Riley Knapp Interview: Release and You Shall Receive

0:17 Luke F. Walton What's up everybody? Welcome to Love Music More. I am joined with longtime collaborator, longtime friend.

0:26 Luke F. Walton Riley Knapp, a great guy across from drumming to songwriting to mastering engineering, of which he does all of my masters, to the good ones, not the old ones, those ones are not very good, so don't put that evil on his name, to even starting his own business with some other friends of ours that I'm super, super hyped on that is using AI, I think in the right way, I've talked about that a lot on the podcast too,

0:52 Luke F. Walton so I'm excited to dig in all of. of all of that what's up riley welcome to

0:56 Riley Knapp How

0:56 Luke F. Walton my

0:56 Riley Knapp you doing?

0:56 Luke F. Walton show good

0:57 Riley Knapp Thank

0:57 Luke F. Walton dude

0:57 Riley Knapp you so much for having me. I'm super excited to be here.

0:59 Luke F. Walton yeah it's gonna be so fun i'm i'm really excited to dig into this because we talk all the time but we don't get to necessarily like talk talk it's like more high level like hey this this master sounds good or this one's a little hot or like what's good with your life now let's uh we can deep dive it

1:16 Riley Knapp Absolutely. Yeah, let's get into it, man.

1:18 Luke F. Walton Awesome. So I want to start with what I kind of ask every guest is what got you into music? What hooked you? What was the what was the kind of inception point of the whole thing?

1:28 Riley Knapp Well, I guess not to be cliche, but I come from a very musical family. My dad, his whole side is extremely musical and my mom's side are lovers of music. It was one of those things where it was natural for me. I was kind of forced into piano lessons at a very young age and

1:45 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

1:45 Riley Knapp immediately started to understand, oh, there's something to this that I really enjoy, which then kind of transitioned into me negotiating with my parents. Well, if I quit piano lessons and I take up another instrument, can that be, is that okay? And that led me into my love for drumming. And the second I touched the drum set, it was game over for me.

2:05 Riley Knapp I had this innate connection to it. I realized there's an emotional connection to music that is a lot deeper than just listening to it. And once you kind of dig in and understand the roots of how music is made, the feelings behind that music can really impact how you listen to music and how music affects you on a day-to-day. And really not just music, but sound. I

2:28 Luke F. Walton Ooh,

2:29 Riley Knapp think I've

2:29 Luke F. Walton yeah.

2:29 Riley Knapp always had a fascination with sound and how sound can affect. everyone people objects uh you know having sort of innate vibrations within us you know to get metaphysical but

2:39 Luke F. Walton Yeah

2:40 Riley Knapp uh the idea of sound was always fascinating to me as well so i think kind of uh you know drums was the the most visceral way to make those sounds and obviously a very uh upfront in your face sort of sound which i really enjoyed and uh my love for drums kind of led me into discovering other instruments and saying wait this is all

2:59 Riley Knapp all interconnected once you learn one thing the others kind of begin to fall in place and if you have that curiosity you can really delve deep and figure out you know what specifically your your purpose your skill set is and how that can lend itself to the creative world and how music can then kind of become you know part of you in a way that is uniquely you which I think is the coolest thing about music

3:23 Luke F. Walton Totally. I love that. And I also think that there's an interesting, I don't know.

3:28 Luke F. Walton I know a lot of audio engineers or mastering engineers that are drummers, and I feel like if you don't blow out your hearing, you've got this like full frequency spectrum instrument that other instrumentalists might not have, where it's like you're attuned to everything from the highest highs to the lowest lows. And I feel like, yeah, there's a through line. There's something I'm reading there.

3:48 Riley Knapp there's something there man there's something there yeah if you don't blow out your ears i

3:52 Luke F. Walton Yeah, exactly.

3:52 Riley Knapp tell everybody always wear your earplugs you know young people that i meet i'm like wear your earplugs you're not going to look dumb or whatever you think it is please do it you know it really does you know keeps you sane and aside from hearing loss tinnitus is my biggest nightmare so

4:07 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

4:07 Riley Knapp number one thing but yeah i think drums drums is like you mentioned the full spectrum full spectrum instrument i also think that with drums there is a a need for listening to other instruments maybe in a different way And, you know, understanding your role as a drummer, I think some of the best drummers understand their role and strictly adhere to that,

4:29 Riley Knapp you know, like the Josh Friezes of the world or whoever it may be. But just having that innate ability to listen deeply to other people and what's happening while maintaining your steady rhythm and sticking on your track, you know, your train is going, but you're looking around and making sure everyone is happy and everyone is happy.

4:48 Luke F. Walton It's Yeah.

4:48 Riley Knapp kind of on the same page. So there is definitely something there, you know, a lot of drummers are producers, audio engineers and, you know, I think it's changing a lot more now and it's a lot more open ended, but it's always kind of been a thing.

5:01 Luke F. Walton I agree. I agree. And then, yeah, it's like you're the quarterback, you're the heartbeat, you're so many things. And I also really appreciate the energy that you brought as a drummer and just as a person of like, yeah, checking in on everybody, making sure everybody's still on the train. Because there are some drummers that are just like, hey, you keep up.

5:18 Riley Knapp yeah for sure man oh for sure those are fun those are fun to watch for

5:23 Luke F. Walton They

5:24 Riley Knapp sure but

5:24 Luke F. Walton are.

5:24 Riley Knapp but

5:24 Luke F. Walton Yeah, yeah.

5:25 Riley Knapp my skill set was always like you said being the quarterback and that's funny to say that when I was in high school there

5:31 Luke F. Walton Mm-hmm.

5:31 Riley Knapp was like a super group that was developed by a bunch of older alumni and then they wanted one current student in high school to play with this band for this big auction that they hosted every year so

5:42 Luke F. Walton Cool.

5:43 Riley Knapp they came to me you know I had actually just gotten off of warp tour and it was kind of like one of these weird situations where I was having like a moment as a high schooler and a young player um and i remember right before our first show i was so nervous because these guys were pros i

5:58 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

5:59 Riley Knapp mean you know multi-platinum selling people you know all the credentials in the world total pros and then the singer comes up to me he's just like you're our quarterback we're

6:07 Luke F. Walton Yes.

6:07 Riley Knapp going to defend you he's like whatever happens we're all in this together and we're following you so don't worry about mistakes don't worry about coming off the wrong way we are all here with you and for you and I was like okay okay and it really did it changed my life and ever since then I thought of it exactly like that you know and not that I'm as a drummer the leader but it's more so just the person responsible

6:33 Riley Knapp for others and at least in my mind it was always that responsibility and it's great when everyone has that responsibility but just for me I think one of the biggest drivers and maybe this is Something to dig into. But

6:45 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

6:45 Riley Knapp one

6:45 Luke F. Walton yeah, yeah.

6:46 Riley Knapp of my biggest drivers is not letting people down, you know,

6:49 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

6:49 Riley Knapp and

6:49 Luke F. Walton right,

6:50 Riley Knapp on

6:50 Luke F. Walton right.

6:50 Riley Knapp stage, I want to just make sure everyone's happy, the audience, my band, whoever it is, because I know that I'll be doing my part, but just making sure that it all blends together, you know.

7:01 Luke F. Walton I like that. And that is an interesting thing to unpack too, because I think that that perspective is actually a less exhaustible form of motivation. where

7:10 Riley Knapp Mm it's-hmm.

7:10 Luke F. Walton like trying to keep the team going not letting other people down rising to the moment and pushing each other where if you're just focused on yourself that that well runs dry like once you

7:25 Riley Knapp Absolutely.

7:25 Luke F. Walton get to be like i'm only i'm doing this for me it's like it's the same thing that i feel like with um with like working out if i think of it as i'm trying to get sexy it's like that doesn't work because i don't actually really care that much it's so selfish it just doesn't really work but if it's like i'm trying to climb a mountain it's like okay like i'm scared of that I'm doing that with friends.

7:46 Luke F. Walton I don't want to let them down. I don't want to be the guy that's going to make us turn back. So then I'm going to show up and do my sprints or whatever. You know, it's like the framing

7:54 Riley Knapp 100%.

7:54 Luke F. Walton of those things are totally different for me.

7:57 Riley Knapp Yeah, the mentality is super important.

7:58 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

7:58 Riley Knapp And, you know, along the lines of working out, I also think there's a lot of parallels with sports and music and people and people don't speak about that. You know, I think honestly, some of the best experiences I've had in bands or even collaborative settings are with people who at least did team sports as

8:14 Luke F. Walton Cool.

8:15 Riley Knapp a kid, you know, whether or not they were into it or good at it, just having that discipline and that understanding of this is for the greater whole. This is not.

8:23 Riley Knapp not just for me this is not about me it's a crucial thing you know and I think that there is that's kind of something that a lot of people don't speak about and especially in music school it can be very segmented in my opinion and it can be very clicky in a lot of ways and

8:38 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

8:38 Riley Knapp they don't really advertise you know the team aspect of it i thought usc actually did a very good job of that uh you know making sure that people came together making sure that it was everyone is working towards the same goal the same vision um but it's the most important part right because at the end of the day you want to see people in harmony on stage you don't want to see five people doing their own thing you know those bands exist and we know who they are uh and it's and it's great

9:02 Riley Knapp great to go for, you know, your specific niche, you know, only watching the drummer, only watching the keys player, whatever it may be. But at the end of the day, when you see five people or however many absolutely in unison, in harmony, having an amazing time with each other, that's the most magical experience in any aspect of the human existence, really.

9:21 Luke F. Walton I agree. I agree. And it's that, yeah, from like one, from two many, it's not. it's that synergy it's that it's that one plus one equals three kind of thing that you can't get to if you're just trying to shred um just trying to show off like i've i i think about that a lot too like how much time i spent just trying to get fast at my instrument and technical and then like no one cares like

9:46 Riley Knapp Yeah.

9:46 Luke F. Walton nobody cares anymore it's just i don't ever do that um i think that there's like a reason to practice those things other than just doing those things but at the same time it's like They care about are you having fun? Is it coming across? Is it interesting? I think that there's like a different hierarchy than a lot of young players approach learning an instrument versus what people actually want and listen to.

10:12 Riley Knapp Certainly. Yeah, now that the barrier to entry is

10:15 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

10:15 Riley Knapp so

10:15 Luke F. Walton yeah. Same too.

10:16 Riley Knapp low in so many ways, too,

10:17 Luke F. Walton Mm hmm.

10:18 Riley Knapp it

10:18 Luke F. Walton Mm hmm.

10:18 Riley Knapp really kind of purifies creation, in my mind.

10:21 Luke F. Walton Interesting.

10:22 Riley Knapp You know,

10:22 Luke F. Walton Okay,

10:22 Riley Knapp I

10:22 Luke F. Walton let's dig into that. Yeah.

10:23 Riley Knapp think that... There are so many people with amazing ideas, Mm fantastic

10:28 Luke F. Walton -hmm.

10:28 Riley Knapp taste, great instincts that may not have the discipline, the time, didn't have the luxury as a kid to learn instruments, you know, like maybe you or I did.

10:39 Riley Knapp And with these new tools that are coming out and have been out and that lower barrier to entry, they're allowed to express themselves in this musical and creative way in a much simpler way to where they can simply adhere their taste.

10:52 Riley Knapp to something specific in the sonic realm or or maybe you know whatever whatever realm it is in the creative world but it's a lot easier for them to do that and it's an extremely pure and creative and admirable thing to see you know i think it's like the coolest thing in the world when someone sends me this thing and they're like i don't i've never made music before but i used x and y software i put together this three minute mashup whatever it is you

11:19 Riley Knapp and i listen to it i'm like there are unbelievably beautiful moments in here

11:23 Luke F. Walton Yes,

11:24 Riley Knapp you know there might

11:25 Luke F. Walton uh

11:25 Riley Knapp be wrong things there might be some some things that are you know maybe not you would maybe fail at music school or you know not actually hit the music theory notes or whatever it may be but it's beautiful and it's so cool and i think that's unbelievable and that's my favorite part about this and i think that's why you know the the shredders or the the player players who are you know

11:46 Riley Knapp more out there to just kind of fulfill their own needs it doesn't really matter and of course there's niches for it i love watching all those videos

11:55 Luke F. Walton Totally, totally same way.

11:56 Riley Knapp um but it's all acceptable now you know as where back in the day it was kind of a very streamlined path and if you were if you were somewhere off the beaten path you know you were kind of a weirdo or or you weren't totally socially accepted and maybe even shunned you know a lot of those a lot of those people didn't really enjoy the fact that people

12:15 Riley Knapp Who didn't play music could make music and that is changing every day

12:19 Luke F. Walton Yeah. And the definition of the artist is evolving a lot. And I actually think that that's a really cool perspective from drummer to songwriter, producer, and mastering engineer that you've had on kind of like the artist journey and then these different perspectives that you had.

12:35 Luke F. Walton So let's let's before we jump into mastering, I'd love to talk about kind of when you started songwriting, when you started producing and kind of how that. evolved for you.

12:46 Riley Knapp Certainly, yeah. So it pretty much went drums into playing in the bands.

12:50 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

12:52 Riley Knapp finding that I love every instrument and finding all the similarities between those and kind of understanding, oh, I can actually do some of these other things.

13:01 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

13:01 Riley Knapp So shortly

13:01 Luke F. Walton yeah, yeah.

13:02 Riley Knapp after I started playing drums, I started learning other instruments just on my own. I re-approached piano. I started picking up the guitar and noodling with it. My dad's a phenomenal musician as well. So I would kind of watch him and just glean information from that.

13:15 Riley Knapp And it kind of got to the point where I fell in love with every single instrument. went sprint and had this unquenchable desire to learn as much as I could. understanding my skill sets and where my priorities were you know I couldn't

13:27 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

13:27 Riley Knapp practice

13:27 Luke F. Walton yeah, totally.

13:27 Riley Knapp everything equally you know

13:28 Luke F. Walton No.

13:28 Riley Knapp so I kept drums as my main love but

13:30 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

13:30 Riley Knapp I realized that how much beauty there was and everything else and being in bands I would always kind of be in the studio and hear things and realize things and have these epiphanies that I then later in life was able to kind of say hey actually could I try that out could I try this guitar part out

13:49 Luke F. Walton Yes.

13:49 Riley Knapp you actually sit down on the keys and show you what I'm hearing here.

13:52 Luke F. Walton Yes.

13:53 Riley Knapp And after having success with that, you know, even just internally, great feedback from my peers, I found that not only did I love it, but I had a knack for it. And that the collaborative aspect of music was my favorite part.

14:07 Luke F. Walton Yes.

14:07 Riley Knapp It wasn't necessarily, you know, playing shows live or anything like that. It was collaboration in whatever form that looks. So I really dove into that.

14:16 Riley Knapp that and that's what started my love for songwriting that's what started my love for production you know I've always been someone who who I feel like I have very a very tangible taste meaning I I have a taste that a lot of people seem to agree with sometimes you know being vague here but I think it was it was always something that led me to to want to explore that more and to give my input and and just simply

14:42 Riley Knapp hold my hand up in a room where maybe before I was a little nervous or I wasn't totally confident in my abilities and I realized, listen, you don't have to be the best player. You don't have to be the fastest player.

14:51 Luke F. Walton Nope.

14:51 Riley Knapp Everyone's idea is valuable and everyone's idea should be heard. So that really kind of started expanding my brain. And from there, I got deep into songwriting and production. I would say songwriting first. I always had...

15:06 Riley Knapp Just I always had ideas floating around my head and I always had different ways of coming up with those ideas, you know, whether it was guitar, piano, lyrics, melodies first, whatever it was. So I'd always kind of been doodling around with that. I'd write songs with with my old bands and collaborate with those with those peers and learn from them as well.

15:25 Luke F. Walton Mm-hmm.

15:26 Riley Knapp But not until I got to USC that I actually really started getting into production.

15:30 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

15:31 Riley Knapp I met my roommate, Cary Singer. who was a it

15:35 Luke F. Walton Yep.

15:35 Riley Knapp was a phenomenal musician and just a really genius of a person and he told me you know you should download logic you should download

15:41 Luke F. Walton Yes.

15:41 Riley Knapp logic and start putting these ideas down and I had never really thought about that before you know for some reason there was a mental block and and I said gosh I'm never going to be the guy behind the board I'm never going to be the dude doing that stuff and he kind of told me no do it start playing around you know start messing around with all your MIDI keyboard you know put ideas down see what happens and

16:01 Riley Knapp that kind of changed my life man I

16:03 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

16:03 Riley Knapp would stay up and I would stay up in in the USC dorms literally all night like until 5 or 6 a.m just making beats finding things that I had liked finding cool new sounds finding ways to kind of to make things that are creative but also haven't that I hadn't heard before and

16:21 Luke F. Walton Yes, yes.

16:22 Riley Knapp that was my goal you know I was like Because after a certain point, you have the wherewithal to say, oh, this sounds familiar. I

16:28 Luke F. Walton Uh

16:28 Riley Knapp might be

16:28 Luke F. Walton -huh.

16:28 Riley Knapp pulling influence from this or that.

16:30 Luke F. Walton Uh

16:31 Riley Knapp And

16:31 Luke F. Walton -huh.

16:31 Riley Knapp once you have that wherewithal. in my opinion it's a really healthy thing to say okay now I pivot you

16:36 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

16:36 Riley Knapp know now I

16:37 Luke F. Walton right.

16:37 Riley Knapp completely go in another direction and let's let's acknowledge this but let's see where I can take it that's going to feel almost improvised or unique um and that is really having those epiphanies is what absolutely changed my life when it came to production you know it was just it was like it was a lot like a puzzle and it was a lot like a an ever-evolving puzzle that was up to me and it was a

17:00 Riley Knapp almost like a choose your own adventure puzzle you know what I mean and for every sure song every creative piece was a choose your own adventure adventure thing for me um so I started really just making all different kinds of music uh different beats different sounds uh and then after you know after a while I started to be able to put on melodies and lyrics to those things and I started to really approach the production and songwriting as one and I started to realize okay you know now that I'm kind of

17:28 Riley Knapp diligently working on this production thing and I have been working on the songwriting thing they start to blend together and everything becomes a lot more natural in a simultaneous fashion which I never really thought of before honestly you know I was always kind of in bands doing old school recordings you know having

17:46 Luke F. Walton Yeah, you're you're you're laying like you were talking about. Yeah

17:49 Riley Knapp yeah 100 you know like the songs would be done and

17:51 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

17:51 Riley Knapp we would write them and we'd jam them then we'd get into the studio and record them and then the idea of sitting down and making a beat and simultaneously coming up and singing vocal melodies over it you know placeholder whatever it was had never occurred to me so that was just an absolute game changer for me and that's uh you know

18:09 Riley Knapp I give a lot of credit to a lot of my early college peers for that and pushing me in that direction and inspiring me in that world because I honestly don't think I would have ever put those pieces together on my own.

18:19 Luke F. Walton Me either. Me either.

18:21 Riley Knapp Yeah,

18:21 Luke F. Walton And it's, I mean, maybe some people who listen to my music would have heard the thing that I did with Cary and Robel. But yeah,

18:29 Riley Knapp yeah.

18:29 Luke F. Walton I mean, you and Cary were super, super influential on my outlook on production. because yeah it was the same thing it was very like old school leaning to start like you hire musicians you let the musicians do their thing and that's the record um but yeah you you guys were super inspirational to me like to look at it the same way and then also like when you when you start to conceptualize music songwriting production recording all of that as one thing then you can grow it as one thing and then you get better at it as one thing

19:04 Luke F. Walton when you're like just doing these little individual parts it doesn't it doesn't end up locking together in the way that now you can make a lot of music that's interesting pretty quickly because you've grown it all together as a unit and you've thought of it as that unit i don't without that epiphany that you guys shared with me as well um i don't know if i if i'd be making the music that i'm making i doubt it You

19:28 Riley Knapp Yeah,

19:28 Luke F. Walton know, yeah,

19:28 Riley Knapp no, that's the best way to put that. You have to grow it all at once. You know, back to the exercise analogy, if you just work on your legs

19:37 Luke F. Walton uh

19:37 Riley Knapp all

19:37 Luke F. Walton -huh

19:37 Riley Knapp day long, you know, you're going to be a little off balance if you just work on your arms, etc. So finding a way to grow it as a whole and realizing that this is all one thing, these are not separate things. Mixing, production, songwriting, mastering even, you know, sound design, sound replacement, sound choice. there

19:55 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

19:56 Riley Knapp are so many different things that come into play and I think it's the coolest part of music is being able to say okay no I am not a mixer I am not a you know whatever technical word you want to use but I accomplish what I accomplish which most people would say is mixed or fully produced even

20:12 Luke F. Walton Yes. Yeah,

20:13 Riley Knapp though

20:13 Luke F. Walton totally.

20:14 Riley Knapp I don't call myself that you know it's

20:15 Luke F. Walton Absolutely.

20:16 Riley Knapp the coolest thing in the world

20:17 Luke F. Walton It is super cool. And it's funny too, because it isn't, there is not like a clear threshold.

20:21 Luke F. Walton old that you once you cross you have now leveled up enough that you can call yourself a mixer or whatever it's just like cultural acceptance or personal acceptance that now you're there i mean i could i think that a good chunk of the reason why my music is doing better is because i've gotten better at mixing but i've only gotten better at mixing because like i've done it more and then i work with you so you give me like another set of perspective and then i work with collaborators and they give me a new set of perspective and then over time it's like oh

20:50 Luke F. Walton Oh, I'm this now.

20:52 Riley Knapp Yeah, your journey in particular has been one of my favorites to watch. I mean, no, honest to God, it's so cool to see.

21:00 Riley Knapp everything that you've done i mean you know obviously in college we were both kind of instrumentalists

21:04 Luke F. Walton Uh,

21:04 Riley Knapp and in

21:04 Luke F. Walton yeah.

21:05 Riley Knapp that lane and then you've blossomed into this unbelievable multi-talented entity that is crazy to see and and i've obviously been working with you for for quite a while now

21:16 Luke F. Walton Before this,

21:16 Riley Knapp and before before

21:17 Luke F. Walton we're working together that long.

21:19 Riley Knapp this exactly we're exactly this long no but but really just to see you and to see how incredible you've gotten not only

21:28 Luke F. Walton Oh,

21:28 Riley Knapp you

21:28 Luke F. Walton thank you.

21:28 Riley Knapp know in the technical skills with production and mixing and songwriting but finding your lane and sticking within that and creating a sound is so admirable and that's the hardest part right everyone can everyone can come up and have their abilities shine through and it's clear okay this person can mix this person is a good producer but that cohesiveness and that that sound and that feeling

21:54 Riley Knapp That is consistent is the hardest thing consistency is the hardest thing

21:58 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

21:58 Riley Knapp and I mean back You know when Casey and I started RKCB

22:03 Luke F. Walton Mm-hmm.

22:03 Riley Knapp Which was you know my main musical project for

22:06 Luke F. Walton Totally.

22:06 Riley Knapp years and years and years That was the biggest thing we struggled with because we had both basically met in a master class at USC with

22:15 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

22:15 Riley Knapp young guru and Chris Sampson. And we could not have been more opposite in our skill sets, our tastes and everything. And we kind of came together and started making this music that had this sound and that was cohesive. And we didn't know where it was coming from. So when you don't know where it's coming from, how do you recreate it?

22:36 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

22:36 Riley Knapp uh and at the beginning stages I just distinctly remember sitting there and being like how did we do you know we finish a song we bounce it out final final 19 whatever it

22:45 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

22:46 Riley Knapp was and

22:46 Luke F. Walton yeah, yeah.

22:46 Riley Knapp uh and I was like how are we gonna ever follow this up and that was actually kind of an early stressor you

22:52 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

22:52 Riley Knapp know that was something that really stressed me out early on because I just didn't know where it was coming from it's the classic pulling things from the ether and creating something and saying this wasn't really fully me you know this was this is not there's that higher power coming in so

23:06 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

23:06 Riley Knapp you know then you then you get into well I drank gin that day I

23:11 Luke F. Walton Yes, exactly.

23:11 Riley Knapp I slept for nine hours the night before so you try to start replicating the process and finding that consistency and I just think it's such a cool thing and I think that you are the ultimate example of that I think I'm I'm biased because I get to I've been able to watch your journey and see how that's grown

23:28 Luke F. Walton And you've listened intently like you've had you've been i've been forced to like

23:32 Riley Knapp Right. Right.

23:32 Luke F. Walton hear

23:33 Riley Knapp Yes.

23:33 Luke F. Walton everything all

23:34 Riley Knapp I

23:34 Luke F. Walton along

23:34 Riley Knapp know,

23:34 Luke F. Walton the way

23:35 Riley Knapp man,

23:35 Luke F. Walton you

23:35 Riley Knapp I feel like I know your music so

23:37 Luke F. Walton too i've

23:38 Riley Knapp well.

23:39 Luke F. Walton heard all sorts of my nonsense side project things like you you've got you probably have as good of a representation of the stuff that i make as i do or as anybody else yes

23:50 Riley Knapp If you ever like needed a drummer last minute, I guarantee you I could hop in and play your songs.

23:55 Luke F. Walton i believe it i believe it yes

23:56 Riley Knapp I know, I know your sound. I know your music. I know your your instincts now

23:59 Luke F. Walton Cool,

24:00 Riley Knapp and and it's

24:00 Luke F. Walton cool.

24:00 Riley Knapp just it's cool to watch you know because at the end of the day that is art and

24:05 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

24:05 Riley Knapp that consistency is

24:06 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

24:06 Riley Knapp what makes you an artist that being said you know you can deliberately veer off path and

24:11 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

24:12 Riley Knapp and

24:12 Luke F. Walton for

24:12 Riley Knapp try

24:12 Luke F. Walton sure.

24:12 Riley Knapp new things and all of that but it's kind of hard to escape your own artistry you know it's it's hard to cover up your soul

24:19 Luke F. Walton That's a, that's the thing that I, I've actually been struggling with because I've been trying to do like do like commercial music, right?

24:26 Riley Knapp Mm

24:27 Luke F. Walton Like make some money with like, I mean, score an Apple commercial or whatever. As my internal like artistic voice and instinct and whatever has grown, I've gotten worse at that. Like to composing debris for whatever I am.

24:42 Luke F. Walton pretty bad at it now where it's like i thought i was getting better at music is like you're getting more specific and that actually makes you worse at some of these other jobs just curious like what do you i don't know do you have a take on that i've never actually expressed this opinion but it's kind of a light bulb moment for me

24:57 Riley Knapp I relate to that.

24:59 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

24:59 Riley Knapp so intensely I can't even tell you the amount of times that I've tried to write briefs I've tried to you know I've gone out for things for specific sync spots and at the end of the day it comes back sounding like one of my tracks that I could release for one of my projects and I'm like but but there's something there's something beautiful there and I think that you know I think that that actually has a lot more longevity and I think that and sticking to that

25:28 Riley Knapp At the end of the day, when people come to you for those things,

25:30 Luke F. Walton Mm

25:30 Riley Knapp they come to you because they've probably heard something that you've done that they enjoy.

25:35 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

25:35 Riley Knapp So

25:35 Luke F. Walton yeah,

25:35 Riley Knapp they

25:35 Luke F. Walton yeah.

25:36 Riley Knapp enjoy your sound. They enjoy what your soul creates. You know, maybe you put a different hat on it and maybe you kind of dress it up differently, but at the end of the day, it's going to be unavoidable for you. And I think that.

25:48 Riley Knapp you know maybe there's not a lot of immediate payoff if you need to you know write a samsung commercial hit these spots and

25:54 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

25:54 Riley Knapp and it's not fully your thing you know like i could never do those hype tracks those rb style but you

26:01 Luke F. Walton Yes.

26:01 Riley Knapp know what i mean like that

26:02 Luke F. Walton They're

26:02 Riley Knapp i mean

26:02 Luke F. Walton so

26:03 Riley Knapp as hard. hard as i it's so difficult and as hard as i tried and as much as i knew specifically what i needed to do i mean down to a t i was like i've got all these i've got the same sound the same samples i i know i could break

26:15 Riley Knapp each song down note for note I know exactly what's happening but it just wasn't my soul and and it was kind of soul-sucking after a while I mean I tried to do it man for probably two and a half years and I didn't land one thing one thing that I that I tried to go

26:31 Luke F. Walton out Gosh,

26:31 Riley Knapp and get

26:31 Luke F. Walton that's so painful.

26:33 Riley Knapp It was painful, but Yeah. I also realized, you know, I'm just going to keep doing me.

26:38 Luke F. Walton Yes,

26:38 Riley Knapp And I kind of turned that energy into, okay, well, I've got this project, this RKCB thing, that's my bread and butter and my baby. Why don't I start collaborating with other people and releasing music myself under side projects and just start releasing all of this stuff that I'm creating that I want to be heard that I think is cool that I think would work for.

27:00 Riley Knapp all these different things but don't really have a plan for it and just kind of start creating that and once i started doing that i started landing all these random things uh

27:09 Luke F. Walton Yes.

27:10 Riley Knapp and

27:10 Luke F. Walton Yes.

27:10 Riley Knapp it turned the most unbelievably rewarding feeling where i said no i'm gonna do me and i'm gonna stick with my gut and maybe it took years longer i mean dude i just had a song uh synced in the apple um vision pro commercial

27:26 Luke F. Walton Oh, cool. Yeah, yeah, yeah.

27:28 Riley Knapp that was a side project that that me and Amon one of our old college friends that we did five and a half years ago and the project had under a thousand monthly listeners it was a total nothing burger right and somehow they found this song and they wanted this song and it was you know it was a huge fun a huge opportunity out of nowhere and it was honestly it was so rewarding I they if they didn't pay me I wouldn't have cared honestly I just thought it was so

27:54 Riley Knapp So cool that

27:54 Luke F. Walton Mm-hmm.

27:55 Riley Knapp it was that they chose to use this indie artist song and I thought it was so cool that this thing that I was so passionate about that we were so passionate about we decided to follow through with it

28:06 Luke F. Walton Yes.

28:06 Riley Knapp despite all of the weirdness and and you know oh is this the right thing to do oh should I even have side projects will that kind of blur you know blur where my head is at and and make people question okay what are his intentions and has he really focused you know all those weird thoughts that Yeah.

28:22 Riley Knapp get in your head and it was such an amazing feeling of saying no did the right thing followed through played the long game wasn't trying to adhere to anyone's specific thoughts or opinions or or just trying to you know make what i thought other people would like i was making what i liked and that's the most cliche thing in the world but that is the secret and the key in

28:42 Luke F. Walton and you

28:42 Riley Knapp my opinion

28:42 Luke F. Walton release it and you release

28:44 Riley Knapp and we release it and we release that absolutely

28:46 Luke F. Walton a

28:47 Riley Knapp absolutely

28:47 Luke F. Walton lot of people make what they like and then they just sit on it forever

28:51 Riley Knapp The amount of stuff that I've worked on that has not seen the light of day bums me out so hard. I mean, I'm not talking about created. I'm talking about mixed and mastered,

29:00 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

29:00 Riley Knapp you know, like I've

29:01 Luke F. Walton yeah.

29:01 Riley Knapp mastered albums where I reach out to the artist and I'm like, this is unbelievable. You should be so proud of this, you know, as your first project, as your second project. I'm blown away. You know, people deserve to hear this. Three years later, nothing. And the amount of times that I've actually reached back out to those artists. And I'm like, hey, I just wanted to check in here.

29:22 Riley Knapp I still love this. I think about this often.

29:24 Luke F. Walton Mm

29:24 Riley Knapp You hmm. know, what are you doing? And a lot of the times there's kind of like, I wasn't confident. It didn't

29:29 Luke F. Walton feel Yeah.

29:29 Riley Knapp right. The time has passed and

29:31 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

29:31 Riley Knapp it bums me out. I'm like, I'm like, I want to leak this. I

29:35 Luke F. Walton I

29:36 Riley Knapp want

29:36 Luke F. Walton know.

29:36 Riley Knapp to leak

29:36 Luke F. Walton Right.

29:36 Riley Knapp this so bad.

29:37 Luke F. Walton Exactly.

29:37 Riley Knapp You know, people

29:38 Luke F. Walton Exactly.

29:38 Riley Knapp deserve to hear it.

29:39 Luke F. Walton Yeah, I believe that. It's funny, too, because there are all of these like conflicting.

29:48 Luke F. Walton internal monologue stuff that plays into that i think um i think first among them is looking for the ideal release partner like

29:57 Riley Knapp Mm-hmm.

29:57 Luke F. Walton kind of the cavalry like the cavalry will come any day now and then they will swoop in and make my release huge so i'll wait for the cavalry and not release it until they come and

30:06 Riley Knapp Mm-hmm. Oh,

30:07 Luke F. Walton then they yeah. never come

30:09 Riley Knapp Absolutely. Absolutely. And I think a lot of that can come from outside pressures, you know, once

30:12 Luke F. Walton Oh,

30:13 Riley Knapp you start getting

30:13 Luke F. Walton you know,

30:13 Riley Knapp management.

30:14 Luke F. Walton and all sorts

30:15 Riley Knapp Oh,

30:15 Luke F. Walton of stuff.

30:15 Riley Knapp yeah,

30:15 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

30:15 Riley Knapp sure.

30:16 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

30:16 Riley Knapp Absolutely. Seeing it's all comes down to seeing what other people have done that made them successful,

30:22 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

30:22 Riley Knapp and then trying to replicate it, which sure there is credence to and that does make sense for some situations. And there's always something to be learned from people. But it can really kind of They can really muddy the waters of your soul, you know, and it can really change the way that you approach.

30:43 Riley Knapp how you think about your art and that can be a very slippery slope you know I've experienced that for sure where other people's opinions come in you

30:52 Luke F. Walton Mm.

30:53 Riley Knapp know you sign a record deal you sign a publishing deal

30:55 Luke F. Walton Yes.

30:55 Riley Knapp and all of a sudden this thing that was free and exciting and up to you doesn't feel so free exciting enough to you anymore and and you do have to wait for those perfect times or you know give Spotify you know four to six weeks for us to get our job done or you know whatever it is and it's like you but this is a St. Paddy's Day song and it's on Friday

31:15 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

31:15 Riley Knapp so shouldn't you know what I mean it's

31:17 Luke F. Walton right.

31:17 Riley Knapp like what

31:17 Luke F. Walton Exactly.

31:18 Riley Knapp are we doing here it's like the point of my creation was for this specific moment in time this specific feeling this is what should happen I don't care about these partners and and at the end of the day if it's gonna if it's gonna do something it's gonna do something And I'm a firm believer in that, you know, even in the day and age now of 120,000 songs a day being uploaded to Spotify,

31:39 Riley Knapp I think that things will find homes and people will find art that is meant to be found.

31:45 Luke F. Walton Great. Especially, I mean, just look at the example you just gave.

31:49 Riley Knapp Mm

31:49 Luke F. Walton uh

31:49 Riley Knapp -hmm. super good lessons to keep in mind. I like having these conversations, too, because they help reinforce stuff that, you know, I need to hear because I'm going into next year's writing cycle now and it's like, OK, what am I going to do? But I love the idea of like you have a plan.

32:11 Riley Knapp you're going to release this song then whatever but you have a spark and you go i've got i just wrote a saint patty's day song saint patty's day is next week let's just move every other release over slightly and then drop that in the middle and if you have a label or management that's down with that it's like you already have got a leg up on so many people because you're able to be creatively free you're able to explore and you're able to meet those moments when they come

32:37 Riley Knapp Mm hmm. Absolutely. And it gives you confidence that, oh, look, Yeah. I am doing the right thing. Oh,

32:42 Riley Knapp Yeah. I can't be spontaneous. Yeah. Sometimes, sometimes the point of creating art is just, it could be just to release something, you know, like it honestly, like, it doesn't have to be to have it successful. It doesn't have to be because you think it's the best thing ever. Sometimes there are just these little moments that just need to be put out there in whatever capacity that is. I wrote I wrote a song to my old cats and it

33:10 Riley Knapp Oh. was this joke song I woke up one morning I was I like had a session that day I would always kind of sit around and kind of just warm myself up and start creating ideas and I was like to kind of come in come in with ideas or at least just things in the back of my head that I could bring to the table and this one morning I just wrote this song to my cats and I was like, I love this. I was like,

33:32 Luke F. Walton this Yeah!

33:33 Riley Knapp feels, this feels incredible, you know, and I was like, it's this whole thing. And I ended up, you know, showing it to some friends and stuff. And, and people were like, dude, can you send me this? You know what I mean? And it kind of got sent around and people would kind of send it around to people. And it was one of those things where it felt so good.

33:50 Riley Knapp And I would meet literally a friend would introduce me to a mutual and they'd be like, you're the guy who wrote Honeycomb. You know, I was like, oh my God. God.

33:58 Riley Knapp Oh my And it gosh. was never out there, never even on a sound file, Yeah. right?

34:01 Riley Knapp Yeah. Just an MP3. So just feeling those urges and again, to your point, releasing them in whatever capacity that is.

34:09 Riley Knapp Right. Yeah, that could just be, that could be sending it to a few friends as an MP3 on

34:12 Riley Knapp Exactly. a voice message. Exactly. It doesn't matter what Yep. it is, right? You created the point of that creation is just to get it out there, you know, and sometimes the point of the creation is just to create, acknowledge, delete the whole session. You

34:25 Riley Knapp yeah know, yeah like yeah sometimes totally you never need to revisit it. and but you'll know and it's like follow the that instinct i don't know like the the person that ended up tweaking my head in that way was uh jai paul it

34:38 Riley Knapp Oh, yeah. was like Oh, yeah. i thought that he was the perfect example i just saw him at coachella It's crazy.

34:44 Riley Knapp oh my god so cool so cool after almost a decade of anonymity and secrecy behind this project man that was one of my early goals when i you know first got signed and everything i was like who is jai paul i was like you know i first with people from the uk and i was like do you know this artist and if so how do i get in touch you know it was like the biggest secret in the world but that project was so cool and the fact that

35:11 Riley Knapp it happened in a legitimate way like that

35:14 Luke F. Walton Mm-hmm.

35:14 Riley Knapp was a leaked album right it was truly leaked in it and it was so good and it came off so well that a lot of people said there's no way this was this is a PR stunt to say it's leaked and now you know it's so good and he's he was fuming he was so mad that it got leaked you know it's just the ultimate irony and it's like sometimes things do need to see the light of the day

35:37 Riley Knapp and you the universe will tell you when it's time even if that means it's leaked you know what i mean like

35:42 Riley Knapp totally for it's sure yeah gonna happen and you can't avoid it don't try to push against the major force of the universe

35:48 Riley Knapp man i mean like think about that leak doesn't happen in the way that it changes your music Cary's music my music it's it's like

35:58 Riley Knapp that leak ends up, I feel like kind of creating a little bit of what the USCE sound was that we were exploring

36:05 Riley Knapp 100%. and have continued to explore in our own genres and our own ways. But that was a spark that I think lit a lot of our fuses.

36:13 Riley Knapp Absolutely. Absolutely. The influence that art can create is Yeah. it has no value. It is literally invaluable. And the impact that it has on even one person. I mean, it's the butterfly effect. It truly, truly is. And people don't realize that. I mean, now more than ever, that butterfly effect is in full effect. I mean, I can be scrolling through Instagram or something and hear like a random person.

36:40 Riley Knapp five seconds of their clip and i'll scroll past it and then two days later i'll be like what what is this melody that i'm

36:47 Riley Knapp Yeah, hearing what is this yeah thing that's going on in my head i'm like i think it was from that random guitar lick from that random person that i didn't even look at their name didn't follow them nothing like that and it's just these these small moments of inspiration so that can't happen unless it's in a public domain in whatever capacity that is so people need to you know

37:07 Riley Knapp get less precious you know obviously be diligent with with your creativity and stick to your guns but be less precious because you might be holding on to something that would change someone's life that they that then may change the whole music industry you have no idea you know truly

37:24 Riley Knapp literally don't yeah truly and you never know how these things spiral you never know when these things pop off it could be five years like

37:34 Luke F. Walton Music, when it's out there, now it has that life and the chaos of the internet and the universe and stuff can...

37:42 Riley Knapp can reward it and breathe more into it and Yeah. even if it doesn't i mean like the i was i can't i'm gonna feel bad for forgetting his name but i was reading about the history of hyper pop um which Cary Singer is super into uh and has turned turned me on to several years ago and um i'm super into it now too but um i was reading about it there's this one dude who i think he lived in

38:06 Riley Knapp i don't really remember but he he basically i think it was in mexico he wrote a bunch of like hand punch card player piano stuff that was absolutely impossible for anyone to ever play and then a bunch of the

38:19 Luke F. Walton music was just lost to time never released and then his son was like you're not cool dad you've never done anything cool he's like oh really i'm this badass composer i've got all this stuff in my garage i'm gonna release it he ends up taking over this like weird classical world thing of just computer music player piano music classical music all this mishmash and

38:45 Luke F. Walton that ends up really really inspiring a bunch of the people that end up making hyper pop music like in its in its history but it's like this one dude if he wasn't challenged by his son to release his music to prove that he was a cool dad like almost cuts off this this arm of electronic music from ever existing and and turning into this crazy phenomenon that it is today

39:12 Riley Knapp It's No, amazing. isn't that crazy? I So think it's the cool cool. thing in the world.

39:15 Riley Knapp I I think it's love the coolest it. thing in the world. Yeah. Makes me so happy. And, you know, now being more on the post-production end of things,

39:22 Riley Knapp Yeah, it's yeah, yeah. cool to kind of be able to witness it That's and cool too.

39:25 Riley Knapp be a part Yes. of these projects that honestly, I could never create, you You're know?

39:31 Riley Knapp a huge part of it and you get to be a part of a ton of them, which I'm a little jealous of. I feel like that's super cool. You're able to put your music. people stamp and taste across a whole bunch of genres across a huge volume of work so let's talk a little bit post-production did

39:47 Riley Knapp Sure. you start it because no one else did was that was that how it started because i remember when you when you started being like hey i'm mastering stuff now and i was like oh yeah nobody's mastering stuff i was like okay yeah i'll send it to riley was that was that how it started or was it a passion or was it just because nobody else did it you had to fill that void like where where did it begin

40:05 Riley Knapp uh it was a it was a scratcher on itch passion so Cool. when i was doing RKCB stuff i had to you know we would make these demos we we'd

40:15 Riley Knapp Yeah, work five or six days a week sometimes two a day session so at the end of the week we could have 12 14 songs that were pretty chaotic you know pretty pretty messy vocals needed comping tuning tracks needed mixing some form of mastering to make these demos listenable and then the environment where our publisher and our label were playing them so it was straight out of necessity um but

40:39 Riley Knapp I always had this love for it. It wasn't like this thing that I dreaded doing.

40:43 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

40:43 Riley Knapp I would always spend like Sunday and sometimes on Saturday, like late into the night, just messing around with stuff because I had such a passion for it. And it was just this exciting time for me. It was this time of discovery. I didn't necessarily have the technical know-how and I wasn't ever specifically trained in mixing or mastering.

41:04 Luke F. Walton Right. Totally.

41:04 Riley Knapp Even at USC, I never... I never took a class. Yeah. I actually think maybe I took a Garver's mastering class, but

41:11 Riley Knapp Cool. I think I, I think I did terrible. Yeah, And I think, right? I think he was kind of like, what are you doing? Why are you using the, why are you processing things like this?

41:18 Riley Knapp I Yeah. was like, listen to it. It sounds Sounds fucking sick. sick, yeah. Yeah. It was like, he's like, what are you talking? He's like, it's pumping. I'm like, that's the point.

41:24 Riley Knapp That's the point, you're supposed to pump. It's supposed to pump. But yeah, Totally.

41:30 Riley Knapp man, it was, it was, it was necessity. And then And then it turned into a huge passion.

41:34 Riley Knapp Yeah. And I realized, hey, I have a sound. I have a way of doing this that I can replicate.

41:43 Riley Knapp Mm hmm. I think it works. People are commenting on my own work of my project and saying, hey, this engineering, this mixing and mastering, this is good.

41:54 Riley Knapp Yeah. And so I knew I had that feedback and I wanted to test myself. You know, I always like to challenge myself because obviously growth is everything and that's what keeps you fresh and in it. So I would start reaching out to different peers at USC and I'd be like, hey, you know, I'll make. I'll mix your album for literally nothing, you

42:09 Riley Knapp Mm know, I'll, hmm. I'll do it for 10 bucks a song and Yep. a bottle of wine, whatever it was. Uh, and it was. it was a stressful time of my life I mean I distinctly remember I was mixing two different people's albums and it was like finals time and I was like what am I doing right now I was like this is a nightmare

42:30 Riley Knapp especially because I had such a passion for the mixing and mastering part that I would just totally ignore the school part and I was like oh no I'm gonna totally I'm gonna totally ruin myself but yeah dude that that's honestly how it happened and you know mixing mixing is a lot more complex and a

42:46 Riley Knapp Yeah. lot more touchy and and I learned that early on I learned that you know there's a reason why Chris Lord Algie is known as the rock guy and why he doesn't really touch R&B, you know, there,

42:56 Luke F. Walton Totally.

42:56 Riley Knapp there, there are reasons why people have their specific sound and stuff, the same reasons that, you know, when I was trying to write pitch songs that were dubstep or whatever,

43:04 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

43:04 Riley Knapp I wasn't, I wasn't doing it well,

43:06 Luke F. Walton Uh

43:06 Riley Knapp you know, I just,

43:07 Luke F. Walton -huh.

43:07 Riley Knapp it just wasn't that thing in that it sounded like passable, but it wasn't, didn't have the gut feeling you said, this is a mask on something else, you know?

43:15 Riley Knapp So I learned that early on and that was that was an important lesson to learn early on and that made me realize that I want to learn as much as I can about all these different styles and try to be as much of a chameleon as possible work on these different styles work on different projects that are different forms of production different qualities you

43:36 Luke F. Walton Mm-hmm.

43:36 Riley Knapp know some things were nearly finished some things were completely raw and

43:42 Luke F. Walton Yep.

43:43 Riley Knapp learning you know learning the difference between overdoing it underdoing it and then doing what's right and man that was a huge thing you know I think I think that was the most the most important lessons I learned and the the most valuable experiences I had were not those that were incredibly challenging and time-consuming they were the simplest ones and you know I feel like I'm saying so many cliche things here

44:08 Luke F. Walton No,

44:08 Riley Knapp but no, that's

44:08 Luke F. Walton this is

44:08 Riley Knapp the truth

44:09 Luke F. Walton good.

44:09 Riley Knapp you Yeah, you yeah. know like I would work on I would get sent a song to mix and I would throw all the stems in and I'd press play and I was like I don't know what I can do here.

44:19 Riley Knapp Right. I was like, this is incredible. And, you know, kind of just getting in the mindset of, okay, well, what is, what is my gut saying? What would I want from this? Obviously this person is wanting something else or wanting something slightly different and finding and finding a way to put myself in their shoes and try to kind of just really be true to their art.

44:42 Riley Knapp And I think that coming from such a creative background and producing and writing so much I

44:47 Riley Knapp Yep. had a I had a leg up on that and I was able to kind of understand and respect that a lot more um but I was humbled so many times I

44:58 Riley Knapp Mm mean you know -hmm. there were times Oh, when when for sure. I when I did too little and

45:01 Riley Knapp Uh I sent -huh. it back and they were like did you touch this and Yeah. then there were times when I did too much and they're like dude you ruined my thing and

45:06 Riley Knapp Yep. I was like okay okay Totally, okay man. okay and it's just all getting inside the head understanding what you think is right in your gut and then applying that to what their artistry is you know and that's that's the coolest part about mixing aside from you know working on all these cool different projects and being able to meet cool new people who are genuinely doing cooler shit than I ever could you know

45:29 Luke F. Walton Cool. And I like what you're saying too about

45:34 Riley Knapp like i i think i i think i'm i'm not a great chameleon mixing engineer i think i'm like i'm more developing in the lane of my thing ish with you know there's a there's a there's a fan effect like i could go more dance i can go more hip-hop go more funk but it's like kind of my thing um like i wouldn't i wouldn't be a good classical mixing engineer or um I don't know if I'd do Latin too well, really,

46:02 Riley Knapp unless it was like my kind of like, you know, lo-fi Latin. Mm-mm, mm-mm. But I think it's interesting that you took such a cool approach so early on in.

46:13 Riley Knapp your kind of mixing journey and i remember that i remember seeing like damn like this guy's just hustling like he's mixing another thing and being really inspired because i i i loved your pace and uh and you were one of the people in college that helped me like think of like the pace is only where you set your limiter at you

46:33 Riley Knapp Mm can always -hmm. do more if you're fully focused always getting better and hungry for a new opportunity And I saw that from you and I saw it a ton when you did the switch to mastering because then you were able to like crank quicker because how I mean mastering doesn't take nearly the time investment, does it in terms of like a single track mixing versus mastering it.

46:55 Riley Knapp no and you know a lot of that does come down to organization and

46:59 Luke F. Walton Of

46:59 Riley Knapp session prep

46:59 Luke F. Walton course. No,

46:59 Riley Knapp and

47:00 Luke F. Walton totally.

47:00 Riley Knapp right

47:00 Luke F. Walton Like fast does not mean it should be cheap or that it's devalued. It just means, you know,

47:06 Riley Knapp right

47:06 Luke F. Walton I can get through more. Yeah.

47:07 Riley Knapp right the process is totally different and you know i envy mixers who have assistants that you know get everything

47:13 Luke F. Walton Me

47:13 Riley Knapp ready

47:14 Luke F. Walton too,

47:14 Riley Knapp even

47:14 Luke F. Walton man. Me too.

47:15 Riley Knapp kind of get get base eq and compression and stuff done and

47:18 Luke F. Walton Yep.

47:19 Riley Knapp then you know like

47:20 Luke F. Walton Clean

47:20 Riley Knapp i've got i've met

47:20 Luke F. Walton those rumbles

47:20 Riley Knapp some dude

47:21 Luke F. Walton and yeah.

47:22 Riley Knapp exactly exactly so you're approaching coaching it as a as 100 a creative oh Yeah.

47:27 Riley Knapp my god that would be the best gig in the

47:28 Luke F. Walton That'd be so nice.

47:29 Riley Knapp talking with some of these mixers i'm like that's really how you work I'm i'm

47:33 Luke F. Walton know.

47:33 Riley Knapp like and they're like yeah i mixed x song in literally 45 minutes and all the engineers are saying that's the truth and i'm like what are you talking about

47:42 Luke F. Walton Yes.

47:42 Riley Knapp like that's incredible you

47:44 Luke F. Walton Yes.

47:44 Riley Knapp know how fun how inspiring and it's a performance at that point you

47:48 Luke F. Walton It

47:48 Riley Knapp know you

47:48 Luke F. Walton really is.

47:48 Riley Knapp get in there and it's a performance the performance and you leave the room and the performance is done uh

47:51 Riley Knapp Yeah, that's it's so cool mastering cool. I mean, you know, it's called the dark arts for a reason. People don't really understand what it is and people don't really understand the secrets behind it. And it used to be there used to be a technical wall in front of it where you needed gear.

48:15 Luke F. Walton yeah

48:16 Riley Knapp You

48:16 Luke F. Walton like

48:16 Riley Knapp needed specific,

48:16 Luke F. Walton expensive gear

48:17 Riley Knapp expensive. You needed two Labradoodles. You

48:20 Luke F. Walton yeah

48:21 Riley Knapp know what I mean? Like you needed you needed PMCs. You needed these things in order to achieve those sounds because a lot of that. a lot of that secret sauce clipping

48:30 Luke F. Walton Mm-hmm.

48:30 Riley Knapp uh you know soft clip all of that no one ever talked about you know the fact that the tubes added different saturations and colors and you needed all these different things no one talked about that like honestly i think not until maybe like five or six years ago did mastering engineers finally and it was probably you know with the whole era of mix with the masters and

48:52 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

48:52 Riley Knapp a lot of these online tutorials but

48:53 Luke F. Walton Yeah, yeah, yeah.

48:54 Riley Knapp not until then did it and the people start saying okay well now i gotta start showing people what i'm doing and here's what we've all been doing you know

49:01 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

49:01 Riley Knapp like uh like i think big bass brian who's an old school hip-hop mastering engineer a lot of hip a lot of like 50 cent eminem stuff like that he originally was the first person to say i'm gonna clip this through my converter i'm gonna i know that if i pump these 808s these songs with loud 808s and all this stuff into my limiters it's going to start bouncing and pumping and doing all this weird

49:27 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

49:27 Riley Knapp stuff so

49:28 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

49:28 Riley Knapp i'm going to chop that shit off and i'm going to saturate those things and then i'm going to be able to make this loud in the way that i want to make it loud you know which is why he got the name big bass brian because he would maintain that bass and he wouldn't suck it out with any limiters or anything he'd barely use a limiting you know limiting was just a was a brick wall to prevent any digital clipping uh

49:49 Riley Knapp but that sort of learning those secrets completely

49:52 Luke F. Walton Yes.

49:52 Riley Knapp changed my life like once I started to get into that and I realized oh not only are there no rules but breaking the rules is the standard I

50:00 Luke F. Walton Yes.

50:01 Riley Knapp was like I'm all in I was like I gotta I gotta know more about this and I gotta know like all the different things and you know which digital EQs sound good when you over overdrive them and what things you know actually work and the different versions of like linear phase EQ and what the different what a spleen eq is and just kind of all the cool technical

50:20 Luke F. Walton I do

50:20 Riley Knapp stuff

50:20 Luke F. Walton not know.

50:20 Riley Knapp yeah

50:21 Luke F. Walton I do not know the difference between EQ, but I don't know if I need

50:23 Riley Knapp yeah

50:23 Luke F. Walton to. I got you.

50:24 Riley Knapp no but but but those were the things that i then started hyper focus on

50:29 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

50:29 Riley Knapp i would

50:29 Luke F. Walton for sure.

50:30 Riley Knapp have dreams i would have dreams about clippers like

50:32 Luke F. Walton Yes, that's

50:33 Riley Knapp i'm not

50:33 Luke F. Walton awesome.

50:34 Riley Knapp kidding you

50:34 Luke F. Walton That's awesome.

50:34 Riley Knapp dude i would have dreams and i was like i was fascinated and i would go through and i would do these little tests and i'd clip things and i go look at the waveforms and i'm like oh what's what's happening here

50:44 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

50:44 Riley Knapp you know just

50:45 Luke F. Walton cool.

50:45 Riley Knapp for for no reason you know I think it was kind of one of those hyper focused niches but but it's it's a totally different love and passion than mixing is and I think my favorite part about it is what you've touched on is the fact that I can work on so many projects at once and kind of be able to hear all these things and be a part of them because at the end of the day I love listening to music

51:11 Riley Knapp And mastering is pretty much listening to just

51:14 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

51:14 Riley Knapp finished track,

51:15 Luke F. Walton Right.

51:16 Riley Knapp you know what I mean?

51:16 Luke F. Walton Right.

51:16 Riley Knapp And then finishing it,

51:18 Luke F. Walton Mm

51:18 Riley Knapp finish finishing

51:18 Luke F. Walton hmm.

51:18 Riley Knapp it.

51:19 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

51:19 Riley Knapp And when I was mixing a lot, I would really try to focus on maybe one or two projects at a time. And I was trying to back to that consistency thing and back to kind of pulling from the ether. I thought it was almost sacrilegious if I were to work on a lot of different projects at once, obviously being a solo. solo person if I had engineers and

51:38 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

51:38 Riley Knapp assistants under

51:39 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

51:39 Riley Knapp me that could kind of do some stuff for me it's a very different thing but I was trying to be really really um cognizant of what the artist wanted for the particular projects and things like that so so I was pretty I was you know pretty respectful to that process and it was it was good and bad uh you know it was it was it was a great learning experience and I think I did good work but it was a little bit Um,

52:06 Riley Knapp it was just draining. It

52:08 Luke F. Walton Mm

52:08 Riley Knapp was a

52:08 Luke F. Walton -hmm.

52:08 Riley Knapp lot more, it was a lot more. mentally consuming energetically consuming uh I would start to you know have specific songs on replay in my head I would start to you know get all these crazy things that that made me feel kind of crazy to where I was like okay I can't listen to music anymore you know I would I would drive 45 minutes with nothing on you know what I mean and

52:30 Luke F. Walton I've totally been

52:31 Riley Knapp I started to

52:32 Luke F. Walton in those

52:32 Riley Knapp yeah

52:32 Luke F. Walton places that

52:33 Riley Knapp exactly and I started to just kind of not enjoy that so

52:36 Luke F. Walton totally

52:36 Riley Knapp you

52:37 Luke F. Walton No.

52:37 Riley Knapp so that's where I that's where I said okay well mastering is the best of both worlds you

52:41 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

52:41 Riley Knapp know I could I could master six different albums and you know a few different singles and then I could go into my car on that same 45 minute drive and I'd listen to those songs and do car tests and I was like hell yeah you know this is so weak this is fun you know not only because it's less time consuming but just because at the end of the day you're just you're presented with what someone loves and

53:03 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

53:03 Riley Knapp with what someone is happy with most of the time Right. and and you're all you're doing is making their smile bigger you know and

53:10 Luke F. Walton I love that.

53:10 Riley Knapp it's the cool it's the coolest thing in the world and that's where I really started to fall in love with mastering

53:14 Luke F. Walton I really love that. And you're, it's, it's fun too. Cause you're like. your your game to mix it up for the different projects and stuff like that like when i like i've got i've got one for you maybe we'll talk about a little bit of life so people can get in on it

53:29 Riley Knapp Yeah, yeah, yeah,

53:29 Luke F. Walton um but like when when we moved from the koan records to the moonlight beach record like i was like hey this isn't quite hitting and then you're like oh it's it's a new record i was like yes and you're like okay i'm gonna change this stuff up and you did and it was like there it is we're good

53:46 Riley Knapp yes.

53:47 Luke F. Walton it was

53:47 Riley Knapp Yes,

53:47 Luke F. Walton just in the wrong box and and i i love that i don't i don't know of a lot of mastering engineers that are necessarily like on that tip of like oh i see what you're doing artistically differently here like your master bus is different my master bus is going to be different we're going to build that together that's a really special and really really cool thing that i think

54:07 Riley Knapp absolutely.

54:07 Luke F. Walton is impactful for mixing engineer especially if you're mixing engineer and the artist you

54:13 Luke F. Walton who like i don't have anybody else it's like you're it you're the you're the the the back line the the foundation that you know if i if i'm if i'm doing something dumb it's like i i need you to tell me it's like hey this is not working yeah

54:29 Riley Knapp that's that's such an honor i i love that so much and i i it's the coolest thing i mean i i really that's my other favorite part is that people do trust me and and back to that you know the first thing I talked about when being a drummer not

54:41 Luke F. Walton Yes.

54:41 Riley Knapp letting people down Yep. you know that

54:43 Luke F. Walton Totally.

54:44 Riley Knapp drives me and that motivates me and you know in the example you just brought up it's just a simple mindset shift of

54:51 Luke F. Walton Yes.

54:51 Riley Knapp oh wait he's he's closed a chapter and he's opening a new chapter I have to do the same I at least have to approach it with that mindset even if at the end of the day the right thing to do is the same thing I've been doing just approaching it with a different mindset

55:04 Luke F. Walton Mm

55:04 Riley Knapp is how you grow and how you respect the artist because there are a lot of engineers mastering engineers mixing engineers who are very stubborn you know and very stuck Yes. In their own ways and they'll tell you you know no that's not what we should be doing for this or something it's like but wait it's my music what are you talking about I do want it that loud and I do want it this bright you know whatever it

55:28 Luke F. Walton may Right.

55:28 Riley Knapp be so at the end of the day it's all about respecting the growth of an artist and

55:32 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

55:32 Riley Knapp you're one of the few artists that i've gotten to grow with in

55:35 Luke F. Walton Cool.

55:35 Riley Knapp this capacity

55:36 Luke F. Walton Yeah, man.

55:36 Riley Knapp i mean really i mean

55:38 Luke F. Walton Love

55:38 Riley Knapp you you're probably

55:38 Luke F. Walton that.

55:39 Riley Knapp i've probably grown with you more than any other artist it's been i've years and years

55:43 Luke F. Walton It's

55:43 Riley Knapp of working

55:43 Luke F. Walton been years.

55:43 Riley Knapp yeah yeah

55:44 Luke F. Walton I know. Yeah.

55:45 Riley Knapp and it's it's inspiring and it's cool and you have challenged me to keep growing as well

55:50 Luke F. Walton I

55:50 Riley Knapp like

55:50 Luke F. Walton love it.

55:51 Riley Knapp it's it's not like i get another scoobert song and i say oh you know throw it in these settings Every time I listen to it and I'm like, okay, I see it's improv,

56:00 Luke F. Walton Cool.

56:01 Riley Knapp right? It's Yes, yes and.

56:01 Luke F. Walton yes,

56:01 Riley Knapp And I say,

56:02 Luke F. Walton yes.

56:02 Riley Knapp I get it. I understand what this project is, but I understand these differences.

56:07 Luke F. Walton Yes.

56:07 Riley Knapp And it's also nice because your mixing skills and your production skills are really kind of bolstering the whole project and you're leveling up in ways that. it's not even like uh linear leveling up it's like lateral movement you

56:23 Luke F. Walton cool

56:24 Riley Knapp know like

56:24 Luke F. Walton man sweet

56:24 Riley Knapp you were always kind of like hitting that hitting that peak but now you're kind of over you're just encompassing this gigantic portion of the sonic spectrum and and

56:33 Luke F. Walton thank

56:33 Riley Knapp you're yeah

56:33 Luke F. Walton you i'm

56:34 Riley Knapp and i love it so much so

56:36 Luke F. Walton so glad

56:36 Riley Knapp yeah

56:36 Luke F. Walton i'm

56:36 Riley Knapp that's a great great example of that

56:38 Luke F. Walton so glad it's working okay so uh real quick what's coming what's coming next year um this is my crazy idea is uh

56:45 Luke F. Walton instead of doing one album cycle and then another album cycle i'm thinking about doing them in tandem and then like releasing singles from each and then both of the albums like almost back to back like two weeks apart so that it's it just kind of i'm gonna i'm trying to figure out how to do this with the album art too but like there is

57:03 Luke F. Walton obviously they'll be sonically linked because they'll be being made at the same time but finding the ways to differentiate them so they really do feel like different records on every step of the process like i'm going to do different stuff on the signal chains the um the samples that i use the guitar tones like i'm going to do slightly different things between the two and um i want to challenge you to try to do the same thing in tandem so

57:25 Riley Knapp Oh,

57:25 Luke F. Walton it's not like that's... album a is done album b is done it's like album a and b are both Chugging along on parallel tracks.

57:32 Riley Knapp Dude, I so love that. And I think you're one of the few artists who can do that and have your audience enjoy it beyond belief.

57:40 Luke F. Walton Cool.

57:40 Riley Knapp I think you've done such a good job of being so unique and creative and so yourself. You haven't confined any boundaries or stuck yourself in any sort of box to where that would. absolutely work and that is the dream to be able to do that right like

57:54 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

57:55 Riley Knapp when i was when i was making music i would you know have an ep or album coming out obviously would be working on the next one or on music simultaneously in parallel and the amount of times when i was like well can we just release this song too with

58:07 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

58:07 Riley Knapp that or

58:07 Luke F. Walton Right.

58:07 Riley Knapp how about can we release these four songs

58:09 Luke F. Walton Mix

58:09 Riley Knapp with

58:09 Luke F. Walton it

58:10 Riley Knapp those up. four songs

58:10 Luke F. Walton Yes.

58:10 Riley Knapp you

58:11 Luke F. Walton Yes.

58:11 Riley Knapp know they're clearly very different sounds they're clearly different projects but i like them both equally and i want them both out now you know

58:19 Luke F. Walton oh

58:19 Riley Knapp yeah

58:19 Luke F. Walton you're

58:19 Riley Knapp and

58:19 Luke F. Walton right

58:20 Riley Knapp and you know very rarely we were able to a few times do that um and it ended up being more more collaborative like bringing on another artist or a feature or something like that right to kind of justify that difference in sound and that release schedule but man that's the best thing to do and now I don't think that shit matters at all I

58:41 Luke F. Walton I don't think so don't either

58:42 Riley Knapp that there's

58:42 Luke F. Walton I

58:42 Riley Knapp no

58:43 Luke F. Walton think they one's gotta

58:43 Riley Knapp gonna

58:43 Luke F. Walton cast

58:43 Riley Knapp gatekeep

58:44 Luke F. Walton it yeah

58:44 Riley Knapp that yeah like how cool would that be man you have two singles on two different different projects simultaneously doing fantastic under

58:51 Luke F. Walton yeah

58:51 Riley Knapp different playlists yeah so different genres how cool is that and they're not like features it's not like remix like Skrillex remix for the dance world you know I think that's incredible

59:02 Luke F. Walton cool man i'm i'm really excited i think it's gonna also like help me justify almost keeping each album a little bit more narrow like i always have this album creep thing where i have this like idea of what i want the record to be but then i get other ideas i'm like oh but i want an uptempo song like oh but i want a little this and then the scope widens which is fine but i think that this would allow me to make like a little bit of like two tighter works um just because it's like i've no okay i have an idea that's actually for this record i have an idea that's actually for that record and i don't have to

59:34 Luke F. Walton necessarily blend the streams it'll be fun i

59:36 Riley Knapp that

59:37 Luke F. Walton don't

59:37 Riley Knapp blows

59:37 Luke F. Walton know we'll my see mind we'll

59:37 Riley Knapp yeah you're also so prolific that that you can do that if i try to

59:42 Luke F. Walton see

59:42 Riley Knapp do

59:42 Luke F. Walton well

59:42 Riley Knapp that it'd be three songs max three songs on each project and and you're done but i mean like dude the amount of like the amount of stuff that you send me that's months out and months in advance and i'm like how do you create this much how do you how do you have time how do you even do it i'm serious like you're the most prolific

59:58 Luke F. Walton thank you

59:59 Riley Knapp artist i've ever worked with for sure

60:01 Luke F. Walton I really

60:01 Riley Knapp It's

60:01 Luke F. Walton appreciate that.

60:02 Riley Knapp crazy.

60:02 Luke F. Walton I

60:02 Riley Knapp Yeah,

60:02 Luke F. Walton want to no, get that

60:03 Riley Knapp it's awesome.

60:03 Luke F. Walton mantle. I really do appreciate it. And I don't know, man, I don't know, like, I don't know the next day that I'll be able to do it again. I just kind of wake up and start working. And I love it.

60:17 Luke F. Walton I love it so much that it's, it's just making myself like you're saying the smile wider just chipping away at that doing it again it's like i've always wanted to do a drum feel like like feel like this or like oh i got these new drum samples like that sounds fun i want to play with those and it's like oh there's a song

60:35 Riley Knapp Yeah. yeah just kind of yes-ended your way until like oh oh yeah i love it that's a single let's let's release that and sometimes those tributaries just like go into a dead end and then you just make a cool little loop and now you're like familiar with that bit of gear or whatever um but that's that's how i end up doing it is it's like less master planning and more just kind of like doing it as often and as long as i possibly can

60:58 Riley Knapp Yeah, beautiful. The fact you enjoy it is the reason why that's happening. And it's crazy

61:03 Riley Knapp it's to keep enjoying it as much as you do. it I think that's is it's rare. That's rare.

61:07 Riley Knapp weird i've surprised myself i keep thinking that i'm gonna get bored or i'm gonna really want to mix it up or something like that and it's like no i i like music that sounds like this and it's it still has got a decent amount of variance but i feel like i've developed a thumbprint that um doesn't feel forced it doesn't feel like i have to be in this this little world um

61:27 Riley Knapp Certainly. i want to talk about ai uh and i want to talk about your company so um first of all i very recently when i was doing the podcast theme song i which you mastered um i did a lander version because i was like oh i don't know if you'll be able to turn around quickly enough i'll just throw that in there and then yours came in and i was like oh my god thank god his came in because then i didn't have to release that abomination onto the world dude

61:51 Riley Knapp Oh my, how was the land of virgins? Curious. it sucked

61:54 Luke F. Walton sucked it sucked it was crazy and it was so weird because it was like i can't even completely place it and if you a beat it you'd win a hundred times out of a hundred to anybody but i couldn't quite like be like oh it's because x y and z it was just like no this one has soul and vibe and this one is just checking boxes and you can feel it it made everything thinner and just less musical and i understand that it does some cool stuff and it's gotten

62:21 Riley Knapp It's gotten a lot better, but Mm-hmm. it is a really interesting use case of one kind of AI, the like, let's take jobs and take the creativity or whatever and smash it and put it in a box and the box can be that tool versus your kind of AI and what you're doing with your company that's empowering, that is creator focused, that I think is gaining real steam and will continue to gain steam.

62:44 Riley Knapp But I just I just want to start off that conversation there before you even dig into the company, just like what are your thoughts on that interplay of generative AI of like creator focus versus creator replacing i guess yeah

62:58 Riley Knapp For sure. For sure. How much longer do we have? Oh boy, I just came i into know this dude

63:02 Riley Knapp deep i deep know that's so true maybe we could do this two-parter do you want to do i could do a two-parter we could end it here like check it out next week we're gonna come back yeah all right let's let's do that um where can people find your stuff then then riley uh because we'll end the podcast here and then we'll we'll pick it up with ai stuff

63:20 Riley Knapp Beautiful. Yeah, Yeah. you can find my music under RKCB on any streaming platform. Mixing and mastering, just Google my name, you'll find me. I'm on Sound Better, I'm on all those things. Send me an email. Yeah, we'd love to hear from you. Love working with everybody.

63:35 Luke F. Walton Awesome. Really appreciate it. And we'll pick this up again next week. I am Scoobert Doobert once again. My website is scoobertdoobert.pizza. You can find my links and subscribe, five star, all that good stuff. I'm going to say a fake goodbye now.

63:47 Luke F. Walton Bye, Riley.

63:48 Riley Knapp Bye. See you soon.