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Creativity isn’t tidy—it’s risky, chaotic, and full of surprises. It’s full of breakthroughs and breakdowns, moments of flow and moments of doubt. Join Mishu Hilmy for unfiltered conversations with artists, filmmakers, musicians, and fearless makers who thrive in the unknown, embrace imperfection, and create at the edge of possibility.
This is your front row seat to the self-doubt, unexpected wins, and messy emotional work of making something real. But craft isn’t just about feeling—it’s about problem-solving, process, and the devotion behind mastery.
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Mishu Hilmy (00:03.244)
Welcome to Mischief in Mastery, where we embrace the ups, downs, and all around uncertainty of a creative life, and that steady, and sometimes not so steady journey toward expertise. Each episode we talk candidly with people I know, people I don't know, folks who produce, direct, write, act, do comedy, make art, make messes, and make meaning out of their lives. You will hear guests lay out how they work, what they're thinking about, where they get stuck, and why they snap out of their comfort zones and into big, bold, risky mo-
So, if you're hungry for honest insights, deep dives into process philosophies and practical tips, plus maybe a little mischief along the way, you're in the right place. For more, visit mischiefpod.com. Hey everyone, it's Mishu and welcome to Mischief and Mastery. Today we are talking with Yuxin Liu. Yuxin Liu is a Chicago-based sound designer and composer with a background in precise piano work and a cross-cultural musical palette that's been showcased in performances across
Europe and the United States. As a Chinese composer, they blend Eastern and Western musical traditions into scores that feel both intimate and cinematic, moving easily between emotional piano work and synth-driven energy. Yushin was also selected as one of 14 members for Paramount and MTV's inaugural First Time Composers Initiative and collaborated on the production and vocals for Sync Music under the guidance of Five Alarm Music and Jingle Punks.
Since entering film in 2018, Yushin has gone all in on scoring, sound design, and post-production, bringing that range to indie projects and to their own 2021 EP, Pink Arena. So was lots of fun getting to talk to a very talented musician and Yushin and I, talked through a lot. We talked about the scoring process as well as spotting sessions and figuring out where.
original music belongs and knowing when a cue fits their style or when it's better to hand it off to someone else. also talk about their love of emotional piano work and their approach to synths and how they think about shaping a film's sound without forcing anything. if that's something you're into, please keep listening. You can learn more about Yushin at sourlyx.com and follow them on Instagram at sourlyx. So without any more delays, here it is a very fun, very lovely conversation with myself and Yushin Lim.
Yuxin Lu (02:19.95)
We're working on her feature and I'm the composer for the feature. And we had a spotting session a couple of weeks earlier. I guess the next month I can actually start writing something for the film, you know, so that's really exciting. Other than that, just, you know, we'll mix some.
make some audio for my build. I don't know if it's a good way to say it, but just not extremely creative, but you know, get it going.
So yeah, so the the spotting session for the feature that's roller babies the Jamie's Totally and so like when it comes to say spotting because I imagine are they at picture lock or if they're near picture lock is it more you're more able to spot you know music like what exactly is like spotting from your your your side
Yeah, or maybe...
Yuxin Lu (03:12.78)
Yeah, I guess it's to, well, first of all, to know the whole structure of the film. And then I guess I'll point out parts, I guess it's more of a mix of me as a composer and music supervisor where we decide which parts we need songs that needs licensing from, or like where do I chime in and write some original cues? Yeah.
Cool. So then when it comes to say like working with a director around original cues, how do you go about it? Like you're looking at the images, you're looking at the scenes, like what's the conversation like around, you know, any given project versus say this particular project when it comes to like your creative voice, your perspective in terms of serving the story.
Personally, I always want to make sure that our styles are aligned because there are things I certainly cannot do and I don't want to writing things I'm not comfortable with. So for Roller Babies, there are a lot of, you know, a comical side and maybe orchestral, a little bit orchestral, like comical, dramatic, but in a funny way. So I think that's a very good starting point for me. And I just...
want to make sure that A, the music fits and aligns with the type of that the editor picked and the director and something that the director has in mind. yeah, and I tell them if it's like, you know, underground metal rock and I cannot do that at all. So please find, please find a local artist who's really good at doing that. Yeah.
Yeah, you're not necessarily out there to shred.
Yuxin Lu (04:44.151)
No, no, no, not at all. I know there are guitarists, like composers that can do that. Not for me. I'm a pianist, so yeah.
Is it from like a classical background? Is it from a piano background? Like, where do you find the sort of the roots of your sort of musical confidence or certain, you know, musical styles that you're generally drawn toward or lean toward?
It's going to be a little dramatic because I like a good emotional... I like instrumental piano or simple strings. I'm not huge about like dramatic brass and stuff. I know it's something that I need to work on, but I enjoy writing ambience and emotional tunes. At the same time, I really love writing synth bass, like high energy beats. It's very extreme.
I want, I'm very interested if in the future, it ever happens to write something as both something slow, beautiful, and then something hyped and know, since VBM, stuff like that.
And like, do you have like some synth hardware that you typically like to use or is it a fair amount of sort of digital?
Yuxin Lu (05:49.036)
Yeah, I unfortunately cannot afford a $5,000 synthesizer. know Arturia has a whole library with all the vintage synths and they're upgrading every year, but I had the older version. So that's like my main synth sound library. Gear wise, have Minilogue by Korg and then some like Road.
rolled sound from like Yamaha little keyboard, you know, nothing too fancy.
And then I'm curious like for synths, at least even in synth emulation, like how's your relationship to sort of like the mathematics of it? Do you go more like intuitive, like playing around, poking around, or can you get mathematical about it with all the different waves? I'm totally like naive to it all. like, to me, I get overwhelmed by it. Like how do you relate to like all the fun?
Yeah, I agree. At first I was very overwhelmed by how many knobs I can tune on one synth, especially with Mug. There are so many things you can change. Envelopes, time attack delay, different sound waves, then there's oscillators for every single signal and you can stack them together, all of that. guess nowadays, now that I know how they would sound like eventually.
I kind of start from the result and I dial back if that makes sense. So say I want something soft. want a soft pad and I start with like sine wave and I try to find a pad sound like from the library and use that as a reference and try to add my own flavor to it or something like that.
Mishu Hilmy (07:32.214)
Right. Yeah, because I think that's the challenge because like you're ultimately trying to evoke a feeling, but it sounds like if you know the problem you're trying to solve or the feeling you're trying to create to that you kind of build from there. Because I think the hardest thing with any sort of tool is like, I know what I want to do, but which tools should I be using? Should I be using attacks or delays or all these different things? Like, and I think that probably just takes a lot of practice, but at the onset, it seems like overwhelming where I want something that sounds soft or whatever, but I'm not sure how to quite get there.
Yeah, I guess it just comes with practice, I guess. At first, when I look at the library, it comes with whichever synth you pick and there are like 50 sounds, at least 50 sounds you can play around with. And I just have to go through them one by one and then eventually I kind of just memorize, I guess, the patterns or, you know, the vibe of it, you know.
Music is in and of itself its own sort of art form, where versus like filmmaking, it's hard to practice without having actors show up, having a crew show up and you're filming it. So like, how do you balance say like the the craft of doing a collaborative music score versus like personal practice for just fun or just practicing the tools you have? How does that integrate in terms of like your your usual creative routine?
I guess like thanks to the piano training I had at school growing up and I know at the end of the day it's a step by step process. So it can be really overwhelming at first, but I kind of know as soon as I start making the first step and I will naturally know what to do next, you know? And sometimes it takes forever and it's really scary to push it forward. You know, it's like pushing.
myself out of comfort zone, step by step. There's really like no way to generalize it, I guess. I'm more of, I'm going to do it and see how it goes. I'm that kind of person.
Mishu Hilmy (09:30.242)
Yeah, yeah, that's great. Because it's like, it's, I think it's hard to just like push yourself out of your comfort zone in a practice space. I think you can, but sometimes, you know, practice is like to maybe rehash or refresh or just work your general skill set versus say, booking a gig or working with a client where it's like, they're asking for this. I haven't done this in a while or I've never done this and trusting like the skills you have and then how to sort of apply it to a new situation.
For sure, for sure. Yeah, it takes a lot of courage and I'm absolutely still working on, I don't know, being more upfront or I don't know, to actually know what I'm capable of doing instead of saying, I don't know, like, do you want this? Do you want that? Yeah, yeah, yeah. I guess it comes with practice.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. was like, yeah, that practice and like maybe the curiosity or the confidence of like, I haven't done this before, but I'm willing to, you know, put myself out there. Maybe I'd put a caveat or maybe qualify it briefly, but it sounds like you're at least like, I think I could do this. I won't go too hard on like, don't expect too much from me.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. It's a tough balance sometimes.
And then you mentioned earlier sort of the temp, you know, what's a temp track the director editor might've lied down. So I'm curious like what your relationship is with, you know, navigating temp scores.
Yuxin Lu (10:48.866)
love them because A, they are something like recognized, recognizable and they're famous, right? So that's why people know exactly what they want for the scene or for certain cues. And I feel like nowadays we have so much resources online and I see them as a good really learning opportunity. You you can drag the track in your DAW and then analyze the waveform and see their EQ and stuff. Sometimes I get, it's like...
I don't know, very nerdy producer side things that people would do, but in my head it gives a really good direction because music can go anywhere, literally. So yeah, I love temp tracks and I try to be as good as them. That's guess that's...
Oh yeah, totally. Yeah, that's great. Cause I think it's interesting. Cause I think some on the other side, I don't know if it's maybe a purity approach or someone desiring a truly blank canvas where it's like, I'd rather be as far removed from it as possible. But even so, if you're writing a horror movie, you've seen horror movies. So like, if you're hearing a song, like you've seen it, but maybe not in the context of like, well, I've never heard this song or this temp track with this image.
but it sounds like maybe that isn't too much of a hang up rather than it helps get on the same page with say the director, the team, and like jump off and try and like improve upon it. And then you mentioned like mixing, is that more in the sort of the client side where it's like when you do mixing gigs, it's like, it's more technical. So maybe not the most creative outlets. Like, right, I got to fix the EQ, maybe clean up some noise. Like what, how does that sort of different?
Yeah.
Yuxin Lu (12:23.188)
It's, well, I do a variety of audio gigs. So there are times I'm out of tuning a vocal and there are times I'm mixing dialogue and it's very different. Music world and say like podcast slash film world. like dialogue based mixing versus music mixing. It's very different. So I guess to answer your question, it's always technical, like no matter what.
If we talk about sound design, that'll be more creative. Mixing wise, yes, there are room to be creative, but not that much. Cause like, of course, different plugin you choose and different effect you choose would change the outcome, but it's more of like enhancement or a nice flavor, I guess, but it change the base of the sound, I guess. Yeah.
And is it usually dependent on sort of the context of how you approach the mix? know, because it's like all the all the tracks are essentially there and like whether this is a podcast or say a dialogue scene or say a song, is that usually what determines like your your approach to like, if I mix this down, you can hear this vocal track better. But it's not fundamentally altering things. It's just potentially adding clarity or a little bit more style.
So you're asking if I want more clarity or I want it to have a style.
I guess it's more curious around like when it comes to say the actual mix because the baseline tracks are there like how, is it just mostly a contextual approach for you when it comes to say like problem solving or is it, you know, depends on the client's needs. I'm just curious, like what your relationship to the.
Yuxin Lu (14:02.862)
Absolutely. I'm just gonna say my personal approach because I feel like every person has a different preference. I try to make it sound as natural as possible unless I'm dealing with experimental films or like a multi-channel experimental project or animation which is like out of this world kind of animation. there are like, and we'll have a discussion, me and director. at that time I'm just doing both sound design and mixing the same time. So like I'm taking
The steering wheel. Yeah, but if we're talking in general, I want it to sound authentic. don't want sound to be... I don't want sound to steal thunder of what's actually happening when... If we're talking about like video, like visual art. Obviously, like graphic is a more important thing here. Yeah, I guess it's a balance of...
this partnership between audio and video, you gotta find a balance.
Yeah, that's interesting because I don't know if I would say that the visual is more important than sound. Anything I'd say maybe they're equally, maybe they're equally important.
Yeah, but and in my head I'm like, okay So say you see someone's like they're fighting and do you want like this like this sound to be? Like take you out of the scene or do you want to focus on how they fight, know, yeah
Mishu Hilmy (15:27.278)
Yeah, it's a good point because I think that also comes down to sort of direction and style, right? Because if it's a comedy, you might be able to get away with a punch sounding like an explosion versus like saying something that's a little bit more realistic. So I think there's style there. yeah, I do think maybe it's a little bit more sensitivity to what the sound design or the sound mix is going to be like. So you don't necessarily detract from the images. But I would say they're probably just as important in terms of creating subliminal emotional responses to the viewer.
Yeah, I guess it's all about teamwork. Like we decide how this will work out, I guess. Yeah.
Yeah. So for you around sound design, just because we naturally talked about it, like what's your relationship to say sound design versus, you know, composing?
I think to me, writing music is more emotional. They're both, I think they're both emotional, but music is definitely a lot more energy, how to say it. Like I think I, what I'm doing sound design, care about the story telling more. Like how do I carry, how do I help to tell the story? And when I'm writing music, it's more about how to make this more powerful. Of course I'm still telling story, but a little bit more emotional.
Mmm.
Yuxin Lu (16:39.182)
I would say. Ever since I went to music school, find like my writing skill has declined because I kind of lost. I know how to express myself through music more than words. to me, it's a good outlet of how I feel. Like this very abstract emotion. I know how to use instruments to carry through, how to, which chord make it sound better.
Hmm.
Sound design wise, I feel like it depends on the genre though. I love working on animation documentaries and in that case, it just helps bring story to life. Bring the raw audio to the next level. That's really satisfying to be able to do that. But music is such an important part to me personally. I guess I take it way more seriously.
Yeah, I mean, that makes sense. Because I do also wonder, like, sometimes sound design can serve a literal function. And I think the baseline of sound design at the most literal level is like, well, what's going on the scene and what do we want to highlight or accent? And then you can totally be very creative within the nuance of like a door hinge opening or a faucet running. But then after sort of speaking to the main literalness of it, there's creativity and like, how can you add tension, darkness or...
Yeah.
Mishu Hilmy (18:02.112)
specificity, but overall, seems usually it's like it's to serve a literal environmental experience of the world. And then you can probably add else other things like change the tone versus I think music can drive itself.
Yeah, it's really challenging sometimes to write about things that are not there yet. Music-wise, mean, you know this is going to happen, but the audience, they don't. Yeah, that's a challenge to give it a hint, but not too much. And then bam, something hit.
Yeah, I rewatched the Barbie movie and it's like that sort of the woes I made for Melody is like throughout the whole movie and then you get hit with it at the end. But it's like the thing is like the problem or the challenge of like the composer of like how many hints of phrases do we give that can lead to it or whether it's at the overture level or just intermittent. It's an interesting challenge to have to do it without over killing it.
Yeah, it's always a challenge. like, hopefully I'll get better at doing it.
Yeah. And then I'm curious about like, there's songwriting for the sake of the song, like the music that it exists within itself versus songwriting and music writing, composing for films. like, do you approach those differently of say you're just writing a song for yourself or a different project versus something associated with an image? Yeah.
Yuxin Lu (19:22.958)
I guess the textbook definition of difference will be like in film there's a motif carrying through the whole thing, especially in the feature film. I don't get to do that very often, but say you're writing for a feature film, theme, like a main theme would happen at least two times, two, three times. Well, if I'm doing a track, a song for myself, it's more about structure, lyrics, and a catchy melody. And that's like, it's more difficult and more simple at the same time.
You know, so you have very limited space to tell the story in a song, right? But it's simple in a way that you only need to write for two minutes.
Yeah. like with say like the nature of feature films, sometimes you might have a short sequence of 30 to 40 seconds versus a longer sequence or longer motifs. Like how do you approach the variability of duration? Like, wow, this is only 200 frames or 10 seconds. Like then they're asking me to spot this or they're asking something there.
what's the of the fun or the challenge of all the different lengths that you might be dealing with.
Yeah, for me, got to watch the film many times to be able to figure out how important this little couple seconds of cue is or which one is more important. And then going backwards, of. So how do you want the music, how the audience to go to the next scene? Yeah. Or do you want to like a slow burn and like a big dramatic scene happens? Yeah.
Yuxin Lu (21:04.878)
I think just like working backwards. Yeah.
And then I'm curious, like the sort of the iteration process and the demoing process, because I imagine like you don't want to commit to something where you put a lot of work into and they're like, this isn't the feel. like, do you, how do you build at least off of what could be just a demo you recorded on a voice memo with the artists or the team? Like what's that process for you?
do you mean, like, how do I build my demos?
Yeah, like if you're working on a scene or a couple scenes for say a movie and you're scoring it, do you like how do you yeah, how do you all the various choices that you have are the options? Do you give like, here's 10 stems that I made that are for this scene? What do you think? know, like, what's the demoing going like?
Yeah, I try to give out three, four options. And I know other composers will give out even more. More options. And the thing is they have to be good enough. You can't just like send out a draft, like a total draft. Yeah, this is my demo. Yeah. Many options. I'll go with different tempo, different arrangement.
Yuxin Lu (22:16.384)
sometimes different instruments or like minor differences where same chord but different rhythm, know, stuff like that. Yeah.
And then sort of like the evolution process, because it's like you're communicating with the director and it's like, here's this sample. I gave them five samples and they really like sample number three. And then you're sort of building off of that. Because you're both decoding each other to a degree. You're decoding the scene and you're decoding the notes. like what's, I'm sure it depends on the director, but like what's the communication like when it comes to revising and altering, like what works for you and like what necessarily doesn't work, et cetera.
I love reference tracks. think we talked about temp tracks and that's really, in my opinion, the most straightforward thing. We're talking about what kind of stuff we want because it's... Say the director is not musical at all. I guess the most convenient way would be like, what song in your head do you feel like that fits most for the scene? I'll try to come up with something that sounds like that.
Pretty much it, I think. So we started with a reference track and I can do variations on that. Sometimes I'll be like, this, we need low energy, more low energy things or like if you find a song that will fit better or something like that. Yeah.
great. So yeah, this is sort of helpful where it's like you can reference either a previous reference track or even previous versions that you might have provided to kind of go
Yuxin Lu (23:42.606)
I'll try to ask simple questions like is it too fast too slow the part of it you don't like? Is it too much happening at the same time or do you want it to be more exciting?
Yeah. And then like you said, like you ideally those initial samples, they're good. They're, they're good enough, right? They're not like threadbare. They're not just pure first drafts, but like, what's the difference between say something that's good enough versus like fine tuning? Are you adding more instrumentation more, more layers to it? Like, what does that usually look like as it's building or progressive?
I think most of the time it's either me trying to do the best I can do or the director feels like this needs to be more hyped or more exciting or it needs to hit harder or something like that. And layering things can... it's tricky. I've experienced this many times where I come up with three...
demos and they are the complexity level is like from zero to a hundred and then I think more than 50 % chances that people are gonna like the zero level better than the more complicated track. So all these effort I put in for nothing? So that really made me you know start thinking because as a pianist I play textures both hands I play polyphonic music so like it's very easy for me to make it more complicated so simplicity is key sometimes.
Yeah, that's I mean, it's interesting. But that's also sort of speaks to like a potential effort or energy saving because yeah, complex doesn't necessarily mean better. And sometimes complexity, it does invite more hours, more labor, more effort. But is it is it then like a fair amount of experimentation? Because it's like, they're liking this, they're liking the thrust of it, but they want a little bit more energy. It doesn't necessarily mean add more to create that energy, but it's more experimenting of like, well, what if it's this sound instead of that? Is that kind of like the general approach?
Yuxin Lu (25:15.299)
Fisher.
Yuxin Lu (25:33.774)
yeah, it's, guess it's trials and errors sometimes. know, it's tough to describe them in words, so you gotta start making them out, sending out demos and see, know, what exactly are you thinking about?
Yeah. And then like when as you're sort of like, as you wrap up, like say, say the score for like an eight minute short film, like what's your relationship to your sense of artistry or signature? Because there's one argument that the song or the music's in service of this greater story, this greater vision. So like, how do you, you know, experience seeing something that you created, but maybe it's not quote unquote your own.
Yeah, think I'm struggling to find my own voice after working with film for so long because I'm always the... I participate in the project, it's not like I am the lead or something. So I guess I'm very used to writing for projects, meaning that it's more than 50 % is not me. It's what the project means.
I'm trying to put more like my flavor into things and I feel like now I have a little bit sense of, okay, that's kind of my style of doing things, but it's not quite there yet.
Yeah. Right. Yeah. I mean, think, know, style is like ever evolving and your point of view as an artist is also ever evolving. think that the challenge is like, you might have these, I think what I'm trying to get to is like, there are probably tracks where you're like, I really like this. But then the team or the individual or the director is like, no, thank you. And you're like, man, you're a dummy. You don't get it.
Yuxin Lu (27:15.15)
I try not to let that happen, but sometimes, yeah, sometimes it's like that. And then I gotta learn, learn how to, again, like how to step out of my comfort zone because God, we are in a fusion era and many, many things are becoming like emerging together. So I guess it's always a learning process.
So like when you mean like a fusion era, are you talking about just like music genres in general that you're starting to even more like hip hop and country blending in? So how do I fit in with these fusions? And that becomes sort of like a challenge.
Well, mean, coming from a classical background, I've always wanted to be able to do something that's like classical based, but has an electronic twist in it at the same time. It just happened. We happened to like witness this era of, you know, like hip hop is no longer the hip hop 20 years ago. And then pop has become like there was a like 10 years ago, it's very dubstep dance. And now we're like melodic and it's not only melodic sometimes like
Just different genres start to blend together. know, like jazz is no longer like old school jazz and it's like soul music, R &B is no longer the same. I guess my point is to have an open mind and learning. Yeah, like what's happening.
Yeah, because I think for like most people, it's like whatever you listen to from ages 12 to 22, like that's that's where people get locked in. But because this is your creative craft and this is an art form you live in, like, how do you deal with, say, like the the default, I don't want to necessarily say nostalgia, but the bias of like what you loved in your youth versus like what you want to become an expert in is just a curious artist.
Mishu Hilmy (29:01.122)
to all the tools available. So like, how do you navigate maybe those biases that come up with like your general preferences?
I went through a phase where I studied the most popular music on the internet and tried to find a way to make that happen. I remember I think 2018, 16-ish, it's like the beginning stage of beat making and I literally would watch all the beat maker tutorials online, like how do I sound like one of them? But then I realized that, know, hip hop rap music is really not my genre and I have friends who can do it way better than me.
That took me like a solid two years to be able to come to that realization. I guess what I'm trying to say is I think we all need our own niche and you can't do it all. there are people who can do something better than you and you can do something better than them. So the balance, I guess.
It's like you seem to like allow yourself to not necessarily be compelled or like forcefully drawn to either new or contemporary genres where it's like, yeah, like you're not beating yourself up of like, you don't need to know it all rather than feeling more confident committing to the things you do enjoy or that you feel more connected to just kind of keep focusing on.
I'm trying. It's hard because again, like not all we like is the thing we get to do. But I'm yeah. I got like, I'm trying, I'm trying to do that more than, you know, get an assignment and then write what people want. Of course it's like very, it's something you must do like now. I'm not saying it's like work. It's work. It's, it's something you don't want to do, but you have to do it. Yeah. But again,
Yuxin Lu (30:44.172)
Like I need sometimes like a passion project or like working with friends to write about things I'm excited to write about, you know.
And then when your sort of general writing practices say that it's unrelated to client work, unrelated to film projects, and it's just like your own songwriting, like how has that approach been going for you?
It's been tough. I feel like, I don't know about you, if I'm making creative work as my main job, the fun and passion starts to fade away from time to time. Say I have a hundred percent when I wake up and I do something else for work. And by the end of the day, I'm like, do I really want to open up my door and write something for myself? It's so hard. But now I'm trying to play some piano at least.
three to five times a week to just to keep, just to have my passion.
Yeah, yeah, yeah.
Yuxin Lu (31:38.286)
Yeah, and like for me when I'm working very hard on something that's not mine, I think I shut down my emotional side because when I'm working it's tough. know, if I'm talking about songwriting, a big part of it is being vulnerable and willing to share your story with people. And if I'm just making, say what I did, like a popular beat or something.
Like listen back, I feel like they're just, they're pretty soulless. Like it's a good way of exploring my skills, like exploring the genre. Maybe it's because I'm getting older and I do want to something. I do want to make something that's close to my heart, closer to my heart. It's more about me rather than, you know, how to create a hit just like them. And not saying like I'm a hit.
I really wanted to do that, it's not like that. It's like creating things for myself. It's very hard. It's something I'm working on.
Yeah, I I really I think it's difficult, right? Because it's like what you I think most people have three to four hours max of like being able to do deeply any specific skill set. So if you're dedicating those three to four hours for a film or a client project, you know, your your your energy reserves, your creative reserves are pretty tapped out. Then you got to wait another 24 hours the next day until you're sort of refreshed. It's just like a it's a strange dilemma to have to be like the joy of your
you're getting compensation for your creativity. But the price of that is like, it's your creativity is dedicated to either someone else or pure productivity, pure capitalism of like, you got to make a jingle. It's like, but there's like virtually no risk. There's no personality in it.
Yuxin Lu (33:34.818)
Yeah, I talked to like for the longest time I wanted to be a jingle songwriter or whatever and I talked to a bunch of them. I was like, how do I make this happen? How do I just make music and that, you know, becomes money? And all of them were just like, at first it's really exciting, but after a while, they kind of just miss like making music because music is fun. I really don't know. It seems like a problem for every industry though. It's like once you have a taste of it, then you started to wonder why.
But I mean, but most of us are just trying to make it so yeah, it's complicated.
think it's just like, maybe it's either a mix of intentionality and a mix of gentleness. Cause it's like, if you're working with five or six clients, maybe you're like, all right, the month of November, December, I'm probably not going to be able to do as much personal practice. I think where the intentionality comes in is like, okay, but how can I try to carve out just a little bit? Maybe it's not every day. Maybe it's every week, but like, I think that takes just a little bit of fortitude, but it's, think very hard when you're, when you're just
get creatively spent up and creatively exhausted.
That's a good word. Creatively exhausted. Yeah. Yeah. That's what I'm saying to those who have nine to five jobs and they want to be creative. So I was like, Hmm, think about it. And then your passion will become a burden. It's, it's work at the end of the day. So don't sugar coat it too much. Yeah.
Mishu Hilmy (34:45.399)
Yeah.
Mishu Hilmy (35:00.62)
Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. think like everything has its price, but I guess the challenge is like, how, how do you go about like, cause no one wants to think they love to become soulless or like, but you don't like it anymore or that you just put it off and suddenly it's like 30 years later and you're like, well I didn't create that concept album that I've been dreaming of. but 30 years is too late. You can, you can make it in your sixties or like, what do you permit yourself to know? Like, all right, I'm a little bit tired this week, but I'll do.
I'll doodle on the piano for like two minutes.
Yeah, think I'm just lucky enough to have the skill sets of doing technical stuff and musical stuff at the same time. If I'm writing a lot of music this week, I'll just try to focus on like audio mixing or just, you know, do a tedious dialogue edit session and then I'll balance it out. guess. Yeah, something like that. Yeah, I think it's more the balance between doing technical things and being creative.
And then like for things like say mixing or even dialogue edits, like how do you deal with your ears getting tired, right? Cause then after a few hours, like your ears could kind of just like get shot, especially when it comes to mixing. like what's worked for you to like walk away from the door? Like how do you, how do you go about it? like, I gotta sleep on it. Like gotta wait till tomorrow.
Sleep on it works way better for music, think. With mixing, definitely a year break. I do something else, like I boil some water, make a cup tea or take a walk outside, something like that. Or on our phones, I'm not just one of us. It's Instagram real time.
Yuxin Lu (36:42.434)
Yeah.
that
I have to say I am not the best mixer in the scene for sure. think my strongest suit is to create but I can't mix. I want to be honest. Yeah, I want to be honest. I can't mix but I don't have as much expertise as lot of mixers in town who have way more experience with mixing.
think that there's some people who like absolutely love mixing and say mastering, because I would say mastering is probably similar in terms of the technical requirements as mixing. But do think that like that's a specific love of like the technicalness of it?
What do mean? Like doing both?
Mishu Hilmy (37:27.124)
People who like to mix and like to master.
I can't speak for the mastering engineer because I'm not one. I can't do some. Like I'm just being genuine here. It's, it's something you gotta do it. The more you do it, the more you know it. It's just like anything else. It's, it's technical in a way that also comes in experience, at least from what I've heard. And I was like, I will not, I will never know what you're talking about unless I, I, I mix the song and I dig into the dirty working guy. Well,
understand the little things that you'll pay attention to and the tricks.
Mm-hmm.
Yeah, I would delegate this to an engineer if I have to master a song or something up. I'll ask for their opinions and be like, help me.
Mishu Hilmy (38:16.494)
And then like, so like, you'll, you'll make the music per se a project, whether it's a film or other things as, all right, I did here, here it is. And off, off you go. So I'll let you figure out that mix. That's ideal. Right.
If I want to go beyond and go extreme and beyond, but I can do basic mixing and mastering for sure. I'm saying like the one level above me and I don't, I'm not, I need some guidance. Yeah.
Totally. I imagine you'd still probably prefer to just get more writing gigs and say, mixing gigs. What's been your approach in terms of building relationships or getting leads or contacts to have worked for writing music? you send cold emails, like 20 emails, 30 emails a month? What's your approach to getting those opportunities?
It's really tough. don't have a good answer to that. Cause now I'm actually in film world more than in music world. I will say like three, four years ago, I was way more in music world and I was in a writing camp with Paramount, song writing camp. And I was more involved with like reaching out to libraries and you know, writing demo tracks and try to find, try to make it work as a full-time job or something like that. But sadly it's all about
Cool
Yuxin Lu (39:35.832)
talking to people and get to know them. maybe, maybe move to New York or LA or something. Maybe, just maybe, because I also know there are people who live in the mountains and still writing music as their full-time job. So I guess nowadays the most popular way is to either start your own TikTok YouTube channel, promote your own music, influencer style, or you're writing for libraries.
Mm-hmm.
Yuxin Lu (40:02.862)
you submit the tracks and they have to be good enough for them to pick it up. always good to email all of them, all the people, be polite, you know, do it in a spam email way. I guess for film music, I think Tim and Tony probably has more to say, but you know, again, it's a connecting, it's all about connection and how you build relationships with people to find the right people to work with, to find the right film to write on.
Before all of that, you gotta do it until you get paid by doing it. I don't have a soft way to say this. Literally do it until it happens.
I think what makes this so hard is that there's only so many projects that exist and there's only so many projects where your particular style or voice or skill set would be appropriate for. So it's like a double filtration of like, not only am I like the ideal person for this, but do I have the ideal knowledge or the connection with that person to know, to even consider me in the first place? So I think it's, I guess it's always hard, but it makes it a little bit.
the more difficult because it's so particular.
Yeah, I think I used to make an analogy of, you I find you're the conductor of an orchestra and there are almost 100 people in the orchestra, but one conductor, right? So, being a film composer is like being that one person that you need to find the style, you need to find the right orchestra to work with, you know, yeah.
Mishu Hilmy (41:32.974)
And do you, do you feel that you put pressure on yourself to be like, Oh, I should be doing social media. should be having, you know, where I'm like dropping, you know, a beat. Yeah.
Yeah, guess it's 2025, we have to do one these, one thing or another.
Yeah, think it's kind of difficult because it's like the idea of like if this has some degree of virality, might help me out. I'm not familiar with like composer talk or songwriting talk. like, is it sort of, know, influencer type folks who are showing their DAW, showing their beats, like what's, you know. Yeah.
Yeah. Yeah. Exactly like what you said, just showing the process and I'm making a little series, you know, how to remake one song. I just do it by ear and it's easier with pop songs where the layers aren't really easy to figure out.
So you've been experimenting with like doing sort of educational or behind the scenes type things with some of your work.
Yuxin Lu (42:37.568)
Yeah, yeah, I just recreate songs from a producer's perspective. Yeah.
Nice. what do you mean? So you like, yes, what does that mean? Like recreating songs from a producer's perspective?
Just like pick a hit song and then do it like layer by layer, know, drums, synth, bassline, things like that. Yeah.
Cool. And do find that also gives you, in a weird sense, sort of like a practice or an expertise and like how you can apply that to your own songwriting?
Yeah, for me, it's like practice and analyze what's happening with the top five songs, you know, what are they doing?
Mishu Hilmy (43:13.74)
And then, I'm curious, like, given how challenging and uncertain the creative arts are, like, how do you stay motivated with, you know, songwriting or your artistic practice?
There are a lot to write about and I haven't done that yet. I think that's what's keeping me going. I need to push it out of my system eventually and find better ways of doing that. Yeah. To get better at doing my craft, I guess. Yeah. Always learning.
Hmm. So do you find sort of like the desire to just like kind of write through it and keep keep up the practice to like learn more about it?
Yeah, um, I guess essentially to get better at doing it. Yeah. Until I don't feel like until I like reached the top of the pyramid or something, but that's, I don't know if that would ever happen. Yeah. Yeah.
Yeah, yeah, yeah. Yeah, I tried to think less of the ladder, less of the pyramid and more of the neighborhood.
Yuxin Lu (44:04.686)
yeah, yeah, it's way healthier to think like that.
Then I think I'm curious, are there any sort of songwriting elements that you love versus that are sort of pet peeves of yours when it comes to watching a movie and seeing music used?
Oh, I guess it's over compression. Um, yeah, I, was a long time ago, but I remember when Adele released, I forgot the latest, like her latest album and the vocal was severely compressed. I was like, I did that. I could not understand that that choice. I was like, this is Adele. Like she has so
much to like her voice has so much stuff and now you're just making it out of course is like more straightforward powerful and stuff but yeah I don't know and it happens to a lot of songs like right now
Because compression is, if I remember, it's like basically trying to get the lowest higher and the highest lower and like leveling.
Yuxin Lu (45:11.042)
Compressing everything out? yeah, a little bit of that. It just doesn't sound natural. You know, if you see a clip of her from a phone, like her live performance from your phone, sounds more natural and more powerful, like just because she's a doll and she can sing and you hear a studio track and it's, you feel like her singing has become smaller or, you know, something like that. Yeah.
And then I'm curious, are there any scores that you just like listen to over and over again or are you're like, hey, if you haven't heard the score or seen this movie, you have to see it.
my recent, my very recent favorite is, Arcane. Yeah. Arcane is my favorite. I attended like a lecture by the composer, online, just try to figure out how, how they do it. It's so, it's so amazing. So perfect. It's a perfect combination of like epic orchestra and the
Is that the League of Legends one?
Yuxin Lu (46:17.806)
Yeah, so and they are so emotional all the songs and soundtracks. Yeah
Yeah, that's cool. Yeah, I'm finally watching it. I got like two, three episodes left of the last season. And yeah, it's so fascinating. They'll have those needle drops, but then original music and all kind of blends together in the world.
Yeah, yeah, it's really to me. It's a mind blown project. Like, how do you do this?
Well, I'm excited to hear some of your work that's going to be mind blown projects for future artists. Well, Yusha, is absolute pleasure getting the chat.
to be here, I'm sure. Thanks for having me.
Mishu Hilmy (47:28.418)
Alright, let's have a fun prompt and let's do one about what you love.
Take two minutes to write down what you love doing in your creative work and two minutes to write about what you keep forcing yourself to do out of obligation. And then choose one thing you love from the love item list and spend five, 10 minutes on it today. Nothing fancy, just one rep, just one five to 10 minute rep. So yeah, spend a few minutes listing things you love in any creative work and also the things that you find yourself forcing yourself to do.
and pick the one you love. that's that for today. Alright. Thanks for listening so far. Have a good one.