Dom sits down and talks to producer Bronze all about his experiences from working on the Netflix original Inside Job, BBRC and his production and solo career.
The definition of success is different for everyone, and many people put a lot of pressure on themselves to be ‘successful’ in life; Bronze goes on to explain what success means to him as an artist and as a person.
“I’m still trying to find myself in my art, which isn’t necessarily a struggle it’s a journey of finding what your inner joy is, just to be able to be yourself on these records and give the world something that feels more like you. If I were to give any advice to these young people on the come up, it might be cliché but to quote Rick Rubin “the best records are the records that don’t fit” I always went about making music in a very unorthodox way, I finally concluded that this is me, this is how I sound, I’m starting to come into my own and it took a long time.”
Bronze expresses how the new projects he is working on pushes himself more in new ways, different from his production work and projects with BBRC.
“It started when I thought I don’t have to fit in this box anymore, that’s just making music or my day job as a creative director or a designer artist, I can lean more into having a voice musically as a solo artist not just being a rapper in a group. I started to feel like I can do this, and I can make a go of it on my own, with my own decisions behind my own music.”
Reflecting on his career and experiences Bronze expresses some of the biggest lessons he has learnt over the years and what advice he would give his younger self.
“I think it would probably be don’t overthink anything, I think the idea of overproducing and just like stewing in your own juices too long is detrimental to any artists. If it feels good at that moment the world at some moment should know what that feels like to you and give them the opportunity if its something they want to tune into, and I think I learnt that way late.”
Being a creative director has a lot of transferable skills with the other work Bronze does and creates, subconsciously they all link with each other.
“I don’t think I think about it consciously, it all bleeds into the way I, not just produce music but maybe the way I present music. I’m really not good at promoting myself, I’m not a marketing genius that’s not what I do, I’m super creative I come up with 100’s of concepts, everyday I’m just clicking through things. I think it works a lot for me because I’m six steps ahead in my head, that those transferable skills I can already see into my own future, it’s all about what feels right. It was my day job for a long time, and it still is but not just as a creative director but as a designer and managing Rob and a few other artists, helping with their brands.”
In this type of industry and career there are many time scales and deadlines, Bronze speaks about his experiences with this working on Netflix’s Inside Job and working on ‘Pa$$ The Time’.
“In this situation I’m fortunate because Shion [Takeuchi] who is the creator and head writer of the show and Jeff who is the art director are close friends of mine, they’re like family. So, I didn’t have the pressure it was like, so this is how it happened I put out a free tape with my group I think in 2017/2018 and we ended up adding to it and having a formal release in 2019, we decided to put it on streaming platforms and the last song on the tape was this solo song of mine and it was an early version of pass the time. My LA squad like Jeff, Shion, Alex [Hirsch] all these guys, creators of Inside Job before putting that project together three-dimensionally, that song became their crew anthem.
We’d go on road trips, that was the song! It was Shion that was like this has got to be my theme song, quite literally, for this show it just feels right. I was fortunate there was no pressure the song was basically done all I had to do was kind of remix it and remaster it a little bit. I really didn’t have to change anything apart from speeding some things up a little bit, it was already what I had created, they just wanted the Bronze sound.”
With working with different people who have supported Bronze, especially the BBRC, Bronze expresses how grateful he is and how important having that collective and support is.
“It starts with my formative years as a teenager, finding my people. People who were like-minded and didn’t judge me and we just went at it. I fell into creative direction because it was just a natural skill that the group needed. I’m grateful that they even return my calls, even just in the last 5 years of diving into TV and me and Jeff doing television together and pitching it to networks and finding myself in a different way. Personally, I thrive off collaborative experiences.”
The tips and advice Bronze has for young people wanting to follow the path into production and that mistakes do happen along the way.
“You’ve got to be yourself; I think I found that out too late in my career, I would’ve preferred to of figured that out 10 or 15 years ago. You’ve just got to be yourself and not overthink anything. As coming out as a solo artist, sometimes you’ve just got to trust yourself and your gut-instinct. At some point you’ve got to realise you’ve got to be who you got to be. You have to make mistakes to learn from them.”
Anything to promote?
“I’ll start with my core, personal brand which is just Bronze. Then there’s pass the time and flying cars just came out on Friday, it’s a digital release and its streaming everywhere and I would start there because it gives people a good idea of what’s happening right now. Less than a month ago I put out a full-length project with my group BBRC as a collaborative project [with Plutonic Lab] and that’s called ‘SHWING’.
I’m just out here trying to have fun and I’m so grateful for the support, don’t think twice about hitting me up, I’m not somebody who looks the other way, I’ll engage. So, if anybody wants to holler at me, I’m approachable.”
Check out the following links to support Bronze:
Words: Katie Lovatt / Original Interview: Dom Smith
Listen to the full interview below:
