An Interview with Serena Sun

0:49 Luke F. Walton Good everybody, this is Scoobert Doobert here for Love Music More. I'm about to have a great conversation with Serena Sun, a Chinese-Canadian artist, songwriter, and producer.

0:59 Luke F. Walton One of the things I loved about that conversation was I always love what it's like for emerging artists, what they're going through, how they're confronting the challenges of this modern moment, as well as the opportunities. But I also like just that energy of I'm producing myself. I'm going to figure out my own core sound. I'm going to cultivate that.

1:19 Luke F. Walton And she also just did a really interesting move from Vancouver, one town that I love, to London, another town that I love. But talking about the differences in that music scene and how it's influencing her sound, her perspective.

1:34 Luke F. Walton I just thought that she had a really unique kind of sense of where she wants to go and how she wants to get there. And she happens to be on one of my favorite record labels in the entire world, Indie Shake. So really excited for Serena Sun. She's got some amazing music. I got to hear a bunch of it before this episode, and I can't wait for you to hear this conversation and her music as well.

1:53 Luke F. Walton Before we get into that, though, DistroKid is our title sponsor. DistroKid makes music distribution fun and easy with... With unlimited uploads and artists get to keep 100% of royalties and earnings. I use it because again, 100% of your earnings and unlimited music. So if you want to get your stuff out there, it's a great way.

2:13 Luke F. Walton And we've got a great deal for you for 30% off at distrokid.com slash VIP slash love music more. All one word. A million plus artists rely on DistroKid to get their music onto Spotify. by Apple Music, YouTube, TikTok, Tidal, Instagram, and all of the other major streaming services. One of the things that I love about DistroKid is I've got my app so I can go, oh cool, I got some earnings right to my bank.

2:38 Luke F. Walton Oh, I need to check my UPC or my ISRC, you know, some industry stuff. I can do that just right on my app and that's just kind of a game changer because these

2:49 Luke F. Walton This career is full of flexibility and responding to a current moment and you might be sitting on a subway.

2:56 Luke F. Walton When you get that call, hey, we need this and this and this for that song, or this person just sold their catalog and, you know, all these kind of crazy things, District Kid is there to help you make it happen. So check out District Kid at districtkid.com slash VIP slash love music more for 30% off and enjoy this conversation with Serena.

3:18 Luke F. Walton What's good, everybody? Welcome back to Love Music More. I am Scoobert Doobert joined with Serena Sun. And what's up, Serena?

3:25 Serena Sun Hey, how's it going?

3:26 Luke F. Walton It's going great. It's going great. Thank you so much for joining the program. I'm so excited to talk about your artist career, your move from Canada to the UK, and just kind of navigating what it's like to be an emerging artist with a bunch of attention, getting on Spotify playlists and Amazon playlists, which I don't know how you even get on Amazon playlists. So I'm excited. Maybe you'll teach me.

3:48 Serena Sun I was like, I don't know. I'll get into it.

3:50 Luke F. Walton It's awesome. Awesome. It's awesome. But I'm so excited to talk about kind of the career arc, the artist journey, what it looks like, you know, post pandemic and also taking risks for your career. And I think that's a really cool kind of theme and nugget that I've talked to a lot of different people about taking that leap.

4:06 Luke F. Walton And I feel like moving to the UK is kind of that leap or signing with a label like Indie Shake is kind of that leap. And people know the overnight success, but let's talk about the backstory and the things that happened before. or the quote-unquote overnight

4:19 Serena Sun super

4:20 Luke F. Walton success exactly

4:20 Serena Sun we are we are in the backstory we are in the thick of the backstory right now

4:24 Luke F. Walton exactly

4:24 Serena Sun so yeah

4:25 Luke F. Walton i've

4:25 Serena Sun i'm super down thank you for having me by the way

4:27 Luke F. Walton really been enjoying your music i've been listening to it and i am i don't know i'm just I like the idea of maybe maybe we'll get a little glimpse in your biopic someday of being on the love music more podcast.

4:41 Serena Sun Oh my gosh, let's definitely put her in there. I'll be like, this is one of my first podcasts.

4:44 Luke F. Walton To start off, I want to zoom in on these last like you're making your EP and signing with Indie Shake and making your move. How did all of that start to happen? How did you be like, okay, this is the time to double down and really just go for it. or it in the career.

5:03 Serena Sun To be honest moving here was kind of it was like a wild card for me because I was living in Vancouver for I want to say around four years

5:12 Luke F. Walton Okay.

5:12 Serena Sun prior to my move. I'm originally from Vancouver but I also spent some time in the U.S. for boarding school and then my undergrad was also in the U.S. I had been traveling to L.A. a bit and New York a bit like for songwriting sessions and stuff prior to moving here. So nobody really including me like had it in their minds that I'd be moving to the UK.

5:31 Luke F. Walton Yeah. Yeah.

5:32 Serena Sun But as a Canadian, there is this thing called the youth mobility scheme. That it was like there was just an easy process to get this visa. And so. And it sounds like an adventure.

5:41 Luke F. Walton Yes.

5:41 Serena Sun So long story short, me and my partner and our dog decided to make the leap around Christmas time 2023,

5:50 Luke F. Walton Okay.

5:50 Serena Sun which was last year. We like filled in the paperwork, got the visa and moved over in May. So it was just like maybe a three months, four months difference between when we decided to go and we landed here.

6:02 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

6:02 Serena Sun Yeah, so it kind of came out of nowhere, but I was craving a move and like you said for the risk for route for the career

6:08 Luke F. Walton Mm

6:08 Serena Sun like

6:08 Luke F. Walton -hmm.

6:08 Serena Sun there was in the back of my head that I always did want to go somewhere like a city that had a bigger music industry and like an infrastructure where you can meet other artists more easily and play like shows in front of industry like leaders and stuff and you know maybe create more opportunities for yourself yeah that's why I moved to London the EP itself like you said like you know it's self-produced self-written it's the only

6:33 Serena Sun time I've ever taken the time to

6:34 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

6:34 Serena Sun do that and genuinely it's in existence only because I was lonely and bored

6:39 Luke F. Walton Cool. Yeah.

6:40 Serena Sun for my first several months in London it was always like a goal of mine to create something from start to finish well not finish I guess I have amazing mixing and mastering engineers on it that actually really brought it to life but with the productions that I really wanted to create the world myself

6:55 Serena Sun yeah when i moved here didn't have any contacts and i was kind of like well this is now or never let's give

7:00 Luke F. Walton There

7:00 Serena Sun this a try

7:00 Luke F. Walton is magic in making music in those transition periods, I swear.

7:06 Serena Sun totally i me too i'm kind of like should i uproot my life

7:09 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

7:09 Serena Sun like every

7:10 Luke F. Walton right.

7:10 Serena Sun two weeks maybe

7:10 Luke F. Walton Totally.

7:11 Serena Sun not

7:11 Luke F. Walton Totally. Exactly. Cheat code. There's something about that. I don't know what it is, what it does to the brain or the new environments or something like that, but it totally unlocks a different sort of sound, a different sort of energy. I moved into. to displace my first

7:23 Serena Sun are

7:23 Luke F. Walton actual

7:23 Serena Sun you

7:23 Luke F. Walton yeah

7:23 Serena Sun in san diego

7:24 Luke F. Walton i'm in san

7:24 Serena Sun beautiful

7:24 Luke F. Walton diego i thank you thank you this is my first time actually not i mean it's technically is a bedroom but i've converted the bedroom into a recording studio it's

7:32 Serena Sun it's a magical

7:32 Luke F. Walton crazy thanks

7:33 Serena Sun spot yeah it doesn't matter like what it is like i think that's awesome also like those panels are so sick did you make them oh

7:39 Luke F. Walton no no i bought them i bought them online

7:40 Serena Sun they're gorgeous yeah oh

7:42 Luke F. Walton um and i finally paid them off um but but it the i i made like an entire record the second i got the space because it was just like it was inspiring and it felt like i needed to you know plaque the champagne on the ship so to speak it's like you're in a new spot you're in london like i move into this this room and it's just like okay i gotta like christen this thing i gotta make make music to make like it real

8:06 Serena Sun what energy is it bringing you know and like i think that's so sick is

8:11 Luke F. Walton totally totally so

8:11 Serena Sun the record out that you made or is

8:13 Luke F. Walton the record

8:13 Serena Sun it still

8:13 Luke F. Walton is

8:13 Serena Sun oh

8:13 Luke F. Walton out the record is out it is called i like the

8:15 Serena Sun letter oh

8:15 Luke F. Walton i

8:16 Serena Sun yeah yeah Yeah, I've actually

8:16 Luke F. Walton Okay,

8:17 Serena Sun I've seen the

8:17 Luke F. Walton hey, sweet. Awesome.

8:18 Serena Sun Cool.

8:18 Luke F. Walton Thank you. So yeah, that's the sound of the space. I've got some big news, everybody. My vinyl record is out. We didn't make a ton of these, so these guys are going to sell out, and I would love for you to get your hands on one of them because they're so dope.

8:34 Luke F. Walton They're so dope and it comes with a whole bunch of like liner notes and pictures and you know special stuff the things that really went into making this record and I want you to get your hands on it so go to scoobertdoobert.pizza or check out my Instagram for a link or click the link in the show notes or the bio or wherever you're watching this to pick up your copy you know they're gonna sell out we really did not make very many of these and I want you to have it it's it's like a collector's item so

9:02 Luke F. Walton Thank you. Thank you for supporting my music and I can't wait for you to hear it actually on physical vinyl. Enjoy the rest of the episode. I'm excited to talk about the different music scenes, the different energies. First, I want to talk about indie shake. So you get signed to one of my absolute favorite record labels in the world and it's based in Sweden. So now you're in Europe, you have a European label.

9:22 Luke F. Walton What has that been like? How did you sign that deal and how has that been like helping and impacting your career being on a, you know, a label that's obviously it's not like universal or something like that, but it's a label that believes in their artists work super hard. And I think it's like a good modern blueprint for what artists want labels to be,

9:40 Serena Sun 10

9:40 Luke F. Walton you

9:41 Serena Sun out of 10.

9:41 Luke F. Walton know?

9:42 Serena Sun all

9:43 Luke F. Walton Cool.

9:43 Serena Sun of the above i agree like it's been a dream

9:45 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

9:45 Serena Sun so far to be honest i think before i signed it i had this light level of anxiety because i was this is the first time i've signed some like signed

9:53 Luke F. Walton Every

9:54 Serena Sun a deal like

9:54 Luke F. Walton artist.

9:54 Serena Sun um

9:54 Luke F. Walton Absolutely.

9:55 Serena Sun yeah

9:55 Luke F. Walton 100%.

9:55 Serena Sun i've been very diy up until this point working with amazing people who've helped me get certain things but i think giving it that level of control and also entering into a partnership that is like still technically unknown before you enter into it you don't really know fully

10:11 Serena Sun fully what you're signing up for was a little scary but Indie Shake's been incredible hot kind of amazing yeah I mean they're artists themselves so like I think having that background of knowing what it's like and knowing that you want to have a creative voice and like they're helping you and what you want to be helped with and letting you take the reins with the other parts that you feel confident in or like you like want to have more control over so how I got in contact

10:35 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

10:35 Serena Sun with

10:35 Luke F. Walton yeah.

10:36 Serena Sun them was through an artist here to your friend last year um

10:39 Luke F. Walton Mm hmm.

10:39 Serena Sun yeah i

10:40 Luke F. Walton What's

10:40 Serena Sun she's

10:41 Luke F. Walton your friend? Fran's awesome.

10:41 Serena Sun amazing

10:42 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

10:42 Serena Sun yeah right of the stairs

10:43 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

10:43 Serena Sun we met at a songwriting circle

10:45 Luke F. Walton No

10:45 Serena Sun yeah

10:45 Luke F. Walton way.

10:45 Serena Sun and we got along really well she came over and like we did a session together

10:50 Luke F. Walton Actually,

10:50 Serena Sun and

10:50 Luke F. Walton could you explain what songwriting circles are? I'm sure that there are people in the audience

10:53 Serena Sun happy to yeah

10:54 Luke F. Walton that are like, why are they excited about that? Like, what does that mean?

10:56 Serena Sun we're like what is this circle it sounds like i don't know like culty

10:59 Luke F. Walton Right.

10:59 Serena Sun um

11:00 Luke F. Walton Totally.

11:00 Serena Sun maybe perhaps yeah a little bit basically there's this other amazing artist named juniper and their partner is another another amazing artist fair hazel the two of them were in london for a short period of time and they have their own community out here in london but they were moving to nashville and before leaving they wanted to host a song circle which was inviting either some of their new artist friends or like long-term collaborators into their space their living room it was kind of like very uh play what you feel comfy with and if you even want to

11:31 Luke F. Walton Mm hmm.

11:31 Serena Sun um and get feedback if you're looking for it and it was just such a wholesome sweet and like also a little nerve

11:37 Luke F. Walton Totally.

11:37 Serena Sun -wracking because some of these artists also like but

11:39 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

11:40 Serena Sun yeah no everybody was super nice and it felt like a a good way to like just shed some walls from the get-go of meeting people and like be introduced to their art and like yeah so that's how I met Fran

11:51 Luke F. Walton I agree. And it's a cool thing because I want to do that again. It's been a long time,

11:55 Serena Sun Yeah.

11:56 Luke F. Walton and I really,

11:56 Serena Sun Do you

11:57 Luke F. Walton I've

11:57 Serena Sun host them?

11:57 Luke F. Walton not, I know I haven't hosted one. I probably couldn't. I probably could now

12:01 Serena Sun You

12:01 Luke F. Walton that I've got

12:01 Serena Sun a probably

12:01 Luke F. Walton bigger space.

12:01 Serena Sun could.

12:02 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

12:02 Serena Sun You can even do it in a park.

12:03 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

12:04 Serena Sun You know, if that's you want

12:04 Luke F. Walton true.

12:04 Serena Sun like physical

12:05 Luke F. Walton That's true. There's no, you

12:05 Serena Sun space,

12:05 Luke F. Walton don't have to be in a, exactly,

12:06 Serena Sun right?

12:07 Luke F. Walton exactly.

12:08 Serena Sun And you're in San

12:09 Luke F. Walton I'm

12:09 Serena Sun Diego,

12:09 Luke F. Walton in San Diego,

12:10 Serena Sun yeah,

12:10 Luke F. Walton so we got some, we got

12:10 Serena Sun it's

12:11 Luke F. Walton some

12:11 Serena Sun always sunny

12:11 Luke F. Walton parks

12:11 Serena Sun and over

12:11 Luke F. Walton stuff.

12:11 Serena Sun there.

12:11 Luke F. Walton I got, songwriting circles are cool because they're kind of equivalent to my brother-in-law writing fiction, and he does these.

12:19 Luke F. Walton kind of equivalent things where everybody kind of passes around the latest passages that they were working on and gets critiques so they have like plot points or an outline for a book and other artists kind of that are more experienced or less experienced look at it and give feedback.

12:34 Luke F. Walton I mean it really changed his his writing and it's funny because songwriting circles is like the closest thing that we have of like your peers it's a safe

12:41 Serena Sun Yeah, space yep,

12:42 Luke F. Walton in a supportive environment where

12:44 Serena Sun definitely.

12:44 Luke F. Walton you're able to try stuff out. out and the audience is really tuned in because they're all songwriters so you can like do something weird with song form and be like does this land does this work am i over complicating it those kind of deeper questions that are harder to get like feedback on i don't know submit hub or whatever like that's just kind of a little bit more like i liked it i didn't like it it's like no i like i want to know why like why what about what

13:08 Serena Sun i

13:08 Luke F. Walton about this resonated

13:08 Serena Sun also having a person or even like online with people's faces i think it's just like like it's just a totally different energy because like submit hub it feels like i almost feel like i'm about to be judged um whereas

13:18 Luke F. Walton yeah

13:19 Serena Sun it's

13:19 Luke F. Walton yeah yeah for yeah

13:19 Serena Sun not

13:19 Luke F. Walton for sure

13:20 Serena Sun necessarily

13:20 Luke F. Walton yeah

13:20 Serena Sun that that is what happens, but

13:21 Luke F. Walton totally

13:22 Serena Sun it's, I feel like, I don't know, like with songwriting circles, it feels more personal.

13:25 Luke F. Walton there's different incentives different audience um you know submit hub like they're they're for what that is for people that don't know that's that's like one of the key parts of the indie music ecosystem of kind of getting your music heard by independent playlisters blogs and things like that and there are options to get feedback So my sister that can be really harsh.

13:44 Luke F. Walton I know when I was growing as a mixing engineer. Oh my god, did they hate my mixes?

13:49 Serena Sun oh my gosh my first production was like you know what they to be fair they were nice but they were just kind of like this is very slow there's

13:55 Luke F. Walton yeah yeah

13:56 Serena Sun no beat

13:56 Luke F. Walton right

13:56 Serena Sun and i was like fair

13:57 Luke F. Walton yeah

13:57 Serena Sun enough in hindsight they were correct

13:58 Luke F. Walton totally

13:59 Serena Sun so you

13:59 Luke F. Walton right

13:59 Serena Sun know what if you're open to more people exactly like and they have also been nice sorry

14:03 Luke F. Walton yes

14:03 Serena Sun i don't mean to be like sometimes

14:04 Luke F. Walton no no

14:04 Serena Sun this

14:04 Luke F. Walton no not

14:05 Serena Sun is a scary place

14:05 Luke F. Walton haters because yeah

14:06 Serena Sun it's not but

14:07 Luke F. Walton not haters that's the main is been like an integral because i released all the time and getting my music out there getting it on independent playlists and you get one independent playlist a user finds it they put it on their playlist and it's like kind of helped

14:20 Luke F. Walton to get the whole like flywheel in motion because how else do i get you know over a hundred songs out into the universe and have people like starting to listen to it that's the best way is to get you know a little bit of creator action to kind

14:33 Serena Sun Right.

14:34 Luke F. Walton of like keep the keep the thing flowing and it's cheap you know i don't spend more than like a couple hundred bucks and

14:40 Serena Sun Yeah,

14:40 Luke F. Walton uh

14:40 Serena Sun I think this has like re-inspired me to like submit through SubmitHub for my next release. Because it's been a while since I've actually thought about doing it that way. Yeah.

14:47 Luke F. Walton It's another one of those like artist things that's just hard to do. And in the same way, like we should talk more about the label thing because there's an inertia. There's like a decision paralysis, especially when you're bringing a new member.

14:59 Luke F. Walton into your creative circle into your team like that songwriting circle where that feels so safe but then when you start adding in like business people or like lawyers and contracts and making that really real then the alarm bells start to go off because you're like oh artists always tell me be scared of record labels or be scared of agents or whatever but the reality is is be scared of the wrong ones

15:21 Serena Sun exactly i agree with that fully because i think this has already shifted my view i'm like the right

15:26 Luke F. Walton Okay.

15:27 Serena Sun partnerships like working with Indie Shake because so far like especially at my level where I feel like I want the support to grow to, you know, reach more people and like maybe find people who like would really connect with the music like I

15:39 Luke F. Walton Yes.

15:39 Serena Sun think not like a scary move as much as I thought it was in my head when I was signing the deal you

15:44 Luke F. Walton Yes.

15:45 Serena Sun know so yeah thanks

15:46 Luke F. Walton Totally. Totally. And it is so much a people business. I think I can understand the big conglomerate type, like signing with the big major where you really are fighting to survive and be seen.

15:59 Luke F. Walton and because you're one of a million emails and they'll ignore you the second they get what they want and all that kind of stuff versus small independent individuals like you know their names and like they run the company themselves that is built on belief and community whereas the other I think is just built on profits and goals nothing wrong with that but those are like dangerous seas hard to navigate

16:23 Serena Sun it's hard when you're entering the music industry early on and you get approached approach by a major I

16:27 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

16:27 Serena Sun think like

16:27 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

16:27 Serena Sun when you don't have like close friends who can like tell you horror stories or you haven't like dove into these podcasts like this where they're talking about like reasons why majors are a bit scarier to sign up so it's like when you go in blind you're like this is exciting my whole life is going to change and then maybe you're getting shelved for several years and you're like what the hell like I thought we were signing this like a release music you know yeah

16:48 Luke F. Walton Exactly. Especially in the current environment where if you don't. don't release you're not on people's minds

16:56 Serena Sun Right.

16:56 Luke F. Walton because there's just so much music and the way the algorithms and stuff musicians have to make music in order to be out there

17:02 Serena Sun If you old bar then it just like stops their creativity.

17:05 Luke F. Walton totally and that's that's a crazy thing that labels can do of just oh this isn't ready oh this isn't time the idea of you know just

17:14 Luke F. Walton holding off on a record for two years and now all of a sudden it sounds two years old it

17:18 Serena Sun Oh my goodness that would drive me insane

17:21 Luke F. Walton it drive me crazy it

17:22 Serena Sun yeah because

17:22 Luke F. Walton drive me

17:22 Serena Sun also

17:22 Luke F. Walton crazy

17:22 Serena Sun like

17:23 Luke F. Walton yes

17:23 Serena Sun the story that you're trying to tell like you want to explain in a point where you're also feeling a bit more connected to it right so yeah

17:29 Luke F. Walton totally totally and i also think like with music that goes viral or whatever music that feels like right now is so important and hopefully like there's universality in the music that you make and that it can last forever but like even i don't know even like fleetwood mac or whatever still sounds like the time it was recorded you know it's like it sounds

17:50 Serena Sun but it

17:50 Luke F. Walton like

17:50 Serena Sun feels nostalgic

17:50 Luke F. Walton that yeah

17:51 Serena Sun in that way too at least exactly right

17:52 Luke F. Walton exactly but like how weird would it have been if it came if like rumors came out in like 85 or something it'd be like like

17:57 Serena Sun yeah I'd be different different

17:59 Luke F. Walton yeah indeed yeah

18:01 Serena Sun response

18:01 Luke F. Walton yeah exactly exactly you just feel wrong and then you lose that nostalgia so yeah having a label that's open to actually putting music out might be my number one of like yeah are they cool people do you do you vibe does it feel like community will they put music out yeah

18:18 Serena Sun yeah that's funny you say that because that was one of the things I asked them on our first initial call I was kind of like so would there ever be a case where The music that we sign with you. isn't allowed to come out and he

18:31 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

18:31 Serena Sun was like absolutely not what the heck you know it's like okay good good that was my main fear yeah definitely recommend calls and

18:37 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

18:38 Serena Sun five checks because i think it's like i don't know if you've ever um heard this from any other artist but it's like even with managers and stuff it's like almost like you're entering not a romantic relationship but a close-knit

18:48 Luke F. Walton Oh,

18:48 Serena Sun relationship yeah. where

18:48 Luke F. Walton Totally.

18:49 Serena Sun you're constantly communicating and like if you don't feel comfortable talking to that person like you're kind of just shooting yourself in the foot

18:55 Luke F. Walton It's like hiring a CEO for your life or something. or something like and

18:58 Serena Sun yeah

18:58 Luke F. Walton you're both incentivized to make it work yeah yeah

19:00 Serena Sun yeah but i think that's the case with like all collaborators too like i think

19:05 Luke F. Walton that's

19:05 Serena Sun it's

19:05 Luke F. Walton true taking

19:05 Serena Sun important especially in writing rooms that you feel comfy or like you make the other person you know feel comfortable

19:10 Luke F. Walton that leap of faith and then also i love the idea too about those calls because i feel like it's so easy or like the way that people textbook think about it is i'll hire some big shot entertainment attorney and they're gonna just like Get

19:24 Serena Sun Be

19:24 Luke F. Walton the best more possible

19:24 Serena Sun official.

19:25 Luke F. Walton deal.

19:25 Serena Sun Yeah.

19:25 Luke F. Walton Yeah, exactly that it's it's a people business and like you need to talk about it and figure out like yeah what is what's your biggest fear like lay that on on the table and then let's work around that you know yeah

19:35 Serena Sun i'm definitely open with that so that's my biggest fear are you

19:38 Luke F. Walton exactly

19:38 Serena Sun good actually

19:38 Luke F. Walton exactly right yeah but like when you're about to sign a contract it's like what's preventing me what's scaring me the most and just like being upfront about that because that's like you're those are your red lines whether or not you know it and you need people i know that there's like this idea of just

19:53 Luke F. Walton of just independent everything and i i agree like on the production side i think that's really cool to be able to diy and then yeah choose choose what you want to do you know and you can that can change over time but in terms of like release partners and getting the music out there

20:08 Serena Sun it's

20:08 Luke F. Walton It still takes

20:08 Serena Sun a whole hobby

20:08 Luke F. Walton a

20:09 Serena Sun really

20:09 Luke F. Walton community.

20:09 Serena Sun i

20:09 Luke F. Walton Yes,

20:10 Serena Sun think

20:10 Luke F. Walton right.

20:10 Serena Sun also like to what you were alluding to earlier with like the playlists and stuff

20:15 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

20:15 Serena Sun i think there is a level of like industry know-how where a lot of the editorial playlisters do hear directly from like managers labels distribution partners and that's almost like a more normal way of like being able to be pitched rather than like directly from the artist and If people are like negotiating like business side things, I think actually sometimes artists aren't taken as seriously in these negotiations.

20:43 Serena Sun So

20:43 Luke F. Walton Yes.

20:44 Serena Sun it is really helpful to have team members to be able to like bolster like your side when those situations come up because my background is in business, but since I am an artist now, I think nobody views me as the business person.

20:58 Luke F. Walton Everybody's got their role that they are supposed to play and leaning into that a little bit is a good.

21:03 Luke F. Walton a good thing because that's what people see and expect and want from you and you can always be on the side texting your business manager being like hey don't go for that percentage like hey really you know like you can be the business person just like a little bit more quiet about it that's kind of a sweet spot because then you can just be like vibing as an artist as playing that role as you should but still protecting yourself and still sticking up for yourself but having a team that can kind of play the good cop bad cop a little bit and then

21:28 Serena Sun that's

21:28 Luke F. Walton you

21:28 Serena Sun exactly get that

21:28 Luke F. Walton more power

21:29 Serena Sun is exactly what I was trying to say Nailed

21:30 Luke F. Walton cool good awesome

21:31 Serena Sun it exactly

21:31 Luke F. Walton awesome and i hope that any artists that are listening to this like really think about that because we are advocating not to do everything yourself to get a team that you trust and these are the reasons why you're going to get a higher percentage you know you're going to get more favorable terms people are not going to take advantage of you so much and you get to be more homey it's like all of the above that's worth it

21:53 Luke F. Walton Oh,

21:53 Serena Sun it's like you're protecting your peace so you can create the art that you want to and not get bogged down by all this like stress and like this because I get a little tense when it comes to negotiations you know I feel like sometimes it's harder to advocate for yourself than it is to advocate for someone you care about you know it's kind of like that's what your team is there for I feel like a lot of people always ask like how do you get a team like I'm so tired of doing it by myself and I feel like in different there's different situations like maybe you get introduced to a team member through a friend or like something like that

22:20 Serena Sun that or you know you could like I've heard a lot of manager stories where they work with their friends you know like a manager is a friend who has a certain skill set that like aligns with what a manager would want to have you know and you can start there kind of thing that's

22:35 Luke F. Walton For sure. Come

22:36 Serena Sun cool

22:36 Luke F. Walton up with the people you're around. It's like,

22:38 Serena Sun do you do you have management or like yeah how did you meet yours

22:43 Luke F. Walton During the pandemic, I released some really weird music and they liked it.

22:47 Serena Sun we love the weirdness I feel like yes I don't know what this is but I love it it's

22:52 Luke F. Walton there's some some kernel of

22:54 Serena Sun perfect

22:54 Luke F. Walton something in there yeah we grew together you know it's a good energy to to feel like there's no cavalry coming make your own momentum and then people are going to want on that ship and

23:07 Serena Sun yeah I feel like This is the first time I've wanted to be visible, which I think is an interesting thing as an

23:14 Luke F. Walton Interesting.

23:14 Serena Sun artist. Because

23:15 Luke F. Walton Tell me more

23:15 Serena Sun I

23:15 Luke F. Walton about that.

23:15 Serena Sun think, yeah, I've

23:17 Luke F. Walton What do you mean by that?

23:17 Serena Sun been thinking about this recently because in the past I started making music because...

23:22 Serena Sun to be honest I just had too many emotions that were really bubbling up at a time that was really chaotic in my life I use it as a form of like desperation almost to let those emotions out in doing that it was a very like solo like solitary action like I was writing and recording on my own at that time and I never even intended on putting it out into the world but like one thing led to another and I did and then I started working with a lot of people which is amazing I learned so much about the like craft itself but

23:48 Serena Sun since I wasn't someone who started out as like a performer who's like craves being on stage or like craves being visible online that's something only recently that I'm like okay well if I want my art to reach more people I need to be comfortable with sharing it I was always very shy about sharing my stuff and

24:08 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

24:08 Serena Sun I think this year is like the year that I actually want to claim more ownership of no I feel proud of this music and I do want to share it if people like fuck with it great and if not then like they just won't listen and that's fine you know so

24:20 Luke F. Walton Yes.

24:21 Serena Sun more

24:22 Luke F. Walton Yeah. And I don't know that that's a good point, too, about making music that feels honest and putting more of yourself into it.

24:31 Luke F. Walton It's almost like opposite of what you might expect that might allow you to share it more broadly.

24:38 Serena Sun yeah

24:38 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

24:39 Serena Sun when you're like oh yeah because I think I guess initially you'd be like oh my gosh this is too personal like

24:44 Luke F. Walton Exactly.

24:44 Serena Sun I'm like yeah yeah yeah yeah no I know it's it's an interesting shift for me because I noticed I was giving some previews of these songs to some of my artist friends who I really admire and

24:53 Luke F. Walton Yes.

24:54 Serena Sun at first I was like oh gosh am I gonna be nervous if they like it and kind of as they were listening and I was like thinking I was kind of like You know what I actually I often say I want them to like it,

25:03 Luke F. Walton Mm hmm.

25:03 Serena Sun but I like it so

25:05 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

25:05 Serena Sun much that I don't actually care

25:06 Luke F. Walton Yeah. Yeah.

25:08 Serena Sun So that was fun. That was a fun little

25:10 Luke F. Walton It's good that in that confidence, that's that's infectious. You know, those are sometimes those are the things that I think artists need before the team.

25:19 Luke F. Walton finds them or they find the team is like going through part of that journey which is very hard but you kind of got to do some of that alone and once you start to develop that confidence and you're like you know what i don't care i don't care how many people are listening to it i don't care if my friends like it or whatever you know i don't care if my hometown likes it i'm going i'm going for somebody in the world you know exactly

25:39 Serena Sun yeah if you love it then somebody else they'll understand like what you're going for and yeah purpose behind it

25:47 Luke F. Walton and and we have that have that privilege of i don't know global listenership there's like a bunch

25:52 Serena Sun True.

25:52 Luke F. Walton of people you'll find your place just believe in the music double down on it create it release it and with that confidence good things comes yeah

26:00 Serena Sun Amen.

26:01 Luke F. Walton so i'm curious how it felt getting your first spotify like official playlist

26:07 Serena Sun oh my gosh that was really exciting i think i would i obviously wasn't expecting it Mm so

26:12 Luke F. Walton -hmm.

26:12 Serena Sun i was kind of just like oh what does this mean like yay somebody else likes my music yay i don't know i mean i also i'd written that with my partner actually um and

26:23 Luke F. Walton Cool.

26:24 Serena Sun my friend who's an amazing producer nathan chu he brought to life in the production and so i was really excited that it almost felt like a win for all of us too

26:34 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

26:34 Serena Sun so like

26:34 Luke F. Walton Yeah. Yeah,

26:35 Serena Sun look what you guys helped me do make me like create and like hopefully

26:38 Luke F. Walton yeah

26:39 Serena Sun other people are listening to it too now and like editorials are funny because I think it sounds like this mystical thing that you like wanted for the validation almost and then it shares your song to like such a wide audience that they wouldn't have been exposed to your music and music otherwise like all of these people are real listeners right

26:53 Luke F. Walton I know. Yeah,

26:54 Serena Sun so

26:54 Luke F. Walton they're not just numbers.

26:55 Serena Sun yeah

26:55 Luke F. Walton Yeah, totally.

26:56 Serena Sun exactly so I think that's what I think about I'm like you know what like after getting out a few of them I'm like I'm so grateful for everyone it's never guaranteed I would love to keep getting on these editorial playlists but I also like don't want to hold the worth of my song on whether or not it gets on one you know so yeah those are my thoughts That's and

27:17 Luke F. Walton good. Those are good thoughts.

27:18 Serena Sun also there's always people pitching behind the scenes you

27:20 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

27:20 Serena Sun know as much as I'd love it to be like an editorial playlist or like I mean who knows maybe they do stumble upon a song and they're like this is great let me just add it but like more often than not they're sent an email with it you know

27:32 Luke F. Walton Totally. I think you hit on something really interesting because before you get editorial playlists, they are viewed as the panacea, as the elevator, as the This is the thing that's going to take me over

27:43 Serena Sun Yeah.

27:43 Luke F. Walton the top.

27:43 Serena Sun Yeah,

27:43 Luke F. Walton But after you get them, you realize they're an important piece of the puzzle. They're a great broadcast. It's very similar to getting on the radio or something.

27:50 Serena Sun exactly. Yeah.

27:51 Luke F. Walton You know, it doesn't necessarily change everything. It helps. I've had two songs on New Music Friday Global.

27:57 Serena Sun Amazing. Congrats.

27:58 Luke F. Walton Those are not in my top 10. now

28:01 Serena Sun Hmm.

28:01 Luke F. Walton after time you know like they're they get listens but

28:04 Serena Sun Right.

28:05 Luke F. Walton the sparks that those songs and that those playlists provided did not materially change the you know trajectory of those songs forever it wasn't like okay now that's your big song forever it's like i love those songs but what people gravitate to especially over time that like they want to listen to for years or put on their own personal playlist or like they're like this is my summer driving song it's

28:29 Serena Sun Yeah.

28:29 Luke F. Walton like it might not be the one that spotify picked is like hey this is his hit it's like no like the actual quote-unquote hit is that weird b-side quasi

28:38 Serena Sun With

28:38 Luke F. Walton instrumental he

28:38 Serena Sun one of a

28:39 Luke F. Walton did you

28:39 Serena Sun weird,

28:39 Luke F. Walton know exactly

28:40 Serena Sun beside. It's unique.

28:41 Luke F. Walton i got

28:41 Serena Sun You're

28:41 Luke F. Walton plenty

28:42 Serena Sun like,

28:42 Luke F. Walton of those

28:42 Serena Sun yeah. I think it's a song itself right it's like when

28:45 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

28:45 Serena Sun people find something that they're really attached to they'll add it to their playlist or they'll interact with it and

28:51 Luke F. Walton Yes.

28:51 Serena Sun so more important than like getting on these editorials is like making something you're so proud of that really feels like you and then if you get added to an editorial that's when like maybe other people will be like well what is this weird like thing like that I'm listening to that I love you know

29:07 Luke F. Walton It's that conversation. It's like you're bringing in new people because you're getting a broadcast. best but it doesn't necessarily mean that that song that brought them in is going to be the song that they're always going to love or live with um sometimes i

29:20 Serena Sun helpful

29:20 Luke F. Walton wish it

29:20 Serena Sun and

29:20 Luke F. Walton was that easy

29:20 Serena Sun that it is it would be nice right it's like you

29:22 Luke F. Walton yeah

29:23 Serena Sun think there's like one thing that's gonna like do the whoop and then like no it's just it's all things it's over time and i think that's like being patient is something i've learned in this industry and being more flexible i think too i

29:36 Luke F. Walton totally totally and

29:37 Serena Sun i

29:37 Luke F. Walton it's

29:37 Serena Sun mean

29:37 Luke F. Walton cool

29:37 Serena Sun being an artist saved my life in that way i

29:39 Luke F. Walton yeah tell me more about that What's

29:41 Serena Sun I

29:41 Luke F. Walton that mean?

29:41 Serena Sun think for me I don't know I feel I like to joke I'm like I'm not very chill I would love to be more chill as a human but I think I was like raised pretty type A and

29:52 Luke F. Walton Uh-huh.

29:53 Serena Sun like pretty overachiever first daughter you

29:55 Luke F. Walton Yes.

29:55 Serena Sun know family vibes loving family so lucky very lucky but um yeah like I put a lot of pressure on myself and going the route of like you know school business and not artistry for a long time in my life like and then switching to artistry. It was kind of like first an identity crisis, but then also learning to be more flexible. I think it's made me a happier person.

30:16 Serena Sun Actually, that's okay, double-edged sword, because sometimes I'm like, what the hell am I doing? And then I have like life crises all the time.

30:23 Luke F. Walton same yeah i understand yeah

30:25 Serena Sun But in general, I think it's made me more of like a jokey person.

30:29 Luke F. Walton it puts you in touch with different sides of yourself too because you're constantly having to like examine your own psyche and write songs about it

30:35 Serena Sun Amen. Yeah, exactly. But yeah, what brought you into music?

30:39 Luke F. Walton I guess I got obsessed with it when a neighbor won a guitar in an auction. She left the guitar over at our house and I just like went crazy on the internet and just

30:48 Serena Sun That's amazing.

30:48 Luke F. Walton never really looked back. I started making music with like the goal of being a professional like high school or whatever. And that was I think when I got the bug though was really when I started recording. That's why I still hang my hat more on like production and stuff than.

31:04 Serena Sun than than playing live a lot i'm i am playing live and i'm excited too but like my my thing is i love creating i love cooking in the studio i love having my own studio playing the sound making things that nobody's ever heard before um

31:17 Serena Sun I love it's that yeah oh my gosh I was like like yeah I'm gonna have to like pick your brain later on all your favorite techniques and stuff like that or now if you want to expose some of them but I don't know I just I also really love share that love for the like the music creation process and like I don't know, I consider myself quite a baby producer. I'm always up and learning.

31:35 Serena Sun Yeah, I mean, great stuff comes out of that phase.

31:41 Luke F. Walton We're up for this very important broadcast, but it's time for one more advertisement for myself for this podcast. What I'm asking for is for you to rate it five stars, share it with your friends. This is like the most important thing for this podcast to grow. So if you want to do this, you go onto the podcast screen, right?

31:55 Luke F. Walton You click on the dot, dot, dot on Spotify under there. It says rate show and you go and you click it five stars. If you could do that for me, that's the best way for the algorithms and all this stuff to share it out with the world.

32:07 Luke F. Walton I know that it's a lot to ask, but if you could please, please, please, just please just hit those three dots on a five star. It would really help us out and helps us, you know, get the word out and spread the love of music. So thank you. If you're listening on YouTube, you know what to do. Like, subscribe, all that good stuff. Thank you so much. And here's the rest of the episode. You're

32:24 Serena Sun you trying to don't work know what you're out. doing yeah so you're just kind of like well let's see if this is good

32:27 Serena Sun Totally. I try to keep that alive inside myself too. Because, yeah, no, like I don't want to become the person that gets stuck in the same process.

32:36 Serena Sun says always using the same plugins i like intentionally every couple records or sometimes every record will add in something new to my toolkit or Yes.

32:45 Serena Sun i'll abandon something that i was leaning on too much as a crutch beforehand so like one of my big techniques and things that i've thought about and has like really changed the quality of my recording has been setting like master fader or like the final fader settings earlier on in the production So I'm like pushing all of the sound into kind

33:07 Serena Sun oh interesting yeah of like what I've got going on over there. So a lot of times it's like an Ampex virtual tape, SSL style bus compressor, maybe Golfoss, which is like a EQ resonance thing that makes things sound better. But I've been tweaking what those settings are and what those plugins are for every single record. So every single record's got a little bit more tape or a little bit less tape or a little bit more distortion

33:30 Serena Sun and or then you'll less have distortion. it on like the mastered channel like just from the get-go

33:34 Serena Sun from before the you get-go start anything so that's every it through sound that i do runs through that so and

33:37 Serena Sun that yeah okay the reason why i did that is i i didn't do that earlier on and i would like make a whole drum part and

33:44 Serena Sun oh then i and then would have the it sound after would be like yeah completely different i'd be like well i wrote the whole song for this drum part and now that everything's being compressed and distorted and saturated and whatever together the drums sound completely different and so it was that feeling of

33:58 Serena Sun of like i don't want to be surprised in the mix like doing a little bit of it like i still do like a full-on proper mix session of every song but like setting myself up so i at least kind of know the general direction that i'm charting towards then

34:11 Serena Sun that's at the very a good end start i'm not like this is like a total the surprise

34:13 Serena Sun different picture you're like well this is like a tunnel yeah exactly yeah yeah i don't want to be like that i want to like have a nice progression towards like the goal rather than a series of like late stage surprises early stage surprises rise is totally cool with the

34:26 Serena Sun Welcome. like the you Yeah, exactly. know like i already tracked the vocal to this thing and now it's different it's like crap

34:32 Serena Sun that's a good tip I'm definitely gonna play around with that I do work with a mastering chain on it too but I think I could be a bit more specific with it because I truly don't know what I'm doing with that so I'm just slapping something I'm like that sounds right that sounds good sure um

34:46 Serena Sun no one knows what they're doing there are people with more confidence because they make more money but nobody nobody has the answer everyone's just doing stuff trying to make stuff sound good and if you set the mastering chain or like whatever the the master bus

35:01 Luke F. Walton settings in one place that doesn't mean everything's going to sound like that it just means that

35:06 Serena Sun the ways you are routing the audio through that river to get to the goal is just going to be slightly different in order to maintain that. So for example, I've done mixes with a bunch of tape saturation and virtual tapes throughout and a bunch of sessions without any of that. They don't sound that different. They should, but it's because I'm adjusting.

35:26 Serena Sun Right. I'm like, oh no, I want it to sound a little warmer. Yeah, So I'm adding yeah,

35:29 Serena Sun in yeah. some more warmth over here because I don't have it later in the stage. Age.

35:33 Serena Sun okay one thing that I think is important with this EP is like that it really was born out of experimentation and really not knowing what I was doing but being okay with that which historically is not my personality sometimes I'm like I really want to be good at something maybe I'll give up certain things prior to like diving into it but I think like being good at something especially with production it's like you just really have to be patient and like grow a taste for what you like and I think

35:59 Serena Sun I Yes. think that's pretty important especially in the early stages of it and like not really caring what it fully sounds like until you get further along in the process what do you think for like early stage producers because I feel like especially like with the skew of like male to female producers

36:15 Serena Sun Yeah. and like non-binary you know like I think I would love to wake up in a world in the future where there are a lot more female producers who felt like it was okay to like take that leap even though they didn't see as many people doing it you know yeah

36:28 Serena Sun Yep. Totally agree. And I think there needs to be more resources and some of these things need to be demystified. I think part of what it is, is that, yeah, like some of these mix engineers.

36:39 Serena Sun Right. like i'll go to i'll go to the nam show right and there will be all these mix panels some of them are so arrogant and so prickly that i think it turns people off to even getting started because they go i'll just hire somebody or like oh they they know what they're doing i don't know what i'm doing so like i trust their confidence and i understand like that's job security for them so they're trying to like pump up their stock so that people come and give them their music because they are the oracle and no one else can be

37:05 Serena Sun can become the oracle. It's just not the case. That's not the way it is. And Right.

37:10 Serena Sun so I think part of it is just the confidence, that leap of faith and having resources.

37:15 Serena Sun to do so and then you can always produce and then hire a mix and master engineer there's nothing wrong with that yeah that's what like almost everyone does and

37:24 Serena Sun and I actually like that that it the best it's like the best you give other people something that you worked on you give them with fresh ears and they get to add like their taste and like their things to it and like you can work with them closely to be like actually what you brought out there I don't love like can we bring that a bit more down like this was the vision and like yeah I there's nothing wrong with that that's

37:44 Serena Sun Those are the ways that I think you can create an environment in which you can grow, but grow in stages rather than trying to digest the whole thing all at once. I still use a mastering engineer because I don't know. It's like that's I don't need to do that final frontier. It's nice to have somebody else give me that gut check and be like, hey, this sounds like crap. Go back.

38:05 Serena Sun I don't think they're saying that They used to. They used to. They're all right.

38:10 Serena Sun we all have that moment mine makes me do very nicely was like how about we do this and I'm like yes I'm down

38:16 Serena Sun yes yeah yes but i think finding those communities finding those workflows unlock things that you wouldn't have expected or allow you to produce or do something that you thought was out of your wheelhouse but if you have people that you trust somewhere in the chain to give you that gut check and point you in a different direction sometimes when you need to or hype you up

38:36 Luke F. Walton up when

38:36 Serena Sun Yeah.

38:37 Luke F. Walton you need to be hyped up, I think that will help unlock more diversity in the audio industry.

38:43 Serena Sun I think my favorite way to like get like a an easy entryway into the production side

38:48 Serena Sun Yes. is working with producers who are willing to like just let you like peer over their shoulder ask questions while you're recording you know like some of my favorite producers that I work with were so willing to teach you know they're just friends who are

39:02 Serena Sun Yeah. like oh yeah like this is what I'm doing and Yeah. like and I'm like oh great like why did you choose this plug-in or why did you what did you do there to make that sound so sparkly or whatever and like

39:11 Serena Sun yeah like they were just so happy to share and I think if you surround yourself with people like that to work with in the first place first of all you're gonna have a better time because they're more fun and they're nicer second

39:19 Serena Sun agreed totally of all you'll come out with like some little tidbits that you can try at home you know so yeah

39:24 Serena Sun totally and none of this should be gatekept like the goal is music no I was like why I don't know part of me I have like a funny perception I'm kind of like are you insecure like about your workflow is are you scared that someone's gonna just like it's like steal it and then like you're i don't know it's just what's the point no

39:43 Serena Sun it's not the tools it's like do yeah carpenters get still get hired if people can like own table saws like i don't know like everybody has access to the same tools that i do they just don't have my ears and some of some people have got better tastes than i do and i've got better taste than other people and i can be plugged into a lot of different stages in the process so i'm not scared that i'm gonna lose my job

40:08 Serena Sun yeah and it's like taste is so like subjective too you know it's like a culmination of like all the things that you like to listen to so it's like if people have similar tastes they'll want your work and if they don't they'll probably want someone else yeah

40:18 Luke F. Walton That's fine. Yeah. And also like I celebrate people taking more ownership of their music. even if that means that i'm not getting a gig or something like that it

40:28 Serena Sun that would make me happy too

40:29 Luke F. Walton does it makes

40:30 Serena Sun because

40:30 Luke F. Walton me happy

40:30 Serena Sun i'm like you've unlocked something that's awesome you know good vibes

40:33 Luke F. Walton good vibes good vibes i think sometimes the people that gatekeep too much might not actually completely know what they're doing because i think a lot of the stuff you cannot you cannot completely know what you're doing like there there there should be humility in audio because audio is weird everything affects everything else you make one change in one area now all of a sudden the bass is too loud

40:53 Luke F. Walton you don't know why but

40:54 Serena Sun yeah you're

40:56 Luke F. Walton it's just like it is and

40:58 Serena Sun then it's too loud and you're kind of like is this nice

41:00 Luke F. Walton right yeah exactly exactly but then you have to make a million gut check micro decisions all the way through and that's why it is nice to have somebody else because then like you don't have to make all of the million in every single stage you

41:13 Serena Sun also

41:13 Luke F. Walton can have somebody

41:13 Serena Sun your

41:13 Luke F. Walton else ears make get them

41:14 Serena Sun tired

41:14 Luke F. Walton totally

41:14 Serena Sun you know

41:14 Luke F. Walton get

41:14 Serena Sun like tired you

41:15 Luke F. Walton 100

41:15 Serena Sun so you're just kind of like i no longer know if this is what i want

41:18 Luke F. Walton yes yeah

41:19 Serena Sun take breaks

41:19 Luke F. Walton take breaks Walk. Go for walks.

41:23 Serena Sun Yes.

41:23 Luke F. Walton Nature is good.

41:25 Serena Sun amen i miss real nature not

41:27 Luke F. Walton yeah yeah yeah

41:28 Serena Sun that like

41:28 Luke F. Walton let's

41:28 Serena Sun there's

41:28 Luke F. Walton talk about

41:29 Serena Sun no

41:29 Luke F. Walton your roof let's talk about yeah talking about nature like i did a camping trip in squamish with my homies i think we were like 19 or 20 so we could drink we were so excited yeah

41:39 Serena Sun you're like this is the country i

41:41 Luke F. Walton exactly exactly hey

41:43 Serena Sun mean we do have bears over there i went back for the summer and luckily landed on a long weekend when my friends were going camping and i was like oh perfect like i crave being out in nature there's like a bear in our campsite i was like

41:54 Serena Sun I'm like oh my goodness I am so far from being like the Canadian I was prior to moving to London I'm a city girl I'm a city girl don't eat me no Canada is an amazing place their bear safety is a thing so if you're going camping in places that have wildlife just know what you're doing don't leave your food out that's silly um yeah yeah

42:12 Luke F. Walton don't bring food in your tent don't need to do

42:14 Serena Sun that perhaps not yeah I mean some people I feel like that's not nobody knows if you're not told right so you

42:19 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

42:20 Serena Sun ever seen to this and you plan to camp in bear country don't bring bear food they

42:24 Luke F. Walton They're strong.

42:25 Serena Sun are fast dude have you ever yeah if you've ever watched a video of a bear running and sprinting up a tree that is scary

42:32 Luke F. Walton I am more scared of moose, though.

42:35 Serena Sun all right oh you know what fair enough because if they charge you you're you're

42:39 Luke F. Walton you're done oh

42:39 Serena Sun it's not good oh gosh can you imagine that's the way you go moose moose

42:43 Luke F. Walton yeah i

42:43 Serena Sun moose bash oh

42:44 Luke F. Walton actually can't i actually can't imagine that that's

42:46 Serena Sun no don't

42:48 Luke F. Walton that's

42:48 Serena Sun mess what

42:49 Luke F. Walton a scary yeah moose final destination version not was the moose

42:54 Serena Sun moose

42:54 Luke F. Walton the move um going to the uk getting into that scene i know you've been playing shows out there the contrast because i know you've done new york you've done some shows in la you've done obviously hometown shows and open for some great artists in vancouver compare and contrast those industries a little bit or at least the vibe around like live music okay

43:11 Serena Sun there's definitely more going on here in

43:14 Luke F. Walton yeah

43:14 Serena Sun London obviously I mean it's a bigger city like geographically it's also this like population density is much you know

43:21 Luke F. Walton yeah

43:21 Serena Sun it's more dense here so there's a lot more going on I think culture culture is also quite different that drives that Vancouver everyone is quite outdoorsy not everyone but like a large majority and if you're not outdoorsy you'll probably eventually get into it just by peer pressure no I'm

43:34 Luke F. Walton Yep.

43:34 Serena Sun just kidding um but it's just a different culture and I think more people are willing to go to shows on a like moment's notice here in London like

43:42 Luke F. Walton Okay. Yeah.

43:42 Serena Sun it's just people you know like to be out and about drinking more like I um I've definitely drank a lot more this last year than I had

43:50 Luke F. Walton they would be doing the same if i was in london

43:52 Serena Sun yes

43:52 Luke F. Walton at least their beers are light nice

43:54 Serena Sun oh yeah I know I've gotten a Guinness which is like

43:57 Luke F. Walton yeah you have the real guinness out there

43:59 Serena Sun yeah

43:59 Luke F. Walton too yeah

43:59 Serena Sun exactly split the G it's like a fun game that I'm kind of competitive so I'm like I love playing a game and if you give me a game with alcohol I'm like hell yeah let's get it with the music scene here it's been really easy to like meet artist friends so I like I feel like I've created a group of like-minded artists

44:15 Serena Sun gal friends that like I hang out with and like that's a new experience for me because

44:19 Luke F. Walton OK.

44:20 Serena Sun in Vancouver I had great artist friends that I love but we just didn't see each other as often

44:24 Luke F. Walton Hmm.

44:24 Serena Sun I wouldn't say they were like my primary friend group and I mean there's benefits to both cities for sure I feel like I had a lot more downtime in Vancouver and more headspace to like breathe I

44:35 Luke F. Walton Yeah,

44:35 Serena Sun guess London

44:35 Luke F. Walton yeah, yeah.

44:36 Serena Sun sometimes I get overwhelmed very different cities I'd say of

44:39 Luke F. Walton Yeah. Yeah. It's interesting to think about how that impacts music.

44:42 Serena Sun music

44:42 Luke F. Walton culture and live culture and yeah having people that are more yeah excited to be out every night and public transportation and stuff so you

44:51 Serena Sun it's

44:51 Luke F. Walton can get

44:51 Serena Sun so easy yeah exactly true

44:53 Luke F. Walton i was surprised though by how deep the tube is like you know i was walking down

44:58 Serena Sun like how

44:58 Luke F. Walton it

44:58 Serena Sun underground

44:58 Luke F. Walton for the first time

44:59 Serena Sun it's

44:59 Luke F. Walton i'm like it's so underground

45:00 Serena Sun it is so underground

45:02 Luke F. Walton it's like no

45:03 Serena Sun did

45:03 Luke F. Walton wonder you this

45:03 Serena Sun ever take

45:03 Luke F. Walton is

45:03 Serena Sun quite

45:03 Luke F. Walton a bomb

45:03 Serena Sun a bit

45:04 Luke F. Walton shelter like i'm in the center of the earth

45:06 Serena Sun yeah fair enough I've actually never thought of it that way which almost scares me for an earthquake now but that's fine

45:13 Luke F. Walton i don't know do they get earthquakes they like barely have

45:16 Serena Sun oh yeah that's a good point that's a good point I unclear whether

45:19 Luke F. Walton spoken

45:19 Serena Sun or not they

45:19 Luke F. Walton like

45:19 Serena Sun get a clear

45:20 Luke F. Walton true pacific rim person

45:21 Serena Sun yeah

45:21 Luke F. Walton yeah same

45:22 Serena Sun I'm like thinking about like the ones in Vancouver like there's one coming

45:25 Luke F. Walton exactly exactly yeah

45:26 Serena Sun have you been out here like quite a few times or just like once

45:28 Luke F. Walton yeah

45:28 Serena Sun or twice

45:29 Luke F. Walton a few times i i've done some small tours and stuff and

45:32 Serena Sun Oh,

45:32 Luke F. Walton then there's

45:32 Serena Sun amazing.

45:32 Luke F. Walton the best thing ever

45:34 Serena Sun Yeah.

45:34 Luke F. Walton was i got stranded in london for like three weeks because the artist i was with had to renew her visa to come back to the united states so she's just like just just stay just stay maybe we'll find some shows i'm like okay

45:49 Serena Sun did

45:49 Luke F. Walton so

45:49 Serena Sun you

45:49 Luke F. Walton you actually had to have like

45:50 Serena Sun a it good time oh

45:50 Luke F. Walton was awesome it was

45:52 Serena Sun good

45:52 Luke F. Walton amazing yeah yeah

45:52 Serena Sun maybe it's meant to be yeah

45:54 Luke F. Walton it was great it was it was it was like it was my moment to be like okay what would it be like to live in London I'm like I like it I could do this yeah it was

46:02 Serena Sun I

46:02 Luke F. Walton awesome I

46:03 Serena Sun like San Diego a lot honestly like

46:04 Luke F. Walton love San Diego yeah this

46:05 Serena Sun I used to go down there quite a bit when I was in university yeah

46:08 Luke F. Walton is my favorite like home base in the world because like you're saying it has that space that chill kind of thing but there is energy and there's access and

46:16 Serena Sun wow

46:16 Luke F. Walton the airport is like super tiny but it flies everywhere and

46:19 Serena Sun oh nice

46:19 Luke F. Walton um and it's just like

46:20 Serena Sun also

46:20 Luke F. Walton a sweet

46:21 Serena Sun LA is drivable

46:21 Luke F. Walton oh

46:22 Serena Sun like you

46:22 Luke F. Walton like super

46:22 Serena Sun can drive

46:22 Luke F. Walton drivable like hour

46:23 Serena Sun your

46:23 Luke F. Walton and a own half driving from

46:24 Serena Sun yeah

46:24 Luke F. Walton where i'm at basically

46:24 Serena Sun oh

46:24 Luke F. Walton yeah

46:25 Serena Sun crazy

46:25 Luke F. Walton yeah

46:25 Serena Sun like

46:25 Luke F. Walton without

46:26 Serena Sun you're

46:26 Luke F. Walton traffic

46:26 Serena Sun in New York

46:26 Luke F. Walton of

46:26 Serena Sun nice

46:26 Luke F. Walton course yeah it could

46:27 Serena Sun yeah

46:27 Luke F. Walton be 12

46:27 Serena Sun I was gonna say hours traffic

46:28 Luke F. Walton in

46:28 Serena Sun even

46:28 Luke F. Walton traffic yeah

46:29 Serena Sun within LA is like an hour I

46:30 Luke F. Walton but we gotta we actually have a train like i'm proud of the fact that we have

46:33 Serena Sun didn't

46:33 Luke F. Walton this you

46:34 Serena Sun know you had a train oh

46:34 Luke F. Walton do and it's beautiful it's absolutely gorgeous like i love that train so much um i will sometimes watch the video from like yeah yeah

46:45 Serena Sun that's

46:45 Luke F. Walton exactly seriously

46:45 Serena Sun nice

46:45 Luke F. Walton like you yeah i would um but i'll put it up on my side monitor um like when i'm making music i'm just like the nice vibes and views of going on

46:53 Serena Sun oh

46:53 Luke F. Walton that train

46:53 Serena Sun i

46:54 Luke F. Walton at sunset

46:54 Serena Sun love that

46:54 Luke F. Walton because it's just so it's so good because it's a coastal it's a coastal route yeah

46:58 Serena Sun oh that is the ride pretty or is the train itself pretty

47:00 Luke F. Walton the ride the train is fine but like the ride itself is just gorgeous because it goes through like rolling california hills into uh right up against the coast that thing's gonna fall into the coast 100

47:11 Serena Sun oh

47:11 Luke F. Walton that is

47:11 Serena Sun got

47:11 Luke F. Walton what i'm saying

47:11 Serena Sun it got

47:11 Luke F. Walton stretches

47:12 Serena Sun it got it oh

47:12 Luke F. Walton in del mar and that's that's like what i'm thinking of that beautiful basically hugs the coast it's absolutely gorgeous and then it goes out through oceanside camp pendleton and then into la um

47:20 Serena Sun i

47:20 Luke F. Walton but think yeah it's

47:20 Serena Sun issue is

47:21 Luke F. Walton great

47:21 Serena Sun in la though you need a car so it's like somebody else

47:24 Luke F. Walton yeah

47:24 Serena Sun drive i'll take the train totally

47:25 Luke F. Walton doing la without a car and if you can figure out the logistics but yeah yeah i mean it's interesting like san diego versus la la's got that music scene like where there is always stuff going on but it's a little bit of selfish

47:35 Serena Sun la is quite different from london

47:36 Luke F. Walton it

47:37 Serena Sun though because

47:37 Luke F. Walton is because la everybody's got he's got something to do and everybody everybody's looking for the cooler thing to do so

47:42 Serena Sun Yeah,

47:43 Luke F. Walton like they will drop whatever you've got going on even if they said yes if something else comes up that's cooler and so it's just this constant competitive match

47:52 Serena Sun how do you feel about the like the songwriting scene itself I mean obviously I was in like very small circles whenever I was going down there also I haven't gotten to live in LA as a songwriter before versus like I obviously do in London I just feel like the songwriting here is weirder and I love a weird choice you know

48:08 Luke F. Walton songwriting in uh in LA yeah is it's very different like Nashville Nashville's got the true

48:15 Serena Sun storytelling kind

48:16 Luke F. Walton storytelling

48:16 Serena Sun of thing and like well

48:17 Luke F. Walton you can go in anywhere everybody's a songwriter this is there's like a different

48:21 Serena Sun yeah

48:21 Luke F. Walton edge la you kind of find these sub niches and communities and a lot of it is centered around like who's actually in town because everybody's touring everybody's like a side

48:32 Serena Sun that

48:32 Luke F. Walton musician that's

48:32 Serena Sun makes sense yeah

48:33 Luke F. Walton the biggest difficulty of la is you can have like a community you can have a lot of friends and then everyone just like disappears for a while because they go out on the road it's like like cool acts but then it almost feels like everybody like half or like 30 percent lives in LA because

48:48 Serena Sun that's

48:48 Luke F. Walton everyone's

48:48 Serena Sun very low

48:48 Luke F. Walton always on

48:49 Serena Sun wow

48:49 Luke F. Walton the road yeah I know I know a lot of people that like basically are homeless because they're on the road so much and it just makes

48:57 Serena Sun yeah

48:58 Luke F. Walton way more

48:58 Serena Sun why would

48:58 Luke F. Walton sense

48:58 Serena Sun you pay

48:58 Luke F. Walton totally

48:58 Serena Sun for rent if you're gonna yeah huh that's interesting yeah i've never been to nashville i would really love to go i

49:04 Luke F. Walton Nashville

49:04 Serena Sun go a lot

49:04 Luke F. Walton is cool.

49:05 Serena Sun yeah

49:05 Luke F. Walton Nashville is cool. Yeah,

49:06 Serena Sun yeah

49:06 Luke F. Walton I did a couple weeks out there. I can see how somebody who really, really wants to feel that songwriting community and group kind of

49:15 Serena Sun that's

49:15 Luke F. Walton thing,

49:15 Serena Sun definitely

49:15 Luke F. Walton Nashville is probably

49:15 Serena Sun more

49:16 Luke F. Walton the spot.

49:16 Serena Sun my bread and butter

49:17 Luke F. Walton Yeah, exactly. It's beautiful. Well, that's fun. That's fun. Thanks for comparing and contrasting those cities.

49:23 Serena Sun oh yeah of course

49:24 Luke F. Walton I'm curious what you think is kind of your next. next step like so you're going to be promoting this this new ep would love to hear a little bit about that just kind of like yeah where do you where do you see yourself going yes

49:33 Serena Sun yeah um well we have a date set for the first single off of this EP um the track is called sunny blue and I'd say it's like an indie rock a little brooding track for me I'm like okay well I'm getting a little nervous because I'm like well this is the first time I'll be telling the world that I'm like I made this on my own please don't hate it but no

49:55 Serena Sun but no i'm really i'm really excited just because i really like the song i think it's like a nice entry way into the rest of the ep it's giving people a taste of like a bit more of an indie side to like my writing rather than i think a lot of the stuff that i've released is a little bit more indie pop leaning and

50:10 Luke F. Walton Yeah. Mm-hmm.

50:10 Serena Sun i'd say this is like a little bit more indie singer songwriter so i mean not that that's a big distinction but like it's

50:17 Luke F. Walton It's real.

50:17 Serena Sun a bit of a shift yeah i was like i chose a lot of lyrics that just i don't know if if in a writing room he'll be like yeah I fully understand that I'm like that's okay because you know I've got to make the choices by myself this time so

50:28 Luke F. Walton i think it's fun for listeners to think about the you know strategy and like the ways that we yeah think about

50:32 Serena Sun fair

50:32 Luke F. Walton like

50:32 Serena Sun enough yeah

50:33 Luke F. Walton how do you put music out there nowadays and like how do you get people to actually listen to it and that single

50:36 Serena Sun I strategy mean I think the goal is just like to give each song some space to breathe

50:40 Luke F. Walton yeah

50:40 Serena Sun right and like get it give it its time to live and like have people really fall in love with it and or even hear it hype up the next one and then and that like all of them together into the world that it lives in i think the whole project does definitely live in its own very like washy world that

50:54 Luke F. Walton Good.

50:54 Serena Sun is my brain sometimes so

50:56 Luke F. Walton Yes. Yes.

50:56 Serena Sun totally

50:57 Luke F. Walton And I like the idea too of like letting a song be as its own thing and then also showcasing it as part of a collection and like seeing how that changes and how that the perception of that song shifts.

51:07 Serena Sun yeah yeah i love like hearing singles and then getting to see where it existed in like the you know i think that's really cool Oh,

51:15 Luke F. Walton I agree. So I've got one last question for you. The same question I ask every guest. The show is called Love Music More and this segment is called Love Music Why. I would love to hear why do you love

51:26 Serena Sun there's

51:26 Luke F. Walton music?

51:26 Serena Sun so many things that excite me about music on the creation side it's definitely getting to have something special it's almost like came out of thin air you're just like well that didn't exist 24 hours ago and this new like just I don't know it's just like it's like oh you could build a world in

51:43 Luke F. Walton Yeah.

51:43 Serena Sun a you know it's like building a world in a day like Rome wasn't built in a day but a song could have been who's to say right I think on that side that's the magic that really excites me the choices of sounds and like the choices of energy throughout a song and then as a listener I think being able to be brought into somebody else's world for like three to four to ten minutes you know like that's really special and it's like you you get to hear them

52:07 Serena Sun like some of these songs that i'm putting out i'm like you get to hear a snapshot of me and i think that's really cool so that's what makes me love music like

52:16 Luke F. Walton Great.

52:16 Serena Sun connection i guess is the main thing yeah

52:19 Luke F. Walton Connection and world building.

52:21 Serena Sun exactly

52:21 Luke F. Walton So where can people get in touch? Where can they follow you and listen to you?

52:25 Serena Sun instagram it's serena l like lisa that's my middle name Sun serena Sun was taken don't know who that girl is but hey if you're listening we

52:33 Luke F. Walton Give

52:34 Serena Sun got no

52:34 Luke F. Walton it

52:34 Serena Sun i'm just kidding we got these no i'm just kidding um you can give me the username if you want but yes serena elson on instagram uh at serena elson i believe on tiktok as well serena sun music on youtube serena sun on all streaming platforms and that's my name in case you were wondering in case you didn't know

52:57 Serena Sun Well, awesome. Thank you so much for joining us and sharing your story. for having me this

53:00 Serena Sun My pleasure. is great hit I'm so glad. me up if you're ever in London I will. I'll be there.

53:04 Serena Sun please do yeah