Award-winning producer and video game music composer Luminist has recently released his new album, Atone: Heart of the Elder Tree Original Soundtrack. The album accompanies the Wildboy Studios game Atone: Heart of the Elder Tree, which was first released in 2019 alongside the launch of Apple Arcade. Luminist’s work has already been recognized with a New Zealand Game Award in the Excellence in Audio category for the soundtracks he produced for the game. Check out my latest conversation with him as he speaks about his career and how he got into video game music composition.
For the latest on Luminist visit: Twitter.com/Luministmusic
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Mason Vera Paine Show: Transcription
[00:00] – Announcer: Mason Vera Paine.
[00:01] – Mason Paine: Sydney, Australia’s own Luminist has left his Mark in the world of gaming as an ambient and synthetic wave producer. Now, Luminist joins me to speak about his latest project and how he got into being a video game composer. Thanks for joining me, Luminist.
[00:15] – Luminist: Oh, thanks for having me here. It’s a pleasure.
[00:16] – Mason Paine: So tell me, how did you get your start in music?
[00:19] – Luminist: As a kid, I was in a choir with my primary school. We had a choir that was part of the Cathedral in Sydney in Town Hall, where I’m from, Sydney, Australia. And the Cathedral choir was part of our school at St Andrews Cathedral. I had an education there for about five or six years as a kid learning choir and church music and developed from there, really.
[00:44] – Mason Paine: Did they teach you any sheet music, like how to read it?
[00:47] – Luminist: Yeah, absolutely. I got a great education in that. These days, I’m a little bit rusty. I don’t really practice that music very much anymore, though it’d be nice to return to it. But yeah, we did study that definitely.
[1:01] – Mason Paine: I’m a little curious, how did you go from being in a choir to where you are now?
[1:08] – Luminist: Yeah, it’s a strange journey, I guess. I started that and church music was my first education. That was definitely a huge influence on the music that I appreciate and like in terms of the sound of it. It’s quite beautiful, moving, harmonically rich music. Then as I got to a teenager, I started listening to bands like the Strokes, and I was like, Oh, I want a guitar. I want to learn how to play that. So I got into rock music a little bit. And then late teen, I started to do session vocals for a company that did advertising jingles. So I was singing on those things. And then eventually they were like, Oh, do you want to have a go at writing one? So I was like, Yeah, cool. Let’s give it a try. And so I did that. And my music got chosen for one of the advertisements they were working on. And it went from there. I started working freelance with that company for quite a few years. I moved to London in the UK when I was 20 years old and just wrote music for jingles and discovered synthesizers and got into electronic music from there.
[2:13] – Luminist: And that’s where I’m at these days. I’m definitely more in the electronic music world and not so much singing anymore. Although I’d like to return to that a little bit, it’s not really part of the music I make these days.
[2:26] – Mason Paine: I love that you did jingles. I actually know a lot of people who do jingles did you do as a side gig, just a way to make some money. Yeah. And it’s funny. I’m curious, you wrote it. Did you produce any of it, too? Did you do everything or was it just like, hey, vocals? And then I went into writing it.
[2:46] – Luminist: With jingle stuff, a lot of the time it’s just one person doing all of the music. So sometimes you’ll hire people if you need a specific singer or something like that. But yeah, I was writing and producing the whole track pretty much every time. It was a good education in music production, actually, when I first started doing that because the deadlines are pretty brutal in most cases. So yeah, you have to learn to work quickly. I really loved it for that reason.
[3:12] – Mason Paine: Yeah, absolutely. People think when it comes to jingles that you can have this great creative flow and it’s like, no, this is part of a corporation. You need to get the work done.
[3:22] – Luminist: Yeah, absolutely. They need things yesterday all the time. So yeah, it’s a quick one.
[3:27] – Mason Paine: So you got from jingles to now, Synth Wave to video game music composer. Man, you’re jumping everywhere. How did this go?
[3:38] – Luminist: Yeah, the journey of a lot of musicians who maybe don’t fit into the general touring artist pocket, I suppose. But yeah, I’ve always had a love for video games. I started playing video games from a young age and always owned n nintendo consoles and then PlayStation a little bit after when I got a bit older. But yeah, video games are a big part of my life and I always wanted to participate in the creation of a video game at some point. Probably from when I discovered Final fantasy, I was always really in love with the music from those games. And so, yeah, a few years ago, I was looking around for a new project to work on. And I was like, Oh, well, why don’t I have a look at indie games and see if there’s anything interesting that might fit the music I do? Yeah, I was lucky enough to come across a project that was still in its early stages by a small development team based in New Zealand called Wild Boy Studios. And they didn’t have a composer just yet. I reached out to them and said, Hey, it’d be great if we could maybe work together on something.
[4:42] – Luminist: Can I send you my idea for title music? Music for your game. They got back to me and said, Oh, yeah, we actually had to listen to some of your music and we loved the vibe of it. Can you… Yeah, please, we’d love that. It started as a very tentative thing. I wrote some music for their title screen for the game that became a tone, Heart of the Elder tree. Immediately when I sent it over to them, they loved it and they thought that it fit perfectly with the visual and writing style of the game. So yeah, it was a great start to that relationship for sure.
[5:14] – Mason Paine: So you came on just to do that one track and now you’re in the thick of it. What was it like being part of that creative process with tone, Heart of the elder tree?
[5:24] – Luminist: Yeah, it was a lot of fun. So it’s a game that mixes a few different, I guess, play style genres. When you’re exploring the main world of the game as the main character, Esther, you’re going through this fantasy environment and it’s a top down view. And you’re going to be solving puzzles along the way. And we wanted that music to be quite ambient and relaxing so that the player doesn’t get overwhelmed when they’re solving a puzzle, for example. You don’t want to divert their attention. And so that music ended up being a really fun experience because I just got to draw things out and make very relaxing sounds that were just soft and comfortable. And then another aspect of the game is rhythm style battles akin to Guitar Hero or Dance Dance Revolution, where in those sections, the music was obviously going to be very high energy and more since wavy. The developers really wanted to go for a since wave style. So I incorporated that and then added my own elements to it, especially with making sure that there were some elements of old world style music that might have existed around the time of Norse mythology, which is what the game is about.
[6:31] – Luminist: So you’ll hear things like harp and flute, small acoustic percussion instruments and drums that you would expect to hear in a Norse mythology setting, but also mixed with electronic elements like synthesizers and drum machines that are very synthetic. So we came to something interesting. And with the battles, which were rhythm music section, we programmed it in a way that the button combinations would be in time with the music. So you’re basically playing the melody of each track for each battle at the same time as listening to it. So it was a really fun experience trying to figure that out and iterate on those ideas until they became something fun to play.
[7:13] – Mason Paine: Now, I’m curious, did you have any input in the way the story was going or how the battles were going to happen?
[7:20] – Luminist: I did have some input. We had a really strong writer involved in Rebecca Hayes. So she was the main writer on a tone and she did a fantastic job of bringing those characters to life and moving the story in a way that made sense. The team had a very basic story fleshed out, but then she came on board and made sure that it made sense and made sure that it was written well. And made sure the characters interacted in believable ways together. I tended not to want to interfere with that thing because while I have an appreciation and love for it, it’s definitely outside of my wheelhouse professionally. I definitely stayed more on the music and sound design side of things for myself. But every so often I would come in and give some feedback on things, definitely. But yeah, it was just from that point of view, really.
[8:10] – Mason Paine: Now, for me, the game was short, but the soundtrack really made me keep going. And I really liked how… That’s what I wanted to hear. It was. Honestly, there are so many sad parts in that game. I’m like, I had to pause because there are. There are so many sad parts in that game, and the music just pulled you into that moment. And I love that about how you created that. You understood that this is a time that needs to be softer. And then my favorite song was Aaron’s Lament and then Blood on the Stair. Snow. Oh, yeah. Aaron’s Lament is soft. And it’s supposed to be just a moment to take in what’s happening. And then Blood on the Snow is hard paced. It’s really getting you into that anger portion. And I was like, That’s really beautifully done.
[9:03] – Luminist: Thank you. I was really happy with how those two pieces of music turned out, personally as well. Aaron’s Lament, that scene is a very thomper moment, and it’s quite heart wrenching though they’re going into detail. We don’t want to spoil anything necessarily. But it goes into the next section, which is Blood on the Snow. And then you’re going into a fight, which is probably the most dangerous situation that you’ve been in so far in the story. And I really loved how, particularly Blood on the Snow came out as a piece of music. I was really proud of how dark and dangerous it felt and also how it felt a little bit unpredictable. Yeah, I was really happy with that one.
[9:43] – Mason Paine: Yeah, absolutely. It did. It honestly did because on hard mode, it just felt like it was going all over the place. But it was fun and it was meant to be erratic. And that was exactly what that moment was meant to be. And I was like, this is perfect. With that said…
[10:01] – Luminist: I’m so glad to. Hear that.
[10:03] – Mason Paine: With that said, I’m not the only person who has noticed this. New Zealand gave you a Game Award in Excellence in Audio, and I’m just like, absolutely. How does that feel to receive a recognition like that?
[10:15] – Luminist: It felt really wonderful, honestly. That was still during… I think that might have been about halfway through development or something. We hadn’t fully finished the game just yet, but we’d showcase the demo of it along to a bunch of different places. And yeah, that felt really good. It was fantastic. It was lovely to be recognized for the contributions that I put into the game. And it helped me crystallize that, okay, we’re doing something interesting that people are taking notice of here. So something must be going well.
[10:43] – Mason Paine: I’m curious, did it have any like positive impacts on your career? Are you now a serious video game composer?
[10:50] – Luminist: Something that I want to keep doing, absolutely. I’m currently looking for the next project, but yeah, I think it has definitely helped my career. It’s something concrete that I can show, Hey, yes, I shipped a project. There’s an hour and a half of solid music in this game, and it’s out there for anyone to go and check out if they want to. It definitely makes it much easier for me to continue in this industry, I think. It definitely makes it easier to continue in this industry for me. I think having a solid project like that under my belt. Yeah, it feels really good, definitely.
[11:21] – Mason Paine: I’m curious, are you going to continue working as a DJ? Are you going to produce stuff there too? Or are you going to lean a little bit heavier into the video game composer area?
[11:31] – Luminist: I would like to lean a little bit more into video game composition, but I’m going to keep releasing tracks as an artist as well because I really enjoy that side of things. It lets me explore sounds on my own terms rather than music that’s made for a specific brief, which I love as well. There’s something fantastic about creating a bespoke piece of music to fit a visual interactive element of media. Yeah, it’s really fantastic to be able to do that. But also as an artist, a musical artist, it’s also fun to just explore the ideas that I’m coming up with naturally without any further involvement. I think both sides of the coin end up with different styles of music that I can then incorporate into each other as well. So yeah, it’s definitely something I’m going to continue on both lanes with.
[12:19] – Mason Paine: Now, before I let you go, I’m curious, what was your favorite song in a tone?
[12:24] – Luminist: Good question. I think for me, it has to be Reunion. It’s a very short track in the soundtrack that only happens once in a specific area during a dream sequence. And it’s just a very soft, lilting, arpeggiated synthesizer. It’s almost like a lullaby, I guess.
[13:48] – Luminist: I created that one just by accident one night when I was up late and I was just messing around with my keyboard. I came up with this and I looped it for a really long time just because I was enjoying the way it sounded and how I felt listening to it. When I ended up looking at the clock after some time, it had been almost an hour and I was like, Okay, I’ve got to use this in the game somewhere. But we couldn’t figure out where to put it until almost right at the end of development where I’d forgotten about the track’s existence because it was just a little demo that I was messing around with one night. It wasn’t specific to any area of the game. I showed it to the development team and they were like, Oh, my God. We have to put this exactly in this place. Then it just worked really well in that situation and it felt like the perfect piece of music for that element of the story. So yeah, that’s my favorite one, I think.
[14:47] – Mason Paine: Well, thank you very much for joining me. I really appreciate you being here. And for those listening, where can people find more information about you?
[14:54] – Luminist: Yeah, you can find me on Twitter. My profile is .Twitter.com/Luministmusic. And my music is also on bandcamp. It is luministmusic. Bandcamp. Com.
[15:07] – Announcer: This has been. The Mason Vera Paine Show. Thanks for listening.
Like Mason on Facebook at: Facebook.com/MasonVeraPaine and follow on Twitter at: Twitter.com/MasonVeraPaine. Interested in being a guest on the show or wish to send pitches contact us at: Contact@Masonverapaine.com