Mikaelin 'Blue' Bluespruce

This time, we sat down with the man, the myth, the legend, Mikaelin ‘Blue’ Bluespruce (@mixedbyblue). Blue is a Grammy Winning Engineer and record producer, a top respected name in the industry, and most importantly, a new father and a stand-up gentleman. Blue is a relatively reserved, calm dude, much like myself, but for the next 90 or so minutes we are going to take about how he is quietly making a dent in the music game with a nonstop work ethic. He has worked with prominent artists like Solange, Skepta, and those involved on the Hamilton Mixtape.

Style-wise, Blue does not look like your typical engineer. This dude dresses fly as shit to show up to the studio with the tapered joggers, fade on point, sneaker game stupid, and that’s who he is. He brings his own brand to the beat beyond just the moves he makes in the studio. When Blue touches a track, you know it’s him, and he’s here to tell you how he developed his own unique aesthetic. In this episode, Blue discusses his early creative experiences with music, the routine that leads to greatness, the creative process with Solange, pulling all-nighters in NYU studios, the flow state of engineering, and more.

MakeYouKnowLove

This week, we sat down with Michael and Anthony Hannides, otherwise known as MakeYouKnowLove (@makeyouknowlove). They are brothers from the UK, multi-platinum songwriters, and practicers of martial arts. Just to give you a snapshot of their resume, Anthony and Michael co-wrote and produced Zayn’s smash hit Pillowtalk which went #1 in 75 countries, as well as many other songs on Zayn’s debut album Mind of Mine and Zayn’s follow up project Icarus Falls. They also co-wrote Kiss Me by Rita Ora which appeared on the Fifty Shades Darker Soundtrack, as well as worked with artists like Jay Sean, Alesha Dixon, Conor Maynard, and McLean.

Back in 2005, Anthony and Michael sang in the group 4-Tune which made an impressive run to the finals on X-Factor, which we will get into more later. After touring for a couple years playing 4-Tune gigs, Anthony and Michael took that money to create their own makeshift studio. At first, they made music using a cupboard with curtains as the vocal booth. Working, eating, and sleeping out of the same place, they barely made any money for the first three years in the studio. As Michael and Anthony say, “A song’s success isn’t what makes us happy - writing the song itself, that’s the happiness.”

With that mindset, the songs they’ve created have reached nearly 3 billion streams to date, and they have now released their own project called MakeYouKnowLove. I learned a lot from this conversation, including insights into fitness, meditation, and what it takes to make a living as a creator. Even if you have zero interest in music and songwriting, this conversation will broaden your perspective, and hopefully, leave you with some tools and messages that can apply to your everyday life.

FINNEAS

On our latest podcast, we spoke with the producer/songwriter FINNEAS who is now making waves as a solo artist. In 2018, FINNEAS has released six single thus far, treating each song with its own story and carefully crafted cover art. He has also made music with talents like Khalid, Tori Kelly, Wafia, and of course, his sister Billie Eilish. In this article, we’ve taken a few of our favorite quotes from the podcast interview and broke them down.