Ben Levin - Staying True to Yourself as an Artist: Music Production Podcast #384

Ben Levin is a musician, visual artist, and educator. He runs the Ben Levin Music School where he hosts courses that help artists find their voice, finish music, and maintain and cultivate their love of music-making. Ben's YouTube Channel hosts his art, music, and educational content. His new album Heaven Heaven Heaven features indie, alternative rock music with 2 Fender Bass VIs at its core.

Ben and I explore the complexities of artistic identity, the challenges of navigating platforms like YouTube, and the importance of creativity in education. Ben explains the challenges of being artistically honest and following our passions while trying to create a consistent online presence that cooperates with the algorithms so we can actually make a living artistically. Ben even brings out his Fender Bass VI to demonstrate how he uses it on his new album Heaven Heaven Heaven.

This episode is sponsored by Baby Audio, makers of incredible music software. Use the code MPP15 to save 15%! https://babyaud.io

Listen on Apple, Spotify, YouTube

Takeaways:

Ben Levin discusses the duality of being a multifaceted artist.
Navigating the YouTube landscape requires balancing creativity and marketability.
Batch production of content can help manage audience expectations.
The importance of creating space for endings in artistic work.
Teaching creativity in schools can enhance student engagement.
Understanding modes in music requires contextual learning.
The arts provide essential emotional support during difficult times.
Artistic expression can be a powerful healing tool.
Personal growth in music production often involves collaboration and community.
The creative process is often nonlinear and requires patience.
The Fender Bass VI offers a unique sound that bridges bass and guitar.
Authenticity in vocal performance resonates more than technical perfection.
Finding one's voice is a journey that requires exploration and practice.
The creative process is often more rewarding than the final product.
Vulnerability in music can create a deeper connection with listeners.
Teenage experiences and emotions can be effectively expressed through music.
Balancing humor and seriousness in art can enhance emotional impact.

Links:

Ben Levin Music School - https://benlevinmusicschool.com
Ben's Courses - https://benlevinmusicschool.com/p/courses
Heaven Heaven Heaven by Ben Levin - https://benlevingroup.bandcamp.com/album/heaven-heaven-heaven
Ben's YouTube - https://www.youtube.com/@BenLevin
Ben's Art - https://benshow.horse
Ben on the Fender Bass VI - https://youtu.be/G1DLpdFWrdM?si=gEvXLlRG6QzCKYIt
Brian Funk Website - https://brianfunk.com
Music Production Club - https://brianfunk.com/mpc
5-Minute Music Producer - https://brianfunk.com/book
Intro Music Made with 16-Bit Ableton Live Pack - https://brianfunk.com/blog/16-bit
Music Production Podcast - https://brianfunk.com/podcast
Save 25% on Ableton Live Packs at my store with the code: PODCAST - https://brianfunk.com/store
This episode was edited by Animus Invidious of PerforModule - https://performodule.com/

Thank you for listening.

Please review the Music Production Podcast on your favorite podcast provider!

Episode Transcript:

Brian Funk (00:01.152)

Welcome aboard, Ben. Great to have you. Yeah, man. I'm so happy you're here. I love your work. It's fun and it's, there's like, you sometimes it's silly. Sometimes it's deep. Sometimes it's very technical stuff. You kind of scratch like a lot of different itches, you know, musically. And I love your sense of humor about stuff and I find it very inspiring. Great.

Ben Levin (00:02.866)

Thank you. Woohoo! We made it.

Ben Levin (00:23.582)

Thank you.

Thank you. It's a gift and a curse. It's a gift from a, I get to do a lot of things and experience a lot of emotions and learn a lot about myself from doing all these different mediums and styles and stuff, but it's really hard to market myself. And it's been a consistent career challenge where I like.

on my YouTube channel there will be so much different stuff that someone who likes one thing isn't guaranteed to like the other things and so my channel is not bingeable to most people and I've been I've been punished horribly by the internet because of that over the years but yeah thank you for noticing

Brian Funk (01:10.2)

Well, I think though, like maybe, maybe it's like, you know, an acquired taste sometimes with certain people online, cause you know, they're not like, this is what you get every time. But as it's a nice thing to like develop into and see as like, you know, as I've been like watching you for years now, it's really nice to just see what happens, you know? And I like the kind of, I don't even know what you're going to do next.

Ben Levin (01:39.548)

Neither do I. I yeah, I'm glad you like that. I think it's something I would like to see in other people too. And I like it when I see it, but I also recognize that a lot of the time I don't actually like what they're making.

Because of it and like I just can feel I can definitely feel it being like kind of frustrating because whenever you love an album I made or a video I made you can be almost certain that the next thing I make won't be the thing that you loved So you have to care about Like me, I guess as in general as a thinker or or like artists or something in order to really enjoy everything as a whole because that's the only

Brian Funk (02:12.025)

Mm.

Ben Levin (02:26.29)

thing that ties it all together is that it's me over here. but I've been thinking about that a lot lately actually, because there's so many incentives algorithmically to become simpler and more consistent in, in your like brand and everything. And the reality of needing to make, you know, money and stuff.

income is always like this thing that keeps changing for artists and Contractors in general people who are self -employed in general is like figuring out how to get the jobs and what the jobs are and all that keeps changing and so there's a lot of pressure for me to become More predictable, but I've found also that like the way my brain is wired I can only really focus on one thing at a time and I focus on it extremely hard and That thing I have no control over what it is and it's always

Something different, so I think I'm kind of stuck this way So I started a second channel to be my like artsy channel But then I needed to start a third channel to be my sweetie cuties like cartoon stuff only channels now I have three YouTube channels. It's weird Yeah

Brian Funk (03:35.253)

yeah, yeah, it could be a lot to juggle. But you know, they just like certain artists and bands that I think, you know, I just love them. You know, I don't know, I don't always know what they're going to come out with next and you're kind of interested to see it. But then there is the other side of it where there's a band like, love that one album, but like, what happened? Why don't you guys do that anymore? Why doesn't this artist follow that?

Ben Levin (03:59.154)

What happened?

Brian Funk (04:04.509)

But you're right, does, it's kind of a shame that that stuff has to be a factor, but sometimes I guess it helps you make decisions about what you're going to do, but.

Ben Levin (04:16.7)

Yeah, I've been finding all kinds of ways to get to work within that system and doing a lot of experimenting with how I can fit into a system where people want that predictability.

Brian Funk (04:17.959)

I can recognize that.

Ben Levin (04:31.48)

And one thing I've started doing is making all my art in batches. So I'll instead of release a video each week, like make a video each week, release a video each week, or like with my little cartoons, just make them and then put them out and make another and put it out. I'm thinking of myself more like a TV channel. So I'm making seasons of stuff. So I just made an eight.

part horror series for Instagram, which is kind of funny thing to do. But I made eight of them in a batch and then released them after all eight were made. And now I'm working on a batch of my like little cartoon guys, the sweeties and cuties making sweetie cutie universe, which is like this new YouTube channel where all of that stuff lives. And I'm making a batch of that stuff now so I can focus on it. And then

when it comes out, people will at least know, okay, there's nine of these coming out. So they'll like know what to expect, like expect nine of them. And then something different is gonna happen. But we got eight of the horror things and then the album is out now. And then the next thing is nine of the sweetie cutie things. Like I think that at least makes it so people who see the first thing know how many more there will be and expectations are clear. And they can get deeper into the lore and stuff. I think.

Brian Funk (05:32.158)

Hmm.

Brian Funk (05:52.115)

Yeah, that sounds like a smart way to deal with it because you give them like, as you said, think, binge ability. You you kind of get that and like get into your world and then you can say like, what else does he got going on? And they'll be in for a surprise if they come from sweetie cutie to horror.

Ben Levin (05:59.431)

Ben Levin (06:05.062)

Yeah, you know...

Ben Levin (06:09.414)

That's true, yeah. I mean, it's all cosmic horror at the end of the day, but very different approaches to it. And yeah, and like part of, think being a good artist is, especially for like bands and performers, a big part of our job is to enter a space, make it nicer, and then leave. And we are not so good at leaving.

These days we're like constantly poking our audiences about like the latest to this, the latest that we're working on the thing. We're putting the thing out in two weeks. Here's the thing. Here's the tour and here's the next thing. And here's the next thing. And, of course it's not our fault that we do that. Like that's seems to be necessary or something, but,

I've been thinking a bit about how do you like properly leave space for your audience? Like how do you create endings? Because it's unpleasant to watch a TV show that never ends. It's unpleasant, you know, when they keep dragging a story on or it's unpleasant to not have any, resolution. And there's so many TV shows and stuff where,

Brian Funk (07:15.081)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (07:28.658)

The ending's not that satisfying because they were mostly concerned with like keeping it going as long as possible. So I just think about that lately. I don't really have any answers, but at least with the batches, I can tell people this will end and it will end in nine of these, you know?

Brian Funk (07:34.517)

Hmm.

Brian Funk (07:44.46)

Yeah. Great point too, cause yeah, definitely love shows that just kind of got dragged on and you start to think like, you know, this would have been a good movie. This would have been better, more condensed or yeah, art can get stale in that way. cool way for you to not get kind of burnt out on stuff though, too, that you get to zone in, be there for a while.

Ben Levin (08:02.846)

Mm -hmm. Yeah.

Ben Levin (08:07.934)

Yeah. Yeah, it's been a huge burnout year. or 2022 was the biggest burnout year ever for me. And I've still been recovering from that. And this year, the plan was to make a YouTube video.

every week for 20 weeks and then see what happened. And this time the way the YouTube thing was going to work was I was going to make music education YouTube videos that were exactly what I thought people expected me to make.

fun, creative songwriting, production related, YouTube videos that are educational and artsy and like have good titles that I think of in advance and all that. And I was going to do that 20 in a row. And I was thinking of it as like, let's just make 20 bangers in a row and see if that like answers some of my like career questions. And the funny thing is that like making 20 of them in a row,

did help my career, but much more than it helped, it burnt me out. And I've had streaks that long before, I've had streaks that long before and I've always thought when I look back, it's like, why did I stop? You know, I look back at the videos and like, they were so good and I was really on it and like, man, why did I stop? And I always kind of seem to forget just like a person giving birth forgets the pain, you know, they're like, ooh, but the babies, you know, like it's.

Like it I just feel like I always forget how burnt out I get doing it Doing YouTube specifically and especially when I'm like working with the flow of YouTube instead of with the flow of me My flow sucks for money like I'm not trying to just complain the whole time about finances or anything I've just been thinking about it lately is like

Brian Funk (10:03.129)

you

Ben Levin (10:06.578)

Like, where do I fit in all of this? And I bet, like, I bet you feel the same way, because I feel like all of us artsy folks have been kind of dealing with an ever -changing landscape the whole time we've been doing it. And so it's interesting to talk about, I guess. That's the main reason. I'm not trying to complain too much about, like, my finances as much as just be like, it has been an endless search.

and there's been so many like I've found that if you're gonna make money doing the arts you have to do something too much like if you're gonna make it as a youtuber you have to do too much YouTube and if you're gonna make it as a wedding musician you're gonna have to play too many weddings if you're gonna make it as a touring musician you have to tour too much for too long if you're gonna like make it as a band you have to make albums too frequently and so yeah how do you like

Brian Funk (10:50.841)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (11:04.06)

make that statement false. know, how do you get around that?

Brian Funk (11:08.506)

Hmm. Yeah. Well, I think about it too, a lot, you know, it's nice to talk to somebody that's going through it. I mean, doing well, I mean, you have a lot of success, know, lots of, seems like your videos are always very popular and well done. course. mean, that, that for me is a given. Like the stuff you did put out is always great, but I guess like,

the tail chasing that we have to do too. And I think we even said it right before we started about something, know, the things we get involved with because of music and because of art. I forget what we were even talking about, but could have just been like the camera or something like that, but.

Ben Levin (11:46.557)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (11:52.924)

Yeah, right, like how you have to learn how to make your background nice and how you have to get good with color and shot composition, stuff like that.

Brian Funk (12:04.123)

Yeah. I mean, like making a website or learning social media, how to, like there's so many things that I would probably never touch if it wasn't because I'm trying to do music and then get it out. And you know, it can be really easy to get caught up in that. like, sometimes I say to myself, like, all I do is talk about making music or all I do is get ready to make music. And I'm not actually doing it.

Ben Levin (12:18.472)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (12:26.492)

Mm -hmm.

Ben Levin (12:30.448)

Totally. Yeah.

Brian Funk (12:32.239)

It's like you said too much of a lot of things.

Ben Levin (12:35.836)

Yeah, it does seem like, if you make music, you have to convince people to give it a chance. But if you make educational content, then you can appeal to people even if they don't know who you are, because you're giving them something they already know they want, which is an answer to some music theory or production question. People are like,

I need to know about EQ and then they search to learn about EQ and they find videos on EQ, but nobody is like, I need to know about this new, I need to find an album that is like a rock trio album about gas stations made by like a 35 year old, like eccentric,

guy, I'll search for that and then they find me. You know what I mean? Like that. Yeah, I have to get in their face and be like, hey, I made an album, please, please, please listen to it. Just listen to a few seconds. No, not just a few seconds, maybe 30 seconds. Come on, please. Like that. That's the thing. But if you're making a podcast and if you're making a podcast about production, you know, if you made it about if you if you called it the Brian Funk.

Brian Funk (13:27.891)

Yeah. Right.

Brian Funk (13:40.765)

you

Ben Levin (13:49.458)

Podcast you would then have to go and be like here's why you want to hear from Brian Funk and But yeah, if you're like here's a production podcast then people are interested in music production We'll find it and so yeah, we end up making stuff about the art That has an educational bend to it out of survival and it could be worse I had say at least education is a beautiful thing. I really love that

Brian Funk (14:07.527)

Ben Levin (14:17.2)

If I was going to be forced into some sort of job, like, I love that I've been forced into the education field, because, yeah, that's a good field at least. At least I'm not forced into, I don't know, like, fracking. That would suck if I had to frack. I don't like it.

Brian Funk (14:33.766)

You

Yeah, it's, it's the field I was forced into. That's what I do for my day job is no, not fracking teaching. Yeah. Wouldn't that be funny? Actually, I don't even know what equipment I'd have, but yeah, it's, I teach high school English by day. That's the, adult grownup job. and it, yeah, it's.

Ben Levin (14:42.5)

I'm sorry. I'm so embarrassed. teaching. good good I'm excellent at fracking in Long Island. I love to frack

Ben Levin (15:00.678)

Nice.

Brian Funk (15:06.78)

It's rewarding at times, but it's also maddening. You're spinning your wheels too. I'm currently feeling it already like three and a half weeks into the school year. I don't know what I'm doing anymore.

Ben Levin (15:19.424)

yeah, because you're... And you're talking to groups of kids at once, so there's this management side to it that's really... I'm really impressed when people are good at that.

Brian Funk (15:31.07)

That's my main struggle this year. It's an upgraded management challenge from years past. I seem to have gotten to like the next level in the video game that's almost impossible.

Ben Levin (15:36.743)

Mmm.

Ben Levin (15:44.944)

It's like the dark souls of teaching.

Brian Funk (15:47.552)

Yeah, it's challenging me to rethink how I do a lot of things, but it is kind of nice that it's challenging actually. It does make it kind of rewarding when something works. I'm keeping that in mind now as I'm on this massive uphill journey that maybe down the road I'm going to say, all right.

Ben Levin (15:59.365)

Ben Levin (16:07.175)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (16:12.988)

Yeah, yeah, that's a good point. have to put a flag in it sometimes when you're like, there are reasons I'm doing this that are good, there are things I want to do, and I hope that if I achieve these goals that I'll notice it. Because it is easy to just move on to the next thing right away, and it is easy to forget why the thing you're doing is important.

If you're teaching high school English, like what are you focusing on? Like reading or writing.

Brian Funk (16:43.357)

right now it's like sit down, stop throwing things. But yeah, it's, it's a lot of reading and writing. I, I have a lot more writing actually in my class by choice that, I just like that better. I like the creative process and I like to talk to them about it. Cause, so much of what I talk about with them is same stuff I talk about with music and that I'm struggling with myself.

Ben Levin (16:47.614)

Yeah, cool.

Brian Funk (17:12.502)

So there's, know, being creative is like almost everything in life. Even if you're trying to, I don't know, like have a home, you know, and furnish it or something, but.

Ben Levin (17:22.844)

Yeah, takes a lot of, definitely. Takes creativity to turn a house into a home. Yeah. And yeah, when you're teaching writing, do you have a lot of guidelines, of like, is there a curriculum that's handed to you or do you get to sort of decide what the writing is focused on?

Brian Funk (17:29.727)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (17:46.72)

It's, it's kind of loose. of course we have our New York state exams they have to pass, but that's not till they're a couple of years older. So I do get a lot of freedom with that, which is probably the survival, you know, ticket for me is that we can do sort of interesting things. but it's, you know, like when I teach a music class, everyone's like,

Ben Levin (17:59.902)

That's cool.

Ben Levin (18:04.221)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (18:16.429)

doing? How'd you get that? can you? When I'm teaching an English class, when I have people that have to be there against their will, like, you know, it's a much bigger show to just, it's kind of like, please listen to my song, even five seconds, you know, please, please. Like, it's the same sort of thing where, yeah, like, you got to make them care. And that's tough. That's, you know, what a, what a

Ben Levin (18:18.162)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (18:23.804)

Right, yeah.

Ben Levin (18:30.108)

Right, yes.

Ben Levin (18:38.065)

Mm -hmm.

Brian Funk (18:42.66)

challenging age, know, like that 14, 15 years old, like I don't want to go back to that age. was, that's hard. Nobody knows who they are and everyone's scared of each other.

Ben Levin (18:47.945)

No, no, yeah.

Ben Levin (18:53.406)

And yet we let our 14 and 15 year old selves decide what our dreams are for the rest of our lives and make us think that we need to be famous and touring the world in order to be a success. We listened to those bastards when we were 14 and 15. We listened to our, our, our teenage selves for so long. when you're trying to motivate people to write, like, I feel like

Brian Funk (19:01.22)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (19:10.031)

the

Ben Levin (19:22.492)

The thing I was missing so much in high school was, I guess creative outlets in school and like any sort of use for a lot of the different things that were being taught to me. Like, you know, especially in math, there was no clear.

Reason why I should know about? Asymptotic lines like two lines that get infinitely closer, but never touch I think that's asymptotic. Is that the word well? Whatever they just keep going forever, and they never touch

Brian Funk (19:59.053)

If you said that to me in high school, I would have just laughed that you basically said ass. Yeah, asses are getting close. That would have been what I got out of it.

Ben Levin (20:04.73)

Ass yeah, asm toad. Yeah, nice. It's like an ass backpack Yeah, well like I I just remember learning that concept and asking the teacher like why? Do you how can two lines get closer together forever infinitely and never touch and why like why do I need that and? It just frustrated her and she you know had to keep the class going so it really was it was the last math class I ever took but like

I write. Like I write now. Writing is very important in my life and yeah, instead of like the three paragraph essay structure with the intro paragraph and the thesis at the end of the intro paragraph and then the conclusion paragraph, like if, if I could have been like, if it was like write a comic book, but do it in such a way where you don't need to see the panels, like just be so descriptive, but it's, it's like,

Just think of it as a comic book, but it's just so descriptive and so sensory that you don't have to see the panels. then, you know, maybe someone else in the class or in an art class will draw the panels based on your description. And then you can like trim down the words, you know, just like assignments like that would have been cool. But it seems really hard to get people to to like see their future in what they're learning or see how they're learning will affect their future when they're forced to.

Brian Funk (21:22.843)

Right.

Ben Levin (21:33.33)

to be there every day and kind of wasting away, getting A's.

Brian Funk (21:37.488)

Mm. Yeah, and like, you know, that's a cool project, actually, by the way. might have to work on that. I might be like reaching out to you. What should I teach today?

Ben Levin (21:45.32)

Thank you. Please, that would be awesome. It would be so cool if you did a collab with the art students or something.

Brian Funk (21:54.567)

Yeah. But like that question about those lines is, it's really an interesting question, but unfortunately there's so much drive. Well, we got to get through the material. We can't really stop at thinking about this. I had a math teacher that taught us the derivatives of the formulas once, like when he would teach us, you know, a squared plus B squared plus C squared, you know, whatever it is, equals C squared, right? He would explain.

Ben Levin (22:04.286)

Yeah, there's 15 other people.

Ben Levin (22:18.514)

Mm -hmm. Yeah.

Brian Funk (22:22.778)

how they came up with that. He's like, all right, so one plus one is two, right? So then we go from there. And I thought that was really fascinating because now it's like, like this is not just, you know, things that came down on stone tablets out of nowhere. Like people figured this out and that is missing. You know, the real understanding that would probably help you understand more concepts.

Ben Levin (22:36.466)

Hmm

Ben Levin (22:50.396)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (22:50.579)

You know, like so much with music and production, as you really understand one thing, the other stuff becomes clearer. Like even different art forms, different mediums. I'm sure when you're working on some of the cartoons and things like that, it's strengthening you as a music producer in some abstract way.

Ben Levin (22:57.415)

Right?

Ben Levin (23:10.408)

Definitely. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Because I have to make a song that feels like a full song that's just a minute long and also make it something where if somebody had never seen any of my other songs before, any of my other ones, they would be able to just jump in at that point. Because that's like one of my lieutenants of like what I think

is important for a sweetie cutie for the little animations with the birds and stuff. feel like what I want to do with that project, which is very different from all the other stuff I do, is just have it be really accessible to anyone at any point, no matter which one they start with, and have people be able to see themselves in the birds and the bunnies and the ducks and the dogs. And yeah, the...

process of doing that really forces me to make music in a different way. And I've gotten really comfortable making one minute of music that feels like three minutes, but I've gotten way less experience now making like a 30 minute epic. You know, I used to make those, like 2011, I was making 40 minute pieces almost exclusively. And now I am like, I have a one minute brain.

and 10 song albums and one minute songs. Those are like my two formats. yeah, definitely. feel like approaching art is like walking up a mountain where you're circling up the mountain and you're seeing the same vistas at every turn.

from a higher and higher perspective. So maybe you learn modes once, but then you might have to learn modes again from a different angle. And then you start plugging them into your DAW and then hearing them that way and this way. And then you start learning, you know, modular and they have a module that lets you pick a mode. And then you have all these different experiences with modes. And then you get higher and higher up where like modes mean more. When you think of a mode, you're actually thinking of a sound now, not just like a order of

Ben Levin (25:23.024)

notes or something.

Brian Funk (25:24.706)

Hmm. That's funny you say that because modes are a perfect example for me where when I first encountered them in guitar lessons, I was like, isn't this just the major scale and, you know, a different key, but we're just starting somewhere else? I couldn't understand how to apply it. Like, because every time I start playing this, like one mode, I feel like I'm playing the major key. just automatically brings me back to whatever that root of the major key would have been.

Ben Levin (25:43.004)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (25:48.402)

Right.

Ben Levin (25:52.54)

Yeah, it's a tragedy that people teach the modes that way. Cause it's a literal tragedy. But yeah, that's, that's because people are taught the modes as, one scale, but you start each mode from a different note in that scale. And then what happens is you learn that completely divorced from chords and totally out of context. so if you play each mode,

Brian Funk (25:56.929)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (26:22.074)

Each mode sounds about the same. But if you play them all in parallel, which means instead of going from the first note of a scale to play the first note mode, and then the second note of that same scale to get to the second mode, if instead you look at the like the different modes by shape, but play them all starting on the same note. So instead of

C Ionian, which is the name of the first mode for people listening who are new to this. There's like C Ionian and then there's D Dorian, which would normally be what you'd learn next. You'd learn like modes of the C major scale. So it'd be C for the first one D for the second one, but it's actually better to learn C Ionian and then C Dorian, which is slightly more complicated because that puts you in a different key. But then you really hear the difference and

Brian Funk (27:19.469)

Right.

Ben Levin (27:20.51)

Before people even understand why they're getting those notes or where they're derived from, they should be learning how they sound. And the teacher could be just playing them in parallel like that because it is kind of complicated. If I were to like have 30 seconds to explain parallel modes right now, that would be hard. explaining modes the normal way, could do that in 30 seconds. I could do that probably in 15 seconds. like instead of explaining it first, though, people could really learn the difference between the sounds.

and then, and even just learn shapes and be like, just trust me, just do this for now. We'll talk about why later. That would be fine too. And then people would understand why they need to know the modes because they all sound so cool. Like this is the difference between C Ionian and D Dorian.

Brian Funk (27:58.104)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (28:13.416)

Here's Dee Dorian.

Ben Levin (28:17.886)

There's... it sounds just as much like it could go back to here. There wasn't really a dramatic change, but here's the difference between C Ionian...

See Dorian.

Ben Levin (28:37.778)

hear a big difference.

Brian Funk (28:45.809)

you

Ben Levin (28:48.168)

Do it again.

Ben Levin (28:52.966)

time, Ionian?

Ben Levin (28:59.486)

It's just like an obvious difference and you actually feel something when you hear that difference. And that's how I think Mo's should be taught where you're feeling the differences first and you're applying a name to the difference. And then you can learn the notes so that you can then play them, you know?

Brian Funk (29:00.443)

Hmm.

Brian Funk (29:12.688)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (29:17.831)

Yeah, when you go right to the D, Dory, and it just sounds like we're singing up the scale. You know, so this was like a vocal exercise or something. but, but the emotion is really clear. You know, it got like cloudy and dark and mysterious when you started playing it in C. Just to absorb that a little bit, like, yeah, there's a feeling going on. That's really what we're creating, right?

Ben Levin (29:23.079)

Exactly.

It's confusing. Why the heck would you learn that?

Ben Levin (29:37.916)

Yeah, definitely.

Ben Levin (29:44.346)

Yeah, it feels good to be in there.

Brian Funk (29:47.908)

Yeah, kind of. You know, it's a little dangerous. You know, it feels like you should probably keep your eyes open and make sure you're not going the wrong way. But.

Ben Levin (29:56.7)

Yeah. When you feel yourself making that sound happen, it's so satisfying. And like you said, there is a sense of danger kind of because, you can be really, really surprised by it too. And, and yeah, it can, it can give you chills sometimes it, and that's a good sign. If you're like, if you're playing something and it's, if the feeling is as clear to you as when you go, da da da da.

And you really want to hear it, if you feel something that's pulling you like that from any aspect of music, then you're doing something cool.

Brian Funk (30:28.04)

Alright.

Brian Funk (30:37.105)

Hmm. Yeah, that's nice. Great metaphor to the mountain because you sometimes don't realize you're moving up the mountain. You're just like, what are we going in circles here?

Ben Levin (30:47.282)

Yeah, exactly. A lot of my students feel bad that they already learned something and yet they don't remember it. And it's like, well, they learned it one way and now we'll learn it another way and it'll be easier to remember as a result.

Brian Funk (30:49.789)

This is.

Brian Funk (30:57.277)

Hmm.

Brian Funk (31:03.635)

Yeah. Yeah. Getting like a different look on things. Like I said, with modes, know, then suddenly it was like, video game music. started to realize it was like, that's why it works. Is that mood? And then when, push came out for Ableton, it was like, I can now just play in it. And it kind of guides you with that like lit up pad. That's the root note. So you're like, I just come back to here and then.

Ben Levin (31:33.276)

It's perfect.

Brian Funk (31:34.824)

Yeah, took a while. mean, still to me, I'm like, you're always exploring, right? Like you never really quite see the whole terrain and always discovering new stuff.

Ben Levin (31:44.72)

Ideally, it's an endless journey. Yeah. I would hope that it's endless because it gives you something to look forward to. It's like. Yes, there will be loss. There will be so many challenges, so much of how life looks now. The things I love about it will be different, but it's really hard to take music away from someone. It's been there for so long. People singing together.

good luck taking that away. even people who are enslaved sing together. And, yeah, it's a really hard thing to steal. And so it's an optimistic thought that, there's no end to it. There's always more to explore because that there's lots of other things that do end that you don't want to end. And there's lots of things that change that you'd wish wouldn't change, but

Yeah, it's nice to know that like you can never run out of things to do with music.

Brian Funk (32:50.826)

Right. That is kind of cool to think about. And since we're always changing our relationship to it is different. The old like, you can never step in the same stream the same time because the stream is changing and so are you. Yeah. But for me, there've been times in my life where for whatever reason, maybe I'm down on myself or been through something crappy and get down on like music, you know, like

Ben Levin (33:05.254)

Yeah, nice. Yeah, that's good stuff.

Brian Funk (33:20.054)

think it's silly, it's pointless, it's not like real work and all of that. It always winds up being the thing that pulls me out of that. Even if I'm actually starting to feel down about the music itself, it's the music that winds up bringing you back. There's some power to it.

Ben Levin (33:30.556)

Mmm.

Ben Levin (33:39.282)

Yeah, it's interesting that there are forces that can make you believe that music's not important or that it's silly. It's like I feel that sometimes too. feel like what, am I just a big baby being a baby? And I just wanna have fun all the time and I say it's so important, but all I'm doing is just making like silly shit. But then the...

Brian Funk (33:57.132)

Thank

Ben Levin (34:05.682)

The quote that really helps me, and I don't know who said this. Maybe I said it. I don't know, but it's just like this thought, is, like, yeah, like science and plumbing and, social, like the city departments that take care of trash and all that, they help us live longer. They, vaccines help us, you know, extend our like, more age of

The average age people die gets higher and people live longer, but the arts make it worth it. Like what's the point of you, who would want to live a thousand years in torment or a thousand years in emptiness, you know, but it's when the pandemic started and people were stuck at home, what did they do? They went and they.

Brian Funk (34:43.201)

Hmm.

Brian Funk (34:47.692)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (34:58.95)

watched their shows, they played their Elden Ring, they listened to their music, they watched bands live streams, they watched live streams, you know, they, like everybody got really into the arts even more. They read books, they appreciated nature, you know, these kinds of things. that's what people do when they're, when they, you know, I think that's what people want to do at least the most when they're suffering.

psychologically, especially like when your body is working, but your mind is like lost. the arts can really help with that. The arts won't heal your broken leg, but it's great while you're in bed that healing from that, that there are, there's art and that's something I am. I wonder about like, like

Brian Funk (35:40.151)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (35:50.45)

I'm getting political for a second, but not because I want to convince people of anything, but I'm just like wondering about this because it's a big thing in the arts is like this idea of boycotting a specific country or state or like boycotting. Yeah. Just in general, the artists like agreeing not to play in certain places because they don't want to like help the economy of that place or like, endorse somehow endorse the regime that's running that place.

And I, yeah, I think like, I think that makes sense. But then I also wonder about like how much, like how in any given place there are tons of good people who really are suffering because of these regimes, you know, because of whatever like bad thing their government is doing and denying them concerts, something about that feels like maybe not effective.

because like we're drying out the souls of the people and all there is to turn to is anger.

Brian Funk (36:56.51)

and

Ben Levin (36:57.746)

just a thought I want to put out there as like a to wonder about and but not something I'm trying to convince people because I don't try to get people to stop doing action to fix the injustice they see in the world. But it's more like I just feel like music is such a in the arts are such a powerful healing thing that like it's hard to imagine it being good to deny like people that like if you just think think of a theoretical country that

Brian Funk (37:10.721)

Ben Levin (37:27.698)

Like the reason you don't like them is because they are violent towards queer people for instance. But then what about all the queer people who live there? Are we gonna deny them Lady Gaga or whatever? Just like any artist that they like. I just thought of her because I think she encourages a lot of people to step into their selves and be brave and bold.

Brian Funk (37:53.989)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (37:56.946)

That's just something I think about whenever I like the topic of like how much music has helped people like psychologically comes up. I've just been thinking about that lately.

Brian Funk (38:10.324)

It's almost like maybe we should send more art that way, know, send more of that love and acceptance and stuff that brings people together with music.

Ben Levin (38:14.493)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (38:21.618)

What if we could dump entertaining zines from planes, like cool stories and stuff, I don't know. But yes, I think so.

Brian Funk (38:24.645)

Yeah. Right?

Brian Funk (38:31.609)

Yeah. Well, yeah, I know. mean, in so many of those cases, like the average person has very little to do with that stuff and those policies or whatever it is that is being, you know, disagreed with at the time.

I think about it at school too, with like say kids that are getting in trouble or struggling. The first thing that happens is they get privileges taken away. They're not allowed to be in the club or go to the prom or whatever it is. And maybe that's almost the opposite. Like maybe they should be put in the club or they should be given something. I mean, I sit in the in -school suspension room.

Ben Levin (39:11.358)

Mmm.

Brian Funk (39:18.479)

this year is one of my periods to just kind of watch them and to like have them in this windowless room without any, just sit there, be quiet kind of thing. It's like, they kind of need something. A lot of them, some of them are in there for, you know, they just did something boneheaded like we all did, but some of them like are actually could use something. It would be awesome if like there was like, all right, now we're gonna.

Ben Levin (39:20.018)

Wow, interesting.

Ben Levin (39:35.219)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (39:39.26)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (39:46.585)

make music, now we're gonna, you know, but we're afraid, but then it's not a punishment. It's like, well.

Ben Levin (39:48.275)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (39:52.732)

Right, you're incentivizing bad behavior, because then they get to go and have fun.

Brian Funk (39:57.891)

Right, I'm gonna be bad so I can go have fun in ISS. alright, I don't know.

Ben Levin (40:03.175)

That's yeah, so that's interesting it's Like okay, yeah, so that's complicated in a way like yeah, cuz cuz right people will be motivated to get in that room if being in that room is really fun and people will figure out a way to get in there, but but it's like

Brian Funk (40:19.641)

Yeah, and school is...

Ben Levin (40:27.548)

Yeah, like revenge type justice. Like you did something bad. So something bad is happening to you now. I feel like.

Brian Funk (40:30.98)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (40:38.91)

Intuitively that seems wrong like intuitively that seems like they were like not justice It's just like more suffering more net suffering, but I saw this this science video about Game theory and about this thing the prisoners dilemma. Have you seen that you know about that thing?

Brian Funk (40:58.208)

Ben Levin (41:00.028)

Yeah, that's like for people who who haven't heard it. I guess I'll explain it vaguely. I guess is basically it's like a it's like a there's a game where you can't it's like a two player game and You say if you're going to cooperate or if you're going to like deceive the other person and so each if both people like

Brian Funk (41:06.563)

I could use a refresher too, but this is...

Ben Levin (41:29.532)

at the same time they're like go and they say cooperate if both cooperate they each get a point but if one person says deceive when the other person says cooperate the one who cooperated gets zero and the one who deceived gets like three points so like the most like the most but then if both deceive something bad happens i don't remember exactly but the strategy that ended up being the best

Because then what happens is sorry, sorry. So you play one round and you get a point and then you play another round But this next round you're like thinking what happened last time so that changes you so like if if you get deceived once and then you're like fuck this guy and you just keep deceiving from then on that's like a strategy right and so you just keep playing and they found that the strategy that won the most Was when you were betrayed once you would then betray back once and only once

So it'd be tit for tat, but then every now and then you would forgive just randomly. You wouldn't deceive twice in a row. So like that ended up being the winning strategy to get the most points, which is kind of mind blowing to me. Like the fact that retaliation is like good at any point, but it does sort of make sense. Like if somebody,

hurts you or like if somebody says something mean to you and then you are like let's I don't know I this is tricky I'm just thinking out loud but alright someone yells at you and you yell back at them like don't you yell at me but then you stop yelling and every now and then when someone's yelling at you be like look you just need to take a couple seconds I know this isn't you you're a nice guy every now and then you do that I don't know that it does kind of make sense that that would result in overall less yelling

But yeah, I don't know what I'm supposed to do with that information, but as far as like what people who are suspended in school, like maybe like they did a bad thing. Like if it's a really bad thing, like let's say they hurt a kid, you know, maybe like there should be like a period of time where they have to do like an unenjoyable community service type task, but that's still like a positive thing they're doing.

Brian Funk (43:45.307)

Brian Funk (43:50.267)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (43:50.888)

But every now and then they're just like listened to and are like they should always be listened to. No, I'm just thinking out loud. Shouldn't they be asked like why they like did that and like talked to? That's tricky. I don't have kids. So it's all conceptual for me.

Brian Funk (43:57.21)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (44:03.867)

Yeah, I don't either. Yeah. I see how complicated it gets every single day and it's scary actually, you know, to, you know, my time ends every 40 minutes and I'm off the hook. you imagine like, where you're not, but if to translate this to say dog training, the best thing that seems to work is just positive reinforcement for what you like and just ignore, you know, no attention.

not even negative, just don't acknowledge that dog when they're doing what you don't want them to do. If you don't want the dog to jump on you, pay no attention to it. And then as soon as it stops, reward it with the attention. I mean, I don't know, training dogs and raising kids is the same. It's obvious differences. mean, no matter what you do to your dog, it's always happy to see you when you come home.

Ben Levin (44:40.082)

Yeah, yeah.

Ben Levin (44:44.882)

then

Ben Levin (44:48.562)

Love that.

Ben Levin (45:01.552)

Yeah. And I mean, I think it can be like, I think the dog isn't always necessarily happy to see you, but maybe relieved to not be isolated because they've been bred to not be alone. There's no time when even with like the lone wolf is a strange thing. You know, even going back to wolves, they're not that similar to wolves though. Dogs like.

Brian Funk (45:04.461)

Thank

Brian Funk (45:25.124)

Right.

Ben Levin (45:29.666)

but yeah, like the, sounds like you know stuff about dogs because yeah, I know stuff about dogs too. And it's good. It's fun to talk about like, yeah, like the, they're never supposed to be alone. Like that wasn't, they weren't bred to just be alone. And so it's a huge relief to not be alone. And sometimes we mistake our like dog happiness. We like think relief is happiness, but really it's like, and it's like relief that suffering has.

Brian Funk (45:44.72)

Right.

Brian Funk (45:55.802)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (45:59.216)

stopped and yeah so they're complicated you know yeah yeah he's a good guy he's cool yes very beautiful that's cool

Brian Funk (46:05.924)

They are. You have one in the room with you? It like you were looking for. Nice. I'm like, you see my coffee mug. We've done agility training with our dogs. Running through the hoops, through the weave poles and it's great. And everything is just positivity. That's what they teach you. And most of it's training you.

Ben Levin (46:19.71)

Hell yeah.

Ben Levin (46:23.698)

That's awesome.

Brian Funk (46:32.068)

not really training the dog, the dog just reacts to what you're telling them. And most of the time you don't realize you're telling them that. it's opened my eyes to a few things about teaching, that's for sure. And even just the way, and even music production, this like kind of, you know, you gotta be positive about it and supportive. And they really respond to that.

Ben Levin (46:32.658)

Mm -hmm.

Ben Levin (46:37.554)

Yep.

Ben Levin (46:58.076)

Yeah, I've been noticing also with dogs, something that's helped me in normal life is like when they're like barking and growling and like that they're not angry, they're scared. And recognizing anger as like a manifestation of fear is a really, I think, nice way to look at anger, you know? Because yeah,

Brian Funk (47:12.393)

Right.

Brian Funk (47:23.526)

Yeah, fear or hurt. I remember my mom saying that to me too about anger. It's sort of like a secondary emotion. It's a reaction to it. You're afraid, you're hurt, or there's something under it causing it. And yeah, with animals especially, there's...

Ben Levin (47:28.52)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (47:39.72)

Mm.

Ben Levin (47:44.477)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (47:48.936)

There's something going on that is, they're not just mean and evil. And I think it's, I kind of like to believe that about people too, that if I were in whatever situation that person was in, with the same exact history, I'd probably be just like them.

Ben Levin (47:54.087)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (48:07.704)

Yeah, yeah, I think about that a lot. Actually, I struggle with this one thing, is like, Nelson Mandela and Hitler both had difficult lives, but they went in really opposite directions. And I do wonder, yeah, if you could somehow...

I do wonder like why, I guess it's like you want to be compassionate to everyone and try to empathize and try to see everyone as human no matter what for sure. And then also like, I guess have a customized, yeah, guess it's, yeah, some people I think just,

end up doing really bad things and then there isn't much that can be done to like bring them back in at a point. That's tricky stuff. mean, none of your high schoolers should be thought of that way. Like the high schoolers should always be seen as non -deterministic or whatever. Like they could be, they could all turn out great. Even the ones who having the most trouble and like none of like that. We should definitely give that to kids.

And I guess we should do that for adults too. It's hard to think of. Yeah. We're just a couple of musicians though. Hey, we don't mean any harm. We're just regular.

Brian Funk (49:41.003)

It's hard. we're just, yeah, that's why, right? That's why I'm gonna, yeah. That's why sometimes just making these bleeps and bloops and noises is maybe the best thing to do. Well, it's a privilege, right? It's very lucky that that's the problems we get to.

Ben Levin (49:59.558)

Yeah, yeah, we can't fix everything.

Brian Funk (50:08.744)

juice.

Ben Levin (50:10.3)

Yeah, definitely. Once you're like in the hierarchy of needs, it's like food and shelter then beeps and bloops. It's all good. Good guy. He thinks part of his job is to like get people who are walking by to keep walking by. Because he'll like bark at them and then they'll keep walking by and he'll be like, this works.

Brian Funk (50:20.072)

Yeah, there we go. Right on cue.

Brian Funk (50:32.754)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (50:37.127)

I did it.

Yeah. Sure.

Ben Levin (50:40.85)

But just a sec, I'm gonna help him out.

Ben Levin (51:14.45)

That's a new one. He was barking at the closet. I don't know. I looked in there.

Brian Funk (51:19.456)

Yeah, if they only had words, they could just tell you and make a lot of things easier.

Ben Levin (51:23.452)

Yeah, it'd be so convenient. Yeah, definitely.

Brian Funk (51:30.316)

I didn't think we'd get about 50 minutes into our conversation, first of all, getting into all this other stuff and not really getting into your new album. Heaven, heaven, heaven. Congratulations. As a person that knows what it's like to try to put together an album and...

Ben Levin (51:40.796)

Haha, yeah. Came out yesterday. Yeah. Alright. I forgot about that. Thank you.

Brian Funk (51:52.63)

finish songs and all of that. I mean, you have a course called getting songs done. It's not easy. It's a huge accomplishment. And I know we were talking earlier about, you know, just to get people to listen to it, but that's a whole other level. But the fact that you even got it done, congratulations.

Ben Levin (51:58.056)

Ben Levin (52:11.666)

Thank you, appreciate it. Yeah, album release date is complicated. It's a complicated feeling.

Brian Funk (52:17.694)

I try to take joy in other people's achievements, especially with releasing albums. I think there was a time when I would have been a little more like, I'm jealous, know, like, I'm not getting anything done, you know, all that nonsense. But I've found like changing that around has been very effective in my own productivity too.

Ben Levin (52:28.028)

Mmm. Yeah.

Ben Levin (52:39.662)

yeah, yeah, I... Yeah, comparing yourself to others and all that is... Yeah, it's hard to avoid and yeah, anything you can do to flip it is good, yeah.

Brian Funk (52:51.705)

Well, you've proved to me it's not impossible. So in those moments when I'm struggling, which is every time I work on anything, there's always that point, even the stuff that feels like it's coming and magic, know, the universe is like seeing me and I'm seeing it. Inevitably, there's a point where you're just like, no, like what do I do? I'm stuck or whatever. So it's nice to see there are examples of it actually happening.

Ben Levin (52:55.175)

Right.

Ben Levin (53:11.836)

Mm -hmm.

Ben Levin (53:18.47)

Yeah, yeah, so you feel like, are you trying to make an album right now?

Brian Funk (53:25.215)

No, not exactly, but, you know, I'm always making songs, making music and, trying to finish stuff. I've set a goal kind of to do like a song a month at minimum. And I'm doing that with my music production club, the monthly music mission to finish something every month and, got something I think for this month. So I'm feeling good. but yeah, like if I can do that.

Ben Levin (53:39.718)

Mm -hmm.

Nice. Awesome.

Ben Levin (53:50.053)

Excellent.

Brian Funk (53:53.859)

that's an album a year if I want to make it an album. I think at first I thought maybe that wasn't enough. know, like I should be able to do much more than that. Sometimes I am certain periods you go through like bursts and certain periods are like more of like a regrouping or something. But I think it's both manageable and still challenging. So every month.

Ben Levin (53:55.612)

yeah, definitely.

Brian Funk (54:23.755)

If can go through the rest of my life with that, I'll have quite a, yeah, right?

Ben Levin (54:27.376)

a lot of songs. Yeah, it's hard to get an album ready song together because part of how I know if a song is ready for an album has so much to do with how it fits with the rest.

And also sometimes you can't see the potential in a song isolated away from the context of a larger body of work. Cause not every song is like the first song on the album. Like not every song is like a instant banger. There's gotta be an ebb and a flow of energy and some songs create space for like contemplation and get your ears ready for the next banger. And so,

Brian Funk (55:10.245)

Ben Levin (55:12.926)

It's helpful if it's a song a month, but also seeing them as a collection, sort of like the 2024 collection and how they serve each other. That can probably help with the challenge of defining something as album ready.

Brian Funk (55:25.839)

Hmm.

Brian Funk (55:32.293)

Yeah, in the past I've had pieces of music that I probably wouldn't decide to put out on their own, realize like, this really glues these two tracks together. This creates a story in the overall picture of something larger. And you can't really see that until you make more stuff. Just make stuff is like, just got to keep making stuff. And sometimes they take on meaning.

Ben Levin (55:54.502)

Right. Right.

Ben Levin (55:59.632)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (56:01.867)

in the context, sometimes they stand alone.

Ben Levin (56:05.5)

Yep. Yep. That's true. Yeah. Well, that's cool. I'm glad you also are doing it with people. That helps to have like a club. Yeah.

Brian Funk (56:12.271)

Yeah, it does some kind of accountability and, again, like more people do it and you're like, okay, they can do it. It's like when you're, if you go to like a workout class or something and you're real tired and you're doing your pushups or whatever you're doing and they're still going and they're still going. And do you wind up getting a few more out of yourself because of that? You know, like, well, I can't quit that guy's still going.

Ben Levin (56:21.842)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (56:35.552)

yeah that's cool. Yeah that makes sense. A little bit of competition. Doesn't hurt.

Brian Funk (56:42.537)

Yeah, not even competition, like, again, like it's, I, it's not impossible. You know, I think it was like when the, the first person ran the, there was a four minute mile, maybe it five, I forget, but they thought it was impossible for humans to do. And then finally someone broke it. then like a couple of weeks later, someone else broke it. A short time thereafter, like now a number of people have done it.

Ben Levin (56:49.158)

Mm -mm.

Ben Levin (56:56.658)

Mm.

Brian Funk (57:11.772)

And you just almost need to like understand that it can be done by regular people.

Ben Levin (57:16.818)

like the bassoon part at the beginning of the Rite of Spring, because that was supposed to be like sound really unhinged and hard to play and straining and now people do it with such ease and it's such a normal thing for a bassoonist to do. I guess they just had to become normal.

Brian Funk (57:35.794)

Yeah, right. Put their energy into it. So I listened to your album today. is it, cause, at the time of this recording, just came out yesterday, I think. Right. So I loved it. and again, like a little bit of a surprise, I didn't realize it was going to be quite as, I don't know if I want to say dark. I don't know if that's the word, but heavy maybe.

Ben Levin (57:39.836)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (57:43.304)

Thank you.

Ben Levin (57:47.826)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (58:02.939)

Mm -hmm. Yeah.

Brian Funk (58:03.758)

heavy not only in just some of the sounds but like some of the content too like you know it wasn't the the sweetie cutie kind of thing you know

Ben Levin (58:13.606)

Yeah, no, was pretty gloomy, melancholic, and yeah, at times cathartic. Yeah, that's the idea. Yeah.

Brian Funk (58:23.957)

Yeah, powerful. And as you were talking about, like, just like an album too, a lot of great, it just, I felt like I was listening to almost just one song, you know? It was just one nice listen that things worked together really well. I love that in an album, where it just, it feels like an album. It wasn't like, no, this song and that song. Which I guess I could think of examples where I liked that too, but.

Ben Levin (58:37.022)

Thank you.

Ben Levin (58:48.72)

Yeah, yeah.

Sure.

Brian Funk (58:52.754)

It had a real cool consistency in all the parts, the vocal sound, the instrumentation and all really awesome stuff.

Ben Levin (59:03.516)

Yeah, I was kinda destined to sound cohesive because of the instrumentation just being

two bass sixes and drums originally and just that is so distinct of a limitation that every song being that way creates like yeah inevitable cohesion but then I did end up adding regular guitar to get the climaxes to really hit because I was finding that two bass sixes really was good on the verses and on the quiet parts but it just didn't quite get there on the big choruses. None of high end.

Brian Funk (59:37.558)

Yeah, I love that about it too. I don't know if you can see it, but I purposely stuck my Fender bass 6 in the background for you. Okay.

Ben Levin (59:44.703)

cool, yeah I can't see it in this window. That's cool. Because I'm seeing myself, I guess I could move myself. But I don't want to mess with it. Yeah, it's cool.

Brian Funk (59:52.95)

Yeah. I just found that instrument, I guess it was like January of this year. it's like, the thing that really got me thinking about it was when the Beatles get back. Did you see that whole like 13 hour or whatever it was thing that they did? Yeah. So they had one and like it got used basically, I guess when

Ben Levin (01:00:10.077)

Hmm

Ben Levin (01:00:14.374)

I saw the first episode of that.

Brian Funk (01:00:21.956)

John and George were playing bass because they weren't lefties. but since then I've had like this like hankering, know, check it out. And I love it so much because it's, it's this like, kind of in between instrument, you know, definitely does the base well, but then it also has this territory that's neither bass nor guitar kind of in that middle area. And it's such a great texture and,

Ben Levin (01:00:37.767)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:00:45.148)

Right. Yeah, distinct.

Brian Funk (01:00:52.065)

It's hard to find things that just sort of sit in the place really well musically that's not competing with so much other stuff.

Ben Levin (01:00:56.476)

Yes.

Ben Levin (01:01:00.318)

Yeah, the challenge with bass 6 is you wouldn't want to do bass 6 and then also have someone else in the band playing bass. That doesn't quite work. And if you play the bass 6 really hard, the low end kind of goes away. And so like learning how to play the bass 6 like a bass, then switching

mentalities for like in the middle of a part for the parts that are supposed to come through as more of a mid -range instrument like a low guitar or something. I found that playing the low strings pretty soft and playing the high strings pretty hard is like a surprisingly necessary. I can show an example like

Brian Funk (01:01:55.735)

I'll just say for anyone that's not familiar with bass six, you know what it is? It's a six string bass that, is tuned exactly like a guitar except one octave lower. So normally five string basses would have a lower string, like a B string, you know, different notes, that are lower than a normal bass, but this is just like a guitar except an octave lower.

It feels a lot like a guitar too. The strings are closer together. The neck is kind of narrow, I guess. A little more electric guitar style neck than like a thicker bass neck. And it also has some fun things you can do with the pickups. can get lots of different tones from pretty bassy to pretty trebly. And then there's even a low cut that lets you get rid of the bass so you can have that middle ground area.

Ben Levin (01:02:56.432)

I haven't messed with the pickups at all. That was very interesting to hear. I just like the one configuration I have here, which is they're all up except this one. yeah, I should mess with the pickups more. Yeah, so if you play just a three note C major chord, G, E here, it sounds so good. And.

You can play it pretty hard. Clipping my thingy though, I'll just turn it down a little bit. Yeah, you can play it pretty hard. And it holds.

Ben Levin (01:03:41.886)

these three note per string chords, then when you play down here, if I was doing bass...

Brian Funk (01:03:48.966)

Yeah, it gets kind of rattly.

Ben Levin (01:03:50.588)

Yeah, and you lose some of the actual subby low end, but if you play it soft, I mean, it's not necessarily coming through right now because it's the kind of thing where on the album I was having it go through amp emulation, actual bass amp emulation, but I was finding that it would just go away when I was doing the rattly. So you'd be like, that'd be how I do actual bass.

Brian Funk (01:04:10.758)

Hmm.

Brian Funk (01:04:16.326)

A lot of palm muting, right? Like, the thing just wants to be palm muted.

Ben Levin (01:04:17.979)

Yeah.

And then, yeah. And also playing with pick and fingers helps, because just strumming this is very good for climax, but going like.

Ben Levin (01:04:41.34)

Using my pick and fingers, get a lot of the cool bass six features. Whereas if I pick it, it's a much different feeling.

Brian Funk (01:04:45.915)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (01:05:04.254)

It's a good voicing.

Ben Levin (01:05:10.558)

Yeah, I love bass 6. I love spread voicings on bass 6, 1, 5, 3, instead of playing like the whole chords.

Brian Funk (01:05:10.619)

Hmm.

You

Ben Levin (01:05:29.182)

That's May 6th, folks!

Brian Funk (01:05:30.856)

Yeah, sounds great. it's, I haven't really tried to play it finger style like that. And you can't really play it bass finger style with the, you know, the two fingers kind of running up and down the strings because the strings are so close together. But you can see if you're to play finger. So it'd be more like playing guitar finger style with, with the, other two fingers in there. It sounds really nice. haven't something I got to explore.

Ben Levin (01:05:41.298)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:05:45.106)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:05:51.132)

Right. Exactly.

Ben Levin (01:06:02.504)

really like it.

Brian Funk (01:06:02.599)

I was curious how you amped it or what you did as far as recording it because you get a lot of great tones on the record. Variety of tones too.

Ben Levin (01:06:11.294)

Yeah, yeah, I worked with a producer named Bradford Krieger who I have worked with on all my stuff for since 2018 and he used like the twin reverb JC thing, Fender amp for the not bass stuff. And then we used my Helix.

Just a patch on the Helix like a preset for all the bass stuff because I had two bass sixes one was acting like a bass plus and the other was acting as like a low guitar basically and The low guitar one we were going for like the McGee kind of sound where he has this Chorusy very dynamic You can really hear the pick on the strings kind of sound kind of harsh even sometimes a little bit

Not really. It just clips in a cool way. And then the bass has... I mean, can literally pull up the preset for the bass because you'll hear it really has a distinctly hybrid capability of being a little bit bass, a little bit guitar in a way where you still got plenty of bass. And I'm almost there. Almost pulled it up.

Brian Funk (01:07:34.015)

You

Ben Levin (01:07:34.814)

It's called Bass Cali 400 Channel 1 and it's like this. So you can hear there's a way more boomy low end. And so that's when I was like talking about like the low end kind of goes away compared to.

Brian Funk (01:07:53.406)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (01:07:53.746)

The subby low end is there when I play with my thumb. And it sounds really nice with the high stuff. But super dark, super low.

Brian Funk (01:08:07.092)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (01:08:29.662)

later in the song when I really need to play hard.

Ben Levin (01:08:38.354)

holds together and also we put a microphone on the strings like a piezo like went under the strings to mic the strings and we use that a little bit for the big like dirty choruses to make it yeah extra gnarly yeah yeah

Brian Funk (01:08:43.021)

really?

Brian Funk (01:08:54.646)

Hmm. Yeah. that's cool. It's, it's got a lot like, cool. was, I got like a kind of like built to spill feeling like, darker. Yeah. Like, yeah. Maybe a little bit vocally too, you know, with, just the delivery, the sound, like you do like a really nice job with your voice.

Ben Levin (01:09:06.608)

Hmm, I don't know that. Built the spill.

Brian Funk (01:09:24.73)

sounding like, what's the word I'm looking for? Kind of like vulnerable and real. It's not, it's endearing. It feels honest and it's very easy to tell what you're saying. And it almost doesn't sound like you're singing in a lot of ways. You're just kind of telling the story of the song. It's really cool. It's a great style that

Ben Levin (01:09:31.122)

Thank you.

Brian Funk (01:09:53.898)

I think is, you know, like, it's not like operatic, you know, American Idol singer type stuff. And I love that, you know, I love like just kind of like, if you're like a real guy singing these songs, you know, you're kind of normal.

Ben Levin (01:09:59.678)

Ben Levin (01:10:06.15)

Yeah, I'm kind of norm - I'm normal! Hey, I'm normal! Yeah, I Yeah, I like that too. I - I think that, people's most authentic voice, is their best voice, and for some people that is a very operatic voice. authentic doesn't necessarily mean what's easiest or most natural for you, but the one that you're really drawn to, the one that you're

that you believe when you hear. So like, yeah, like Matthew Bellamy from Muse, for instance, I think he's singing in a very natural way for him, even though it's got a lot of affectation and it's very over the top in a good way. It's just like super dramatic voice. I really believe it coming from him. I think that's his voice. I think Thom Yorke's voice.

Another, like, you you think of one, think of the other. Tom York's voice is very authentic, even though it's, it's got a lot of affectation to it. But for me, the most, I just listened to Weezer so much when I was in middle school and it kind of stuck with me. Yeah. It just kind of never went away. I always just still wanted to make an album that sounded like Weezer or something. And I've been trying the last

Brian Funk (01:11:22.417)

They too.

Ben Levin (01:11:32.722)

You know, every now and then I've been trying. I think I finally got it, this one. It's got that thing I liked about Pinkerton, the way Rivers sings in that album. It's like, I feel like we got it this time. And my vocal journey has been, I feel very relatable to my students and colleagues who start out believing they're just not meant to sing. And then...

I explore a lot, I've explored a lot and practiced a lot and sang a lot to find my realness, to figure out what that even is. And yeah, I feel like I'm supposed to sound like a regular guy. And what is regular anyway? But I am supposed to sound like a person going through stuff, not like a big powerful, you know,

God of sorrow or like, mean like thinking of maybe the way that like Beyonce is like the, like just so unbelievably like powerful of course at times, but just like unbelievably in control of her voice just sounds.

Brian Funk (01:12:35.493)

Tom Jones.

Ben Levin (01:13:02.608)

When she can sound real sad and real emotional and real like excited in all these ways and it always feels like she nails it like she nailed it and there's no tight tightrope. There's no like danger. She's got it and I love that. I'm like amazed by that. But when I hope to sound that in control, I am I overanalyze my voice and I become very dissatisfied with it because

My voice has an emphasis around here.

Ben Levin (01:13:36.62)

and it just

Yeah, it's just like, it's not like a.

It doesn't sound like, like, I'm just thinking like, trying to think of a perfect example.

Ben Levin (01:14:00.228)

It doesn't sound like, God, I'm trying to think of someone that everybody knows. Well, like, you know, pop singers who are always in tune perfectly and like do the runs and they just always sound in command of their voice. Like Justin Timberlake or someone like that. I, when I try to do that, I just get.

really over analytical and I'm kind of miss my performances. I miss like the, the feeling that the music is making, but I feel like my voice pairs really well with the music I actually make. It doesn't pair that well. If I'm singing like a cover, it's hard for me to do covers at this time still, but I can always keep improving. I'm not done. but yeah, that's what's natural for me. I guess I like what, feels right to me is just to sort of let the vocal takes be.

Brian Funk (01:14:40.295)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (01:14:58.526)

90 % accurate. And you know, I put tuning on my vocals too. know, they're whenever it's whenever it's too out of tune for me to like it, we fix it. Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:15:10.006)

Right. Well, I think like with that, know, if you got the performance, you know, it's worth it. know, it's even...

Ben Levin (01:15:18.589)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:15:20.004)

in terms of authenticity, especially it sounds almost counterintuitive. How is it going to be authentic if you're tuning it? But sometimes like you just can't do it again. I'm like a lot like you in these ways that like I'm, don't ever think of myself as a singer. I use my voice, I sing in a band, I sing on songs, but I don't, but I'm like not, you know, I'm like just like a punk rock guitarist knows like some power chords, you know.

Ben Levin (01:15:39.644)

You're definitely a singer.

Brian Funk (01:15:49.925)

Ben Levin (01:15:50.974)

You're not going to the singing Olympics, but, or like you wouldn't be like the singing chef at like a Michelin star restaurant, but you got your own little restaurant that people really enjoy for singing.

Brian Funk (01:15:53.627)

No.

Brian Funk (01:16:02.091)

Yeah, I'm not even so sure about that. But it's like a tool. It's something to use. And when the story of the song is being told and the emotion is being told, that's kind of first and foremost. But yeah, sometimes things need a little fix here or there. I'm not above that either. Let's make.

Ben Levin (01:16:24.467)

Yeah.

no, I don't think anyone really is. Yeah. Well, people, people just do it, you know, whether they admit it or not. think someone's doing it because records are just in tune now. You compare it to Freddie Mercury, you know, like show me the, show me the pop star who has out of tune notes like Freddie Mercury did. Just doesn't happen.

Brian Funk (01:16:29.608)

Not anymore. Yeah, I guess this is an old conversation,

Brian Funk (01:16:42.059)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:16:53.553)

Right. And they're so effective. There's a lot of emotion in those notes. know, like the strain to get to the note sometimes is way better than just landing there. Smooth landing, you know.

Ben Levin (01:16:56.349)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:17:04.55)

Yeah, totally. And like with modern production, it's not like we don't like necessarily miss that because modern vocal performance and model modern vocal production go hand in hand. where like Sia's voice in chandelier sounds a hundred percent badass, emotional, dirty, gritty, so good, so airy and perfectly mixed. Just the air in the

Everything about her voice is that's just the most incredible vocal performance ever. And it is perfectly in tune. And I'm pretty sure when she does it live, it would be very in tune, but not perfectly in tune. And who cares, right? Like I'm, I'm guessing they either did enough takes that she had every note perfectly in tune or they tuned it.

Brian Funk (01:17:53.003)

Right.

Ben Levin (01:18:02.527)

little bit some of the time That yeah like it just doesn't matter anymore in my opinion at least like I don't care

Brian Funk (01:18:09.312)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:18:14.524)

Yeah, I think people should get their music sounding the way they want it and then put it out. And I have maybe like a different take on AI than this. Like maybe there is a limit to this where like AI generated music maybe is definitely not necessarily hitting the same way auto -tune music is. Like I don't see auto -tune as like a line to AI though. Like I just think

I think people should make their music the way they want to make it and it should come out sounding like they want it and that is great.

Ben Levin (01:18:54.91)

Completely generating a song, I don't know. We'll see how things change. Right now it's not really possible to use AI to make a song exactly like you want it anyway. It's much more general. I think that's maybe part of the problem with it. It's not exactly reflecting people enough. It's just sort of like, here's a cool option. And then people post the option.

So I guess if, yeah, if there was an AI that could read my mind perfectly and make my music sound exactly like I wanted and just poof, poof, it would appear, I think that would be more authentic than generating until you hear something that sounds pretty good and then just posting it. Sorry, I went there.

Brian Funk (01:19:39.126)

No, it's kind of worth discussing. I'm coming to this place where so much of the fun is in the making, know, and so much of the glory is in the making and the, it's never quite what you wanted. And sometimes that's in an unexpectedly good way, the happy accidents that you would never do. But

If I generated the perfect song exactly how I heard it in my head, I'd feel so much less glory in the one that I worked on and struggled. Because I have all those relationships to the sounds and the process and the things you tend to, you fall in love with. I've grown tomatoes and vegetables hardly, but I have.

Ben Levin (01:20:28.307)

Nice.

Brian Funk (01:20:35.17)

And I love that cucumber I grew so much more than the much better cucumber that was at the supermarket. It was just, there was something about it. was so fun to eat it, you know, even if it was worse in so many ways, but.

Ben Levin (01:20:41.116)

Yeah, yeah.

Ben Levin (01:20:45.682)

Yeah, that's beautiful.

Yeah, your own private garden. You pick all the vegetables and then serve a salad to your guests. Like, that's amazing. That's a beautiful thing. And yeah, it almost doesn't matter if.

Brian Funk (01:21:01.326)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:21:04.186)

It tastes any different than a store salad. It doesn't even matter. I mean, it probably does, but it doesn't even matter. Like that's a good point. I like, yeah, like the Adam Neely video about AI music where he's saying how like music isn't the output alone. It's like the process and that I, I agree with that for sure. yeah, I think I have a pretty like regular average take on AI these days. I think most people sort of just feel.

on average just feel sort of like, yeah, it's just not that good. And like the result isn't that good yet. And also I just like people music and maybe the one way I converge from that thought is like, I also am not worried about people music being replaced. Like I'm much more worried about like, bots replacing people in general, like in comment threads or like on the internet and like,

Not being able to tell who's a person, which is kind of where we're at already. I think that's scarier than the idea that like the next album I fall in love with that shows up on my recommended playlist is going to be made by non -humans. Like I, I just don't, you know, maybe that'll happen and I'll hear some awesome album and then I'll find out it was AI and then I'll be like disappointed. But mostly, I mean, it's just, people do this like

Brian Funk (01:22:03.866)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:22:30.461)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (01:22:32.072)

We're really good at surprising each other too. Like we're really good at like unexpectedly like revealing what everybody didn't know they wanted. We do that for each other often. Very surprisingly. And we show them an album that's super fresh and super broken from a meta perspective. And then it's exactly what we want. actually like, turns out.

Brian Funk (01:22:47.901)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (01:22:59.23)

for a while, you know, people just wanted music to sound like the sixties again. That was a thing for a while. And then now, you know, now maybe with like Charlie XCX's Brat, people want way more vulnerable dance music, you know, and like really like broken album art, you know, like that album cover. don't think an AI would ever generate that because they're trained on

an idea of beauty.

Brian Funk (01:23:30.303)

Right? Yeah, yeah, like that surprise element is so many of my favorite records, like I didn't know I was going to love it. And I might not have even loved it at first, actually. Took a little growin'.

Ben Levin (01:23:39.911)

Right.

Ben Levin (01:23:45.372)

Yeah, that's not optimized. It was not optimized properly if you had to listen to it more than once.

Brian Funk (01:23:48.99)

Yeah.

Well, you brought up Pinkerton, which might be my favorite record, when you ask me. And at first, after, because I'm like you, I love Weezer. I just saw them do the Blue Album at Madison Square Garden, that show. was super fun, just to hear them play all those songs. But when Pinkerton came out, was kind of like,

Ben Levin (01:23:59.175)

Yeah, right.

Ben Levin (01:24:06.98)

wow, that's crazy.

Brian Funk (01:24:19.125)

It's a different. don't know. It wasn't too long, know, a few listens and then it was like, my God, this is the best thing I ever heard. But, you know, it was a little bit of a departure, a little definitely raw, know, raw and vulnerable, like you said, but that was like, that just hit when it came. I was 16. like, you know,

Ben Levin (01:24:29.565)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:24:36.326)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:24:43.794)

The... Yeah, that's a perfect age for it.

Brian Funk (01:24:48.494)

Yeah, was like, I was there. I felt like a loser and you know, so it just.

Ben Levin (01:24:52.956)

Yeah, yeah, it's extremely flawed perspective. a very like, the perspective of that album is like, is sort of like a lovable villain almost, you know, like, like just, just like a.

You know who writes a song like I'm tired of having sex and then talk about all the different people They're having sex with on different nights of the week You know like that's that's like a really like raw like messed up That's like a really hard to get into character at the beginning

Brian Funk (01:25:20.17)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:25:25.521)

Unless you're like glam rock 80s you would expect maybe, you know, but not in that like vulnerable, you know, dark, it's dark, yeah, like.

Ben Levin (01:25:30.835)

Mm -hmm.

Ben Levin (01:25:36.617)

Yeah, and it made me think you know right like it makes you think Instead of these like masculine norms of like I'm a player because I have got all these girlfriends How cool is that it's like this person is broken and they're they're like This how it makes you think especially when you're 16 and like never really necessarily Thought about this sort of thing, but it's like how could somebody having sex every night be bad

You know, and like, it's a really like captivating intro. And then, you know, like that stuff, talking about.

Brian Funk (01:26:04.711)

you

Ben Levin (01:26:14.29)

this song like Across the Sea, like a song about falling in love with your underage fan who is so far away and like that is like a really like difficult thing to like admit to and then and then like saying I could never touch you I think it would be wrong like like giving us that relief that like they got their right and it's like the most it's like

Brian Funk (01:26:37.67)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:26:39.186)

forbidden love that should be forbidden and it's just like it's kind of like drenched in taboo in a way that like was so subversive like so just unrecognizable I like I don't think I realized that what I was hearing was was taboo and was and and That is sort of what it is like to be a teenager like You're like you're always stowing so many secrets and desires that you

Brian Funk (01:26:54.143)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (01:27:08.018)

believe are like inappropriate bad desires. you know, like when you first, when you have like a sexual awakening, when you have puberty and stuff and like, when all that happens, it's mostly at least my, you know, in my life kept secret and there's so much like hiding that. And, yeah. So it's like, Pinkerton's very relatable to like the very, the very like,

Brian Funk (01:27:23.157)

Hmm.

Brian Funk (01:27:32.041)

Mm.

Ben Levin (01:27:36.2)

private, like dirty parts of a teenager experience growing up in the, mentally speaking. With shame, yeah.

Brian Funk (01:27:41.523)

Hmm. Yeah, the shame, guilt, and yet universal, you know, that you learn that later, but usually by then, like, there's already been so much scarring and, you know, shame, guess, and guilt and all that, that surrounds it. But it

Ben Levin (01:27:49.096)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:28:02.824)

You have like the right music to help you access those emotions when you're a teenager helps you avoid being an insult later. You know, like being someone who's just like full of resentment and entitlement. Like I do think I would have ended up, I think I would have easily ended up being like a way worse person if I didn't have any outlet, like any friends to talk to about any of that stuff.

Brian Funk (01:28:10.772)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (01:28:32.446)

like anyone to kind of like know my mistakes when I was 15, 16, you know, like I went to summer camp and like we had like an uncommon level of freedom for someone that age and we did like we did some experimental shit that like was you know, like people were doing crazy stuff all around us and we were just sort of piecing together like where the lines are like what's not good.

And I don't know if that's an environment teenagers really should be put in. I don't know. But nonetheless, I feel like I learned a lot of important stuff about like... I guess I got the chance to express my wheezerness early instead of holding it internally.

without like anyone to point to, to be like, you're like me. okay. And, maybe we should like not be like this or whatever. You know, I got my Weezerness like highlighted and pointed to and a nice like displayed and be like, you're going through this. And was able to recognize, recognize it and have a catharsis away from it. So that later in life, I wouldn't be mad at girls that didn't like me or like

Brian Funk (01:29:59.092)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (01:29:59.984)

you know, we didn't,

Ben Levin (01:30:04.156)

wouldn't like steal a kiss, you know, like, like things that you see like in movies a lot. There aren't a lot of people back then, especially who are portrayed, not a lot of characters portrayed as weak and fumbly as Rivers in Pinkerton. Usually they were all the like masculine people in movies were all like confident and or, or or if they were like the underdog, they were really like,

bad people doing bad things like Revenge of the Nerds, know, like where those guys actually were the bad guys. Yeah, stuff like that. I'm just grateful for the dirty sloppy words in that album and like how, yeah, how it sounds and how it feels and what it did for me.

Brian Funk (01:30:35.955)

Hmm.

Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:30:53.245)

Yeah, I agree. And even like, before that record, you know, they were like, had that nerdy thing going and, it made you feel like you didn't always have to live up to that. Like, you know, growing up, like I wasn't unpopular, but I wasn't running with the popular crew, but I was lucky enough to have a couple of really close friends. And I often think about how different things could have turned out if I didn't have them to talk to and just to realize like.

Ben Levin (01:31:21.0)

Mmm.

Brian Funk (01:31:22.845)

Yeah, we're all weird. And it's normal. It's normal that we're weird. And them as a group too, I kind of let you have that. Even with the Blue album, when they first came out, they were like this kind of dorky thing, anti -hero. They look kind of like the kids that were getting picked on at school, but they were making this awesome music that you loved.

Ben Levin (01:31:26.301)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:31:40.2)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:31:43.943)

Yeah.

Yeah, it's like, this is a category I can stay in instead of constantly trying to get out of.

Brian Funk (01:31:52.862)

Yeah, you can have like a little pride in who you feel like you are. Which is an important thing to have at any point, really.

Ben Levin (01:31:56.584)

Mm -hmm.

Ben Levin (01:32:01.564)

Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. I just, it's just a very complicated experience, like being alive in general, but it's very extra complicated when you're forced to go to school every day and you're, you don't have very much freedom and you don't necessarily,

Ben Levin (01:32:29.884)

Yeah, you don't have like a therapist necessarily or like a way to,

Ben Levin (01:32:37.084)

get feedback on like your feelings and yeah I used to like getting physical fights and stuff and like but it was because I was really like late to puberty and small and like insecure and I wanted to be like thought of as a scary gangster type guy not like a a shrimp or whatever and yeah and so I remember like I did stop fighting

after ninth grade, which is when I got into Weezer. I got into Weezer like eighth and ninth grade, and in ninth grade I had my last fight ever. I think that's partially because I identified as one of those peaceful outsider types who just likes their music, and then I got into guitar, you know, instead of being like a, I wanted to be like Michael Corleone or something.

Brian Funk (01:33:33.011)

Hmm. That's, I mean, it's that age, you know, you're trying on, I literally remember trying on different personas and different clothes and seeing, maybe I'm this kind of kid, like actually thinking that and going for it, you know, maybe at the start of the school year. And it wasn't until, yeah, it wasn't until like a lot of these things, a lot of it was through music that.

Ben Levin (01:33:48.829)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:33:55.048)

I need fresh start.

Brian Funk (01:34:02.971)

I was able to find an identity that felt like a fit. At least enough to survive.

Ben Levin (01:34:09.821)

Yeah.

Gosh, and imagine them worrying about singing in tune. You know, like, if that was all they were thinking about, they're like, I can't put this out, I'm not a good enough singer. Or like, you know, just imagine Pinkerton getting cleaned up, you know?

Brian Funk (01:34:29.769)

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it cost them, you know, like the album at the time was a failure and it was so real. mean, there's all that like lore around Rivers Cuomo, just, you know, felt rejected and the band went on a hiatus and you all that stuff that happened. I look at them now. Like now that's exactly why they're so celebrated. But it's hard to...

Ben Levin (01:34:35.326)

Ben Levin (01:34:50.877)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:34:58.194)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:34:59.709)

It's hard to be real and then, you know, it not work out. Cause you think you're supposed to go through life and when you're honest and you're your true self, like that's what we're supposed to And then you do that and it's like, we don't want that.

Ben Levin (01:35:06.45)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:35:18.342)

That's brutal. Yeah, here I am. This is really me. We don't want you. Don't be that. Don't be you. Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:35:24.513)

Yeah. Yeah. Right. It's tough.

Ben Levin (01:35:29.938)

I'm always trying to get people to be their true selves, you know, to like find their true selves and be willing to change what that means when they, as they change and like be real in their music. And by real, I just mean like take risks, take chances, like explore, like get, get your thoughts in there and don't necessarily hide behind cleverness too much, you know, things like that. But naturally.

doesn't always result in a hit song or anything like where you'll get external validation but I just think it makes you stronger in your in yourself like more confident that

I guess just more, more confident that you have a place for your emotions and like experiences to live. That's healthy, like a healthy place for them. And that no matter what happens, at least you can, you can keep making art and keep digging. But if you're like trying to, if in your art process, you're trying to

meet unreasonable goals of perfection, then you really have nowhere to put your real struggles or your real thoughts. There's nowhere really for it to go then. Besides through in creativity, think, and journaling and stuff, you gotta let yourself be that.

Brian Funk (01:37:05.36)

That's where I get caught up a lot. trying to, you said like hiding and cleverness. Like I think like, I gotta have these, like these chords gotta be interesting and it's kind of has some unique rhythm or something. And meanwhile, like half the stuff I love is actually pretty simple. And it's usually once I let go of that, that the real stuff comes out when you're not trying to.

Ben Levin (01:37:16.392)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:37:23.986)

Mm -hmm.

Brian Funk (01:37:35.46)

I don't want to, I hate saying like be so serious sometimes because like, yeah, of course it's like you take it serious, but you got to also sometimes, you know, I'm silly. Let me be silly sometimes. And like, I'm going to make a song that's like comical if I want. And not everything has to be this like deep artistic expression of who you are.

Ben Levin (01:37:48.444)

Yeah, yeah.

Ben Levin (01:38:00.572)

Right. Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:38:02.06)

Sometimes I get caught up in worrying about that, you know, that that's how people are going to see it. They're going to, they're going to psychoanalyze me through this. And sometimes I just like the way the words sound and the way they fit the melody. And it's fun to play around with them.

Ben Levin (01:38:18.696)

can be a very brave thing to let it not be a big deal now and then. Just, yeah, make a silly song. Making silly songs is serious business because it forces you to confront your identity. But other people can only make silly songs. I think we just have different disguises and we have to just, I guess, buy more disguises. Really, just, yeah.

Brian Funk (01:38:24.517)

Hmm.

Brian Funk (01:38:30.682)

fifth

Brian Funk (01:38:46.607)

Well, you know, to bring it back to what you were saying earlier about finding like the thing that'll be predictable so it'll like serve your YouTube algorithm and make sure like people get what they expect. I've always appreciated that about what you do is that you have like some stuff that is like practically just like craziness that you put out there and some of the songs are just they're funny, they're silly, they're...

Ben Levin (01:39:08.572)

Ben Levin (01:39:13.672)

diaper songs.

Brian Funk (01:39:14.04)

And then, yeah, yeah, just like, it's like, again, like you never know what you're going to get. And I've seen your stuff and just like started laughing, you know, like, this is so absurd. I love it. And, and then like your record is, is a whole other side and it's, it's the way people are. Like to always be a certain way. I don't know. That just seems really.

Ben Levin (01:39:25.752)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:39:35.302)

Right.

Brian Funk (01:39:43.672)

tough. That would be harder for me too, I think, to always have to be the serious artist or always have to be a funny artist, always have to be anything. And it would be inauthentic actually, in a lot of ways.

Ben Levin (01:39:54.396)

Yep.

Ben Levin (01:39:59.622)

Yeah, realness is multifaceted and different every day. yeah, so you have to, if you're going to be real in your work, you have to be flexible and open. it's, it's something that eventually I think comes naturally, but there are a lot of algorithmic incentives to not, not

Fully explore everything that you do that you are capable of. I think the world would be better if everybody could be silly and serious naturally within the same like stroke, you know, just to like have silliness and seriousness kind of interwoven seamlessly and not necessarily separate the two because they're, they're

Found, they're like kind of foundational elements of communication. Expressing serious stuff with no humor is hard. Is like, it's like listening to a UN speech or something. You know, like, listen, you know, like, yeah, just, yeah, like if you want to explain to people like how stressful it was when your dog got a.

Brian Funk (01:41:15.999)

Right? C -span?

Ben Levin (01:41:28.474)

sprayed by a skunk. Like to tell the story with zero humor, all it is is stress. You put in a little humor and there's, I think maybe like an opening for people to really put themselves in your shoes and feel the feelings and think the thoughts. So my skunk story is, like my dog got skunked, two weeks in a row, a week apart. And so I've already ruined the story, but

I don't know. This is the first time it's happened, but, the proper way to tell that story, I think, is you make it sound like that first week of the skunk was torture. Just like everything from the...

fact that my dog he killed the skunk and I buried the skunk and it's so sad and that the smell is so bad and sticks in your throat and like you tell the story and you really like accentuate how we had to clean the house we had to clean every corner and we had to get all the new sprays and everything and the more painful you make that first week sound then the more like kind of funny and crazy it is that you say and then so then after that week finally yeah

Finally things were sort of getting back to normal and he was okay. And then it happened again! You know, like that's how you tell the story. In my opinion, that's like the best way to tell the story of he got skunked twice in a row is you make this huge buildup and then you make it seem like it ended and then the surprise and humor of like, and then the whole thing happened again. You know, then you feel the feeling of the skunk ordeal. You feel it.

Brian Funk (01:42:51.296)

Heh.

Ben Levin (01:43:12.658)

But if all it is is like saying how bad everything is, and implying that it like not surprising people with the, happened again and creating that like humorous timing, but just being like, and it happened two weeks in a row, just.

Misery like we cleaned the house and then we did it again and again and it just seemed like he was gonna get skunked forever And it was just now when he goes outside at night I have to go with him and and it was so horrible like pulling the skunks away Eventually, you're just like here are a lot of details here are a lot of details But like the the humorous moment Makes it so you feel the burden for real and I think that they just yeah, that's how they kind of help each other they

Brian Funk (01:43:41.173)

Alright.

Brian Funk (01:43:52.915)

Right.

Ben Levin (01:43:57.062)

The humor opens a hole in people's hearts where they don't have to guard the, guard themselves too well because there's going to be relief. So they have room, they have the capacity to, to experience empathy and, and not just be overwhelmed by their own pain. now you, now your pain, but humor, like it makes it a softer landing so you can actually, relate better.

Brian Funk (01:44:22.767)

Hmm. Yeah, it's like, I feel like I got to get away from you now. Like, my God, this guy is skunk again. But when it's the joke, it's, I'm laughing with you. I'm, man, know, funerals are a good example of that. mean, like people will often crack jokes, you know, it seems like you shouldn't, but you know, you get like the person delivering a eulogy and.

Ben Levin (01:44:33.01)

I'm skunk cursed.

Ben Levin (01:44:38.973)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:44:52.908)

often there's some comic relief that then like makes it okay, you know, where there's some kind of like camaraderie that comes in as opposed to just the like, my God, this is so, so sad. Like, you know.

Ben Levin (01:44:58.589)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:45:07.698)

Yeah, you have the capacity to grieve in a way that where you're really feeling the feelings and really grieving and not just paralyzed and numb. If you can create one of those like special windows with the humor, it's like a special window into the emotion where it feels safe to go in.

Brian Funk (01:45:32.59)

Yeah. Yeah, it's the contrast, guess. Contrast was a big part of what I enjoyed about your record too, by the way. was the word I had to say to you. Because it was so cool. Sometimes it gets really complicated rhythmically and even sonically, dense, noisy, chaotic, and then...

Ben Levin (01:45:39.036)

and little bit of relief.

Ben Levin (01:45:47.486)

Hell yeah.

Brian Funk (01:45:56.616)

straightens out really nice and especially on like some of the big choruses of the record where it straightens out and it's just like okay like yeah nice eighth note yep

Ben Levin (01:46:07.174)

Yeah, the best rhythm is all eighth notes or quarter notes depending on the tempo. Yeah. That's still my favorite rhythm. Dun, dun, dun, dun, dun. Yeah. Especially emphasizing the two and the four a little. Mm -hmm.

Brian Funk (01:46:13.156)

Right. Yeah. So me too. It's a Weezer type rhythm too. The slow groove. It's great stuff. I'm very happy you made it and that I get to listen to it now. And it's a really cool piece in the tapestry of work you're doing. You've got a wide range of stuff that...

Ben Levin (01:46:31.73)

Thank you.

Brian Funk (01:46:39.962)

You know, personally for me, I'm already in the door, I guess. So I want you to keep being you and surprising me. but I know what you're saying about that poll to be, you know, like a brand almost, or like a, a thing that we can know what to expect from.

Ben Levin (01:46:54.31)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:46:58.812)

Yeah. Yeah, I think...

brand is just a form of way of communicating more clearly. And if I can make it so that my brand is that I will surprise you and then I can just do whatever I want. And my brand is like to it, you should expect that things are going to change. Then I've communicated communicated clearly. And so like back to that batches thing, it's like when this series is done, it's going to be something else. And, know, just being clear that like my albums are a pretty different.

space than my YouTube lessons and stuff. That would be good branding, but then there is like bad branding where it's like all you do is limit yourself and corner yourself and that I need to avoid. My hope is that I will always keep doing the things I want to do and that that's what all the different YouTubers and artists will do so that the algorithm starts to change.

Brian Funk (01:47:43.908)

Hmm.

Ben Levin (01:48:01.5)

I don't know if that's really what would happen, but it would be cool if people just did kind of what they felt like doing.

Wow, can you imagine that? Like, YouTubers like who - like Veritasium, who - like science YouTubers who do a science video every week and then another week they're like, today I'm at the alpaca farm and it's so cool, like look at them eating the seeds out of my hand. I want to see which of these alpacas can eat the most seed! And like, I have whatever, that shouldn't be it, but yeah. Just like whatever they want.

Brian Funk (01:48:11.745)

Hahaha

Brian Funk (01:48:25.08)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:48:28.874)

Alright.

Brian Funk (01:48:33.285)

Yeah, like, wait, wait, what? Like, what's going on here? Where's the lab coat? Where's the?

Ben Levin (01:48:36.59)

Actually play guitar I do science videos, but also play guitar and then veritas seems like this is my favorite guitar like That'd be fun Yeah, really surprising. We really put back the you in the YouTube You never know what to expect

Brian Funk (01:48:40.64)

Yeah. Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:48:49.427)

That's right. Hey, and if everyone is just chasing the algorithm, maybe there'll be that desire for people to want to see something that's not, know, that there's always a swing that happens with culture and art. So.

Ben Levin (01:49:02.212)

Mm -hmm. Yeah. Pendulum.

The meta. The meta evolves.

Brian Funk (01:49:10.675)

Yeah. So we can send people to benlevinmusicschool .com. We've got courses and they can learn with you. Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:49:17.992)

Yeah, if they want to learn from me, I've got the courses. Yeah, I do one -on -one lessons. I coach people with their songwriting, with music theory, with production, with guitar, with singing.

And I have courses there of getting songs done, which is all about writer's block, which can and how to move past writer's block at the beginning, middle and end phases of writing a song. have a blender for musicians, which is how to use a 3d modeling software called blender. And it's geared towards.

getting musicians from not knowing how to use the software at all to being able to use it for things they would actually want to use it for like music videos in as little time as possible. And then I have making music for yourself, which is all about finding different reasons to make music besides an ambition to be like impressive or good, know, redefining good.

And then I have Getrongus, is advanced guitar -y -tudes that are really, really, really weird. Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:50:28.286)

That's cool. I love the idea of the making music for yourself, putting the fun. I often wind up saying it to myself, people I'm working with, teaching and it's play music. It's not work music. We don't work it, we play it. It's very easy to let the thing you love become very stressful and you worry about it. I mean, it happens to all the time.

Ben Levin (01:50:40.807)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:50:53.064)

Yep.

Brian Funk (01:50:57.289)

probably check out your course.

Ben Levin (01:50:57.5)

Yeah. Yeah. I mean, we, we try to, the thing is like, all struggle with that still, you know, and that's like, that's part of the point of the course is it's three people made it, me, Justice Cowan, that one I kid, Josh Friedman, who's yeah, he goes by many names, but yeah, my friend Josh and Jessica and I, we were

Brian Funk (01:51:04.799)

Ben Levin (01:51:22.545)

kind of cheerleading each other to help us get past, you know, find different reasons, different motivations to make music. and that was like, you know, shortly after my major burnout or maybe right before my major burnout. Yeah, it was, it was. and.

Yeah, so like we're talking about all the things that have helped us before, but none of it works all the time. And something interesting about the course is it gives you an opportunity to see the potential alternatives, but also like admits that you can't just do what's in the course over and over again. Rather, it's like a launching point to find your own like exercises in.

and practices that will help you enjoy your music more, enjoy making music more.

Brian Funk (01:52:12.326)

That's a great message to put out there because we can often feel like there's something wrong with us. a format we can follow every time you picture.

people that can just breeze through it every time or they know the way they have the answer and I've never spoken to anybody that has the answer even people you think does and it's cool that you have a course for it that even just says like this is going to be part of it here's some things you could try but get ready because it's coming and it's always coming

Ben Levin (01:52:40.22)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:52:47.418)

Absolutely. Yeah, there's ups and downs. We can't expect to just feel confident and perfect all the time. But ideally you would, your downs wouldn't be too far down and your ups wouldn't be so far up that you get lost. But you'll, you can have this like effective nutritional happy ish like

Brian Funk (01:52:51.603)

Yep.

Ben Levin (01:53:16.208)

Artistic relationship with yourself where it's like it doesn't always feel good, but it's always right. It's like It's always it always helps you to be Being creative, but it doesn't always feel good like that. We have to admit that we're not always gonna feel good Because once we start expecting to always feel good. We feel like double bad We feel bad and then we feel bad that we feel bad, you know, so it's it's good if we can remove the

Brian Funk (01:53:41.966)

Yeah.

Ben Levin (01:53:46.214)

feeling worried that we're gonna feel bad and then feeling bad that we're gonna feel bad and just let the feeling bad part happen.

Brian Funk (01:53:53.338)

Hmm, here it is. It's time. It's time for that feeling. Yeah. Here we go. But that's why the glory is so nice. If it didn't happen, then who would care? Like, so what? It's easy to make music. Come on. Like...

Ben Levin (01:53:57.911)

Let's go feel bad

Ben Levin (01:54:08.316)

I think like, I like a minimal amount of glory these days. I just, yeah, I kind of just wish I had stability. I see the life around me and I'm like, this is a good life. It would be nice if there are no horrible like,

diagnoses or you know car crashes or whatever like I Just it would just be cool if I felt like I could afford to fix my teeth if something went wrong with my teeth You know just like I always want to keep keep things like Safe ish. I don't have like huge upward ambitions Anymore like recurrently I guess I should say I like I don't really

I would like to have the same number of audience now forever. That would be great. I wouldn't, I don't really need like, a bigger number. just would like to, feel like somewhat more, regularity and like predictability that I could keep, keep things chill and that, you know, I'm not like about to round a corner and get smashed in the face.

But my therapist says not to think that way. It is like a fallacy to think that the other shoe is just about to drop, is always about to drop. You can just deal with life as it comes. You don't have to spend all this time worrying about it coming. But yeah, I'm not really seeking big ups is all I'm trying to say. I'm just trying to keep it chill.

Brian Funk (01:55:44.975)

Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:55:51.31)

Right.

Brian Funk (01:55:58.744)

Yeah, I get you. Yeah, that's, that's reasonable. It's reasonable, you know? A lot of our suffering comes from wanting and that goalpost can just be pushed back further and further. So it's good to know when to say enough is enough.

Ben Levin (01:56:03.022)

Eh, it's not very American though.

Ben Levin (01:56:16.53)

Yeah, you're supposed to say that too, like in interviews. You're supposed to be like, all right, it's all about the next thing. Like, okay, we're here, but it's all about the next thing. Yeah, just you wait. Yeah, you think this was good? Yeah, that's how we're supposed to be, but it's not how we're supposed to be.

Brian Funk (01:56:25.72)

Right. Next year, you wait. The biggest year yet.

you

Yeah. Well, listen, man, it's been awesome talking and I feel like there's so many other things I could get into with you. But we've covered a surprising amount of stuff in this conversation. Things I didn't know, places we didn't know we were going. But that's the fun of it.

Ben Levin (01:56:41.896)

You as well.

Ben Levin (01:56:51.964)

Yeah, my ADHD manifests in many, yeah, I get surprised with like, why am I talking about this now? It's just like, all right.

Brian Funk (01:57:04.388)

Yeah, I like that. That's why there weren't specific questions and all that stuff when I do this is because I love that that aspect of it. I feel like I get to know people better and there's, you know, you can ask questions that you almost know the answer to kind of, and sometimes you don't know what the questions are. that's where it gets interesting for me. So.

Ben Levin (01:57:24.926)

Ben Levin (01:57:30.13)

Yeah, figuring out what the questions are from the talking. That's nice. That's sort of like making music where you just start making sounds and you find out what's cool instead of like planning what's going to be cool in advance. Find out what's cool. Yeah.

Brian Funk (01:57:45.151)

Yeah, reacting to what happens. Thank you for playing along. I think you said in the email that I wrote, what you said, I'd like to clown around. that how you put it? Down the clown? I was like, nice.

Ben Levin (01:57:52.156)

My pleasure.

Ben Levin (01:57:57.618)

Down to clown. Yeah. Yeah. I like to rhyme. Yeah. yeah. Thank you.

Brian Funk (01:58:06.426)

We'll send people to your site and YouTube, Instagram, all those places.

Ben Levin (01:58:13.979)

Yeah, try to do a good job, try to make things fun and interesting and nice. And if you like it, then that's great. It's there.

Brian Funk (01:58:24.776)

I like it very much.

Ben Levin (01:58:26.545)

Hell yeah, thank you.

Brian Funk (01:58:29.054)

Thank you guys for listening to the show. Take care.

podcastBrian FunkNovember 5, 2024ben levin, music production podcast