You can find thousands of articles and videos where artists talk about the inspiration behind their songs, instruments, songwriting, studio techniques they used, and everything in between.
But much less often do you see an artist explain and actually show you how a song was created: opening a laptop and recording software, pointing out every vocal and instrumental element, highlighting sounds that you hear almost subconsciously but rarely pay attention to. , and explains what is wrong. just how, but why are they there.
Finneas O’Connell, brother and musical partner of Billie Eilish, is one of the most eloquent musician-producers at translating spoken language into normal human language, and this is on full display in “Behind the Song,” the pilot for a new video. series of Diversity. In it, you see him describe how “What Was I Made For?”, his and Eilish’s song from the film and Barbie soundtrack, was written spontaneously and completed in about half an hour with him at the piano and Eilish singing, and recorded on his phone.
A more complex recording apparently followed, and O’Connell proceeds to point out on his computer and explain almost every element, what each one contributes and why, from Billy’s ethereal, transcendental harmony lines to the faint percussion of a seemingly percussion-free song.
He explains his approach as a producer in the same way as an artist’s. “I’m a terrible artist,” he says, “but when you see a great painting that has 190 different shades and it doesn’t look like 190 different shades—it looks like a sunset. And for me, that’s the approach to all music production: if you think about it, I failed. But if you just absorb it, it’s success.”
Watch his deep dive into the song and his and Eilish’s process below, and read even more at DiversityInterview with them in 2019 about their songwriting and recording processes.