting because I wouldn't have practiced that well that week.
• 11:14
  SPEAKER_03: Sure.
• 11:15
  SPEAKER_04: Because I was fucking exhausted and I had classes all day, and I was getting I was sick, and then I'd have to go in the locker room for an hour and just sit there and be bored out of my mind, and then we finally have practice, and it was you know, humid as fuck, because it's the east coast, and I would just be thinking about dinner and all the homework I had and the music I needed to finish or whatever.
• 11:33
  SPEAKER_04: So, yeah, that's what was happening, and then game times would come, and you know, we'd usually be traveling, so we'd be on a bus for anywhere two to six hours.
• 11:42
  SPEAKER_04: Brutal, yeah, and you're either going there the day of or you're going there the night before, and then you're staying in some shitty hotel with shit food, waking up super early.
• 11:51
  SPEAKER_04: So it's just like a long process to like actually play a game.
• 11:54
  SPEAKER_04: So by the time you get there, and when you're in the state that I'm in, you're fucking exhausted.
• 12:00
  SPEAKER_04: So, yeah, there are multiple times where I was warming up before or coming out of the game, and I was just like, oh my god, this is horrible.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_04: This is horrible.
• 12:08
  SPEAKER_04: That's funny and I would put it to like nerves or something, but it really wasn't nerves, it was just me.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_04: Sure.
• 12:13
  SPEAKER_01: No, in that in that high intensity, it's it's just the same thing with any sort of injury, really.
• 12:20
  SPEAKER_01: I came out of a couple games um where something was clear clearly broken.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 12:26
  SPEAKER_01: But or you come at halftime, you're like, this is definitely broken, but in my head, maybe it's just like maybe something, maybe it's not broken.
• 12:35
  SPEAKER_01: Like you know it's broken, but you're telling yourself it's not, because you have to.
• 12:38
  SPEAKER_01: It's like that high-intensity environment.
• 12:40
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 12:41
  SPEAKER_01: You push through those things.
• 12:43
  SPEAKER_01: So that's interesting though.
• 12:44
  SPEAKER_01: Your music really, you were starting to produce music that your freshman year while you were playing.
• 12:50
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, I was making really shady music on a program called FL Studio, freshman year, just trying to like figure out what people like Avici were doing, like the really cheesy, like progressive house, you know, like fist pump EDM stuff.
• 13:03
  SPEAKER_04: Just trying to figure out how to make that.
• 13:05
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and sophomore years when I put out a remix like that style of um Steal My Girl by One Direction, yeah, because I found that vocal and it was a really clean vocal, which I guess was hard to come by at the time.
• 13:18
  SPEAKER_04: And I was like, oh, I can just rip this off YouTube and make a song around it.
• 13:21
  SPEAKER_04: So that's what I did.
• 13:22
  SPEAKER_04: And then I showed it to a few of my friends, and I remember my friend Rich Pizzano was always like super supportive of it, and he had just joined uh, or he was like rushing pike or whatever.
• 13:33
  SPEAKER_04: And so I maybe this was at start of junior year, but maybe end of sophomore year, they would like start playing some of like my first remixes in the house, and then like point to me and be like, Yeah, like this new song or whatever, and just like sneak it into you know a night, and that would be really fun.
• 13:49
  SPEAKER_01: That is funny.
• 13:50
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, that's that's pretty cool.
• 13:51
  SPEAKER_01: So, what do you consider what what kind of music did you you say?
• 13:54
  SPEAKER_01: I started making shitty remixes of like what what were the first songs that you were inspired by?
• 14:00
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, so I did I did Steal My Girl One Direction very like 2014 Sound Dean Progressive House song.
• 14:09
  SPEAKER_04: I did a remix of um four or five seconds.
• 14:14
  SPEAKER_04: Dude, I remember that.
• 14:15
  SPEAKER_01: Didn't that get taken down?
• 14:16
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, so that one was a weird scenario because SoundCloud was like insane those days, like anything could pop off.
• 14:23
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, and that one did, but in a weird way, where the it didn't seem like the reach was organic, it seemed like someone had plucked my song and like thrown it to China and just said, like, play this to a million plays or something.
• 14:35
  SPEAKER_04: But don't don't give them any likes, don't give them comments, nothing.
• 14:38
  SPEAKER_04: So it was just like this ghost audience that somehow got the song to a million plays.
• 14:44
  SPEAKER_04: Um, that was super strange, and everyone's super psyched about it.
• 14:47
  SPEAKER_04: And I was kind of psyched, but at the same time, I was like, Yeah, but this doesn't this isn't like real engagement, so I don't really know what's going on.
• 14:52
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, and I still don't know what the fuck that was, but yeah, that one did, I guess, well.
• 14:57
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and then I what else did I do?
• 15:01
  SPEAKER_04: And then I think I did my first real one was burn slow or burn fast.
• 15:07
  SPEAKER_04: Burn fast, burn fast.
• 15:08
  SPEAKER_04: I get confused because I have a single that hasn't come out yet called Burn Slow, so I get them.
• 15:13
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 15:14
  SPEAKER_04: But yeah, it was Burn Fast.
• 15:16
  SPEAKER_04: So that was like the first one I had on Spotify.
• 15:18
  SPEAKER_01: You can have an EP later called Burning.
• 15:21
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, I know.
• 15:22
  SPEAKER_04: Everything's burning, burn slow, burn fast.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: Wow.
• 15:26
  SPEAKER_01: So were there was was there a moment then with these songs?
• 15:29
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe it was the 456 one where you're like, maybe this has potential.
• 15:34
  SPEAKER_01: Was it just a hobby at this time, or were you actually thinking of the future with it?
• 15:39
  SPEAKER_04: Um that one was also very gradual.
• 15:42
  SPEAKER_04: Like I never called my parents and said, like, I'm gonna be a DJ.
• 15:47
  SPEAKER_04: Like that just never happened.
• 15:49
  SPEAKER_04: And I I never I don't know if I ever like flipped the switch while I was in college saying like I I feel like I didn't because otherwise maybe I would have just said fuck school and not gonna class and just a hundred percent focused on it.
• 16:03
  SPEAKER_04: So I always knew it was more of like a backup thing to keep pushing on to like give me an up, you know, an option B or whatever.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_03: Sure.
• 16:11
  SPEAKER_04: But uh I feel like I don't know exactly when it was I guess the music I started putting out because let's see, junior year I started putting out music probably more often, and then when I spring semester of junior year is when I went abroad.
• 16:30
  SPEAKER_04: So that I think that was actually a game changer because I lived alone in Paris, so I didn't have any immediate like distractions like I would in the house that I was living in with 10, 12 other guys, you know, and like constant ability to go out and party or whatever uh or go to class.
• 16:49
  SPEAKER_04: Like I had a few classes a week, and so I just had a ton of time, and part of that time I would spend you know binge watching a show, or whatever because I was bored, but then most of the time I was like, that's when I was really getting the music because I really had nothing else to do.
• 17:05
  SPEAKER_04: So I that's when I think I made like probably the whole heart remix.
• 17:11
  SPEAKER_04: I made my Mr.
• 17:13
  SPEAKER_04: Watson remix, I made maybe my samurai remix, like just a lot that have done well over the years now.
• 17:20
  SPEAKER_01: Dude, maybe you need to go back to Paris.
• 17:23
  SPEAKER_04: I know, I know, and it was always rainy there, you know, and like just kind of shitty outside and like kind of depressing.
• 17:29
  SPEAKER_04: So music was just like the way to keep myself entertained.
• 17:33
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and then those songs just started to get more attention, yeah.
• 17:36
  SPEAKER_04: And I was just like, this is what I'm out here doing.
• 17:39
  SPEAKER_04: I don't have much class, like I I should just take advantage of this, and I think I did a decent job of that.
• 17:46
  SPEAKER_01: At what point did you start playing shows then?
• 17:49
  SPEAKER_01: Was it your junior year?
• 17:50
  SPEAKER_04: No, I think that was my senior year because when I was abroad in the spring of junior year, that's when also soccer just kind of started dipping because I wasn't at school and I couldn't really play.
• 18:02
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, like they were fields in Paris, but I mean I'm by myself in a fucking crazy city and I don't know where the fields are.
• 18:10
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, I tried looking them up, there's a few, but you don't know the rules of like when people are playing, when it's open, you don't speak French fluently, you know, like it's just a lot to take on and figure that out.
• 18:22
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and I had cleats, but I didn't have a ball.
• 18:25
  SPEAKER_04: Like it was just a bunch of things, and it was always raining outside, so it's like people weren't playing.
• 18:29
  SPEAKER_04: It's it's a ton of factors, and it was just more energy to do that than stay inside and work on music.
• 18:35
  SPEAKER_01: So no, absolutely.
• 18:37
  SPEAKER_01: I would it sounds like it was more the focus on you were you had all this time and it was you were drawn towards making the music over and exactly.
• 18:47
  SPEAKER_04: It was like you were left alone with no other distractions, and it was like, what do you ultimately want to do?
• 18:52
  SPEAKER_04: And it was like definitely leaning towards music.
• 18:54
  SPEAKER_04: Like I tried to join a gym in Paris, and that was super complicated because they had all these crazy rules about joining gyms there and like cancellations because I was only there for like four months, and I don't remember.
• 19:08
  SPEAKER_04: No, you could, but there were all these strange rules about leaving and and whatnot, and like the requirements to to go to a gym there.
• 19:16
  SPEAKER_04: It was really strange, but I remember joining a gym and it just felt weird to be there, and I was like, I don't need to work my legs today, like, what am I doing?
• 19:25
  SPEAKER_04: So, so after like five months of that, I got home, and then immediately I went to LA, and that just like catapulted me more to music, and so by that point, it'd been like eight months since I'd even thought about Trinity Soccer, and it was just like, yeah, it's been too long at this point.
• 19:39
  SPEAKER_01: I do have actually a question I thought of earlier that I wanted wanted to hear about, which is what were the you thinking back to the shitty music that you made at the very beginning where you just tried to reproduce the house, the progressive house or whatever it is, what were the biggest mistakes you look back on and you go, God, you idiot.
• 19:58
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, there's so much of them.
• 20:01
  SPEAKER_04: It's so bad.
• 20:02
  SPEAKER_01: Is there anyone in particular that stands out?
• 20:05
  SPEAKER_04: I mean I think it's I wouldn't say I mean there are mistakes, obviously, but they're mistakes that have to be made.
• 20:16
  SPEAKER_04: So I wouldn't say like I should I I wish I could go back and do this song differently or whatever, because every song was just a learning process and just an experiment.
• 20:25
  SPEAKER_04: And I didn't care.
• 20:26
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, I cared how good it was, but at that time it's just it's just training your ear to understand what's good.
• 20:34
  SPEAKER_04: And when you start out, you don't know.
• 20:37
  SPEAKER_04: You think you know, like you make a beat.
• 20:39
  SPEAKER_04: That's why when people just start out making music and they make their first beat or their tenth beat, they they're really excited about it and they show it to you, and they think it's really good.
• 20:49
  SPEAKER_04: And then you play it to someone like me who's been producing for five years, or you play to someone else who's been producing for 10 years, and it sounds like you know, a fucking like this thrown into a blender.
• 21:00
  SPEAKER_04: It sounds awful, like it just sounds metal clanging together, things are not in time, things are off, like things are out of tune, out of key, whatever.
• 21:09
  SPEAKER_04: So obviously, I was making a lot of production mistakes then, uh, too many to even name, but those you just kind of fix over time with each new song, and each and each night you spend, you know, watching more tutorials and figuring things out.
• 21:27
  SPEAKER_04: Um, but I would say things I did do well.
• 21:29
  SPEAKER_04: I think I picked a name that was pretty good because I'm still using it today, so that's obviously gotta be a positive.
• 21:40
  SPEAKER_04: Um and I didn't I didn't think I don't think I oversaturated like my name too early on.
• 21:47
  SPEAKER_04: Like I wasn't putting out a remix every week, you know.
• 21:49
  SPEAKER_04: I was like taking my time with it.
• 21:51
  SPEAKER_04: And I wish I guess I put out even less music than I did.
• 21:56
  SPEAKER_04: Really a lot of people I didn't realize this at the time.
• 22:00
  SPEAKER_04: I thought like if you wanted to make music, you pick a name and you start working, and when you're done with a song, you put it out and you just keep doing that over and over and over again.
• 22:08
  SPEAKER_04: But later, now I realize like a lot of people, it's more about planning and it's more about branding and a story and having your sound really refined so that you could like I would love to start a new project with my producer friend now.
• 22:25
  SPEAKER_04: And but before we release anything, like we know exactly what the branding is, we know how we would market it, we know like the tone of the music, we would know even like the tempo range, the sound, the the instruments we would mainly be using, um even like the visual aspect that would go with the music.
• 22:45
  SPEAKER_04: Like we know everything, and it would be super high quality, like the highest quality that it could be.
• 22:52
  SPEAKER_04: And then once you put out one of those and you're and then you're consistent with it, you can blow up a project instead of in four years, you can blow it up in six months.
• 23:01
  SPEAKER_04: Because it's so much it's just so clear what it is, and people can easily just gravitate towards it.
• 23:06
  SPEAKER_04: Whether, but in my case, it's like you have this remix that sounds like this over here, and then a couple months later you have this remix that sounds completely different over here, and it just kind of slowly brings people in, but it brings people in from different songs, so then they might be able to do it.
• 23:23
  SPEAKER_04: It's not as clear, and it's not maybe what they thought it was gonna be because this song is completely different, and maybe that's not their vibe, but this other remix was, and so it's like they're a fan, but they can't really become a super fan because not all your shit is sounding the same, you know.
• 23:39
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, it sounds to me like I guess my question was aimed wrong then, just because I didn't have the perspective, which was I was asking about the errors you made in music, and it makes sense that the the answer was they're all mistakes that had to be made.
• 23:54
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, because that's that's anything, it's a learning curve.
• 23:57
  SPEAKER_01: But it sounds like the place you may have made the most mistakes, even if you had to make them to learn them, was maybe on the marketing side or the advertising side.
• 24:10
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, I would say the mistake I made was probably like not having the foresight of knowing like what I really wanted to accomplish.
• 24:16
  SPEAKER_04: Because for me it was just a hobby and it was fun, and I was like, oh, BK, like that's a cute name, that works, whatever.
• 24:23
  SPEAKER_04: Um, but I didn't think like, okay, I never thought about like what would a live show of mine look like, or like, do I want to be able to tour, or do I want to be playing festivals, or do I want to be playing um just like small venue shows?
• 24:41
  SPEAKER_04: Or do I want to be playing nightclubs, or do I want to be playing you know, music venues?
• 24:46
  SPEAKER_04: Like, there's a difference.
• 24:47
  SPEAKER_01: It was about creating a character before the world, right?
• 24:51
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, exactly.
• 24:52
  SPEAKER_04: And I never really had that foresight because I didn't understand that that was an important part of the business.
• 24:59
  SPEAKER_01: Do you looking back?
• 25:00
  SPEAKER_01: Do you really think though that that I mean, is that not part of the part process itself?
• 25:05
  SPEAKER_01: Is finding that out about yourself and about what you're enjoying and seeing those things.
• 25:10
  SPEAKER_04: No, it definitely is like a something that you learn along the way and you can learn along the way.
• 25:15
  SPEAKER_04: And like I think it is good for if someone becomes a fan of you early on, it's good for them to see a progression of you like refining your sound or whatever, because that's exciting for them, and they're like, Oh man, I was a fan of this guy, and now he's like he's even better, and it's awesome to you know watch that.
• 25:32
  SPEAKER_04: So that's good, but at the same time, I think you want like a general outline of what you're trying to do.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_04: Right.
• 25:38
  SPEAKER_04: And I kind of did, like, I knew I wasn't gonna be a house artist or a dubstep king, you know.
• 25:45
  SPEAKER_04: Like I knew I wanted to make pop friendlier music that was dance, and I'm still doing that, which is good.
• 25:51
  SPEAKER_04: I'm glad I'm not like a bass house music guy now, but that's what progressive house means.
• 25:57
  SPEAKER_04: No, so like progressive house is like um I'm trying to think of like specific songs, like Heroes by Lesso.
• 26:09
  SPEAKER_03: Uh-huh.
• 26:10
  SPEAKER_04: Like that's progressive house.
• 26:12
  SPEAKER_04: So and I another thing I would say is like a good thing for an artist to do is not only one pick a sound, but sometimes like do a sound that not everyone's doing.
• 26:25
  SPEAKER_04: And but for me, because I was such I was just starting so early on in my career, like I was just literally emulating whatever was hot at that time, right?
• 26:34
  SPEAKER_04: And and the dance music scene has changed so much in the past six years of what's popular that so did my sound, and so did like what I was learning or trying to learn.
• 26:45
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah, that makes sense.
• 26:47
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and so you started playing shows your senior year.
• 26:51
  SPEAKER_01: Was that a steep learning curve as well?
• 26:54
  SPEAKER_01: Playing in front of people.
• 26:55
  SPEAKER_01: Sounds like you weren't even expecting to do that at the beginning.
• 26:58
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, uh, that was one of the more exciting parts because it's one thing to make music in your dorm room or whatever, and then see thousands of plays, like that's really exciting.
• 27:10
  SPEAKER_04: I remember I have a video of me like kind of vlogging just a night or whatever, and it was me being excited about a thousand plays on SoundCloud.
• 27:21
  SPEAKER_04: And now I I don't have a video anymore, but I remember watching it like a year later, and at that point I had hundreds of thousands.
• 27:26
  SPEAKER_04: I was like, oh man, this kid was so innocent and just like really fucking valued a thousand plays, and now I look on my Spotify and it's like wholeheart remix, 14.4 million.
• 27:35
  SPEAKER_04: You're like, What?
• 27:36
  SPEAKER_01: Um which one of those is more exciting though?
• 27:39
  SPEAKER_01: Which one of those moments, if you if you could choose the moment to relive when you got a thousand views, or the moment where you saw that it was 14 million views?
• 27:48
  SPEAKER_04: A thousand a hundred percent.
• 27:51
  SPEAKER_04: Because now I'm at the point where it where I'm just a like my single glue has what like 360k?
• 27:58
  SPEAKER_04: Like, sure, that's great.
• 27:59
  SPEAKER_04: But I'm I would say generally that's right now at this point disappointing.
• 28:04
  SPEAKER_04: Like, I would like it to be at a million.
• 28:06
  SPEAKER_04: But if you get if you told me in 2015 or 16 that you're you have a single and it has uh almost half a million plays on Spotify, I would be like my mind would be absolutely blown, you know.
• 28:20
  SPEAKER_04: So it's a shame that that that thought process is gone there, but at the same time, it just shows I think the evolution and the growth.
• 28:27
  SPEAKER_04: So that's also good.
• 28:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 28:29
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, it's like this theme of of having goals or be uh aspiring for better, right?
• 28:34
  SPEAKER_01: Is you are at some point, especially from where we grew up in the Bay Area, where it's very uh very driven, goal-centric, right?
• 28:42
  SPEAKER_01: It's what you're taught, right?
• 28:44
  SPEAKER_01: And so it's kind of our personality trait is to whenever you're out of place, think of what should happen next, right?
• 28:51
  SPEAKER_01: And so, you know, maybe no, I I love that response though, because when you release your first song, you have a total of zero views, right?
• 29:00
  SPEAKER_01: So even getting one is kind of crazy, but getting a thousand views, you know, it's like a thousand different people.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 29:05
  SPEAKER_01: Um versus now you have an audience, and I wouldn't say it's like an expectation of them to listen, but maybe it kind of is.
• 29:14
  SPEAKER_04: It's just like you know what you've achieved thus far, and so you want to keep doing that or do it better.
• 29:19
  SPEAKER_04: You don't want to see it go backwards.
• 29:22
  SPEAKER_01: Sure.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 29:23
  SPEAKER_01: What is the the best process you find for trying to create that progress?
• 29:29
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, if you ask like anyone whose job it is to create that progress, like at a label or whatever, I would say I would say consistency is probably number one.
• 29:40
  SPEAKER_04: I would say quality and then consistency and then um just giving valuable content, you know, right to your like fans or followers or whatever, like showing that you care, like you're really trying to do this, or yeah, all that all that sounds like.
• 29:59
  SPEAKER_01: So there's actually a form of it's not necessarily just the content itself, there's also a form of kind of expression or a connection between you and the audience that you're trying to appreciate.
• 30:07
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, and that's also part of like your branding and your what you're trying to say, or you know, yeah.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 30:13
  SPEAKER_01: But so you're really trying to form, I mean, I guess maybe music in general that kind of makes sense, then is about forming a relationship with your fans, right?
• 30:21
  SPEAKER_04: Mm-hmm, mm-hmm, 100%.
• 30:23
  SPEAKER_04: Like you want your when you're making music, you should think like, what am I trying to achieve with this song?
• 30:29
  SPEAKER_04: And what do I want people to feel when they hear this?
• 30:32
  SPEAKER_04: Because ultimately, like, no matter what you're trying to make them feel, you want to make it.
• 30:36
  SPEAKER_04: I think the biggest compliment is making like it a timestamp for them.
• 30:40
  SPEAKER_04: So when they hear that song, they listen to that song when it came out a bunch and they had a great time with that song, and then five years down the line, they hear that song again and they immediately remember like that summer, you know, yeah, from 20, whatever.
• 30:53
  SPEAKER_01: Could you give an example of that for your most recent song, Glue?
• 30:55
  SPEAKER_01: Like, what did what kind of feel did you want?
• 30:57
  SPEAKER_01: What did you want people to think when you released it?
• 31:00
  SPEAKER_04: That one I really when I made it was like I want it, just gave me like spring vibes.
• 31:05
  SPEAKER_04: So that's why I made the artwork like super bright and yellowy, and I uh the canvas on the song on Spotify, like it's a bunch of flowers and stuff, and it's just really pretty and it's sunny and happy.
• 31:17
  SPEAKER_04: And um, yeah, I just wanted it to be a very feel good song, like coming out of not that sounds corny, but like coming out of winter, you know, like starting to enjoy the summer.
• 31:29
  SPEAKER_01: Absolutely no, it makes sense.
• 31:31
  SPEAKER_01: When you say that, I immediately thought of Songbird by Air.
• 31:39
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 31:40
  SPEAKER_01: Um I love that song.
• 31:41
  SPEAKER_01: I think in that song they even say something around the lines of we're singing this in 2012, make sure you're bumping this in 2040.
• 31:52
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 31:53
  SPEAKER_04: No, that shit is true, and that's a their band is like a perfect example of like a an artist that has a sound, like their specific sound that was super chill and just kind of like nostalgic.
• 32:05
  SPEAKER_04: And then now if I listen to that band, it immediately brings me back to like high school when we were obsessed with them.
• 32:11
  SPEAKER_01: Dude, I can picture driving down 280 listening to it.
• 32:14
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, exactly.
• 32:15
  SPEAKER_04: I have the same thing.
• 32:16
  SPEAKER_01: And that's it's pretty crazy, honestly.
• 32:18
  SPEAKER_01: I think this is a pretty cool thing about music, is it's one of those things can that can it it creates hooks around memories in your in your mind where it actually takes you back to like this really back to memories you had?
• 32:32
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it does.
• 32:33
  SPEAKER_04: I think that does it better than pretty much anything.
• 32:35
  SPEAKER_04: Like I I have a terrible memory, but songs really help put me back in like a certain place at a certain time.
• 32:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 32:43
  SPEAKER_01: Do you feel like you're able to provide that then?
• 32:49
  SPEAKER_01: Is that maybe a part of the impact that you're trying to provide with music?
• 32:53
  SPEAKER_04: Long term for sure.
• 32:54
  SPEAKER_04: I want to do that.
• 32:55
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 32:56
  SPEAKER_04: I want because I don't wanna I love listening to like hard dance music that I can like pre-game to or whatever, or like if I hear it at nightclub, it's awesome and it it, you know, it's a great time.
• 33:08
  SPEAKER_04: But I want more songs that like you can sit outside in a you know a beach chair to and like day drink with your friends, or just you know, or like go on a hike with, or you're just driving around your town and you're you're not trying to turn up, but you're trying to, you know, just feel good.
• 33:26
  SPEAKER_04: That's yeah.
• 33:28
  SPEAKER_01: That's what I want.
• 33:29
  SPEAKER_01: Why do you want to do that?
• 33:30
  SPEAKER_01: Why would that kind of music?
• 33:32
  SPEAKER_04: I just think that music will like stand the test of time a lot better.
• 33:38
  SPEAKER_04: And if you and if you listen to it more in like an everyday scenario rather than like you only listen to it when you go to a nightclub, I think it'll that'll just last with you longer.
• 33:49
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, absolutely.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_01: It's cool.
• 33:52
  SPEAKER_01: I like your interpretation of music kind of being uh a stamp in time, right?
• 34:01
  SPEAKER_01: Because it gives it more of an interactive state than I don't know, watching an episode of like Survivor or something when you were a kid.
• 34:13
  SPEAKER_01: It was just something you did.
• 34:14
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 34:15
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 34:16
  SPEAKER_04: It's like you did it and then you're you're kind of done with it.
• 34:18
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 34:19
  SPEAKER_01: So we're I guess right now, actually, could you tell me about the experience of getting your first song played at EDC?
• 34:28
  SPEAKER_01: Wasn't that a thing?
• 34:29
  SPEAKER_04: Like like a first, like the first time I saw Big DJ play my song.
• 34:33
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, yeah, yeah.
• 34:34
  SPEAKER_04: I think the first one was um, I think the first one was my Beatogether remix for Major Laser.
• 34:41
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 34:42
  SPEAKER_04: Which it wasn't an official remix, it was a remix contest, which were pretty popular at that time.
• 34:47
  SPEAKER_04: So you could just go on this website called I think it was like Waivo or something, and then every month they'd have maybe a few remix competitions going on, and you'd have like three weeks to to to uh turn it in.
• 34:59
  SPEAKER_04: And so they give you the vocal.
• 35:01
  SPEAKER_04: I it was usually maybe just the vocal or maybe like the vocal and a few other stems of like drums or whatever.
• 35:06
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, but um, I would only ever use the vocal, I remember.
• 35:09
  SPEAKER_04: And yeah, Major Laser had one.
• 35:11
  SPEAKER_04: I think I made it.
• 35:13
  SPEAKER_04: I remember there's a video of the soccer house in Trinity bumping it like for a Christmas party or something.
• 35:19
  SPEAKER_04: So that was probably I don't know if that was my junior year.
• 35:22
  SPEAKER_04: It must have been my junior year because that was an early one.
• 35:25
  SPEAKER_04: So I let's say like it came out maybe like right before the end of the first semester junior year, right before I went abroad, maybe.
• 35:32
  SPEAKER_04: And um, yeah, I remember the results came back to the competition like after a month, and I didn't win.
• 35:39
  SPEAKER_04: It was someone else was the winner, but I thought I put it on my SoundCloud as soon as I was done with it, and it did, I think, really pretty well.
• 35:48
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and I think the first thing that happened was I was checking my SoundCloud, uh, as I did every single morning, because SoundCloud was just amazing at that time, and I was getting followers really quickly and likes and replays, whatever.
• 36:06
  SPEAKER_04: And Diplo had followed me on SoundCloud, and I freaked out because it was like, I think it was the first person with like a check mark or whatever, like an artist check mark that had followed me, and I click on his page off and he has like seven million followers.
• 36:18
  SPEAKER_03: I'm like, holy fuck!
• 36:19
  SPEAKER_04: And I don't know how many followers I had at that point, maybe like 5,000 followers on SoundCloud.
• 36:24
  SPEAKER_04: So, like just starting, and then I think a week later, uh someone sent me a video, or someone's oh yeah, someone sent me a picture of a tweet that said, like, where did you what remix did you play at this show?
• 36:38
  SPEAKER_04: I don't remember where it was.
• 36:39
  SPEAKER_04: And he was like, It was the BK remix, but he didn't tag me on Twitter or anything, but it just said that, and then someone found that screenshot to me, sent it to me, and I freaked out.
• 36:47
  SPEAKER_04: And then spring came and it was Coachella, and my buddy Ben Maxwell, who lives out here, who I'm still friends with, he went with his girl, current or ex-girlfriend, and um they were at Coachella and they were taping Major Laser and they played the Be Together remix.
• 37:04
  SPEAKER_04: So he had a full video of like them on the main stage at Coachella with like pyrotechnics and everything, like fireworks going off with my song.
• 37:13
  SPEAKER_04: And I'm he tells me like he loved it, it was like one of the greatest things ever, and he was videotaping it, like, oh fuck, like BK.
• 37:19
  SPEAKER_04: At the same time, he was like so mad because he was like, Fuck, I wish this was my remix they were playing.
• 37:26
  SPEAKER_04: So he I he he took that video and sent it to me, and I shared that everywhere.
• 37:31
  SPEAKER_04: And then, like, that whole spring and summer on Major Laser's tour, when they mean they were so popular, they played every single festival around the world, they were doing huge shows, and like a group like that, like they pretty much have a set made that they're gonna just play for every single show, and so that's what they did.
• 37:50
  SPEAKER_04: And and luckily, my remix was in their their set, so they played that remix all across the world, probably to like millions and millions of people.
• 37:59
  SPEAKER_04: That's our that's it's pretty outrageous when you think about it.
• 38:04
  SPEAKER_01: It's not it's absurdly outrageous, is the idea that someone else can run with something you built and show it to millions of people around the world, or yeah, tens of thousands, whatever it is.
• 38:18
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, and free of charge.
• 38:20
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, it's great.
• 38:22
  SPEAKER_04: My parents would be like, Do you get paid like every time they play it?
• 38:24
  SPEAKER_04: I'm like, no.
• 38:27
  SPEAKER_04: I do not.
• 38:28
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, but I'm sure it gave you a pretty solid following.
• 38:32
  SPEAKER_04: No, but that was great for like publicity or whatever, you know, getting your name out there.
• 38:36
  SPEAKER_01: I could see if they did that right now, where you're a little more set in a career, it might be a little bit more of like, oh, I'd like to get some compensation for this.
• 38:45
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, having 5,000 followers followers at the time, you'd probably welcome any yeah.
• 38:51
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, it would be it would have been great if uh it was like an official remix and they had it on Spotify and stuff.
• 38:57
  SPEAKER_04: Oh, yeah.
• 38:58
  SPEAKER_04: And then it would get streaming numbers and like build up my monthly listeners over it.
• 39:01
  SPEAKER_04: But at that point, Spotify, I mean it was happening, but it wasn't it wasn't insane like it is now, yeah.
• 39:07
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and it it never became an official remix.
• 39:09
  SPEAKER_04: I think we tried like years down the line, but it just never really happened.
• 39:14
  SPEAKER_04: Um, but yeah, and then the end of that story is that in 20 uh 17 I went to EDC to play this art car, so like this kind of like small moving stage that was sponsored by Trap Nation.
• 39:30
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, so that was like my first festival show, and it was my birthday weekend, and and so I was able to go backstage.
• 39:39
  SPEAKER_04: Like, you know, in Vegas, that the other nightclubs and DJs play the nightclubs, yeah.
• 39:44
  SPEAKER_04: And so that weekend is a super big weekend because not only are the DJs playing the nightclubs, but they're also playing the festival right next door.
• 39:50
  SPEAKER_03: Sure.
• 39:51
  SPEAKER_04: So everyone is in town, yeah, and the chain smokers were playing the night of my birthday, so I was able to get in with them to their party at the club, and then I was able to get into their after party in the hotel room in Vegas, and hello and behold, who walks into this after party to DJ the after party but Diplo?
• 40:09
  SPEAKER_04: Oh he's DJing this after party, and then 30 minutes into it, he like turns it off and he's like, Alright, we need to move this after party to my hotel room, which is like down the hallway.
• 40:18
  SPEAKER_04: So everyone vacates the Chase Maker's hotel room and goes to Diplo's hotel room, and then at some point, then I I get a chance to introduce myself and play it cool, and I mentioned who I am and that I made the be together remix, whatever, and he just immediately knew who it was or knew the song, yeah, and like really appreciated and said he really appreciated it and like loved the remix, loved playing it out, like it's really well done, etc.
• 40:41
  SPEAKER_04: Wow, and so he was super nice to me.
• 40:43
  SPEAKER_04: And I had always been told that he was a dick to people, but he was really nice to me.
• 40:48
  SPEAKER_04: So, yeah, that was a really like full circle moment when he recognized me for that.
• 40:52
  SPEAKER_01: What was that like?
• 40:53
  SPEAKER_01: How'd that feel?
• 40:54
  SPEAKER_04: That recognition it was just crazy because I was like, You're so famous, everyone in this room is so famous except for me.
• 41:01
  SPEAKER_04: And uh, it was just nice that he didn't like push me away or whatever, like he took the time to say hi or like let me say hi.
• 41:08
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, and uh acknowledge something that I made that he really benefited from, you know.
• 41:13
  SPEAKER_04: Sure.
• 41:14
  SPEAKER_04: So that was cool, and I benefited from obviously.
• 41:16
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 41:17
  SPEAKER_01: No, that acknowledgement is pretty crazy, especially with people who you know you you look up to, which I'm sure you do for him.
• 41:23
  SPEAKER_01: That guy being that kind of position.
• 41:25
  SPEAKER_01: Um geez, did that inspire you then?
• 41:29
  SPEAKER_01: Were you?
• 41:30
  SPEAKER_01: I here's an interesting one.
• 41:33
  SPEAKER_01: You get this video of Diplo playing your song with all the pyrotechnics.
• 41:37
  SPEAKER_01: At any point you go, hmm.
• 41:40
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe I could be on that stage.
• 41:43
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, yeah, of course.
• 41:44
  SPEAKER_04: Like that seeing videos like that is probably one of the biggest motivators you could have.
• 41:49
  SPEAKER_04: Um, it's one thing to like there's a website called 1001tracklists.com, which basically does a good job of tracking what DJs are playing in their sets, and so you can look up an artist or you can look up a specific song and just kind of find a compilation of DJs that have played that song and like where they played it, so that it can say, like, okay, Lost Kings played this remix of yours at Hangout Fest in 2017 or whatever.
• 42:14
  SPEAKER_04: So that's like it's a good catalog, and um, so it's one thing to go through that and search your name or search your songs and see how many people are supporting it and where, and that's cool, but to see actual videos of yeah, like all of the money spent on pyrotechnics and just FX and the visuals, and then see a crowd of 10 to 50 to 80,000 people all having to having to listen to that song like in a good moment, and obviously they're having a good time.
• 42:44
  SPEAKER_04: That's awesome.
• 42:46
  SPEAKER_04: And it's like, yeah, okay, well, if that if that song's doing well enough in their brains to play out to all these people in that moment, and the reaction of it is as good as it looks, then in my set, you know, it could be the same result.
• 43:01
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 43:02
  SPEAKER_04: When I'm on stage.
• 43:03
  SPEAKER_01: 100%.
• 43:04
  SPEAKER_01: I'm sure that's probably also a pretty daunting feeling, though.
• 43:08
  SPEAKER_04: What do you mean?
• 43:09
  SPEAKER_01: Well kind of with going with that perspective that I was talking about earlier, very driven, goal-oriented mindset, inherently means that when you reach a level or when you see something that's possible, you start to make goals that are oh yeah, to think like, okay, what do I have to do to be in that position?
• 43:30
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 43:30
  SPEAKER_04: And you're like, yeah, I mean, obviously it's a ton of work and uh they have a huge machine.
• 43:35
  SPEAKER_04: And you know, any artist on the stage like that has a huge machine working for them to get there and like such a big team.
• 43:42
  SPEAKER_04: So I know that I don't have that team now, but it's just like a stepping stone to get there.
• 43:47
  SPEAKER_04: And you know, getting I think getting one of my singles with a major label would be the first step, and we're really close to that.
• 43:53
  SPEAKER_04: And hopefully when that happens, I see success in that, and then people at that label go, Okay, well, we Really like this song.
• 44:01
  SPEAKER_04: This artist that we signed the song with is doing quite well.
• 44:05
  SPEAKER_04: Like, let's give him another song.
• 44:06
  SPEAKER_04: Let's give him three.
• 44:07
  SPEAKER_04: Let's give him four.
• 44:08
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, now he's got an EP with a major label that's doing well.
• 44:11
  SPEAKER_04: Okay, cool.
• 44:12
  SPEAKER_04: Let's do another EP with even bigger features and bigger artists and bigger collabs.
• 44:16
  SPEAKER_04: And that's gonna blow up his socials and his fan base, and it just keeps going and going and going until yeah, you're on that stage.
• 44:24
  SPEAKER_01: Until you're on that stage, man.
• 44:26
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 44:28
  SPEAKER_01: That's wild.
• 44:30
  SPEAKER_01: It's it's such an interesting field, too, where such a it's not it's not small, obviously, it's a ton of work, but right three and a half minutes of music can be heard by half half a billion people, and then puts you on the map from nothing.
• 44:52
  SPEAKER_04: Mm-hmm.
• 44:53
  SPEAKER_04: That's crazy, and also like the fact that two minutes to three minutes of anything could be life-changing.
• 45:02
  SPEAKER_01: What do you mean?
• 45:03
  SPEAKER_04: Like, I could make 10 songs, right?
• 45:06
  SPEAKER_04: And all of them are two to three minutes long, and I spend thousands of hours on them, and some of them could kind of just do nothing for me, but one of them could be listened to by someone very important, and that could link me with someone else very important, and suddenly all my next singles lined up are getting blown the fuck up because of it, you know.
• 45:29
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, like one decision I could make in a song could make that song so much better that it it does wonders for me.
• 45:37
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it's pretty crazy.
• 45:38
  SPEAKER_01: And even it's also wild because the magnitude of how popular that one two or three minute song could be could actually bring up the value of all the other songs.
• 45:51
  SPEAKER_04: Exactly.
• 45:52
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, and that's what you'd hope for.
• 45:54
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, yeah.
• 45:56
  SPEAKER_01: What would be so I guess the goal then success, obviously, in one fashion here is becoming as big as possible, right?
• 46:04
  SPEAKER_01: Having as many people connect with you and and and hear your music as possible, maybe playing bigger shows and stuff like that.
• 46:09
  SPEAKER_01: Are there any extra goals that are outside of the purely financial or or popularity side of music?
• 46:22
  SPEAKER_04: Hmm.
• 46:24
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, I definitely wanna I want to get to a certain point.
• 46:27
  SPEAKER_04: I don't need to be like the biggest artist in the world.
• 46:32
  SPEAKER_04: I'm not I'm not gonna be upset with myself if that doesn't happen.
• 46:35
  SPEAKER_04: I just want to be able to have like a very um loyal fan base that can let me tour like whenever I want at a good size venue.
• 46:49
  SPEAKER_04: And then I also want to be able to use this like career trips I've made to be able to do other cool things, you know.
• 46:57
  SPEAKER_04: Like I really want to use this to be able to travel because I've been traveling, I've been lucky and fortunate up, and like the conversation you said you had with the other guy about being grateful.
• 47:08
  SPEAKER_04: Like, I've been so lucky to, and I'm very grateful that I've been able to travel so much with my family because they value that so much, and I want to be able to do that again in my 20s and 30s on my own or you know, with a partner or whatever, or with other DJs, you know, and just experience everything that's out there through my job.
• 47:29
  SPEAKER_04: I think that's like the coolest thing I could possibly do with it.
• 47:33
  SPEAKER_04: And I haven't really been able to do that.
• 47:35
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, I I have to a small extent, like in college and and my first few years out here, I've gotten to go to a lot of places in the country I normally would not have gone to, you know, like a lot of places in the south or the Midwest that I just never would have seen.
• 47:48
  SPEAKER_04: I've been able to experience because of music.
• 47:51
  SPEAKER_04: So I just kind of want to like build that out and you know, go to, I mean, I even got to go to Canada.
• 47:57
  SPEAKER_04: I I want to now like go to Mexico, be able to go venture in Europe, go to Australia for a month, like things like that.
• 48:03
  SPEAKER_04: I really want to I want to do.
• 48:05
  SPEAKER_04: But outside of that, I would love to um at the end of the day, I would love to start some sort of business where I'm bringing people up.
• 48:16
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 48:16
  SPEAKER_01: So kind of on a similar theme of the music that you aspire to create, which is giving them this feel, like this good feeling, right?
• 48:25
  SPEAKER_01: It's the it's the day drinking or the day hike or sitting on the beach and like enjoying life kind of feeling.
• 48:32
  SPEAKER_01: What what does a business like that do?
• 48:35
  SPEAKER_01: What does that make sense?
• 48:39
  SPEAKER_04: What do you mean, like the music itself or like creating a structure?
• 48:44
  SPEAKER_01: Well, you said you wanted to create something, does or a business.
• 48:48
  SPEAKER_01: Does that business just mean your music label?
• 48:52
  SPEAKER_04: No, I'm saying like outside of my own music and and like touring aspirations and whatnot, at later on, when I don't want to be that guy who's doing a ton of shows and traveling and living on an airplane, um, as a lot of DJs do, I would want to be stationed somewhere where I could work in an office and like have a company created where I'm bringing up new artists.
• 49:17
  SPEAKER_04: That's what I was trying to say.
• 49:18
  SPEAKER_01: Oh, I see what you're saying.
• 49:19
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, yeah.
• 49:20
  SPEAKER_04: And like artists that I support.
• 49:21
  SPEAKER_04: And I don't know if that means like I would own a record label or I would work with Timmy on like a management company or something.
• 49:27
  SPEAKER_04: I don't know yet because that's the way down the line.
• 49:31
  SPEAKER_04: But um eventually, yeah, I'd I don't I wouldn't want to be traveling anymore.
• 49:35
  SPEAKER_04: I'd want to be relaxed at home and then building something bigger than myself.
• 49:40
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 49:41
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_01: Why?
• 49:42
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, there are plenty of different avenues to go down and building something bigger than yourself.
• 49:46
  SPEAKER_01: What is what stands out about helping other people do the thing that you're trying to do right now?
• 49:55
  SPEAKER_04: I just think it would be more not more, but it would just be rewarding to like at the end of the day be able to create that for someone else.
• 50:06
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, you know, rather than just be like, think about yourself the whole time.
• 50:11
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, absolutely.
• 50:12
  SPEAKER_01: It's yeah, it's uh I think it's a common sentiment.
• 50:17
  SPEAKER_01: People want to help others, and it also makes sense because this is what you're spending a lot of your time on, so it's kind of the expertise you're building.
• 50:26
  SPEAKER_01: You'll want to give it to other people in some form or fashion.
• 50:29
  SPEAKER_04: Exactly, exactly.
• 50:30
  SPEAKER_01: Do you think the only way to do that is to leverage other artists or help other help build up other artists, or are there other ways of of using your music in a positive way that you've thought of?
• 50:44
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, there's certainly tons of ways, like uh for example, something that's happening right now during COVID, uh, is a lot of these big um YouTube channels like Trop Nation or Proximity, or there's a company called Brownies Eliminate, which is like a big promoting company out here that does a host a lot of shows and events.
• 51:06
  SPEAKER_04: They've been doing these um online festivals basically where DJs play sets, and then the people who tune in to watch their artists play a set, um, they are constantly just donating money to like reliefs and and and organizations to help people.
• 51:22
  SPEAKER_04: So the first festival they did raised like half a million dollars or something crazy like that.
• 51:28
  SPEAKER_04: So people can do that, and I would love to be a part of that soon.
• 51:33
  SPEAKER_04: And then, you know, way, way, way, way down the line, maybe like host, you know, a festival like that, you know, and like create that kind of event.
• 51:41
  SPEAKER_04: That'd be awesome.
• 51:42
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, no, it's cool because it brings another aspect of music into it because at the most superficial level, it's really just kind of about enjoyment.
• 51:52
  SPEAKER_01: I mean you listen to music and you have a good time, but it's it's interesting to see, and I guess this is actually kind of cool because you can see it in it's why uh musicians will go into war zones and play for our troops, right?
• 52:07
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 52:07
  SPEAKER_01: There's like a tangible impact that can be created by musicians.
• 52:11
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, no, a hundred percent.
• 52:13
  SPEAKER_04: And I think right now, like it's music's super important.
• 52:17
  SPEAKER_04: That's why people like these YouTube channels are putting on these festivals because people are at, I mean, maybe not as much now, but uh, you know, from March onwards, like people have been home, people have been feeling weird and bored and worried and sick, and they just kind of need an outlet, so that's why you know Netflix has been at an all-time high, and and and just so many festivals online have been taking place because music, you know, is there for that for entertainment?
• 52:49
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 52:50
  SPEAKER_01: Would you I guess we kind of touched on this earlier when we were talking about how music is like a timestamp in your memory, it's it can evoke pretty strong feelings.
• 53:03
  SPEAKER_01: But why do you feel like music is so impactful?
• 53:08
  SPEAKER_01: Is it just that?
• 53:09
  SPEAKER_01: Is there anything more to it?
• 53:14
  SPEAKER_04: Besides as a timestamp, I mean for me personally, I think well now it's harder because I have a harder time like separating listening to music for work and listening to music for leisure.
• 53:28
  SPEAKER_01: That's kind of tough.
• 53:30
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it is kind of tough sometimes.
• 53:32
  SPEAKER_04: I guess it's kind of the same thing as like an actor not being able to separate like judging someone else's work versus like just enjoying something that someone's made.
• 53:42
  SPEAKER_04: But um I mean, leisure is probably a top one, and then another one would be just like kind of a distraction, an escape, I think is probably one of the uh the biggest things I I hear people say.
• 53:59
  SPEAKER_04: Um especially, I mean, not even in like a festival situation, just like in an everyday, you know, AirPods in going to the gym scenario.
• 54:11
  SPEAKER_04: Like it's just yeah.
• 54:12
  SPEAKER_01: No, it's yeah, and it's accessible, right?
• 54:15
  SPEAKER_01: Everyone does that.
• 54:16
  SPEAKER_01: I would think everyone I would think everyone does that on the way to work, like everything, commuting, yeah.
• 54:23
  SPEAKER_01: It's tough then that one of your favorite things to do is become all work.
• 54:29
  SPEAKER_01: It's probably not because it's kind of a work and play at the same time.
• 54:34
  SPEAKER_01: Do you only see it as work or is it a mix of um it's tough.
• 54:39
  SPEAKER_04: I've had to like kind of expand what I listen to to separate the separate them.
• 54:44
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, because it's like I can enjoy, I can still enjoy obviously like a new Zed song or new chain smokers.
• 54:52
  SPEAKER_04: Like, I'll I'll love listening to it, but at the same time, after that first listen, I'm really like just kind of studying it and dissecting it and being like, okay, why does this kick drum sound so freaking clean compared to mine or someone else's, or like how did they make this look like vocal effect, chop, whatever?
• 55:12
  SPEAKER_04: And I'm just trying to study it at that point.
• 55:15
  SPEAKER_04: So now when I'm in my time of leisure, like sitting outside or hiking or whatever, I I'll go back to like the classics of rock, or now, like a lot of us in the house, we like listening to country.
• 55:31
  SPEAKER_03: Sure.
• 55:31
  SPEAKER_04: Because it's just kind of so different, it's it's able to switch our brains off from hearing music and immediately connecting it to work to just hearing music and it's just like pure enjoyment and it's just a separation.
• 55:43
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 55:44
  SPEAKER_01: I don't know if this will come across clearly, but it's kind of an interesting perspective, which is you have this really goal-oriented mindset, right?
• 55:54
  SPEAKER_01: And that shows in you know, take you said earlier making the most of whatever you have, and that was kind of music.
• 56:02
  SPEAKER_01: And so you got this opportunity to play with music, and so you then you are all of a sudden you create larger goals for it.
• 56:10
  SPEAKER_01: And then now it's actually come becomes some form of habit where as you're listening to music, you are then not editing it, but you're analyzing it in your head as to what it could you what you could use it for.
• 56:26
  SPEAKER_02: Right.
• 56:26
  SPEAKER_01: How that could make you better.
• 56:28
  SPEAKER_01: So it's like like that that goal-oriented mindset has actually become I don't know, more of a habit, uh more of the a way, more of a perspective.
• 56:39
  SPEAKER_04: It's more like just I would say like naturally ingrained now.
• 56:43
  SPEAKER_01: Right.
• 56:44
  SPEAKER_01: Now you just take all music and say, How does this, how can it help me?
• 56:49
  SPEAKER_04: How can or how can I use it to make me a better Yeah, which is which I would say is a good thing, obviously, but it requires a new level of like exploring different music and separating music into like a different file of like this is not something that I need to study or dissect.
• 57:08
  SPEAKER_01: Have you started then to look towards other ways of finding leisure then?
• 57:12
  SPEAKER_01: If it's not just music.
• 57:13
  SPEAKER_04: I mean, it's funny.
• 57:15
  SPEAKER_04: I guess the to a good way to tie it up would be like so the whole your like your first question of of balancing the schoolwork and the soccer and the music.
• 57:25
  SPEAKER_04: So soccer obviously kind of died my junior year, and then music took over.
• 57:32
  SPEAKER_04: And I'm I've been out in LA for three years, and when I first moved out here, even I think about yeah, the second two years I as I was out here, I didn't think about soccer, uh, I didn't play any soccer.
• 57:48
  SPEAKER_04: Like my general exercise levels and like routines were just like at an all-time low.
• 57:54
  SPEAKER_04: And I was it was just music, music, music.
• 57:57
  SPEAKER_04: And then about a year and a half ago, that began to switch over again.
• 58:03
  SPEAKER_04: So I got, yeah, I was getting kind of drained for music, and then I just realized I was kind of not taking care of myself as well as I was in the past, and so that's when like the gym came back, and then I finally was able to living with people that knew about a soccer team.
• 58:20
  SPEAKER_04: So I joined a soccer team again, and so suddenly I was playing again, which was a new feeling, yeah, and I was getting very into it, and then you know, my senior year, my first yard here, my second yard here, I wasn't following the Premier League at all.
• 58:35
  SPEAKER_04: I had no clue what was going on, and then suddenly again I was like really interested in watching it.
• 58:40
  SPEAKER_04: So there's just like this resurgence of soccer coming back after missing it for a few years, and that kind of created a whole new balance again while I'm out here.
• 58:53
  SPEAKER_01: It's interesting.
• 58:54
  SPEAKER_01: I I I appreciate you bringing that up.
• 58:56
  SPEAKER_01: It's interesting because I feel like I see that a lot in a lot of people our age, which is 24, 25, 26, is that people when they came out of college, it was like jumping into the deep end, and everyone just went crazy into whatever they were doing, whether it was work or actively not working.
• 59:16
  SPEAKER_01: And it seems like even though no one really knows why it's happening, people are starting to value that balance a little bit more.
• 59:27
  SPEAKER_01: I mean, most people are starting to appreciate they're starting to see maybe that work isn't everything or that work is just like a part of the whole.
• 59:39
  SPEAKER_04: I would say now more than ever, like the main thing I focus on is not music, it's just balance, like balance of sleep, balance of going out, balance of staying in, balance of working out, balance of resting, um, balance of drinking, not drinking, uh, balance of working on music for X amount of hours a day versus taking the day off to like rest my ears and rest my ideas and come back to it more fresh the next day, you know?
• 1:00:10
  SPEAKER_04: Like everything I'm trying to balance everything.
• 1:00:13
  SPEAKER_01: Why?
• 1:00:14
  SPEAKER_01: Why what's so important about creating a balance?
• 1:00:16
  SPEAKER_04: I think it just I don't know, it makes me subconsciously feel like I'm doing the right thing or I'm more on the right track because I'm not like losing myself in one direction.
• 1:00:28
  SPEAKER_04: Um, I'm just kind of like steady, uh, and it just feels healthier.
• 1:00:34
  SPEAKER_04: And I think overall, I think you just feel happier because you're not relying on the success of one thing to make you feel happy or sad, like you have more things going on and more things you can control that just keep you on the right track.
• 1:00:51
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, yeah.
• 1:00:52
  SPEAKER_01: No, that's a really good way of putting it, man.
• 1:00:55
  SPEAKER_01: Also, it's better for the long term in as far as the actual results you put out.
• 1:01:03
  SPEAKER_01: Like if you and it's an interesting, it's uh like if you spend less time on music, obviously you're still working really hard making music, but if you spend a little bit less time and create more of a balance, the music you do create will probably be better.
• 1:01:18
  SPEAKER_04: Exactly.
• 1:01:19
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 1:01:20
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah.
• 1:01:21
  SPEAKER_01: Like you aren't forcing it, and that's the same with studying for tests or anything.
• 1:01:26
  SPEAKER_01: It's not, I I wouldn't say it's total hours.
• 1:01:28
  SPEAKER_01: I think you there is a there's a minimum where you have to study up to, and above that it'll be probably better.
• 1:01:35
  SPEAKER_01: But you know, if you spend if you pull an all-nighter and study for 12 hours, you're probably gonna get less out of it than if you slept for six hours of those.
• 1:01:43
  SPEAKER_04: I would yeah, and I mean, I'm not saying like from the beginning I should have been more balanced.
• 1:01:49
  SPEAKER_04: I think it's good to dive really deep into something and learn from that.
• 1:01:54
  SPEAKER_04: And I and in music especially, I mean in anything, like you need to put in your 10,000 hours.
• 1:01:59
  SPEAKER_04: And I think I definitely did that at the end of college and like my first few years out here.
• 1:02:04
  SPEAKER_04: I really was because I mean there's just so much to learn, and you have to put you have to keep your head down and like put those hours in.
• 1:02:11
  SPEAKER_04: But now that I've kind of come out of that and I'm more experienced, I definitely think it's more beneficial at this point to use your time more wisely and and make sure that you're keeping the balance so that when you are going into music or going to sports, like you can just do a better job of what you're trying to do.
• 1:02:29
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, absolutely.
• 1:02:30
  SPEAKER_01: That I guess would leave me with one last question, which is you've put in all this work and all this practice, and it's I I do also like that perspective of that there you need there does need to be some sort of dive into it, right?
• 1:02:44
  SPEAKER_01: Maybe, maybe I don't know.
• 1:02:46
  SPEAKER_01: I guess it's probably dependent on the person.
• 1:02:48
  SPEAKER_01: Some people need to jump full throttle into something and then find balance, and then maybe some people just stick with the balance, yeah.
• 1:02:56
  SPEAKER_02: Yeah.
• 1:02:57
  SPEAKER_01: But now that you're kind of finding that balance, and I'm sure it'll it'll go in waves, it's a roller coaster.
• 1:03:02
  SPEAKER_01: Is there anything you're super excited about coming up with your music or with your performances?
• 1:03:07
  SPEAKER_04: Or uh, I mean, for sure, like today was a good example because uh we had submitted the song I was I had been working on for two weeks um Wednesday because Timmy gave me like a hard deadline, which is another helpful thing because I you know anyone can work on a song forever, it's never finished.
• 1:03:30
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, but you need someone else to come in and say, look, it's done, you just have to move on.
• 1:03:35
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, and so he did that.
• 1:03:36
  SPEAKER_04: He was like, I need it Wednesday, and so I was like, Okay, okay, so Monday, Tuesday, I was like grinding it out, trying to perfect it or whatever.
• 1:03:43
  SPEAKER_04: And then Wednesday, I was like, all right, it's at a place where I'm I feel comfortable sharing it, which is takes a lot.
• 1:03:48
  SPEAKER_04: So did that, we sent it to them.
• 1:03:51
  SPEAKER_04: Then the first guy in charge, I don't even know what he does, but he's like, I like it, I'm gonna forward it to Jenna, the writer, and the vocalist.
• 1:03:58
  SPEAKER_04: Like, great, that's a good start.
• 1:03:59
  SPEAKER_04: Then today they came back saying Jenna loves it, the writer, and the vocalist loves it too.
• 1:04:03
  SPEAKER_04: So she wants to stand for the feature.
• 1:04:05
  SPEAKER_04: Like, is this gonna be an upcoming single for BK?
• 1:04:08
  SPEAKER_04: So, like, all positive across the board.
• 1:04:10
  SPEAKER_04: So something like that is super exciting because someone like Jenna, this writer, is insanely well connected um to major labels.
• 1:04:21
  SPEAKER_04: And so is the so is the the vocalist or the top liner.
• 1:04:24
  SPEAKER_04: It's so all across the board, it's just like a very good look if my name was put with these other names.
• 1:04:29
  SPEAKER_04: And that would do a lot for me in terms of like just establishing myself as like a serious, serious artist in this in this space.
• 1:04:39
  SPEAKER_04: Um, so something like that is really exciting, and I have I have a few songs right now in the back burner that are just like the highest quality I've ever had.
• 1:04:50
  SPEAKER_04: Um, like the vocals are just getting better, their production is getting better, so I'm really just seeing progress in my work.
• 1:04:55
  SPEAKER_04: Like I I have singles that were maybe supposed to come out two years ago, you know, or like I have a package of demos from two years ago, and when I listen to those compared to what I have now, it's just like night and day.
• 1:05:09
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah.
• 1:05:10
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and so one of the things I've struggled with in my career, I'd say, was putting out a single because it just felt like it took forever.
• 1:05:18
  SPEAKER_04: And we were just running through all these roadblocks that were stopping us from putting out songs when we wanted to.
• 1:05:24
  SPEAKER_04: And now that we look back at it, it's like those are probably good things that happen to us because it let me mature in my production.
• 1:05:32
  unknown: Sure.
• 1:05:33
  SPEAKER_04: It just helped give me time to like become a better producer and not rush it.
• 1:05:38
  SPEAKER_04: Um, and and so when I do put out songs, like I was saying earlier, they're just more refined and they sound more professional, and it's just gonna help me because those songs are gonna be that much better and bring in more viewers than it would if I released three songs two years ago that were kind of trash now, you know.
• 1:05:55
  SPEAKER_01: Yeah, and I think that's one of the coolest probably aspects of it's probably of any work if you if you look at it with with the right lens, but with your music is you could actually have a file of you know, day one, day a hundred, year five, and you could play those tunes back to back to back, and that's it's pretty wild to be able to see your entire progress of five years, half a decade, yeah, you know, ten minutes, right?
• 1:06:24
  SPEAKER_04: No, it is crazy.
• 1:06:25
  SPEAKER_04: Yeah, it's awesome.
• 1:06:26
  SPEAKER_01: Cool, man.
• 1:06:27
  SPEAKER_01: Well, thank you for doing this, yeah.
• 1:06:29
  SPEAKER_04: Thank you for letting me do this.
• 1:06:30
  SPEAKER_04: This is awesome.
• 1:06:36
  SPEAKER_01: I want to thank Brian for that discussion.
• 1:06:38
  SPEAKER_01: Kind of like an episode that will come a bit later with my friend Manu, this ended up really just being a fun exploration with a good friend of mine.
• 1:06:46
  SPEAKER_01: In that vein, there are a couple things I really enjoyed about this.
• 1:06:50
  SPEAKER_01: First, I hope that anyone listening takes this as motivation to go and talk to your close friends and ask them why they do the things they do, and make the decisions they make.
• 1:06:58
  SPEAKER_01: You and your friendship might just grow because of it.
• 1:07:01
  SPEAKER_01: Second, Brian has some experience in a tough industry that a lot of people are trying to get into, and I think that's fascinating.
• 1:07:08
  SPEAKER_01: And lastly, it's pretty common to hear how failures are a great place for growth.
• 1:07:12
  SPEAKER_01: I love that Brian can now look back at the things he might have done wrong in the past and say, those mistakes had to happen.
• 1:07:20
  SPEAKER_01: It makes me wonder what chances I have to take and embrace, whether they lead to success or failure, so that I can look back on them in the future and say, for me to be here now, regardless of if it was painful or embarrassing or discouraging, I had to do that.
• 1:07:37
  SPEAKER_01: And maybe it makes you wonder the same thing.
• 1:07:39
  SPEAKER_00: Thanks for listening.
• 1:07:42
  SPEAKER_00: If you liked this episode of Seeking Authenticity, that's freaking awesome.
• 1:07:46
  SPEAKER_00: All I want to ask of you, the listener, in return for the time and effort I put into making it, is that you take a deep breath.
• 1:07:54
  SPEAKER_00: I mean really breathe.
• 1:07:56
  SPEAKER_00: Breathe so that it stretches out your shoulders and your back and your chest and pushes out your stomach.
• 1:08:02
  SPEAKER_00: No more of these shallow, bullshit breaths.
• 1:08:04
  SPEAKER_00: They're barely keeping you alive, my friend.
• 1:08:06
  SPEAKER_00: And after you exhale, go out and soak up today.
• 1:08:10
  SPEAKER_00: Because in the end, your actions and the way they interact with the world and the people around you right now are all you have in this life.
• 1:08:18
  SPEAKER_00: So be authentic with them.
• 1:08:20
  SPEAKER_00: Peace.