The Europe In Synch Podcast

EP05: Leo Niemi (Sync Sauna) - The Art Of Opportunism And The Science Of Sound.

• Europe In Synch • Season 1 • Episode 5

Share episode

Welcome to Episode five of the Europe In Synch podcast.

This time we are talking with Leo Niemi, an independent music supervisor and founder of indie music supervision platform, Sync Sauna, based in Helsinki, Finland.

In this episode, Leo takes us behind the scenes of forging a business in the nuanced Nordic world of music supervision. He talks openly about the challenges he faced while founding his own enterprise as well as the triumphs of crafting successful campaigns for Finnish powerhouse brands such as Finnair and Marimekko. He highlights the importance of persistence and the art of being opportunistic as being essential to becoming successful.

Leo offers insight into understanding the international reach of Finnish music and the pivotal role his Guild membership plays in amplifying his career. He reminds us that being  resilient is key as well as needing to have a deep and genuine love of music and music curation.

We recorded this conversation during Tallinn Music Week in Estonia on 03.04.2024.

We hope you enjoy the episode and thank you for listening!

Please note that there is a full transcription of this podcast available for you to follow while listening to the audio.

Find out more about our guest:

If you have questions, ideas, requests, recommendations, or general feedback, feel free to contact us at feedback@europeinsynch.net.

Europe In Synch is created, managed, promoted, and driven by several European organizations and companies and is a truly cross-border collaboration.
The goals are to bring together professionals from the music sector with decision-makers from film & advertising to provide a real-life, hands-on, learning experience, and to promote European music in the complex field of synchronization, through communication, knowledge-building and networking via focused mentoring and peer training sessions.


Follow Europe In Synch:

Intro/Outro music is an instrumental edit of "Gimme" by Daffodils.
They're on Soundcloud.

Europe In Synch is co-funded by the European Union.

This is a SuperSwell production for Europe In Synch...

Paul:

Welcome to another episode of the Europe in Synch podcast. We've travelled to Tallinn Music Week in Estonia to meet our next guest. We're talking now with Leo Niemi, an independent music supervisor from Helsinki in Finland. Hi, Leo, hello.

Leo:

Hello Paul, nice to be here.

Paul:

We're going to talk about your background a little bit, as well as the current work that you're doing. I'm really always interested in finding out how people end up where they are. So what is your background?

Leo:

My background is in music. So after high school I went to study in Helsinki Pop and Jazz Conservatory. It was really the only thing I had in my mind. I wasn't sure if I wanted to be a professional musician and after studying there for a year or two I realized that no, that is not what I want. I was very happy to be there. I'm just very curious about music and studying instruments. And studying pop and jazz tradition was my way of exploring music, or one of my ways. But before I graduated from the conservatory I already started studying musicology at the university and that's where I really sort of found myself.

Paul:

I could say that's a science of music, isn't it science of?

Leo:

music. That's how. When people ask what? What is musicology? That's what I say. It's a science of music, so you can choose any method or any angle, but the substance is always music or something music or sound related, and I really love the possibilities in studying music in musicology at the university. So that's my background trained musician and master of arts in musicology.

Paul:

Well, you described yourself a master of arts, music supervisor, but also a sound explorer. What do you mean by a sound explorer?

Leo:

I think there's so much more to music that is often spoken about. I'd say Sounds can be musical or not musical, so I'm just very interested in just sounds, because I think it's very interesting how people are affected by sounds. Sounds are very strong.

Paul:

They impact you very quickly and very deeply in your emotions yeah, music has always conjured up images, so I guess that's one of the things you must have if you're getting into a world where you're combining music with visuals. You must have that already as part of your personality. Do you think that's the case, or do you have to really train for that?

Leo:

I I'd say I've had it. You know, before I started supervising, before I even knew what supervising this supervision is, I do visualize music in my head, see geometric shapes. That's how I see music, which is annoying to say, but that's the truth, I'd say, and yeah, it's just always been with me and I think it's. I don't know if it's helpful or harmful, but it's, it's very interesting anyways.

Paul:

I wonder if this is related. I read about your study in your musicology studies that you focused on sound color studies. Yes, is that what we're talking about here, or is that something else?

Leo:

that's something else. What's that? Sound color is like timbre. I felt that melodies and rhythms I'm very rhythmical. Rhythm is sort of my main area together with sound color. But I feel like let's take music education, for example. What is music education? What is often taught in music? It's structure, it's the melodies, it's the scales, it's the harmony, it's the rhythm. There's very little about how things sound.

Leo:

Whilst I was studying, I was working as a part-time employee at an electronics store where people came to buy headphones but what most people wanted was just the cheapest headphones and I hated them. And I thought that people, they will hear the rhythm, they will hear the melody, they will hear the chords, but they don't hear the sound color. Music producers pay so much attention to mixing and how things sound and then people use these 10 euro headphones. They don't hear it. So I wanted to explore what people miss.

Leo:

In my, in my thesis, master's thesis, I wanted to explore what are the parts that people will miss when they only use these cheap headphones. So that's why I did a case study about trap music, the subgenres of rap, which I think is really interesting, has a really interesting frequency response, or average frequency response. That kind of music. It's very bass heavy, there's nothing in the middle and then there's high hats at the high end. So yeah, that's my sound color color studies. I also did a bachelor thesis about sound color, but then I was studying the frequency response over eight string electronic guitar in heavy metal, essentially mesh hugged and gen guitars yeah, it sounds like that's someone who would move into music production At that time.

Paul:

what were you doing those studies for? Did you have an end goal in mind? Were you already thinking about using this knowledge and experience you were getting? What were you doing it for?

Leo:

Yeah, see where you're coming from, but no, I was just curious and that's what I loved about university, that's what I love about the humanist department. We can just do whatever we want, study whatever we want.

Paul:

In Finland, famously, they allow this a lot, don't they? The education system I've got a lot of Finnish musician friends who studied until they were into their late 20s and 30s.

Leo:

Yes, exactly, and I think our department was especially allowing to just choose any subject we want.

Paul:

So what happened once you'd got your bachelor's and you're a master of art and you now need to have a job and work? Did you know already you were going to use those skills for something, but you didn't know what? Or did you have something in mind already?

Leo:

I had moved to Copenhagen after my then girlfriend, just before I graduated actually. And then I did graduate and I had to find a job. The first job I had was at Music X, which is a Swiss competitor for Thomann, the German music instrument giant.

Paul:

Yeah, a music instrument supplier. That's where I bought this equipment from, exactly so I was working for the competitor translating their website into Finnish instrument giant. Yeah, a music instrument supplier.

Leo:

That's where I bought this equipment from exactly. So I was working for the competitor, translating their website into finnish, but still looking for jobs on the side, and then I saw music supervisor and I thought that sounds hella cool. I want to be a super, whatever. But it was for a part-time, danish-speaking music supervisor. So I just sent a semi-open application saying I'm looking for a full-time job and I don't speak Danish and I don't intend to learn Danish. Would you be willing to hire me anyways? And they hired me and yeah, five years later, here we are. So that's what brought me into this business and that's where I fell in love with this business. Music supervision to me, has been probably the most interesting way to explore music, because when you bring the visual component, but when you also bring the commercial component in advertising and I do have to say that my strengths play out pretty well- in freelance music supervising.

Paul:

Interesting point you brought up already was you know we're talking mainly about the creative side, the matching of music or matching of audio with visual, very creative work. But you mentioned the commercial side. Now this is something where I would imagine a musician or a creative person, an artistic person, might run into kind of moral questions. You know, what is this being used for? There's always going to be a commercial aspect and you are independent, so I guess to a point you can pick and choose what kind of work you get involved with. But is this something that's important to you as well? Does the commercial aspect have to be certain type?

Leo:

that's a really interesting question and I do have to say I did surprise myself starting in this business converting pretty quickly into sort of accepting the world of advertising. I wasn't really interested in advertising and I do have to say I'm sort of have a leftist youth, so my starting point in sort of capitalistic endeavour was not the greatest, but I did convert pretty quickly because I just realised that and especially after I started my own business, I realised that business is business and some businesses use music to sell more products. I think it's interesting. I'm very curious about how to do it the best way you can, and if somebody wants to pay me to help them doing that, I'm here.

Paul:

And how did you get to the point you're at, where you are your own business now You're an independent music supervisor. Were you working for companies? You know learning the ropes. How did you get the experience to be able to go out on your own?

Leo:

I learned the tricks of the trade in copenhagen mainly from my colleagues and I do have to name drop tore garbag and christ Blad and Sara Fargram. We were a tightly knit group in Copenhagen during the tough times of lockdowns and stuff and I think I learned from them and we learned together. So I had a pretty good background in how to just sell my expertise and just do the old school grind of cold emails, cold calls, meetings.

Paul:

I don't want to stereotype or offend anybody. I know a lot of Finnish people. I lived in Finland for 10 years, so your character is not really typical. Typically, Finns don't tend to be that proactive, confident. I guess they have a few doubts about their own ability, especially internationally. I think they shouldn't feel that way, because they have all the attributes. It's the selling aspect. They're not good at selling themselves and Finland has this kind of reputation of not wanting to be seen as too pushy. You know what I mean, right?

Leo:

No, I definitely know what you mean and I gotta say I mentioned Christian Blatt and Christian, my good friend from Copenhagen days. He's half Swedish, half American, so he has all the traits in his genes that I lack, being a Finn, you know. So just being around Christian was really, really essential for me to sort of build the framework going into this business and selling yourself and not be ashamed of it. I think without Christian I wouldn't be here, so I was very lucky in that sense.

Paul:

So what came next after working in Copenhagen, because this is quite recent You've only really been doing this professionally on your own since lockdown, then right Three years.

Leo:

So lockdown happened. It was summer 2020 when I moved back to Finland. I was still working part time for the Danish company and then I started podcasting. I was really into podcasting during the lockdowns and I saw an opportunity to do it professionally and it was during that time I actually decided to start my own business. It was at that point when I thought, like I asked myself the question where am I going? Do I start applying for jobs? Because these types of music, expert musicology jobs there are not that many in Finland.

Paul:

So yeah, Are there any music supervision agencies finland that you could have gone to to work at? What made you decide to go on your own rather than join a collective?

Leo:

if you look at london, for example, and you search music supervision companies, you can find multiple of them. There's no companies like that in finland. Sweden has a few, uh, denmark has a few, norway has maybe two, but Finland doesn't really or didn't really have any.

Paul:

Had you already got some clients lined up by that point, or were you starting completely from scratch?

Leo:

No, I didn't have to start from scratch. So I worked in Denmark or for the Danish company for a year and a half. So that's where I sort of laid my groundwork and did my market research and sort of had all the companies listed somewhere or had the idea of the scope of the market in Finland, both on the commercial side and on the film and TV side.

Paul:

So you already had a good idea of the layout who to approach, how to approach them.

Leo:

Yes.

Paul:

What you needed to approach them with. So what happened? What was the first thing you did? What was the? How many rejections did you get before you got something that led to a campaign? How did that go?

Leo:

So I do have to mention that I did audiobook production also on the side, sort of like a side hustle. It was those heydays of audiobook production when the production was still growing, so that really helped me a lot, financially as well. So how many rejections, you ask? Well, I don't have enough fingers and toes to count the rejections. You shouldn't count them. They're part and parcel of the job, so don't pay attention to rejections.

Paul:

That's usually a question I ask how do you deal with the frustrations and the rejections and how do you keep yourself going through all that? So you choose just to ignore it. It's just one of those things. There's always another approach to be made, another pitch to be made.

Leo:

I wouldn't say that I'm not affected by it ever, because I am, but not every time I'm rejected. It doesn't hurt me, but sometimes it does, but what doesn't? Everything can hurt. It's just part of life. It's not just part of this business.

Paul:

I guess it's more. If you think you've got a pitch that is perfect, that this is the one, please take it and they say no to that, that must be disappointing that you're not going to use this great idea you've had.

Leo:

I see what you're saying, but I don't think I'm that sort of married to my ideas, because ideas come and go and even commercial projects have so many people involved and everybody wants to have their creative input. And if I send a cold email to someone saying, hey, here's a creative idea and it gets rejected, I'm just happy that they answered. But when I actually get to pitch to something and it gets rejected, it's also just a really good thing to showcase your talent and build connections to someone, so I would count that as a success.

Paul:

Yeah, I guess. So I mean it's a good experience, but what about your independent supervisor? That conjures up the image to me that you work alone a lot, so a lot of work to do and you're, from start to finish, responsible for all of it. I've talked a couple of times now with people who come from the other end, where they're part of a big agency, where they're surrounded by creatives and people going off to get clearances and coming up with different parts of the strategy. Do you prefer working alone at the moment, or is working in a bigger agency something you'd consider, even from a workload point of view?

Leo:

from a workload point of view, it definitely makes sense to work with somebody and I have thought about it and last fall was really tough. I really felt the loneliness in work. It was really stressing me out because sometimes there's just so much pressure because, like, I don't have an outlet, I don't have a partner or a co-worker or a boss or an employer. So I'm definitely looking into that for future. I'm not probably looking to go work for someone, but rather just building my business and maybe hiring people in the future. That would be nice.

Paul:

Let's talk about some of the campaigns you've had then. I mean, I've looked on your website and looked at some of the work you've done and there's huge names there, brands such as Suntory Whiskey, mcdonald's, lidl anniversary campaign and Marimekko, one of Finland's best known global brands. So Finnair and Marimekko, as a Finnish music supervisor, land in these huge Finnish brands. That must be incredibly satisfying.

Paul:

Yes, it is incredibly satisfying yeah, but how did this happen then? Because that's huge. It's a very big step to take. I would think for someone doing it for three years to be doing these top end brands.

Leo:

How did you get there, just as I got any other projects, basically. So just connected with producers or directors. We can talk about finner, for example. Well, finner is pretty funny actually. The story is pretty pretty good, I think, for anybody who wants to get in music business.

Leo:

It was produced by directors guild, probably the most awarded finnish production company I've. I've did some work with them before, which I'm very proud for, uh, in the first place. Then one day I was browsing instagram and I saw a story posted on directors guild account and they had some people tagged over there that I knew, but also a name that I was unfamiliar with, and that was Mika Vaso, the director. So I googled Mika Vaso, found that he's a director, finnish director, based in London. So I emailed him saying hey, I saw that you're tagged in this story on Instagram in director skilled account and you know I'm a freelance music supervisor. I work with director skilled before.

Leo:

I think you're shooting something exciting now, because I could notice from the picture that they're in New York and I just said hey, if the music is not locked, can I pitch? And he said well, thanks for the message. Yeah, you can pitch. There's actually two composers sort of competing for the work. But yeah, if you're willing to pitch for free, pitch for free. And so I pitched and I think the song that got selected, which is a fantastic song by the name of Megaforce from Elia Lombardini, was the first song on my first pitch.

Leo:

So, from Instagram to Finnair, 100 year anniversary content yeah that's opportunistic, yeah, but deserved the look really yeah, I think the lesson to learn there is just shoot every shot great advice.

Paul:

I like that. What happened after that, once it landed? What work did you have to do in order to finalize everything, and was there a lot of pressure in getting that finalized there?

Leo:

was a lot of stuff related to the rights. Obviously, you know that's the invisible side of music supervision. Obviously, we can't go into too much detail on this podcast, but it was a global campaign so there was a lot of you know, we need this or we don't need that, or we do actually need that. So, going back and forth with the producer, shout out to seppo kerkela I love you, bro. Thank you for your patience.

Leo:

Um, and then, well, it wasn't a clear, just a straight or direct sync. There was big edit in the background as well, which I did myself. So I made a stem edit of that track. I love editing. I think I sent my ideas for the 60 second or the master film edit saying, okay, here's one idea, here's another idea, here's how this music could go. And then I think Miika started editing based on those edits and then sort of figured out oh, we do need this or we don't need that here, and it ended up having this extra sort of more quieter, intimate point in the music. That is very typical for 60-second brand films to have this moment, this more intimate moment, before it sort of flies again at the end.

Paul:

Yeah, so that's a real collaboration between you and the filmmaker oh, there were like maybe over 20 versions is it usual that you get that level of partnership with, or is it something that you probably don't get that many opportunities to kind of develop the idea?

Leo:

I don't really know what to say to that. All the directors are different and my goal is to serve what they want, give them what they want. So Mika wanted my creative input, so I was very happy to obviously give it. I'm a creative person as well, so if I get a chance to be creative in my work, I obviously take it.

Paul:

I like that the whole thing. What a great story. It's a great ad. I really like it. I loved the Marimekko one even more. What was the music for that?

Leo:

take me back. Take me back to Piaui, by Yuka Chavez, 1970, something it's a wonderful ad.

Paul:

It really the marriage between between the visuals and the music is absolutely insane. It's fantastic. So you know that's something people should check out on your website. But was that a similar process? That sounds like it might not have been the same thing. There wasn't a Finnish director or agency involved in that, was there?

Leo:

No, there was. There was. The director was Finnish. I don't know if there was an agency, Probably was just the brand and the production company and all of those were Finnish. Actually, that process was definitely different and I'm really happy to actually share how it happened because this is something that I don't really think has happened in Finland before this and even after that. But that was a disco. Finding that song.

Leo:

You know, you're aware of disco, the music supervision platform I learned about this on our previous podcast with Emmeline Marabelle music supervisors can get connected with music publishers and music labels around the world, but it's not like Spotify that you can just look up anything. You have to request access to the catalogs and that often takes time because it's a manual accepting when people give you the access. So what I did? I mean there's hundreds of publishers and labels around the world, small and big, hundreds of publishers and labels around the world, small and big. So I actually hired my good friend's little brother to download and request access to all disco labels and publishers. I think I collected like 60,000 or 300,000, some insane number of songs in my disco and so I was talking to the production company. Duotone visited them, had lunch, maybe a couple of months later they get this project and they have a reference song or the director has a reference song, but obviously there's nothing in my catalog that could be a replacement for Sol Bossemova, queen's Jones.

Leo:

But what disco has is a similarity search, so I'd use that. I think I copy pasted the YouTube link for Sol Bossa Nova on Disco. Then it scrabbled through all the tracks that I had saved, or my friend's little brother had saved in my Disco, and that's how I found. Take Me Back to POE by Yuka Chavez from Brazil, from 1970, something. Yeah, I don't think anybody. I haven't heard that many people using disco, searching for music. There's people hosting their music, publishers, labels hosting their music on disco, but somebody who's looking for music for sync on disco and yeah, that's how I found brilliant and was that kind of accepted straight away.

Paul:

Were they happy with that choice? No, what were the obstacles then?

Leo:

so I think a good idea for a supervisor in many cases is to especially for me, because supervision is not that known or used service in Finnish productions A good idea is to supply different options of music, obviously, but also different price points. So I sent my client three ideas on three different price points. Take Me Back to Pio was one of them. I think I can say that it was the most expensive of them, but it was also the best song and it was way over the initial budget. But I think because it was such a good song, the end client, mari Mekos, marketing manager, really liked the song as well. So that's why the budget was increased for that.

Paul:

Interesting that you chose to push it despite knowing it was over the budget. Do you sometimes not do that? Do you think they don't want to know anything over the budget? They won't want to know about that. Yes, so it was a bit of a risk you took.

Leo:

It was yes. I would say that I think I still saw the opportunity, or I saw that there's no harm, even if I suggest it, because that's the beauty of sync when people make music in 1970 just for fun and then that gets placed 50 years later onto a dancing ad, the music is just so much richer compared to if music was composed directly to that ad. That's my opinion. That's the magic of sync.

Paul:

I think, yeah, I think it's a pleasant surprise to discover that there was someone at the other end that saw it that way as well, that they gave it the chance and they saw what you saw Also, I think it's important not just to send songs but to explain why they are powerful. How do you do that?

Leo:

So I try to be very concise in what I write.

Paul:

So this is all by writing. You don't get to sit in front of somebody and explain it to them at first. You have to put it in writing and persuade them that way.

Leo:

When I share music, I always send a playlist via email and that's where I write my ideas. I usually send a 10 song playlist and pick out a handful of the most strongest options and then write something I like about them or something I think is strong about them, and one thing about this song and this campaign was that TikTok was a very important part of that campaign. In the first place, I was looking for a song that could work on TikTok. I think that Take Me Back to Piaui has a very catchy vocal phrase very repetitive, a little bit annoying, but also very cool, very singable, and that's what I wrote, together with the budget, and I think it helped them choosing that song.

Paul:

And when you're pitching it, you're not pitching directly to Marimekko, in that case, are you? Are you pitching that to the production company?

Leo:

In this case, I was pitching that to the production company in this case I was pitching it to the director, actually, and probably the production company as well.

Paul:

The production company takes care of the budget and the director takes care of the creative and you know that's always a question I ask as well, because there's this chain and you don't always have the direct access to the person who ends up deciding. So, even when you have very persuasive, strong reasons and arguments for this music, you're giving it to someone and they have to then take that to the person who decides. And how do you know they're going to represent your ideas as strongly as you would yourself? I don't.

Leo:

It's not always guaranteed. Is that frustrating? It's not frustrating, it's just what it is. As I've said before, there's so many people involved that want to be creative and need to be creative, so it's not my job to make sure that only my creative input gets selected. I like it when it does, but when I just get to help creative people find what they actually want, it's great for me as well. Find what they actually want, it's great for me as well.

Leo:

I do think that when people reach out to me and ask me to find music for them, they want my expertise. They want to know why I chose those songs and why I like them and why I think they are the best fit. So I try to explain it and I do have to trust myself, too, that I actually think that these are not just subjectively good. That's one of the most important things, I think, in supervision. Obviously you have to no, I was about to say that obviously you have to like the songs yourself. No, that's not true. Actually you don't have to like the songs yourself. But yeah, so the objective side of the creative is way more important than subjective, but if those both combine, it's just way easier to sustain the work.

Paul:

And we've talked there about two examples that I picked out, because they're these large global brands and big campaigns and you're successful in them. What was the first campaign that you landed? Do you remember?

Leo:

The first bigger thing was something very unique which I haven't done before or after that. It was a YouTube video content thingy, if I can call it that. I had contact with this Finnish beverage Finnish like an energy drink based on a mate tea, argentinian tea. So they wanted to activate their brand on YouTube and so what I did for them is I sort of curated and found and booked seven artists to perform like a semi-live, semi-acoustic performance of their song in this brand's YouTube channel. That was really fun, that was really creative. I got to invite my favorite Finnish musicians to be part of that and, yeah, there were seven artists and seven videos. So there was actually a lot of work, because I remember going solo on March and April 2001, so it was April May when this happened straight away, so is that something that helped build a reputation for you?

Paul:

I?

Leo:

would guess so, at least partly. It wasn't the traditional music supervision, as as we know, and the brand wasn't at that time. It wasn't widely, but some of the artists were, so I got to use the thumbnails of those YouTube videos on my webpage and associate myself with these artists you mentioned was it Sync Studio, sync Sauna?

Paul:

Sorry, of course it's Sauna. It's Finland. Yes, you mentioned Sync Sauna. What is it?

Leo:

Finland. Yes, you mentioned Sink Sauna. What is it? Sink Sauna is a sink library. It's a Finnish indie music sink service that I've built.

Paul:

Does this run alongside your work as a supervisor?

Leo:

Yes, as a supervisor I noticed that Finnish majors they do what they do. They market their artists and music for advertising and brands and films. But nobody's really doing it on the indie side. So I thought maybe I could do it myself. And Finnair Santori Dancing with the Stars Advertisement Ba-I-Sala brand film. They're all from SingSong.

Paul:

Right, I see. Okay, I saw on your website you did the music for the Speddy movie. I was the supervisor when I first went to Finland. It was mid-90s. He was a huge star on TV Household name. Then they made a movie about it sometime later. What's the difference there, where you're involved in a movie production rather than a TV commercial? Was there anything majorly different?

Leo:

Yeah, I'd say the needs on film and movies are more diverse, especially when it comes to licensing, also with the creative side. But with Spere, for example, what I got to do I was very excited to do this I got to dig very, very deep into the national archives of Finland to find a specific tape, the specific version of Uno Turhapuro theme music, not the main theme everybody knows, but some weird version of it that was uploaded to YouTube by someone, nobody knew who, and I had to find where it's from to be able to license it correctly. So I've never got to do that sort of digging in advertising. But in films, when you really need this piece from this period of time in history, there's no workarounds, you just have to find them, is it a?

Paul:

slower pace working on a film, whereas commercials, I hear there's always tight, tight deadlines. I guess budget issues in any work that you do, but is there one of the things that you prefer to do?

Leo:

I would like to do more films. That's what I know at this point. They're very different. I can't really say which one is better or which one I like more. They're so different, different and obviously, as you said, you know, advertising is much more fast paced and film productions take years, so that's just the nature of it. I think film also makes a bit more lasting impact than commercials and Spere, the iconic figure of Spere. Those films will be aired decades after they're released. So I think it's very interesting to be part of that absolutely talking more internationally.

Paul:

I mean, you're from Finland, a small market. You're quickly establishing yourself as a go-to guy for Finnish brands. What ambitions do you have beyond that? Anything even beyond Scandinavia?

Leo:

As a supervisor. I'm sticking to Finland now, but with Sink Sauna I'm very interested to open up Finnish indie music to international audiences and markets as well. So that's why I travel to Nordic countries, and then I've been to London marketing Sink Sauna, and we'll definitely visit those countries again.

Paul:

I know from my experience working with finnish artists and scandinavian artists there's a great love of nordic music in general, nordic art. There's definitely a interest for people putting together finnish music into commercials internationally. I guess that'd be interesting to see you mentioned on your website. I saw that you're a member of the UK and European Guild of Music Supervisors. How important was that for you to have? Is this something that's a mark?

Leo:

of approval, is it? It's exactly that, and I am very proud to be part of the guild.

Paul:

What are the benefits of that?

Leo:

I think the best benefit so far has been the network of people and I've already gotten some help from them. I think the best benefit so far has been the network of people and I've already gotten some help from them. They've really expressed that they will be there for me and just having that approval by the guild to really say that I'm a supervisor Now I really am, mama, I made it, I'm really a supervisor. I was really happy about it. So that's something you needed psychologically, even more psychologically than anything else, I would say, probably up up to this point.

Leo:

Yeah, and just just having that awesome network, just at my fingertips is really, really, really nice and really connects me to this global network of music supervisors.

Paul:

Well, this is my final question. People looking to get into the business as well, people trying to take this same journey that you're on, what are the essential ingredients? What are the main tips you would give? Developing a thick skin persistence.

Leo:

I think for me, having gone through tough times and tough times are if know tough times are if they're not on you. They're just around the corner, so you just have to accept that and don't be scared. But I think one of the most important things that has carried me through the tough times is the fact that I really do care about music, and what I try to say with that is if you want to do whatever you want to do, but if you want to become a music supervisor, you really really have to take care of yourself and be sure that you really like music and you really care about music, because work can sometimes be very boring or very tedious or repetitive or uninspiring as any work can be but when the substance is of the work is something you deeply care about, that really helps you survive the tough times. Easy times are easy times, but tough times are when you really need to dig deep.

Paul:

That was profound very profound and what a great way to wrap it up, I think. But, leo, it's been a real pleasure listening to you tell your side of how things go. It's inspiring, I think, as well. You made some bold moves and it paid off a lot of it. So you know, hopefully that carries on and the work speaks for itself. The examples that we've given here absolutely phenomenal. I absolutely loved them. So well done and just keep up the great work, and thank you so much for talking to us about it.

Leo:

Thank you, paul, thank you.

People on this episode

Head Shot

Paul Cheetham

Host